In Buckley v. Valeo the United States Supreme Court struck down most limits on political campaign spending as unconstitutional, opening the door to disaster.
George Bush became head of the CIA.
Registration for the draft was called off.
Showing posts with label Conscription. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Conscription. Show all posts
Friday, January 30, 2026
Tuesday, January 27, 2026
Thursday, January 27, 1916. Britain introduces conscription.
Two years into the Great War, Parliament passed the Military Service Act introducing conscription for the first time in modern British history.
President Wilson issued a proclamation regarding the plight of the Jews.
Whereas in the various countries engaged in war there are nine millions of Jews, the great majority of whom are destitute of food, shelter, and clothing and
Whereas millions of them have been driven from their homes without warning, deprived of an opportunity to make provision for their most elementary wants, causing starvation, disease and untold suffering and
Whereas the people of the United States of America have learned with sorrow of this terrible plight of millions of human beings and have most generously responded to the cry for help whenever such an appeal has reached them; therefore be it
Resolved that in view of the misery, wretchedness, and hardships which these nine millions of Jews are suffering, the President of the United States be respectfully asked to designate a day on which the citizens of this country may give expression to their sympathy by contributing to the funds now being raised for the relief of the Jews in the war zones.
And whereas I feel confident that the people of the US will be moved to aid the war-stricken people of a race which has given to the US so many worthy citizens;
Now, therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the US, in compliance with the suggestion of the Senate, do thereof appoint and proclaim January 27, 1916, as a day upon which the people of the US may make such contributions as they feel disposed for the aid of the stricken Jewish people.
Last edition:
Wednesday, January 26, 1916. Mount Hope.
Sunday, January 11, 2026
Wednesday, December 31, 2025
Sunday, December 14, 2025
Friday, December 14, 1945. Tragedy and ethnic Germans, the LDS and conscription.
As its copyrighted and I don't have permission to post it, I'll merely note it, it was of German women in their children, formerly of Lodz, waiting for a train in Berlin with hopes of going to the west. One of the children is sick, and died during the photo session.
The First President of the LDS issued a postwar statement on the draft to Utah's Congressional delegation.
Press reports have for some months indicated that a determined effort is in the making to establish in this country a compulsory universal military training designed to draw into military training and service the entire youth of the nation. We had hoped that mature reflection might lead the proponents of such a policy to abandon it. We have felt and still feel that such a policy would carry with it the gravest dangers to our Republic.
It now appears that the proponents of the policy have persuaded the Administration to adopt it, in what on its face is a modified form. We deeply regret this, because we dislike to find ourselves under the necessity of opposing any policy so sponsored. However, we are so persuaded of the rightfulness of our position, and we regard the policy so threatening to the true purposes for which this Government was set up, as set forth in the great Preamble to the Constitution, that we are constrained respectfully to invite your attention to the following considerations:
1. By taking our sons at the most impressionable age of their adolescence and putting them into army camps under rigorous military discipline, we shall seriously endanger their initiative thereby impairing one of the essential elements of American citizenship. While on its face the suggested plan might not seem to visualize the army camp training, yet there seems little doubt that our military leaders contemplate such a period, with similar recurring periods after the boys are placed in the reserves.
2. By taking our boys from their homes, we shall deprive them of parental guidance and control at this important period of their youth, and there is no substitute for the care and love of a mother for a young son.
3. We shall take them out of school and suffer their minds to be directed in other channels, so that very many of them after leaving the army, will never return to finish their schooling, thus over a few years materially reducing the literacy of the whole nation.
4. We shall give opportunity to teach our sons not only the way to kill but also, in too many cases, the desire to kill, thereby increasing lawlessness and disorder to the consequent upsetting of the stability of our national society. God said at Sinai, “Thou shalt not kill.”
5. We shall take them from the refining, ennobling, character-building atmosphere of the home, and place them under a drastic discipline in an environment that is hostile to most of the finer and nobler things of home and of life.
6. We shall make our sons the victims of systematized allurements to gamble, to drink, to smoke, to swear, to associate with lewd women, to be selfish, idle, irresponsible save under restraint of force, to be common, coarse, and vulgar, all contrary to and destructive of the American home.
7. We shall deprive our sons of any adequate religious training and activity during their training years, for the religious element of army life is both inadequate and ineffective.
8. We shall put them where they may be indoctrinated with a wholly un-American view of the aims and purposes of their individual lives, and of the life of the whole people and nation, which are founded on the ways of peace, whereas they will be taught to believe in the ways of war.
