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- Original file by zfeet -
- Resync by Ornlu Wolfjarl -

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♪ Catch a boat to England,
baby, maybe to Spain ♪

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♪ Wherever I have gone

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♪ Wherever I've been and gone

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♪ Wherever I have gone the
blues run the game. ♪

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TIM O'BRIEN: I grew up in
a small farming community

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in southern Minnesota called Worthington.

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Small town America... at
least my small town...

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had great virtues.

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It was a safe place to grow up.

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There was Little League
baseball in the summer,

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and there was hockey in the winter.

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SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: ♪ When I ain't
drinkin', baby, you are on my mind. ♪

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O'BRIEN: Everybody knows everyone
else's business and their faults

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and what's happening in their marriages

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and where the kids have gone wrong.

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It was full of the Kiwanis
boys and the Elks Club

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and the country club set and
the kind of chatty housewives

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and the holier-than-thou ministers.

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SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: ♪ Wherever
I've been and gone... ♪

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O'BRIEN: I remember the day
my draft notice arrived.

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It was a summer afternoon,
maybe June of '68.

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And I remember taking that
envelope into the house

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and putting it on the kitchen table

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where my mom and dad were having lunch.

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And they didn't even read it.

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They just looked at it
and knew what it was.

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And the silence of that lunch...

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I didn't speak, my mom didn't
speak, my dad didn't speak...

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was just that piece of paper

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lying at the center of the table.

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It was enough to make me cry
to this day, not for myself,

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but for my mom and dad,

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who both of them had been in
the Navy during World War II,

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had believed in service to one's
country and all those values.

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HOWARD TUCKNER: ...considers all
civilians potential enemies...

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O'BRIEN: On the one hand I did think
the war was less than righteous.

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On the other hand I love my country.

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And I valued my life in a small
town and my friends and family.

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And so the summer of '68, I
wrestled with what to do,

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was for me, at least, more torturous

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and devastating and emotionally painful

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than anything that happened in Vietnam.

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In the end I just capitulated.

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And one day I got on a bus
with other recent graduates,

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and we went over to Sioux
Falls about 60 miles away,

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and raised our hands and got in the Army.

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But it wasn't a decision, it was
a forfeiture of a decision.

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It was letting my body go,

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turning a switch in my conscience,

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just turning it off,

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so it wouldn't be barking at me saying,

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"You're doing a bad and evil and
stupid and unpatriotic thing."

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Last week's casualty figures in
the Vietnam War released today

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showed 299 Americans killed, the
lowest figure in two months.

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("Revolution 1" by the Beatles playing)

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(music continues, crowd shouting)

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♪ You say you want a revolution ♪

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♪ Well, you know

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♪ We all want to change the world ♪

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♪ You tell me that it's evolution ♪

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♪ Well, you know

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♪ We all want to change the world ♪

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♪ But when you talk about destruction ♪

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♪ Don't you know that you
can count me out, in ♪

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♪ Don't you know it's
gonna be all right ♪

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NARRATOR: By June of 1968,
the spirit of revolution...

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over the Vietnam War, over
injustice, over human rights...

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seemed to have spread everywhere.

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The pressure to bring an end
to the war was building.

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President Lyndon Johnson
had already decided

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not to run again,

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assassinations and unrest
had staggered the nation,

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and the country was preparing
to choose a new president.

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Meanwhile, American and North
Vietnamese diplomats in Paris

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were getting nowhere.

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The communists insisted there could be

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no substantive negotiations

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until the United States stopped
all bombing of North Vietnam.

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LENNON: ♪ With minds that hate...

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NARRATOR: The new secretary
of defense, Clark Clifford,

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who had turned from hawk to dove

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after just a few months in office,

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begged the president to call a total halt.

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"We can only hope for success
at the bargaining table,"

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he told Johnson.

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"We are in a war we cannot win."

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The president refused to stop the bombing.

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Over the following months,

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there would be reports of
progress on the battlefield

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and in the countryside.

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But that progress came so
slowly and at so high a cost

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in human lives that the war against the war

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intensified back home,

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pitting classes and generations
against one another,

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spreading distrust of political
leaders who seemed unable

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or unwilling to bring
the fighting to an end.

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Young men from all over the
country would continue

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to face questions and choices

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their fathers and grandfathers
had rarely had to face

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when asked to fight in other wars:

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What obligation did a
citizen owe his country?

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What should one do when
asked to fight a war

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in which one did not believe?

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How was a soldier to distinguish
between a shadowy enemy

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and the Vietnamese civilians he
was supposed to be defending?

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LENNON: ♪ Shoo-bee-do-wop

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♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh.

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NARRATOR: The coming summer of 1968

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would be one of the most consequential

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in American history.

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LENNON: ♪ All right, all right,
all right, all right, all right ♪

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♪ All right, all right

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♪ Shoo-bee-do-wop

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(song fades out)

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Earlier this year, top U.S. leaders vowed

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that the U.S. Marine outpost at Khe Sanh,

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then under a 77-day enemy siege,
would be defended at all cost.

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(jet engine roars)

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(explosion)

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MAX CLELAND: Johnson had
said in the fall of '67,

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and as we went into '68,

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"I don't want no damn Dien Bien Phu."

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So the whole American military,
from the Joint Chiefs on down,

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whether they believed in
saving Khe Sanh or not,

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were hell-bent for leather
to make damn sure

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the siege was broken.

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Now the telltale moment
of that is that a week

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after the siege was broken,

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they plowed the base
under and abandoned it.

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That was Vietnam in a microcosm.

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(helicopter blades whirring)

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NARRATOR: There was a new
commander in Vietnam now,

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General Creighton W. Abrams,
a hero of World War II,

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a soldier's soldier, one reporter said,

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who "could inspire
aggressiveness in a begonia."

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LEWIS SORLEY: Some newsman
once described him

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as looking like an unmade
bed smoking a cigar.

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He's gruff.

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He drank a lot.

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He's grumpy in the morning.

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Sometimes staff officers would
schedule appointments with him

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in the morning

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for, with generals who
were causing him trouble.

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NARRATOR: Abrams was a welcome
new face for the American war.

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Reporters found him more frank
and open than his predecessor.

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"The overall public affairs
policy of this command,"

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he told his subordinates,

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"will be to let results
speak for themselves."

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"Occasionally," one officer
said, "we are allowed

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to state frankly that we didn't
do a damn thing this month."

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Many soldiers would believe
for the rest of their lives

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that if Abrams had taken command sooner,

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the outcome could have been different.

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VINCENT OKAMOTO: You're
told very succinctly,

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"We need to rack up as
much body count as we can.

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How many gooks did you kill today?"

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And it was the kill ratio that determined

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whether or not you called
it a victory or a loss.

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So if you killed 20 North Vietnamese

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and lost only two people,

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they declared a great victory
for that particular firefight.

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NARRATOR: Lieutenant Vincent Okamoto
was born during World War II

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in a Japanese-American internment camp

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at Poston, Arizona, the seventh
son of Japanese immigrants.

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All six of his brothers
had served in uniform...

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two fought with the celebrated
442nd Regimental Combat Team

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in Italy and France,

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the most highly decorated
unit of that war...

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and so, when Okamoto's country
went to war in Vietnam,

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he believed he should go, too.

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He was now a platoon leader with
Bravo Company, 2nd Battalion,

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27th Regiment, 25th Infantry
Division, based at Cu Chi,

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some 20 miles northwest of
Saigon, an area honeycombed

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with miles of Viet Cong tunnels.

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OKAMOTO: My parents are
Japanese immigrants.

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I had rice literally every day of my life

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until I went into the military.

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So we were conducting a cordon
and search of a village.

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Didn't find any weapons,

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didn't find any communist
literature or whatever.

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So we took a prolonged lunch break.

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Everybody wants to get out of the sun.

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Well, my RTO, my medic and I

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went into this particular
house, and there was...

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there were three women, and a babe in arms,

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and a kid about four years old.

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And she was cooking... rice.

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Well, here, here's Okamoto, Mrs.
Okamoto's son,

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that hadn't had rice now... hot,
steamed rice... for months.

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I'm looking at it, it
looks pretty good to me.

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So I-I get my interpreter.

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I said, "Hey, tell this woman, the grandma,

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"that I'll give her a pack of cigarettes,

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"my C-ration turkey loaf,
and a can of peaches

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for some of that steamed rice
and that fish and vegetables."

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It was great.

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And I asked for seconds.

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My RTO says, "Damn, ain't
these people poor enough

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without you eating their food?"

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I said, "You know, hell,
they got enough rice here

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to feed a dozen men."

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And then, it just dawned,

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they did have enough rice
to feed a dozen men.

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So I had my interpreter ask the woman,

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"Who's all this rice for?"

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(speaking Vietnamese)

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"I don't know, I don't know."

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So we started looking around again.

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We found a tunnel mouth.

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I was given a grenade.

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After the smoke cleared,
we pulled, I think,

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seven or eight bodies to the town square.

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And we wanted to see who
would cry over these people.

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And then we'd have more people to question.

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The women that lived in that house,

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and I had eaten their rice,

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they're all squatting down, wailing.

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And you couldn't identify these, these...

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they're just charred bodies.

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Um...

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And I think that was the first time I knew

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that I personally had killed people.

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I got an "Attaboy" from the supervisor.

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But, uh...

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it wasn't something that you
can say had glory in it,

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or you felt a real sense of accomplishment.

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NARRATOR: Over that summer,
Okamoto was wounded two times

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and made 22 helicopter assaults,

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four of them as commander of Bravo Company.

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On the morning of August 23,
he made his 23rd assault.

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Nineteen helicopters ferried
the first and second platoons

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to a new landing zone near Cambodia.

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Their task was to dig in, stay put,

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and somehow block a battalion
of North Vietnamese troops,

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who were trying to escape
across the border.

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Okamoto's unit was reinforced by a platoon

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of mechanized infantry,
three APCs, and a tank,

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but they were still badly outnumbered.

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He and the fewer than 150
men under his command

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spent the rest of that
day and all of the next

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preparing as best they could for an attack,

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setting Claymore mines

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and hanging three coils of razor wire.

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OKAMOTO: August the 24th,
about 10:00 that night,

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we got hit with a very
heavy mortar barrage.

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(shouting, explosions)

248
00:14:55,714 --> 00:14:59,214
Within the first I would say ten seconds,

249
00:14:59,314 --> 00:15:02,846
all three of those armored
personnel carriers and tanks

250
00:15:02,946 --> 00:15:05,346
were knocked out with
rocket-propelled grenades.

251
00:15:09,114 --> 00:15:12,513
NARRATOR: Trip flares briefly
lit up the landscape.

252
00:15:12,614 --> 00:15:15,247
Scores of enemy troops were running at them

253
00:15:15,346 --> 00:15:17,346
through the elephant grass.

254
00:15:17,447 --> 00:15:18,614
(gunfire)

255
00:15:18,712 --> 00:15:23,646
VC mortar shells blasted two
gaps in the razor wire.

256
00:15:23,747 --> 00:15:27,414
If Okamoto and his outnumbered
men couldn't plug them,

257
00:15:27,515 --> 00:15:29,980
they were sure to be overrun.

258
00:15:30,080 --> 00:15:33,815
He and the four men closest
to him held their M-16s

259
00:15:33,914 --> 00:15:37,780
above their heads and fired blindly.

260
00:15:37,881 --> 00:15:40,547
The enemy kept coming.

261
00:15:40,647 --> 00:15:42,280
OKAMOTO: I had my four people.

262
00:15:42,381 --> 00:15:45,847
And through the light
of the flares, I said,

263
00:15:45,948 --> 00:15:47,815
"A couple you guys go and
man the machine guns

264
00:15:47,914 --> 00:15:49,315
out on those APCs."

265
00:15:49,414 --> 00:15:51,480
Well, the response I got was, like, uh...

266
00:15:51,580 --> 00:15:53,448
"Fuck you, I ain't going up there."

267
00:15:55,147 --> 00:15:59,647
So I ran to the first armored
personnel carrier, and I...

268
00:15:59,748 --> 00:16:03,248
pulled the, the gunner
out of the turret, dead.

269
00:16:03,347 --> 00:16:06,815
I jumped in there, manned the machine gun,

270
00:16:06,914 --> 00:16:09,647
and fired until it ran out of ammo.

271
00:16:09,748 --> 00:16:13,615
NARRATOR: Okamoto moved to
the second disabled APC

272
00:16:13,714 --> 00:16:17,580
and then the third, emptying their guns.

273
00:16:17,681 --> 00:16:20,881
OKAMOTO: And they were still coming at us.

274
00:16:20,980 --> 00:16:24,615
So I crawled out there, till I
was about ten meters from 'em.

275
00:16:24,714 --> 00:16:28,280
And I killed 'em with hand grenades.

276
00:16:28,381 --> 00:16:31,081
NARRATOR: Two enemy grenades fell near him

277
00:16:31,182 --> 00:16:33,648
and he managed to throw both back.

278
00:16:33,749 --> 00:16:37,481
But a third landed just beyond his reach.

279
00:16:37,581 --> 00:16:41,215
Shrapnel fragments peppered
his legs and back.

280
00:16:43,182 --> 00:16:46,148
OKAMOTO: I just knew for
sure I was going to die.

281
00:16:46,249 --> 00:16:48,281
"Okamoto, you're not going
to make it out of here.

282
00:16:48,382 --> 00:16:49,616
"Mom's going to take it hard,

283
00:16:49,715 --> 00:16:52,915
but, you know, you're not going
to make it out of here."

284
00:16:53,016 --> 00:16:54,348
And that's liberating.

285
00:16:54,449 --> 00:16:56,781
When you know you're going
to die, you don't...

286
00:16:56,882 --> 00:16:58,215
the fear leaves.

287
00:16:58,316 --> 00:17:00,116
At least in my case, I
was no longer afraid.

288
00:17:00,215 --> 00:17:02,292
I was just mad because here
are all these little guys

289
00:17:02,316 --> 00:17:05,348
trying to kill my ass.

290
00:17:05,449 --> 00:17:07,281
And if that's the case,

291
00:17:07,382 --> 00:17:10,182
then I'm going to make it as
tough on them as I possibly can

292
00:17:10,281 --> 00:17:11,281
before I go down.

293
00:17:13,981 --> 00:17:16,848
I killed a lot of brave men that night.

294
00:17:16,949 --> 00:17:19,081
And I rationalized that by telling myself,

295
00:17:19,182 --> 00:17:22,016
"Well, maybe what you did... just maybe...

296
00:17:22,116 --> 00:17:24,581
saved the lives of a
couple of your people."

297
00:17:28,449 --> 00:17:32,282
NARRATOR: During the night, the
enemy had slipped into Cambodia,

298
00:17:32,383 --> 00:17:35,750
dragging as many of their
dead with them as they could.

299
00:17:38,517 --> 00:17:42,916
A third of Okamoto's company had been lost.

300
00:17:43,017 --> 00:17:45,417
("The Lord Is in This Place" by
Fairport Convention playing)

301
00:17:45,450 --> 00:17:46,950
For his efforts that day,

302
00:17:47,049 --> 00:17:50,883
Vincent Okamoto received the
Distinguished Service Cross,

303
00:17:50,982 --> 00:17:54,450
the Army's second highest honor.

304
00:17:54,549 --> 00:17:56,950
Before his tour of duty ended,

305
00:17:57,049 --> 00:18:00,950
he would become the most highly
decorated Japanese-American

306
00:18:01,049 --> 00:18:03,750
to survive the Vietnam War.

307
00:18:06,582 --> 00:18:08,183
OKAMOTO: You know what?

308
00:18:08,282 --> 00:18:09,683
(sighs)

309
00:18:09,782 --> 00:18:12,183
The real heroes are the men that died.

310
00:18:15,649 --> 00:18:19,250
19-, 20-year-old high school dropouts.

311
00:18:19,349 --> 00:18:21,683
They didn't have escape
routes that the elite

312
00:18:21,782 --> 00:18:25,450
and the wealthy and the privileged had.

313
00:18:25,549 --> 00:18:26,549
And that was unfair.

314
00:18:29,617 --> 00:18:32,383
And so they looked upon
military service as...

315
00:18:32,482 --> 00:18:34,149
(sighs)

316
00:18:34,250 --> 00:18:35,818
...like the weather.

317
00:18:35,917 --> 00:18:37,783
You had to go in, and you'd do it.

318
00:18:39,717 --> 00:18:44,184
But to see these kids, who
had the least to gain,

319
00:18:44,283 --> 00:18:45,693
there wasn't anything to look forward to;

320
00:18:45,717 --> 00:18:47,083
they weren't going to be rewarded

321
00:18:47,184 --> 00:18:50,150
for their service in Vietnam.

322
00:18:50,251 --> 00:18:55,884
And yet their infinite patience,
their loyalty to each other,

323
00:18:55,983 --> 00:19:00,384
their courage under fire
was just phenomenal.

324
00:19:01,583 --> 00:19:04,018
And you would ask yourself,

325
00:19:04,118 --> 00:19:07,983
"How does America produce
young men like this?"

326
00:19:47,885 --> 00:19:51,885
NARRATOR: At first, Radio Hanoi
had portrayed the Tet Offensive

327
00:19:51,984 --> 00:19:54,752
as a series of "tremendous victories"

328
00:19:54,851 --> 00:19:58,351
in which "hundreds of thousands
of people have risen up

329
00:19:58,452 --> 00:20:02,452
and destroyed enemy positions."

330
00:20:02,551 --> 00:20:06,351
"But after a couple of weeks,"
one North Vietnamese remembered,

331
00:20:06,452 --> 00:20:09,252
"we didn't hear any more news.

