Evie Salomon, at 60 Minutes Overtime:
This past week marked the 46th anniversary of the My Lai massacre, in which 504 unarmed Vietnamese civilians were massacred by U.S. troops in 1968. It’s one of the most shameful chapters in American military history, and now documents held at the Nixon Presidential Library paint a disturbing picture of what happened inside the Nixon administration after news of the massacre was leaked.
The documents, mostly hand-written notes from Nixon’s meetings with his chief of staff H.R. “Bob” Haldeman, lead some historians to conclude that President Richard Nixon was behind the attempt to sabotage the My Lai court-martial trials and cover up what was becoming a public-relations disaster for his administration.
One document, scribbled by Haldeman during his Dec. 1, 1969, meeting with Nixon, reads like a threatening to-do list under the headline “Task force – My Lai.” Haldeman wrote “dirty tricks” (with the clarification that those tricks be “not too high a level”) and “discredit one witness,” in order to “keep working on the problem.”…
The question is, was anyone actually on the receiving end of those “dirty tricks” in Haldeman’s My Lai action plan? According to Trent Angers, author of newly updated book “The Forgotten Hero of My Lai,” Nixon’s targets were the star witnesses of the My Lai court-martial trials: pilot Hugh Thompson and gunner Larry Colburn. They were the two surviving members of a U.S. helicopter crew that was flying a reconnaissance mission over the South Vietnam village of My Lai when they saw the massacre in progress that March day in 1968.
If not for the actions of the helicopter crew, the death count at My Lai could have been far higher. Thompson and Colburn were so horrified by the sight of American soldiers slaughtering unarmed civilians, they put their own lives at risk to try to stop it, even saving a wounded boy from a corpse-filled ditch and delivering him to the hospital…
Mike Wallace told the helicopter crew’s story in the gut-wrenching 60 Minutes segment called “Back to My Lai”… which was first broadcast in 1998. That same year, the U.S. military officially honored the crew’s actions in My Lai. Not present was the crew’s third crew member, Glenn Andreotta, who was shot and killed in action three weeks after the massacre. It had taken 30 years for the U.S. government to recognize the three men.
But when Thompson and Colburn first returned home after Vietnam, it was a much different story. They weren’t received as heroes, but as traitors.
Thompson testified about the massacre in the U.S. government’s court-martial trials, but according to author Trent Angers, two Congressmen who were working in concert with Nixon, managed to seal that testimony in order to damage the cases against the culprits of My Lai. Whether it was one of the “dirty tricks” Nixon prescribed in Haldeman’s 1969 meeting note is a matter of debate for historians…
Thompson died in 2006, and Colburn says he was in the room with him during his final moments. With his friend gone, Colburn says he feels an obligation to carry the torch, and speak publicly about what happened in My Lai that day. But he misses having Thompson at his side.
“There were times you start thinking, ‘Why are so many people against what we did? What we did was morally correct– why don’t they understand?’ It was always nice to have one other person who did understand,” says Colburn. “We were therapeutic for each other.”…
The complete “Back to My Lai” video segment is at the link; I’d consider it NSFW, unless you have a stronger stomach than I do.
I had just entered high school in 1968, and can attest from memory that the Nixon cabal’s dirty tricks would’ve been — not for the first or last time — politically unnecessary, since the infamous Silent Majority was already loud in its support of killing “gooks, slopes, or slant-eyes” in defiance of any rules or restraint. Calley would’ve been exalted, Thompson and Coburn reviled, with no further assistance from the White House. All their “self protection” provided was a permanent record of an ongoing criminal conspiracy.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
I stopped watching 60 Minutes after the NSA Tribute show.
Villago Delenda Est
Ah, but it certainly was not politically correct.
gene108
A lesson the right-wing learned, as seen by Ollie North having a steady radio gig for a number of years, plus guest spots on Fox News, as well as Bush & Co. making sure they never wrote anything down to be used against them later.
