Lessons from a Tragedy
Soldiers on a search and destroy operation near Qui Nhon in central Vietnam, January 17, 1967. Bettmann/Getty ImagesThe lessons of Vietnam long ago became a cliché in American political debate. It provided a shorthand for mistakes to avoid or overcome. Successfully driving Saddam Hussein from Kuwait in 1991, at minimal cost in lives and money, appeared to lift the United States from the shadow of Vietnam. After the disappointed hopes of more recent Middle Eastern conflicts, however, the shadow returned. Ken Burns’ recent documentary series, The Vietnam War, revives the debate over what lessons that war provides. Rather than the usual approach of drawing analogies that show what policies to adopt or avoid, learning from Vietnam involves…
Burns and Novick on Vietnam: A Neutral Film, or a Rifle Butt to the Heart?
When it comes to the Vietnam War, we face almost the same situation that we do with physics: there’s really no “grand unified theory” among either scholars or the public. The staggering complexity of that conflict resists any conclusive definition of what, precisely, it was about.
Ken Burns’ Vietnam
Journalists often claim to write the first draft of history, but that statement raises the question when a story turns from current events into history. The Vietnam War now stands closer to World War II than 2017. A formative experience for the baby boom generation, those who came of age after 1990 see Vietnam as an episode in history. Documentary filmmaker Ken Burns captures the immediacy of the conflict in the ten episode series The Vietnam War airing on PBS. The series also raises larger questions about American foreign policy that resonate today.
