0:00:02 > 0:00:06This programme contains some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting.
0:00:06 > 0:00:08RAPID GUNFIRE
0:00:10 > 0:00:11HELICOPTER WHIRS
0:00:37 > 0:00:43Coming home from Vietnam was close to as traumatic as the war itself.
0:00:45 > 0:00:47For years, nobody talked about Vietnam.
0:00:51 > 0:00:54We were friends with a young couple,
0:00:54 > 0:00:58it was only after 12 years that the two wives were talking,
0:00:58 > 0:01:00found out that we both had been Marines in Vietnam.
0:01:01 > 0:01:03Never said a word about it.
0:01:03 > 0:01:05Never mentioned it.
0:01:05 > 0:01:08And the whole country was like that.
0:01:09 > 0:01:11It was so divisive.
0:01:13 > 0:01:16And it's like living in a family with an alcoholic father.
0:01:18 > 0:01:19Ssh, we don't talk about that.
0:01:22 > 0:01:24Our country did that with Vietnam,
0:01:24 > 0:01:27it's only been very recently that I think that, you know,
0:01:27 > 0:01:30the baby boomers are finally starting to say, "What happened?"
0:01:31 > 0:01:32What happened?
0:01:42 > 0:01:46What we need now in this country is to heal the wounds
0:01:46 > 0:01:49and to put Vietnam behind us.
0:02:01 > 0:02:04The killing in this tragic war must stop.
0:02:16 > 0:02:19The General Westmoreland strategy is producing results.
0:02:19 > 0:02:23The enemy is no longer closer to victory.
0:02:31 > 0:02:32No matter how you measure it,
0:02:32 > 0:02:35we are better off than we thought we would be at this time.
0:02:41 > 0:02:45You have been less than candid as to how deeply we are involved
0:02:45 > 0:02:47in Vietnam.
0:02:47 > 0:02:51We have increased our assistance to the government, its logistics,
0:02:51 > 0:02:53we have not send combat troops there.
0:02:55 > 0:02:59You have a row of dominoes set up, and you knock over the first one,
0:02:59 > 0:03:01and the last one, certainly, it'll go over.
0:03:01 > 0:03:03If aggression is successful in Korea,
0:03:03 > 0:03:06we can expect it to spread throughout Asia and Europe,
0:03:06 > 0:03:08and to this hemisphere.
0:03:30 > 0:03:34# Where have you been, my blue-eyed son?
0:03:36 > 0:03:40# Oh, where have you been, my darling, young one. #
0:03:42 > 0:03:46Victor Franco, who survived the death camps in World War II,
0:03:46 > 0:03:49wrote a book called Man's Search For Meaning.
0:03:52 > 0:03:55You know, 'To live is to suffer.
0:03:55 > 0:03:57To survive is to find meaning in suffering.'
0:04:00 > 0:04:03And for those of us who suffered, because of Vietnam,
0:04:04 > 0:04:08that's been our quest ever since.
0:04:10 > 0:04:16# And it's a hard, and it's a hard, it's a hard, and it's a hard
0:04:16 > 0:04:21# And it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall. #
0:04:21 > 0:04:25America's involvement in Vietnam began in secrecy.
0:04:27 > 0:04:33It ended 30 years later in failure, witnessed by the entire world.
0:04:36 > 0:04:41Before the war was over, more than 58,000 Americans would be dead.
0:04:43 > 0:04:48At least 250,000 South Vietnamese troops died in the conflict as well.
0:04:50 > 0:04:53So did over a million North Vietnamese soldiers
0:04:53 > 0:04:55and Viet Cong guerrillas.
0:05:01 > 0:05:05Two million civilians, North and South, are thought to have perished,
0:05:05 > 0:05:09as well as tens of thousands more in the neighbouring states
0:05:09 > 0:05:11of Laos and Cambodia.
0:05:13 > 0:05:19For many Vietnamese, it was a brutal civil war, for others,
0:05:19 > 0:05:21the bloody climactic chapter
0:05:21 > 0:05:24in a century-old struggle for independence.
0:05:30 > 0:05:32For those Americans who fought in it,
0:05:32 > 0:05:35and for those who fought against it back home,
0:05:35 > 0:05:39as well as for those who merely glimpsed it on the nightly news,
0:05:39 > 0:05:42the Vietnam War was a decade of agony.
0:05:44 > 0:05:47The most divisive period since the Civil War.
0:05:49 > 0:05:53Vietnam seemed to call everything into question.
0:05:54 > 0:05:57The value of honour and gallantry.
0:05:59 > 0:06:01The qualities of cruelty and mercy.
0:06:04 > 0:06:06The candour of the American Government.
0:06:08 > 0:06:11And what it means to be a patriot.