But I think the cabal of remaining Nixonites are getting too old to take back power again, so despite the right-wing being crazier than ever before, they do not have the “evil genius” fortitude folks like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Bush, Sr., etc. learned from Nixon and employed later on.
ulee
War is a terrible thing. It makes people kill when in ordinary life thay would not think of killing. If I had George W. in front of me I would kick his ass. Worthless hunk of nothing.
bemused
How incredibly sad that Thompson and Colburn felt alone and were treated badly for being decent humans. I remember My Lai, I was in high school then. I thought it was deeply shameful then and now. I couldn’t imagine how it could be defended. I sure don’t know how anyone could have been a teen in the Vietnam war years with kids you knew being drafted and not become cynical from then on.
Villago Delenda Est
@ulee: There’s a reason guys like the deserting coward and the Dark Lord avoid war zones.
They’d be killed by their own troops.
somethingblue
Today the Republicans would be running Calley for Congress.
Ruckus
@bemused:
Time does help. Sometimes a lot.
It can make you a lot less trustworthy of politicians, which never seems to be a bad thing.
Mike in NC
I was pretty young at the time but do recall that “Rusty” Calley became quite the hero in some quarters. I’ve gone to the local VFW hall with a Vietnam vet neighbor, and everybody in there is hardcore Tea Party.
Ruckus
@Villago Delenda Est:
Bet there would be a pool on which day of the first week it would happen.
bemused
@Ruckus:
Time can also make people forget what went down and turn into Foxbots.
Rock
Colburn and Thompson are heroes.
LanceThruster
I wrote this here and later saw it in a Vietnamese language publication —
LanceThruster December 6, 2010 9:34 am (Pacific time)
The horror and sadness of Mr. Duc Tran Van’s recounting of the massacre of beloved family members and neighbors while so very young is heart-wrenching. He too was one of the heroes of that day as his actions prevented his brother and himself from becoming fallen victims of the slaughter. His survival allowed him to be there for his remaining family and share his story with others in a most poignant and graphic way. Armed conflict always involves senseless death and destruction, but what he experienced at the hands of those who believed their own sacrifices were for the good of his people was beyond the pale. I became draft age in ’75 as America’s direct military involvement in the conflict had essentially ceased. I had considered enlisting but did not feel I could trust my government with regards to those it might determine warranted killing. I was reminded of this when my friend’s son Adam, part of Marines 1/5 for the fall of Baghdad in the second Gulf War, returned home from Iraq. When I cautiously asked him about his experiences in a combat zone, the first words out of his mouth were, “We killed people for no reason.” I learned from him that even with very specific rules of engagement, innocent people would die. A vehicle would approach his checkpoint too fast, too erratic, and not heed signals to stop or slow down, and he and his fellow Marines would fire upon the vehicle and its occupants. He told me about the time he did just that, and when he went to inspect the vehicle, it was full of dead and wounded women and children, some of whom were screaming or crying or moaning, in terror or pain or anguish. He bears no physical scars from his tour of duty, but is on PTSD status. I was traumatized by merely hearing of some of his encounters over there. I can only imagine the toll it takes actually living them. To Mr. Duc Tran Van; I am truly so very sorry you and your family and your country suffered so as a brutal war was waged across your land. I have tried to remain informed and active politically so that I could do whatever I can to help prevent my country from inflicting further such tragedies on others. As you might imagine, sometimes I too feel very helpless in this regard. You and Tim King have done much to remind me that sometimes courage can be as simple a thing as to just keep moving forward. And for that, you have my sincere gratitude.
Cassidy
@Mike in NC: The local VFW I joined asked me why I wasn’t renewing my membership. I told them that a Soldier supports the CoC, regardless of personal beliefs and maybe they should remember that. They haven’t called me back.
ulee
And Dick Cheney is still on Fox expousing his view on the world and how Obama is doing it wrong. Hemingway would have this killer in the village square with his head cut off.
Villago Delenda Est
@Rock: Absolutely. Without a fucking doubt.
Ruckus
@bemused:
It always amazes me how some people can walk around with their heads so far up their own ass.
But you are correct of course.
Snarki, child of Loki
@somethingblue: “Today the Republicans would be running Calley for Congress.”
Didn’t they already do that with Allen West?
bemused
@Ruckus:
Some I went to school with turned into Tea Party morons.
Ruckus
@Rock:
Absolutely they are.
Ruckus
@bemused:
Were they males of draft age in 65-73 and without deferments?
