My husband wouldn’t be able to speak Laotian, my favorite babysitter would be putting his kids through college instead of lying in a grave, and there wouldn’t be restaurants on every corner in South Texas serving pho and bubble tea.
And the Vietnam War actually had its roots in 1947, when Vietnam underwent a surge in nationalist fervor after the Japanese, who had temporarily displaced the French, were defeated. The French fought there for eight years, getting help from the U.S.A., then we and our allies took over from the French, just as we and our allies took over from the Russians in Afghanistan.
And actually, these were a people whose battle for independence began more than 2,000 years ago when the Chinese first invaded the peninsula.