332
00:20:09,351 --> 00:20:11,619
"The Saigon regime was still there

333
00:20:11,718 --> 00:20:14,984
"and the U.S. planes were still bombing.

334
00:20:15,084 --> 00:20:18,784
It was obvious the radio
wasn't telling the truth."

335
00:20:23,284 --> 00:20:26,019
Casualty figures were never revealed,

336
00:20:26,119 --> 00:20:29,718
but to North Vietnamese citizens
secretly listening to reports

337
00:20:29,819 --> 00:20:32,418
on the BBC and Radio Saigon,

338
00:20:32,519 --> 00:20:35,784
it was clear that they had been heavy.

339
00:21:37,453 --> 00:21:42,887
NARRATOR: In late August 1968, Le Duan
and the North Vietnamese leadership

340
00:21:42,986 --> 00:21:45,954
launched still another offensive.

341
00:21:46,053 --> 00:21:49,754
The result was the same
as Tet and Mini-Tet.

342
00:21:51,521 --> 00:21:57,086
They lost 17,000 more men.

343
00:21:57,187 --> 00:21:59,986
Thousands of fresh recruits
had to be ordered south

344
00:22:00,086 --> 00:22:02,254
to replace them.

345
00:22:02,353 --> 00:22:04,954
"The war began to seem like an open pit,"

346
00:22:05,053 --> 00:22:07,521
one North Vietnamese remembered.

347
00:22:07,621 --> 00:22:11,754
"The more young people were lost
there, the more they sent."

348
00:22:13,153 --> 00:22:15,454
The sons of some party officials

349
00:22:15,553 --> 00:22:19,353
and their friends were sent
abroad to escape the draft.

350
00:22:19,454 --> 00:22:21,687
University students were exempted.

351
00:22:21,786 --> 00:22:24,353
People with money bribed recruiters

352
00:22:24,454 --> 00:22:26,720
to overlook their offspring

353
00:22:26,821 --> 00:22:30,586
or paid physicians to declare
them unfit to serve.

354
00:22:47,921 --> 00:22:50,755
NARRATOR: Most draftees were poor
people from the countryside,

355
00:22:50,854 --> 00:22:53,721
especially receptive to the slogans

356
00:22:53,822 --> 00:22:57,455
and promises of the revolution.

357
00:22:57,554 --> 00:22:59,755
Thousands of replacements made their way

358
00:22:59,854 --> 00:23:01,721
down the Ho Chi Minh Trail

359
00:23:01,822 --> 00:23:05,154
past burned-out vehicles
and military graveyards,

360
00:23:05,255 --> 00:23:09,421
the stones neatly marked
with the names of the dead

361
00:23:09,522 --> 00:23:11,854
and the date each had died.

362
00:23:13,854 --> 00:23:17,022
They encountered small
groups of wounded men

363
00:23:17,122 --> 00:23:19,455
moving in the other direction.

364
00:23:19,554 --> 00:23:22,255
Those without arms walked.

365
00:23:22,354 --> 00:23:25,154
Legless men rode in camouflaged trucks.

366
00:23:25,255 --> 00:23:27,688
There were blinded soldiers

367
00:23:27,787 --> 00:23:31,987
and others who had been
hideously burned by napalm.

368
00:23:32,087 --> 00:23:34,587
"You'll see all kinds of
pleasures in the South,"

369
00:23:34,688 --> 00:23:39,221
the weary wounded told the young
men moving toward the war.

370
00:23:39,322 --> 00:23:42,721
"Everyone was frightened," a
political officer remembered,

371
00:23:42,822 --> 00:23:45,822
"especially when we met those men.

372
00:23:45,921 --> 00:23:49,055
It was like looking at our future selves."

373
00:23:52,788 --> 00:23:55,256
The youngest delegate of
the New Jersey delegation

374
00:23:55,355 --> 00:23:57,889
casts his vote for the next
president of the United States,

375
00:23:57,988 --> 00:23:59,023
Richard Nixon.

376
00:23:59,123 --> 00:24:02,788
We've got 18.

377
00:24:02,889 --> 00:24:04,922
David, we doubled it, 18.

378
00:24:05,023 --> 00:24:07,456
NARRATOR: Richard Nixon
had been a prominent

379
00:24:07,555 --> 00:24:10,488
and controversial figure
in American politics

380
00:24:10,588 --> 00:24:13,488
for more than two decades.

381
00:24:13,588 --> 00:24:15,855
He'd been a congressman and senator,

382
00:24:15,956 --> 00:24:18,922
best known for his fierce anticommunism,

383
00:24:19,023 --> 00:24:21,222
then served eight years

384
00:24:21,323 --> 00:24:24,389
as Dwight Eisenhower's vice president.

385
00:24:24,488 --> 00:24:27,355
He narrowly lost the presidential race

386
00:24:27,456 --> 00:24:30,222
to John Kennedy in 1960

387
00:24:30,323 --> 00:24:32,488
and was defeated again two years later

388
00:24:32,588 --> 00:24:35,722
trying to become governor of California.

389
00:24:35,823 --> 00:24:39,988
His career seemed to be over.

390
00:24:40,088 --> 00:24:44,123
But then, in one of the most
extraordinary comebacks

391
00:24:44,222 --> 00:24:46,355
in U.S. political history,

392
00:24:46,456 --> 00:24:48,788
he had outsmarted and out-maneuvered

393
00:24:48,889 --> 00:24:50,757
and out-campaigned his rivals

394
00:24:50,856 --> 00:24:55,556
to win the 1968 Republican nomination.

395
00:24:55,656 --> 00:24:57,489
MAN: Richard M. Nixon...

396
00:24:57,589 --> 00:24:59,089
(cheering and applause)

397
00:25:02,156 --> 00:25:05,024
His pick for vice president
was the tough-talking

398
00:25:05,124 --> 00:25:09,390
but largely unknown governor
of Maryland, Spiro Agnew.

399
00:25:11,457 --> 00:25:13,457
Nixon made the case for himself

400
00:25:13,556 --> 00:25:17,089
as the man who could bring a
fractured America together

401
00:25:17,190 --> 00:25:21,124
and bring an honorable end to the war.

402
00:25:21,223 --> 00:25:24,856
When the strongest nation in
the world can be tied down

403
00:25:24,957 --> 00:25:28,856
for four years in a war in
Vietnam with no end in sight;

404
00:25:28,957 --> 00:25:30,832
when the richest nation
in the world can't manage

405
00:25:30,856 --> 00:25:32,757
its own economy;

406
00:25:32,856 --> 00:25:34,757
when the nation with the greatest tradition

407
00:25:34,856 --> 00:25:38,624
of the rule of law is plagued
by unprecedented lawlessness;

408
00:25:38,723 --> 00:25:41,923
when a nation that has
been known for a century

409
00:25:42,024 --> 00:25:43,423
for equality of opportunity

410
00:25:43,524 --> 00:25:46,923
is torn by unprecedented racial violence;

411
00:25:47,024 --> 00:25:49,089
and when the president of the United States

412
00:25:49,190 --> 00:25:52,857
cannot travel abroad or
to any major city at home

413
00:25:52,958 --> 00:25:55,557
without fear of a hostile demonstration,

414
00:25:55,657 --> 00:25:58,025
then it's time for new leadership

415
00:25:58,125 --> 00:25:59,825
for the United States of America.

416
00:25:59,924 --> 00:26:02,025
(cheering)

417
00:26:08,758 --> 00:26:10,758
Good evening from Chicago,

418
00:26:10,857 --> 00:26:13,057
where the 35th National
Democratic Convention

419
00:26:13,157 --> 00:26:16,691
opens tomorrow with the promise
of turmoil inside this hall

420
00:26:16,790 --> 00:26:18,657
and a threat of violence without.

421
00:26:18,758 --> 00:26:22,590
JOHN LAURENCE: Both sides moved in
their troops on a balmy Sunday morning

422
00:26:22,691 --> 00:26:24,891
for the confrontation of Chicago.

423
00:26:24,990 --> 00:26:26,958
Some 6,000 crack Army troops,

424
00:26:27,057 --> 00:26:29,857
riot trained and ready for action...

425
00:26:29,958 --> 00:26:33,490
The Army soldiers moved out to
secret locations around the city

426
00:26:33,590 --> 00:26:36,157
after one of the largest troop
movements in domestic history.

427
00:26:38,825 --> 00:26:42,990
NARRATOR: Some 15,000 protestors
had gathered in Chicago,

428
00:26:43,090 --> 00:26:46,490
most to register their
anguish over the war...

429
00:26:48,724 --> 00:26:51,724
Some bent on disrupting the convention.

430
00:26:54,991 --> 00:26:58,759
Richard J. Daley, the
Democratic mayor of Chicago,

431
00:26:58,858 --> 00:27:02,692
was determined that there
be no trouble in his city.

432
00:27:04,459 --> 00:27:08,791
Twelve thousand Chicago
policemen were on alert.

433
00:27:08,892 --> 00:27:12,225
In addition to the 6,000 U.S. Army troops,

434
00:27:12,326 --> 00:27:16,091
there were 6,000 more
armed National Guardsmen

435
00:27:16,192 --> 00:27:20,058
and a thousand intelligence
agents from the FBI,

436
00:27:20,158 --> 00:27:23,291
the CIA, and the military.

437
00:27:24,725 --> 00:27:27,558
Mayor Daley cordoned off
the Chicago Amphitheater

438
00:27:27,658 --> 00:27:29,192
where the convention was being held

439
00:27:29,291 --> 00:27:32,725
and denied the protestors permits to march

440
00:27:32,826 --> 00:27:35,425
or to sleep in the city's parks.

441
00:27:36,759 --> 00:27:38,701
INTERVIEWER: Are you planning
to go without the permit

442
00:27:38,725 --> 00:27:39,858
if you don't get the permit?

443
00:27:39,959 --> 00:27:41,326
RENNIE DAVIS: Given the fact

444
00:27:41,425 --> 00:27:44,991
that for many months we
have notified this city

445
00:27:45,091 --> 00:27:48,826
and this nation that we wish
to hold a demonstration,

446
00:27:48,925 --> 00:27:50,692
an assembly in Chicago

447
00:27:50,791 --> 00:27:53,291
to register our convictions about the war,

448
00:27:53,392 --> 00:27:56,791
the tens of thousands of people
coming to the city of Chicago

449
00:27:56,893 --> 00:27:58,659
constitute a permit.

450
00:28:00,726 --> 00:28:02,893
Our fight is with the militarism

451
00:28:02,992 --> 00:28:04,693
that is developing in this country

452
00:28:04,792 --> 00:28:07,627
in the response to legitimate
political and social grievances

453
00:28:07,726 --> 00:28:09,592
by bringing in troops

454
00:28:09,693 --> 00:28:12,559
rather than dealing with the
real issues and real problems.

455
00:28:16,059 --> 00:28:18,299
CRONKITE: In the name of
security, freedom of the press,

456
00:28:18,327 --> 00:28:20,559
freedom of movement, perhaps as far

457
00:28:20,659 --> 00:28:22,693
as the demonstrators
themselves are concerned,

458
00:28:22,792 --> 00:28:26,893
even freedom of speech have
been severely restricted here.

459
00:28:26,992 --> 00:28:32,059
A democratic convention is about
to begin in a police state.

460
00:28:32,159 --> 00:28:34,726
There just doesn't seem to
be any other way to say it.

461
00:28:36,893 --> 00:28:39,327
JOHN BAILEY: Will the
delegates please be seated.

462
00:28:39,426 --> 00:28:41,359
NARRATOR: Vice President Hubert Humphrey,

463
00:28:41,460 --> 00:28:44,893
President Johnson's chosen
successor, was the frontrunner.

464
00:28:44,992 --> 00:28:49,127
He had always been a hero to
his party's liberal wing,

465
00:28:49,226 --> 00:28:52,127
but because he had loyally
supported the president

466
00:28:52,226 --> 00:28:56,092
and the war, many delegates,
and most of the demonstrators

467
00:28:56,193 --> 00:29:00,328
outside the convention hall,
backed his antiwar rival,

468
00:29:00,427 --> 00:29:03,194
Senator Eugene McCarthy.

469
00:29:03,293 --> 00:29:06,394
(muffled shouting on megaphone)

470
00:29:06,493 --> 00:29:08,961
On the second night of the convention,

471
00:29:09,060 --> 00:29:11,128
the police drove hundreds of demonstrators

472
00:29:11,227 --> 00:29:15,093
out of Lincoln Park with
clubs and tear gas.

473
00:29:15,194 --> 00:29:16,860
(sirens wailing)

474
00:29:20,461 --> 00:29:23,237
JOHN CHANCELLOR: The delegates wearing
bands of black crepe on their arms...

475
00:29:23,261 --> 00:29:26,427
NARRATOR: The next afternoon,
the Democrats heatedly debated

476
00:29:26,528 --> 00:29:31,028
a plank in the party platform
calling for an end to the war.

477
00:29:31,128 --> 00:29:34,628
When Humphrey supporters voted it down,

478
00:29:34,727 --> 00:29:38,394
the antiwar delegates erupted.

479
00:29:38,493 --> 00:29:40,969
CHANCELLOR: ...who have joined New York
in this extraordinary demonstration

480
00:29:40,993 --> 00:29:45,493
of antiwar sentiment on
the convention floor.

481
00:29:45,593 --> 00:29:47,569
("Street Fighting Man" by
the Rolling Stones playing)

482
00:29:47,593 --> 00:29:49,836
DOUGLAS KIKER (on TV): The demonstrators
resisted when police attempted to arrest

483
00:29:49,860 --> 00:29:52,160
a young man who tried to
rip down an American flag.

484
00:29:52,261 --> 00:29:54,360
PROTESTOR: Watch... watch these fuckers.

485
00:29:54,461 --> 00:29:56,293
Don't turn your back on these fuckers!

486
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:03,029
MICK JAGGER: ♪ Everywhere I
hear the sound of marching... ♪

487
00:30:03,129 --> 00:30:04,470
PHILIP CAPUTO: The cops were all...

488
00:30:04,494 --> 00:30:06,054
they were guys from the neighborhoods...

489
00:30:06,129 --> 00:30:09,728
Italians, Polish guys, Irish guys.

490
00:30:09,829 --> 00:30:12,161
Probably some of them had been in Vietnam.

491
00:30:12,262 --> 00:30:13,762
And if they hadn't been,

492
00:30:13,861 --> 00:30:17,895
they certainly had cousins
or brothers who were.

493
00:30:17,994 --> 00:30:22,294
NARRATOR: Philip Caputo, who had
fought with the Marines in Vietnam,

494
00:30:22,395 --> 00:30:24,195
was now a reporter,

495
00:30:24,294 --> 00:30:28,195
assigned to cover the
conflict in American streets.

496
00:30:28,294 --> 00:30:31,094
Get a picture of them throwing the rocks!

497
00:30:33,228 --> 00:30:35,195
CAPUTO: So all of a sudden
the streets are filled

498
00:30:35,294 --> 00:30:37,462
with these kids who don't
look like college kids

499
00:30:37,561 --> 00:30:40,061
are supposed to look in the cops' view.

500
00:30:40,161 --> 00:30:41,962
(protestors shouting, sirens wailing)

501
00:30:42,061 --> 00:30:43,661
(explosion)

502
00:30:43,762 --> 00:30:45,442
And some of them were committing vandalism

503
00:30:45,529 --> 00:30:49,228
and yelling obscenities.

504
00:30:49,329 --> 00:30:52,794
And I think a lot of policemen saw that

505
00:30:52,895 --> 00:30:59,161
as abusing the privileges that
they had and scorning them.

506
00:30:59,262 --> 00:31:00,661
They are provoking us

507
00:31:00,762 --> 00:31:03,695
but we do not want to confront
them now... move back, please.

508
00:31:03,794 --> 00:31:05,995
JAGGER: ♪ Well, then
what can a poor boy do ♪

509
00:31:06,095 --> 00:31:09,795
♪ Except to sing for a
rock 'n' roll band ♪

510
00:31:09,896 --> 00:31:12,662
♪ 'Cause in sleepy London town

511
00:31:12,763 --> 00:31:16,062
♪ There's just no place for
a street fighting man ♪

512
00:31:16,162 --> 00:31:20,729
(police chanting): Move back! Move back!

513
00:31:23,530 --> 00:31:25,995
(screaming)

514
00:31:32,463 --> 00:31:38,130
That's a report, on film, from
Grant Park, downtown Chicago.

515
00:31:40,396 --> 00:31:42,763
NARRATOR: That evening,
thousands of demonstrators,

516
00:31:42,862 --> 00:31:45,963
barred from getting anywhere
near the convention,

517
00:31:46,062 --> 00:31:49,963
were marching toward
Democratic Party headquarters

518
00:31:50,062 --> 00:31:53,196
in the Hilton Hotel on
Michigan Avenue instead.

519
00:31:53,295 --> 00:31:56,696
ALINE SAARINEN: The marchers seem
to have come from everywhere

520
00:31:56,795 --> 00:32:00,229
and now are coming up
south on Michigan Avenue

521
00:32:00,330 --> 00:32:01,696
back toward the point where

522
00:32:01,795 --> 00:32:05,630
the police were blocking them before.

523
00:32:07,730 --> 00:32:09,173
NATIONAL GUARDSMAN: Get your hands up!

524
00:32:09,197 --> 00:32:10,730
Hands up!

525
00:32:10,831 --> 00:32:12,063
Come on!

526
00:32:12,163 --> 00:32:15,031
(shouting)

527
00:32:20,063 --> 00:32:21,897
Come on now! Go! Go!