9. We shall take them away from all participation in the means and measures of production to the economic loss of the whole nation.
10. We shall lay them open to wholly erroneous ideas of their duties to themselves, to their family, and to society in the matter of independence, self-sufficiency, individual initiative, and what we have come to call American manhood.
11. We shall subject them to encouragement in a belief that they can always live off the labors of others through the government or otherwise.
12. We shall make possible their building into a military caste which from all human experience bodes ill for that equality and unity which must always characterize the citizenry of a republic.
13. By creating an immense standing army, we shall create to our liberties and free institutions a threat foreseen and condemned by the founders of the Republic, and by the people of this country from that time till now. Great standing armies have always been the tools of ambitious dictators to the destruction of freedom.
14. By the creation of a great war machine, we shall invite and tempt the waging of war against foreign countries, upon little or no provocation; for the possession of great military power always breeds thirst for domination, for empire, and for a rule by might not right.
15. By building a huge armed establishment, we shall belie our protestations of peace and peaceful intent and force other nations to a like course of militarism, so placing upon the peoples of the earth crushing burdens of taxation that with their present tax load will hardly be bearable, and that will gravely threaten our social, economic, and governmental systems.
16. We shall make of the whole earth one great military camp whose separate armies, headed by war-minded officers, will never rest till they are at one another’s throats in what will be the most terrible contest the world has ever seen.
17. All the advantages for the protection of the country offered by a standing army may be obtained by the National Guard system which has proved so effective in the past and which is unattended by the evils of entire mobilization.
Responsive to the ancient wisdom, ‘Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it,’ obedient to the divine message that heralded the birth of Jesus the Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of the world, ‘. . . on earth peace, good will toward men,’ and knowing that our Constitution and the Government set up under it were inspired of God and should be preserved to the blessing not only of our own citizenry but, as an example, to the blessing of all the world, we have the honor respectfully to urge that you do your utmost to defeat any plan designed to bring about the compulsory military service of our citizenry. Should it be urged that our complete armament is necessary for our safety, it may be confidently replied that a proper foreign policy, implemented by an effective diplomacy, can avert the dangers that are feared. What this country needs and what the world needs, is a will for peace, not war. God will help our efforts to bring this about.
Respectfully submitted, GEO. ALBERT SMITH, J. REUBEN CLARK, JR., DAVID O. MCKAY, First Presidency.
I actually ran across this on Reddit, where it has been posted by an unhappy former Mormon. It might be noted, of course, that at that age a large number of Mormons go on missions, which is an effort to consolidate them in their faith, so there was no doubt some reason for Mormon's to be concerned. While I've heard it claimed that there's no pressure for them to do so, as a demographic, by my observation, they tend to marry young as well, which relates to one of the things noted in the letter, maybe more than one.
Still, the points made are interesting, and not necessarily invalid. Indeed, almost every point raised in this letter is correct.
There is actually a lot to unpack here, and my own views on this have changed back and forth over the years. In 1945, when this letter was written, there had only been a single instance of conscription into the Federal Army during peacetime in U.S. history, and that came right before World War Two. There was a history of mandatory militia service, but that had fallen by the wayside after the Civil War.
Also of note, the National Guard, in peacetime, still did not receive Federal basic training in 1945. Entry level soldiers were trained by their units by older NCO's delegated that task. Given this, the nature of the training was always local, but it obviously varied in other ways depending upon who was delivering it. In the case of this letter, the author could be assured that enlisting young men would have been trained by older soldiers of a like mind, with therefore much of the societal dangers noted avoided. I'm not sure when the training system actually changed, but I suspect it was by the very late 1940s or certainly by the 1950s. By the time I was in the Guard the Guard was incredibly integrated into the Regular Army, which is even more the case today. Enlisting men received regular Army basic and advanced training, and were in the Army when they received it.
When I was younger, I held the view that conscription was a bad thing, save in times of war, as it forced a person to serve against their will. That's a less developed point than the set of points noted above, but there is a point to it. Having said that, what I don't think I appreciated earlier is the dangers of a large standing Army, which is why the US had a militia system for defense in the first place. We're seeing a lot of those dangers come into fruition now. That's not directly related to conscription, it might be noted, but it somewhat is as we have a large, all volunteer, armed forces, which inevitably leads to a sort of military class. Armed forces with conscripts are much less likely do to that, and therefore they make a much more democratic force that's much less likely to act as praetorian guards for a would be dictator.
