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.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Related Pages:

Movies In History:  The List

Buffalo Relief. Natrona County Courthouse.

This is the old Courthouse, built in the 1930s, which has been featured here before.  

 

Dr John becomes "deeply concerned".

Barrasso joins GOP critics, Democrats in pressing RFK Jr. on vaccines: “Since then, I’ve grown deeply concerned.”

Now he's deeply concerned?

He should have been deeply concerned for months. 

Congressional panel hears call for national park funding, restoration of staff

Congressional panel hears call for national park funding, restoration of staff: In front of the Tetons, public land advocates support the Great American Outdoors Act that provides money for public-lands maintenance and permanently funds acquisition of parks and access.

Today In Wyoming's History: Governor Gordon orders flags to fly at half-staff immediately for former Superintendent of Public Instruction Lynn Simons

Today In Wyoming's History: Governor Gordon orders flags to fly at half-staff ...:   

Governor Gordon orders flags to fly at half-staff immediately for former Superintendent of Public Instruction Lynn Simons

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 4, 2025

CONTACT: Michael Pearlman, Communications Director

Michael.Pearlman@wyo.gov

 

Governor Gordon orders flags to fly at half-staff immediately for former Superintendent of Public Instruction Lynn Simons

 

CHEYENNE, Wyo. –  Governor Mark Gordon has ordered both the U.S. and State of Wyoming flags to fly at half-staff statewide today, September 4 until sundown on Saturday, September 6 in honor and memory of former Wyoming Superintendent of Public Instruction Lynn Simons. Ms. Simons served as Superintendent of Public Instruction from 1979 until 1991. She passed away on Saturday, August 30, 2025.

A memorial service for Ms. Simons will be held at 2 pm on Saturday, October 18 at First Christian Church, 219 W 27th St. in  Cheyenne. 

-END-

Friday, September 5, 1975. Attempts.

Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson, attempted to assassinate U.S. President Gerald Ford, but was thwarted by United States Secret Service agent Larry M. Buendorf and by the fact that she failed to chamber a round in the 1911 pistol she was attempting to use. She's later claim she'd intentionally ejected the round, and one was found in her apartment.

The Provisional IRA bombed the London Hilton.

Last edition:

Wednesday, August 6, 1975. 아니요.

Labels: 1960s, 1965, 1970s, 1975, law, South Korea, United Nations

Saturday, September 5, 1925. Picnic Etiquette

The Saturday Evening Post anticipated the start of school in most localities the following Tuesday.

Ethel Hays portrayed a still familiar type.

Calvin Coolidge issued a proclamation.

Proclamation, September 5, 1925

Purpose: To commemorate the cross erected and dedicated at Fort Niagara by Father Millett on Good Friday, 1688

Date: September 5, 1925

WHEREAS, by section 2 of an Act of Congress approved June 8, 1906 (34 Stat. 225), the President was authorized “in his discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States to be national monuments, and may reserve as a part thereof parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected”;

AND WHEREAS, Father Millett, a French Jesuit Priest, who came to Canada – then known as New France – in 1667, and who served about fifteen years as a missionary among the Onondaga and Oneida Indians within what is now the State of New York, and subsequently became a chaplain in the French Colonial Forces, first at Fort Frontenac and later at Fort Niagara, did, on Good Friday, 1688, erect and dedicate a cross on what is now the Fort Niagara Military Reservation; and the Knights of Columbus of the Sixth New York District have requested that a suitable site be set apart thereon for the erection of another cross commemorative of the cross erected and blessed by Father Millett;

NOW THEREFORE, I, Calvin Coolidge, President of the United States of America, under authority of the said Act of Congress do hereby reserve as a site for the said monument, the following described parcel of land situated within the limits of the military reservation of Fort Niagara, New York, and do hereby declare and proclaim the same to be a national monument to commemorate the cross erected and dedicated at Fort Niagara by Father Millett on Good Friday, 1688, viz:

Beginning at an iron pipe on the northerly line of old stone block house (building No. 33) produced, and seventy-four (74) feet westerly from the northwest corner of said block house, running thence eighteen (18) feet westerly along said northerly line produced to an iron pipe; thence northerly at right angles to above line eighteen (18) feet to an iron pipe; thence easterly on a line parallel to the north line of block house produced and eighteen (18) feet distant northerly therefrom, eighteen (18) feet to another iron pipe; thence southerly at right angles to said northerly line of block house eighteen feet to the point of beginning; containing 0.0074 acres more or less.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington this 5th day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and twenty-five and the Independence of the United States the one hundred and fiftieth.

