As far as I know it's because both sides had pretty banal low-level and straightforward stated goals that were all "met" so there wasn't a clear "winner" and a "loser" in those strategic goals. It was really more of a 3 week skirmish than a full war. Vietnam obviously wanted to force China out of their country, and China said they wanted to bat Vietnam on the nose and force them to pull out of and not occupy Cambodia, or Laos or Thailand.

Which China left meaning Vietnamese succeeded in their strategic goals, and the Vietnamese diverted major resources and pulled out of Cambodia and didn't occupy Thailand and Laos meaning the Chinese succeeded. There weren't really any major strategic goals that were stated by either side that showed blatant failure; like China never said they intended to fully occupy Hanoi and create a Chinese puppet state and failed. Vietnam as far as I know never said they intended to continue occupying Cambodia or occupy Thailand and then failed to. So in a way they both got what they wanted and it was a status quo antebellum situation. Thus indecisive in the context of if it weren't 'indecisive' there would have been a winner or loser.

Thailand and Laos were under multi-factional civil wars whose royal governments were also US proxies; so the Vietnamese were also involved there (and involved with their local communist parties), prompting Sino-Soviet-split-related concerns with China since even though both China and USSR provided support to Vietnamese communists; the USSR became the dominant supporter and ally of Vietnam and continued to be. China also had an alliance with Cambodia dating before Khmer Rouge even; which was in part because Cambodia wanted assurance against the larger Vietnam and Thailand. The split in the Chinese Cultural Revolution era between the ultra-lefts and others had half of the CPC supporting the Prince and half of it supporting the Khmer Rouge against the prince. North Vietnam and Khmer Rouge provided support for each other for a while too. The politics were a mess. No idea what other involvements China had with Thailand and Laos other than Sino-Soviet fears.

People overstate the significance of Chinese casualties as meaning a loss when that's not how war works. Strategic objectives are all that matter. The losses (if you average the wildly disproportionate claims from all sides; impossible to actually know when you look at it) were more even than something like The Winter War between USSR-Finland; and though that war had the Soviets suffer disproportionate losses, it was still a complete strategic victory for the Soviets; they got everything they were after which had refused by Finland in previous requested land-swaps, namely gaining the Karelia buffer region.

America can’t stop tons of drugs and weapons getting delivered into America every day

who is it that you think built and began that whole project?

me laughing at you for acting like a child is not "striking a nerve." You really aren't as significant as you think you are.

You usually have to be remotely seen as part of some "cool" crowd to bully people as "dweebs."

You're not. You're a random; and this is mostly embarrassing to see you do. You're not in middle school anymore. Grow up.

and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gehlen_Organization
and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Sunrise_(World_War_II)
and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip
and https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio
and https://www.historynet.com/these-nato-generals-had-unusual-backgrounds-they-served-in-the-third-reich/
and https://www.redstreetjournal.com/p/cia1
and... yknow i'd be easier to name the nazis that the US intelligence and military didn't hire. which some were instead by MI6 and Mossad, like the pioneer of the gas vans Walter Rauff [Archived]
And for good measure: just a few of the industrialists and political elite of the US capitalist class who financed and were deeply connected with the Nazis and the German capitalist class for whom fascism were the anti-communist market-seizing attack dogs. ("first they came for the communists...")

the soviet union hasn't existed for like, 33 years. You need to wake up. In fact I think you need a mirror, because you are so knee-jerk reactionary with needing to engage in a nationalist either/or narrative here that you are making it up for other people out of wholecloth.

I wonder what Biden's record has been on on prisons and polici--oh

No, neolibs have figured out how to placate segments of the (ever-shrinking) petty bourgeois and defeatist windbags (like you've allowed yourself to become in saying these things, but can still self-criticize and grow from), who lack or otherwise benefit from not having an active dialectical consideration of the circumstances before us --- in the bare-faced exposure of the sharpened contradictions between mass political movements in society; here between the reactionary bourgeois establishment and its allies, and the advancing of progressive segments and theirs; which itself in the arena of parliamentary and protest politics, and how the media reports on it, are significant representations of wider political trends.

And by not thinking before speaking, and engaging in this liberal and reactionary rhetoric you actively stand in the way of building communism and working class momentum more than Macron does, and you are perpetrating the same "keeping people unaware" that you say the media is. I don't think you should trust what it "sounds like" to you, because I don't think you've given serious thought to any of this. How does the media "keep the majority unaware" when we're, all of us even outside of France, hearing about and talking about it?