Additionally, as I've grown older I've noted that there's a distinct difference between people who served when asked, and those who avoided it. Our narcissist in chief in Washington D.C., who avoided serving due to shin splits, is a good example. Donald Trump would have benefited enormously from two years as an enlisted man in the military. But it's not just him, I've noted this in a lot of men who found a way not to serve. Their characters would have been better off if they had.
Last edition:
Thursday, December 13, 1945. Crimes against humanity.
Thursday, October 23, 2025
Tuesday, October 23, 1945. Signing Robinson.
It was announced that Jackie Robinson had signed with the Kansas City Royals, although he was not to play under the arrangement for a full season, going to the Montreal Royals for the 1946 season.
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Robinson in 1946 as a Montreal Royal.
Robinson was a great man, and is justly celebrated, but there's a fair number of myths regarding his pioneering role in integrated baseball. He was not, for one thing, the first black player in the major leagues. That honor would inaccurately go to Moses Fleetwood Walker, although he had played in the 19th Century, and is inaccurate itself as William Edward White had played a single major league game prior to that. White didn't reveal his race, and therefore is often not credited, but Walker's brother Weldy Walker did, and he also played major league baseball
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Moses Fleetwood Walker.
So, in reality, Robinson was the fourth African American ball player known to have played in the majors and the third to acknowledge his racial identify.
Weldy Walker.
1883 letter to editor by Weldy Walker.
Additionally Robinson was not the only black player in the majors in 1947, Larry Doby appeared in the American League two months later, something that has also been planned as far back as 1945. His appearance, however, had not been accompanied by advance press, as Branch Rickey had done with Robinson. It just happened.
A surprising part of the story is that Robinson being picked upset a fair number of players in the Negro Leagues who well knew that their talents were superior to Robinson's. It was Robinson's character, of course, that had lead Ricky to pick him.
If the entire story is pieced together, it makes for an interesting focus on racism in the United States following the Civil War and before the Civil Rights Era. Racism was intense the entire time, but it can be argued it actually got worse towards the end of the 19th Century. The Navy had been integrated going into the Spanish American War but forces were at work to end that, and soon did. Breaking the color barrier was hard for athletes in team sports, but was possible in the 19th Century up until the late 1880s when it became much harder, with it being harder in baseball, where the color barrier was absolute, as opposed to football, where a few men crossed it here and there before the 1946 groundbreaking season.
World War Two had a lot to do with the color barrier fracturing.
Considerations were being made about the post war military, including a proposal to have a single service (something the Canadians in fact did). Also proposed was something akin to the pre war German system, a small professional army with a large conscript reserve.
Neither proposal found favor at the time.
Of course, in just a couple of years conscription would in fact be revived, and would remain a feature of American life until 1973. Watching current events, however, a good argument can be made for just what Truman had proposed here, a very small professional Army with a conscript reserve. Conscripts are a lot less likely to fire on their friends and neighbors than professionals or volunteers are.
Last edition:
Monday, October 22, 1945. The Handan Campaign (邯郸战役) launched.
Saturday, September 6, 2025
The Vietnam War in film
Infantry in Vietnam.
Having recently created the page on Movies In History, listing all the films reviewed on this site, I found that I hadn't reviewed any Vietnam War movies. I think that is, in part, as I intended to set them all out in one big list, as I have done for movies about incursions into Mexico and about the Battle of Stalingrad.
Each of the movies listed here deserve their own thread, but they'll all be treated together for one single reason. There really isn't an accurate, Saving Private Ryan, type film about Vietnam. Something about the war has just kept there from being one. Every movie about the war is politicized in some ways, so the war, which is our most politicized war since the Civil War, continues on to be colored by debate, even in film, and even after the many years since the war ended. So here we treat the films all together.
Chances are, I'd note, that some are missing.
The Big Screen
Apocalypse Now.
This film was really the first big budget movie about the Vietnam War if it's about the Vietnam War, and for that reason it got a lot of attention at the time it was released in 1979 I saw the film at that time, while I was in high school, and liked it.
I can't make it through the film now.
Based on the novel Heart of Darkness, which is actually set in Africa in an earlier era, this film adopts the river trip theme of that novel and follows a Special Forces captain on a secret mission up a river, and into Cambodia, to assassinate another Special Forces officer who has gone rogue.
The plot is absurd and anyone familiar with the war itself would find most of the details absurd. Why must the officer be inserted by boat? If a B-52 mission is standing by, and it is, why not just bomb the target rather than do this? The whole thing is really silly. Dark and moody, but also very silly.
There are a couple of redeeming features to the film but only a couple. One is the portrayal of a somewhat unhinged 1st Cavalry officer by Robert Duvall. Portrayed as a satire on professional military men, the character actually holds up well and seems saner over time than he did at the time the movie was made.
Helicopter scene are really well done, in part because the helicopters are real Philippine Army helicopters that actually had to roar off on real missions while the movie was made. So, they look authentic because they are. And the Navy riverine boat is well portrayed.
The rest of the movie doesn't hold up and it isn't close to being an accurate representation of any real war we've ever fought.
On material details, I will say that they are nicely done.
postscript
In retrospect, I was too harsh on this film as its really nearly completely allegorical. Many of the military characters in the film represent an arrogant American military and an arrogant prideful United States that's having its head handed to it by a much more primitive native army. Brando's character stands for the realization that, while Sheen's Special Forces captain is coming to realize it. The sailors on the boat are the American nation in general of the time, mostly blue collar, mixed race, and only there because they have no choice.
Updated on September 6, 2025.
Platoon.
Nearly a decade after Apocalypse Now was filmed, Platoon was released.
A moody introspective 1986 film about a moody infantryman and the two rival sergeants in his platoon, this film also appealed to me when it was released but it doesn't hold up well in some ways.
The film attempts to portray the somewhat broken Army of the late Vietnam War, but it goes a bit overboard in depicting that. Still, the depiction isn't without some merit. Where it fails is that the NCOs are shown as way more powerful in context than they really would have been, and the officers way more anemic, even for this strained period.
In terms of event depictions, the concluding enormous battle is also, quite frankly, incorrect. Big huge assaults by large North Vietnamese Army units happened, but not very often and the depiction of the NVA in the latter part of this film shows a much more conventional and aggressive army than the NVA really was. The experience shown just doesn't depict an experience a real American soldier would have been likely to have endured.
In terms of material details, there are some weird errors in this film, particularly given that the director, Oliver Stone, was a Vietnam veteran. For example, NCOs are shown carrying CAR-15s rather than M16A1s. CAR-15s did make an appearance in the Vietnam War in the hands of Special Forces troops, but not regular soldiers, and the inclusion here is really odd. The film omits any depiction of designated automatic weapon infantrymen, but that detail isn't surprising as its a military detail that only those with service would note. The film goes overboard in the end (in a lot of ways) in showing the recapture of ground by an armored force that's adopted a Nazi German battle flag and is lead by a really fat soldier. Not very likely.
So, the movie is only so so.
postscript.
I was likely too harsh on this film as well, as it also is heavily allegorical. The two sergeant figures at war with each other for the private's soul really represent competing forces of good and evil at work in the American culture of the time. It seems that Sgt. Barnes, the evil character, has triumphed until "Chris", the private, kills him in the climatic final scene. Basically, the United States is redeemed in the film from below.
Updated on September 6, 2025.
Hamburger Hill.
Of the big budget well known Vietnam films, this one is both the best and the least well known.
Released in 1987, the year after Platoon, this movie is a fictionalized account of the real battle for Hill 937 in 1969. The battle was a Vietnam War anomaly as it featured almost Korean War like conditions in which the U.S. Army assaulted a fortified NVA held hill, taking it. While North Vietnamese casualties were nearly ten times higher than American ones, the battle itself became infamous in part because it was easy to focus on. This movie does a good job of following a single squad in that battle. Completely enlisted man focused, the film is sort of the Battleground of Vietnam War films. Material details, additionally, are well done.
Oddly, this film received very little attention when it came out. Platoon, which was a commercial success, but which is not as good of film, came out only a year prior, so that's a bit hard to explain. This film, which sort of recalls the Korean War film Pork Chop Hill, may just have been a bit too conventional in a time at which the Vietnam War was still recalled in the early 1970s fashion.
The Boys In Company C
This 1978 film predated Apocalypse Now by a year and is almost unknown today.
This film follows a Marine Corps Company through basic training and on to Vietnam. It's really well done, although it certainly shows its 1970s release in terms of its mood. A much better film than many of the later Vietnam War films, it's a bit marred by its odd ending.
postscript
Something I should have noted in my earlier review is that the plot of this film is nearly identical to that of Full Metal Jacket, as described below. In my view, however, this is the better film.
