Burns/Novick: The Vietnam War

[Steve]

I would imagine that Burns will put a focus on the My Lai Massacre. I would also imagine families watching this series together with some knowing little or nothing about this incident. It could test the audience in ways that no other scene does.

Interesting point! For many watching this would have occurred before they were born.

 

[William Parcher]

Interesting point! For many watching this would have occurred before they were born.

Really you can have entire families born after the war - both the parents and their children.

From the beginning of this series I have been wondering what Burns would do with My Lai. He has presented us with brutalities. But My Lai is a topper of toppers. Our boys were shooting babies and children. One right after another. Depending on how he presents it he could break his audience into little pieces.

 

[Spindrift]

Really you can have entire families born after the war - both the parents and their children.

From the beginning of this series I have been wondering what Burns would do with My Lai. He has presented us with brutalities. But My Lai is a topper of toppers. Our boys were shooting babies and children. One right after another. Depending on how he presents it he could break his audience into little pieces.

The 8th episode (next Tuesday) deals with My Lai and Kent State.

 

[Giordano]

I have watched every episode so far and I believe it to be very balanced and informative (if very long.

So far I think one conclusion from the special is no surprise: the world is very complex and that events and people are not easily fit into simple categories. For example Ho Chi Minh was both a nationalist and a communist. Certainly he was attracted to communist ideology, especially in his youth and this continued to various extents throughout his life. Yet he also idealized the USA for a long time (before we ended up supporting the French re-coloniszation of Vietnam after WWII) and even later had hoped that the USA would be an ally rather than an enemy. He was very strongly a nationalist who wanted Vietnam free of foreign control, yet ironically agreed to accept Chinese and USSR help (and influence) to achieve that goal. And despite given his ideology and actual alliances, Vietnam never followed a Soviet or Chinese communist model before or after his death (and in fact Vietnam in 1979 fought against China, its former sponsor, in a brief border war and played the key role in ending the genocide in adjacent communist Cambodia). Not a simple man, but few are.

The more broad conclusion I have so far from the special (and my own observations) is that the Vietnam War was pure tragedy- many people who made mistakes due to ignorance or ideology or ego that lead to the deaths of millions of people (both military and civilians), the physical devastation of a beautiful country and of its people, and lasting damage to US society and politics. A war between people who by all rights should have been friends.

 

[Axxman300]

I'm glued to the set, and the series is already available on DVD for $69 online and at your local Target store.

The show is top-notch. The viewer gets everything straight between the eyes.

Best part is that it's all done in context. By the third episode where the US is fully engaged in Vietnam you know how we got there.

All sides are represented fairly, and get their say.

I forgot what good TV was like.

 

[portlandatheist]

The more broad conclusion I have so far from the special (and my own observations) is that the Vietnam War was pure tragedy- many people who made mistakes due to ignorance or ideology or ego that lead to the deaths of millions of people (both military and civilians), the physical devastation of a beautiful country and of its people, and lasting damage to US society and politics. A war between people who by all rights should have been friends.

This is a beautifully stated summary of the film and war.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

...
So far I think one conclusion from the special is no surprise: the world is very complex and that events and people are not easily fit into simple categories. For example Ho Chi Minh was both a nationalist and a communist. Certainly he was attracted to communist ideology, especially in his youth and this continued to various extents throughout his life. Yet he also idealized the USA for a long time (before we ended up supporting the French re-coloniszation of Vietnam after WWII) and even later had hoped that the USA would be an ally rather than an enemy.

So he admired capitalism and communism?

...He was very strongly a nationalist who wanted Vietnam free of foreign control, yet ironically agreed to accept Chinese and USSR help (and influence) to achieve that goal.

Why is that ironic?

...And despite given his ideology and actual alliances, Vietnam never followed a Soviet or Chinese communist model before or after his death (and in fact Vietnam in 1979 fought against China, its former sponsor, in a brief border war and played the key role in ending the genocide in adjacent communist Cambodia). Not a simple man, but few are.

Which should tell you something about his ideology, that it was not communist.

