Personal Comments About the PBS Vietnam Series and Station Practices

Donald Voth

There is a glaring error in segment 5.  While discussing the rise of president Ngo Dinh Diem, narrator says, as I recall "There has never been a separate, southern government of Vietnam." Anyone who knows even the most elementary stuff about the history of Vietnam knows that, starting in 1558, the southern, Nguyen, dynasty was established in direct conflict with the Trinh dynasty in the north, and that they fought each other more or less regularly, from 1600 until 1800, and that the southern regime actually became a dynamic and wealthy state, completely overwhelming the Trinh dynasty in the North.  Else what the hell was Hue about?  It's so obvious I surely don't need to cite sources, eh?  The error is not trivial, it must surely be celebrated by the current regime in Hanoi, which seeks to downplay any and all accomplishments by the southern Nguyen dynasty whenever possible.

Donald E. Voth, Ph. D.
Professor of Rural Sociology, Emeritus
University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR
4323 Balcon Ct., NW
Albuquerque, NM  87120

Louis Wolf

While I found the
series quite positive in terms of the unique Vietnamese
war footage included demonstrating that Ken Burns & Co.
had gone to some lengths to include it, I found the section
about the Tonkin Gulf incident severely thin and did not even
mention that official U.S. government documents prove that
the incident was not caused by Vietnamese navy vessel/s
shooting at the American ship, a fact hidden and kept secret
for many years. Rather, the incident was the basis for
the Tonkin Gulf Resolution which launched the war that
lasted for three decades, resulting in the deaths of some
millions of Vietnamese, 58,00 U.S. servicemen killed, and the
lingering effects of Agent Orange in both countries.

The other piece which was virtually left out of the series was
the 'secret wars' in both Laos and Cambodia, which also caused
the deaths of additional millions in both countries. Also
missing was any treatment of the continuing presence in both
countries of unexploded ordnance which the U.S. left behind.
In both countries, the Central Intelligence Agency was a central
architect of the wars by secretly arming, training and supplying
the brutal Khmer Rouge forces of Pol Pot in Cambodia, and by creating
and supporting the mercenary Hmong secret army in Laos. It is
no coincidence that measured in terms of the per capita population, the tonnage of ordnance
dropped there by the U.S. Air Force made Laos the most bombed country
in the entire history of warfare. Moreover, the Air Force used Laos
as a virtual laboratory for the secret use of chemical weapons, including
the highly toxic Agent Orange and Agent Blue.

I hope the agenda will include an ongoing effort to effectively
counter the Pentagon's semi-public pet project of rewriting
the history of the Vietnam War, reportedly costing American
taxpayers some $15 million.

Louis Wolf

louw7@live.com


Neville Williams


I thought I was over Vietnam 40 years ago, although I've known America is never "over Vietnam" as Ken Burns relates in his comprehensive 10-part, 18-hour PBS series on the war.

This is the best war documentary since "Victory at Sea." It is also the best antiwar film ever made, and the best thing Burns has ever done. Words fail me when I try to praise what Burns accomplished (an eleven-year-long production). It is the most magnificent television journalism I've seen in the past 50 years. It leaves the viewer with no other conclusion that this was one great war crime from start to finish; this is not a version of history the public has accepted -- until now, if they watched this, and millions did.

Along with many friends who suffered through the war as soldiers, as US officials, as antiwar leaders, or, like myself, as war correspondents, I said I can't watch this. I'd already seen all the documentaries on Vietnam I ever wanted to see and read all the books on the war I ever needed to read. I had given 200 of my Vietnam books to George Washington University and all my writings and files on the war and the draft etc. to the American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming. I was SO done with Vietnam, and never looked back after helping organize the "War Is Over" celebration in Central Park in May of 1975 with Phil Ochs, Cora Weiss, and Carl Rogers.

But I did watch it, with my wife, who wanted to learn what really went on during all those crazy years. Once we started watching, I couldn't take my eyes off the screen.

First, Peter Coyote is the best narrator there is. Second, it's extremely well written, the narration underpinned by the most amazing footage of all aspects of the war I've ever seen, and I've seen a lot of it. Turns out, I'd seen very little. A third of the footage comes from the North Vietnamese, their army, the NLF, and foreign journalists and TV cameramen. Much of it has never been shown before. All 18 hours is accompanied by music from our era. (I'll never forget waking up to Judy Collins' "Both Sides Now" on many a morning in Saigon being broadcast over Armed Forces Radio.)

The series misses nothing. I can't offer a single criticism of the content, the facts, the history, or the delivery, and I was ready not to like it. The first three and half hours covers the years from the late 40's to 1965 explaining how we got into the war. For most of us, the war started with the Marines landing in Danang in 1965, but there is 15 to 20 years of history -- and US meddling in the country -- prior to that. After Mao proclaimed the People's Republic in 1949, and Stalin continued with his iron rule, and Eastern Europe "went communist," it was inevitable that we would draw the line somewhere, and that line was Vietnam, after the French left in 1953.

But while the war made perfect sense historically, it didn't make any sense to our generation, especially when the draft was instituted. What is extraordinary about the film is that it is fair to everyone involved in the war at all levels, on all sides, but it leaves one with the full knowledge that the Vietnam War (or the American War as the Vietnamese call it) of the stupidity, the evil, and criminality of this misbegotten enterprise. We all knew it at the time, but now everyone can know it. The film clearly identifies the criminals -- at all levels. Instead of featuring antiwar leaders, it uses interviews from soldiers, officers, policy-makers, and journalists on all sides to tell the story. And no one interviewed for the program "on our side" defended the war, its purpose, or its prosecution. There are plenty of antiwar leaders, from Allard Lowenstein to Jerry Rubin to Jane Fonda, and even an army deserter, whom I knew in Canada, who get their brief licks in; there as lots of footage of antiwar marches from the Pentagon to London to the New Mobe, and then there is Kent State.

Burns makes it very clear that divisions in America today are the direct result of fighting, and losing, that war. We will never be over Vietnam.

Neville Williams
October 2017

(Williams is the author of The New Exiles [1971], and a retired solar energy company CEO.)



Walter Teague

"Winning the Hearts and Minds of the People!"

As a veteran and anti-war activist since 1964, viewing most of Ken Burn’s documentary The Vietnam War I am worried not so much about the content or quality of the film, but about its long term effect on the public’s understanding and acceptance of the current and future such wars.

Most of the reviews especially by other veterans of the war and anti-war movement, agree the film is flawed and point out historical and political discrepancies. Most also recognize that Burns presents a middle-of-the-road position and he admits his aim is to resolve the conflicts the war left in the U.S.

While most critics focus on the films accuracy or focus and hope the film will provide a base for further understanding, few discuss the likely ongoing effect on a public which knows little of the US war on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia and is often accepting or confused about the current seven ongoing wars. My observation is that efforts by veterans and critics have not been allowed equal time at film previews nor can they compete with the massive public hype around this historic event.