0:06:18 > 0:06:22And those who lived through it have never been able to erase its memory,
0:06:22 > 0:06:26have never stopped arguing about what really happened,
0:06:26 > 0:06:30why everything went so badly wrong, who was to blame...
0:06:31 > 0:06:34..and whether it was all worth it.
0:08:11 > 0:08:15The French conquest of Indochina began with an attack
0:08:15 > 0:08:19on the ancient Vietnamese port of Da Nang in 1858.
0:08:21 > 0:08:26It took 50 years to lay claim to the whole region, Laos and Cambodia,
0:08:26 > 0:08:29as well as the 1,200 mile-long area
0:08:29 > 0:08:31that would come to be called Vietnam.
0:09:08 > 0:09:12The Vietnamese people did not take easily to French occupation,
0:09:12 > 0:09:16just as they had fought against earlier invasions by the Chinese.
0:09:18 > 0:09:23But anyone who dared resist colonial rule risked exile,
0:09:23 > 0:09:25prison, or the guillotine.
0:09:28 > 0:09:33By the 1920s, nationalism was on the rise,
0:09:33 > 0:09:37and a generation of Vietnamese leaders was beginning to emerge.
0:09:37 > 0:09:41Including a slender young man named Nguyen Tat Thanh.
0:09:43 > 0:09:47During his long shadowy career he would adopt some 70 different
0:09:47 > 0:09:53pseudonyms, finally settling on the most enlightened one,
0:09:53 > 0:09:54Ho Chi Minh.
0:09:56 > 0:10:00Ho Chi Minh was a man who succeeded in projecting an image
0:10:00 > 0:10:05of somebody who was totally dedicated to freeing his country
0:10:05 > 0:10:08and his people from foreign domination.
0:10:10 > 0:10:15To the point that he sacrificed his own wellbeing, his own life,
0:10:15 > 0:10:17not having a family of his own.
0:10:19 > 0:10:20To the Vietnamese, that's a
0:10:20 > 0:10:22big sacrifice because, to us,
0:10:22 > 0:10:24everybody needs a family.
0:10:26 > 0:10:29Ho Chi Minh was born in 1890,
0:10:29 > 0:10:32the son of a minor official in the French regime.
0:10:33 > 0:10:36After taking part in a demonstration against the puppet emperor
0:10:36 > 0:10:39and the Frenchmen who pulled his strings,
0:10:39 > 0:10:42Ho was expelled from school and marked for arrest.
0:10:44 > 0:10:50He left Vietnam in 1911, and remained in exile for 30 years.
0:10:52 > 0:10:55He served as a cook's helper, aboard a French liner,
0:10:55 > 0:10:59and visited New York and Boston, where he worked for a time
0:10:59 > 0:11:02as a pastry chef at The Parker House.
0:11:03 > 0:11:06He shovelled snow in London,
0:11:06 > 0:11:08tinted photographs in Paris.
0:11:10 > 0:11:14There, Ho Chi Minh joined the French Socialist Party,
0:11:14 > 0:11:17but when he discovered the anti-colonial writings of Lenin,
0:11:17 > 0:11:19he became a communist.
0:11:21 > 0:11:23He was invited to Moscow to study,
0:11:23 > 0:11:26underwent training as a Soviet agent,
0:11:26 > 0:11:30was sometimes criticised for being a nationalist first,
0:11:30 > 0:11:34a communist second, and then was dispatched to China
0:11:34 > 0:11:37to organise a cell of other Vietnamese exiles
0:11:37 > 0:11:42and help establish the Indochinese Communist Party.
0:11:43 > 0:11:47Through it all, he was taut and quivering, a friend remembered,
0:11:47 > 0:11:52with only one thought - his country, Vietnam.
0:12:08 > 0:12:11In 1940, much of the world was at war.
0:12:20 > 0:12:25Germany had seized most of Western Europe, including France.
0:12:28 > 0:12:33Imperial Japan threatened many of the European colonies in Asia
0:12:33 > 0:12:37and occupied Vietnam, where they permitted their allies,
0:12:37 > 0:12:41the collaborationist French, to continue to oversee their colony.
0:12:43 > 0:12:49The time had come, Ho said, to rally patriots of all ages and all types.
0:12:49 > 0:12:55Peasants, workers, merchants and soldiers, to defeat the Japanese
0:12:55 > 0:12:57and the collaborationist French.
0:13:00 > 0:13:06In February of 1941, after three decades away from his homeland,
0:13:06 > 0:13:11Ho Chi Minh slipped back across the Chinese border into Vietnam
0:13:11 > 0:13:16and set up headquarters near the remote village of Pac Bo,
0:13:16 > 0:13:21in a limestone cave at the side of a mountain he named for Karl Marx,
0:13:21 > 0:13:26overlooking a jungle stream he named for his hero, Lenin.
0:13:28 > 0:13:31There he founded a revolutionary movement
0:13:31 > 0:13:35which he called the Vietnam Independence League.
