Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War

I ordered this complete mini-series for video a couple weeks ago. It starts with the mostly unknown first ("French") Vietnam war. The French lose the war. The Vietnamese gain independence, but like Korea (or like Germany used to) they are devided by two different systems. Of course the major eye is on the 2nd ("American") war: Though America and his Allies fought heavily, the war was lost. A big reason was the American home-front with its peace movement,but the main cause for the loss of South Vietnam was South Vietnam itself. They thought the Americans would do the whole job themselves alone. America tried as hard as the could, but it was an unequal fight in many ways. The real losers of the war were the 18, 19, 20-year old boys, who were sent to a foreign, unknown country. Most of them didn't really know what they were fighting for, they just did what they were told to.

With a lot of interviews (with members of both sides) and a lot of realism, this series is probably the best Vietnam war documentary.

Perhaps you have to be foreign to judge another country's version of history. Americans naturally have problems with rather infamous parts of their past, as do Germans or Turks. On the other hand, they should also have greater insight, but that requires more courage and honesty than is common. Peter Davis' "Hearts and Minds" sets a pretty high standard.

The Iraq and Afghanistan wars have generated new interest in the Vietnam era, "one of America's most mysterious wars". I agree. But this 1980's series does little to solve the mystery, despite its closeness to the events it describes. What it does rather well, especially from today's point of view, is turn not-so-distant reality into "documentary" fiction. You'll look in vain for the wide spectrum of peace and protest movements the Vietnam war created, fueled by a "youth revolution" that stretched across the globe, and it doesn't demystify the strategic planning behind the "domino theory", the perceived communist threat to such post-WWII allies as the Philippines, Thailand or Japan. It doesn't expose the Gulf of Tonkin incident as the staged event it was (to be fair, maybe unknown at the time). It lacks perspective because it doesn't discuss the aftermath of the war, namely the rise of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, to which the American bombing heavily contributed, or the long-term effects of Agent Orange we see even today. It all but disguises the fact that war with Vietnam continued in economic guise after the reunification, seriously hampering the rebuilding of a country ravaged and depopulated by decades of war - instead, we are left with parting images of happy, healthy Vietnamese children, followed by an entire episode to grieve for and with the poor, maltreated American veterans - now where have I seen that before?

Curiously, the interviews with the soldiers in last episode offer some of the best glimpses of the true face of any war, attitudes and confessions that are usually turned into Hollywood myths or abstracts, especially by a warlike "superpower" that hasn't experienced war at home for almost 150 years. After all, it's over, why offend anyone. But they're the life blood of history and the main reason why war has such a bad reputation. The series avoids mutilated bodies and common war crimes by both sides, other than the My Lai massacre, but excluding most of the iconic pictures that sparked the Vietnam protests.

That's not to say it's all bad. Although it leaves out far too much and looks surprisingly modern in its superficiality, it offers a general war time line as well as nowadays rare interview footage of the political players. To fill in some of the gaps, I recommend "Secrets of War: Vietnam" (1998, narrated by Charlton Heston) and "Sir! No, Sir!" (2005) on the Vietnam GI Anti-War movement. The measuring gage, of course, is "Hearts and Minds" (1974), and not for its grisly images, but for the variety of snapshots from the era it has to offer. Documentaries are not only made to explore, but also to shape the perception of the past.

The Ten Thousand Day War: Vietnam, 1945-1975 is a 26-part documentary about the war in Vietnam, produced by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It was conceived by Michael Maclear, a Canadian broadcast journalist and film maker, who had spent some time in North Vietnam during the war. Maclear's wife, Mariko Koide, a Japanese news researcher, had contacts which helped Maclear gain access to archival film from North Vietnamese military and civilian organizations (unfortunately, this film, in black and white, is of poor quality). This series also employs film from Canadian, French, Australian, and Japanese news organizations, from the U.S. National Archives, and the Nixon, Kennedy, Johnson, and Ford Presidential Libraries. The script was written by Peter Arnett (who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1966 for his reporting on Vietnam), and narrated by actor Richard Basehart. Interviews with a wide range of U.S. and Vietnamese officials (especially Nguyen Cao Ky and Nguyen Van Thieu), and American military officers and soldiers provide important perspectives on the war. There is less input from the other side, mainly from Australian reporter Wilfred Burchett, and Ha Van Lau.

