Opening the American Mind: Recognizing the Threat to the Nation

By Andrew P. O'Meara Jr.

Opening the American Mind is a history of our involvement in Vietnam and an examination of the communist models of revolution. OMearas report examines the impact of the War on the Vietnamese people and on the American Home Front He looks at the role of communist front organizations used to mobilize resistance in underdeveloped societies as well as more sophisticated fronts used to wage revolutionary warfare in industrialized societies.
The long march of the radical left through American colleges and universities established the support for the cause of International Socialism and communist revolutionaries in America. It was Marxist professors and fellow travelers, who wrote the one-sided historical accounts of American involvement in Vietnam justifying the cause of our enemies.
Colonel OMeara wraps up his survey of Americas stand in Vietnam by looking at communist front organizations operating behind the scenes here in America. His work is must reading for all Americans, especially young Americans seeking answers to questions concealed by politically correct control of higher education in America.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 15, 2016
• ISBN: 9781514456293

Andrew P. O'Meara Jr.

The Author Colonel OMeara graduated from the Military Academy. He served in Vietnam as a lieutenant, captain and a major. He was decorated for valor five times during his service in Vietnam. His awards include the Purple Heart and the Combat Infantrymans Badge. Colonel OMeara directed the training development of the M-1 Abrams Tank. He served as the President of the Army Training Board and as the Senior Army Instructor at the National War College. Following his retirement he served as a government contractor in the Middle East. During his work in Saudi Arabia, the Army Mission was attacked by al Qaeda. He was working in the Mission Headquarters in Riyadh when a truck bomb destroyed the building inflicting over three hundred casualties. His published works include Infrastructure and the Marxist Power Seizure and Only the Dead Came Home. He was co-editor of Leadership: Combat Leaders and Lessons. His articles have appeared in newspapers and professional journals.

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Copyright © 2016 by Andrew P. O’Meara Jr.

Library of Congress Control Number:         2016901722

ISBN:                          Softcover                        978-1-5144-5630-9

                                     eBook                             978-1-5144-5629-3

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Rev. date: 09/03/2018

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Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1   Spiking Our Cannon on the Home Front

Chapter 2   What’s so great about Community

Organizers?

Chapter 3   Illuminating the Vietnam War

Chapter 4   Failed Liberations

Chapter 5   The Vietnam War aftermath and PTSD

Chapter 6   Fundamentally Transforming America

Chapter 7   All Lives Matter

Chapter 8   A Time for Boasting

Chapter 9   Conclusions

List of Illustrations

1. Villagers who befriended the author in Vietnam 1963

2. Colonel George S. Patton commander of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment in the Republic of Vietnam 1968

3. Air assault conducted by an American infantry unit in Vietnam

4. Artillery firing in support of combat operations in Vietnam

5. Air Force support of combat operations in Vietnam in 1968

6. Members of the Rifle Platoon of the Air Cavalry Troop of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment with captured weapons in Vietnam in 1968

7. Black Lives Matter Demonstration

8. Black couple with Black Lives Matter sign

To We the People

After 239 years of combating enemies foreign and domestic the Republic faces an existential threat.

Introduction

I spent the summer of 1963 in South Vietnam. The country was in crisis. Riots disrupted Saigon, while rumors of coups circulated in the Western press. The rumors had been appearing over several months gradually bringing military operations to a standstill. Commanders called a halt to military operations in the countryside as they positioned their troops in garrisons to take sides in any coup attempt. The abrupt retreat of government forces from rural areas created a vacuum the communists were ready to exploit. It was a disastrous time for the Government of South Vietnam and their American allies.

With government operations in the countryside brought to a halt, the Viet Cong (VC) redoubled their efforts to capture control of villages and districts loyal to the Saigon Government. Communist propaganda was stepped-up, attacks spread through the countryside, and demonstrations spread through urban areas. Dissident groups infiltrated by VC cadre staged protests that captured headlines in international newspapers. Public demonstrations were carefully orchestrated to ensure American or French photographers were on hand to record the main event of the evening, a self-immolation that galvanized resistance at home and abroad.

The long awaited coup finally occurred, orchestrated by the American Embassy in Saigon. The Ambassador, Henry Cabot Lodge, had become convinced that President Diem was the problem that could be solved by nothing less than a coup. He directed the CIA station chief to take charge and make the coup happen. Ambassador Lodge made certain the coup planners were given assurances of American support for the overthrow of President Diem. As events came to a head in Saigon my tour of duty came to an end. I boarded a plane for San Francisco weeks before the coup that took the lives of both President Diem and Minister Ngu.

I returned to the United States resolved to return to Vietnam better prepared than I had been for my initial service as an American advisor with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). I wanted to study communist revolutionary warfare. My opportunity came knocking when I was offered a job teaching ROTC at the University of Wisconsin. Shortly after I began my teaching assignment, I enrolled as a graduate student in the Department of Political Science attending night school. I went on to earn a master’s degree over the next three years.

My research revealed two distinctly different revolutionary models. The Leninist or Bolshevik model was the archetypical revolution used by the Communists to seize power. It relied upon the industrial workers, the proletariat, to capture control of the power center. The other model was the Maoist model based upon Mao’s success leading peasants to capture control of the country.

In the course of my research I came across references to an extraordinary document that revealed the plans for Mao’s revolution. It had been produced by American advisors serving with Mao in the Yenan Base during World War II. Upon their return to the United States following the defeat of the Japanese, they wrote a report detailing the Maoist revolution revealing the diversified organization, military strategy and tactics, as well as their methods of waging political warfare. Someone in Congress recognized the value of the document and reproduced it in the Congressional Record. I located it in the Library of Congress and had it photocopied.

The American advisers with Mao did us a very great favor by bringing home the blueprints for communist revolutionary warfare as waged in rural, agrarian societies.