0:13:35 > 0:13:36The Viet Minh.
0:13:50 > 0:13:54To build and lead a fighting force for his revolution,
0:13:54 > 0:13:59Ho called upon Vo Nguyen Giap, a one-time teacher of French history
0:13:59 > 0:14:02who had instructed the children of Hanoi's elite.
0:14:02 > 0:14:06Giap was an early convert to communism,
0:14:06 > 0:14:10whose lifelong hatred for the French intensified
0:14:10 > 0:14:13when his wife died in a French prison.
0:14:15 > 0:14:18Inspired by Napoleon, Lawrence of Arabia,
0:14:18 > 0:14:22and the Communist Chinese revolutionary Mao Zedong,
0:14:22 > 0:14:26Giap had already begun to develop a distinctive theory of warfare
0:14:26 > 0:14:29that relied on guerrilla tactics,
0:14:29 > 0:14:33until a full-scale conventional attack could be mounted.
0:14:34 > 0:14:39In the fight for independence, which he believed was coming, his army,
0:14:39 > 0:14:43Giap said, would be everywhere and nowhere.
0:14:45 > 0:14:49The reason Vietnamese had always resorted to guerrilla warfare
0:14:49 > 0:14:53was because we were a small country, and it was just a way to fight,
0:14:53 > 0:14:55the weak against the strong.
0:14:57 > 0:15:00Don't fight unless you're sure you can win,
0:15:00 > 0:15:04and surprise is a big element.
0:15:06 > 0:15:07Choose your own battle.
0:15:15 > 0:15:17I had about 26 guys that day, out of 45.
0:15:17 > 0:15:20We were always somewhat
0:15:20 > 0:15:21understrength, and this day we were
0:15:21 > 0:15:23quite understrength.
0:15:27 > 0:15:31And, all of a sudden, the first guy in the column said,
0:15:31 > 0:15:33"VC on the trail. VC on the trail."
0:15:36 > 0:15:39Before I had a chance to digest this, he went down,
0:15:39 > 0:15:41shot right through the chest.
0:15:43 > 0:15:47And what was a very well-laid ambush erupted.
0:15:47 > 0:15:49RAPID GUNFIRE AND EXPLOSIONS
0:15:58 > 0:16:02I knew I'd lost a bunch of guys. I said a prayer to God,
0:16:02 > 0:16:07saying, basically, if you need any more guys from my platoon, take me,
0:16:07 > 0:16:09don't take any more of my men.
0:16:09 > 0:16:14As soon as I said it, I freaked myself out, I said, "Holy shit,
0:16:14 > 0:16:15"can I take that prayer back?"
0:16:28 > 0:16:31By the spring of 1945, more than three years
0:16:31 > 0:16:35after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor,
0:16:36 > 0:16:39the United States government was looking for allies
0:16:39 > 0:16:41behind the lines in Vietnam.
0:16:41 > 0:16:46The Americans were hoping to find a way to undermine Japanese forces
0:16:46 > 0:16:49there when they were contacted by Ho Chi Minh.
0:16:50 > 0:16:54And so it was decided to drop an OSS team in to meet
0:16:54 > 0:16:57with the Viet Minh leadership.
0:16:59 > 0:17:03Paul Hoagland was the medic on their team,
0:17:03 > 0:17:05and the first thing he was told was
0:17:05 > 0:17:07that he must attend to their leader
0:17:07 > 0:17:09who was desperately sick.
0:17:09 > 0:17:13So he was taken to a grass shack where a whiskered,
0:17:13 > 0:17:18skinny man lay on a bundle of straw, desperately ill.
0:17:18 > 0:17:19And that was Ho Chi Minh.
0:17:21 > 0:17:26The OSS, the secret wartime precursor of the CIA,
0:17:26 > 0:17:29supplied Ho's ragtag guerrillas with arms.
0:17:29 > 0:17:33And marvelled at how quickly they learned to handle them.
0:17:34 > 0:17:39Ho Chi Minh began to call his followers the Viet American Army,
0:17:39 > 0:17:43and praised the United States as a champion of democracy
0:17:43 > 0:17:46that would surely help them end colonial rule.
0:18:09 > 0:18:12When an atomic bomb destroyed Hiroshima
0:18:12 > 0:18:16and three days later a second one destroyed Nagasaki,
0:18:16 > 0:18:19Japanese surrender seemed imminent.
0:18:21 > 0:18:25Ho Chi Minh called upon all Vietnamese to rise up
0:18:25 > 0:18:28and take over their own country before the free French
0:18:28 > 0:18:32could re-establish their old colonial regime.
0:18:33 > 0:18:37They did, in cities and towns across the country.
