RE: anyone watch the Vietnam in HD series on the history channel

[merkin]

I suspect there are some of you who lived it and don't need to watch it. Thank you for your service. I DVR'd it and I'm about half way done. It seems like it jumps ahead fast without a lot of explanation of the build up. I was 8-9 when it started and they ended the draft one year before I was elligible. Lucky since my lottery number was under 10. I thought I would always remember that lottery. In high school I had just kind of figured I would enlist in the airforce and hope not to get shot at. Then they ended the draft so I never had to serve.

I never did understand the layout and geography of Vietnam and this has really helped. It looks like it was a mess since there were not really any front lines just guerilla fighting all around. It looked like hell

Thanks again for all of you who served

Keith

[Groomlakearea51]

My draft # was 3..... I lasted 2 weeks "on the street" in 1969.....

There are some "film clip" inaccuracies; some significant to the narrative, and some just stupid. It's an attention to detail issue. The narrative is, however, pretty good. The problem with H and H2 "documentaries" is that they continue to use the same old stock footage, and in many instances it is not accurate for the time or place in the narrative. The researchers and production folks are either lazy, or they don't really care about true accuracy.

The most notoriously inaccurate use of footage is any of the MIL, H or H2 channels stuff on WW-II.

[Mallette]

I'll wait until I hear how they handle it. I get so furious everytime I hear how we "lost" that war I stay away from these things. Being there in the last six months before they folded in Paris and having access to the intelligence of what was going on I was stunned and remain so when the NV broke their treaty two years later knowing that between US public opinion and the War Powers Act we would do nothing.

Given how few VC were left (see ANY in that footage of the NVA invasion?) and how devastated the NV military complex was I don't think they'd have dared without the WPA being passed.

"Triumph Forsaken" by Mark Moyar is the best book I've seen with real history in it. That could have saved 50k wasted American lives. Then there is Uncle Walter, who completely misunderstood Tet and the OVERWHELMING victory of American arms that completely devastated that "Battle of the Bulge" attempt as well as NV confidence. If the administration had listened to the Pentagon instead of Walt we'd have mopped up that mess and been done within 12 months.

While Moyar makes a great case for why Vietnam was a "right" war, I'll stay out of that. Once you've commited you have an obligation to make it right regardless of why you got in. We did nothing but feed my generation into a meat grinder after Tet and even with our hands tied and being stoned most of the time we whupped them right and proper...and then Washington let them steal the peace.

I find it interesting (and very, very sad) that this coincided with our initial backing down on space and technology that culminated with our current 3rd world status in such matters. Why this nation simply surrendered at its pinnacle is something I will go to my grave wondering.

Once a nation loses it's vision and resolve it is done.

Dave

[Groomlakearea51]

Iraq and Afganistan vets are all heroes.... Us Viet and Cold War vets are.... well, you know.... "oh, you guys...."

When the C/O sends out the DA2496 (ubiquitous disposition form used for everything) that tells us never to travelto CONUS or anywhere else for that matter in uniform while on leave, etc.... that generally gives one the value of our contributions.......

Oh well.... It was real, it was fun, but not always real fun....

[Mallette]

never to travelto CONUS or anywhere else for that matter in uniform while on leave, etc.... that generally gives one the value of our contributions.......

That was one of the most humilating experiences I ever experienced. Giving up three years of young life to serve under the American flag, then being told to make sure I was in civvies before entering the San Fran airport coming home.

I suppose if I'd been wearing black pajamas and **** boots I'd have been greeted as a hero.

While the monument moves me, I still find it sad that what we got instead of the exhilirating and chest swelling monuments to other feats of American arms was a black wall emerging from the nether regions, building to a peak, then disappearing into nothingness again covered with our dead...just like the war itself. Appropriate, but indescribably sad.

But, as the newscasters said, "There you have it, friends..."

Dave

[BigStewMan]

we experience everyday the victory in vietnam. few realize how communism was spreading and without our involvement in vietnam, who knows what the global landscape would look like today--but, i dare say not as good as it is today. vietnam was a PR loss (sadly) but a strategic success as it halted the spread of communism in that region. heard a great line a few years ago, "war is evil; but, few stop and think about all the evil that war has stopped." I spent 20 years in the Coast Guard, a few years too young for Vietnam; but, thank you all that went, and I'm glad you made it back, and proud to be Klipsch brothers with you. **Steve**

[germerikan]

I got a lot of first hand reports from brothers in arms when I was in the service, not a good chapter in our history at all. Many of them got an Article 15 and was told to take it with a grain of salt from the CO because they wore their Dress on leave.

In regard to how the troops are looked upon now I think the general populace learned from the Korea/Vietnam era and learned that the liberties given to call troops names and spit on them are the same liberties these troops fight to defend.

Soldiers are the last who want a war and the first to fight it.