And "Things aren't bad enough" for what? For an immediate revolution and dragging Macron to the guillotine right here and now, like we're remotely in a stage of things in material reality where that's what you think "building the communist movement" is? In what way is that, to you, a reasonable framework to analyze the current material conditions and consequences for communists and how to orient within them? And how is it not just unthoughtful and inattentive idealist tripe completely disconnected from the material reality and trajectories that currently exist, and which only serves to justify sitting on your hands and telling others to sit on their hands because you're waiting for... What, exactly? Some utopian revolutionary miracle to pop into existence on its own out of thin air and awake the placated masses (of which surely you're not a part?)? Revolution is built; and its building takes dedicated and active long-term political engagement among the progressive elements of society with communists, even if not yet in the position to dominate its most visible "official" leadership channels, still always at the forefront of the struggle as members of the most politically advanced segment of the working class.

How do you expect to create revolutionaries before having them even come to recognize revolution as, not only an option, but a necessity; which can only be done through these kinds of lived political experiences highlighting and vindicating through agitation and propaganda the correct analyses of the communists, that bourgeois parliament will not and can not be the instrument to achieve their aims?

You're contributing to and advocating placation. Your "it's hopeless why bother" attitude is the "copium" (internet-poisoned term), which serves nothing but to take (and worse, try to further in others' minds) a lazy capitulation into your own placation. Comrade it is not only wrong, but it is intolerable opportunism. It is a reactionary and defeatist attitude, and is not in any way a cogent recognition of the reality --- which is that the amount of rage and disaffection over this in the masses of the working class left-wing (and even just 'not right-wing') populace of France, which were able to mobilize as they did to get such results to compel these self-exposing acts in the ruling class, spills visibly through even the bourgeois-media articles about it. You have to close your eyes and plug your ears to not hear mention of the anger, frustration, exasperation, and that's just what they do mention. I guarantee they couldn't and wouldn't be scratching the surface of those masses that aren't being interviewed who harbor more severe sentiments or would, with proper political education, having experienced this. Many of even the petty-bourgeois reformist leaders of these parties are calling for obstruction and protest as less motivated, more opportunist, and bourgeois-aligned representatives of their much-more pissed off bases who carry much greater potential.

I've worked with and organized alongside US communists that became communists out of their experiences and disaffection over how the DNC and Democrat Clinton campaign undermined and slandered Bernie Sanders and his supporters in that grassroots groundswell. And Bernie and that whole experience was milquetoast and petty compared to this, and had more comprehensive targeted propaganda. And still it made many communists, some of whom have contributed more as more capable Marxists than even I had managed at the time, to elevating the consciousness of the working class and movement-building in their communities, instilling communist political understandings, analytical methodologies of theory and practice, and organizational principles in action around peoples lived material realities and experiences at the hands of the system.

People are pissed, and more than you allow yourself to recognize have, by the reality of the situation and living this political experience, come to or are primed but haven't-yet-been politically educated to understand and advocate, some of the first and most important recognitions, conclusions, and emotions toward bourgeois politicians and their system, and of its bourgeois class character, inherent and unchangeable without smashing it and putting in its place a proletarian dictatorship to maintain power against the these-and-worse bourgeois machinations and reactions.

Just because the masses aren't immediately fulfilling your idealist projections of what you unrealistically 'require' of them to "prove" to you personally that this is a progressive development for the communists (which is opportunist --- rather than trying to engage actively as the most politically advanced segment of the working class to make and lead people to the proper conclusions, you are tailing behind mass movements among and as a member of the least advanced, soaking blankets to throw on the advancing segments in the most critically significant and educational moments); like they're not immediately revolting and dragging Macron to the guillotine over this when that's not the phase that things are in doesn't mean that this is not a progressive development for the communists. I strongly suggest you consider all of this and correct these opportunist and defeatist attitudes, which are misaligned with reality and run counter to progress.

because nothing seems to be working.

This is an inspiring sign for communists. No reason for pessimism. A large mobilization of masses of engaged politically active workers in a state where the masses still largely believe in parliamentarism; who formed sprawling coalitions into a large left national upswelling that also made international headlines, now have themselves and onlookers been shown, better than any propaganda alone ever could, why bourgeois liberal democracy is an impediment to progress rather than a channel for it; and that the Liberals will side with the fascists to keep the left from getting an inch. This has made more communists than you probably realize. Especially if your communists have been reading their Lenin and agitating on this point, which probably a lot of workers didn't even need much agitation to expect this because of the state of things and how just... unbearably awful Macron is in every way

...
It is a good day friend. Communism will win, and these liberal politicians are helping it do so. Don't let the systems and their media and propaganda make you believe otherwise in their lies. They're trying to convince you of your own defeat because of the implications if you don't believe you have been, and instead realize they're selling you the rope they will be hanged with; and you push harder in smarter ways that they can't keep up with, using connections built in these mass movements and coalitions which invariably have radical new elements that just need drawn together.

