Vietnam in HD on the History Channel

6 Responses to Vietnam in HD on the History Channel

1. Bear says:

   November 9, 2011 at 12:50 pm

   I watched Part 1 last night, and thought it was well done. The first hour had Joe Galloway speaking about the battle of the Ia Drang Valley in Nov ’65 and how the yardstick, the infamous body count, became the measure of success. Tonight features the Tet Offensive of ’68 thru 1969. The last part will be on Thursday evening. Not easy to watch but thus far factual. It certainly doesn’t glamorize war and showed how very elusive our enemy was.

   Tonight they are replaying Part 1 before Part 2 comes on if you missed it.
2. Bear says:

   November 10, 2011 at 7:03 am

   I watched Part 2 last night which focused on the ’68 Tet Offensive and Hamburger Hill. The hardest part for me was watching those in the program discuss their homecoming facing the war protests which had erupted. They felt they had done their duty with honor and were driven to shame and/or embarassment upon their return. Those impressions deeply impacted many of us making some of us view our fellow Americans and our govenmental leaders with distrust and lifelong bitterness towards what appeared to be an ungrateful nation which probably made dealing with PTSD far worse. That first impression upon returning home shaped how we viewed our country throughout much of our adult lives. Personally, I can never forgive them…
3. Bear says:

   November 10, 2011 at 11:22 pm

   Pam and I finished watching the series this evening. I want to thank all my fellow Spurs for their honorable service to our country in Vietnam. Hold your heads high, we did our part with honor and dignity in what was a noble cause.

   May you all have a blessed Veterans Day!
4. Leonard Magruder says:

   November 16, 2011 at 3:32 pm

   VIETNAM VETERANS FOR ACADEMIC REFORM

   Leonard Magruder -- Founder/President
   Former professor of psychology -- Suffolk College, N.Y.,
   Director of Counseling and Research -- Univ. of N.D.(ret.)

   “Our national recollection of the war still matches that of the New Left.” -- Columnist Stephen Young on the 30th anniversary of the Vietnam War,

   Press Release: VIETNAM FILM A MAJOR ACCOMPLISHMENT
   but certain crucial elements left out

   by Leonard Magruder
   Lawrence, Kansas, Nov. 16, 2011

   The goal of Wednesday night’s showing of “Vietnam in HD ” seems to have been, on the one hand, a desire to fairly portray the heroic achievements of the American soldier, while at the same time, protecting the “leftist version ” of the war by omitting certain aspects of the story.
   The footage was remarkable, what was shown was accurate, the overall impact was profound. But the full truth was missing. It is our intention to help balance the story by re-releasing four previous articles dealing with these missing elements. The distribution will be, as usual, nation -wide but with particular concern to reach college students, such as those here in Lawrence, Kansas at the University of Kansas, as it is they that remaine most confused by all the conflicting information they have received over the years from left/liberal academics about this war.The four articles are briefly summarized below.:

   That the issue of biased, or incomplete, information about Vietnam has continued to be a problem up to today is shown by the fact that even as John Kerry was being nominated at the Democratic Convention in Boston, right before the 2004 presidential campaign, right across the street some of the nation’s top historians and military experts on Vietnam were holding a symposium, “Examining the Myths of the Vietnam War.” Out of this came the Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation.
   The President of the group, Col. George E. Day, said this in a press release:

   “A false history of Vietnam has been used to endanger and demoralize our troops in combat, (Iraq) undermine the public confidence in U.S. foreign policy and weaken our national security. Leftists lied about the war 35 years ago and are lying about it today. Our goal is to counter more than three decades of misinformation and propaganda and set the record straight.”

   The psychology of the phenomenon in academia is elementary. To admit to having been wrong would be to face, not only guilt, but disproof of their ideological assumptions. But it is these same assumptions that are causing the wave of anti-Semitism on campus, the dangerous “Islam is peaceful” mythology, and the anti-Americanism being pressed on students: “It is because of something we did to them.”

   1) “Tet Offensive and the Media”

   After showing victory after Allied victory, the History Channel film came to the Tet Offensive. Both Johnson and Westmoreland knew this offensive was coming but did not know the day or the extent. First impressions of the offensive seemed bleak, but in fact, almost the entire offensive was thrown back in the first 48 hours, with great victories later at Hue and Khe Sanh. Yet according to the film, this was the beginning of a defeatist attitude on the part of the American people. How did this happen ? Since when do the American people turn pessimistic following a great American victory ? This article explains, quoting from 21 standard histories and commentaries on the war to the effect that the media had misportrayed the event, beginning with Walter Conkites estimate that the situation was a “stalemate” .The film itself points out that the enemy lost 69 % of its troops killed, with relatively little damage to the Allied forces.This was a stalement ?