...The more broad conclusion I have so far from the special (and my own observations) is that the Vietnam War was pure tragedy- many people who made mistakes due to ignorance or ideology or ego that lead to the deaths of millions of people (both military and civilians), the physical devastation of a beautiful country and of its people, and lasting damage to US society and politics. A war between people who by all rights should have been friends.

You left out one very important aspect, corporate influence to maintain their assets and profits.

Of course the minute I post that, all the forum right wingers falsely believe I am against corporations and capitalism, which is pure bull.

The US has a long history of subsidizing corporate bottom lines by using our taxpayer supported military to defend corporate exploitation of other country's natural resources.

What our government claimed was stopping communist dominoes, was in fact preventing countries from nationalizing their industries.

It's not completely straight forward, often those corporations invested significant capital developing the national resources. But then they failed to use some of their profits to reinvest in the countries they got the resources from. And it is all too tempting to take advantage of cheap human labor as a resource. It became the international norm over a century ago, murdering union organizers and supporting corrupt oppressive dictatorships, because that goes hand in hand with corporations maintaining control of said resources.

So don't leave greed and corruption off your list.

 

[Spindrift]

Which should tell you something about his ideology, that it was not communist.

Why was he a founder of the Communist Party of Vietnam then? He helped found a party that wasn't his ideology?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Why was he a founder of the Communist Party of Vietnam then? He helped found a party that wasn't his ideology?

It was a means to an end.

He went to the Western countries first in a plea for independence from the French and he was turned down. If he was such a communist, why go to the West for help first?

At the Versailles Peace Conference of 1919 Ho emerged as a self-appointed spokesman for his native land. Seeing in Woodrow Wilson's proposal for self-determination of the peoples the possibility of Vietnam's independence, Ho, dressed in a hired black suit and bowler hat, traveled to the Palace of Versailles to present his case. He was, of course, not received, although he offered a program for Vietnam. Its proposals did not include independence, but basic freedoms and equality between the French rulers and the native population.

Whatever hopes Ho may have held for French liberation of Vietnam were destroyed in his mind by the failure of the Versailles Conference to settle colonial issues. His faith was now transferred to Socialist action. Indeed, his first recorded speech was at a congress of the French Socialist party in 1920, and it was a plea not for world revolution but "against the imperialists who have committed abhorrent crimes on my native land." He bid the party "act practically to support the oppressed natives."

Immediately afterward Ho became, fatefully, a founding member of the French Communist party because he considered that the Socialists were equivocating on the colonial issue whereas the Communists were willing to promote national liberation.

"I don't understand a thing about strategy, tactics and all the other big words you use," he told the delegates, "but I understand well one single thing: The Third International concerns itself a great deal with the colonial question. Its delegates promise to help the oppressed colonial peoples to regain their liberty and independence. The adherents of the Second International have not said a word about the fate of the colonial areas."

Of course this resulted in communist influence. He had communist role models and sources of learning once he turned to China for help.


We have different POVs on this. I saw many people seek help from communist countries to overthrow right-wing dictators the US supported. The US, of course, then vilified the revolutions as communist revolutions. Any time you threaten to take back your country's natural resources from Western corporations that invested in them, aided by corrupt dictators, the US will label you a communist.

If a country has a one party government that is not friendly to Western corporations, they are called communist (and sometimes they are, but sometimes they mostly are communist in name rather than in substance). If a country has a one party dictatorship that is friendly to the West, they are called capitalist.

Yes that is an over simplification. Yes there is corruption in both models.

Vietnam 40 years on: how a communist victory gave way to capitalist corruption

After the military victory, Vietnam’s socialist model began to collapse. Cut off by US-led trade embargos and denied reconstruction aid, it plunged into poverty. Now its economy is booming – but so is inequality and corruption

So we'll have to agree to disagree on what is ideology here and what is a means to an end to colonial rule or the overthrow of corrupt dictators that leave their populations impoverished.

 

[Spindrift]

It was a means to an end.

