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Missing from Ken Burns’ ‘Vietnam’: The patriotism and pride of those who fought
NY Post ^ | 19 September 2017 | Bing West

Posted on 09/21/2017 9:20:30 AM PDT by oh8eleven

Most of the interviewees talk in the lugubrious tones of the defeated. We all know the story ends badly. But when it’s over, we aren’t told why we lost. The music is more memorable than the pictures, and the pictures are more compelling than the narration. We are deluged by sights and sounds but not enlightened as to cause and effect.

The film casts the antiwar movement in a moderately favorable light. Are the protesters the real heroes here? What about the valiant US soldiers, 75 percent of whom were volunteers?

(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: 60s; defundpbs; documentary; kenburns; moviereview; vietnam; war
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To: oh8eleven

Kenny should stick with baseball.

Schmuck!


101 posted on 09/21/2017 11:44:53 AM PDT by heterosupremacist (Domine Iesu Christe, Filius Dei, miserere me peccatorem!)
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To: beelzepug
I took R&R in Honolulu with Mrs. Pug in late March
I was scheduled to meet my fiance in Hawaii in early March, but R&R was canceled due to Tet. Went to Taiwan in late April - solo - and don't recall a single minute.
102 posted on 09/21/2017 11:46:21 AM PDT by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
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To: RedMonqey

Boy wasn’t that something?

I was and never will be a fan of the black panthers...but you could understand why the black community was pissed.

I was just a baby back then, so I never caught on to any of that.


103 posted on 09/21/2017 11:52:16 AM PDT by Vermont Lt (Burn. It. Down.)
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To: RedMonqey

104 posted on 09/21/2017 11:53:41 AM PDT by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
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To: tumblindice

“We Americans didn’t lose a major battle, starting with the Ia Drang valley in `65.”

That was a major victory, but of course lots of our guys died, the obvious result of fighting any major battle.

I recall watching some of the original footage on youtube of it, and a reporter - Morely Safer - back at one of the bases with helicopters landing. He ended his report with something like “The only question now is how long will the American public put up with their brave young men returning home in body bags?”

I was dumbfounded - the first major battle! I could understand it a bit more if it was 1970 with all of the protests back home, the war dragging on, etc. But right at the start the press was against us!

CBS report below. It begins with Cronkite talking over video of caskets getting unloaded from an airplane. “This is the price of victory....”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFTBfPYRZ9k


105 posted on 09/21/2017 11:59:58 AM PDT by 21twelve (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2185147/posts FDR's New Deal = obama)
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To: oh8eleven

Nguyen Cao Ky's wife returned to Vietnam in 2009 and opened a restaurant in Ho Chi Minh City that she ran until she died last year.

106 posted on 09/21/2017 12:00:29 PM PDT by Snickering Hound
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To: frog in a pot
From the earliest, almost on cue, Tet was widely reported as a painful and devastating loss for the U.S.,

"Almost"? I don't believe in coincidences. Walter Cronkite was an outright communist. I wouldn't be surprised if he knew; that he was in contact with Moscow and Hanoi.

107 posted on 09/21/2017 12:10:03 PM PDT by NorthMountain
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To: 21twelve
I recall watching some of the original footage on youtube of it, and a reporter - Morely Safer

There's another one that was up to his eyeballs in puking up propaganda for international communism.

108 posted on 09/21/2017 12:13:13 PM PDT by NorthMountain
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To: oh8eleven

I’m sorry your R&R didn’t work out. In the language of the times, “that had to be a real bummer, man”.

Actually, mine was “Mrs.Pug to be” but the Army never asked any questions. She stayed with other wives at Ft. DeRussy til I showed up two days later.


109 posted on 09/21/2017 12:16:53 PM PDT by beelzepug (H,MN! WIAM? DMS!)
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To: beelzepug
I’m sorry your R&R didn’t work out.
Well, we're still married and next year is the big "five oh." How we got this old I'll never know.
110 posted on 09/21/2017 12:23:26 PM PDT by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
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To: oh8eleven

America had a great military and of course smart people only the libs would try to slant that. What we didn’t have was leadership up the food chain. I have read books that claimed LBJ saw himself as some great military leader and he so wanted to be a hero he tried to micromanage the war from the oval office- with detailed maps trying to tell military leadership what to do next and how to do it.

Of course anyone like that is going to make sure they have people at the top of the military that agree with them or are at least willing to support their decisions 1000%. Those military leaders that really knew what was going on, those that were there in Vietnam, in the field with the soldiers were not listened to. The top of the food chain makes decisions those at the bottom have to deal with or die from or what have you.