The film does show much of the ugliness of U.S. motives and actions. But will showing these flaws and U.S. bias help or prevent most U.S. viewers to develop a full awareness of the troubling lessons? Will the weaknesses and omissions of the film succeed in smoothing over the more vile and aggressive causes of the U.S. aggression and conduct of the war? Will this film by excusing U.S. aggression and war crimes make it easier for the U.S. government to continue and expand its current and future wars?

So the more serious question is not is this a good and accurate film, but will this film help prevent such tragic and immoral U.S. war crimes past, present and future? Will this film help prevent more wars by revealing to the average viewer, the true causes and horrors?

Therefore I have 2 major disagreements with the argument that the film should be judged separately from its public affect.

1st, it is not just a film. Many reviews focus on the discrepancies with the facts and interpretations of the political history. This approach supports the conclusion that this film series can and should be something to build on. I agree we should build upon the film since it will be a major public event whatever its weaknesses, but because the film is likely to dominate public opinion, it is all the more important we consider what the overall political impact will be and what can be done to mitigate the damage.

2nd, will it really promote peace? Most of the reviews and critiques of the film are from those who already know a great deal about these issues. However the most important impact of this film is not as entertainment or even a historical record, but its special and likely massive potential impact on the general public’s awareness and interpretation of the meaning of that war. In a time of ongoing wars and charges of war crimes, the U.S. Pentagon recognizes the public’s view of the Vietnam War can influence public support or opposition for its current and future wars. Therefore the Pentagon has initiated a massive 13 year campaign to present and organize public awareness to support the Pentagon’s point of view.1 In the middle of this massive Pentagon campaign to re-write the Vietnam War history and white-wash the war crimes and anti-war movements, PBS’s 18 hour series will play again and again and become an important part of the public’s education.
Is there any question whether this film’s effect will agree with the Pentagon’s view or be counter to it and even if it helps to educate the public? How effectively it builds support or opposition to ongoing wars will be the major test of this film series.

And then will this film help or hinder the pentagon’s effort by rewriting the history of this war to protect the US from any quilt or blame for its past and continuing war crimes?1

At a time when the President surrounds himself with generals and actions that risk adding major wars in Asia and Africa to the ongoing 7 wars so little understood or opposed by the general public, I am reminded of that phrase we all remember, "winning the hearts and minds of the people!"

Since the US public is the real target and their reactions will determinant the effectiveness of this film, we should ask how will this film influence the less informed public. Will it reveal that the U.S. intentionally started the war for only slightly hidden Imperial purposes? Will it reveal the many systemic war crimes detailed in the pentagon papers and discussed in Congress? Will this film help change the views of those who have heard for 50 years how we should have won the war and it was a mistake not to support the troops? Will they finally realize they were being massively lied to just as they have been lied to since? Will it build opposition or support for the ongoing and new wars?

The reviews I’ve read fall into two general categories, those who consider The Vietnam War as a portrayal of a major error and the others including a spectrum of those who see the war as a major moral crime that should teach us to guard against those who try to rationalize or recreate such wars. Today most of us know not to trust the Pentagon, but how many will be deluded by Ken Burns into agreeing that the war was started by people with good intentions?

The public’s awareness is likely to be split since most know little about the facts or causes of the war. Using this film to teach one-on-one, many of us could easily debunk and correct the glaring historic distortions and counter the pentagon's 50th anniversary effort. But if those of us who are opposed to the U.S. claims and actions that led to this terrible war, soft pedal our responses, it is very unlikely we will have an opportunity to protect the larger public from once again being misled by what I believe is a major propaganda documentary.

1. http://www.vietnamwar50th.com/

Walter Teague, 9-16-17
wteague@verizon.net

Todd Gitlin Response to Jerry Lembcke

I beg to disagree with Jerry, though I’m an admirer of his book The Spitting Image. Now I have to say that I’ve seen only the first half of the series—the first 5 episodes. Thus I haven’t yet gotten to the returning GI SFO airport story Jerry leads with.  But in the first half I have seen no false balancing. Every frame shows, & virtually every line spoken says, that the war was atrocious, a calamity created by wrongheaded, often stupid, often vicious decisions. The evil is American evil. Not only are a number of American vets taken seriously as the film tracks their (mostly) disillusion, but the North Vietnamese and “Viet Cong” veterans are taken seriously—it’s quite amazing, I have to say, to see coverage of the same battle from both sides. (There are two such battles in early episodes.) The travails of the North Vietnamese and NLF are vividly and compellingly present (and informative: I for one didn’t know about big fights in NVN about Tet, leading essentially to the sidelining of Ho for a time). I don’t think anyone before has depicted the ways in which the US funded & otherwise backed the French colonial war. Ho Chi Minh is a hero. His POV is the dominant one in the French colonial episode.

I agree that many dimensions are scanted or missing—GI opposition to and resistance against the war; so many dimensions of the American convulsion & resistance; and overall, the immensity and range of the antiwar movement. (I wrote an essay on the movement’s impact for the companion volume, edited by Burns and Geoffrey Ward, but had nothing to do with the making of the film itself. I think it’s fair to say that my piece celebrates the movement.) There are a few words (but only a few) that are ill-chosen:  the one I’ve seen quoted is this, as in the morning NYT:  "It was, the narrator Peter Coyote says, 'begun in good faith by decent people out of fateful misunderstandings, American overconfidence and Cold War miscalculations.’” Decent people? Good faith? Well, if you thought the worst thing that could have happened after 1954 was reunification under Ho, then you could make a case for good faith but it was in the name of utter incomprehension. “Decent” goes way too far—as perhaps did our beloved Paul Potter in Washington, April, 17, 1965:  "I do not believe that the President or Mr. McNamara or Mr. Rusk or even McGeorge Bundy are particularly evil men. If asked to throw napalm on the back of a ten-year-old child they would shrink in horror–but their decisions have led to mutilation and death of thousands and thousands of people.

As did Carl Oglesby in his famous denunciation of Bundy, McNamara, at al. as liberals.” I would not say “decent." I would not have written those lines. But I don’t think there are many of them in the voice-over. And nothing is more overwhelmingly damning of the fucking war than the extended footage of US/ARVN viciousness, stupidity, damage, lies. It pounds into your head something like this: The ideas and people who made this war did great and systematic evil. 

After I watched one episode, at a public screening, with everything writ even larger across a big screen, I felt once again that I was standing at the brink of hell—which, I’m pretty confident (but who knows?) is exactly what most younger or neutral or uniformed viewers would feel and think; that this was was an abomination, it was unnecessary, it was intellectually crazy and criminally stupid, and nothing like it should ever be done again. This is what I would want a viewer to think about that hell of our youths.