He went to the Western countries first in a plea for independence from the French and he was turned down. If he was such a communist, why go to the West for help first?Of course this resulted in communist influence. He had communist role models and sources of learning once he turned to China for help.


We have different POVs on this. I saw many people seek help from communist countries to overthrow right-wing dictators the US supported. The US, of course, then vilified the revolutions as communist revolutions. Any time you threaten to take back your country's natural resources from Western corporations that invested in them, aided by corrupt dictators, the US will label you a communist.

If a country has a one party government that is not friendly to Western corporations, they are called communist (and sometimes they are, but sometimes they mostly are communist in name rather than in substance). If a country has a one party dictatorship that is friendly to the West, they are called capitalist.

Yes that is an over simplification. Yes there is corruption in both models.

Vietnam 40 years on: how a communist victory gave way to capitalist corruption

So we'll have to agree to disagree on what is ideology here and what is a means to an end to colonial rule or the overthrow of corrupt dictators that leave their populations impoverished.

People can't ever change? And couldn't being rejected by the West have driven him to communism?

I don't understand the denial that Ho was a communist despite all the actions that Ho himself took.

It may have been a means to an end, but if you found a communist party, you're pretty much a communist by self-identification.

If a country calls itself communist, I would think they know best.

 

[William Parcher]

Each episode begins with a warning on screen that viewer discretion is advised because the film contains strong language yet all spoken profanities are bleeped and written ones are blurred.

 

[Mark F]

I almost fell out of my chair when Burns used the exact same cicada sound effect but this time in Vietnam. He also used the same cooing dove sound effect that he had used in Lewis and Clark.

Hey, that's what's on the disk in the old Emulator II he bought from Ferris Bueller back in 80's.

 

[BStrong]

I've caught up to the last episode.

Pretty hard to listen to the accounts of the family members. The accounts from the participants ring true to me.

I joined the Army at the end of 1974. Saigon fell in April of '75. I did serve with many NCO's that had tours under their belt and in some cases were inclined to teach lessons based on their first hand experience rather than what might be in the UCMJ and the rules of land warfare. I'd heard it before from my Dad (Korea) and his older brother (WWII and Korea) not much changed in human behavior between WWII and Vietnam.

A few clarifications and comments. At one point the statement is made that JFK didn't extend the war into Laos. We already had a covert operation up and running, manned by SF troopers in Laos as of 1957 (Operation White Star) As of '62, the operation officially ended, but the troops on the ground were sheep dipped into the C.I.A. and the project ran for years under the radar - there's a pretty good account of the air end of the operation, The Ravens:

https://www.amazon.com/Raven-Chroni...coding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3BM7MT8650XB2Z5Y6DNZ

Attention was paid the the "Tiger Force" atrocities committed by the 1/327th Regiment of the 101st Abn. It was a pretty well known series of events, at least in Airborne infantry circles. The platoon's operational premise, at least as it was explained to me, was that the platoon's goal anytime they had an operation was to collect 327 confirmed kills.

The description of their actions in the documentary match up with what I was told back then. Most guys were properly disgusted, a few guys thought they hadn't done anything wrong, but one NCO explained where the blame really laid:

"That's what you get for lettin' legs in an Airborne unit." We were 82nd Abn, the 101st had been transitioning to airmobile and not all infantry troops in the 101st were airborne qualified.

A note about how witness accounts can be mistaken. In the segment concerning Tet '68, they show and describe the execution of a VC troop by a SVN General. Everybody has seen it, I won't link to YT showing it. A Vietnamese witness described watching Gen. Loan load his .45 and shoot the prisoner in the head. The video is quite clear. Gen. Loan executed the V.C. with a Smith and Wesson .38 special revolver, not a .45 automatic.

One of the veterans interviewed is Robert Rheault. His contributions were well thought out, which isn't surprising given his level of education and the respect he earned as a professor at West Point. What remains to be seen is if the documentary will touch on his arrest in 1969 while he was serving as the CO of the 5th Special Forces group. Rheault and some of his NCO's were charged with murder for the execution of a suspected VC spy and conspiracy related to the disposal of the body of the victim. All charges were eventually dropped.