0:18:41 > 0:18:47On September 2nd, 1945, the same day the Japanese formally surrendered,
0:18:47 > 0:18:52hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese streamed into Ba Dinh Square
0:18:52 > 0:18:57in Hanoi to see, for the first time, the mysterious leader
0:18:57 > 0:19:03of the Viet Minh, and hear him proclaim Vietnam's independence.
0:19:03 > 0:19:06HE ADDRESSES THE CROWD IN VIETNAMESE
0:19:07 > 0:19:11With an OSS officer standing nearby,
0:19:11 > 0:19:15Ho Chi Minh began with the words of Thomas Jefferson,
0:19:15 > 0:19:19"All men are created equal.
0:19:19 > 0:19:24"They are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights,
0:19:24 > 0:19:29"and among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
0:19:29 > 0:19:31APPLAUSE
0:19:52 > 0:19:55Ho Chi Minh had great hopes that the
0:19:55 > 0:19:58US would support the Vietnam desire
0:19:58 > 0:20:00for independence,
0:20:00 > 0:20:02not necessarily by intervening,
0:20:02 > 0:20:07but by doing what it could to support an independence movement.
0:20:10 > 0:20:14President Franklin Roosevelt had promised a post-war world
0:20:14 > 0:20:17that would respect the rights of all peoples.
0:20:19 > 0:20:24But Roosevelt was dead now, and his successor, Harry Truman,
0:20:24 > 0:20:26had inherited a very different world.
0:20:28 > 0:20:32The alliance with the Soviet Union that had won the Second World War
0:20:32 > 0:20:33had collapsed.
0:20:33 > 0:20:39The Soviets now occupied the Eastern European countries they had overrun,
0:20:39 > 0:20:43and hoped to spread their influence further into Iran,
0:20:43 > 0:20:45Turkey and the Mediterranean.
0:20:47 > 0:20:49A new Cold War had begun.
0:20:51 > 0:20:53French President Charles de Gaulle
0:20:53 > 0:20:57warned that if the United States insisted on independence
0:20:57 > 0:21:00for her colonies, France might have no choice
0:21:00 > 0:21:03but to fall into the Russian orbit.
0:21:03 > 0:21:08The United States must do nothing to undercut the restoration
0:21:08 > 0:21:13of France's empire, including Vietnam.
0:21:17 > 0:21:20There were hardly any Americans in Vietnam, you know,
0:21:20 > 0:21:25State Department people, council officials, a few businessmen.
0:21:26 > 0:21:29Hardly anyone from this country
0:21:29 > 0:21:31knew where Vietnam was located.
0:21:31 > 0:21:35George Wickes was part of a seven-man OSS mission
0:21:35 > 0:21:39sent to Saigon - the largest city in the south.
0:21:39 > 0:21:42The United States was officially neutral,
0:21:42 > 0:21:46hoping the French and Viet Minh could reach some peaceful solution
0:21:46 > 0:21:47on their own.
0:21:54 > 0:21:59But in the fall of 1945, fresh French troops began arriving
0:21:59 > 0:22:00in Saigon.
0:22:02 > 0:22:05They quickly established control of the city,
0:22:05 > 0:22:08and set out to reoccupy the entire country.
0:22:11 > 0:22:15Ho Chi Minh hoped somehow to achieve independence without a
0:22:15 > 0:22:19war with France, and he still hoped the United States would intervene.
0:22:20 > 0:22:24He did not want to fight the French as an enemy of America.
0:22:25 > 0:22:28And, in fact, I saw the letters
0:22:28 > 0:22:32he wrote to President Truman
0:22:32 > 0:22:36saying, we believe in the same things you believe.
0:22:36 > 0:22:39Those letters, I saw in the CIA files.
0:22:39 > 0:22:43They had never been given to President Truman.
0:22:48 > 0:22:51In June 1946, Ho Chi Minh returned to Paris
0:22:51 > 0:22:56in a fruitless attempt to get the French to live up to a promise
0:22:56 > 0:22:59they had made of increased autonomy for his country.
0:23:01 > 0:23:02While Ho was away,
0:23:02 > 0:23:07General Giap began consolidating Communist control of the revolution.
0:23:08 > 0:23:11He conducted a merciless purge
0:23:11 > 0:23:13of members of rival Nationalist parties,
0:23:13 > 0:23:17and people he called reactionary saboteurs.
0:23:18 > 0:23:22Landlords and moneylenders, Trotskyites and Catholics,
0:23:22 > 0:23:27men and women accused of collaborating with the French.
0:23:27 > 0:23:30Hundreds were shot, drowned, buried alive.
0:23:44 > 0:23:50On December 19th, 1946, after months of building tension,
0:23:50 > 0:23:54fighting broke out in Hanoi between the Viet Minh and the French.
0:23:58 > 0:24:01The Viet Minh proved no match for French firepower.
