Due to a big event in downtown Akron that day, the Brothers of Holy Cross dismissed us Hoban High School students early on Oct. 21, 1964. Although I favored his Republican opponent, Barry Goldwater, I was excited to make my way through a massive crowd on Main Street and reach out for a handshake with President Lyndon B. Johnson from his motorcade.

In his campaign speech to a thunderous crowd at the University of Akron, Johnson addressed the rumbling war in faraway Vietnam.

“We are not about to send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves,” he said.

It was a lie.

Two months earlier, Johnson’s misleading — if not downright false — assessment of a naval encounter resulted in passage of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution by Congress. He was authorized to send more and more American boys to Vietnam.

By the time Johnson’s presidency ended four years later, 37,229 American military members had been killed in the Vietnam War.

Credible evidence has shown that Richard M. Nixon and his 1968 presidential campaign pressured the South Vietnamese government into sabotaging a peace pact being negotiated by Johnson. Another 21,257 American lives were lost in Vietnam during the Nixon presidency.

In 1983, President Ronald Reagan directed a controversial U.S. peacekeeping force to Beirut, Lebanon. On Oct. 23 that year, suicide bombers attacked a U.S. Marine Corps barracks there, killing 241 American servicemen. The 1985 Inman Report determined that Reagan’s Marine Corps officers failed to take proper steps to protect the barracks.

While Johnson and Nixon reportedly saw some action with the U.S. Navy during World War II, Reagan had a cushy job as a U.S. Army public-relations officer in California.

Despite scoring a dismal 25% on a pilot-training aptitude test, George W. Bush somehow dodged the Vietnam military draft by jumping ahead of a long line for the National Guard. Even more suspiciously, Donald J. Trump received a draft deferment for supposed bone spurs in his feet.

Following the tragic terrorist attack of Sept. 11, 2001, President G.W. Bush launched the military campaign against Afghanistan and Osama bin Laden, the founder of al-Qaida, which had organized that attack. But after U.S. forces backed away from the assault on al-Qaida in the Battle of Tora Bora, Bush brushed off bin Laden’s reported escape.

Did that irresponsibility prolong the war in Afghanistan, which took 2,459 U.S. military lives over two decades?

Based on the false claim that Iraq’s possession and development of weapons of mass destruction necessitated yet another Mideast war, Bush ordered the military invasion of that country in March 2003. Just six weeks later, Bush gave a televised victory speech, “Mission Accomplished,” onboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln.

Unfortunately, that also was false.

Much more unfortunately, 4,419 American lives were lost in the Iraq War that lasted nearly nine more years.

Dave Lange, a retired editor who holds a master’s degree in political science, is a member of the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame and author of the memoir “Virginity Lost in Vietnam.” He writes from Lakewood.Dave Lange, a retired editor who holds a master’s degree in political science, is a member of the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame and author of the memoir “Virginity Lost in Vietnam.” He writes from Lakewood.Tony Lange

And now that Americans have cowardly draft-dodger Trump as our president and commander in chief, should we believe that his military invasion of Venezuela was because of drug trafficking or oil thievery? Where is the truth? Will Greenland be next? Will it be Colombia, Mexico or Cuba? Or Iran?

What Americans should know is that presidential lies and obfuscation have led to war after war after war. We do know that thousands and thousands of American lives have been lost in those wars. What has America gained from this deadly skulduggery in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq? What other deadly skulduggery lies ahead?

Lange is a retired editor, Vietnam War veteran and member of the Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame. He writes from Lakewood.

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