As I was writing the above, I see Steve Goldsmith’s correct observation about the disproportionate damage done to the US and VN. He’s right, of course.   If I’d been writing the series I would have led and closed with Steve's observations. (Again, what gets said about the scale of the damage in the second half of the series, I don’t know.) And. This is a film with mainstream sponsorship that’s going to be seen by millions, or tens of millions (I hope) of Americans, who think of America First.  They are the people we live among, not necessarily the people we wish to live among. They will, I’m confident, come to the right conclusion:  In the words of the December 1964 SDS resolution deciding to March on Washington, “"SDS advocates that the United States get out of Vietnam for the following reasons: a) war hurts the Vietnamese people; b) war hurts the American people; c) SDS is concerned about Vietnamese and American people.”

I also agree with this assessment by our comrade Maurice Isserman (whom I’m taking the liberty of adding to this list), writing in Dissent (https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/ken-burns-lynn-novick-vietnam-war-review):

The overwhelming impression given through their testimony is that the anti-communist South Vietnamese government was a corrupt, ramshackle travesty, dependent on U.S. patronage from its founding in 1954 to its collapse in 1975, without political legitimacy. Through the testimony of their witnesses, Burns and Novick portray the Vietnamese Communist Party, the determined opponent of the sham Saigon government, as brutal and ruthless, but suggest nevertheless that it represented a powerful and genuine wave of nationalist sentiment. They do not celebrate the eventual triumph of the Communists, but they make it clear that this outcome was all but inevitable. The United States professed to be fighting in defense of a heroic independent ally, but instead stood in the path of Vietnamese self-determination. And in doing so, conducted a war that proved an atrocious waste of human life, both American and Vietnamese.

Maurice goes on:

The bad news is that in their portrayal of the war’s opponents, Burns and Novick are, at best, inconsistent, at worst, intellectually lazy.

The narrator (the excellent Peter Coyote, formerly of the San Francisco Mime Troupe), says in the series’ final episode, “Meaning can be found in the individual stories of those who lived through [the war].” That is and has always been Burns’s credo as a documentary-maker. He is not primarily an idea guy—he’s a story-teller (which, of course, is key to his popularity). Story-tellers are necessarily selective—the stories they choose and the ways in which they decide to tell them determine the narrative’s larger purpose.

In the stories they tell in the series, Burns and Novick manage simultaneously to offer a thorough indictment of the war, and a dismissal of most of the people who were committed to ending it. It’s both antiwar and anti–antiwar movement. The one protest against the war the film truly admires is the October 1969 “Moratorium,” which turned out several million people in peaceful protest across the country, and was indeed an impressive achievement on the part of organizers and participants. But in the series, it is used to denigrate the rest of the movement. 

As I said, I haven’t gotten to the second half of the series yet. But Maurice is mistaken about one thing:  In the 1967 episode, #5, there’s an extended treatment of the March on the Pentagon, which is not at all dismissed. 

I don’t think the movement is so much denigrated as short-shrifted. Which is a fair criticism. But I’ll be thinking about this as I watch the second half.

Best to all,

Todd

Todd ix professor of journalism and sociology and chair of the Ph. D. program in Communications at Columbia University.  He is the author of 16 books including The Sixties and of a chapter on the anti-war movement in the companion book for The Vietnam War.

Reply from Jerry

Friends:

Burns and Novick begin Episode #1 with Karl Marlantes’s claim that coming home was nearly as traumatic as the war itself. Episode #9 opens with Marlantes being driven away from his airport home-coming with snarling protesters assaulting the car—accompanied with visuals created by Burns and Novick resembling so closely those of “Bob’s” arrival home in the 1978 film Coming Home that Fonda and company could claim plagiarism. Then in the Episode #10 finale we have the Biberman lament of having called Vietnam veterans “baby killer.”

We know the technique: tell the readers/viewers what they are going to see and, at the end, tell them what they have seen.

As Todd Gitlin suggests, Burns and Novick have packed plenty in the middle. This is, after all, 18-hrs long, so there is plenty of middle. But the bulk of it is battle, after battle, after battle—the New York Times reporter counted 25. Some of which support a war-is-hell narrative. But war-is-hell has failed as an antiwar slogan a long time ago, especially when, here, we see troops, all 18-20 years old the film has us believe (in yet another of the many myths, clichés, and tropes strung together in this film) loading into those choppers with CCRs “Bad Moon Rising” thumping with the wop, wop, wop of the rotor blades. This was the rock-and-roll, lock-and-load war wasn’t it?

The US government comes off looking deplorable just as Todd says and there is merit in Burns and Novick telling that as it was. But what’s new? Admittedly, I’m not the expert historian on the matter (so I’m ready to listen), but what in the film about government lying and general malfeasance that cost millions of lives have we not known since the Pentagon Papers?

Make no mistake. This film uses Vietnam veterans, not so much as eyewitnesses to a war that we don’t know about—as they were, of course, during the war years—but as props for rewriting the lost-war story into a coming-home-to-the-war-at-home narrative, the story that the real war was the one lost at Columbia, in Ann Arbor, Madison, and Berkeley.   

Jerry Lembcke

My Own Opinion of "The Vietnam War"

A Peace Activist Perspective on “The Vietnam War” of Ken Burns and Lynn Novick

The bottom line is that “The Vietnam War” is a cinematic super star which implicitly demonstrates that the US war in and with Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia was wrong and a failure while the views of its opponents were  right and successful.  However, there are flaws in the series that will impede lessons learned for other interventionist wars and movements to end them..

1)  The series never addresses directly whether there was an underlying reason that strategies of escalation and deescalation all failed.  U.S. decisions to support the restoration of French colonialism, create a client state in the south, and block the reunification elections mandated by the Geneva Agreement could have been asserted as personal motivations by an anti-war activist. These were the factors that motivated anti-war activism from the teach-ins to draft counseling and resistance to mass demonstrations to election of peace candidates for Congress to grass roots pressure for legislation to end US bombing and aid to Thieu.  They also contributed to the demoralization and disaffection of US troops.

2)  The series never acknowledges the diversity and breadth of anti-war activity that made this the first and only time in US history that a peace movement succeeded.  The role of the religious community and later of lawyers and business people is barely mentioned.

3)  The series perpetuates, and never addresses, a phony conflict between veterans and anti-war activists, although it does a good job in showing how some of the former became the latter.  If an activist ever called a veteran a baby killer or pounded on a car, it was an anomaly contrary the the goals and ethos of the anti-war movement.  Substantial civilian support was provided to GI newspapers and coffee houses, an important and unprededented activity that the series never mentions.   Post-war polling showed former peace activists to be more supportive of the special needs of veterans confronting PTSD, Agent Orange, etc. than persons who backed the war.

4)  The anti-war movement is treated as a spectacle not as a substantive factor in the considerations of US war makers and of the resistance by Vietnamese civilians in the south and the strategy of the other side.

5)  The march on the Pentagon coverage ends before more than 600 people were arrested, most staging a non-violent sit-in on the Pentagon steps where they sang America the Beautiful and This Land is Your Land, and watched draft cards burned before being arrested very forcibly by US Marshals.

