American Experience Vietnam: A Television History
Vietnam was before my time, so this was a good introduction for me. I’m sure it can’t cover everything and I accept same. For me, the show leaves unaddressed one important question/decision. First, a quick review of some facts from the show:
1. Tonkin in summer of 1964; the communists might have assumed they were attacking South Vietnamese and/or the CIA so these facts don’t matter for my question. However, the Americans DID retaliate by bombing the North.
2. On the eve of the November 1964 elections, the Communists attacked an American airbase near Saigon that was being used against them; this was the first Communist attack against an American installation. The Americans did NOT retaliate.
3. December 24, 1964, the Communists bomb the Brinks Hotel which hotel was occupied/used by high-ranking American Officers. The Americans did NOT retaliate (“who could bomb Santa Claus?”).
4. The Communists attack an American airbase in the Central Highlands (“Pleiku”) killing 8 and wounding 126 (it is not clear from the show how many of the forgoing casualties were Americans). The Americans DID retaliate AND planned sustained bombing but the bombing was postponed because of a coup attempt in Saigon in February of 1965.
5. Sustained bombing does begin as Operation Rolling Thunder.
6. On March 8, 1965, 3,500 Marines are brought in to defend the three jet-capable American airbases (these 3,500 are mentioned in the context of DaNang).
7. Three weeks after these Marines land, the Communists attack the American embassy in Saigon.
8. Less than one month after landing, the Marines’ mission is expanded to engage in offensive patrols (“ … don’t sit on your dittyboxes ….”).
9. 72,000 American troops are “committed” by the end of Spring. 200,000 American troops are “committed” by the end of the year.
The question(s): Did the Communists think that these pinpricks would dissuade the Americans from entering the War? Or what did they think the probability was that these attacks would dissuade the Americans rather than cause them to escalate their efforts? Surely the Communists did NOT want the Americans to escalate their presence/effort?
Louis J Sheehan
http://Louis-J-Sheehan.us/
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/page1.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/Blog/blog.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/AboutMe1.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/page.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/ImageGallery/CategoryList.aspx?id=a1206a74-5f7f-443f-97f5-9b389a4d4f9e&m=0
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page3.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/ImageGallery/CategoryList.aspx?id=36f0e6c9-8b8a-4f0a-8630-e5d3b879fad4&m=0
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page1.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page2.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page.aspx
(AP) -- Scientists have apparently broken the universe's speed limit.
For generations, physicists believed there is nothing faster than light moving through a vacuum -- a speed of 186,000 miles per second.
But in an experiment in Princeton, New Jersey, physicists sent a pulse of laser light through cesium vapor so quickly that it left the chamber before it had even finished entering.
The pulse traveled 310 times the distance it would have covered if the chamber had contained a vacuum.
Researchers say it is the most convincing demonstration yet that the speed of light -- supposedly an ironclad rule of nature -- can be pushed beyond known boundaries, at least under certain laboratory circumstances.
Not so impossible
"This effect cannot be used to send information back in time," said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. "However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that `nothing can travel faster than the speed of light' is wrong."
The results of the work by Wang, Alexander Kuzmich and Arthur Dogariu were published in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.
The achievement has no practical application right now, but experiments like this have generated considerable excitement in the small international community of theoretical and optical physicists.
"This is a breakthrough in the sense that people have thought that was impossible," said Raymond Chiao, a physicist at the University of California at Berkeley who was not involved in the work. Chiao has performed similar experiments using electric fields.
In the latest experiment, researchers at NEC developed a device that fired a laser pulse into a glass chamber filled with a vapor of cesium atoms. The researchers say the device is sort of a light amplifier that can push the pulse ahead.
Previously, experiments have been done in which light also appeared to achieve such so-called superluminal speeds, but the light was distorted, raising doubts as to whether scientists had really accomplished such a feat.
The laser pulse in the NEC experiment exits the chamber with almost exactly the same shape, but with less intensity, Wang said.
The pulse may look like a straight beam but actually behaves like waves of light particles. The light can leave the chamber before it has finished entering because the cesium atoms change the properties of the light, allowing it to exit more quickly than in a vacuum.
The leading edge of the light pulse has all the information needed to produce the pulse on the other end of the chamber, so the entire pulse does not need to reach the chamber for it to exit the other side.
The experiment produces an almost identical light pulse that exits the chamber and travels about 60 feet before the main part of the laser pulse finishes entering the chamber, Wang said.
Wang said the effect is possible only because light has no mass; the same thing cannot be done with physical objects.
The Princeton experiment and others like it test the limits of the theory of relativity that Albert Einstein developed nearly a century ago.
According to the special theory of relativity, the speed of particles of light in a vacuum, such as outer space, is the only absolute measurement in the universe. The speed of everything else -- rockets or inchworms -- is relative to the observer, Einstein and others explained.
Application: faster computers?
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/page.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/ImageGallery/CategoryList.aspx?id=a1206a74-5f7f-443f-97f5-9b389a4d4f9e&m=0
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page3.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/ImageGallery/CategoryList.aspx?id=36f0e6c9-8b8a-4f0a-8630-e5d3b879fad4&m=0
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page1.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page2.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/page.aspx
http://louis2j2sheehan.us/Blog/Blogger.aspx
http://louis2j2sheehan.us/page.aspx
http://louis2j2sheehan.us/page1.aspx
http://louis1j1sheehan.us/Blog/blog.aspx
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/page1.aspx
http://louis2j2sheehan.us/ImageGallery/CategoryList.aspx?id=14218f60-0cb6-4fa5-beba-5ee65da4b5e1&m=0
http://louis-j-sheehan.us/Blog/blog.aspx
http://Louis-J-Sheehan.us/
In everyday circumstances, an object cannot travel faster than light. The Princeton experiment and others change these circumstances by using devices such as the cesium chamber rather than a vacuum.
Ultimately, the work may contribute to the development of faster computers that carry information in light particles.
Not everyone agrees on the implications of the NEC experiment.
Aephraim Steinberg, a physicist at the University of Toronto, said the light particles coming out of the cesium chamber may not have been the same ones that entered, so he questions whether the speed of light was broken.
Still, the work is important, he said: "The interesting thing is how did they manage to produce light that looks exactly like something that didn't get there yet?"
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment