Vietnam and MIA Question

Vietnam has left a scar on the American pscyhe. Though the war ended nearly 20 years ago, the ghosts remain. For those who served in Vietnam the memories can be stark and the emotions raw. United States policy toward Vietnam is not rational.

I recently returned from a visit to Vietnam after a 25-year hiatus. It is a beautiful country filled with an industrious and educated people who want nothing more than to be given a chance to move ahead economically and politically. Why are we standing in their way? It’s because they won the war. If they had been defeated like the Japanese or Germans, they too could now be economically booming.

The MIA question is a non-issue kept alive by a small vocal group of families who insist on grasping at straws 20 years after the fact. I sympathize with them but their demands are irrational and should not dictate our policy toward Vietnam’s 60 million people. Let them go to Vietnam (as I did) and search the country inch by inch for their loved ones. No one will stop them.

I served in Vietnam as an officer in the U.S. military. I saw what we did to the country and the people. It was we who made the mistakes, however good our intentions were. Instead of standing in the way of the Vietnamese people we should be bending over backwards to help them.

ALAN L. BROOKS

Long Beach