The strategically minor incursions into Laos and Cambodia the US did engage in resulted in an international outcry and further sapped support we had from allies. That's part of the problem of assuming a military solution to modern wars. No nation is strong enough to go it alone any longer. War is now more than ever an extension of politics. I feel like a lot of folks who argue we could have won Vietnam if only we were more harsh or more brutal or more expansive in who we fought forget that politics are part of war and that the military is not a solution in and of itself.

Also, the Soviets, Germans, and Japanese did not face resistance only as a function of distance from the metropole. It was more closely related to the level of brutality they engaged in.

That Tet episode from tonight was intense. I was actually exhausted after watching it.

Probably some of the best work Burns has ever done.

Was tonight the first reference to Giap (about one second of discussion) ?

No, he was talked about in the first episode about the French.

I probably just missed it, but why did the French end up in Vietnam? I know 19th century colonialization, but why Vietnam?

Fascinating discussion btw. And thank you to those who have posted personal accounts and anecdotes.

So far, what new information has everyone learned from this film that they didn't know back in the day?

For myself, I was unaware that there were factions in the North Vietnamese leadership and that by the mid-1960s Ho Chi Minh was getting shouldered aside by a younger generation of leaders. He was still very much the public face of North Vietnam, but apparently by that time other people had a stronger grip on the levers of power.

Old Jock 1997 said:

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I probably just missed it, but why did the French end up in Vietnam? I know 19th century colonialization, but why Vietnam?

Fascinating discussion btw. And thank you to those who have posted personal accounts and anecdotes.

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Honestly, the French were there because the British had more control in China and Malaya and the Dutch had Java. It was simply a race across the map to capture and claim what they could.

aTmneal said:

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That Tet episode from tonight was intense. I was actually exhausted after watching it.

Probably some of the best work Burns has ever done.

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That interview with the Viet Cong woman discussing shooting the American soldier: "He was 3 meters away and I had to drop him, so I shot him with my AK47."

Wartson:

It's always difficult to argue counterfactual hisotry so I tend to shy away from it. But you seem awful sure that taking the war to the north would not have worked, when the history says the VC and NVA were on the verge of destruction. Are you thinking China or Russia or both would have intervened or we would still be battling guerillas there today? I kind of doubt either situation.

BQ78 said:

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Wartson:

It's always difficult to argue counterfactual hisotry so I tend to shy away from it. But you seem awful sure that taking the war to the north would not have worked, when the history says the VC and NVA were on the verge of destruction. Are you thinking China or Russia or both would have intervened or we would still be battling guerillas there today? I kind of doubt either situation.

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I'm not Watson (and probably disagree with him more often than not), but I agree with him here.

We already saw where China had gotten involved with Korea, and we know they were providing supplies (at the very least) to the north Vietnamese, so it's really not that big of a stretch that they would get involved again, is it?

And as for winning against guerillas, I'm not convinced we've figured out how to do it yet. If you go full-on, kill 'em all and let God sort it out, you alienate everyone and turn them against you (not to mention the international political capital you're chucking down the toilet). You have to convince enough people in the north that your way is better for them than the commie way, but all the while making it to where they don't feel they live in an American puppet state. They were such hardcore nationalists that I just don't know it could've been done.

Honestly, to steal the famous line from War Games, the only way to win is not to play.

7:35
James Willbanks
Texas A&M

Some say LBJ was a functional psycopath. Do you agree?

Got to watch the 1st two episodes last night. Seems well done. I like that he went back and told the history of Vietnam, and Ho Chi Minh. I thought it was interesting that Truman likely never saw the letter from Ho Chi Minh about getting US support after WWII. Also, that we sided with the French after they implied they would fall under the influence of the Russians over Vietnam.

When the French did finally leave, we made all the same mistakes they did.

ABATTBQ87 said:

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7:35
James Willbanks
Texas A&M

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http://www.historynet.com/interview-jim-willbanks-tets-truths-myths-and-mysteries.htm

I wonder how the doctor POW reacted to his wife's political involvement? I'm certainly not judging anyone, but I am curious.

Well their marriage didn't survive but that is in an upcoming episode.

Series has been very riveting and especially the interviews. Got a lump in my throat last night after watching the Christmas bombings segment by B-52s as my dad commanded one of them. I did not realize that 15 were shot down.

Dad was at camp Evans in '69-'70 as a crew chief on Medivac Huey with the Dustoff 237th. He never spoke of it growing up, but as he's gotten older, met other buddies online and started going to reunions, he really has opened up and started telling stories. He even had a story written into a chapter in a book on Dustoff. One story that really freaked me out was when he talked about the numbers of young officers "fragged." He said it seemed it was a daily occurrence. That really freaked me out when he was talking about it. They even mentioned it last night in the episode.

RedAgs01 said:

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Doesn't anyone else find John Musgrave a fascinating interview? Sometimes I'm watching the show while also messing around with my phone but when he comes on I always put it down.

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You're the absolute worst. Why bother?

4L Aggie said:

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Series has been very riveting and especially the interviews. Got a lump in my throat last night after watching the Christmas bombings segment by B-52s as my dad commanded one of them. I did not realize that 15 were shot down.

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The final episode was hard to watch with dry eyes. The veterans talking about when they first saw the Wall was impactful.

terata said:

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Some say LBJ was a functional psycopath. Do you agree?

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We are still paying for LBJ's Administration.

Enviroag02 said:

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"The war was winnable if the military had been allowed to win it". Is that a popular viewpoint?

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It is one of those statements that is easy to make--and is, in a certain sense, true--but the only reasonable follow up to that assertion is "what do you mean"?

If the question is whether the war could have been won with the actual personnel on the ground and the actual political situation, no, I don't think so. Different (and better) generals and different rules of engagement (or different tolerance for attacking countervalue targets, depending on your point of view) might have changed some of the particulars, but probably not the final outcome.

But if you're going to play the counterfactual game:

1) We could, in theory, have used nuclear weapons. That was never ever ever going to happen, but we had the weapons, and knowing what we know now about the Soviet Union in the Brehznev era, they would not have responded if we had done so.

2) A conventional military option involving a full-scale mobilization of the available men of fighting age, similar to World War II or the Civil War, could have overrun North Vietnam, presumably. But the political response to such a proposition would have been a disaster for whatever administration proposed it, so it is hard to see it happening.

3) Even if you could have simply convinced the public to acquiesce to the continuation of the war for another 10 years or so, time enough for someone like Reagan to get elected and greenlight an arms race with communist nations, they would have withdrawn their patronage of North Vietnam and convinced them to acquiesce to a partition of the country (similar to the original agreement after the French left), or fight a losing battle on their own.