   2) “Closing in On Truth”

   The one seriously incorrect statement made in the film was when it was said that General Abrams, after taking over from General Westmoreland, continued his “search and destroy” policy.” Abrams immediately switched to “secure and hold”, take the villages and stay in them to protect them. This policy, which later became the basis for the “surge” in Iraq was highly successful in Vietnam, leading to 95 % pacification leading to a peace treaty.When introduced to Iraq the media could not mention this success in Vietnam as this would lead to a public already misled to ask, “What success ?”

   Said war historian Lewis Sorley in “A Better War”:
   “In these later years the press simply missed the war. Maybe it wasn’t exciting enough. But it was what the American soldier had done for South Vietnam; hamlets in which the population remained secure, refugees able to return to their villages, distribution of land to the peasantry, miracle rice harvests, roads kept open for farm-to-market traffic, the election and training of village governments. What the press saw in Vietnam never got to the public back home.”
   They didn’t want the American people to know the war was being won. Nor did the anti-war forces

   3) The Lies of the Anti-war Movement

   We show you straight from literature handed out in the 60’s at major protests, that anti-war leaders told their followers that the war was a civil war within the South between the government and Viet Cong “indigenous freedom fighters.” The actual enemy, the Communist North Vietnam, of which the Viet Cong was always a combat arm, was never mentioned.
   The truth is, the “peace” movement was never really concerned about peace. Although it cloaked itself in an aura of great moral purpose, it in fact gave aid and comfort to the enemy, marched under the flag of the Viet Cong, allowed Hanoi to dictate its agenda, and turned its back on the American soldier. When the soldiers returned, it tried to stereotype them, with the help of the media, as dupes, or drug -crazed “baby killers.” That those who did all the suffering in Vietnam should on their return be asked to bear additional suffering at the hands of the very ones who had betrayed them was absolutely unconscionable. Not to mention they wanted the soldiers to lose.
   As David Horowitz, an editor of the radical anti-war movement’s journal, Ramparts, during those years later acknowledged, “Let me make this perfectly clear. Those of us who inspired, and then led, the antiwar movement did not want just to stop the killing as so many veterans of those domestic battles now claim. We wanted the Communists to win.”

   4) The Anti-war Movement Utterly Refuted

   In this fourth article we show how the entire anti-war movement rested on the lie that North Vietnam was never involved in aggression. The main focus of lying by the anti-war movement were two White Papers issued by the State Department in December 1961 and March 1965, which argued the North was involved. Admission of this involvement by Hanoi is found in the report “Summary of Fact,” issued in 1987 by Hanoi’s Military History Institute. Wrote analyst Stephen Young, “The Summary confirms the two American White Papers and utterly refutes the position of the anti-war movement.” Those who supported the war were never confused about this.
   The White Papers of 1961 and 1965 had assessed the intentions of Hanoi with complete accuracy. The credibility gap, or cynicism, of the 60’s was not created by any fabrication on the part of the Kennedy or Johnson Administrations. It was created by deliberate lying by the leaders of the anti-war movement.
   Said Stephen Young, “The basic question is whether the U.S. involvement resulted from a tissue of lies from Washington, or whether its factual assessment of conditions in South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia and its consequent policy response to the plight of the South Vietnamese people was rational and justifiable.”
   We now know, with much of the evidence coming from the enemy itself, that the response was rational and justifiable. Therefore, what is taught on campus about the Vietnam War can no longer be tolerated as it is largely based on lies.

   Students need to be told about these things, for one thing, to help them realize that the new anti-war elements on campus are engaged in the same type of betrayal, totally oblivious, apparently, to the fact that this time it will include nuclear attacks on American cities.

