[TV] The Vietnam War - on iPlayer documentary

[jonnyrovers]

Thanks for the recommendation. 10 hours of brilliant and incisive film making with one huge glaring omission. There is not one single mention of the military industrial complex and the militarist alliance hell bent on keeping the US in a 'permanent war state'. Eisenhower's 1961 warnings of the 'disastrous rise of misplaced power' went unheeded and allowed Korea, Vietnam and many wars since, gulf states included, to be instigated and endured despite overwhelming public opinion and political pressure and aversion. This work is incomplete without referencing that influence.

 

[Goldstone1976]

Our government has always denied any involvement in the Vietnam conflict. I didn't realise that elements of the Royal Navy was tasked with anything like this. Must have been tough.

My father was in the RAF and served in Vietnam between ‘72 and ‘74. For the last 6 months, he was with Rex Hunt (subsequently the Governor of the Falklands when they were invaded), when he (Hunt) was Consul General. For the first 18 months he did other duties. He never left the RAF during this posting, and was not seconded to a foreign power’s military.

On topic: the documentary is excellent - as far as it goes. As an earlier poster commented, on a par with World at War, but without Olivier’s masterful narration.

 

[Boys 9d]

My only criticism is I thought the story of the era when the French were fighting the Viet Mihn was rushed compared with the time the US was involved.

 

[daveinprague]

My father was in the RAF and served in Vietnam between ‘72 and ‘74. For the last 6 months, he was with Rex Hunt (subsequently the Governor of the Falklands when they were invaded), when he (Hunt) was Consul General. For the first 18 months he did other duties. He never left the RAF during this posting, and was not seconded to a foreign power’s military.

On topic: the documentary is excellent - as far as it goes. As an earlier poster commented, on a par with World at War, but without Olivier’s masterful narration.

One of our tasks was to find Rex Hunt in DaNang. We never found him, but we heard a rumour that he had been found playing golf! Is that true?

 

[Goldstone1976]

One of our tasks was to find Rex Hunt in DaNang. We never found him, but we heard a rumour that he had been found playing golf! Is that true?

Ha. I heard the same rumour, but can't verify its veracity. I met Hunt on three occasions (much later), and, though I never plucked up the courage to ask him, he did strike me as the sort of man about whom that rumour could well be true!