Not that that would necessarily make a lot of difference. I know people I went to school with who are so far to the right they could be relatives of darth.
Liquid
Gawker (I know) has a decent article about this — http://gawker.com/new-research-nixon-wanted-dirty-tricks-to-cover-up-m-1550455253
p.a.
Worked with a Charlie Company vet (same civilian company different department). Someone came up with the investigation/trial transcripts. He was a prosecution witness, never charged with murder. Defense accused him of serial rape both before My Lai and there. He denied. (Just refreshed my memory from the transcripts; won’t include link, too disgusting. They’re online if you feel up to it.) Can’t remember what his discharge status was. No one I know of ever talked to him or confronted him about it; he was a manager and could make life unpleasant for us peons. Retired about 10 yrs. ago.
Baud
I wish we had a different word for anniversary when the anniversary is of a horrible event.
bemused
@Ruckus:
Sure and unlucky in draft numbers. My friend found out her cousin had died in Vietnam in class when a teacher came in very upset and announced it. The teacher wouldn’t have done that if he/she had known a close relative was in the class but was stunned by the news and not thinking.
joel hanes
@bemused:
Time can also make people forget what went down
Apparently.
No on on this thread has yet mentioned Colin Powell, who was given the assignment of “investigating”
My Lai (making it go away) as a 31-year-old Army Major.
Good practice for his Iraq WMD testimony, I wot.
And no one has mentioned Seymour Hersh, without whom all this would have disappeared down the memory hole
IowaOldLady
@ulee: The only question anyone of TV should ever ask Dick Cheney is “Why aren’t you in jail?”
Commenting at Balloon Juice since 1937
@somethingblue: They tried it near me. An immoral piece of sh*t declared himself a hero for bravely terrorizing Iraqi families by raiding their homes at night. Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t the legacy who was promised the seat so the party crushed him.
lol
Kind of darkly humorous, but if you don’t follow @dick_nixon on Twitter you should. It’s a scarily accurate take on what a still-living Richard Nixon’s twitter feed would look like without really veering into parody.
You can guess what many tweets today are about.
SiubhanDuinne
Charlie Pierce has a few choice words as well.
@Baud:
Jahrzeit?
Cacti
@Mike in NC:
Governor Jimmy Carter was a big public supporter of Calley, and instituted “American Fighting Man’s Day” in his honor.
Probably the one true black mark on JC’s public service career.
Peter
What’s especially horrifying is that there were something like seven other similar operations to the one that lead to My Lai planned. The only reason they didn’t happen is that Thompson reported My Lai to the man in charge, who suspended the other operations.
He didn’t just save the lives of the people he piled into his helicopter. He probably saved hundreds to thousands of lives. A true goddamn hero, and it took thirty years for the military to admit it.
WaterGirl
@Baud: I think Mr. Rogers talked about that once.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
@Cacti: Make it two black marks with the whole mainstreaming born again nonsense.
SiubhanDuinne
@Cassidy:
Good for you. And fuck them.
OzarkHillbilly
Rough.
Judge Crater
I was in the military when My Lai occurred. I was shocked but not surprised. I had heard so many stories of the killing of Vietnamese civilians by American troops and the indifference, even contempt, we Americans had for their lives and property that My Lai was completely believable.
It was an object lesson in what these “savage wars of peace” produce. When we undertake these military adventures we really do go into the heart of darkness. The stain of My Lai, and all the other atrocities committed in foreign lands, never gets washed away. Thompson and Colburn were heroes who said, “enough.” Sadly, American leaders have rarely had the courage to say the same.
SiubhanDuinne
@ulee:
I know I have mentioned before, ad nauseum, probably, that Ernest Hemingway and I are from the same home town, so I grew up kind of saturated in Hemingwayiana. When you think what he did with WWI and the Spanish Civil War, it’s wonderful-scary to think what he might have done with Vietnam.
Long Tooth
“Calley would’ve been exalted, Thompson and Coburn reviled, with no further assistance from the White House”.
Under no circumstance whatsoever would Calley have been “exalted” in the San Francisco Bay Area of 1969. That much I know. Or most other places in the country that year (that I guess).