6)  The treatment of Jane Fonda is sexist and shallow, ignoring completely her standing as a extremely popular award winning actor who created the first film dramatization of the challenges to veterans in Coming Home, as well as her substantive work with the Free the Army show to US bases in support of GI papers and coffee houses and the creation of the Indochina Peace Campaign, the final successful grass roots stage of the anti-war movement that focused on Congress.

7)  After appropriately illustrating the duplicity of the US government in carrying out and justifying the war, the last episode accepts uncritically the official explanation of the peace negotiations, the impact of the Christmas bombing and the reason the war ended in a military debacle.

8)  Far more Americans were involved with the anti-war movement than served in Vietnam.  While only a handful of peace activists died (self-immolations, Kent State, Jackson State), tens of thousands of others faced life changing challenges and costs including imprisonment for draft resistance and civil disobedience, exile, family division and vocational harm.  Their courage and conviction are not conveyed by the series. 

9)  Completely ignored is the humanitarian work of US NGOs with the population of the south, regardless of political loyalties, through medical aid to the north, and of their educational work against the war after returning home.  The death of an IVS staff person is described but not the mass resignations from IVS several years later to protest the war.

10)  Legacies of war (Agent Orange, land mines, UXO)  that still today claim victims among US veterans and the military and civilian populations of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are barely acknowledged and the issue of US responsibility for the consequences of its actions is never raised.  The series is full of emotionally wrenching footage of the horror of war but shows nothing of the horror of the legacies of war, including birth defects and lost limbs.

11)  The only substantial peace movement interviewee is Bill Zimmerman, an old friend.  When I expressed surprise at the negative tone of his last interview segment, he wrote, "in my interview with Burns/Novick I did explain that a good portion of the movement shifted to the grassroots work you and I did after the failure of Mayday.  I also made the point that it was only because of that work and the networks we developed that we were able after the Peace Accords to draw so many people into the grassroots lobbying that eventually stopped the war." 

This was achieved by the Indochina Peace Campaign led and energized by Tom Hayden and Jane Fonda, a network of religious and peace organizations I coordinated from the American Friends Service Committee, and a broadly supported Coalition to Stop Funding the War in Washington.

Film editors must always make hard decisions about inclusion.  However, my sense of the series’ agenda on reconciliation is that they wanted to leave the impression that all sides had regrets.  No doubt that is true, but there was a right and wrong side about the origin and responsibility for the war, a conclusion Burns/Novick declined to reach.  The right side, for whatever its mistakes, was proud of what it had achieved in opposing an unjust and illegal war and for 95% of the way we did it.  Maybe not surprisingly, there is no footage of the huge celebration of the end of the war that took place in Central Park organized by long time peace leader Cora Weiss.

   --John McAuliff, 9/25/17

Episode by Episode

Episode 1

This is a quick take based on my notes.  I have not relooked at it to be sure my memory is correct. 

On the positive side, most viewers will be introduced to Ho Chi Minh in a far more comprehensive and sympathetic way than they previously knew, including a brief mention of his time in the US.  The history is well conveyed that we are all familiar with of his failed efforts to communicate with Wilson in Versailles and with Truman in 1945, as is the cooperation with the OSS.  (FRD could have deepened that picture from our experience bringing the OSS and Viet Minh veterams together in Hanoi and in New York.)  The episode conveys well the messages from Ho that were ignored but not the supportive advice from the OSS team that was also buried in Washington.

The fundamental flaw lies in the underlying and unchallenged editorial judgement voice over in the first few minutes that evokes US belief in its inherent innocence: 

"America's involvement in Vietnam began in secrecy.  It ended thirty years later in failure witnessed by the entire world.  It was begun in good faith by decent people out of fateful misunderstandings, American overconfidence and cold war miscalculation and it was prolonged because it seemed easier to muddle through than admit that it had been caused by tragic decisions made by five American presidents belonging to both political parties."

We know from the New Yorker article that there were extended internal debates about whether to use "failure" or "defeat".  I wonder if the rest of the language was also contested.  Does this represent a Burns/Novick decision about how to avoid alienating and closing down an audience they were trying to reach and/or the consistent national failure to accept responsibility for our actions?

The narration goes on to acknowledge the vast difference in loss of life in the US and Indochina, but a moral conclusion about that reality is totally absent.  Such judgement does not emerge in the last episode, but I don't know yet what lies between.

There are three omissions  that stand out:

1)  The movement of half of Catholics to the south is described but the role of the CIA in encouraging their flight is not mentioned.  The implication of their cultural, military and political link to the French colonizers is not considered.  The US goal to use them to create an alternate anti-communist government in the south is never raised. 

2)  The role of the US in choosing and bringing back Diem is fudged.  Instead Leslie Gelb is allowed without challenge to create the image of the devious puppet controlling the puppet master by making it seem he was indispensable for US success.  How could they have used Gelb but ignored Ellsburg?

3)  Diem's phony referendum is exposed, but the voiding of Geneva mandated elections merits only passing comment and nothing is said of the US determination to prevent them from taking place, although it is acknowledged that Ho was expected to win.

The sense of abandonment among Viet Minh oriented southerners in the face of Diem's repression is described and there is a significant reference by a Vietnamese interviewee that Le Duan from Quang Tri brought southern will to the government in Hanoi.   But the north/south mind set  persists by describing "northerners" being in control of the formation of the National Liberation Front rather than as an alliance between Vietnamese from the south and center, some of whom believed that under the Geneva Agreement they had relocated temporarily to the north.
 (I was reminded of a conversation with Mac Duong, the former head of the Social Sciences Center in HCM City in which he described a book he had just finished about a prison uprising by Viet Minh women that was not recognized as a legitimate patriotic act in Hanoi until after the war war over.)

The leadership in the north is legitimately criticized for Giap's purge of contending forces in the Vietminh while the Geneva negotiations were taking place and for the harsh land reform. 

Notably Mai Elliott's first reference to a civil war is during the struggle against France, with the illustration of the division within her own family, a sister that is with the Vietminh and a Mandarin father who is a third generation collaborator with the French.  Virtually any independence struggle can be described as a civil war because a sector of the population has benefited from and sides with the foreign colonizer, as was the case in the American revolution. 

Artistically I understand the directors' goal in cross cutting between the French and US experience but I am not sure it works as well as they intended.

Episode 2   1961 - 1963

Provides some insight into the failure of the advisory stage and the collapse of the U.S.'s Diem strategy.  However, no one is interviewed who argues that US intervention was inherently flawed, regardless of its form, because of its  intervention in another nation's history.  The Korean War, the Cuban Missile crisis and Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe are posed as explanations, if not almost sufficient reasons, for US policy.

The ostensible hands-off stance that allows the coup against Diem to proceed may understate the behind the scenes US roll in the coup if my memory of research is correct.  If so, that omission serves the purpose of maintaining the theme of US innocence.