0:24:07 > 0:24:10Ho, Giap and their comrades
0:24:10 > 0:24:14slipped out of the city and returned to their mountain stronghold
0:24:14 > 0:24:15far to the north.
0:24:18 > 0:24:21"Those who have rifles will use their rifles,"
0:24:21 > 0:24:23Ho declared in a radio address
0:24:23 > 0:24:25calling for a nationwide guerrilla war.
0:24:27 > 0:24:30"Those who have swords, will use swords.
0:24:30 > 0:24:35"Those who have no swords, will use spades, or sticks."
0:25:05 > 0:25:11But the country Ho Chi Minh hoped to unite was itself bitterly divided.
0:25:11 > 0:25:13Families were being torn apart.
0:25:15 > 0:25:18Duong Van Mai's father was the deputy governor
0:25:18 > 0:25:23of a province east of Hanoi, the son and grandson of Mandarins
0:25:23 > 0:25:25who had all served the French.
0:25:27 > 0:25:30Despite her father's position in the French government,
0:25:30 > 0:25:34her sister felt compelled to answer Ho's call.
0:25:36 > 0:25:42My older sister, Thang, was married to a man who had great sympathy
0:25:42 > 0:25:44for the Viet Minh.
0:25:45 > 0:25:51So my sister and her husband trekked all the way from Hanoi to the base,
0:25:51 > 0:25:54in order to join the resistance against the French.
0:25:56 > 0:26:00So the Vietnam War was really a Civil War, down to the family level.
0:26:09 > 0:26:13France poured thousands of men into Vietnam.
0:26:13 > 0:26:16French regulars, European mercenaries,
0:26:16 > 0:26:22and colonial troops from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Senegal,
0:26:22 > 0:26:26who fought alongside an army of Cambodians, Laotians,
0:26:26 > 0:26:29and anti-Communist Vietnamese.
0:26:33 > 0:26:37French forces managed to occupy most of the large towns
0:26:37 > 0:26:39and province capitals,
0:26:39 > 0:26:43and established hundreds of isolated outposts.
0:26:46 > 0:26:51The Viet Minh mined roads, blew up bridges and railroads,
0:26:51 > 0:26:54ambushed French patrols...
0:26:54 > 0:26:56and then disappeared.
0:26:59 > 0:27:03French soldiers sometimes took revenge on the nearest village,
0:27:03 > 0:27:07burning homes, raping women, executing men
0:27:07 > 0:27:10suspected of aiding the Viet Minh.
0:27:48 > 0:27:52The Communists proved every bit as ruthless as the French.
0:27:53 > 0:27:57"It is better to kill even those who might be innocent,"
0:27:57 > 0:28:01one commander said, "than to let a guilty person go."
0:28:02 > 0:28:06And they specifically targeted anyone who had links to the French.
0:28:46 > 0:28:48French casualties continued to mount.
0:28:50 > 0:28:53"There are days when we are so discouraged,
0:28:53 > 0:28:56"that we would like to give it all up," a French soldier
0:28:56 > 0:28:57wrote his mother.
0:28:57 > 0:29:00"Convoys under attack, roads cut,
0:29:00 > 0:29:04"firing in all directions, every night.
0:29:04 > 0:29:06"The indifference at home."
0:29:15 > 0:29:19I had the opportunity to call my mother, you know.
0:29:21 > 0:29:24And I was telling my mother what was happening over there.
0:29:24 > 0:29:27I was telling her she shouldn't believe what she sees
0:29:27 > 0:29:29in the newspaper, and what she sees on television,
0:29:29 > 0:29:31because we're losing the war.
0:29:32 > 0:29:35I said, you'll probably never see me again,
0:29:35 > 0:29:38because everybody in my unit is dying.
0:29:38 > 0:29:43And my mother said, "No, you're coming back."
0:29:43 > 0:29:46She said, "I talk to God every day, and you're special.
0:29:47 > 0:29:48"You're coming back."
0:29:50 > 0:29:53And I said, "Ma, everybody's mother thinks that they're special.
0:29:53 > 0:29:56"You know, I'm putting pieces of special people in bags."
0:30:04 > 0:30:06President Truman's dramatic announcement
0:30:06 > 0:30:08that Russia have the atom secret caused State Departments
0:30:08 > 0:30:10all over the world to stir uneasily.
0:30:13 > 0:30:18We were very aware that there was a Cold War, and that we had an enemy,
0:30:18 > 0:30:21and that enemy was the Soviet Union.
0:30:22 > 0:30:25The United States stood at one pole,
0:30:25 > 0:30:27and the Soviet Union stood at the other pole.
0:30:27 > 0:30:30It was kind of a Manichaean dynamic
0:30:30 > 0:30:32that there was evil and there was good,
0:30:32 > 0:30:35and we were good and the other side was evil.
0:30:35 > 0:30:37It wasn't morally ambiguous.