   —————————

   It is absolutely time to demand that the media and the university stop hiding out on the subject of Vietnam and re-enter into dialogue with the rest of America, especially its Vietnam veterans, as to what really happened. The History Channel film was a good beginning.We cannot go into a world-wide war on terrorism with huge lies in our history. Holding on to, and perpetuating myths, has too great a potential for creating another lethal, paralyzing polarization. The media, and the campus, must find the courage to consider “second thoughts,” as have David Horowitz and so many others of the anti-war movement, Horowitz now describing what they did in the 60’s as “treason.” The campus and the media fell for enemy propaganda and it is time they admitted it. Now they are misleading students as to the root cause of a new war, on terrorism, inspired by the scriptures of Islam.

   As the Chief of Military History-U.S Government wrote in his Final Report, “If there is to be an inquiry related to the Vietnam War, it should be into the reasons why enemy propaganda was so widespread in this country, and why the enemy was able to condition the public to such an extent that the best educated segments of our population (media and academia) gave credence to the most incredible allegations.”

   The time has come to raise the questions anew, because the new films and the new histories are devastating to the leftist version on campus and could end this debate forever. This is the one great trauma in the tissue of American history that has never been honestly dealt with.

   CONTACT:
   Magruder44@aol.com
   v-v-a-r.org
   wmdterror.com
   785-312-9303
   article may be reproduced in any form
   unlist by contacting magruder44@aol.com
   ———————-- -30-

   Notice:
   We will send a copy of our own documentary, “How the Campus Lied About Vietnam” to any vet who can get it shown on their local TV station, using Public Access TV which is free. The film is made up of 11 interviews with Vietnam vets durng the days of the Houston Vietnam Veteran parade, asking about their views on the anti-war movement. 40 minutes, allowing 20 minutes for a group of vets to discuss any related topic. Here are excerpts from what was said by every veteran that appears in the film, showing how the impact of statements by the war protestors impacted the returned veteran. Contact magruder44@aol.com. Allow two weeks for delivery.

   Veteran A: Now that hurt me a lot. They yelled at us, “Nixon’s hired guns”, does one need a college education to do that?

   Veteran B: All they cared about was themselves, and those who served in Vietnam. They didn’t give jack—- about us and that stinks. When a country turns its mind and body against a veteran who fought a war for that country, that stinks.

   Veteran C: When I returned I could only keep going if I forgot my Vietnam service, shut it out of my life. But I don’t feel that way any more. I have every reason to be proud of what I did in Vietnam.

   Veteran D: Humiliating, insulting, degrading. It hurt, what the protestors did.

   Veteran E: They protested the fact that the American soldier was in Vietnam, but when we came back they treated us like dirt—they didn’t care.

   Veteran F: When we came home we wanted to fit back into society as soon as possible. But it didn’t work out that way. They kept saying, “you must be one of those baby killers, one of the psychopathic killers of Vietnam.” When you start living with something like that you start telling people you were not over in Vietnam, just out of the country.

   Veteran G: They were idiots…we came home alone, straight into the jaws of insensitive idiots. The peace movement was very diverse, from Vietnam Veterans Against the War to mother and fathers who couldn’t understand.

   Veteran H: Because of them we were portrayed as people that we were not, as “baby killers” and all of that. If they could make those returning feel they had done something wrong it added credibility to their arguments. It was a tack taken so they would not have to go.

   Veteran I: Oh boy, do I remember that, spitting at us at the airport and saying we were rapists, that we raped babies, and they left a mark on us making people think that we were no good.

   Veteran J: When they got back they were blacklisted as very uncomfortable reminders to those people who opposed the war, and many of them felt the arrogant need to isolate many of those who tried to come home and re-penetrate those peer groups—they were ordered to the closet. It was especially difficult for disabled veterans, who were told their sacrifice was a stupid and unnecessary act of patriotism.
   • Bear says:

     November 16, 2011 at 3:56 pm

     Here’s a little tidbit I’ve gathered from my fellow Spurs that were there before me during the ’68 Tet. Our unit working with the 199th Light Infantry Brigade were fully aware that a major enemy offensive was about to take place and that the intel information they had observed of major enemy movement near and around Saigon was passed up the chain of command to MACV. In truth, MACV either knew or ignored that intel.

     In fact the 199th Light Infantry and our Troop Commander had put their troops on high alert prior to all hell breaking loose. The Spurs were awarded a Valorous Unit Citation for their heroic actions during the Tet Offensive

     Overall, I thought the History Channel series was pretty well done and factual in what they could cover in six hours. It’s a beginning and long overdue.
5. Roger says:

   January 4, 2012 at 7:52 am

   I finally got the DVD’s from the History Channel, and the bonus disc is well done also!

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