528
00:32:21,996 --> 00:32:25,696
I place before you for the
Democratic nomination

529
00:32:25,797 --> 00:32:28,496
as president of the United States

530
00:32:28,596 --> 00:32:32,864
the name of Senator Eugene J.
McCarthy of Minnesota.

531
00:32:32,964 --> 00:32:37,031
(cheers and applause)

532
00:32:37,131 --> 00:32:41,364
Downtown Chicago at Balbo
and Michigan Avenues,

533
00:32:41,464 --> 00:32:45,131
there has been in progress for
some time a peace demonstration.

534
00:32:45,230 --> 00:32:47,496
The police have come to put it down.

535
00:32:47,596 --> 00:32:50,096
The National Guard has been called to help.

536
00:32:50,196 --> 00:32:53,596
(crowd chanting "sieg heil" at police)

537
00:33:01,096 --> 00:33:05,096
(chanting continues)

538
00:33:05,196 --> 00:33:09,432
(siren wails)

539
00:33:10,764 --> 00:33:15,997
(screaming)

540
00:33:16,097 --> 00:33:17,597
MAN: Get him!

541
00:33:17,697 --> 00:33:20,231
Get him! Get him!

542
00:33:28,798 --> 00:33:30,731
GABE PRESSMAN: ...people screaming...

543
00:33:30,831 --> 00:33:32,240
JAMES WILLBANKS: I turned
on the television.

544
00:33:32,264 --> 00:33:34,108
I don't think I was too
particularly thoughtful

545
00:33:34,132 --> 00:33:35,432
as a junior in college,

546
00:33:35,532 --> 00:33:38,798
but I thought the country was
coming apart at the seams.

547
00:33:38,898 --> 00:33:41,032
It looked like we were
devolving into madness.

548
00:33:42,798 --> 00:33:46,664
And I couldn't tell, was it
protestors or the police

549
00:33:46,764 --> 00:33:47,764
or was everybody insane?

550
00:33:47,831 --> 00:33:51,664
(crowd chanting)

551
00:33:51,764 --> 00:33:53,465
(gavel pounding)

552
00:33:53,564 --> 00:33:56,197
NARRATOR: At the convention
there was more confusion.

553
00:33:56,298 --> 00:33:59,298
Some antiwar delegates once pledged

554
00:33:59,398 --> 00:34:02,597
to the murdered Robert Kennedy
now threw their support

555
00:34:02,697 --> 00:34:04,697
behind yet another candidate,

556
00:34:04,798 --> 00:34:08,398
South Dakota senator George McGovern.

557
00:34:08,497 --> 00:34:11,731
ABRAHAM RIBICOFF: And with George McGovern
as president of the United States,

558
00:34:11,831 --> 00:34:15,732
we wouldn't have to have Gestapo tactics

559
00:34:15,832 --> 00:34:19,598
in the streets of Chicago.

560
00:34:19,698 --> 00:34:26,366
(crowd reacts boisterously)

561
00:34:26,466 --> 00:34:28,799
PRESSMAN: The persistent
chanting by the crowd,

562
00:34:28,899 --> 00:34:31,098
"The whole world is watching."

563
00:34:31,198 --> 00:34:34,399
NARRATOR: LBJ, watching
the chaos on television,

564
00:34:34,498 --> 00:34:36,366
considered flying to Chicago

565
00:34:36,466 --> 00:34:39,598
and getting back in the race himself.

566
00:34:39,698 --> 00:34:42,633
Mayor Daley told the president
he'd have enough delegates

567
00:34:42,732 --> 00:34:44,533
to win the nomination,

568
00:34:44,633 --> 00:34:48,933
but the Secret Service warned it
could not guarantee his safety.

569
00:34:53,399 --> 00:34:57,899
RON FERRIZZI: I got to Australia the
last week of August 1968... RandR.

570
00:34:57,998 --> 00:35:00,498
I never really wanted to go on RandR.

571
00:35:00,598 --> 00:35:03,098
I felt that, how can you relax?

572
00:35:03,198 --> 00:35:06,866
So I turn on the TV and the first scene...

573
00:35:06,966 --> 00:35:09,133
The TV gets bright.

574
00:35:09,232 --> 00:35:11,732
The first scene on... it was the camera...

575
00:35:11,832 --> 00:35:15,733
was a close-up, was over the
shoulder of this storm trooper

576
00:35:15,833 --> 00:35:18,034
who had a kid by the scruff of his shirt.

577
00:35:18,134 --> 00:35:20,666
And he smacks him with his bat.

578
00:35:20,766 --> 00:35:23,766
And there's blood and
everything and all this jumble.

579
00:35:23,867 --> 00:35:26,534
And then the camera pans
out and it's far away.

580
00:35:26,634 --> 00:35:28,276
And these riots and there's
fighting going on.

581
00:35:28,300 --> 00:35:29,867
And I go, "Oh, my God,

582
00:35:29,967 --> 00:35:31,666
the Russians invaded Czechoslovakia."

583
00:35:31,766 --> 00:35:34,666
And then ditto, ditto, ditto,
"Chicago Democratic Convention,

584
00:35:34,766 --> 00:35:36,534
United States of America."

585
00:35:36,634 --> 00:35:39,134
And I said... you know,
at that moment my...

586
00:35:39,233 --> 00:35:41,134
I-I was politicized.

587
00:35:41,233 --> 00:35:44,099
("For What It's Worth" by
Buffalo Springfield playing)

588
00:35:51,099 --> 00:35:55,266
♪ There's somethin' happenin' here ♪

589
00:35:55,367 --> 00:35:58,499
♪ What it is ain't exactly clear ♪

590
00:35:58,599 --> 00:36:00,367
FERRIZZI: At that moment in time,

591
00:36:00,467 --> 00:36:03,534
I realized that anybody who
really cared for America

592
00:36:03,634 --> 00:36:06,900
was sent halfway around the
world chasing some ghost

593
00:36:06,999 --> 00:36:09,900
in the jungle, killing
somebody else's grandmother

594
00:36:09,999 --> 00:36:11,900
for no reason at all.

595
00:36:11,999 --> 00:36:14,142
BUFFALO SPRINGFIELD: ♪ What's that sound,
everybody look what's going down ♪

596
00:36:14,166 --> 00:36:17,801
FERRIZZI: And, in the meantime,
my country's being torn apart.

597
00:36:17,901 --> 00:36:19,767
So I saw somebody who looked like my dad

598
00:36:19,868 --> 00:36:21,308
hitting somebody who looked like me.

599
00:36:21,401 --> 00:36:25,301
Oh, my God, whose side would I be on?

600
00:36:25,401 --> 00:36:28,734
BUFFALO SPRINGFIELD: ♪ There's
battle lines being drawn ♪

601
00:36:28,834 --> 00:36:35,100
♪ Nobody's right if everybody's wrong ♪

602
00:36:35,200 --> 00:36:38,968
♪ Young people speakin' their minds ♪

603
00:36:39,067 --> 00:36:43,035
♪ Getting so much
resistance from behind ♪

604
00:36:43,135 --> 00:36:44,135
♪ It's time we stop

605
00:36:44,234 --> 00:36:45,801
NARRATOR: In the end,

606
00:36:45,901 --> 00:36:48,868
Humphrey won the nomination
on the first ballot.

607
00:36:48,968 --> 00:36:51,435
He told the press how pleased he was,

608
00:36:51,535 --> 00:36:55,567
but he confessed to his wife
that the convention had left him

609
00:36:55,667 --> 00:36:59,500
feeling heartbroken, battered, and beaten,

610
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:01,734
as if he'd survived a shipwreck.

611
00:37:03,767 --> 00:37:06,368
A presidential commission would
declare what had happened

612
00:37:06,468 --> 00:37:10,700
in Chicago a "police riot,"
but in a Gallup poll,

613
00:37:10,801 --> 00:37:14,135
56% of Americans approved

614
00:37:14,234 --> 00:37:17,868
of the way the police had
handled the demonstrators.

615
00:37:17,968 --> 00:37:22,136
And when Richard Nixon
chose to open his campaign

616
00:37:22,235 --> 00:37:24,402
with a motorcade through the Chicago Loop,

617
00:37:24,501 --> 00:37:29,036
nearly half a million Chicagoans
turned out to cheer him.

618
00:37:36,201 --> 00:37:38,136
MICHAEL HOLMES (on tape): Hello, Mom, Pop.

619
00:37:38,235 --> 00:37:40,436
I really can't tell you too
much about this country

620
00:37:40,536 --> 00:37:42,201
except the rice paddies stink.

621
00:37:42,302 --> 00:37:46,568
And it's just miles and miles
of nothing but rice paddies.

622
00:37:46,668 --> 00:37:48,068
And they got dikes in them.

623
00:37:48,168 --> 00:37:49,168
Real cool looking.

624
00:37:49,201 --> 00:37:50,802
We go through them with our APCs

625
00:37:50,902 --> 00:37:53,268
and tear them down and everything else.

626
00:37:53,369 --> 00:37:57,369
("Road to Marscota" by
Peter Walker playing)

627
00:37:57,469 --> 00:38:01,436
NARRATOR: On August 29, the day after
police and demonstrators clashed

628
00:38:01,536 --> 00:38:05,302
in Chicago, 20-year-old
private Michael Holmes

629
00:38:05,402 --> 00:38:08,735
arrived in Vietnam.

630
00:38:08,835 --> 00:38:12,768
He was born and brought up in
the tiny town of Williamsville,

631
00:38:12,869 --> 00:38:15,469
in the heart of the Missouri Ozarks.

632
00:38:15,568 --> 00:38:17,969
His father and mother ran the general store

633
00:38:18,068 --> 00:38:20,701
where Michael worked
every day after school.

634
00:38:20,802 --> 00:38:24,736
He floated the rivers,
hunted deer and squirrels,

635
00:38:24,836 --> 00:38:27,836
and was going steady with
a girl named Darlene.

636
00:38:27,937 --> 00:38:31,836
He had trouble keeping up in high school,

637
00:38:31,937 --> 00:38:35,470
did not complete community
college and, as a result,

638
00:38:35,569 --> 00:38:39,502
was immediately drafted into the Army.

639
00:38:39,602 --> 00:38:44,637
In Vietnam, he was assigned to
F Troop, 17th Armored Cavalry,

640
00:38:44,736 --> 00:38:48,102
196th Light Infantry Brigade,

641
00:38:48,202 --> 00:38:50,769
stationed at an isolated firebase

642
00:38:50,870 --> 00:38:56,002
22 miles south of Danang called Baldy.

643
00:38:56,102 --> 00:38:58,537
HOLMES (on tape): So you ask
what the size of Baldy was.

644
00:38:58,637 --> 00:39:01,437
Well, it's just about
as big as Williamsville

645
00:39:01,537 --> 00:39:04,702
and maybe a little bit bigger.

646
00:39:04,803 --> 00:39:09,002
I sent you a picture of me and
a bunch of the other guys.

647
00:39:12,870 --> 00:39:14,602
It's not really that bad.

648
00:39:14,702 --> 00:39:16,336
It's... in a way I like it.

649
00:39:16,437 --> 00:39:18,470
It's just being away from home

650
00:39:18,569 --> 00:39:20,303
and everything that I don't like.

651
00:39:23,537 --> 00:39:27,404
NARRATOR: In Williamsville, family
and friends gathered to listen

652
00:39:27,503 --> 00:39:29,871
to Michael's reports from Vietnam

653
00:39:29,971 --> 00:39:34,237
and to fill him in on what
was happening back home.

654
00:39:34,337 --> 00:39:37,304
WOMAN (on tape): We're all down here
at your dad and mother's tonight

655
00:39:37,404 --> 00:39:40,603
and we thought we'd all
say something for you.

656
00:39:40,703 --> 00:39:45,603
And you could hear our voice
and feel like you's back home.

657
00:39:45,703 --> 00:39:46,603
And we're looking forward...

658
00:39:46,703 --> 00:39:48,038
HAROLD (on tape): Hello, Mike.

659
00:39:48,138 --> 00:39:49,947
I've been doing a lot of
squirrel hunting lately,

660
00:39:49,971 --> 00:39:52,103
and killing quite a few.

661
00:39:52,203 --> 00:39:55,471
Well, the Ozarks really look
beautiful this time of year.

662
00:39:55,570 --> 00:39:56,871
Looking forward to seeing you.

663
00:39:56,971 --> 00:39:58,611
JERRY (on tape): Uh, this is Jerry, Mike.

664
00:39:58,670 --> 00:40:01,871
I think Ricky and Carol broke up, Mike.

665
00:40:01,971 --> 00:40:03,770
Ricky, he's really prowling now.

666
00:40:03,871 --> 00:40:06,670
GLENDA (on tape): Mike, this is Glenda.

667
00:40:06,770 --> 00:40:09,971
Um, I got a boyfriend,
and his name's Danny.

668
00:40:10,070 --> 00:40:11,270
And...

669
00:40:11,371 --> 00:40:13,003
GLEN (on tape): Mike, this is Glen.

670
00:40:13,103 --> 00:40:15,438
All these other boys been
talking about hunting,

671
00:40:15,538 --> 00:40:17,270
I'm gonna talk about girls.

672
00:40:17,371 --> 00:40:20,203
(chuckling): Girls and fast cars.

673
00:40:20,304 --> 00:40:23,270
Gene Bilbury got him a new Bonneville.

674
00:40:23,371 --> 00:40:26,770
MICHAEL'S MOTHER (on tape):
Michael, this is Mother.

675
00:40:26,872 --> 00:40:30,238
The picture you sent us was real
good, it looked just like you.

676
00:40:30,338 --> 00:40:34,204
I even liked that moustache,
and I didn't think I would.

677
00:40:34,305 --> 00:40:35,805
And we miss you a lot.

678
00:40:35,905 --> 00:40:37,848
MICHAEL'S FATHER (on tape):
This is your dad talking.

679
00:40:37,872 --> 00:40:42,671
We think that you'll be okay,
just don't be nosing around

680
00:40:42,771 --> 00:40:45,305
where you don't have any business

681
00:40:45,405 --> 00:40:48,805
and get hold of a booby trap or something.

682
00:40:48,905 --> 00:40:52,972
This is about the end of this
tape, so goodbye for now.

683
00:41:02,071 --> 00:41:05,872
HOLMES (on tape): We burned down
a whole lot of hooches today

684
00:41:05,972 --> 00:41:09,139
of these people who don't
cooperate with us, you know.

685
00:41:09,238 --> 00:41:10,918
Yeah, I don't I don't really understand it

686
00:41:11,004 --> 00:41:16,238
because if, if they are, you know, not VC,

687
00:41:16,338 --> 00:41:19,372
and we do that to them,
you know, treat them bad,

688
00:41:19,472 --> 00:41:21,439
then they're gonna turn VC.

689
00:41:21,539 --> 00:41:23,071
The Army does everything backward.

690
00:41:29,640 --> 00:41:33,772
NARRATOR: One morning that fall,
several APCs from F Troop

691
00:41:33,873 --> 00:41:36,839
moved cautiously up Highway
One toward Danang.

692
00:41:36,940 --> 00:41:41,339
Michael Holmes rode in the second vehicle.

693
00:41:41,440 --> 00:41:45,140
(explosion)

694
00:41:50,105 --> 00:41:54,839
His APC hit a 300-pound bomb
buried beneath the road.

695
00:41:54,940 --> 00:41:58,239
Three of his friends died instantly.

696
00:41:58,339 --> 00:42:00,672
Holmes was thrown clear

697
00:42:00,772 --> 00:42:05,072
and woke up five hours
later in the hospital.

698
00:42:08,205 --> 00:42:10,272
HOLMES (on tape): Hello, Mom, Pop.

699
00:42:10,373 --> 00:42:11,640
This is me.

700
00:42:11,739 --> 00:42:13,605
Up to this point I didn't know

701
00:42:13,705 --> 00:42:16,973
if there was really a
war going on over here.

702
00:42:17,072 --> 00:42:20,873
I just thought maybe they was
playing a game or something.

703
00:42:20,973 --> 00:42:24,505
But I could've reached out and
touched two of those people.

704
00:42:24,605 --> 00:42:26,640
I knew them real good.

705
00:42:26,739 --> 00:42:28,315
And please don't worry
about me getting hurt

706
00:42:28,339 --> 00:42:31,406
because I'm not hurt all that bad.

707
00:42:31,505 --> 00:42:34,807
Two more Purple Hearts and
I'm out of the field,

708
00:42:34,907 --> 00:42:38,673
and I think maybe I get to get
out of the country altogether.

709
00:42:44,106 --> 00:42:49,474
NARRATOR: Six months later, Michael
Holmes was on patrol, walking point,

710
00:42:49,573 --> 00:42:53,740
when he was killed by a
North Vietnamese soldier.

711
00:43:02,173 --> 00:43:04,240
LIZ TROTTA: This is Long An province.

712
00:43:04,340 --> 00:43:07,673
Since 1962, it has been an
important testing ground

713
00:43:07,773 --> 00:43:09,874
for the pacification program.

714
00:43:09,974 --> 00:43:14,773
Amidst the flat rice fields and
coconut trees lies Loc Tien Mot.

715
00:43:14,874 --> 00:43:18,441
The hamlet chief says only more
troops will make his people safe

716
00:43:18,541 --> 00:43:20,240
from the Viet Cong.

717
00:43:20,340 --> 00:43:21,606
During the night, he adds,

718
00:43:21,706 --> 00:43:24,840
the guerrillas go from house
to house collecting taxes.

719
00:43:24,941 --> 00:43:28,773
The government may have left
its traces of pacification.

720
00:43:28,874 --> 00:43:30,773
The Viet Cong have not left.