Centerville, Arkansas hit a still standing record of 112F.

The New Yorker celebrated tennis.

And Colliers discussed Picnic etiquette.

Last edition:

Monday, August 31, 1925. Bombing Ajdir.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Aircraft, French Navy, Hawaii, Morocco, Peru, Rif War, South America, Spanish Navy, U.S. Navy

 

Army’s M7 rifle will get fewer independent and real-world tests, watchdog warns

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Josh Allen. He's not from Wyoming you know.

Football season starts today.

But the, neither are a lot of the "Wyoming Freedom Caucus".

But I digress.  

Josh Allen is not from Wyoming.  Wyomingites worship him as if he is.

He's not. 

His connection with the state is thin.  He went to UW. That's it.

This is the sort of thing, however, that Wyomingites and Faux Wyomingites do all the time, make somebody a hero as they're theoretically from Wyoming.

Now, I have nothing against Allen.  Indeed, he married Hailee Seinfeld, and she's a fox, so he must have something going for him.

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Hi, we’re from the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and we’re not here to help you - WyoFile

Hi, we’re from the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and we’re not here to help you - WyoFile: Property taxes are a big issue in Wyoming, but not everyone wants more tax breaks that come with a huge price, columnist Kerry Drake writes.

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Monday, September 3, 1945. The new Post War World.

"Japanese soldiers are shown marching through Nanking's residential section. These soldiers are still fully armed but under perfect control at all times. Photographer: Lt. Richard Loeb. 3 September, 1945."

Yeoman's Fourth Law of History.  War changes everything

This is something that somehow is repeatedly forgotten by those who advocate wars.  I'm not a pacifist by any means, but it should be remembered that wars change absolutely everything, about everything.  No nation goes into a war and comes back out the same nation.  People's views about various things change radically due to war, entire economies are dramatically changed, and of course the people who fight the war are permanently changed.

We've discussed this here from time to time in regards to specific topics, but this law is so overarching that the impact of it can hardly be exaggerated.  Every time a nation enters a war, it proposes, in essence, to permanently alter everything about itself.

On Monday, September 3, 1945, people woke up to a new world, whether they realized it or not. 

The prior day Japan, the last Axis hold out, surrendered.

May people had the day off, as it was Labor Day.

With this entry, we end our daily tracking of events 80 days in the past.  When we started tracking events 80 years ago, it was because we were coming up on the 80th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.  Events of the 1940s otherwise are not really the focus of this blog, and 80 years is an odd period to look back to retrospectively, although no odder, I suppose, than 125 years, 115, and 120 years, which this blog otherwise does, although in the context of this blog's focus, that actually is less odd.  The tacking of those other dates fills in gaps left in the focus of this blog when we started posting on the Punitive Expedition from a 100 year focus.  Just as here we failed to fill in the dates from 1939 to 1941, which were very much part of the Second World War story, we failed to fill in the dates from 1900 to 1916, which were very much part of the overall story of the event we were focusing on.

We still occasionally post events 100 years past, and 50 years past, although not all that frequently.  And we will likely catch some 80 years past when they are very significant.  Should this author make to 2030, chances are good that we'll start again with the events of the Korean War, or perhaps just three years from now with the Berlin Blockade.

For now, we're finished with the 80 years retrospectives.

We would note that things were still going on in the Second World War on this date.  The war in the Pacific sputtered to a conclusion and in a manner distinctively different from the war in Europe.  In Europe, as we have seen, there were some German formations that fought on after the German surrender, but usually because they feared being taken captive by Communist forces.  Japanese forces however were often still quite well organized in the field and had not, in many locations, been defeated.  Their surrenders were bizarrely formally orchestrated, usually featuring meetings and formal surrender instruments.  Of course, Japan had not been occupied at the time of Japan's surrender, which was not true of Germany.  

