- Eriksson: This goddamn thing is turning us on our heads, Rowan. We're getting it backwards, man.
- Rowan: 'Cause it's a day in, day out dose of bullshit, man, is what it is!
- Eriksson: I mean just because each of us might at any second, be blown away, everybody's acting like we can do anything, man. And it don't matter what we do. But I think it's the other way 'round. Maybe the main thing is just the opposite. Because we might be dead in the next split second, maybe we gotta be extra careful what we do. Because maybe it matters more - Jesus, maybe it matters more than we even know.
- Meserve: Yea though I walk through the valley of evil, I shall fear no death. Cuz I'm the meanest motherfucker in the valley.
- [last lines]
- Girl on Bus: You had a bad dream, didn't you?
- Eriksson: Yes.
- Girl on Bus: It's over now, I think. Chao ong.
- Eriksson: Give me a minute here on this thing we're doin'. I mean, what we're doin'. What are we doin', Sarge?
- Meserve: We've incarcerated a VC suspect. Is that what you're talkin' about? She's a VC whore - and we're gonna have a little fun with her.
- Eriksson: Yeah, but she's just a farm girl, like she's...
- Meserve: Eriksson, you're the cherry here, right? So lighten up. Just let me carry the weight.
- Clark: [walks up] What's the problem, Sarge?
- Meserve: Eriksson don't think our VC whore is a VC whore.
- Meserve: Brownie, look into my fuckin' eyes I'm gonna hypnotize you. YOU'RE FINE!
- Cpl. Brown: I knew it man, I knew it!
- Eriksson: You a chaplain, sir?
- Chaplain Kirk: Are you religious, son? I'm a Methodist.
- Eriksson: I'm a Lutheran.
- Chaplain Kirk: Well, we can still talk, can't we?
- Eriksson: We went on a long patrol, sir, and we kidnapped a girl from the village. The other four men raped her, and they murdered her, and I failed, sir...
- [chokes up]
- Eriksson: ... to stop them.
- Eriksson: Pardon me sir, what's your point, sir?
- Capt. Hill: There ain't no point, Eriksson. I'm simply trying to illuminate the terrain in which we currently find ourselves deployed. You don't mind that, do you? And if you do, fuck you!
- Eriksson: Yes, sir.
- Capt. Hill: You on my frequency?
- Eriksson: Yes, sir!
- Capt. Hill: You fucking maggot! Who the hell do you think you are? You're in that report recommending Meserve for a Bronze Star! He pulled you out of a VC tunnel, boy! Now the shit with that girl, that was wrong. But he's a kid, Eriksson. He's twenty goddamn years old! And you're gonna ruin his life? He saved yours!
- Prosecutor: So you don't feel responsible for the rape and murder?
- Clark: No, sir. I don't.
- Prosecutor: Is it your feeling, Corporal Clark that you are wrongly brought to trial by the U.S. Government?
- Clark: I don't have anything against the government. But I just think soldiers like Tony Meserve and me... belong out in combat... not here. Throw us in the stockade and you're helping nobody but the Viet Cong.
- [Cct to Private Hatcher]
- Prosecutor: When Sergeant Meserve called you, did you go willingly into the hootch and rape the girl Tran Thi Oahn? Please answer the question.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Y-yes sir.
- Prosecutor: Have you any idea why Eriksson stayed out of the hootch?
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Well, he was brand-new, sir. I was there a lot longer than him. At least three weeks longer than him.
- [cut to Private Diaz]
- Prosecutor: You're saying, then you involved yourself in rape to avoid being ridiculed?
- PFC. Antonio Diaz: When you go out on a patrol, sir you're not gonna be as good as you wanna be. These guys aren't helping you do anything. There's gonna be four people on that patrol, and an individual. And so I did what I did, and I got remorse about it. But I also got remorse about talking at this trial. I have a loyalty to the men I was out there with.
- [cut to Sergeant Meserve]
- Prosecutor: Is it standard for U.S. personnel to have sex with prisoners and kill them?
- Meserve: The prisoner tried to give away the squad's position.
- Prosecutor: She was ill and coughing from the abuse of you and your men. She shouldn't have been there to jeopardize your position! You dragged her out and raped her! And then you blame her for coughing, so you kill her! Does that about sum it up?
- Meserve: Well, sir... I've seen a lot of killing... which it's our duty to do, because it's kill or be killed. Sometimes you hate the enemy so badly... About two ops back... Operation Turner... we saw a hootch that had been burned down. Some Vietnamese were carrying kids out of a bunker. They suffered from smoke inhalation. I gave one small child mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. That just shows you we ain't all combat over here.
