In his current peace-seeking shuttle tour, Secretary of State John Kerry sought to reassure Israelis that he has the key to ending the Mideast conflict.  At a joint news conference with Prime Minister Netanyahu, Kerry offered this bit of history as a lesson for today:

On a personal level, last month I traveled to Vietnam on my first visit there as Secretary of State.  And the transformation in our relationship -- I was a young soldier who fought there -- the transformation in our relationship is proof that as painful as the past can be, through hard work of diplomacy history's adversaries can actually become partners for a new day and history's challenges can become opportunities for a new age.

The secretary, in his unrestrained optimism, obviously seemed to overlook a bit of actual Vietnam history -- a Kissinger-engineered peace agreement that failed, but Kissinger got a Nobel Peace Prize anyway; the fall of South Vietnam amid a U.S. retreat; and a flood of South Vietnamese refugee "boat people" fleeing for their lives.

Is this the fate Israel can expect from Kerry's diplomacy?