Indeed, on this day, General Tomoyuki Yamashita formally surrendered the remaining Japanese troops in the Philippines to General Jonathan M. Wainwright.  Things like this would go on for days.

Also going on for days would be the  British reoccupation of its lost colonial domain in the East.  Other nations, notably the French and the Dutch, would try the same, but they'd have to fight their way back in, and ultimately, they lost the fight.

All that is part of the story of the post war world.  Colonialism was done for.  The British would have the wisdom soon to see that, whereas the French resisted it.  

Also part of the post war world would be the rise of Communism. 

Communism had been part of the global story going back into the late 19th Century, but the Second World War boosted its fortunes, in part because it aligned itself with anti colonial movements.

The struggle between Communism and Democracy, even imperfect democracy, had already begun before the end of the war.  In some places the struggle between Communist and Anticommunist forces was long established.  The Chinese Civil War had commenced before World War Two, and it had recommenced before the Japanese surrender.  In other places, however, the end of the war brought out movements that had not been significant before.  In Vietnam, for example, the Viet Minh has declared independence prior to the Japanese surrender and were moving towards contesting the French for control of the country, something that would be interrupted by the British at first, using surrendered Japanese troops.  That a Cold War was on wasn't widely recognized to be occurring as of yet, but that it was is clear in retrospect.

The rise of the United States as a global power, something that many Americans had not wanted to occur before World War Two, had been completed by the Second World War's end.  Economically, the United States was effectively the last man standing.  1945 would usher in a post war economic world such as had not existed in modern times.  The US became the globally dominant economic power because its factories had not been destroyed, and would enjoy that status well into the 1970s.  At the same time, the US became a major military power for the first time in its history, a status which it retains.

The period from 1945 to, roughly 1973/1991, would be sort of an American golden era, albeit one with many significant problems.  The legacy of that period haunts the United States today.  From 1945 until the early 1970s nobody could contest the US economically and that meant, at home, there were always decent jobs for Americans, no matter how well educated they were, or were not.  A college education guaranteed a white collar occupation.  That began to come apart in the 1970s and by the late 1980s that was no longer true, although Americans have never accepted the change.

Indeed, that's a major problem today.  The US is controlled by those who came of age in this era, and many elderly voters cannot look back past it.  When people pine for a return of a prior era, that's the era they hope to restore.  But it was never destined to be permanent.  World War Two was so massive it destroyed the global economy, but the economy would inevitably recover, and the Cold War against the Soviet Union could never have been won by the USSR.  The economy that had come into place in the 1990s was a more natural one, and interestingly restored the global economy to the state of globalization that it had obtained prior to the First World War.

The social changes brought about by the war were likewise massive, and that's been forgotten.

Ironically, one of the most cited social claims about the war is incorrect, that being that it brought women into the workplace.  It didn't.  That had been going on for a long time, but as often noted here, it was domestic machinery that caused that change.  Having said that, the immediate post war economic boom caused a massive introduction of that machinery into homes.  People who had never owned a washing machine, for example, now suddenly did.  And with the washer and dryer coming in, trips to the laundromat, or hours spent at home working on laundry, both being "women's work", went out. They now had time to go to work. . . or school.

This, as many of the trends we noted, was something that was already occurring. The war accelerated it. Even before World War Two more women graduated from high school than men.  College education remained predominantly male, but even at that the number of female college students grew from 9,100 (21% of the total) in 1870 to 481,000 (44% of the total) by 1930, with female university attendance receiving a big boost during the 1920s.  The war, however, boosted this.  Already by the 1920s the reduction in female labor needs at home had meant that a sizable number of well off and middle class young women could attend college.  The Great Depression dampened that, but the end of the Second World War dramatically altered the situation after 1945.

Young men also began to crowd college campuses like never before.

