I remember how “doolies,” or new cadets, had to memorize “knowledge” and recite it on command to upper-class cadets.

Assuming that’s still a thing, here’s a phrase I’d like you to memorize and recite: Destroying the town is not saving it. 

The opposite sentiment emerged as an iconic and ironic catchphrase of the Vietnam War, after journalist Peter Arnett reported a U.S. major saying of devastated Ben Tre, “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.”

Incredibly, the U.S. military came to believe, or at least to assert, that destroying such a town was a form of salvation from the alleged ideological evil of communism.

But whether by bombs or bullets or fire, destruction is destruction. It should never be confused with salvation.

Read the full article here.