In any case there isn't an interview or voice over that articulates the thesis that Diem would not have existed nor continued past the unification elections but for the US. 

While the facts are presented, no one makes it explicit that the US upping the ante with advisors and modern military equipment is what prompts Hanoi with Chinese support to strengthen its forces in the south.

Was there no one in the US government or the academic world or journalism raising these issues contemporaneously who could have been interviewed to make the point that more reasoned options were rejected and why?

Neil Sheehan ends the episode with an elegant and poignant comment that the US was not the exception to history. 

Missing is an explicit argument that we aspired to replace the French with a different form of foreign authority but with equal determination to frustrate the country's authentic forces for self-determination.

Two side notes: 

1)  There is a brief profile of an IVS worker Peter Hunting who is the first US civilian aid worker killed by local guerillas.  (I wonder if the series comes back to IVS when Don Luce, et. al. resigned to protest the war.)

2)  There is a mention and video of the beginning of Agent Orange spraying but not of its consequences for health and genetic damage.


Episode 3  January 1964 - December 1965

A pattern is developing to make the first reference to "National Liberation Front" before using the more common place (albeit pejorative) "Viet Cong", perhaps a compromise position but acceptable.

Both 3 and 4 make clear that it is the US military that is pushing LBJ to increase bombing and troop numbers.  The Republicans reinforce tha pressure.

In both episodes there are passing references to opposition from allies (England, France and Canada) that deserved greater attention.   I had forgotten the British wanted to reconvene the Geneva conference.  Reasons for US refusal needed to be explained.

Ball's lonely disagreement with escalation is recognized, and the core of his argument reported.

Hal Moore's battle in the Ia Drang valley with North Vietnamese regular forces is dramatically recreated, as it had been in an earlier documentary on PBS, but his costly victory receives a lot more attention than a nearby US defeat.

North Vietnamese regulars come south only after the US begins bombing the north, but the lesson is not made explicit that US escalation precedes and could be said to cause DRV escalation.

A soldier whose family and story are being followed denounces the anti-war movement in a letter to his parents.  No soldiers are heard who welcome it.

The role of Le Duan and his relationship Ho Chi Minh may be exaggerated and influenced too much by the perspective of Vietnamese-Americans.

The teach ins and April 17 SDS march in Washington are reported with good comments from Bill Zimmerman. Norman Morrison's self immolation is not mentioned nor is the November 27th SANE demonstration in Washington.


Episode 4  January 1966 -  June 1967

The Fulbright hearings are well covered.

The effect of search and destroy missions in creating three million refugees is noted, and there is film of people impacted, but no personal story is offered comparable to the personal stories about American suffering.

Piles of Vietnamese combatant corpses are shown, but we see no discussion of mass graves and their significance for Vietnamese funeral traditions.

A short clip of defoliant spraying is shown but no reference is made to long term health consequences.

Caputo characterizes protesters as being self-interested.

A clip of Stokely Carmichael denouncing the war is shown, but there is no mention of early SNCC opposition.   A short clip of Casius Clay is shown with a news story of his conviction for refusing the draft but the injustice is not explored nor the effect in the black community and among sympathetic whites..

A nice clip of Spock and his support for draft resistance.  No reference is made to his later indictment but it could be in a future episode.  No description of nationwide draft counseling in churches and on college campuses that led to the number of CO applications and deferments cited.

A nice clip of Dr. King's Riverside Church sermon but no indication that Clergy and Laymen Concerned sponsored it, nor of how mass media and political leaders criticized him.

Footage of Spock and King at April 15th demonstration in New York with good commentary by Bill  Zimmerman.

A reference is made to FBI and CIA infiltration of protest organizations and provocateur role, but  the consequences for the peace movement are not developed.

Eloquent interview with Bill Zimmerman on conflicting interpretations of patriotism.

Anti-war buildup not covered:  Mobilization Committee mass demonstrations and protest against McNamara speech at Harvard in November; opening of Quaker refugee assistance center in Quang Ngai; blockade of Whitehall Induction Center in Manhattan; Clergy and Laymen Concerned mobilization in Washington; formation of Resistance;


Episode 5   July - Decenber 1967)

The dehumanization, and underlying racism, of attitudes about Vietnamese well conveyed. 

Important description of Tiger Force atrocities and non-prosecution; other descriptions of GI maltreatment of Vietnamese civilians without discussion of why it took place because of the purpose and character of the war.

The Pentagon march is featured but with Jerry Rubin's radical aspirations setting the tone.  The civil disobedience sit-in on the steps, patriotic spirit of protestors, mass arrests and harsh treatment by marshals are not covered; good statement by Zimmerman that US government, not the soldiers were seeb as the enemy; no description of distorted press coverage

Terrible battle footage communicates cost to both sides but stongest personal stories are all of Americans.

No direct connection made between treatment of POWs and the the suffering of bombed civilians.

Allard Lowenstein and McCarthy campaign described.

Anti-war build-up not covered  Vietnam Summer, The Resistance mass turn-ins of draft cards around the country; militant confrontations with police at Stop the Draft Week in Oakland and Dow Chemical protest in Madison, WI; presentation the day before the march of 1000 draft cards at the Justice Department; Customhouse draft board blood pouring action in Baltimore by priests and nuns

Volunteers of America Guide for Watching "The Vietnam War"

A GUIDE TO HOSTING COMPASSIONATE CONVERSATIONS  ABOUT MORAL INJURY AND THE DOCUMENTARY “THE VIETNAM WAR”

Introduction:  “The Vietnam War,” will air on PBS stations nationwide beginning on September 17, 2017; the 18-hour, 10-part documentary series will also be available on DVD for later viewing events. The series presents dozens of diverse views and experiences of the war from American and Vietnamese survivors, and it follows the stories of a number of American and Vietnamese survivors throughout the series as it moves chronologically from the war’s beginning to its end. In doing so, it offers opportunities for empathetic conversations across perspectives that once carried deep enmity and division.  This guide offers suggestions for conversations that encourage deep listening and the cultivation of compassion for self and others. We hope the conversations will increase understanding of moral injuries in the wake of that war. While a relatively new term, moral injury refers to human suffering when wars challenge or destroy moral values and behavior: Moral injury happens to people of conscience when they commit acts or witness events that damage or destroy their core moral foundations.  Personal or group identities can become unmoored from meaning systems under conditions that severely limit choices and result in harm or death.  Moral injury can leave survivors of war isolated in despair, wrought with complex grief or fierce outrage, and struggling to resolve core identity and meaning. The morally injured may also feel betrayed by institutions or leaders they served who violated moral standards and deeply shared values. They can also feel forever stained by participating in or witnessing evil. The suffering of moral injury can linger for years or decades beneath the surface of overwork and outward success, interrupted by eruptions of uncontrollable rage, or the fog of alcohol and drugs. Or it can result in desolation: mistrust of authority and institutions, devastation of faith, loss of hope, emotional numbing, and the stigma of shame that leads to suicide. These signs of inner suffering have proven not only devastating to individuals but also to the families and communities who welcomed someone home who was profoundly changed from the person who went to war. The long-delayed sorrow or shame or guilt or outrage of moral injury, when unprocessed, can affect a person or community’s resilience and ability to flourish. Yet, the suffering itself is a sign of humanity, of people’s moral conscience that can make them feel divided against themselves. Trauma changes people and communities forever. There is no going back to an innocent past, but how trauma is processed is not predetermined. People who have carried it without a chance to integrate it are more likely to be controlled by their pain. Alleviating painful memories through sharing and processing can turn trauma into insight and understanding that inform the future with wisdom and greater freedom from suffering.
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While moral injury is a new term, virtually every spiritual and religious tradition understands the impact on the human soul and the community when people violate core moral values and have their sense of meaning and purpose in life damaged or destroyed. This guide is intended to enable interfaith and secular groups to hold conversations, but it may also be useful for those who share a tradition and want to open conversations to others beyond their congregation. In sharing different experiences and responses to the series, people may finally feel heard and also be able to hear others with compassion and care. If congregations, community organizations, and families gathered at home find this guide helpful, it may open doors to relationships and further conversations that help transform moral injury into wisdom about the past and a better future for us all.