Prior to the Second World War a small minority of men attended, let alone completed, college. In 1940 5.5% of American men had completed a bachelor's degree or higher, which was a higher percentage than women at 3.8%.  Moreover, with certain distinct exceptions, American men who attended college were part of a WASP upper class.  Indeed, the extent to which Ivy League schools were protestant institutions has been largely forgotten.  Princeton, for instance ended its Sunday chapel requirement for upperclassmen in 1935, for sophomores in 1960, and for freshmen in 1964.  Harvard, we should not, ended its chapel requirement in 1886 and Yale in 1926, but the point is that most of those who attended private universities were of a WASP heritage. This was less true, of course, of state universities, which often had a agricultural, teaching or mining focus.  

World War Two, however, changed all of this through the GI Bill, with newly discharged men heading to university.  Included in student body were Catholics, a sizable American minority, who had largely not attended university before.

The implications of this were enormous.  Women leaving homes to live on their own before marriage had really started in an appreciable degree the 1920s, although it occurred and was possible before that.  My mother's mother, had a university degree prior to that time. Large numbers of young men doing so was really new, with perhaps the only real analogy being the camps of young itinerant workers in the Great Depression.

Of course, the Great Depression had practically acclimated young men to living away from home while young, and then the Second World War certainly acclimated large numbers of them.  The new environment was large numbers of young men and young women living away from home, and from very varied backgrounds.  Co-ed students from prior to the Second World War would have found a much narrower demographic than they did after the war.

This at least arguably accelerated the blending of distinct cultures within the overall American culture, although that's always been a feature of the United States.  Having said that, the "melting pot" of American culture melted more slowly prior to World War Two.   With the war having a levelling effect on ethnic differences, they shifted notably.

Prior to World War Two, and for some time thereafter, Catholics, Jews, Blacks and Hispanics were really "others".  It's certainly the case that distinctions and prejudice remains today, but the Second World War started the process of addressing them.  Catholics fairly rapidly moved from a disdained religious minority, albeit a large minority, to part of the general American religious background, that process complete with the election of John F. Kennedy.  At the same time, however, the uniqueness and identify of many of these groups, which had heretofore been quite strong, began to dissipate.

Sudden success and sudden cultural change often has within them the seeds of their own decay and downfall.  This seems to have been much the case with the second half of the Twentieth Century as "the American Century".  Americans came to very rapidly believe that their postwar economic good fortune was due to some native genius, rather than the good luck of having been outside the range of Axis aircraft.  Rapid cultural changes that saw young Americans step right out of high school and into good paying jobs, or off to college for even better paying jobs, all while being outside of their parents homes, began to seem like a decree of nature.  Liberalization of culture yielded to libertinism of culture and an attack on traditional value.  Everything seemed headed, in the end, in one direction.

It didn't.

The destroyed nations rebuilt, and at the same time, under American influence, democracy spread.  This was a huge global success, but it also meant that the US inevitably came to a point at which it could not dominate the world's economies.  Advances in technology an globalization ultimately wiped out he heavy labor segment of the American economy while at at the same time the same developments that freed up women from domestic labor enslaved them to the office place.  The post war arrogance that bloomed in the late 60s ultimately badly damaged the existential nature of the family in ways that are still being sorted out.

The post war world started to come to an end in 1991 with the fall of the USSR.  But like a lot of things, it took and is taking a long time to play out.  We're likely in its final closing pages now, as the Boomer generation makes a desperate effort to restore a lost world, but only selectively.  Very few really want to return to the point before these developments commenced.  The ultimate question remains however if World War Two, which the country had no choice but to fight, resulted in such existential damage to the country, and the world, that much of what came before the war was not only better than what came after it, but that whether the damage of the war was so severe that it cannot be recovered.

On this day, in addition to what has already been noted, British Marines landed at Pennang.  Hirohito opened the 88th Imperial Diet.

The Red Army opened Officer's Clubs.

While we won't catalog events hence force on a day to day basis, we will look in more depth at the changes World War Two brought about, for good, and ill.

Last edition:

Sunday, September 2, 1945. Japan signs the Instrument of Surrender.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Allies, Australia, Blog Mirror, Japan, North Vietnam, United Kingdom, Vietnam, VJ Day, World War Two

The Aerodrome: Space Force HQ to move to Alabama.