Updated on September 6, 2025.
Full Metal Jacket
Full Metal Jacket, which came out in 1987, is one of the more famous Vietnam War films and it did well at the box office. It has to be mentioned, however, together with The Boys from Company C.
If a person watching The Boys from Company C finds it oddly similar to Full Metal Jacket, that's because it definitely is. Stanly Kubrick was sued for that very reason and settled the suit. The film is remarkably similar in following Marines through basic training, with the drill sergeant being played in both films by R. Lee Emery, although he's only of the correct age for that role in the first film. Indeed, in the first film the portrayal of the DI is more realistic and human and less over the top. The films depart paths after basic training, however. The basic training portion of the film, while very profane and with a highly exaggerated DI character, is the best part of the film. The later combat portion of the film really fails.
I don't like this film. It's weird in the Kubrick fashion and too gritty and unseemly for reality. Skip it and see The Boys In Company C instead.
We Were Soldiers
Mel Gibson's 2002 We Were Soldiers should be the best Vietnam War film as its based on the book, a straight history, and its the most recently done. Still, it isn't.
The film isn't bad, but it seems to almost attempt to make up for the anti army mood of other Vietnam War movies. Focused on the 1965 introduction of air cavalry into the Vietnam War, the movie does a good job with material details but it is also the most rah rah Vietnam War movie to have been made since The Green Berets. It's simply too heroic and too one sided. The American Army depicted in this film is invincible.
The film was a nice effort, but it's simply too much. Sort of the The Patriot goes to Vietnam.
The Green Berets
The Green Berets was released in 1968, when the war was still on.
It's awful.
Based upon a book written by a journalist, which was a series of short stories based on fact, this film is really bad. Filmed in South Carolina, it looks it. The characters are all of the super heroic variety found in some World War Two era films. John Wayne, who was responsible for the film, starred in it, and he's obviously way too old to be serving in a Special Forces unit.
Horrible movie. In my view, the worst of the Vietnam War movies, and one of John Wayne's worst.
The Deer Hunter
I hate this movie and have never been able to get through it.
I can hardly describe this film other than to note that it is supposed to follow the service of some close friends in the Special Forces, from their pre war life in Pennsylvania through the post war. It's just bad.
Included in this film, I'd note, for no known reason is a really long Russian Orthodox wedding scene. It's endless.
I'd skip this one.
postscript.
Well, as like a couple of movies mentioned above, I hate this movie a lot less than I used to.
It's still far from my favorite Vietnam War movie, but the final scene is absolutely gut wrenching. It may be worth watching just for the final scene alone.
Updated on September 6, 2025.
Operation Dumbo Drop
It may seem odd to list this small Disney film to the list, but it's about a real event in the Vietnam War. Its a highly fictionalized account, but the movie is well done.
One of the odder things about this film is that its one of the few that gets the small unit nature of much of the war right. The war was a guerrilla war, and in this film its shown that way. Showing a small Special Forces unit, and small NVA and VC units, the film is quite well done. It's one of the better Vietnam War films.
In terms of material details, this film also, oddly enough, does a good job for the most part. Uniforms are actually correct, something that tends to be difficult for movies showing Special Forces units. The film includes a depiction of a C123 Provider, a Vietnam War era transport aircraft that's hardly ever shown in film. An odd era is the depiction of one soldier carrying a Browning High Power in a shoulder holster, but given the character's role, perhaps that actually makes sense.
84CharlieMoPic
A small budget Vietnam War era film, this film is also a surprisingly good one.
This film shows the patrol of a Special Forces squad through the eyes of an Army cameraman assigned to accompany the patrol. His MOS is 84CMoPic, hence the name of the film. The cameraman is only scene twice in the entire movie.
This movie is good one in showing the small scale nature of much of the war, which it does well. It's only so so in material details and makes a few errors, but that doesn't detract from the film overall. One of the better Vietnam War era movies.
Causalities of War
This gut wrenching film is one of the few Vietnam War movies based on actual events, and horrific ones at that.
This movie is based on a real event in which a squad of infantrymen took a Vietnamese girl from a village, assaulted her, and then murdered her. One of the squad refuses to participate and then attempts to report the event, leading to endless frustration of his efforts and his near murder.
Very well done, this film shows the small scale nature of he war and the late war breakdown in the Army. It's also another film that's remarkably correct in material details. It stars Michael J. Fox as the infantryman, and Shawn Penn as his sergeant, which is a nice touch in that they're about the right age for their roles and they portray them well. If the diminutive Fox doesn't seem well cast as an infantryman, perhaps that's the point as after all this was a conscript army in which most of the soldiers were average men.