721
00:43:30,874 --> 00:43:34,006
Liz Trotta, NBC News, South Vietnam.

722
00:43:35,642 --> 00:43:38,308
NARRATOR: Since the Viet Cong
had been so badly weakened

723
00:43:38,408 --> 00:43:41,942
in the Tet Offensive and the two
offensives that followed it,

724
00:43:42,042 --> 00:43:43,808
General Abrams believed

725
00:43:43,908 --> 00:43:46,507
that hundreds of thousands of ARVN troops

726
00:43:46,607 --> 00:43:49,308
could now be freed to
secure the countryside

727
00:43:49,408 --> 00:43:52,274
and win support for the
government in Saigon.

728
00:43:54,142 --> 00:43:57,107
But permanent security was not possible

729
00:43:57,207 --> 00:44:00,442
unless the Viet Cong
political infrastructure...

730
00:44:00,542 --> 00:44:03,341
the tax collectors and village chiefs,

731
00:44:03,442 --> 00:44:06,274
runners and spies and sympathizers...

732
00:44:06,375 --> 00:44:11,207
were killed, captured,
or persuaded to defect.

733
00:44:11,308 --> 00:44:17,475
To do that, the CIA had
created the Phoenix Program.

734
00:44:17,574 --> 00:44:20,542
RICHARD THRELKELD: The villagers
of Thuy Xuan have been assembled

735
00:44:20,642 --> 00:44:22,341
in the village schoolyard,

736
00:44:22,442 --> 00:44:25,841
where teams of government
interrogators are trying

737
00:44:25,942 --> 00:44:28,475
to pick out from among them
the members of the Viet Cong

738
00:44:28,574 --> 00:44:30,375
who live here.

739
00:44:30,475 --> 00:44:33,741
This sort of Phoenix
exercise is a weekly event

740
00:44:33,841 --> 00:44:36,707
in districts throughout South Vietnam.

741
00:44:39,242 --> 00:44:41,075
NARRATOR: After recovering from his wounds,

742
00:44:41,175 --> 00:44:45,108
Lieutenant Vincent Okamoto
became an intelligence officer

743
00:44:45,208 --> 00:44:48,409
attached to the program.

744
00:44:48,508 --> 00:44:49,885
The Phoenix Program was
premised on the fact

745
00:44:49,909 --> 00:44:52,119
that the North Vietnamese coming
down the Ho Chi Minh Trail,

746
00:44:52,143 --> 00:44:53,675
when they went into South Vietnam,

747
00:44:53,775 --> 00:44:55,318
they were strangers,
just like the Americans.

748
00:44:55,342 --> 00:44:58,876
They didn't know the terrain,
they didn't know the people.

749
00:44:58,976 --> 00:45:02,309
So in order for them to
function operationally,

750
00:45:02,409 --> 00:45:04,643
they needed the Viet Cong infrastructure.

751
00:45:04,742 --> 00:45:09,075
And so the project was
to eliminate those guys.

752
00:45:09,175 --> 00:45:11,809
And I think it made a great deal of sense.

753
00:45:13,809 --> 00:45:17,008
STUART HERRINGTON: The communists
thought Phoenix was very effective.

754
00:45:17,108 --> 00:45:19,608
They saw it as a significant threat

755
00:45:19,708 --> 00:45:22,008
to the viability of the revolution

756
00:45:22,108 --> 00:45:26,575
because to the extent that you
could take a sharp pointed knife

757
00:45:26,675 --> 00:45:28,376
and carve out the Viet Cong,

758
00:45:28,476 --> 00:45:30,675
the shadow Viet Cong,
the shadow government,

759
00:45:30,775 --> 00:45:33,943
then their means of control
over the civilian population

760
00:45:34,043 --> 00:45:36,108
in the South was dealt a death blow.

761
00:45:38,409 --> 00:45:41,377
NARRATOR: The pressure the Phoenix
Program put on the Viet Cong

762
00:45:41,477 --> 00:45:45,676
caused dangerous signs of what
one communist official described

763
00:45:45,776 --> 00:45:49,910
as "wavering" among his
followers in the Mekong Delta...

764
00:45:50,009 --> 00:45:53,709
depression, discouragement,
and widespread drunkenness

765
00:45:53,810 --> 00:45:57,877
even among men going into battle.

766
00:45:59,343 --> 00:46:03,276
But Phoenix's targeting was only
as good as the intelligence

767
00:46:03,377 --> 00:46:08,743
upon which it was based,
and that varied widely.

768
00:46:08,843 --> 00:46:12,243
DAVID CULHANE: This film, made
by a CBS stringer cameraman

769
00:46:12,343 --> 00:46:15,444
some weeks ago shows
South Vietnamese forces

770
00:46:15,544 --> 00:46:16,843
interrogating an old man

771
00:46:16,944 --> 00:46:19,176
identified as a minor VC official.

772
00:46:21,477 --> 00:46:22,719
NARRATOR: In the Phoenix Program,

773
00:46:22,743 --> 00:46:26,810
Americans served in an advisory capacity;

774
00:46:26,910 --> 00:46:30,144
most of the day-to-day
enforcement was left to

775
00:46:30,243 --> 00:46:33,644
the South Vietnamese Provincial
Reconnaissance Units...

776
00:46:33,743 --> 00:46:35,676
the PRUs...

777
00:46:35,776 --> 00:46:38,109
who sometimes were more interested

778
00:46:38,209 --> 00:46:42,744
in settling old scores than
in rooting out communists.

779
00:46:44,610 --> 00:46:47,677
OKAMOTO: It was scary because
it was subject to abuse,

780
00:46:47,777 --> 00:46:51,045
and was abused.

781
00:46:51,145 --> 00:46:55,811
Again, the geniuses in Saigon
would use their computers

782
00:46:55,911 --> 00:46:59,445
to come up with the blacklists.

783
00:47:01,445 --> 00:47:04,045
You get the list, and you check
with other intelligence officers

784
00:47:04,145 --> 00:47:06,077
in the district.

785
00:47:06,177 --> 00:47:08,945
And you try to pool that information.

786
00:47:09,045 --> 00:47:11,077
Next night, or a couple nights later,

787
00:47:11,177 --> 00:47:13,710
a bunch of cowboys from the
PRUs would go out there.

788
00:47:13,811 --> 00:47:17,411
And, you know, knock on the door,

789
00:47:17,510 --> 00:47:18,811
"April Fool, motherfucker!"

790
00:47:18,911 --> 00:47:19,911
And boom.

791
00:47:21,545 --> 00:47:23,145
There wasn't any real accountability.

792
00:47:26,411 --> 00:47:29,077
NARRATOR: Later, the director
of the Phoenix Program

793
00:47:29,177 --> 00:47:32,645
admitted to Congress that
no one knew how many

794
00:47:32,744 --> 00:47:37,344
of the more than 20,000 who had
been killed were innocent.

795
00:47:39,478 --> 00:47:41,710
And although the program did succeed

796
00:47:41,811 --> 00:47:44,646
in degrading the Viet Cong infrastructure,

797
00:47:44,745 --> 00:47:47,412
the government of Nguyen Van Thieu remained

798
00:47:47,511 --> 00:47:49,511
as unpopular as ever.

799
00:47:52,412 --> 00:47:55,778
A poll taken in the Delta
province of Long An

800
00:47:55,879 --> 00:48:00,211
would show 35% of the people
ready to vote for Thieu,

801
00:48:00,312 --> 00:48:04,312
20% favoring the National Liberation Front,

802
00:48:04,412 --> 00:48:09,245
and 45% backing someone, anyone,

803
00:48:09,345 --> 00:48:11,745
opposed to both the Viet Cong

804
00:48:11,845 --> 00:48:15,711
and the American-backed regime in Saigon.

805
00:48:20,345 --> 00:48:21,879
MAN: In Vietnam there's a wound

806
00:48:21,979 --> 00:48:24,078
that does not cease its bleeding.

807
00:48:24,178 --> 00:48:29,711
I'm talking about the scream
of death and the wound of war.

808
00:48:29,812 --> 00:48:31,778
We did not come to talk with you, Mr.
Humphrey.

809
00:48:31,879 --> 00:48:33,711
We have come to arrest you.

810
00:48:33,812 --> 00:48:35,379
Now you've had equal time.

811
00:48:35,479 --> 00:48:36,312
Shut up!

812
00:48:36,412 --> 00:48:38,312
(mixture of boos and cheers)

813
00:48:38,412 --> 00:48:42,046
NARRATOR: Hubert Humphrey's
presidential campaign was in trouble.

814
00:48:42,146 --> 00:48:45,546
Richard Nixon was comfortably
ahead in the polls

815
00:48:45,646 --> 00:48:47,512
and refused to debate.

816
00:48:47,612 --> 00:48:50,179
"I've come to the conclusion

817
00:48:50,279 --> 00:48:52,246
that there's no way to win the war,"

818
00:48:52,346 --> 00:48:55,846
he told three of his
speechwriters in private.

819
00:48:55,947 --> 00:48:57,779
"But we have to say the opposite,

820
00:48:57,880 --> 00:49:00,980
just to keep some bargaining leverage."

821
00:49:01,079 --> 00:49:05,380
Compounding Humphrey's problem
was a third-party candidate,

822
00:49:05,480 --> 00:49:06,880
George Wallace,

823
00:49:06,980 --> 00:49:10,047
the segregationist former
governor of Alabama.

824
00:49:10,147 --> 00:49:13,547
He was sure to peel away some white voters

825
00:49:13,647 --> 00:49:16,980
who normally voted Democratic.

826
00:49:17,079 --> 00:49:21,147
Humphrey had confided his
doubts about the war to Johnson

827
00:49:21,246 --> 00:49:25,447
early on, but had always
remained stubbornly loyal to him

828
00:49:25,547 --> 00:49:26,813
in public.

829
00:49:26,913 --> 00:49:30,712
Now his advisors told him
that if he wanted to win

830
00:49:30,813 --> 00:49:33,012
he had to break with the president

831
00:49:33,112 --> 00:49:36,779
and make a bold gesture
toward ending the war.

832
00:49:38,612 --> 00:49:41,712
On September 30, he called for a total halt

833
00:49:41,813 --> 00:49:44,547
to the bombing of North Vietnam.

834
00:49:44,647 --> 00:49:47,079
HUMPHREY: I would stop
the bombing of the North

835
00:49:47,179 --> 00:49:50,481
as an acceptable risk for peace

836
00:49:50,580 --> 00:49:55,180
because I believe it could lead
to success in the negotiations

837
00:49:55,280 --> 00:49:57,113
and thereby shorten the war.

838
00:49:57,213 --> 00:50:01,148
This would be the best
protection for our troops.

839
00:50:01,247 --> 00:50:04,580
NARRATOR: Johnson felt
betrayed and refused to speak

840
00:50:04,680 --> 00:50:06,881
to his own vice president for a time.

841
00:50:08,213 --> 00:50:11,981
But on October 31, just five
days before the election,

842
00:50:12,080 --> 00:50:15,648
the president himself made
a surprise announcement.

843
00:50:17,780 --> 00:50:21,914
He was stopping all
bombing of North Vietnam.

844
00:50:22,013 --> 00:50:25,613
There had been real
progress in Paris, he said.

845
00:50:25,713 --> 00:50:29,914
Hanoi had agreed for the first
time to talk with Saigon,

846
00:50:30,013 --> 00:50:34,648
and the United States had agreed
to include the Viet Cong.

847
00:50:34,747 --> 00:50:40,314
It suddenly looked as
if peace were possible.

848
00:50:40,414 --> 00:50:42,180
Humphrey was jubilant.

849
00:50:42,280 --> 00:50:45,013
His poll numbers rose overnight.

850
00:50:45,113 --> 00:50:49,481
He was confident he would now
be able to overtake Nixon.

851
00:50:49,580 --> 00:50:52,949
But then, on November 2,

852
00:50:53,049 --> 00:50:56,815
with just three days to go until
Americans went to the polls,

853
00:50:56,915 --> 00:50:59,748
President Thieu suddenly announced

854
00:50:59,848 --> 00:51:03,014
that the South Vietnamese
government would not attend

855
00:51:03,114 --> 00:51:05,382
the proposed talks after all.

856
00:51:07,214 --> 00:51:09,781
A representative of the Nixon campaign

857
00:51:09,882 --> 00:51:13,882
at the candidate's personal
direction had secretly contacted

858
00:51:13,982 --> 00:51:15,449
the Saigon government

859
00:51:15,549 --> 00:51:18,382
urging Thieu to stay away from the talks,

860
00:51:18,482 --> 00:51:21,181
promising that once Nixon was elected,

861
00:51:21,281 --> 00:51:25,482
he would drive a harder bargain
with Hanoi than Humphrey would.

862
00:51:25,581 --> 00:51:30,949
Thanks to a CIA bug planted
in Thieu's Saigon office

863
00:51:31,049 --> 00:51:34,614
and an FBI wiretap on the
South Vietnamese embassy

864
00:51:34,714 --> 00:51:38,581
in Washington, Johnson got
wind of what had happened

865
00:51:38,681 --> 00:51:40,982
and called his friend Everett Dirksen,

866
00:51:41,081 --> 00:51:43,482
the Republican Senate minority leader,

867
00:51:43,581 --> 00:51:48,281
to warn him that the Nixon
people were committing treason.

868
00:51:48,382 --> 00:51:50,257
LYNDON JOHNSON: I'm reading
their hand, Everett.

869
00:51:50,281 --> 00:51:52,149
I don't want to get this in the campaign.

870
00:51:52,248 --> 00:51:53,549
DIRKSEN: That's right.

871
00:51:53,649 --> 00:51:54,892
And they oughtn't to be doing this.

872
00:51:54,916 --> 00:51:55,983
This is treason. I know.

873
00:51:56,082 --> 00:51:58,182
And I think it would shock America

874
00:51:58,282 --> 00:52:02,215
if a principal candidate was
playing with a source like this

875
00:52:02,316 --> 00:52:03,715
on a matter this important.

876
00:52:03,816 --> 00:52:04,950
Yeah.

877
00:52:05,050 --> 00:52:06,282
I know this...

878
00:52:06,383 --> 00:52:09,015
that they're contacting a foreign power

879
00:52:09,115 --> 00:52:10,349
in the middle of a war.

880
00:52:10,450 --> 00:52:11,483
That's a mistake.

881
00:52:11,582 --> 00:52:12,883
And it's a damn bad mistake.

882
00:52:15,483 --> 00:52:16,282
RICHARD NIXON: Mr. President?

883
00:52:16,383 --> 00:52:17,282
JOHNSON: Yes.

884
00:52:17,383 --> 00:52:19,082
This is Dick Nixon. Yes, Dick.

885
00:52:19,182 --> 00:52:20,515
I just went on Meet the Press

886
00:52:20,615 --> 00:52:25,950
and said that I had given
you my personal assurance

887
00:52:26,050 --> 00:52:29,115
that I would do everything
possible to cooperate

888
00:52:29,215 --> 00:52:32,150
both before the election and if
elected, after the election.

889
00:52:32,249 --> 00:52:33,650
I just wanted you to know

890
00:52:33,749 --> 00:52:36,950
that I feel very, very strongly about this

891
00:52:37,050 --> 00:52:40,550
and any rumblings around

892
00:52:40,650 --> 00:52:44,349
about somebody trying to sabotage

893
00:52:44,450 --> 00:52:45,950
the Saigon government's attitude

894
00:52:46,050 --> 00:52:47,349
certainly has no...

895
00:52:47,450 --> 00:52:51,749
absolutely no credibility
as far as I am concerned.

896
00:52:51,849 --> 00:52:53,115
That's, that's...

897
00:52:53,215 --> 00:52:54,682
I'm very happy to hear that, Dick,

898
00:52:54,782 --> 00:52:57,651
because that is taking place.

899
00:52:57,750 --> 00:53:01,484
My God, I would never do
anything to encourage Saigon

900
00:53:01,583 --> 00:53:03,159
not to come to the table because basically,

901
00:53:03,183 --> 00:53:05,451
that was what you got.

902
00:53:05,551 --> 00:53:06,683
Well, that's good, Dick.

903
00:53:06,783 --> 00:53:08,783
We've got to get this
goddamned war off the plate,

904
00:53:08,850 --> 00:53:11,226
the quicker the better, and the
hell with the political credit.

905
00:53:11,250 --> 00:53:12,250
Believe me.

906
00:53:12,350 --> 00:53:13,350
Thank you, Dick.

907
00:53:17,551 --> 00:53:21,051
NARRATOR: Nixon was lying
and Johnson knew it.

908
00:53:21,151 --> 00:53:23,051
But to go public with the information,

909
00:53:23,151 --> 00:53:25,817
the president would have
to reveal the methods

910
00:53:25,917 --> 00:53:27,051
by which he had learned

911
00:53:27,151 --> 00:53:30,350
of the Republican candidate's duplicity.

912
00:53:30,451 --> 00:53:32,917
He was unwilling to do so.

913
00:53:33,016 --> 00:53:36,551
Nixon's secret was safe.

914
00:53:36,651 --> 00:53:38,783
The American public was never told

915
00:53:38,884 --> 00:53:43,151
that the regime for which
35,000 Americans had died

916
00:53:43,250 --> 00:53:45,516
had been willing to boycott peace talks

917
00:53:45,616 --> 00:53:49,183
to help elect Richard Nixon
or that he had been willing

918
00:53:49,283 --> 00:53:54,884
to delay an end to the bloodshed
in order to get elected.

919
00:53:54,984 --> 00:53:59,418
REPORTER: At 10:45 this morning,
Eastern Standard Time...