Those that rallied around Calley way back then are the cats that took over the GOP.
raven
You can watch the local Atlanta news report after the Calley verdict here. Of special interest is the fucking moron who obviously works in the PS ” A white commissary employee strongly disagrees with Calley’s conviction and declares he would have helped Calley if he had been in Vietnam with him.”
I was at still in Korea when My Lai happened and shipped over in to Vietnam on August. One of my best buddies from high school was was killed in November and that was the final nail for me. I had been leaning anti-war for quite some time but that pushed me over the edge.
Chris
That we know of.
Like I said a few days ago on another thread (and as this article mentions)… the thing that struck me about My Lai wasn’t what happened, so much as the way the entire institution reacted to it. First cover it up, then when the story breaks in the entire national media, attack Thompson and Coburn as liars and traitors. And this, mind you, was in Vietnam, an era of unusually high pushback against the MIC.
raven
Did they mention Ronald Ridenhour in this piece?
raven
@Chris: And it continued with the Swift Boat fuckers.
ulee
@SiubhanDuinne: I like to think that Hemingway would punch Cruz in the nose. I don’t know about Hemingway’s politics, but it seems he did not suffer fools gladly.
Chris
@Judge Crater:
I got into a conversation with an Iraq veteran on IMDb, of all places, where the subject somehow came up and he insisted that there was so much good going on in Iraq. All these places rebuilt, all this humanitarian aid, all these children he’d handed out candy to, all these wonderful people freed. Me: “You know, I’ve talked to a few Iraqis who were there during the invasion or had family that was. They… really don’t remember it that way.” Him: ::immediate 180 to explain that I should never believe what these fucking people were saying, all of them are scumbags and terrorists, all plotting behind the U.S. soldiers’ backs::
American leaders who object to the war like to stick with the “think of the troops” narrative. Talking about whether some of “the troops” might have committed war crimes is venturing into much riskier territory, touching what’s considered a third rail that most of them won’t go near until they have photographic evidence plastered on the front page of the New York Times above the fold. And those of “the troops” who, like Thompson, stood up against these things… well, sucks to be them.
MikeJ
@ulee:
Premature anti-fascist.
raven
@Chris: That’s funny. I watched “The Pacific” with great interest because my dad fought there and I had read EB Sledge’s “With the Old Breed at Pelilu and Okinawa”. I knew that Sledge had not pulled punches in his book and wanted to see what they did with the HBO mini-series. Part of the series included online discussion boards and it was stunning how some people went ape shit because the series showed Americans basically killing everything that moved. There are a series of Stud’s Terkel interviews with Sledge (who became a Botany Professor) where he explained that they simply turned into animals out of necessity. He said “I’m not telling you the way I wanted it to be, I’m telling you the way that it was”.
ulee
@MikeJ: Yeah, that’s right. He certainly did not like fascists. He was willing to die to keep them from taking power.
Roger Moore
@Chris:
I don’t even know how high it is on the list of things we know of. The strategic bombing campaigns in WWII killed orders of magnitude more civilians and have never been seriously challenged as the atrocities they were. Is My Lai more shameful than all the times we overthrew Latin American governments to help out US businesses? More shameful than invading Iraq on false pretenses? More shameful than The Trail of Tears? Maybe it’s one of the most shameful things that could be claimed to be the result of subordinates doing things on their own, but there are plenty of things that have been done as a deliberate policy that are far more shameful.
raven
@Roger Moore: ” Maybe it’s one of the most shameful things that could be claimed to be the result of subordinates doing things on their own, ”
Calley went off the reservation but there was plenty of culpability from above starting with Medinah.
raven
@Roger Moore: ” Maybe it’s one of the most shameful things that could be claimed to be the result of subordinates doing things on their own, ”
Calley went off the reservation but there was plenty of culpability from above starting with Medinah.
raven
multiple dupes.
Roger Moore
@raven:
Which is why I put the “could be claimed” in there; maybe I should have said they could be pinned on somebody relatively junior. I still stand by my major point, which is that there are plenty of high-level strategic decisions that are far more shameful, both in terms of the harm they did and that they were clear policy that can’t be dismissed as the wrongdoing of a relatively junior officer.