0:30:41 > 0:30:44Just a few weeks after Russia became a nuclear power,
0:30:44 > 0:30:47there was more stunning news.
0:30:47 > 0:30:51Communist forces under Mao Zedong seized control of China.
0:30:54 > 0:30:57Separate Communist insurrections were also underway
0:30:57 > 0:31:00in the British colonies of Burma and Malaya.
0:31:02 > 0:31:08In January 1950, Mao formally recognised Ho Chi Minh's insurgency
0:31:08 > 0:31:12and agreed to provide the arms, equipment, and military training
0:31:12 > 0:31:14he had been seeking.
0:31:15 > 0:31:20The Soviets recognised the Viet Minh as well, and also offered help.
0:31:22 > 0:31:26President Truman, who was being blamed by his political opponents
0:31:26 > 0:31:31for having lost China and having failed to contain communism,
0:31:31 > 0:31:36approved a 23 million aid programme for the French, in Vietnam.
0:31:38 > 0:31:41The United States was no longer neutral.
0:31:43 > 0:31:49In July, one month after Communist North Korea invaded South Korea,
0:31:49 > 0:31:53the Truman administration quietly dispatched transport planes,
0:31:53 > 0:31:56and a shipload of Jeeps to Vietnam.
0:31:57 > 0:32:0235 military advisers went along to oversee their use.
0:32:03 > 0:32:07None of them, and no-one in the American Embassy,
0:32:07 > 0:32:09spoke a word of Vietnamese.
0:32:10 > 0:32:14But the United States was now officially in Vietnam.
0:32:21 > 0:32:26In the autumn of 1951, a young Massachusetts congressman
0:32:26 > 0:32:32named John F Kennedy dined at the rooftop bar of the Hotel Majestic,
0:32:32 > 0:32:33overlooking Saigon.
0:32:34 > 0:32:36As he and his party ate,
0:32:36 > 0:32:40they could hear the thunder of guns across the Saigon River.
0:32:41 > 0:32:46French commanders assured Kennedy that with more American support,
0:32:46 > 0:32:49French rule would be re-established.
0:32:50 > 0:32:53But Kennedy spent two hours with Seymour Topping,
0:32:53 > 0:32:55a seasoned American reporter,
0:32:55 > 0:32:58who gave him a very different perspective.
0:32:59 > 0:33:01The French were losing, he said,
0:33:01 > 0:33:04and many Vietnamese who had once admired the Americans
0:33:04 > 0:33:08were beginning to despise them for backing the French.
0:33:10 > 0:33:12Kennedy believed the reporter.
0:33:12 > 0:33:16Unless the United States could persuade the Vietnamese
0:33:16 > 0:33:20that it was as opposed to injustice and inequality
0:33:20 > 0:33:21as it was to Communism,
0:33:21 > 0:33:24he told his constituents when he got home,
0:33:24 > 0:33:28the current effort would result in foredoomed failure.
0:33:38 > 0:33:43In 1952, General Dwight Eisenhower was elected president,
0:33:43 > 0:33:47in part, because he promised to take a tougher stance on communism.
0:33:50 > 0:33:55That year, American taxpayers were footing more than 30% of the bill
0:33:55 > 0:33:57for the French war in Vietnam.
0:33:58 > 0:34:03Within two years, that number would rise to nearly 80%.
0:34:07 > 0:34:08Here is Indochina.
0:34:09 > 0:34:14If Indochina falls, Thailand is put in an almost impossible position.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17The same is true of Malaya with its rubber and tin.
0:34:17 > 0:34:23Now, may I say that as far as the war in Indochina is concerned,
0:34:23 > 0:34:27I was there, right on the battlefield, or close to it,
0:34:27 > 0:34:30and it's a bloody war. And it's a bitter one.
0:34:35 > 0:34:40By 1953, the French had been fighting for seven years.
0:34:40 > 0:34:43They had suffered over 100,000 casualties,
0:34:43 > 0:34:46and failed to pacify the countryside.
0:34:46 > 0:34:49Six commanders had come and gone.
0:34:50 > 0:34:54Nevertheless, the seventh commander, General Henri Navarre,
0:34:54 > 0:34:58assured his countrymen that victory was near.
0:34:58 > 0:35:01Now we can see it clearly, he said,
0:35:01 > 0:35:03like the light at the end of the tunnel.
0:35:06 > 0:35:10Meanwhile, large parts of the French population were horrified
0:35:10 > 0:35:12by reports of French brutality.
0:35:14 > 0:35:16And the widespread use of napalm,
0:35:16 > 0:35:23gelatinised petroleum that burned foliage, homes and human flesh.
0:35:26 > 0:35:29When returning French troops disembarked at Marseille,
0:35:29 > 0:35:34members of the Longshoremen's Union pelted them with rocks.