920
00:53:59,517 --> 00:54:04,717
NARRATOR: On Election Day, Richard
Milhous Nixon won the presidency

921
00:54:04,818 --> 00:54:08,251
with 43.4 percent of the vote.

922
00:54:08,351 --> 00:54:12,452
Hubert Humphrey received 42.7 percent.

923
00:54:16,751 --> 00:54:19,885
The Nixon campaign's secret
maneuvering may have helped him

924
00:54:19,985 --> 00:54:23,418
win the election, but the
president-elect's fear

925
00:54:23,517 --> 00:54:26,684
that that maneuvering
might someday be exposed

926
00:54:26,784 --> 00:54:29,152
would be part of his undoing.

927
00:54:32,818 --> 00:54:35,418
Thieu waited several
weeks after the election

928
00:54:35,517 --> 00:54:40,684
before agreeing to send
a delegation to Paris.

929
00:54:40,784 --> 00:54:45,617
There, everything stalled over
the seating arrangements.

930
00:54:45,717 --> 00:54:50,552
The North Vietnamese had
insisted on a square table,

931
00:54:50,652 --> 00:54:54,084
with separate sides for all
four parties to the talks...

932
00:54:54,184 --> 00:54:58,784
Hanoi, the Viet Cong, Saigon,
and the United States.

933
00:54:58,885 --> 00:55:04,118
Saigon refused to take part
unless Hanoi and the Viet Cong

934
00:55:04,218 --> 00:55:06,585
sat on the same side of the table.

935
00:55:06,685 --> 00:55:10,618
The standoff went on for ten weeks.

936
00:55:13,585 --> 00:55:17,553
It was the Soviets who finally
came up with a solution:

937
00:55:17,653 --> 00:55:19,852
a round table.

938
00:55:22,153 --> 00:55:25,085
(gunfire)

939
00:55:25,185 --> 00:55:27,685
RADIO OPERATOR: Type of injury
is urgent, shrapnel wounds.

940
00:55:27,785 --> 00:55:29,118
(gunfire)

941
00:55:29,218 --> 00:55:31,085
The area is insecure.

942
00:55:34,685 --> 00:55:35,986
MEDIC: Keep your head down.

943
00:55:38,185 --> 00:55:40,053
RADIO OPERATOR: Got some fire.

944
00:55:43,018 --> 00:55:46,419
KARL MARLANTES: You have these
19-year-old kids with these huge hearts.

945
00:55:46,518 --> 00:55:49,585
They will do what you ask them.

946
00:55:49,685 --> 00:55:53,986
The issue is are you asking them
to do something worthwhile?

947
00:55:54,085 --> 00:55:55,218
That's up to the adults.

948
00:55:55,319 --> 00:55:57,653
And that's where the failure comes.

949
00:55:57,752 --> 00:56:00,319
The failure isn't the kids
saying, "I'm not gonna do this."

950
00:56:00,419 --> 00:56:02,852
Because that's not the way they are built.

951
00:56:02,953 --> 00:56:05,186
19-year-olds don't know
to take a raincoat on

952
00:56:05,286 --> 00:56:06,853
when it's raining, all right?

953
00:56:06,954 --> 00:56:09,253
That's-that's why they're
so good at being warriors.

954
00:56:09,353 --> 00:56:10,853
They'll do it.

955
00:56:10,954 --> 00:56:12,354
They won't even ask you a question.

956
00:56:13,753 --> 00:56:16,219
"All right, we'll do it."

957
00:56:16,320 --> 00:56:19,054
The responsibility is on
the grownups to make sure

958
00:56:19,154 --> 00:56:20,686
they're not being wasted

959
00:56:20,786 --> 00:56:24,786
because they'll do what they're
told, and they'll do it well.

960
00:56:27,686 --> 00:56:31,487
NARRATOR: Karl Marlantes was
born in Astoria, Oregon,

961
00:56:31,586 --> 00:56:34,820
the son of a veteran of
the Battle of the Bulge.

962
00:56:34,920 --> 00:56:37,853
He had joined the Marine
Reserves the summer before

963
00:56:37,954 --> 00:56:39,887
his freshman year at Yale,

964
00:56:39,987 --> 00:56:44,186
eager to prove himself
and defend his country.

965
00:56:44,286 --> 00:56:46,154
When he became a Rhodes scholar,

966
00:56:46,253 --> 00:56:49,786
the Marines allowed him to
defer going on active duty,

967
00:56:49,887 --> 00:56:53,586
and instead of serving in
Vietnam, he went to Oxford

968
00:56:53,686 --> 00:56:57,987
in the fall of 1967.

969
00:56:58,086 --> 00:57:00,154
A few months after he got there,

970
00:57:00,253 --> 00:57:03,887
he wrote to his parents back home.

971
00:57:03,987 --> 00:57:05,695
MARLANTES: "It is with
a little apprehension

972
00:57:05,719 --> 00:57:09,020
"that I write this letter.

973
00:57:09,120 --> 00:57:11,155
"I have given up my scholarship,

974
00:57:11,254 --> 00:57:15,620
"and I will be on active duty as of May 3.

975
00:57:15,720 --> 00:57:19,155
"As you know, I feel the U.S.
is absolutely wrong

976
00:57:19,254 --> 00:57:21,120
"to be in the war.

977
00:57:21,220 --> 00:57:23,787
"A lot of people are dying
for no good reason.

978
00:57:23,888 --> 00:57:28,421
"I can only feel an increasing
rage and frustration.

979
00:57:28,520 --> 00:57:30,921
And a complete feeling of helplessness."

980
00:57:32,587 --> 00:57:38,155
"I have, in effect, been hiding,
and I'll not do it anymore.

981
00:57:38,254 --> 00:57:43,187
"I guess I'm about to do
a highly immoral thing.

982
00:57:43,287 --> 00:57:44,354
"I will be taking part

983
00:57:44,455 --> 00:57:46,754
"in one of the greatest
crimes of our century,

984
00:57:46,854 --> 00:57:51,687
"and I will be doing so out
of frustration, bitterness,

985
00:57:51,787 --> 00:57:55,354
"and a sense of the absurd that
I have only come to appreciate

986
00:57:55,455 --> 00:57:58,155
"in its entirety in the past year.

987
00:57:58,254 --> 00:58:01,055
From now on my logic will be changed."

988
00:58:02,955 --> 00:58:04,888
"I can do something.

989
00:58:04,988 --> 00:58:07,655
"That is, I can do my
very best to get 40 kids

990
00:58:07,754 --> 00:58:10,088
"out of Vietnam alive,

991
00:58:10,188 --> 00:58:13,588
"and if I have to turn into
an evil machine to do it,

992
00:58:13,688 --> 00:58:15,556
then by God I will."

993
00:58:18,621 --> 00:58:22,588
It was my friends, guys
that I trained with.

994
00:58:22,688 --> 00:58:27,456
I felt like I was going
to let the side down.

995
00:58:27,556 --> 00:58:30,521
That by not joining in with
them and sharing the burden

996
00:58:30,621 --> 00:58:33,688
that I wouldn't be a decent person.

997
00:58:33,788 --> 00:58:36,688
It's a mixed bag because I went
over there and killed people

998
00:58:36,788 --> 00:58:38,588
for, you know... is that why I did that?

999
00:58:40,621 --> 00:58:42,255
O'BRIEN: Do you go off and kill people

1000
00:58:42,355 --> 00:58:44,322
if you're not pretty sure it's right?

1001
00:58:44,422 --> 00:58:47,922
And if your nation isn't
pretty sure it's right?

1002
00:58:48,021 --> 00:58:52,156
If there isn't some
consensus, do you do that?

1003
00:58:54,989 --> 00:58:56,489
I was at Fort Lewis, Washington,

1004
00:58:56,588 --> 00:59:00,521
and Canada was, what, a
90-minute bus ride away.

1005
00:59:00,621 --> 00:59:02,889
I wrote my mom and dad and asked for money.

1006
00:59:02,989 --> 00:59:06,056
I asked for my passport.

1007
00:59:06,156 --> 00:59:08,588
And they sent them to me
with, again, no questions.

1008
00:59:08,688 --> 00:59:10,365
Like, "What do you want the passport for?"

1009
00:59:10,389 --> 00:59:11,990
They just sent it.

1010
00:59:12,089 --> 00:59:13,589
And I kept all this stuff stashed,

1011
00:59:13,689 --> 00:59:16,457
including civilian clothes
stashed in my footlocker,

1012
00:59:16,557 --> 00:59:18,256
thinking maybe I'll... maybe I'll do it.

1013
00:59:18,356 --> 00:59:20,232
("Bookends Theme" by Simon
and Garfunkel playing)

1014
00:59:20,256 --> 00:59:22,890
It was this kind of "maybe" thing going on

1015
00:59:22,990 --> 00:59:26,522
all throughout this training
as Vietnam got closer

1016
00:59:26,622 --> 00:59:29,089
and closer and closer.

1017
00:59:29,189 --> 00:59:32,423
What prevented me from doing it?

1018
00:59:32,522 --> 00:59:35,856
I think it was pretty simple and stupid.

1019
00:59:35,957 --> 00:59:39,490
It was a fear of embarrassment,

1020
00:59:39,589 --> 00:59:44,022
a fear of ridicule and humiliation.

1021
00:59:45,689 --> 00:59:48,057
What my girlfriend would have thought of me

1022
00:59:48,157 --> 00:59:51,657
and the people in the Gobbler
Cafe in downtown Worthington.

1023
00:59:53,256 --> 00:59:55,356
The Kiwanis boys and the country club boys

1024
00:59:55,457 --> 00:59:57,789
and that small town I grew up in,

1025
00:59:57,890 --> 01:00:00,256
the things they'd say about me.

1026
01:00:00,356 --> 01:00:06,323
"What a coward and what a
sissy for going to Canada."

1027
01:00:06,423 --> 01:00:09,256
SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: ♪
It was a time of innocence

1028
01:00:09,356 --> 01:00:11,122
O'BRIEN: And I would imagine my mom and dad

1029
01:00:11,222 --> 01:00:14,491
overhearing something like that.

1030
01:00:14,590 --> 01:00:17,958
SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: ♪
Long ago it must be

1031
01:00:18,058 --> 01:00:21,558
O'BRIEN: I couldn't summon
the courage to say no

1032
01:00:21,658 --> 01:00:29,658
to those nameless, faceless
people who really, in essence,

1033
01:00:31,324 --> 01:00:35,290
this was the United States of America.

1034
01:00:35,391 --> 01:00:38,991
And I couldn't say no to them.

1035
01:00:39,090 --> 01:00:44,891
And I had to live with it now
for, you know, 40 years.

1036
01:00:44,991 --> 01:00:50,690
That's a long time to live
with a failure of conscience

1037
01:00:50,790 --> 01:00:55,790
and a failure of nerve.

1038
01:00:55,891 --> 01:00:59,623
And the nightmare of Vietnam
for me is not the bombs

1039
01:00:59,723 --> 01:01:01,058
and the bullets.

1040
01:01:09,824 --> 01:01:13,658
(voice breaking): It's
that failure of nerve

1041
01:01:13,757 --> 01:01:15,357
that I so regret.

1042
01:01:26,492 --> 01:01:31,392
HAL KUSHNER: In the fall of 1968 was
probably the toughest time we had.

1043
01:01:34,492 --> 01:01:41,492
Our daily life was a continuing
struggle for survival.

1044
01:01:41,591 --> 01:01:48,959
Our food ration was three
cups of rice per day.

1045
01:01:50,325 --> 01:01:54,459
We slept on a large bamboo pallet.

1046
01:01:54,559 --> 01:01:58,524
Sometimes there were ten or
12 people on one pallet.

1047
01:01:58,624 --> 01:02:00,925
And we were sick.

1048
01:02:01,024 --> 01:02:03,091
We were very sick.

1049
01:02:03,191 --> 01:02:07,624
Four people died within...

1050
01:02:07,724 --> 01:02:09,258
a month.

1051
01:02:09,358 --> 01:02:12,124
And then two more died
very shortly after that.

1052
01:02:14,825 --> 01:02:17,224
NARRATOR: Thirteen Americans would die

1053
01:02:17,325 --> 01:02:21,125
during Captain Hal Kushner's
time in jungle prison camps

1054
01:02:21,225 --> 01:02:22,792
in South Vietnam.

1055
01:02:24,160 --> 01:02:27,092
He was a doctor but had no medications,

1056
01:02:27,192 --> 01:02:29,792
no antibiotics or saline solution

1057
01:02:29,893 --> 01:02:32,192
with which to treat his comrades.

1058
01:02:32,292 --> 01:02:36,725
All he could do was bury
each in a bamboo coffin

1059
01:02:36,826 --> 01:02:40,426
and make sure the spot was
marked with a heap of stones

1060
01:02:40,525 --> 01:02:43,192
daubed with Mercurochrome.

1061
01:02:45,326 --> 01:02:48,125
KUSHNER: We had nothing to eat.

1062
01:02:48,225 --> 01:02:51,993
And I thought that I was just going insane.

1063
01:02:52,092 --> 01:02:55,359
So we were sitting around
and with this little fire.

1064
01:02:55,460 --> 01:02:57,460
And we saw the camp commander's cat,

1065
01:02:57,560 --> 01:02:59,125
who had free rein of the camp.

1066
01:02:59,225 --> 01:03:00,560
And he came down to our area.

1067
01:03:00,660 --> 01:03:02,692
And we were starving to death.

1068
01:03:02,792 --> 01:03:06,160
So someone suggested, "Let's eat the cat."

1069
01:03:08,460 --> 01:03:09,560
So we killed the cat.

1070
01:03:11,160 --> 01:03:14,592
And we cut the head off
and we cut the paws off.

1071
01:03:14,692 --> 01:03:17,993
And we had this little
carcass of about two pounds.

1072
01:03:18,092 --> 01:03:22,161
And one of the guards came down,
and we told him it was a weasel,

1073
01:03:22,260 --> 01:03:24,760
and we threw a rock at it and killed it.

1074
01:03:24,860 --> 01:03:26,494
And then he looked around

1075
01:03:26,593 --> 01:03:29,927
and someone had neglected
to bury one of the paws.

1076
01:03:30,026 --> 01:03:31,526
And he saw the paw.

1077
01:03:31,626 --> 01:03:35,226
And he knew instantly that it
was the camp commander's cat.

1078
01:03:35,327 --> 01:03:37,793
And things got very serious.

1079
01:03:39,894 --> 01:03:42,994
And they lined us up and
they said, "Who did this?"

1080
01:03:43,093 --> 01:03:44,360
Nobody said anything.

1081
01:03:44,461 --> 01:03:46,293
I thought they were going to kill us all.

1082
01:03:46,394 --> 01:03:48,193
Just execute us.

1083
01:03:48,293 --> 01:03:53,427
And one of the people who
was a ringleader in this

1084
01:03:53,526 --> 01:03:55,726
said he did it.

1085
01:03:55,827 --> 01:03:59,394
And I said that I did it also.

1086
01:03:59,494 --> 01:04:01,626
And we all said we did it.

1087
01:04:01,726 --> 01:04:03,593
"I am Spartacus," you know?

1088
01:04:03,693 --> 01:04:05,360
It was that.

1089
01:04:05,461 --> 01:04:09,593
So they called that person and me out.

1090
01:04:09,693 --> 01:04:13,260
And the guard kicked him and
beat him to the ground,

1091
01:04:13,360 --> 01:04:15,427
and just beat him unmercifully.

1092
01:04:16,894 --> 01:04:20,260
And they hit me in the face
with fists and didn't beat me

1093
01:04:20,360 --> 01:04:22,226
as badly as they beat him.

1094
01:04:22,327 --> 01:04:26,261
And then tied me with commo
wire very tightly to a hooch

1095
01:04:26,361 --> 01:04:29,895
and left me for a day.

1096
01:04:29,995 --> 01:04:33,794
And with the carcass of the
cat draped around my neck.

1097
01:04:33,895 --> 01:04:35,428
And I was so crazy I thought,

1098
01:04:35,527 --> 01:04:37,527
"Maybe they're going to
let me eat this cat."

1099
01:04:37,627 --> 01:04:40,162
But I had to bury it.

1100
01:04:40,261 --> 01:04:45,328
So, the fellow that they beat
very badly died two weeks later.

1101
01:04:46,794 --> 01:04:50,662
But to me the tragedy of it
was we didn't get the cat.

1102
01:04:56,527 --> 01:04:58,828
CHARLES COLLINGWOOD: For the
capital of a nation at war,

1103
01:04:58,928 --> 01:05:02,527
Saigon abounds with a
phenomenal number of young men

1104
01:05:02,627 --> 01:05:05,627
of draft age in sharp, civilian clothes.

1105
01:05:05,727 --> 01:05:09,062
Saigon cowboys they're called.

1106
01:05:09,162 --> 01:05:12,694
It's a war profiteer's economy,
fanned by the forced draft

1107
01:05:12,794 --> 01:05:14,162
of American money.

1108
01:05:14,261 --> 01:05:15,828
They count it a good year in Saigon

1109
01:05:15,928 --> 01:05:18,261
when the prices only go up by 25%.

1110
01:05:22,361 --> 01:05:24,027
NARRATOR: Years of American presence,

1111
01:05:24,127 --> 01:05:28,396
and the tens of billions of U.S.
dollars that came with it,

1112
01:05:28,496 --> 01:05:31,028
had transformed much of South Vietnam,

1113
01:05:31,128 --> 01:05:34,795
creating a false economy
that was utterly dependent

1114
01:05:34,896 --> 01:05:38,463
on that presence becoming perpetual.