Tribes
This 1970 movie is one that I haven't seen in many years, but I recall it as being a fairly good film. It depicts the late Vietnam War incorporation of draftees into the Marine Crops and involves a Drill Instructor's efforts to train one. Its a clash of culture type of film and was well done.
Bat 21
This is an unusual movie, and one of two of which I'm aware involving pilots. This one follows the efforts of an Air Force pilot to extract a shot down Navy pilot. It's really well done and an engaging story.
The other aircraft movie, by the way, is Flight of the Intruder, which I have not seen.
The Killing Fields
The Killing Fields isn't about the Vietnam War, it's about Cambodia, but generally these wars are regarded as part and parcel of each other.
This is a truly gut wrenching true story and this movie may be the absolute best drama about events in Southeast Asia of that period. More of a drama that a war picture, it's justifiably well regarded.
Good Morning Vietnam
This movie involves a fictionalized version of Adrian Cronauer's service as a USAF disk jockey on Armed Forces Radio in Vietnam. Set fairly early in the war, it's well done and showed the late Robin William's dramatic range.
The film suffers in a few material details, but not many, and of course it's not a combat movie.
The Odd Angry Shot.
We're so used to thinking of the Vietnam War from an American prospective that we tend to forget that it wasn't an exclusively American war by any means. Indeed, the ARVN contributed the biggest combat force in defense of South Vietnam.
A major contributor can be found in Australia. Indeed, it's often forgotten, including by the Australians themselves, that the Australians urged the US to get into South Vietnam well before the Americans had any intention of doing so and they threatened to enter the fight themselves if the US did not.
Now, the war tends to be remembered by Australians as something we got them into, which isn't at all correct. But no matter, the fact that it was a significant Australian war means that it should not surprise us that Australia has produced its own move about the war, The Odd Angry Shot.
I haven't seen this film in years, but I do recall liking it, except for its overly cynical view about American soldiers. The film follows a group of Australian SAS troops on a tour of duty in South Vietnam. It's a small action film, unlike any major move that the US has produced. And not a bad one.
Forrest Gump
This may seem like an odd film to add, but the Vietnam War figures prominently, both by having the Gump character serve as an infantryman in the war, and by having the war impact the lives of the character at home.
Frankly, the portrayal of the war may be one of the best ever done. The US soldiers are never shown in a pitched battle, but rather in a series of patrols and on the losing side of a tremendous ambush. The nature of the actual war is quite well portrayed, therefore. Also well portrayed are the period protests against the war and the general turbulent nature of the time.
In terms of material details, this film is also very well done. The soldiers are properly equipped and outfitted for the period.
This film, of course, also covers a lot of additional history. It starts sometime in the 1940s and it concludes around 1994, when the film was made. The nature of childhood in the early 1950s is covered well, as are the times. It also covers the rural south through the period well. The entire 1960s is covered, as are the 1970s. All eras addressed by the film are handled very well.
Date added: September 6, 2025.
Go Tell The Spartans
This film is a 1978 Vietnam War film set very early in the American involvement in the war. The plot surrounds a single American outpost well before the big war that came just shortly after which is in an advisory capacity. Indeed, an act of barbarity by a South Vietnamese soldier is excused on the basis that "it's their war".
This is good film with a small plot. It's not terribly accurate, but its not wholly inaccurate either. The material details are not bad, although there's some odd elements to it that are never explained. These troops, for instance, ought to be Special Forces, but they are not, or if they are, it's not clearly explained. One soldier is a draftee in a role that would be unlikely for one at the time. Burt Lancaster carries a M3 submachinegun which, while not impossible, is unlikely. Arms and uniforms are correct for the early war (not one M16 in the bunch) which gives it a much different look compared to most Vietnam War films as the soldiers look like they're from the late 50s.
This film is recommended.
Date added: September 6, 2025.
Tigerland
Tigerland was a film I had not scene when I first made this list, but have since.
Tigerland is a Vietnam War movie in that the film portrays a group of conscripts who are destined to fight in the late war era. The name of the movie comes from a facility at Ft. Polk Louisiana which has been created to train them for jungle warfare, something that actually was done as the war progressed. As their training advances, none of them want to go to Vietnam, or even be in the Army, and the central character, Roland Bozz, proves adept at getting everyone discharged other than himself.