0:35:34 > 0:35:39Parisian Leftists began to call the conflict La Sale Guerre -
0:35:39 > 0:35:40The Dirty War.
0:35:49 > 0:35:51The camera was a close up.
0:35:51 > 0:35:55It was over the shoulder of a storm trooper, who had a kid
0:35:55 > 0:35:59by the scruff of his shirt. And he smacks him.
0:35:59 > 0:36:01At that moment in time, I realised
0:36:01 > 0:36:03that anybody who really cared
0:36:03 > 0:36:05for America and was sent halfway
0:36:05 > 0:36:07around the world chasing some ghost
0:36:07 > 0:36:11in the jungle, in the meantime, my country was being torn apart.
0:36:12 > 0:36:16So I saw somebody who looked like my dad hitting somebody who looked like
0:36:16 > 0:36:18me. Whose side would I be on?
0:36:26 > 0:36:29In July of 1953,
0:36:29 > 0:36:32the Korean War ended in a negotiated settlement
0:36:32 > 0:36:35in a still divided peninsula.
0:36:35 > 0:36:39American policymakers saw it as proof that Communism in Asia
0:36:39 > 0:36:41could be contained.
0:36:43 > 0:36:47That fall, the French indicated their willingness to begin talks
0:36:47 > 0:36:50to end the fighting in Vietnam.
0:36:50 > 0:36:52Ho Chi Minh agreed to meet.
0:36:54 > 0:36:58But before the negotiators were to convene in Geneva,
0:36:58 > 0:37:02each side sought to improve its position on the battlefield.
0:37:04 > 0:37:08General Navarre set up a fortified base in a remote valley
0:37:08 > 0:37:12in north-western Vietnam called Dien Bien Phu,
0:37:12 > 0:37:16where he hoped to lure the Viet Minh into a decisive battle.
0:37:19 > 0:37:23Navarre was certain that superior French firepower and air support
0:37:23 > 0:37:26would crush any attack by the Viet Minh.
0:37:27 > 0:37:32He and his commanders saw no need to worry about the jungle covered hills
0:37:32 > 0:37:36that overlooked his 11,000 men, dug in on the valley floor.
0:37:38 > 0:37:43The artillery commander was so confident of victory, he complained,
0:37:43 > 0:37:45"I have more guns than I need."
0:37:48 > 0:37:51General Giap saw his chance.
0:37:52 > 0:37:55"We decided to wipe out, at all costs,
0:37:55 > 0:37:59"the whole enemy force at Dien Bien Phu," he remembered.
0:38:01 > 0:38:05To do it, he pulled off one of the greatest logistical feats
0:38:05 > 0:38:06in military history.
0:38:06 > 0:38:10A feat that would be restaged in propaganda films
0:38:10 > 0:38:12and celebrated for decades.
0:38:14 > 0:38:17A quarter of a million civilian porters,
0:38:17 > 0:38:22nearly half of them women, moved everything he needed for a siege,
0:38:22 > 0:38:27from sacks of rice, to disassembled artillery pieces, on foot
0:38:27 > 0:38:28through the jungle.
0:38:30 > 0:38:36Giap surrounded the valley with 50,000 soldiers, and 200 big guns,
0:38:36 > 0:38:42dug in and camouflaged so well they could not be spotted from the air.
0:38:47 > 0:38:52On March 13th, 1954, Viet Minh artillery on the hillsides
0:38:52 > 0:38:57began raining down 50 shells a minute on the French troops
0:38:57 > 0:38:58huddled below.
0:39:00 > 0:39:02The airstrip was destroyed.
0:39:05 > 0:39:09The besieged troops could only be reinforced
0:39:09 > 0:39:11and resupplied by airdrop.
0:39:15 > 0:39:19The French artillery commander who had underestimated his enemy
0:39:19 > 0:39:21committed suicide.
0:39:24 > 0:39:29The French Government begged President Eisenhower to intervene.
0:39:29 > 0:39:33He refused to act without support from European allies.
0:39:33 > 0:39:35Britain said no.
0:39:35 > 0:39:39And the Congress would not support unilateral action.
0:39:39 > 0:39:42The Communists under Ho Chi Minh are able to claim
0:39:42 > 0:39:44that they are fighting for independence,
0:39:44 > 0:39:48and the French appear to be fighting for a maintenance of colonial rule.
0:39:48 > 0:39:52I therefore believe that before the United States moves in
0:39:52 > 0:39:56in any degree, that independence must be granted to the people.
0:39:56 > 0:39:57The people must support the struggle.
0:39:59 > 0:40:01Without consulting Congress,
0:40:01 > 0:40:05the president had secretly sent more American transport planes,
0:40:06 > 0:40:10their markings painted over and flown by civilian contractors
0:40:10 > 0:40:15to help resupply the desperate French troops at Dien Bien Phu.