1115
01:05:38,563 --> 01:05:41,795
GEORGE LEWIS: Since the U.S. began
its big buildup in the mid-'60s,

1116
01:05:41,896 --> 01:05:44,362
millions of dollars worth of
goods have entered the country

1117
01:05:44,463 --> 01:05:46,028
each month.

1118
01:05:46,128 --> 01:05:49,063
Some economists say ten
percent or more of the cargo

1119
01:05:49,163 --> 01:05:51,762
is diverted into black market channels.

1120
01:05:55,528 --> 01:05:58,063
NARRATOR: With so much money
flowing into the country,

1121
01:05:58,163 --> 01:06:01,429
corruption and crime inevitably grew.

1122
01:06:04,028 --> 01:06:06,362
Government officials were on the take.

1123
01:06:06,463 --> 01:06:09,329
So were many ARVN officers.

1124
01:06:09,429 --> 01:06:12,896
Policemen could not be trusted.

1125
01:06:16,063 --> 01:06:20,095
PHAN QUANG TUE: Who benefit from
the financial aspect of the war?

1126
01:06:21,228 --> 01:06:22,762
Generals.

1127
01:06:22,862 --> 01:06:25,063
Don't deny that.

1128
01:06:25,163 --> 01:06:28,562
Then they get the money,
then they become richer.

1129
01:06:28,663 --> 01:06:33,929
We have a term, and I call it,
they were war profiteers,

1130
01:06:34,029 --> 01:06:38,229
from Thieu and Ky down to every echelon.

1131
01:06:38,330 --> 01:06:40,796
HERRINGTON: The Vietnamese had a saying:

1132
01:06:40,897 --> 01:06:43,996
a house leaks from the roof on down.

1133
01:06:44,096 --> 01:06:47,029
(saying phrase in Vietnamese)

1134
01:06:48,964 --> 01:06:53,764
And that was, of course, their
way to elliptically refer

1135
01:06:53,863 --> 01:06:57,464
to the ever-present, nagging
problem of corruption.

1136
01:06:57,563 --> 01:07:02,964
JOE GALLOWAY: They were stealing
from us and selling to anybody.

1137
01:07:03,063 --> 01:07:04,743
Two-man helicopter, you want one of those?

1138
01:07:04,830 --> 01:07:07,764
They got it in a box in the back.

1139
01:07:07,863 --> 01:07:12,130
Probably get it for 12,000 bucks
if you negotiated strongly.

1140
01:07:13,596 --> 01:07:17,296
The corruption was endemic.

1141
01:07:17,397 --> 01:07:20,529
And we tolerated it.

1142
01:07:20,630 --> 01:07:25,063
NARRATOR: Tons of American goods
piled up on Saigon's docks.

1143
01:07:25,164 --> 01:07:28,729
Some Gis took advantage, too.

1144
01:07:28,830 --> 01:07:32,698
U.S. products flowed out
the back doors of PXs.

1145
01:07:32,797 --> 01:07:35,831
In just one year,

1146
01:07:35,930 --> 01:07:42,230
the black market cost the U.S.
military $2 billion.

1147
01:07:42,331 --> 01:07:45,131
COLLINGWOOD: The impact of the war
has disrupted the ancient patterns

1148
01:07:45,230 --> 01:07:47,230
of Vietnamese life.

1149
01:07:47,331 --> 01:07:50,331
The cities are crowded to the
bursting point with people

1150
01:07:50,430 --> 01:07:53,265
uprooted from the land
and the ancestral values

1151
01:07:53,364 --> 01:07:55,698
of a rural-oriented society

1152
01:07:55,797 --> 01:07:58,430
but who have found nothing to replace them.

1153
01:07:58,530 --> 01:08:01,797
NARRATOR: Before U.S. troops arrived,

1154
01:08:01,898 --> 01:08:05,930
eight out of ten South
Vietnamese lived in villages.

1155
01:08:06,030 --> 01:08:09,364
By the end of the 1960s,

1156
01:08:09,465 --> 01:08:13,864
almost half would be
crowded into urban areas.

1157
01:08:13,965 --> 01:08:17,997
Saigon's population
tripled to three million.

1158
01:08:18,097 --> 01:08:22,398
Half the refugees had no permanent shelter.

1159
01:08:24,797 --> 01:08:27,497
Cholera and typhoid killed thousands.

1160
01:08:29,997 --> 01:08:33,765
Hungry children roamed the
streets, scavenging, begging,

1161
01:08:33,864 --> 01:08:38,166
searching for jobs to
do or pockets to pick.

1162
01:08:38,266 --> 01:08:42,832
Tens of thousands of young
women left their village homes

1163
01:08:42,931 --> 01:08:48,031
and came to Saigon to become
bar girls and prostitutes.

1164
01:08:53,798 --> 01:08:55,199
The communist government in Hanoi

1165
01:08:55,298 --> 01:08:57,399
tried to make the most of it,

1166
01:08:57,498 --> 01:09:02,065
accusing the United States and
its puppet government in Saigon

1167
01:09:02,166 --> 01:09:05,298
of destroying Vietnamese
culture in the South.

1168
01:09:08,966 --> 01:09:12,565
But the citizens of Saigon were far freer

1169
01:09:12,666 --> 01:09:14,231
than the North Vietnamese.

1170
01:09:14,332 --> 01:09:18,666
The South Vietnamese people
could express their views,

1171
01:09:18,766 --> 01:09:20,231
for and against their government,

1172
01:09:20,332 --> 01:09:25,365
in the pages of hundreds of
newspapers and magazines.

1173
01:09:25,466 --> 01:09:28,832
And they held demonstrations denouncing

1174
01:09:28,931 --> 01:09:32,931
the rampant corruption and
demanding religious freedom

1175
01:09:33,031 --> 01:09:35,466
and better treatment for veterans.

1176
01:09:39,467 --> 01:09:42,866
For all of its problems,
one man remembered,

1177
01:09:42,967 --> 01:09:47,432
Saigon was "filthy and free."

1178
01:09:47,532 --> 01:09:49,066
(car horn honking)

1179
01:10:29,200 --> 01:10:30,932
(gunfire)

1180
01:11:19,733 --> 01:11:22,701
NARRATOR: In the densely
populated Mekong Delta,

1181
01:11:22,800 --> 01:11:27,533
the war in the countryside
suddenly intensified.

1182
01:11:27,634 --> 01:11:29,901
General Abrams assigned the commander

1183
01:11:30,000 --> 01:11:34,300
of the 9th Infantry Division,
General Julian J. Ewell,

1184
01:11:34,401 --> 01:11:37,201
the job of destroying
the remaining Viet Cong

1185
01:11:37,300 --> 01:11:39,600
south of Saigon.

1186
01:11:39,701 --> 01:11:44,169
His operation was called Speedy Express.

1187
01:11:45,902 --> 01:11:50,534
"The hearts and minds approach
can be overdone," Ewell said.

1188
01:11:50,635 --> 01:11:55,034
"In the Delta the only way to
overcome VC control and terror

1189
01:11:55,135 --> 01:11:58,202
is by brute force."

1190
01:11:59,702 --> 01:12:02,835
Patrols would pursue the
enemy around the clock.

1191
01:12:02,934 --> 01:12:06,335
The night sky was filled with helicopters,

1192
01:12:06,434 --> 01:12:09,001
some armed with instruments
that could detect

1193
01:12:09,101 --> 01:12:11,101
traces of carbon and ammonia

1194
01:12:11,202 --> 01:12:14,068
that meant human beings were below,

1195
01:12:14,169 --> 01:12:17,368
though not which side they were on.

1196
01:12:17,469 --> 01:12:21,702
In areas designated "free-fire zones,"

1197
01:12:21,801 --> 01:12:24,501
anyone out after curfew could be shot.

1198
01:12:26,501 --> 01:12:30,368
During the day, anyone
seen running was targeted.

1199
01:12:32,868 --> 01:12:36,868
Colonel Robert Gard was one of
Ewell's artillery commanders.

1200
01:12:36,969 --> 01:12:42,034
ROBERT GARD: If someone was told that
anyone who runs away should be assumed

1201
01:12:42,135 --> 01:12:45,869
to be an enemy, I certainly
would disagree with that.

1202
01:12:45,970 --> 01:12:47,770
That's totally improper.

1203
01:12:47,869 --> 01:12:51,502
People run away because they're afraid.

1204
01:12:51,602 --> 01:12:55,670
I've seen instances of farmers,

1205
01:12:55,770 --> 01:12:58,470
when you descend in a helicopter suddenly,

1206
01:12:58,569 --> 01:13:01,569
and they freeze, and they're
frightened, and they run.

1207
01:13:01,670 --> 01:13:06,336
You can't just make a blanket judgment.

1208
01:13:06,435 --> 01:13:10,935
NARRATOR: General Ewell boasted of
his unit's statistical record...

1209
01:13:11,035 --> 01:13:16,636
10,899 Viet Cong killed in six months

1210
01:13:16,735 --> 01:13:19,935
with a loss of only 242 Americans,

1211
01:13:20,035 --> 01:13:25,636
an astonishing kill ratio of 45-to-1.

1212
01:13:28,170 --> 01:13:32,836
GARD: To say that we killed
only enemy combatants,

1213
01:13:32,935 --> 01:13:36,535
and to talk about ratios of 40-to-1

1214
01:13:36,636 --> 01:13:39,735
simply defies my imagination.

1215
01:13:41,270 --> 01:13:44,569
NARRATOR: At Abrams' recommendation,
Ewell was promoted,

1216
01:13:44,670 --> 01:13:49,003
but the Army Inspector General
would eventually estimate

1217
01:13:49,103 --> 01:13:52,171
that more than half of
the roughly 11,000 kills

1218
01:13:52,271 --> 01:13:54,603
claimed by the 9th Infantry

1219
01:13:54,704 --> 01:13:57,704
had been unarmed, innocent civilians.

1220
01:14:01,436 --> 01:14:04,337
No one was ever held accountable.

1221
01:14:09,137 --> 01:14:13,971
("Don't Think Twice, It's All
Right" by Bob Dylan playing)

1222
01:14:18,070 --> 01:14:23,404
♪ It ain't no use to sit
and wonder why, babe ♪

1223
01:14:23,503 --> 01:14:27,236
♪ It don't matter, anyhow

1224
01:14:27,337 --> 01:14:32,404
♪ And it ain't no use to
sit and wonder why, babe ♪

1225
01:14:32,503 --> 01:14:36,303
♪ If you don't know by now

1226
01:14:36,404 --> 01:14:40,936
♪ When your rooster crows
at the break of dawn ♪

1227
01:14:41,036 --> 01:14:45,837
♪ Look out your window
and I'll be gone ♪

1228
01:14:45,936 --> 01:14:49,905
♪ You're the reason I'm travelin' on ♪

1229
01:14:50,004 --> 01:14:53,672
♪ Don't think twice, it's all right. ♪

1230
01:14:59,905 --> 01:15:04,905
CAROL CROCKER: I think moving away
from one's family's ideologies

1231
01:15:05,004 --> 01:15:11,772
is a scary balance on a
very tricky precipice

1232
01:15:11,871 --> 01:15:15,638
because they have been the focal point

1233
01:15:15,737 --> 01:15:17,138
of how we judge how we're doing.

1234
01:15:17,237 --> 01:15:21,905
And I was now trying to judge
my decisions and my actions

1235
01:15:22,004 --> 01:15:26,104
on the basis of my own
ideas and own thoughts.

1236
01:15:26,205 --> 01:15:29,371
NARRATOR: The war was
already uncomfortably close

1237
01:15:29,472 --> 01:15:31,838
to Carol Crocker.

1238
01:15:31,937 --> 01:15:34,705
Her brother Mogie had volunteered to fight

1239
01:15:34,804 --> 01:15:39,672
and had been killed in Vietnam in 1966.

1240
01:15:39,772 --> 01:15:41,437
She was still grieving.

1241
01:15:43,705 --> 01:15:47,571
That fall, Carol had entered
Goucher College in Baltimore,

1242
01:15:47,672 --> 01:15:52,572
an all-women's school with a
long conservative tradition.

1243
01:15:52,673 --> 01:15:54,605
CAROL CROCKER: We dressed for dinner.

1244
01:15:54,706 --> 01:15:57,773
We had an 11:00 curfew.

1245
01:15:57,872 --> 01:16:03,206
Obviously no boys or men
were allowed in the dorms.

1246
01:16:03,305 --> 01:16:05,273
That was the rule.

1247
01:16:05,372 --> 01:16:07,382
("Piece of My Heart" by Big
Brother and the Holding Company)

1248
01:16:07,406 --> 01:16:11,139
It could not have even been
any later than the beginning

1249
01:16:11,238 --> 01:16:17,005
of the second semester that most
of the rules that were in place

1250
01:16:17,105 --> 01:16:21,973
and had been in place for many,
many years, no longer existed.

1251
01:16:22,072 --> 01:16:27,639
JANIS JOPLIN: ♪ Oh, come on,
come on, come on, come on ♪

1252
01:16:27,738 --> 01:16:29,206
♪ And take it

1253
01:16:29,305 --> 01:16:30,548
♪ Take another little piece...

1254
01:16:30,572 --> 01:16:31,649
CAROL CROCKER: The challenge

1255
01:16:31,673 --> 01:16:35,773
to campuses countrywide was

1256
01:16:35,872 --> 01:16:37,505
how do we maintain our student body

1257
01:16:37,605 --> 01:16:43,238
to behave in a civil
manner, and teach them,

1258
01:16:43,339 --> 01:16:46,206
and not have them try to burn us down?

1259
01:16:46,305 --> 01:16:48,773
If that means not dressing
for dinner, so be it.

1260
01:16:48,872 --> 01:16:50,973
JOPLIN: ♪ If it makes you feel good

1261
01:16:51,072 --> 01:16:53,238
♪ Oh yes it did.

1262
01:16:53,339 --> 01:16:56,274
CAROL CROCKER: Our guy friends,
we were spending time and talking

1263
01:16:56,373 --> 01:16:57,407
and they were scared.

1264
01:16:57,506 --> 01:16:59,373
And they were worried.

1265
01:16:59,474 --> 01:17:02,573
And they weren't sure what
they were going to do.

1266
01:17:02,674 --> 01:17:06,373
And more discussion was happening about

1267
01:17:06,474 --> 01:17:10,274
whether this was a valid war.

1268
01:17:10,373 --> 01:17:14,974
And this was really, for me, the
first time I opened my ears

1269
01:17:15,073 --> 01:17:17,474
to the war in a way other than

1270
01:17:17,573 --> 01:17:21,039
that it was about my brother's death.

1271
01:17:21,140 --> 01:17:23,840
I honored him.

1272
01:17:23,939 --> 01:17:28,373
I respected him for doing
what he believed in.

1273
01:17:28,474 --> 01:17:30,407
But I did not agree with him.

1274
01:17:30,506 --> 01:17:35,140
JOPLIN: ♪ Come on, come on,
come on and take it. ♪

1275
01:17:35,239 --> 01:17:38,739
NARRATOR: Eva Jefferson was a
sophomore at Northwestern.

1276
01:17:38,840 --> 01:17:42,039
A serviceman's daughter, she
had entered college convinced

1277
01:17:42,140 --> 01:17:45,840
the American government would
never mislead its citizens.

1278
01:17:45,939 --> 01:17:49,674
But for her, too, things
had begun to change.

1279
01:17:49,774 --> 01:17:51,573
Earlier that year,

1280
01:17:51,674 --> 01:17:54,939
when a handful of black
Northwestern students decided

1281
01:17:55,039 --> 01:17:57,208
to occupy the bursar's office

1282
01:17:57,307 --> 01:18:00,775
demanding African-American
studies, she joined them,

1283
01:18:00,874 --> 01:18:04,740
then called her parents to
tell them what she'd done.

1284
01:18:04,841 --> 01:18:07,641
EVA JEFFERSON PATERSON: And I said,
"Mom and Dad, guess where I am?

1285
01:18:07,740 --> 01:18:09,408
We just took over the bursar's office."

1286
01:18:09,507 --> 01:18:11,341
They were horrified.

1287
01:18:11,440 --> 01:18:14,507
And upon reflection, of
course they were horrified.

1288
01:18:14,607 --> 01:18:16,050
And they said, "If you
don't get out of there

1289
01:18:16,074 --> 01:18:17,416
we're going to cut off your money."

1290
01:18:17,440 --> 01:18:19,841
So that was the moment
in my own consciousness

1291
01:18:19,940 --> 01:18:21,975
when I became independent.

1292
01:18:22,074 --> 01:18:24,341
I thought, "Well, they're
going to cut off my money.

1293
01:18:24,440 --> 01:18:26,074
C'est la vie."

1294
01:18:26,175 --> 01:18:30,275
NARRATOR: "The University met
all our demands in three days,"

1295
01:18:30,374 --> 01:18:31,675
she remembered.

1296
01:18:31,775 --> 01:18:34,475
"If you asked for black studies on Friday,

1297
01:18:34,574 --> 01:18:36,641
you got it on Monday."

1298
01:18:36,740 --> 01:18:41,040
PATERSON: It felt like something
was happening that was profound,

1299
01:18:41,141 --> 01:18:42,908
that was irreversible.

1300
01:18:43,007 --> 01:18:44,908
But also you're 18, 19 years old.

1301
01:18:45,007 --> 01:18:46,007
It's exciting.

1302
01:18:47,940 --> 01:18:51,107
I felt as though a revolution was coming.

1303
01:18:51,208 --> 01:18:55,007
And I thought the revolution
would be won by our side.