You're ahead of them in this. They've, in a very real dialectical way, undermined liberal democracy and created more enemies to the capitalist systems and institutions than they made allies, by their own blunders in being incapable of conceding anything to intelligently reify socialists back into feckless parliamentary legitimization of bourgeois democracy, and their failures to navigate contradictions in ways that aren't so short-sighted to look absolutely villainous to huge swathes of the population (and internationally, because this was a large enough movement to make headlines around the world; with a knock-on effect for the international proles who see parallels). Macron's so scared of radical politics he's making them everywhere he steps.

I'm hoping the Communists in France have been reading their Lenin. I can't think of a better gift Macron could have given the communists. "Left-Wing" Communism, an Infantile Disorder

...
This has stripped more and more active and engaged and hopeful people of their illusions about bourgeois democracy than even bernie-clinton 2016 nonsense. Which even that created a lot of communists; and that was relatively milquetoast compared to this huge national mobilization and upswell and coalition movement which was big enough to make international headlines no less. If the French communists have been reading their Lenin and agitating on this stuff even before it happened (as you said, very predictable) then the communist movement has gained 10x more than any eurosocialist thinks "the left" lost.

It was and is still worth not shutting up about this. This has been and continues to be large victory for the communist movement. It was a large mobilization of masses of engaged politically active workers in a state where the masses still largely believe in parliamentarism; who formed sprawling coalitions into a large left national upswelling that also made international headlines, who now have themselves and onlookers been shown, better than any ultraleft cynicposting online ever could, why bourgeois liberal democracy is an impediment to progress rather than a channel for it.

The amount of communists, or potential communists and neutral communist-sympathizers-to-revolutionary-politics this has inevitably created and left in its wake dwarfs what the Bernie-clinton thing did in the US. And that made a lot of communists, I've worked with some; and that was milquetoast compared to this. Especially if the communists of France who many I know were in the coalition or engaged in other ways have been reading their Lenin and have been agitating beforehand about the predictable inevitability (historically, and just Macron, as well as theoretically deducible) of this; that the liberal establishment will obstruct and even side with reactionaries before giving ground to the left. This is the best gift to the communist movement that France and Western Europe in general has seen in a while. I think it was wrong to belittle it then and is wrong to not appreciate it now.

Lloyd George Macron entered into a polemic... with those Liberals who want, not a coalition with the Conservatives, but closer relations with the Labour Party New Popular Front (NPF)... Lloyd George Macron argued that a coalition—and a close coalition at that—between the Liberals and the Conservatives was essential, otherwise there might be a victory for the Labour Party NPF which Lloyd George Macron prefers to call “Socialist” ... "In Germany it was called socialism, and in Russia it is called Bolshevism," he went on to say. To Liberals this is unacceptable on principle, Lloyd George Macron explained, because they stand in principle for private property. “Civilisation is in jeopardy,” the speaker declared, and consequently Liberals and Conservatives must unite. . . .

... Thus the liberal bourgeoisie are abandoning the historical system of “two parties” (of exploiters), which has been hallowed by centuries of experience and has been extremely advantageous to the exploiters, and consider it necessary for these two parties to join forces against the Labour Party NPF.

...
At present, British French Communists very often find it hard even to approach the masses, and even to get a hearing from them. If I come out as a Communist and call upon them to vote for Henderson Castets and Mélenchon and against Lloyd George Macron and Le Pen they will certainly give me a hearing. And I shall be able to explain in a popular manner, not only why the Soviets are better than a parliament and why the dictatorship of the proletariat is better than the dictatorship of Churchill Barnier and Le Pen (disguised with the signboard of bourgeois “democracy”), but also that, with my vote, I want to support Henderson Castets and the NPF in the same way as the rope supports a hanged man—that the impending establishment of a government of the Hendersons Castets will prove that I am right, will bring the masses over to my side, and will hasten the political death of the Hendersons Castetses and the Snowdens Mélenchons just as was the case with their kindred spirits in Russia and Germany.

INDEX: “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder
Ch.07: Should We Participate in Bourgeois Parliaments?
Ch.09: “Left-Wing” Communism in Great Britian

To gauge the population's engagement and what representations and (proportions of representations) of classes the parties in parliament have mobilized and from where. To use as a central point of political agitation and analysis. To be where the masses are, most of whom still believe in parliamentary politics, to, under communist banners, help mobilize inside of these large political upswells of energy to agitate for communism and throw weight behind the left in these coalitions (while maintaining freedom of propaganda and agitation to criticize), to show exactly this; to prove to the mobilized masses through their own lived political experience why we are right and why bourgeois democracy is not the answer, and that liberals will side with fascists before they give the left an inch.