Robert Rehault - 1925 - 2013.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

People can't ever change? And couldn't being rejected by the West have driven him to communism?

I don't understand the denial that Ho was a communist despite all the actions that Ho himself took.

It may have been a means to an end, but if you found a communist party, you're pretty much a communist by self-identification.

If a country calls itself communist, I would think they know best.

I don't have a problem with HCM becoming a communist ideologue or even seeing the communist system as something that might work for Vietnam.

I have a problem with people who see him as a communist first and foremost, the perpetual enemy of the US, as if he was some evil thing that of course we had to go to war against.

It detracts from the facts.

 

[John Jones]

[...]

A note about how witness accounts can be mistaken. In the segment concerning Tet '68, they show and describe the execution of a VC troop by a SVN [ARVN] General. Everybody has seen it, I won't link to YT showing it. A Vietnamese witness described watching Gen. Loan load his .45 and shoot the prisoner in the head. The video is quite clear. Gen. Loan executed the V.C. with a Smith and Wesson .38 special revolver, not a .45 automatic.

[...]

I noticed that too. Arguably the most publicized photo from the Vietnam war, and they got it wrong.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Imagine how little we would know were it not for the Nixon tapes.

 

[bruto]

I'm finding it interesting and informative. I was very much against the war at the time, and still a member of a church which gave considerable support. One of the things I find is that my attitude had mellowed some in the intervening years, and it's revealing how much of what many of us had suspected or felt about the cynicism and dishonesty of the political leaders turned out to be true. But I also remember that by the end of 1967 or so I stopped demonstrating and going to marches, because I thought the peace movement had become corrupted with radical politics and that too, in retrospect, is reconfirmed.

As we get older I think we tend to forget how desperately messed up things seemed at the time.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I'm finding it interesting and informative. I was very much against the war at the time, and still a member of a church which gave considerable support. One of the things I find is that my attitude had mellowed some in the intervening years, and it's revealing how much of what many of us had suspected or felt about the cynicism and dishonesty of the political leaders turned out to be true. But I also remember that by the end of 1967 or so I stopped demonstrating and going to marches, because I thought the peace movement had become corrupted with radical politics and that too, in retrospect, is reconfirmed.

As we get older I think we tend to forget how desperately messed up things seemed at the time.

At first I found it hard to watch. I knew how bad the war was from the beginning. I had some trouble in school and got suspended a few times. I ended up having to go to night school to finish high school. (Weirdly it allowed me to graduate a half year early, but I digress.) There was a module on Vietnam that was exactly what I'd already heard and believed, we entered the war to support the French colonialists. I was in my peak anti-corporatist POV.

But in the last few episodes I've found it terribly emotional. Funny you stopped protesting in the late 60s. That's when my protesting began and continued through to today.

It reminds me why I hate the **** going on today even more.

 

[Craig4]

Saigon fell to the Communists after the US withdrew from South Vietnam for political reasons back home. There was no military defeat for the US in Vietnam. What that photo shows is the evacuation of the US embassy in a foreign country that was overrun by Communists because the US had refused to fight for their ally, not because the US had been defeated there.

War being an extension of politics, this was a loss for the US. We bent to the enemy's will. Tet might have been a victory in the sense that we destroyed the Viet Cong. However, post Tet, the enemy still owned the decision cycle. They still attacked at times and places of their choosing in the South and ultimately, outlasted us.

 

[Spindrift]

I don't have a problem with HCM becoming a communist ideologue or even seeing the communist system as something that might work for Vietnam.

I have a problem with people who see him as a communist first and foremost, the perpetual enemy of the US, as if he was some evil thing that of course we had to go to war against.

It detracts from the facts.

The fact is that during the Cold War one couldn't be a little communist. You either were or you weren't and that is all that was seen from the American policy point of view. And when you do get into a fighting war, you don't portray the leader of the other side as a misunderstood soul.

In hindsight and in the documentary Ho is portrayed as a nationalist who turned to communism because it was the only place he was getting any support. But he also jumped in, he didn't just dip his toe in.