1304
01:19:02,676 --> 01:19:06,976
NARRATOR: Relations between parents
and children, brothers and sisters,

1305
01:19:07,075 --> 01:19:10,241
were changing everywhere.

1306
01:19:10,342 --> 01:19:14,108
ANNE HARRISON BOWMAN: When I stood in the
living room and I was hugging two brothers,

1307
01:19:14,209 --> 01:19:16,541
it didn't matter to me about their choices

1308
01:19:16,642 --> 01:19:20,842
or that they were on two
different sides of the fence.

1309
01:19:20,941 --> 01:19:24,976
All I knew was that they
were both my brothers

1310
01:19:25,075 --> 01:19:27,741
and they were both back in the
same room and there we were.

1311
01:19:27,842 --> 01:19:31,941
NARRATOR: Captain Matt
Harrison, Jr.... Chips...

1312
01:19:32,041 --> 01:19:38,008
had graduated West Point,
served a tour in Vietnam

1313
01:19:38,108 --> 01:19:42,209
and took part in two of the
war's bloodiest battles...

1314
01:19:42,308 --> 01:19:45,941
Hill 1338 and Hill 875.

1315
01:19:48,209 --> 01:19:51,875
He was back stateside
in the autumn of 1968,

1316
01:19:51,976 --> 01:19:56,008
when the family began to worry
about his younger brother, Bob,

1317
01:19:56,108 --> 01:20:00,108
whom his siblings sometimes called Robin.

1318
01:20:00,209 --> 01:20:05,143
MATT HARRISON: He and I were just
great pals since we were growing up

1319
01:20:05,242 --> 01:20:09,242
because we moved every year or two years.

1320
01:20:09,343 --> 01:20:11,442
And, you know, new set of friends

1321
01:20:11,542 --> 01:20:12,843
but always had my brother.

1322
01:20:14,477 --> 01:20:16,509
BOWMAN: Bob was in ROTC

1323
01:20:16,609 --> 01:20:20,710
and polished and buffed his
shoes and had short hair

1324
01:20:20,809 --> 01:20:24,677
and said "Yes, sir" and "Yes, ma'am."

1325
01:20:24,777 --> 01:20:29,009
And then we moved to California
his senior year in high school.

1326
01:20:29,109 --> 01:20:35,542
And he was the consummate blond
surfer boy and cutting school.

1327
01:20:35,643 --> 01:20:37,809
And he was immediately very popular

1328
01:20:37,910 --> 01:20:40,277
and having a great time.

1329
01:20:43,343 --> 01:20:45,509
NARRATOR: Robin did not go to West Point,

1330
01:20:45,609 --> 01:20:48,343
entered Marin Junior College instead,

1331
01:20:48,442 --> 01:20:51,376
and then shocked his family by signing on

1332
01:20:51,477 --> 01:20:55,277
with the Marine... not the Army... Reserves.

1333
01:20:57,009 --> 01:21:01,177
HARRISON: At some point Robin
became convinced that...

1334
01:21:01,277 --> 01:21:05,443
that the war was wrong, and not
only wrong, it was immoral.

1335
01:21:05,543 --> 01:21:10,711
So he quit going to the Reserve weekends,

1336
01:21:10,810 --> 01:21:13,844
and because of that he was activated...

1337
01:21:13,943 --> 01:21:19,010
and was very likely now he was
going to be going to Vietnam

1338
01:21:19,110 --> 01:21:22,344
as a Marine Corps rifleman.

1339
01:21:22,443 --> 01:21:24,743
I didn't think being a
Marine Corps rifleman

1340
01:21:24,844 --> 01:21:27,743
was a very safe occupation.

1341
01:21:27,844 --> 01:21:30,844
And I didn't think Robin
would be a particularly good

1342
01:21:30,943 --> 01:21:32,743
Marine Corps rifleman.

1343
01:21:32,844 --> 01:21:37,211
And so I just thought that this
was a very bad outcome for him

1344
01:21:37,310 --> 01:21:38,778
and for the family.

1345
01:21:43,043 --> 01:21:46,543
NARRATOR: Matt Harrison knew
that under military regulations,

1346
01:21:46,644 --> 01:21:50,010
if one brother was already
in a combat zone,

1347
01:21:50,110 --> 01:21:53,377
a second brother need not
accept assignment there.

1348
01:21:53,478 --> 01:21:57,010
So to keep Robin out of the war,

1349
01:21:57,110 --> 01:22:01,877
he volunteered for a
second tour in Vietnam.

1350
01:22:01,978 --> 01:22:06,678
HARRISON: I was back in Vietnam
I think in less than 30 days.

1351
01:22:06,778 --> 01:22:08,244
I was a seasoned veteran.

1352
01:22:08,345 --> 01:22:10,578
I was going to go command a company.

1353
01:22:10,679 --> 01:22:13,578
My chances of getting hurt were
a lot less than Robin's were.

1354
01:22:13,679 --> 01:22:15,611
And if I did choose to make it a career,

1355
01:22:15,712 --> 01:22:17,744
the fact that I had had a second tour

1356
01:22:17,845 --> 01:22:19,955
as a rifle company commander
was going to be good for me.

1357
01:22:19,979 --> 01:22:23,011
And so, you know, it
wasn't entirely selfless.

1358
01:22:23,111 --> 01:22:27,544
I honestly don't remember a
tremendous amount of dialogue

1359
01:22:27,645 --> 01:22:29,578
between my mom and dad.

1360
01:22:29,679 --> 01:22:32,779
I think they felt like if Bob had gone,

1361
01:22:32,878 --> 01:22:34,712
he would have been killed.

1362
01:22:34,811 --> 01:22:40,279
Whereas I think they felt that
Chips was going to be okay.

1363
01:22:40,378 --> 01:22:45,244
I can't imagine, having
had a son now go to Iraq,

1364
01:22:45,345 --> 01:22:50,744
how my mother could have gotten
through every single day at all,

1365
01:22:50,845 --> 01:22:56,244
without believing very firmly
that he was going to be fine.

1366
01:22:59,078 --> 01:23:01,811
NARRATOR: Matt Harrison's
decision to serve a second tour

1367
01:23:01,912 --> 01:23:05,179
did not fully protect his brother Robin.

1368
01:23:05,279 --> 01:23:07,811
He went AWOL, was court-martialed

1369
01:23:07,912 --> 01:23:10,713
and sentenced to three months hard labor.

1370
01:23:10,812 --> 01:23:13,146
The sentence was suspended.

1371
01:23:13,245 --> 01:23:14,913
He returned to the Marines,

1372
01:23:15,012 --> 01:23:17,180
served as a chaplain's assistant,

1373
01:23:17,280 --> 01:23:20,579
applied for conscientious objector status,

1374
01:23:20,680 --> 01:23:25,045
and then went AWOL again.

1375
01:23:25,146 --> 01:23:27,855
VICTORIA HARRISON: I remember the
FBI coming and knocking on the door

1376
01:23:27,879 --> 01:23:29,913
and looking for him.

1377
01:23:30,012 --> 01:23:33,745
They asked if Robert Harrison was there

1378
01:23:33,846 --> 01:23:37,646
and I just knew this wasn't good

1379
01:23:37,745 --> 01:23:41,012
and said "No" and slammed the door.

1380
01:23:41,112 --> 01:23:46,079
And Bob went out the back

1381
01:23:46,180 --> 01:23:48,512
and ran out to the main street.

1382
01:23:48,612 --> 01:23:53,579
And as I understand it,
got in a car and left

1383
01:23:53,680 --> 01:23:56,680
and that was the last I saw of him.

1384
01:24:01,445 --> 01:24:05,112
BOWMAN: I don't think a military
mom at the time would want

1385
01:24:05,213 --> 01:24:06,713
to announce, "My son has gone AWOL.

1386
01:24:06,812 --> 01:24:08,713
"My son has run to Canada.

1387
01:24:08,812 --> 01:24:11,812
"My son is all the words that
were associated with it,

1388
01:24:11,913 --> 01:24:15,847
a deserter, a coward."

1389
01:24:15,946 --> 01:24:18,347
All of the things that
these guys were called.

1390
01:24:20,647 --> 01:24:23,681
I don't think that's what those
guys thought they were doing.

1391
01:24:23,781 --> 01:24:25,847
I do not think they thought
they were deserting.

1392
01:24:25,946 --> 01:24:27,847
I do not think they thought
they were cowards.

1393
01:24:27,946 --> 01:24:30,946
In fact, I think they thought
they were very brave.

1394
01:24:34,946 --> 01:24:37,746
NARRATOR: When Matt Harrison
assumed command of Alpha Company,

1395
01:24:37,847 --> 01:24:43,181
2nd Battalion, 14th Regiment
of the 25th Infantry Division,

1396
01:24:43,281 --> 01:24:45,781
his Army had changed.

1397
01:24:48,647 --> 01:24:51,746
HARRISON: I was commanding
a company of draftees,

1398
01:24:51,847 --> 01:24:54,181
almost none of whom wanted to be there.

1399
01:24:54,281 --> 01:24:55,946
They didn't want to be in the Army

1400
01:24:56,046 --> 01:24:57,880
and they certainly didn't want to be

1401
01:24:57,981 --> 01:24:59,880
an infantryman in Vietnam.

1402
01:24:59,981 --> 01:25:03,347
There were times when it was very difficult

1403
01:25:03,446 --> 01:25:05,746
to keep the men under control,

1404
01:25:05,847 --> 01:25:08,181
particularly if we had taken
casualties on the way

1405
01:25:08,281 --> 01:25:09,781
into a village.

1406
01:25:11,414 --> 01:25:16,148
One of the things I learned
is the veneer of civilization

1407
01:25:16,247 --> 01:25:18,915
is very thin... very thin...

1408
01:25:19,014 --> 01:25:24,114
on me, probably on you,
and I think on everybody.

1409
01:25:25,915 --> 01:25:28,314
I just saw over and over again

1410
01:25:28,415 --> 01:25:32,381
some nice young guy out
of Huron, South Dakota,

1411
01:25:32,482 --> 01:25:35,614
who back in Huron helped old
ladies across the street

1412
01:25:35,715 --> 01:25:38,482
and went to church every Sunday.

1413
01:25:38,581 --> 01:25:45,715
It did not take long for that
veneer of civilization to erode.

1414
01:25:45,814 --> 01:25:49,881
And he was now capable of doing things

1415
01:25:49,982 --> 01:25:52,982
that just simply are inhuman.

1416
01:25:55,348 --> 01:25:58,982
I was not willing to allow
it to happen on my watch

1417
01:25:59,081 --> 01:26:01,581
and I didn't think it was
good for the soldiers

1418
01:26:01,682 --> 01:26:03,114
to do those kinds of things.

1419
01:26:03,215 --> 01:26:07,282
Now, I'm not saying that we
didn't do some horrific things.

1420
01:26:07,381 --> 01:26:08,381
We did.

1421
01:26:10,314 --> 01:26:13,881
But there's a difference
between being spontaneous

1422
01:26:13,982 --> 01:26:16,482
and being premeditated.

1423
01:26:22,849 --> 01:26:27,082
NARRATOR: Many years later,
Robin Harrison, still adrift,

1424
01:26:27,183 --> 01:26:29,248
got caught up in the world of drugs

1425
01:26:29,349 --> 01:26:35,748
and died 10,000 miles from home
in a hotel room in Hong Kong,

1426
01:26:35,849 --> 01:26:39,048
another casualty, his
brother Matt believed,

1427
01:26:39,149 --> 01:26:41,882
of the war in Vietnam.

1428
01:26:44,948 --> 01:26:48,582
("Magic Carpet Ride" by
Steppenwolf playing)

1429
01:26:51,582 --> 01:26:53,882
♪ I like to dream

1430
01:26:53,983 --> 01:27:00,048
♪ Yes, yes, right between
my sound machine ♪

1431
01:27:00,149 --> 01:27:02,948
♪ On a cloud of sound I
drift in the night ♪

1432
01:27:03,048 --> 01:27:04,683
♪ Any place it goes is right

1433
01:27:04,783 --> 01:27:08,483
♪ Goes far, flies near, to
the stars away from here ♪

1434
01:27:08,582 --> 01:27:10,716
♪ Well, you don't know...

1435
01:27:10,815 --> 01:27:12,815
MERRILL McPEAK: I dropped
a bomb one afternoon

1436
01:27:12,916 --> 01:27:15,783
that must have had a broken
fin or something on the bomb.

1437
01:27:15,882 --> 01:27:19,183
It just went crazy, went
over and hit, you know,

1438
01:27:19,283 --> 01:27:21,883
a mile away from where I was aiming.

1439
01:27:21,984 --> 01:27:28,650
And it started a series
of secondary explosions,

1440
01:27:28,749 --> 01:27:31,883
meaning that I had hit an ammunition dump,

1441
01:27:31,984 --> 01:27:33,460
or a cache of ammunition or something.

1442
01:27:33,484 --> 01:27:35,316
So it cooked off for 15 minutes.

1443
01:27:35,417 --> 01:27:39,116
As we were leaving, the
thing was still blowing up.

1444
01:27:39,217 --> 01:27:41,816
The best result I achieved in a year,

1445
01:27:41,917 --> 01:27:45,150
it was a result of a gross miss
from what I was aiming at.

1446
01:27:45,249 --> 01:27:49,784
Now that's the exact reverse of
how you want to use air power.

1447
01:27:51,549 --> 01:27:54,650
NARRATOR: Major Merrill McPeak
was a crack fighter pilot

1448
01:27:54,749 --> 01:27:58,816
when he arrived in Vietnam in late 1968.

1449
01:27:58,917 --> 01:28:02,784
At first, he had helped provide
air support for the Army,

1450
01:28:02,883 --> 01:28:07,249
with a guaranteed number of
sorties per day, he remembered,

1451
01:28:07,350 --> 01:28:10,316
"whether or not they had
anything in front of them

1452
01:28:10,417 --> 01:28:11,717
worth blowing up."

1453
01:28:14,150 --> 01:28:17,184
MERRILL McPEAK: At the end of any
sortie where we dropped bombs

1454
01:28:17,284 --> 01:28:19,249
on what we called "trees in contact"

1455
01:28:19,350 --> 01:28:21,917
because there was nothing
important down there,

1456
01:28:22,016 --> 01:28:24,884
we would always get back a
list of bomb damage assessment

1457
01:28:24,985 --> 01:28:26,450
from the forward air controller.

1458
01:28:26,550 --> 01:28:31,651
And it would be, like, "12
supply sources destroyed,

1459
01:28:31,750 --> 01:28:34,117
two structures collapsed."

1460
01:28:34,218 --> 01:28:35,617
All these metrics.

1461
01:28:35,718 --> 01:28:37,584
It was phony.

1462
01:28:37,685 --> 01:28:38,851
Just a waste of time.

1463
01:28:40,851 --> 01:28:44,285
NARRATOR: Then, McPeak was
assigned to a top-secret squadron

1464
01:28:44,384 --> 01:28:47,050
seeking to pinpoint men and supplies

1465
01:28:47,151 --> 01:28:50,384
moving on the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos.

1466
01:28:50,485 --> 01:28:54,485
He and his fellow pilots
called their unit Misty,

1467
01:28:54,584 --> 01:28:57,718
after its radio call sign.

1468
01:28:57,817 --> 01:28:59,450
McPEAK: I spent four months in Misty.

1469
01:28:59,550 --> 01:29:03,117
And that was the best
four months of the war,

1470
01:29:03,218 --> 01:29:04,617
as far as I'm concerned,

1471
01:29:04,718 --> 01:29:08,117
because what we were doing
was simple, straightforward,

1472
01:29:08,218 --> 01:29:09,617
and made sense.

1473
01:29:09,718 --> 01:29:13,450
We want to stop traffic from
A to B down this dirt road.

1474
01:29:13,550 --> 01:29:16,485
That I can understand.

1475
01:29:16,584 --> 01:29:19,750
Somebody in Saigon wasn't saying,

1476
01:29:19,851 --> 01:29:22,550
"Go bomb trees at
such-and-such a location."

1477
01:29:22,651 --> 01:29:25,451
We went out and actually found the target.

1478
01:29:34,818 --> 01:29:36,518
NARRATOR: It was dangerous work.

1479
01:29:36,618 --> 01:29:41,451
One out of five pilots was shot down.

1480
01:29:43,818 --> 01:29:45,219
(radio chatter)

1481
01:29:49,885 --> 01:29:53,885
Misty put up seven sorties
a day from dawn to dusk,

1482
01:29:53,986 --> 01:29:57,152
on the lookout for signs
of human activity...

1483
01:29:57,251 --> 01:30:02,451
gardens, encampments, roadside
trees coated with dust,

1484
01:30:02,551 --> 01:30:06,618
or wet roads on either side of fords

1485
01:30:06,719 --> 01:30:11,719
that signaled a truck convoy
had recently passed through.

1486
01:30:15,751 --> 01:30:18,852
McPEAK: I have enormous respect
for those truck drivers.

1487
01:30:20,486 --> 01:30:22,419
They left their homes in the North,

1488
01:30:22,518 --> 01:30:26,385
and they weren't drafted for a year or two.

1489
01:30:26,486 --> 01:30:28,086
They just left and didn't know

1490
01:30:28,187 --> 01:30:30,153
if they were ever going to come back.

1491
01:30:31,920 --> 01:30:35,619
NARRATOR: Although McPeak and his
fellow pilots did not know it,

1492
01:30:35,720 --> 01:30:37,386
among the drivers threading their way

1493
01:30:37,487 --> 01:30:41,252
down the Ho Chi Minh Trail by
night were hundreds of women.