- Lt. Reilly: On the day I was born, my Mama grunted. I popped out. Took one look around. "Shit," I says, "it's Two Creeks, Texas." So about eight years ago I'm still in Two Creeks. My wife's about to give birth to our first child,I took her to the hospital, a natural thing to do. Well, she was refused admittance to this hospital on the basis of her race. Which is, as you might guess: negro. Next thing I know, the baby ain't about to wait. And so my son is born on the goddamn floor of this hospital's reception room. Eriksson, I flipped the fuck out. I started turning over chairs, kicking lamps. It wasn't long before I was in jail. Now wasn't I on the side of righteousness? So, what was I doing in jail? What I was doing, let me advise you, was fixing to shoot some motherfuckers working in that hospital. That's what I was doing. But you know what? It was like they could read my mind and they just kept me in that jail until my mind was turned around completely. By the time I got out, I wanted nothing but to see my baby and my wife.
- Meserve: Okay, Brownie, you get up there with them. Keep your shit together there.
- Cpl. Brown: My shit is together. My shit is forever together! I'm an armor-plated motherfucker! Yeah!
- Meserve: Oh, you wanna take an attack posture wit' me? Yeah, you got a weapon. Clark got a weapon, Clark got a knife! We all got weapons! Anybody can blow anybody away, any second. Which is the way it ought to be. Always.
- Cpl. Brown: You know, Meserve, I've been thinkin', man. Maybe it's about time we stopped ballin' these slant-eyed bitches, man. Otherwise we might end up home diseased, you know.
- Cpl. Brown: The Nam's a trip. First 30 days you don't know shit, the last 30 days you don't give a shit.
- Cpl. Brown: These are the folks, the Sarge and me are overjoyed to have travelled 11,000 miles to assist them in their struggle to - upgrade their ragged-ass selves.
- Cpl. Brown: Without the Sarge, man, you ain't nothin' but a sack of monkey shit. Now you ain't walkin' along at this moment in time jivin' with me, man.
- Cpl. Brown: What the hell, was you doin' back there, the Sarge had to go flyin' back to save your ass?
- Eriksson: The ground opened up on me, Brownie. I'm hangin' there. Half in, half out of one of their tunnels. Mortar rounds coming straight at me. Boom, boom, boom! I couldn't believe it.
- Cpl. Brown: [chuckles] Did you pee your pants, man? C'mon, don't be shy, man. Talk to me.
- Eriksson: I'm talkin', man.
- Cpl. Brown: Yeah, but you ain't tellin' me nothin' man. Now your ass was stuck in a rabbit hole like mud-fuckin' Winnie the Pooh, right?
- Clark: You know, I never knew a fuckin' far-out spade dude like Brownie before Brownie, you know man.
- Meserve: All right. Now we're leavin' a full hour early because at this point, we're gonna detour 2,000 meters to the south - to the ville of Nghia Hành. 'Cause what we're gonna do is requisition ourselves a girl. A little portable R-n-R. It'll break up the boredom. Keep up morale.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Do one of you guys got a Playboy on you that I could borrow?
- Eriksson: Jeez, on me?
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Yeah. I *gotta* find one.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: [drunk] The Cong's gettin' laid. And we're just - it ain't fair, man, you know? Am I talkin'? I can't tell if I'm talkin' or not, man.
- Meserve: Our destination is Hill 209 in the Trà Khúc River Valley. The hill overlooks this Blue Line. There are caves, Battalion thinks there might be VC. We're lookin' for tunnels, bunkers, unmapped trails, whatever. Now, the orders are we don't shoot except in self-defence. But, you get one of these little mother-fuckers out in the open, you waste em.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: It's just like Genghis Khan, man. That's what I was thinkin'. Ever heard of Genghis Khan?
- Eriksson: What? What are you talking about?
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Meserve, man. He's unbelievable! I mean - I mean what we're doin'. It's fantastic! I can't figure out how come he never thought of it before, man?
- Eriksson: Hatcher, this is nuts.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: It ain't nuts! It's what armies do.
- Eriksson: No. We ain't Genghis Khan.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Hey, you're the one who's nuts, man.
- Eriksson: It's the 20th Century, man. Jesus, we're supposed to be here to help these people.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: Who's next, man?
- Clark: Not you, man.
- PFC. Herbert Hatcher: I wish we had some beers, man, you know. I'd really like an ice-cold beer, man you know.