Some Recommendations: In preparation for the conversations, consider who in your wider community or town might benefit from watching the series with others: military veterans and their families, military families, communities that might have a survivor relationship to the Vietnam war, ex. Vietnamese, Hmong, Cambodian, and Laotian immigrant communities, former government officials, or people who were involved in trying to stop the war. Those who are too young to remember the war will have the benefit of being grounded in diverse lived experiences of those times, and those who lived through that time may still have feelings about it that would benefit from being processed. Remember the age of survivors and the losses they may have experienced. Some may have physical disabilities, such as hearing or vision impairment, and need accessible facilities. For them to participate, you should seek ways to accommodate and include them such as microphones, a signer, or even an uplink to offer closed captioning, even for the conversations (it can be contracted remotely with a good internet connection, at an hourly rate—just google “closed captioning for events” to find a company).  A seasoned pastoral counselor, trusted community leader, or group facilitator should give instructions to set the tone and mood of the process and guide the deep listening sharing with care and compassion. A second facilitator is useful for monitoring small group conversations or the talking circle, keeping time, and remaining alert for when extra help might be needed. Both facilitators should be identified to participants as supporting the process so that it works well for everyone. Introducing them “authorizes” their role in the process and frees everyone else to focus on listening to others and to their own hearts. One word of caution: Sometimes, people can be surprised by the intensity of their emotional responses to difficult subjects, and they may want further assistance. This especially may happen to people who have never before spoken of their trauma. Having a few chaplains or counselors available during watch events for people in distress is important support, and a separate room where they may speak privately is a good idea. They should keep an eye on the group to identify and offer care during the viewing. At the end of the event, they may need to assist anyone who is distressed. If you have them, also introduce them before the screening, so people are aware they are present and available.
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It is also recommended that a mental health hotline number be posted and easy to see for people who may want to follow up and talk further with a professional. These measures may not be needed, but they will add layers of support that help everyone feel more comfortable participating. Finally, the rituals to begin and end the conversations are crucial, so do not skip them. The use of art ritually integrates the body-feeling-thinking parts of the brain and changes body states by affecting mood and creating connections among people by having them do the same activity. Arts are ways to help calm people’s spirits, to create a collective mood, and to enact being a group. If your group is one religious community, it should be easy to have a song that everyone can sing, and keep them singing a bit—don’t cut the singing short. You might even do a sung prayer.  If the group is secular, have a nonsectarian song or use a simple, repeatable chant. If the group is multicultural, you might use one cultural/religious form to begin and end with another or do one each to begin and end. It’s OK to ask people to sing in a foreign language if it is simple and you work them through the pronunciation—encourage them to vocalize or hum if they have trouble with the words. For the beginning of the conversation time, select music appropriate to the film that will create a reflective, thoughtful mood, and don’t rush the music part. If people were deeply moved by the film, they may not have words for how they feel. Music can help connect feeling with words and release emotions. To end the conversations, music can be more uplifting and inspiring to send people home feeling like they would like to return for further conversations. It might even have some simple body movement involved—be mindful in planning the rituals to include participation by people with disabilities.


General Instructions:

1. Be sure to have greeters to welcome people as they arrive and find seats. Sometimes people need to sit with their back to a wall or to be able to see the exits (esp. those who might have some PTSD symptoms), so be sure you have such options. 2. If your facility allows, have chairs that are movable, so that after the viewing, people can move into conversation groups. Scatter boxes of tissues around the seating area. You might also have the viewing in one room and the conversations in another. 3. Identify the chaplains or counselors who are available for people distressed by what they see, in case they might extra support or want to talk in a private room. Make sure the counselors or chaplains have the mental health hotline number if the person needs immediate professional help or if they ask for further help. 4. If you want to serve refreshments (recommended), do it before the viewing starts or after the conversations, rather than just as conversations begin. You want people to focus on listening, rather than juggling a drink and/or eating while people are sharing. 5. At the end of the screening and before a break, consider having people sit in silence for 2-4 minutes to let the episode sink in, to listen to their hearts and what
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they are feeling. Have the time begin with three deep breaths with a slow expire. Then use a chant, song, or bell to end the silence. You can explain beforehand in the announcements that you will do this, so people are prepared and don’t leave during the credits. For those who are not staying for the conversations, this processing time can be beneficial to transitioning from the emotional impact of the viewing to the task of getting home. 6. End the time of silence with a short break. The episodes run about 80 minutes, so many will need a toilet break, which also enables those who want to leave to do so.  7. Begin the conversations after the break. 8. Stay within the advertised time. If you plan for an hour conversation after the screening and a break, the entire time commitment would be around 160-180 minutes. 9. After welcoming everyone and before the opening ritual, take care of announcements, identify facilitators and chaplains, and ask them to be mindful of who is present with them. Remind them that people may have complex emotional responses to what they see. Rather than applause, invite people to use their hands in a gesture of agreement to something they see, and, if they appreciate something humorous, to laugh quietly. Humor and expressions of sorrow can vary culturally, and in a diverse group, it’s important to be attentive to those differences.  10. Explain deep listening (see summary below). 11. Begin & end each conversation session with a brief ritual act that is collective & appropriate to those in attendance before the singing. For example, begin the viewing with having people greet those near them in a formal way, then follow with a short invocation, chanting, singing, or a short time of silence to breathe deeply & end with a bell or gong. This marking of the space of the program with a ritual act identifies it as liminal space & time, an experience outside ordinary time. The ritual marks the space as special and heightens the feeling of intimacy during a conversation, and it helps people to be fully present and to settle into the event.