The series opens with "America in Vietnam," a 51-minute overview of U.S. involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1975. Most of the 25 subsequent 25-minute programs are devoted to a general history of the war (with some overlapping between programs), beginning with a brief account of Vietnamese anti-colonialist activities before WWII, and a description of how the Viet Minh and the OSS fought together against the Japanese during World War II. During that war, the U.S. opposed restoration of French rule in Viet Nam; but after the war, and especially after the Communist victory in China and the outbreak of the Korean War, the U.S. began assisting the French in Vietnam. The Ten Thousand Day War devotes an entire program to the battle of Dien Bien Phu, then discusses the Geneva Conference, the Diem regime, and the assassination of Diem, Viet Cong guerrilla warfare against South Viet Nam, the Tonkin Gulf incident, growing U.S. involvement through advisers, bombing, and ground troops, the siege of Khe Sanh, the TET offensive, Nixon's Vietnamization policy, peace negotiations, the final military campaign, and U.S. withdrawal from Viet Nam. Along the way, we learn about Viet Cong tunnel systems, American air and naval firepower, body counts, the limitations of the Army of South Viet Nam, and the impact of the U.S. presence on Vietnamese officials and people,

In addition to this general history of the conflict, The Ten Thousand Day War includes special programs focused on each of the following specific aspects of the war: (1) North Vietnamese society, (2) the Ho Chi Minh Trail, (3) the weapons of the U.S., the North Vietnamese, and the Viet Cong, (4) each side's efforts to gain the support of the villages, (5) the air war, (5) the anti-war movement in America, (6) the lives of American troops in the field, and (7) the experiences of American prisoners of war.

Many Americans who lived through it are likely to be highly critical about things that were done or not done during the war. They may be dissatisfied with this Canadian-produced series, which, to a great extent, avoids taking sides, between South and North Vietnam, between military and civilian officials, or between hawks and doves. Reviewers have expressed vastly different views, one characterized this series as "government propaganda," another commented that it "demonstrates Washington's systematic blundering and inefficiency," and another, who identified himself as a Vietnam veteran, described it as "the finest and most complete history of the Vietnam War I have ever seen."

In the final program, "Vietnam Recalled," a wide cross section of diplomats, military officers, politicians, and soldiers provide a wide range of assessments of America's Vietnam policies. Among them are Ellsworth Bunker, Clark Clifford, William Colby, William Fulbright, Robert Komer, Melvin Laird, Henry Cabot Lodge, Eugene McCarthy, Dean Rusk, Arthur Schlesinger, Maxwell Taylor, and William Westmoreland. There is no equivalent commentary from the other side. In any case, throughout the war, there seems to have been little divergence of policy views among North Vietnamese leaders. With regard to Vietnamese memories of the war, it is perhaps sufficient to note that roughly 5 per cent of Vietnam's people died during the conflict.

The Ten Thousand Day War cannot be considered a definitive history of the conflict. The Vietnamese were involved in fighting for even more than ten thousand days. Guerrilla action against the French actually began before 1940, and was followed by operations against the Japanese during World War II. After 1975, Vietnam was engaged in combat against Cambodia and China. The series neglects much of the diplomacy behind the war, the backgrounds of South Vietnamese leaders, and the course of South Vietnamese political developments. Moreover, like many documentary films, it is largely guided by the availability of motion picture images. Thus, combat operations—of which there is much film footage—tend to receive more attention than diplomatic and military policy decisions (e.g., McNamara's change of heart, government misperceptions and misrepresentations, peace negotiations, etc.), which took place away from the cameras.

Maclear also wrote a companion volume, The Ten Thousand Day War: Vietnam, 1945-1975 (1981), which provides much additional information.

Without question the finest most thorough documentary about the entire Vietnam conflict. The years from 1945 until the fall of Saigon in 1975 are covered with scores of interviews, newsreel footage and photos. Each episode deals with a specific part of the conflict i.e. The Air campaign, The Guerilla war, the American homefront, The French involvement etc. Narrated superbly by Richard Basehart this is to the Vietnam conflict what Ken Burns The Civil War was to that conflict.

Richard Basehart's commanding voice narrates this Vietnam War documentary in an ominous fashion making this truly the BEST documentary in existence on this subject.

The story is told in a frightening manner by Basehart. There are interviews with many of the people who were directly involved and the film footage is real and breath-takingly brutal at times. But this is the way it was and aficionados of military history and international politico-culture should watch this documentary at least once.

Highly recommended to all Americans and Vietnamese as well as students of the Vietnam War conflict.