[RACooper]

You can try and defend Ann Coulter's misguided perceptions about Canada - Vietnam and otherwise - but unfortunately there is really no dancing around the issue that she was dead wrong (again).

Originally posted by Rudey
Well, yes and no. The number of Canadians who fought with the US army is estimated to surpass the number of Americans who dodged the draft to move to Canada. 6 Canadians are still MIA/POW from the war I think.

Canada's government did not send troops to fight in the war and when these troops returned they faced a lot of nastiness - especially from the dick Americans living in Canada. But at the same time the government did not stop them and looked the other way; they did not prosecute these men.

By 1986, these Canadian Vietnam Veterans became organized.

Though still not recognized by the government as veterans nor by the Royal Canadian Legion as such either... basically it means they get no benefits (health or otherwise) that veteran status would entail.

In 1995, the North Wall was erected in Windsor with government assistance. The municipal council donated that land while the Veterans raised funds for the memorial. I don't think Canada has memorials for each war since the country has the National War Memorial, so would this be the only memorial dedicated to an individual war (at least in this century?)?

Hmmm someone has been a little mis-informed

Alright other than the individual community monuments or memorials I'll list the "National" ones dedicated to particular wars:

In the 19th century...
War of 1812 (Queenston Heights, ON), Crimean War (Halifax, NS)

In the 20th century...
Boer War (Lydenburg, South Africa), World War I (Vimy, France), World War II (Juno Beach, France), Korean War (Milton, ON), Peacekeeping Missions (Ottawa, ON)...

and now unfortunately during the 21st century...
The War on Terror/Afghanistan (Kandahar, Afghanistan)

As for the Vietnam Memorial... well yes I did recieve some municpal funding, but it was funded mostly by private donations from Canadian and US citizens - but still it is not recgonized by the Federal government nor the Department of National Defense.

Canada also served in a peace keeping/truce monitoring functions (this time under a government directive).

Canada served (and still does ) in Vietnam and Cambodia as monitors and de-miners under the UN mandate overseeing the peace following the end of the Vietnam War... so while yes Canada did send peacekeepers it was after the cesation of hostilities and under a UN mandate and mission.

So did Canada, the country, send troops? Yes.

Nice try... but did Canada the country, send troops... nope Canada the nation/country/state did not send troops.

Did individual Canadian citizens enlist with the US or Australian militaries to serve in Vietnam? Yep

Did Canada's government send troops? No, but they sure did look the other way during the war and did donate public lands for their memorial after the war.

Well you got the government point down... but did the look the other way? Not entirely - Canada's diplomatic efforts in resolving the conflict was one of the major arguing points between Canada and the US during the conflict... in fact I believe that LBJ physically threatened Pierre Trudeu because of the political/diplomatic division.

Did Canada donate land to the Vietnam memorial in Windsor? Nope - Windsor, ON the city allowed private individuals to purchase the land at a severely reduced cost for the memorial... they couldn't donate it or the federal government and DND would have launched a legal injunction.


Thing is this isn't the first time the issue of recognizing citizens who served in a foreign conflict under a foreign flag... and in the other two cases no memorial was erected either, nor was veteran status awarded to the combatants . The other two conflicts besides Vietnam were of course the US Civil War and the Spanish Civil War,