This is honestly an incredible victory assuming the communists in France have read their Lenin and have been agitating to expect this (which, both from a history standpoint and just knowing that weird smarmy gnome Macron, is not hard to anticipate); I can't think of a better gift to the communists of France than Macron doing this and now creating a large portion of people who realize that bourgeois democracy is not a pathway to a better world, but an impediment to it. As well as instill a realization in people the true nature of liberalism and liberal politicians in capitalist politics in a more effective way than any propaganda ever could (which the propaganda is only to prompt thought and awareness and show who was right in their analysis to those who then live, or did live the political experience of this and witness it, it takes the experience to change the perspective of the masses)

ADVISORY: Outdoor furniture almost certainly uses treated wood. That is, toxic chemicals that act as fungicide, pesticide, and moisture-resister, which would be VERY BAD inhale the smoke of burning it.. And if it's pre-i-think-80s treated wood it's even worse than what they use now. You should also not use treated wood in bonfires and such.

Pipes are cheap, and even an apple (not ideal) is still better than this.

that is not how HIV/AIDS is spread.

You could potentially get herpes from it, but idk how long the virus lives on porous material like wood exposed to the elements. Covid for instance lasts 4 days on wood, but only 1 on cardboard. It lives much longer on, say, plastic, than on clothing.

I'd be much more worried about toxic chemicals because outdoor furniture almost certainly uses treated wood. And if it's pre-i-think-80s treated wood it's even worse.

Considering exhaled smoke is just breath with also burnt plant material and byproduct, that's not too surprising. It's more like 'cigarette and marijuana smoke makes visible the cone of particulates of general exhalation through which contagious respiratory illness is largely spread.'

I suggest Rosa Luxemburg's Reform or Revolution to break people out first, less scary than Lenin, and a I think a "woman's touch" does a thing for peoples minds under patriarchal norms, with the assumption that they're somehow less capable of all of the things they're afraid of. It was critical in my political education when I was starting off grabbing from everywhere to see what gripped the road I saw us flying down (Conquest of Bread sucked, never read more 'kum-ba-ya' utopian idealist tripe in my life, and I could tell that having barely even read much Marx at that point); and Reform or Revolution is more focused on dismantling the single topic. From there, once the reader are forced to mull on that reform will never save us, haunted by their discomfort and spurred by the sprouting seeds of their discontent the only logical next step is to try to find out "okay, well then what is to be done?"

But you have to give a background lesson first if the book/site of it you send them doesn't explain in the preface, the whole thing that in the context of her book "Social-democrat" meant socialists in general; both revolutionary and the Bernstien-type 'voting in socialism through reform' revisonists; because this was in like 1900, before the failure of the second international and resultant split of the communists. It's only after all of that and the 3rd international and the betrayal of Rosa and the communist KPD by the reformists that that the "social democrats" came to be understood as we know them today, reformist welfare liberals (which, incidentally, thoroughly and undeniably vindicates Luxemburg, Lenin and the Bolsheviks, et al and their criticisms of reformism).

Marx has been blunted and made tame and by those who haven’t read him.

You might say they have "Turned Marx Into A Common Liberal"

• "lesser evilism" and voting for the Democrats
• thinking liberal bourgeois 'democracy' is a solution against fascism
  (as if fascism is a person and can be "voted out," as if all of the things Democrats are supposed to "save us from" wrt Trump aren't still happening with no resistance, as if the Democrats aren't outflanking the Republicans on the right of issues like immigration, and as if they aren't just as genocidal and barely even bothering to play empty-rhetoric games to pretend otherwise, and as if both parties aren't part of, financed by, and working for the capitalist class and petty bourgeois who historically back fascism anyway, when economic crises create threats against their system and status for which fascism is the system's immune response against the rise of socialism. "first they came for the communists...")

well except all the Nazis in Germany that were brought directly back into:

• Official posts within the federal government and its ministerial cabinets
• into the upper judiciary and magistrates
• into local governance
• elevated and hired into immense wealth in industry and finance, or just kept where they already were in industry and finance
• hired into forming the Nazi core of the West German intelligence and secret police agencies (which would become today's German agencies) under the protective auspices of the OSS/CIA; who made extensive use of their networks of executioners and collaborators to prop up US-backed dictatorships and cartels and use as anti-communist stay-behind guerilla terrorists by the CIA and NATO (and brought into the CIA and FBI themselves, and into MI6 and Mossad)
• into German academia and universities as faculty and professors,
• to write western history books at the behest and with support of the US Army and OSS/CIA to sanitize themselves
• all those hired into NATO and into the EU
• into positions of power in West Germany (and all the NATO countries, helping in and helped by Gladio violently purging the communists) in such saturation and such impunity that it caused the formation of left wing militant groups that would assassinate and kidnap them.

but other than all of that though!

(And that's not even mentioning the Nazis and collaborators which made up the origins of Radio Free Europe/Liberty, the "Victims of Communism Foundation" which grew out of the fascist-filled anti-Soviet "Captive Nations Lobby" headed by OUN-B Nazis from Ukraine, and all the Operation Aerodynamic, Operation Paperclip, Operation Sunrise, Operation Beladonna, Operation Lynx, etc etc.)