Two Models for Structured Conversations:  These are designed to encourage deep listening.   Structure One: Small Groups:

1. Ask people to create small talking groups with people they don’t know of 3-6. Small groups allow people more time to create a close, friendly context and to talk longer.  2. Begin the small group conversations by having everyone take three deep breaths and letting the breath out very slowly while feeling their body sink deeply into their seat. This helps to calm people and make them present in the moment. 3. Instruct everyone to identify something they are wearing or carrying in a pocket or purse that is important to them, and if it is portable, to take it out and hold it. Have each person introduce themselves in one minute to the others by saying their name and what makes the object important to them. If there is space, they can place the object on the floor in the middle of the group—the objects become an “altar” that holds the presence of each person in the group. The visual reminders
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help people remember the others in the group. Give them one minute per person to do this. (This use of the significance of personal objects is an oblique reference to Tim O’Brien’s beloved novel about the Vietnam War, The Things They Carried.) 4. Select three questions you want to have the groups address. Ask one at a time and give them time to answer them. Make clear that if anyone hears something they want to share outside the group, they must ask the person who said it to give them permission. Questions that might be used (select about three at most and use your own if you prefer): a. What did you receive from this episode that was valuable to you? b. What surprised you about this episode? c. What most affected you emotionally and how does it relate to your life experience? d. What feeling lingers for you from this episode and what evoked it? e. What remains unresolved or difficult for you? f. Was there anything that inspired you or made you feel grateful in the episode? g. How were you changed by watching this? 5. Invite the groups to address each question by every person speak 2 minutes while everyone else just listens. Have a timer, bell, or gong for the conclusion of the time for each question. Be sure the last question helps people shift mood to something neutral or positive. 6. Give the groups 3-5 minutes just to talk and process what happened to them and how they were changed by viewing and talking together.  7. Ask them to collect the things on their altar to conclude the conversations and call everyone back together. If the same groups are gathering every episode, you can use different check-in processes at the beginning but always begin with the three breaths and ask them to do some sort of check-in.  8. You might invite people during the time before the next episode to write or draw their responses to what happened and bring them to share the next time. Begin with those sharings to start the conversation about the next episode—this links the episodes and follows the series itself in which a person’s story appears in several episodes. 9. If the attendees are not regular, do the group altar exercise every time. 10. Call everyone back together and give them 5-10 minutes to volunteer short statements (or even just words) about what they learned or how they were changed. 11. End with a chant, song, extinguishing of the candle, or offer a few words of affirmation and farewell, and an invitation to return for further episodes.

Structure Two: Inner-Talking, Outer-Listening Circles:

(Sometimes called a fishbowl) Recommended for events that will have varied and unpredictable attendance.

1. Set the chairs with an inner circle of chairs that have 10-12 chairs and place a circle around them, but within 4-5 feet of the inner circle. If the entire group is small, the inner circle can be as small as 4. If the attendance is larger than will fit without
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spreading the outer circle too far from the inner one, do two outer circles, one behind the other. The goal is to enable the outer circle(s) to hear what is said in the inner circle. Even better than an extra outer circle would be a second innerouter circle, if you have space, but be sure to have two additional facilitators as well. 2. Announce the total amount of time dedicated to the talking circle and use an hourglass or visible timer, so people attend to the length of time they speak.  3. Have a facilitator sit in the inner circle who invites people to sit in the inner circle if they want to speak (encourage some volunteers if people avoid the inner circle, but not every chair needs to be occupied to start the conversation—it’s a good idea to have a few people who have agreed ahead of time to start the sharing).  4. Explain deep listening and explain that people are invited to speak from their hearts about how they are feeling (the list of questions above can be used as prompts). The outer circle’s role is to listen deeply to the person speaking.  5. Before anyone speaks, have everyone take three deep breaths by inhaling deeply and exhaling very slowly while feeling their body rest deeply into their seat.  6. Invite people in the outer circle to come up to empty chairs in the inner circle if they want to speak and to speak when they are ready. 7. Ask people not to return to the inner circle to speak again until everyone in the outer circle has had a chance to speak.  8. Explain that each person has up to 2 minutes to speak and indicate an hour glass or some other way that everyone can see the time—it helps speaker and listeners to be aware of the limits of the time. 9. Ask everyone else to focus and listen to the person speaking, including the inner circle. After each person speaks, everyone should take two long deep breaths and let what they said settle in. 10. Invite people after they speak to leave the inner circle, after the long breath, when they feel ready. 11. When the next person in the inner circle feels ready, she or he speaks. You can go around by turn, or just let people speak when they are ready and keep going around as new people move into the circle from outside to speak. 12. Do not be afraid of the silences. Often people are taking in something powerful and important, so don’t start to get anxious if the silence goes awhile. Be patient. 13. If a speaker starts to argue or state a political opinion, the facilitator might want to remind them, gently, that people might agree or disagree, but this process is about sharing what moved them and what hurts remain.  14. When time to end comes, don’t interrupt the final speaker. Wait for silent space to bring things to a conclusion. Thank everyone for sharing and listening carefully. 15. Take a few minutes to ask people to look around the room at others and to share how they have been changed or what they have learned from the conversation. 16. End with three breaths, followed by a chant, song, extinguishing of the candle, or offering a few words of affirmation and farewell, and an invitation to return for further episodes. 17. If you have a crowd larger than 50 or so, and cannot do a second circle, you may want to use the small group process.  Not everyone will want to speak, but too large a crowd will prevent some people from speaking who might want to.
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Troubleshooting: With topics as conflicted and contested as war, it can be easy for people to want to argue points of view rather than open their hearts. Often, such differences carry intensity, but not the kind of emotions that encourage vulnerability or openness. If a person uses their time to make an argument, make sure there is the breathing time after they speak. Then, remind everyone that that the process of deep listening means also speaking from the heart with openness.
If someone starts to respond to the argument, dueling opinions can derail the listening process. The facilitator might need to intervene, but graciously and gently so as not to stir things up more. If an argument starts to happen, ask the responder to begin first by restating what they heard and checking with the previous speaker to see if they feel heard. It can be the case that profound grief and hurt lie behind an angry opinion and has been the way a person has coped with their suffering is to hold tight to their judgment. Just feeling heard can help and open up a different way of saying something. So before letting someone else respond to an opinion, be sure the previous speaker feels heard. If a speaker has a hard time with vulnerability, it may help to ask them to sit with what is happening to them or to ask what supports their looking forward with hope if the past cannot be changed and what they believe can inform the future.  If the speaker is not able to make themselves vulnerable and stays with an argument or opinion, you might remind the whole group before the time of silence that the deep listening process asks us to set our own evaluations aside and to take in what was said with an open the heart. Ask them to listen to the feelings and try to connect with compassion for the feelings. Listening with the heart does not require adjudicating the truth of statements, just a willingness to listen to the suffering involved. If someone speaking starts to be overcome with emotion, don’t jump in right away unless you are worried about their mental health state. Give them a short time to recover. If they break down more, a chaplain or counselor may want to approach to sit next to them and offer a steady hand on their hand or arm (touching is cultural so ask permission if the person is a stranger and not of the same culture). If that fails to help them regain control, the support person can ask if they’d like to leave for a bit. After some time to regroup, they may choose to come back or, if they want to leave, the support person should make sure they are OK to get themselves home. If they do not seem stable or in control, use the emergency hotline to get help before you let them leave.