In the beginning the Vietnam War had the support of the American people (we can all argue whether we should have been involved or timing or whatever) but as the war moved forward there was weakness from lack of/terrible leadership which gave an opening to the liberal protestors and of course they took that opening and ran with it.

I don’t blame the protestors for the outcome; I do blame them for their disrespect for this country and for their despicable treatment of our military. The truth is the liberals have always hated the military, they do now. With the complete lack of leadership then they could freely disrespect our military and get away with it. I hated them protesting when they were doing it, hate it now but they weren’t the main cause of the outcome, they just used that war to further their cause.

Don’t forget the role our wonderful media played either. Any success on our part was ignore or downplayed. Any weakness on our part was magnified out of proportion. Support or patriotism was ridiculed or downplayed and liberals protesting was supported. Most Americans trusted the media then, so it demoralized and eroded the support of many average Americans. The media started the body count game, further weakening resolve of support.

After all of this- the last time I looked in a school history text book, the Vietnam War had about one page and was referred to as “Nixon’s War” no mention of LBJ whatsoever. Great example of liberal history revision right there.

Liberals did all the same things they do now, we just didn’t realize it when it was happening then.


111 posted on 09/21/2017 12:25:19 PM PDT by Tammy8 (Please be a regular supporter of Free Republic !)
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To: Snickering Hound
I see. So a video of a single army unit burning a village (which may have been hiding and storing weapons and/or ammunition for the enemy) smears all of our efforts and makes all of the rest of us war criminals?

Again I was there, 17 months. Most of it patrolling villages, dealt with the people a lot.

How is it that someone like you shows up on a conservative site?

112 posted on 09/21/2017 12:29:49 PM PDT by Chainmail (A simple rule of life: if you can be blamed, you're responsible.)
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To: ilovesarah2012

Your husband IS WRONG!
I never saw any drug use (other than morphine for the wounded) when I was at Khe Sanh in 68.
Of course I’m talking MARINES here, not wing wipers.
We were all a little bit to busy trying to stay alive and killing the NVA to walk around stoned and stupid.


113 posted on 09/21/2017 12:32:00 PM PDT by 5th MEB (Progressives in the open; --- FIRE FOR EFFECT!!)
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To: Tammy8
Liberals did all the same things they do now, we just didn’t realize it when it was happening then.
Yes we did. For example, I can't tell you how many times I'd read or hear a headline that denigrated our servicemen as in ... Ex-Marine robs bank or Suspected Murderer is a Vietnam vet. I was on the phone to the local newspaper and TV stations all the time.
In fact - just two years ago a 65 y/o man was arrested for DUI and driving w/o a license. In the newscast he was described as a VN veteran.
I called the TV station and asked how the hell that had anything to do with the story - and they deleted it for the next broascast.
114 posted on 09/21/2017 12:36:33 PM PDT by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
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To: Chainmail

Yes, the green jello is too spicy and I'm sure the nurse will be by soon with your Ensure.

115 posted on 09/21/2017 12:40:35 PM PDT by Snickering Hound
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To: x1stcav
Re: “We were betrayed by the demonrats.”

Agree.

But also by the political catastrophe of Watergate, which fatally weakened the Commander-in-Chief Richard Nixon.

And also by the passive, silent collusion of Gerald Ford and a majority of Republican Congressmen.

116 posted on 09/21/2017 12:42:14 PM PDT by zeestephen
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To: oh8eleven

Bttt for later reading


117 posted on 09/21/2017 12:42:46 PM PDT by amigatec (2 Thess 2:11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:)
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To: Snickering Hound

Aren’t you the little Leftist cutie...


118 posted on 09/21/2017 12:46:55 PM PDT by Chainmail (A simple rule of life: if you can be blamed, you're responsible.)
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To: Snickering Hound

I’ll just repeat Chainmail’s question to you.
WHEN WERE YOU THERE AND WHERE WERE YOU STATIONED.
If you can’t answer that question, you should probably just go back to DU where you belong.


119 posted on 09/21/2017 1:05:13 PM PDT by 5th MEB (Progressives in the open; --- FIRE FOR EFFECT!!)
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To: Chainmail
Aren’t you the little Leftist cutie...

Next you'll be accusing me of sympathizing with the Kaiser.

You fought in that war too, right?

120 posted on 09/21/2017 1:06:47 PM PDT by Snickering Hound
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