The Aerodrome: Space Force HQ to move to Alabama.: 

Space Force HQ to move to Alabama.

The United States Space Force, the most junior, least needed, and most stupid branch of the American military, is moving to Huntsville, Alabama, in part because Donald Trump is demented vengeful twit.

Trump is responsible for the Space Farce in the first place, creating a new branch of the military for no sensible reason, by taking the Air Force Strategic Command, which did make sense, and making it its own branch of the military.  At least initially, it's enlisted members were reassigned from the Air Force to the Farce.  Officers may have been as well, but those officers in this role above the very senior level would have had little choice in any event.

The relocation from Colorado Springs will be expensive and may impair the ability of the Farce to perform its mission for a time.

President Biden really missed his chance and should have reassigned the Space Farce to the Air Force.  Frankly, if I was President, at this point I'd reassign it to the Coast Guard and put the Coast Guard back in the Department of the Treasury, where it belongs.  After commissioned Space Cadets resigned I might move it back to the Air Force.

Hageman to hear testimony in Teton Park on public land funding

Hageman to hear testimony in Teton Park on public land funding: Congressional committee to discuss Great American Outdoors Act, which provided money to preserve the Kelly Parcel. That revenue stream may be in danger.

Sunday, September 2, 1945. Japan signs the Instrument of Surrender.

This Day in History: V-J Day effectively ends World War II

The Australian Minister of Defence announced that the South-West Pacific Command had come to an end.

The Democratic Republic of Vietnam was proclaimed by Ho Chi Minh.

The British government ended wartime censorship.

Last edition:

Saturday, September 1, 1945. Truman addresses the nation.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Chinese Civil War, Coal, Harry S. Truman, Hong Kong, Japan, Philippines, Prisoners of War, Radio, Rationing, the spoken word, United Kingdom, VJ Day, World War Two

Saturday, September 1, 1945. Truman addresses the nation. This Land is Your Land.

Truman addressed the nation by radio.

The thoughts and hopes of all America—indeed of all the civilized world—are centered tonight on the battleship Missouri. There on that small piece of American soil anchored in Tokyo Harbor the Japanese have just officially laid down their arms. They have signed terms of unconditional surrender.

Four years ago, the thoughts and fears of the whole civilized world were centered on another piece of American soil—Pearl Harbor. The mighty threat to civilization which began there is now laid at rest. It was a long road to Tokyo—and a bloody one.

We shall not forget Pearl Harbor.

The Japanese militarists will not forget the U.S.S. Missouri.

The evil done by the Japanese war lords can never be repaired or forgotten. But their power to destroy and kill has been taken from them. Their armies and what is left of their Navy are now impotent.

To all of us there comes first a sense of gratitude to Almighty God who sustained us and our Allies in the dark days of grave danger, who made us to grow from weakness into the strongest fighting force in history, and who has now seen us overcome the forces of tyranny that sought to destroy His civilization.

God grant that in our pride of the hour, we may not forget the hard tasks that are still before us; that we may approach these with the same courage, zeal, and patience with which we faced the trials and problems of the past four years.

Our first thoughts, of course—thoughts of gratefulness and deep obligation—go out to those of our loved ones who have been killed or maimed in this terrible war. On land and sea and in the air, American men and women have given their lives so that this day of ultimate victory might come and assure the survival of a civilized world. No victory can make good their loss.

We think of those whom death in this war has hurt, taking from them fathers, husbands, sons, brothers, and sisters whom they loved. No victory can bring back the faces they longed to see.

Only the knowledge that the victory, which these sacrifices have made possible, will be wisely used, can give them any comfort. It is our responsibility—ours, the living—to see to it that this victory shall be a monument worthy of the dead who died to win it.

We think of all the millions of men and women in our armed forces and merchant marine all over the world who, after years of sacrifice and hardship and peril, have been spared by Providence from harm.

We think of all the men and women and children who during these years have carried on at home, in lonesomeness and anxiety and fear.

Our thoughts go out to the millions of American workers and businessmen, to our farmers and miners—to all those who have built up this country's fighting strength, and who have shipped to our Allies the means to resist and overcome the enemy.