About Deep Listening

When we listen with an open heart, we listen to understand, to empathize, and to accept the other’s feelings and who they are. We seek to be fully present and attentive and to make speaking easier by setting aside a need to judge, evaluate, or challenge. We receive what is shared as a gift, with gratitude. If thoughts, emotions, memories, associations arise in your mind, notice them, and gently let them go, so you can return to listening to the speaker, wholeheartedly. By quieting our
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busy thinking minds, we make it possible to listen precisely and openly, instead of arguing with and trying to control what we hear. Some call this a contemplative mind: fresh, alert, attentive, calm, and receptive.  We are listening for a person’s own understanding of their story rather than for facts to adjudicate truth or to agree or disagree. We do not have to worry about what we think or what we want to say. Just receive and let what we receive settle into our hearts so that, if we speak in response, it will come from our hearts as well. Being listened to this way can be affirming and transformative, especially if we also share by making ourselves vulnerable and honest when we have a chance to reflect on our response.  Deep listening applies not only to communication with another but also to our inner awareness.

Resources:

About types of deep listening:


Small groups listening: http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/practices/features.php?id=15570
Attentive, Receptive Listening: http://www.contemplativemind.org/practices/tree/deep-listening
Slowing Down to the Speed of Love: http://www.selfgrowth.com/articles/what_is_deep_listening.html


1. Arts and Healing Program at UCLA Collaborative Centers for Integrative Medicine (CCIM): http://uclartsandhealing.org/free-downloads/.  2. Brock, R. and Lettini, G. (2012). Soul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury After War, Boston: Beacon. 3. Capps, W. H. (1982). The Unfinished War: Vietnam and the American Conscience. Boston: Beacon. 4. Drescher, K., et. al. (2013). “Morality and Moral Injury: Insights from Theology and Health Science,” Reflective Practice: Formation and Supervision in Ministry, vol. 33 http://journals.sfu.ca/rpfs/index.php/rpfs/article/viewFile/262/261. 5. Graham, L. (2017). Moral Injury: Restoring Wounded Souls. Nashville: Abingdon. 6. Litz, B. T., et al. 2016. Adaptive Disclosure: A New Treatment for Military Trauma, Loss, and Moral Injury. NY: Guilford Press. 7. Marlantes, K. (2011). What It Is Like to Go to War. NY: Atlantic Monthly Books. 8. Van Der Kolk, B.  (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. NY: Penguin Group LLC. 9. Woods, D. (2016). What Have We Done: The Moral Injury of our Longest Wars. NY: Little, Brown.

Prepared by Rita Nakashima Brock, Ph.D., Senior Vice-President for Moral Injury Programs, Volunteers of America and Commissioned Minister of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Pacific Southwest Region. Please send questions, feedback, or comments to rbrock@voa.org. (510) 203-7481. 

Libraries Planning Programs with PBS The Vietnam War

The American Library Association (ALA) and WETA Washington, DC, announced 50 U.S. public libraries selected to receive a programming kit for “The Vietnam War,” a 10-part documentary film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick that will air on PBS stations beginning Sept. 17.

The libraries, selected through a peer-reviewed competitive application process, will receive a copy of the 18-hour documentary series on DVD, with public performance rights, as well as the companion book, “The Vietnam War: An Intimate History” by Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns (Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House, 2017).

The libraries will also receive a programming guide with ideas and resources for public programs to complement the film. A digital version of the programming guide is publicly available. Download “The Vietnam War” Programming Guide for Libraries.

Recipients will also receive promotional materials, online resources developed to support local programs, opportunities for partnership with local PBS station(s), and more.

More than 350 public libraries applied for the opportunity.

The kit is designed to help libraries participate in a national conversation about one of the most consequential, divisive and controversial events in American history. Participating libraries are required to host at least one public program related to the film before Jan. 1, 2018, along with other promotional and reporting requirements.

Programming Kit Recipients

The 50 public libraries listed below were selected to receive The Vietnam War, a film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick programming kit, and will be implementing related programs in their communities.

Alabama

Irondale: Irondale Public Library

Alaska

Ketchikan: Ketchikan Public Library

Arizona

Chandler: Chandler Public Library

California

Palm Desert: Palm Desert Library

San José: San José Public Library

St. Helena: St. Helena Public Library

Colorado

Thornton: Anythink Libraries

Florida

Avon Park: Highlands County Library System

Georgia

Jonesboro: Clayton County Library System

Iowa

Dubuque: Carnegie-Stout Public Library

Mount Pleasant: Mount Pleasant Public Library

Illinois

Aurora: Aurora Public Library

Peoria: Peoria Public Library

Wauconda: Wauconda Area Library

Indiana

Auburn: Eckhart Public Library

Kokomo: Kokomo-Howard County Public Library

Kentucky

Danville: Boyle County Public Library

Louisiana

Houma: Terrebonne Parish Library

Massachusetts

Boston: Boston Public Library

Hingham: Hingham Public Library

Maryland

Baltimore: Enoch Pratt Free Library

Maine

Ellsworth: Ellsworth Public Library

Kennebunk: Kennebunk Free Library

Michigan

Marquette: Peter White Public Library

Minnesota

Elbow Lake: Thorson Memorial Library

Marshall: Marshall-Lyon County Library

Montana

Billings: Billings Public Library

North Carolina

Salisbury: Rowan Public Library

Wilmington: New Hanover County Public Library

Nebraska

Omaha: Omaha Public Library

New Jersey

Brown Mills: Pemberton Community Library

Princeton: Princeton Public Library

Somerset: Franklin Township Public Library

Wayne: Wayne Public Library

New Mexico

Gallup: Octavia Fellin Public Library

New York

Liverpool: Liverpool Public Library

Poughkeepsie: Poughkeepsie Public Library District

Oklahoma

Muldrow: Muldrow Public Library – Stanley Tubbs Memorial Library

Oregon

Coos Bay: Coos Bay Public Library

Portland: Multnomah County Library

Pennsylvania

Harrison City: Penn Area Library

Wyomissing: Wyomissing Public Library

Texas

Houston: Harris County Public Library

Midland: Midland County Public Library

Virginia

Fredericksburg: Central Rappahannock Regional Library

Harrisonburg: Massanutten Regional Library

Washington

Colfax: Whitman County Rural Library

Wisconsin

Kenosha: Kenosha Public Library

Verona: Verona Public Library

Wyoming

Cheyenne: Laramie County Library System