In Charles Todorich’s Jan. 9 letter, he equates patriotism with “unconditional love of country,” describing those who protested the war in Vietnam as “educated elites” (agreeing with another writer) who were “easy prey (for) the anti-American orthodoxy of liberal academia.”

The demonstrations took place not because we were “easy prey,” but because we were expected, by the corporate rulers of the United States, to go to a country that hadn’t attacked us and kill people in order to further the U.S. foothold in the Pacific Rim so that the natural resources of Southeast Asia could be exploited and stolen by the handlers of Henry Kissinger, Richard Nixon, Lyndon B. Johnson, et al.

Nixon showed who the treasonous side was in 1968, when he secretly convinced the Vietnamese to delay the peace talks until he could be elected, resulting in over 20,000 more American soldiers’ deaths!

We weren’t taught to hate America – just those who would use the deaths of over 58,000 Americans and over 3 million Vietnamese to further their agenda of greed.

John Nichols

Portland