"Why do we accept it?"

Good question. Of course many people, like Pilger, are disgusted by it, but are in a position to do nothing. It's all part of an incomprehensible world of infinite horrors that are reported to us in an endless round and a myriad variety of spin. It's overwhelming, and even if you manage to select a stance within the maelstrom of politicised news, it's only one of myriad stances. Meanwhile the horrors go on and people just ignore it all, or listen selectively, or even enjoy the whole extravaganza. Lies lies lies, the world is drowning in drowning cant and moonshine, and those who manage to stay morally sober are so few they might legitimately retort:
"What can we do about it?"

Dear John,

History has value if it provides a reference point for today. It also has value if we can learn from our mistakes. To learn from those mistakes, history must remain “un spun” as a true reference point.

Sadly, our modern society finds it necessary to deconstruct, socialize and apply post-modern ideology that reinterprets much of our history. As a direct result, any opportunity to learn from our historical reference points is destroyed.

There exists a block of humanities academia, media, NGO’s, civil rights advocates and politicians who seek to redirect history to their own ends. This is where you sit.

Some might view you as part of the problem because you have contributed to the causes of some of the effects for which you now seek to advocate. Your one eyed activism is actually corrupting your perspectives which results in even more myopia. You have become a self propelled boomerang missile.

Our history as a species is horrific. We have created millions of rules over thousands of years to try to curb our excesses. The problem is that so many who have stood behind the moralist ramparts and pontificated down to the rest of us plebs, have all turned out to be just as bad as the rest of us, and yes, even our prophets.

Unless of course, you can tell us you are any different?

It really is time John, its time.

As usual Pilger is refighting old battles without realising the technical problems make this sort of propaganda difficult to swallow. He is talking about children being deformed now because their grandparents were exposed to Agent orange almost 40 years perviously.. or is he getting his decades confused?

Its hard enough connecting birth defects where the mother has been directly exposed to whatever is supposed to have caused the mutation - radiation, chemicals etc - let along a generation of so down the track..

Same could be said about Chernobyl. Pilger doesn't realise, probably because he never bothered to find out, that once the Chernobyl inhabitants were evacuated the Russians spread them over the rest of the population and never kept proper records. There were some effects, notably an increased incidence of throat cancers among children in the region, but tracking any other effects is hard.. Its mostly cancers, in any case, rather than mutations.. but I've probably spent too much time on Pilger..

It disgusts me, the attempt by some people to kill the messenger. What happened in Vietnam with Agent Orange (and napalm) was a holocaust, a chemical holocaust which is still ongoing.

Only a fool who was never near the frontline would try to minimize it or raise silly questions about it.

If we don't learn from our mistakes we will repeat them. When nuclear war comes in the not too distant future, will we also try to hide the results of our deranged thinking and behaviour?

Thank heavens for people like John Pilger. Hopefully he will awaken the brain-dead!

Faint hope indeed.

In the short term perhaps but history is not be so easily rewritten. Particularly, in the information age.

I congratulate you on reminding us of Vietnam. For I fear the outrages of Vietnam may well be dwarfed by future revelations from Iraq and Afghanistan.

John, in case you have never noticed: war is hell. Civilians become collateral damage. It has always been thus. Why do you think it would ever be different?

Why is it only the people you have ideological differences with that commit atrocities in war? Or is a case that others do so, but you want to sweep those under the carpet; revising history in your own way?

The only solution to civilian tragedy in war is to stop war. If you care about such things, John, that is what you should be campaigning for. This always makes me wonder why you always appear to be trying to incite class war. What haven’t you learned from history?