1494
01:30:44,220 --> 01:30:48,319
NGUYEN NGUYET ANH:

1495
01:31:06,552 --> 01:31:10,153
NARRATOR: For three years, Nguyen
Nguyet Anh drove her section

1496
01:31:10,252 --> 01:31:16,853
of the Trail, ferrying
arms and supplies south,

1497
01:31:16,952 --> 01:31:21,619
then heading back north with
cargoes of wounded men.

1498
01:31:34,820 --> 01:31:37,053
McPEAK: They drove in stages.

1499
01:31:37,154 --> 01:31:40,087
So they knew 15, 20 clicks of the road.

1500
01:31:40,188 --> 01:31:42,654
And they drove from A to B and back to A.

1501
01:31:47,087 --> 01:31:48,887
And then they rested, during the daytime,

1502
01:31:48,988 --> 01:31:51,988
and then the next night, they
drove from A to B and back to A.

1503
01:31:53,387 --> 01:31:57,854
They had kind of memorized the
road, which was very important,

1504
01:31:57,953 --> 01:32:00,553
because they were running
without lights at night.

1505
01:32:25,953 --> 01:32:27,154
(jet engine roars)

1506
01:32:36,554 --> 01:32:40,121
McPEAK: One time I stumbled across
a bunch of trucks backed up,

1507
01:32:40,222 --> 01:32:42,554
and that was a great morning for me.

1508
01:32:42,655 --> 01:32:44,888
Occasionally one of 'em would break down,

1509
01:32:44,989 --> 01:32:46,789
in a spot where the trucks behind it

1510
01:32:46,888 --> 01:32:48,831
would get trapped and
couldn't back out of there.

1511
01:32:48,855 --> 01:32:53,888
So you try to strafe the last
truck, so that it can't move.

1512
01:32:56,355 --> 01:32:59,088
And these are one-lane roads.

1513
01:32:59,189 --> 01:33:02,388
So once you get the back truck disabled,

1514
01:33:02,489 --> 01:33:04,722
then you just call in fighters.

1515
01:33:06,155 --> 01:33:08,489
You're shooting fish in a barrel.

1516
01:33:12,989 --> 01:33:16,888
NARRATOR: As she drove the Ho Chi
Minh Trail, Anh thought constantly

1517
01:33:16,989 --> 01:33:19,689
of her fiancé Tran Cong Thang,

1518
01:33:19,789 --> 01:33:25,021
an army engineer she'd fallen in
love with four years earlier.

1519
01:33:25,121 --> 01:33:29,254
He was also stationed
somewhere on the Trail.

1520
01:34:24,055 --> 01:34:28,889
NARRATOR: Over 20,000 engineers,
soldiers, and truck drivers died

1521
01:34:28,990 --> 01:34:32,156
along the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

1522
01:34:32,255 --> 01:34:36,423
72 military cemeteries would
eventually be required

1523
01:34:36,522 --> 01:34:38,791
to hold their remains.

1524
01:34:59,323 --> 01:35:02,090
McPEAK: We dropped more
tonnage of munitions

1525
01:35:02,191 --> 01:35:07,357
than the United States
dropped in World War II,

1526
01:35:07,456 --> 01:35:10,323
most of it aimed at the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

1527
01:35:12,491 --> 01:35:14,890
We did not stop traffic down the trail.

1528
01:35:14,991 --> 01:35:18,424
And that is a big disappointment for me.

1529
01:35:18,523 --> 01:35:21,023
To this day, it irritates me.

1530
01:35:23,191 --> 01:35:26,523
The real failures were
made at the policy level.

1531
01:35:28,623 --> 01:35:31,991
We were fighting on the wrong side.

1532
01:35:32,090 --> 01:35:35,724
The South, the government
in the South was corrupt.

1533
01:35:35,823 --> 01:35:38,056
And its people knew it.

1534
01:35:38,157 --> 01:35:39,157
And we knew it.

1535
01:35:40,591 --> 01:35:41,858
I'll tell you something,

1536
01:35:41,957 --> 01:35:44,257
those truck drivers fought very well.

1537
01:35:44,358 --> 01:35:48,925
I would have been proud to fight with them.

1538
01:35:49,024 --> 01:35:51,492
So one of the things you got
to do when you go to war

1539
01:35:51,591 --> 01:35:53,124
is pick the right side, okay.

1540
01:35:53,225 --> 01:35:54,492
Get the right allies.

1541
01:35:58,792 --> 01:36:03,192
NARRATOR: Merrill McPeak would
serve 37 years and retire

1542
01:36:03,292 --> 01:36:05,792
as Air Force chief of staff.

1543
01:36:08,425 --> 01:36:12,257
Nguyen Nguyet Anh and Tran
Cong Thang were reunited

1544
01:36:12,358 --> 01:36:15,024
after the war and married.

1545
01:36:19,192 --> 01:36:22,557
The peace we seek to win

1546
01:36:22,658 --> 01:36:27,225
is not victory over any other people,

1547
01:36:27,324 --> 01:36:31,692
but the peace that comes
with healing in its wings;

1548
01:36:31,792 --> 01:36:34,658
with compassion for those
who have suffered;

1549
01:36:34,757 --> 01:36:37,658
with understanding for
those who have opposed us;

1550
01:36:37,757 --> 01:36:41,292
with the opportunity for all
the peoples of this earth

1551
01:36:41,391 --> 01:36:43,226
to choose their own destiny.

1552
01:36:43,325 --> 01:36:45,926
("Lonely Road" by the Sandals playing)

1553
01:36:46,025 --> 01:36:47,458
NARRATOR: Like Lyndon Johnson,

1554
01:36:47,558 --> 01:36:52,325
Richard Nixon had an ambitious
agenda for his presidency...

1555
01:36:52,426 --> 01:36:56,592
easing a quarter of a century of
tensions with the Soviet Union

1556
01:36:56,693 --> 01:36:58,859
and opening the door to China,

1557
01:36:58,958 --> 01:37:02,758
whose existence the United
States had refused to recognize

1558
01:37:02,859 --> 01:37:06,758
since the communists took over in 1949.

1559
01:37:06,859 --> 01:37:09,958
But as it had with Johnson,

1560
01:37:10,058 --> 01:37:14,458
the ongoing war in Vietnam
threatened all those plans.

1561
01:37:16,426 --> 01:37:21,758
37,563 Americans had died there

1562
01:37:21,859 --> 01:37:24,558
by the time he took the oath of office.

1563
01:37:24,659 --> 01:37:28,392
"I'm not going to end up like LBJ,

1564
01:37:28,493 --> 01:37:30,426
"holed up in the White House,

1565
01:37:30,525 --> 01:37:32,659
afraid to show my face on the street,"

1566
01:37:32,758 --> 01:37:34,793
Richard Nixon told an aide.

1567
01:37:34,892 --> 01:37:36,758
"I'm going to stop that war.

1568
01:37:36,859 --> 01:37:38,325
Fast."

1569
01:37:38,426 --> 01:37:42,958
Nixon's national security
advisor was Henry Kissinger.

1570
01:37:43,058 --> 01:37:47,393
A refugee from Nazi Germany, he
had taught government at Harvard

1571
01:37:47,494 --> 01:37:51,227
and was already a well-known
advocate of a foreign policy

1572
01:37:51,326 --> 01:37:54,860
based on pragmatism, not ideology.

1573
01:37:54,959 --> 01:37:59,660
"Give us six months," Kissinger
told a group of Quakers

1574
01:37:59,759 --> 01:38:01,927
demonstrating on Pennsylvania Avenue,

1575
01:38:02,026 --> 01:38:06,494
"and if we haven't ended the
war by then, you can come back

1576
01:38:06,593 --> 01:38:08,694
and tear down the White House fence."

1577
01:38:11,626 --> 01:38:17,294
In February of 1969, the North
launched yet another offensive.

1578
01:38:19,893 --> 01:38:24,794
This time, they killed 1,100
Americans in just three weeks.

1579
01:38:28,626 --> 01:38:31,059
Nixon did not feel he could retaliate

1580
01:38:31,160 --> 01:38:33,494
by resuming the bombing of the North

1581
01:38:33,593 --> 01:38:37,393
for fear of provoking the
antiwar movement at home.

1582
01:38:37,494 --> 01:38:43,626
So in March, he secretly ordered
B-52s to begin attacking

1583
01:38:43,727 --> 01:38:45,893
the North Vietnamese bases within Cambodia,

1584
01:38:45,994 --> 01:38:50,260
which had offered sanctuary
to the enemy for years.

1585
01:38:51,960 --> 01:38:54,661
The American public was told
nothing about the bombing.

1586
01:38:54,760 --> 01:38:58,661
Congress was kept in the dark, as well.

1587
01:38:58,760 --> 01:39:02,460
Even members of Nixon's own cabinet

1588
01:39:02,560 --> 01:39:04,928
were not initially informed.

1589
01:39:07,495 --> 01:39:11,495
When theNew York Ti mes finally
discovered what was happening,

1590
01:39:11,594 --> 01:39:14,861
the White House denied any
bombing was taking place

1591
01:39:14,960 --> 01:39:18,661
and ordered that illegal wiretaps be placed

1592
01:39:18,760 --> 01:39:21,260
on the telephones of 17 reporters

1593
01:39:21,361 --> 01:39:22,995
and government officials

1594
01:39:23,094 --> 01:39:26,861
in an effort to find out
who had leaked the story.

1595
01:39:26,960 --> 01:39:29,995
"We will not make the same old mistakes,"

1596
01:39:30,094 --> 01:39:32,228
Henry Kissinger had joked to an aide

1597
01:39:32,327 --> 01:39:34,960
shortly after coming to Washington.

1598
01:39:35,060 --> 01:39:37,195
"We will make our own."

1599
01:39:40,195 --> 01:39:42,327
The war went on.

1600
01:39:42,428 --> 01:39:45,594
(helicopter blades whirring, men shouting)

1601
01:39:48,560 --> 01:39:51,761
(gunfire)

1602
01:39:51,862 --> 01:39:55,528
MARLANTES: There's basically
two sides to heroism.

1603
01:39:55,628 --> 01:39:57,761
One is that I want to be special.

1604
01:39:57,862 --> 01:40:00,296
I want people to look at me,
I'm an important person.

1605
01:40:00,395 --> 01:40:02,095
I've done heroic deeds.

1606
01:40:04,895 --> 01:40:08,328
The other side is simply
somebody's got to do something

1607
01:40:08,429 --> 01:40:12,961
to save these people, my platoon
or my company, from destruction.

1608
01:40:13,061 --> 01:40:18,328
The exact same act can be done
with one attitude or the other.

1609
01:40:22,296 --> 01:40:26,196
NARRATOR: After leaving Oxford,
First Lieutenant Karl Marlantes

1610
01:40:26,296 --> 01:40:29,862
found himself executive
officer of Charlie Company,

1611
01:40:29,961 --> 01:40:33,828
First Battalion, Fourth
Marines, Third Marine Division,

1612
01:40:33,929 --> 01:40:36,461
just south of the DMZ.

1613
01:40:36,561 --> 01:40:40,461
His unit was fighting the same sort of war

1614
01:40:40,561 --> 01:40:43,929
over the same terrain that
Marines had been fighting now

1615
01:40:44,028 --> 01:40:45,595
for four years.

1616
01:40:45,696 --> 01:40:47,571
MARLANTES: You would hear,
"Well, it's going to be

1617
01:40:47,595 --> 01:40:50,496
Operation Purple Martin I
or Operation Scotland II."

1618
01:40:50,595 --> 01:40:52,562
And, and it'd be like, "Yeah, whatever."

1619
01:40:52,663 --> 01:40:55,829
What that meant to us was that someday soon

1620
01:40:55,930 --> 01:40:57,962
some choppers are going
to show up and drop us

1621
01:40:58,062 --> 01:41:00,497
into the jungle someplace
or a valley north of us

1622
01:41:00,596 --> 01:41:01,836
or wherever it was going to be.

1623
01:41:01,896 --> 01:41:03,363
And then we'd be off the hill

1624
01:41:03,462 --> 01:41:05,363
and we'd be humping, as we called it.

1625
01:41:09,329 --> 01:41:13,697
NARRATOR: On March 5, 1969,
Marlantes' company was ordered

1626
01:41:13,797 --> 01:41:17,262
to attack a regiment of
North Vietnamese regulars

1627
01:41:17,363 --> 01:41:22,497
dug in on the slopes of a hill
the Americans called 484.

1628
01:41:22,596 --> 01:41:26,596
A few days earlier, his
unit had taken the hill

1629
01:41:26,697 --> 01:41:29,762
and then, under heavy
fire, had abandoned it.

1630
01:41:29,863 --> 01:41:34,363
This time air strikes meant
to soften up the enemy

1631
01:41:34,462 --> 01:41:36,596
hit the wrong hill.

1632
01:41:36,697 --> 01:41:41,230
Charlie Company was ordered
to advance anyway.

1633
01:41:41,329 --> 01:41:43,997
Marlantes led the way.

1634
01:41:45,329 --> 01:41:47,129
MARLANTES: It was a very steep hill.

1635
01:41:47,230 --> 01:41:51,262
And you don't charge because
you have a lot of weight.

1636
01:41:51,363 --> 01:41:53,663
And we had started walking up
and we had probably gotten

1637
01:41:53,762 --> 01:41:55,530
about a third of the way up the hill

1638
01:41:55,630 --> 01:41:56,998
and then they unleashed on us.

1639
01:42:00,597 --> 01:42:02,506
We were in the middle of
this horrible shit sandwich.

1640
01:42:02,530 --> 01:42:04,630
(gunfire, explosions)

1641
01:42:04,731 --> 01:42:06,731
NARRATOR: The Marines took
what cover they could.

1642
01:42:06,830 --> 01:42:10,630
Marlantes realized that if
they continued up the slope

1643
01:42:10,731 --> 01:42:13,931
they would face machine gun fire,

1644
01:42:14,030 --> 01:42:15,563
but if they stayed where they were,

1645
01:42:15,664 --> 01:42:18,130
mortar shells would surely find them.

1646
01:42:18,231 --> 01:42:19,597
(explosion)

1647
01:42:21,630 --> 01:42:23,463
MARLANTES: And then I stood up

1648
01:42:23,563 --> 01:42:25,530
and went up the hill.

1649
01:42:25,630 --> 01:42:28,530
And I thought it was...
I was all by myself.

1650
01:42:28,630 --> 01:42:30,763
And I was running at this point

1651
01:42:30,864 --> 01:42:34,998
because I wanted to cover
that ground fast as I could.

1652
01:42:35,097 --> 01:42:37,830
And I caught some movement
out of the corner of my eye,

1653
01:42:37,931 --> 01:42:40,830
and I rolled to the ground
to come up with my rifle

1654
01:42:40,931 --> 01:42:43,931
to shoot the person.

1655
01:42:44,030 --> 01:42:46,830
And it was a kid from my platoon.

1656
01:42:46,931 --> 01:42:50,298
And then I looked behind
him, there was more kids.

1657
01:42:50,397 --> 01:42:53,530
They had all come behind me.

1658
01:42:53,630 --> 01:42:55,897
It felt to me like I was there for a week

1659
01:42:55,998 --> 01:42:57,531
but I think I was probably by myself

1660
01:42:57,631 --> 01:43:01,732
four seconds, five seconds.

1661
01:43:01,831 --> 01:43:06,898
The entire platoon just
stood up and out they came.

1662
01:43:06,999 --> 01:43:09,564
It remains to me a moment that is just

1663
01:43:09,665 --> 01:43:15,831
almost inexpressible of the
heart that these kids had.

1664
01:43:15,932 --> 01:43:16,932
(explosion, gunfire)

1665
01:43:17,031 --> 01:43:19,331
And then we just hit those bunkers.

1666
01:43:19,432 --> 01:43:23,264
NARRATOR: The Marines cleared
the bunkers one by one.

1667
01:43:31,064 --> 01:43:36,531
For his bravery, Marlantes
was awarded the Navy Cross.

1668
01:43:36,631 --> 01:43:40,531
MARLANTES: Combat is like crack cocaine.

1669
01:43:40,631 --> 01:43:44,764
It's an enormous high but
it has enormous costs.

1670
01:43:44,865 --> 01:43:48,932
Any sane person would never do crack.

1671
01:43:49,031 --> 01:43:51,764
Combat is like that.

1672
01:43:51,865 --> 01:43:55,464
You're scared, you're
terrified, you're miserable,

1673
01:43:55,564 --> 01:43:58,165
but then the fighting starts...

1674
01:43:58,264 --> 01:44:01,965
(gunfire)

1675
01:44:02,065 --> 01:44:04,599
...and suddenly everything is at stake...

1676
01:44:04,700 --> 01:44:06,565
your life, your friend's lives.

1677
01:44:06,666 --> 01:44:08,933
It's almost transcendence

1678
01:44:09,032 --> 01:44:11,565
because you're no longer a person.

1679
01:44:11,666 --> 01:44:14,166
You lose that sense; you're just...
you're just the platoon.

1680
01:44:14,265 --> 01:44:17,632
And the platoon can't be beat.

1681
01:44:17,733 --> 01:44:19,666
And not to mention there's a savage joy

1682
01:44:19,765 --> 01:44:22,500
in overcoming your enemy,
just a savage joy.

1683
01:44:22,599 --> 01:44:25,565
And I think that we make
a big mistake if we say,

1684
01:44:25,666 --> 01:44:26,832
"Oh, war is hell."

1685
01:44:26,933 --> 01:44:29,132
We all know the "war is hell" story.

1686
01:44:29,233 --> 01:44:30,733
It is.

1687
01:44:30,832 --> 01:44:35,632
But there's an enormously
exhilarating part of it.