(I considered using “off the reservation” but thought it was potentially offensive, especially since forcing the Native Americans onto the reservations in the first place is one of the items on my list of shameful high-level decisions.)
raven
@Roger Moore: Yea, I shouldn’t have used that.
Chris
@raven:
There is an absolute mind block in the American public against the notion that U.S. troops could ever be anything other than Eagle Scouts behaving at all times like absolute embodiments of Truth, Justice and the American Way… never mind the environment they’re forced to operate in or what it does to you. And when something like My Lai or Abu Ghraib finally breaks through the headlines, you often as not get a reaction that amounts to “well, can’t judge,” no matter what the context.
Chris
@Roger Moore:
True. I was sticking to military behavior that, as you said, “could be claimed” as subordinates’ actions, but you’re right that in the grand scheme of U.S. policies… we’ve done plenty worse. (The Indian Wars probably take the cake, ethnic cleansing and all that).
LanceThruster
@raven:
I read Sledge’s book too. It was brutally frank. Could tell the influence it had on “The Pacific” screenplay.
Chris
The comments over at the article as a piece of work. To be fair there’s not just bad ones, but the bad ones… “both sides do it because Lyndon Johnson,” “why are we talking about this instead of Benghazi,” “we only hear about crimes by Republicans it’s not fair!” (paraphrasing not direct quotes but pretty much exactly that). This is why we can’t have nice things.
ETA: oh yes, and of course, it wouldn’t be a Vietnam thread without the obligatory “the war WAS winnable it’s the Democrats who lost it by micromanaging from the White House!”
raven
@LanceThruster: He was a wonderful man. I made contact with someone that had him as a prof in the 70’s and they could not say enough good things about him. Auburn has a nice site with his work.
Here is the link to Stud’s Terkel “The Good War” that includes the audio of his interviews with Sledgehammer.
mclaren
As Lt. Calley said at his trial: “What, My Lai?”
mclaren
@Roger Moore:
Not sure about that. Gen. Curtis LeMay remarked to a subordinate that if they lost WW II, they all would have been indicted as war criminals.
Obligatory source.
Then there’s the testimony of Bridagier General Smedley Butler of the U.S. Marine Corps:
Source: “War Is A Racket,” Smedley Butler, 1935.
Sound familiar?
Chris
@mclaren:
I remember people absolutely opening up with both barrels on Jon Stewart a few years ago over his notion that Truman was a war criminal for Hiroshima and Nagasaki, prompting a retraction. The outrage was absolutely surreal in light of the fact that Curtis LeMay, who of all people should know, said basically the same thing (granted, not about the atomic attacks specifically).
Chris
@mclaren:
Smedley Butler is one of these people who makes me wonder how the hell he ever made general with a mouth like that. Maybe he kept it shut until late in the game.
As an aside – this is also why I find the whole story of the Business Plot (a cabal of businessmen who tried to get Butler to lead a coup against FDR) so hard to believe. Depending on Butler, of all people, who had made no secret of his absolute contempt for them?
Soonergrunt
My Lai was a huge miscarriage of justice.
Calley, his Platoon Sergeant, and his Squad leaders should have been hung for what they did. His men should have faced lengthy prison terms.
LanceThruster
@raven:
Great links and refs. Thx.
NotMax
This poster</a. was unavoidable in my high school as well as outside in the shopping districts of town, displayed in store windows. Also included as a b&w picture in the high school yearbook.
The 'Silent Majority' of the '68 campaign was a myth concocted to discredit and disempower the growing anti-war movement and sentiment sympathetic to same. A myth no less devoid of verity than the 'secret plan' to end the war.
Paul in KY
@Rock: Glenn Andreotta was a hero too. Please don’t forget him.
Paul in KY
@ulee: I fantasize about handing Cheney over to the 18th Century Iroquois (master torturers) or to Ramsey Snow.
Would be sure to tell them about his bad heart & to take that into consideration.
Paul in KY
@Cacti: Being an ambitious politician means doing some nasty things. I would expect & hope that Pres. Carter really regrets that.
Paul in KY
@Soonergrunt: Capt.Medina should have been hung too, IMO.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@joel hanes: No fear. He is literally the first person I think of every time My Lai comes up.
I think he would have liked to have been president but didn’t dare run. Too much just sitting there waiting for him.