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mighty_thor

Ken Burns Vietnam

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Anyone watching the Ken Burns Vietnam documentary on PBS? Good stuff. I loved his Civil War doc. I was a little disappointed with his WW2 doc. So, far this one is pretty damn good.

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Was watching last night and I said to my son, what a complete and utter CF, and our troops aren't even there yet. We walked into an ambush and stayed for 12 years. Kennedy could have changed his mind about the war until it ended up on his sleeve. LBJ was not going stray from what Kennedy started.

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I play golf with a friend of my pop's - he was in Nam... Some of the things he tells me is just sickening, hearing him talk about his friends that didn't come back is really sad.

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Who is this Ken and why is he burning Vietnam? Haven't they had enough trouble?!

I thought Agent Orange took care of that :dunno:

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I am in a Hanoi expats group on Facebook. Considering it for the next stop.

 

Some Vietnamese chick just went on a rant about this documentary and America in general.

 

She promptly got the goon hand from a dozen American members, myself included. Thread was quickly killed by mods.

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I play golf with a friend of my pop's - he was in Nam... Some of the things he tells me is just sickening, hearing him talk about his friends that didn't come back is really sad.

I've heard a couple of stories myself. Talk about a complete sh1t storm hell hole. Needless to say. I was told to this day he still has night terrors.

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I love good documentaries and this is one. I didn't know we were there so long. I didn't watch from the beginning and was on the phone a lot so I'm a little confused at times.

 

For the guys that have heard horror stories, is it because of things Americans did while there, the things the Viet Cong did or the deaths...can you share a story?

 

So far the things that have stuck in my head are the monks burning themselves. I thought it was just a few, not many. So deep and meaningful.

The Vietnamese Major waiting for hours for the Americans to come back to pick up his dead soldiers. They never came back.

I really enjoy hearing all sides of the story all these years later.

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I remember my dad and others like him who served in Korea really had nothing good to say about Vietnam vets. They saw them as whiners and complainers who left there air conditioning and movie theaters and ice cream and heroin Firebase in order to go walk around for a few hours and then go back to their Firebase at night. Let's just say they weren't having any of that in Korea.

 

I'm sure that's a bit of Veteran competition going on. And I'm sure it wasn't quite that extreme, but I'm just passing along the stories I've heard. You came back from Korea and nobody even knew what the f*** Korea was. Then the Vietnam guys came back and were whining and crying and getting movies and all kinds of other b******* that Korea never got. All they got was a crappy TV series that had nothing to do with reality. Meanwhile, there were 50,000 Vietnam movies in whiny little hippie f**** whining about post-traumatic stress disorder. Which the Vietnam guys apparently invented if you talk to anybody that served in Korea.

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Just watched the first part. Very well done.

 

I only see the first four on Pirate Bay... is that all thats been released yet?

yes... I started the first one last night. Thought it was an hour, but its 1.5 hours. Had to stop and go to bed after an hour. Very good so far as expected

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Just watched the first part. Very well done.

 

I only see the first four on Pirate Bay... is that all thats been released yet?

It's being shown on PBS. One a night. I think it's 10 or 11 total. 5th episode is tonight.

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About half way through now... excellent and stunning to look back on it all.

I never knew the whole background/history of the war.

 

1 100 years of French colonialism in Vietnam was similar to English colonialism of USA - Ho Chi Minh wanted freedom just like the American Patriots did in 1776.

2. The US was in support of Ho against the French - supporting freedom and democracy for all.

 

3. After WW2, France needs to rebuild to resist communism, tells USA that colonialism is necessary or France will be too weak to resist USSR.

4. USA must publicly/politically allow French colonialism while morally/privately work for Vitenam independence.

 

5. Ho Chi Minh does get support from commies - given a choice between commies and French colonialism, he'll take commies

 

6. Preventing the the spread of communism became an ego/perception issue - US Presidents from Kennedy to LBJ were afraid of embarrassment and loss of elections if communism spreads to Vietnam.

 

7. "Winning the Hearts and Minds" - a purely military victory was possible, turn Vietnam into a moonscape... but the more you do this, the more you turn the people against you and you are no better than the French occupiers.

8. The South Vietnamese Leaders were incredibly corrupt, one bacame a Catholic bishop and started arresting Buddhists - talk about suporting the side that against EVERYTHING your country stands for. Buddhist monks start burning themselves in the streets to protest.

 

9. USA is still not technically an "Active" participant - US military are advisers to the South Vietnamese - but the South's soldiers don't trust their leaders and don't really want to fight - they defect easily to the North who are rallied under Ho Chi Minh and fighting for their freedom against any/all invaders (French/American) and at ANY cost.

 

10. By 1965 / 66, US leaders knew there was no path to victory - militarily obliterate the countryside was possible but would lead to communism, and "limited engagement" would fail militarily.

 

11. Even after all of this, the USA escalates air strikes and sends battalions of troops for the first "official" boots on the ground.

 

12. US political leaders paint an untruthful picture of the war efforts, embedded US reporters begin to broadcast the reality.

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One of the better documentaries I've seen was concerning the very last Marine detachment (embassy guards) that were the last soldiers out of Nam. Telling folks outside the compound that all is well (as they back away towards the building), running towards the chopper while lobbing tear gas behind them, kicking folks off the runners of the chopper, etc.

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I thought Agent Orange took care of that :dunno:

That was Venezuela, Trump will go to war with Vietnam next, get some payback.

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Yeah. We were stone cold wrong im Vietnam. Perhaps the biggest mistake in our history.

 

Yet we keep making it.

 

Bigger than New Coke?

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Governments making mistakes is the norm, I consider anything they get right akin to that blind squirrel finding a nut

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Perhaps the greatest benefit of the Vietnamese occupation was the invention of banh Mi.

 

The French of course had to bring the baguette with them. The Vietnamese looked at that and said well fuuck it, we'll take our ingredients and put it in their bread. Thus creating perhaps the finest sandwich ever.

 

American historical equivalents include the peanut butter and jelly burrito and the spam sushi.

 

True story. There are in the parts of Asia that serve ice cream on hamburger buns. That one doesn't work at all.

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