Our thoughts go out to our civil servants and to the thousands of Americans who, at personal sacrifice, have come to serve in our Government during these trying years; to the members of the Selective Service boards and ration boards; to the civilian defense and Red Cross workers; to the men and women in the USO and in the entertainment world—to all those who have helped in this cooperative struggle to preserve liberty and decency in the world.

We think of our departed gallant leader, Franklin D. Roosevelt, defender of democracy, architect of world peace and cooperation.

And our thoughts go out to our gallant Allies in this war: to those who resisted the invaders; to those who were not strong enough to hold out, but who, nevertheless, kept the fires of resistance alive within the souls of their people; to those who stood up against great odds and held the line, until the United Nations together were able to supply the arms and the men with which to overcome the forces of evil.

This is a victory of more than arms alone. This is a victory of liberty over tyranny.

From our war plants rolled the tanks and planes which blasted their way to the heart of our enemies; from our shipyards sprang the ships which bridged all the oceans of the world for our weapons and supplies; from our farms came the food and fiber for our armies and navies and for our Allies in all the corners of the earth; from our mines and factories came the raw materials and the finished products which gave us the equipment to overcome our enemies.

But back of it all were the will and spirit and determination of a free people—who know what freedom is, and who know that it is worth whatever price they had to pay to preserve it.

It was the spirit of liberty which gave us our armed strength and which made our men invincible in battle. We now know that that spirit of liberty, the freedom of the individual, and the personal dignity of man, are the strongest and toughest and most enduring forces in all the world.

And so on V-J Day we take renewed faith and pride in our own way of life. We have had our day of rejoicing over this victory. We have had our day of prayer and devotion. Now let us set aside V-J Day as one of renewed consecration to the principles which have made us the strongest nation on earth and which, in this war, we have striven so mightily to preserve.

Those principles provide the faith, the hope, and the opportunity which help men to improve themselves and their lot. Liberty does not make all men perfect nor all society secure. But it has provided more solid progress and happiness and decency for more people than any other philosophy of government in history. And this day has shown again that it provides the greatest strength and the greatest power which man has ever reached.

We know that under it we can meet the hard problems of peace which have come upon us. A free people with free Allies, who can develop an atomic bomb, can use the same skill and energy and determination to overcome all the difficulties ahead.

Victory always has its burdens and its responsibilities as well as its rejoicing.

But we face the future and all its dangers with great confidence and great hope. America can build for itself a future of employment and security. Together with the United Nations, it can build a world of peace rounded on justice, fair dealing, and tolerance.

As President of the United States, I proclaim Sunday, September the second, 1945, to be V-J Day—the day of formal surrender by Japan. It is not yet the day for the formal proclamation of the end of the war nor of the cessation of hostilities. But it is a day which we Americans shall always remember as a day of retribution—as we remember that other day, the day of infamy.

From this day we move forward. We move toward a new era of security at home. With the other United Nations we move toward a new and better world of cooperation, of peace and international good will and cooperation.

God's help has brought us to this day of victory. With His help we will attain that peace and prosperity for ourselves and all the world in the years ahead.

The speech, set out above, declared September 2 VJ Day, the third such day to claim that title. 

The War Department issues a report regarding an anticipated world wide coal shortage.

From Sarah Sundin's blog:

Today in World War II History—September 1, 1940 & 1945: US soldiers liberate two civilian internment camps in the Tokyo area. US ends military rule in the Philippines and turns over civil administration to President Sergio Osmeña. Britain reduces clothing ration to 3 coupons pe

Military rule in the Philippine government ended.

A temporary government was established by the British in Hong Kong.

The Xinghua Campaign ended in communist victory in China and the Battle of Dazhongji began.

The lyrics to This Land Is Your Land by Woody Guthrie were published.  The song had been written in 1940, but not released.  The recording would not be released until 1953.

In my view, it's one of the greatest American folk songs.

Last edition:

Friday, August 31, 1945. New dances.

Labels: 1940s, 1945, Diplomacy, Finland, Japan, Marcus Island, Music, Occupation of Japan, Rock Music, United States, USSR, World War Two