This movie seems to be highly regarded by many, but I didn't think it great by any means. It's not horrific either. The discipline portrayed in the film is absurdly loose and not accurate of the U.S. Army at any point, even late in the war when the Army was more or less coming apart. Bozz constantly sports stubble which is something the Army has never done in the modern era in stateside deployments.
Date added: September 6, 2025.
The Small Screen.
Perhaps not too surprising, the Vietnam War has made its appearance on the small screen as well as the large. Some television series set in the war were done, with one being well remembered.
China Beach
Moody in the extreme, China Beach concerned the lives of Army nurses and doctors a the real location of China Beach, in Vietnam.
I liked this series at the time, but it became moodier and moodier and less realistic as it went on. Running from 1988 through 1991, the series oddly attempted to incorporate infantrymen into the story line on an individual basis, something that would not have occurred in the same way in real life. Efforts to explore the lives of the characters post war were well intentioned but bleak.
Tour of Duty
Tour of Duty followed a single infantry platoon in the war during a three year run.
I haven't seen an episode of this since probably 1988 or so, and I didn't seen how the series ended as I was in law school and lacked a television. But the series was well done to the extent I remember it.
No television series involving a single combat unit had been done for a long time, and all the prior ones I can recall concerned World War Two, so this series is somewhat unique. Nothing like it has been done since. Of interest, it's more of a small action film, rather than a big battle film, which more accurately predicts the experiences of most US troops than the movies tend to in that regards.
Gomer Pyle, USMC
What!!???
Gomer Pyle isn't about the Vietnam War! I can hear the exclamations now.
That's right, it isn't, and that's my point.
This series was a spinoff of the Andy Griffith Show and it took Mayberry mechanic Gomer Pyle into the USMC as he followed JFK's injunction to "Ask now what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country". Pyle heeds the President's words and joins the Marines.
Intended to be a charming comedy, it tends to be forgotten that the series ran from 1964 to 1969. So, the series commences one year prior to the Marines landing at Da Nang and it ended after the Tet Offensive. None the less, the war just doesn't show up in the series. Bizarre. About the only concession to a war actually going on is late in the series when Jim Neighbors, who played Pyle, and who was an accomplished musician, is seen singing "Blowing In The Wind" with some hippies. By that point, I suspect, the producers of the show knew that it was badly out of sink with the views then held by the American public.
The point of including this here is to issue a caveat about looking at contemporary films as accurately reflecting the events of their time. In some decades they do, in others they very much do not. Films of the 1940s never ignore the ongoing overriding event of the day, World War Two. Films made during the Depression tend to reflect its ongoing existence. But films of the 1960s generally do not tend to reflect the era. Hollywood was making beach films with the stars of the 1950s well into the late 1960s, for example. And on television, Gomer Pyle was serving in a Marine Corps that looked like the World War Two era Marine Corps, was equipped like it, and it wasn't at war.
What's not listed here?
I admit, as many Vietnam War films as I've seen, I haven't seen them all. The ones that I know I've missed are The Flight of the Intruder and Tigerland.
Postscript. I've now seen Tigerland.
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Related Pages:
Movies In History: The List
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Related Pages:
Movies In History: The List
Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Monday, August 27, 1945. The Allied Fleet enters Tokyo Bay.
The Allied fleet anchored in Tokyo Bay.
Contact is made between the Allies and the Japanese forces in the Sittang Valley, Burma. The Japanese enter into an armed truce in New Britain while in the Solomons Japanese forces fight on, unaware the war has ended.
Truman urges Congress to extend conscription by two years, which it did. Conscription in fact continued until March, 1947.
Draft notice.
This would mean that my father's high school graduation class, 1947, was the first class since 1940 which did not graduate into conscription. The respite would be brief, as conscription would be reinstated in 1948 due to the Cold War.
The Battle of Yinji ended in a Chinese Communist victory.
The 1945 Texas Hurricane made landfall near Seadrift, killing three.
Last edition:
Sunday, August 26, 1945. Bomber Harris announces his retirement.
Saturday, June 14, 2025
An interesting day.
Lex Anteinternet: :
Donald Trump, who hasn't served a day in the military, will preside over the largest military parade in the United States since the end of the First Gulf War.
This should be an interesting day.
Donald Trump, who hasn't served a day in the military, will preside over the largest military parade in the United States since the end of the First Gulf War.
