have we been here before?


Noted in his obituary

Halberstam, David, The Best and the Brightest, New York, Random House [1972]


image of the book, The Best and the Brightest
p. 668
If the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the press and the public had known of the extent of the intelligence community's doubts, there would have been a genuine uproar about going to war ...
p. 665
Time was on the side of the enemy, and we were in a position of not being able to win, not being able to get out ... only being able to lash out ... And so the war went on, tearing at this country; a sense of numbness seemed to replace an earlier anger. There was, Americans were finding, no light at the end of the tunnel, only greater darkness.

Are we condemned never to learn?