Trump, who has made disparaging comments about members of the military, didn't serve during the Vietnam War due to a medical exemption for shin splints.
The parade is ostensibly for the 250th anniversary of the establishment of the U.S. Army, which came into existence on June 14, 1775.
The Army is not as old as the National Guard, which dates its existence, due to colonial militia lineage, to December 13, 1636.
Also today,. Pope Leo XIV will make a virtual appearance at an event in Chicago.
Wednesday, March 12, 2025
Wednesday, March 12, 1975. Last conscription levy.
The last draft lottery for 18 year old Americans took place. Nobody was levied from the conscription pool and registration for the draft was suspended on April 1. Indeed these levies were serving no real point by this time as the last actual conscription of troops took place on June 30, 1973.
An Air Vietnam DC4 went down over NVA controlled territory. American citizens were on board the aircraft whose fate was never determined.
Memorandum Secretary of State Henry Kissinger Regarding Ominous Developments in Vietnam
The Dubai Islamic Bank was established in the United Arab Emirates, becoming the first private institution to operate under the principles of Islamic banking.
Last edition:
Wednesday, March 12, 1975. Reporting the grim news.
Monday, February 17, 2025
Saturday, February 17, 1945. Rum and Coca Cola. Cold Comfort. Scientist leave Peenemünde. Iwo Jima.
The Andrew Sisters song Rum and Coca Cola hit the No. 1 position on the Billboard charts. It was a song I recall as my Quebecois mother liked it.
This song was in the nature of cute at the time, but frankly it's about as accidentally imperialist as possible.
When I was 19 years old, which was the drinking age at the time, this was the first mixed drink I ever ordered in a bar, for the reason it was the only one I'd ever heard of. I was out on the town with a group of my high school friends.
In my view, it's awful. I can't stand rum. Frankly, I wish I was like one of my close friends and never developed a taste for alcohol at all. I do like beer.
The SAS launched Operation Cold Comfort in Italy.
German scientists evacuated the Peenemünde Army Research Center.
One of my (Canadian) cousins lives on Peenemünde today. He's a scientist. Much of the Western world outside of the United States is still keen on science, including our recent allies, and or enemies. Now that J.D. Vance has indicated that we intend to crawl in a hole and pretend the rest of the world doesn't exist, science stands a chance again.
Scopes monkey trials anyone? American being second rate hick nation anyone?
Speaking of Canadians, who entered World War Two in 1939 when the US was still pretending that it could live on a seperate planet, Canadian troops reached the Rhine along a ten mile front.
They were all volunteers.
If I seem bitter, well yes I'm bitter that a Baby Boomer who is morally reprehensible and a South African whose sorry ass should be kicked back to Johannesburg are wrecking the nation, well yes I am.
And, if he's so nifty, why isn't that South African (who, I'll note, emigrated to Canada and incidnetally didn't have to serve in the, mostly black, South African Army as a result) making piles of cash, and producing piles of children, there?
" Infantrymen are working with engineers in road repair near Bullingen, Belgium, to keep supplies moving to the front. Rubble from houses supplies ballast fill. 17 February, 1945. Company C, 395th Infantry Regiment, 99th Infantry Division."
US troops, who were not all volunteers, launched attacks from Luxembourg and near Saarbrucken.
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"Mines and snipers in Hanweiler, Germany, forces this battalion anti-tank unit to seek another route as they move up to support their regiment which jumped off on a pre-dawn attack. They have just made the initial crossing from Sarrguemines, France, into Hanweiler, and over the Saar River. 17 February, 1945. 3rd Battalion, 253rd Infantry Regiment, 63rd Infantry Division." Men who fought for values now betrayed by Donald Trump, Elon Musk and J.D. Vance. If you doubt it, look a the values of post war voters. It's okay, we'll express those values again, but it'll be blood due to our ignorance, again.
Dutch resistance fighter Gabrielle Widner died in Königsberg/Neumark concentration camp from starvation. Unusually, she was a Seventh Day Adventist.
The Italian battleship Conte di Cavour and the unfinished Impero were sunk in Trieste harbor by the RAF.
The British landed at Ru-Ya sought of Myebon, Burma.
The U.S. Navy's Task Force 58 hit Tokyo and Yokohama. That the Japanese home island are fatally exposed is now evident.
Pre invasion bombardments continued at Iwo Jima. Counter battery fire damaged several US ships, including the USS Tennessee.
Last edition:
Friday, February 16, 1945. Corregidor.
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