0:40:19 > 0:40:22Everyone understood that, in and of itself,
0:40:22 > 0:40:24Vietnam didn't mean very much.
0:40:25 > 0:40:29But they believed, I believed, if we lost it,
0:40:29 > 0:40:32that the rest of Asia would tumble to Communism.
0:40:52 > 0:40:58On the afternoon of May 7th, 1954, after 55 days of siege,
0:40:58 > 0:41:02the exhausted French forces at Dien Bien Phu surrendered.
0:41:05 > 0:41:10They had lost 8,000 men, killed, wounded, or missing.
0:41:14 > 0:41:18General Giap had lost three times as many,
0:41:18 > 0:41:20but he had won a great victory.
0:41:39 > 0:41:43We should have seen it as the end of the colonial era in Southeast Asia,
0:41:43 > 0:41:48which it really was, but instead we saw it in Cold War terms,
0:41:48 > 0:41:50and we saw it as a defeat
0:41:50 > 0:41:52for the free world that was
0:41:52 > 0:41:54related to the rise of China.
0:41:54 > 0:41:59And it was a total misreading of a pivotal event...
0:42:00 > 0:42:01..which cost us very dearly.
0:42:06 > 0:42:10The day after the fall of Dien Bien Phu, diplomats
0:42:10 > 0:42:14from nine nations gathered in Geneva to settle the future of Vietnam.
0:42:18 > 0:42:22Despite their victory, Ho Chi Minh and General Giap
0:42:22 > 0:42:26could not keep fighting without more support from China
0:42:26 > 0:42:27and the Soviet Union.
0:42:29 > 0:42:33Both of Ho Chi Minh's Communist patrons urged him to agree
0:42:33 > 0:42:35to a negotiated settlement.
0:42:36 > 0:42:39Ho had no option but to give in.
0:42:43 > 0:42:45In the end, no-one was satisfied.
0:42:48 > 0:42:53Vietnam was temporarily to be divided at the 17th parallel,
0:42:53 > 0:42:57the 130,000 French-led troops stationed in the North
0:42:57 > 0:42:59were to withdraw to the South,
0:42:59 > 0:43:03and somewhere between 50 and 90,000 Viet Minh
0:43:03 > 0:43:05were to regroup to the North.
0:43:07 > 0:43:11The two halves would be separated by a demilitarised zone,
0:43:11 > 0:43:15until an election could be held to reunify North and South Vietnam.
0:43:16 > 0:43:21An election everyone knew Ho Chi Minh would win.
0:43:41 > 0:43:45The United States hoped to encourage the building of a legitimate
0:43:45 > 0:43:48government in the South.
0:43:48 > 0:43:52That government was now headed by Ngo Dinh Diem,
0:43:52 > 0:43:55both a Roman Catholic and a Confucian
0:43:55 > 0:43:57in a largely Buddhist country,
0:43:57 > 0:44:01he was a celibate bachelor who had once planned to be a priest.
0:44:03 > 0:44:08The war, for us, really started when we became the partner,
0:44:08 > 0:44:12or I would say the victim, of President Diem.
0:44:14 > 0:44:19We were going to help him turn South Vietnam into a democracy.
0:44:19 > 0:44:20That's what he said he wanted to do.
0:44:20 > 0:44:22And we believed him.
0:44:22 > 0:44:26Like Ho Chi Minh, Diem was a veteran politician,
0:44:26 > 0:44:29whose loathing for the French was matched only by his hatred
0:44:29 > 0:44:34for the Communists, who had imprisoned him and buried alive
0:44:34 > 0:44:37his eldest brother and his nephew.
0:44:39 > 0:44:44Diem was aloof, autocratic, mistrustful of anyone
0:44:44 > 0:44:46much beyond his own family.
0:44:46 > 0:44:50He also proved to be shrewd, resourceful and skilled
0:44:50 > 0:44:53at exploiting the weaknesses of his opponents.
0:44:56 > 0:45:00When Diem's forces won a two-day battle on the streets of Saigon
0:45:00 > 0:45:04against a French-led crime syndicate,
0:45:04 > 0:45:08the French finally withdrew completely from South Vietnam,
0:45:08 > 0:45:12ending nearly a century of occupation.
0:45:13 > 0:45:16Diem became wildly popular
0:45:16 > 0:45:20because he seemed to embody the nationalist cause in the South.
0:45:21 > 0:45:25He succeeded in getting the French out of Vietnam, all the way,
0:45:25 > 0:45:27and Ho Chi Minh had only got them
0:45:27 > 0:45:28out of the northern half.
0:45:30 > 0:45:34Diem called for a referendum in the South.
0:45:34 > 0:45:38The CIA warned him not to meddle too much with the returns.
0:45:40 > 0:45:42But when the ballots were counted,
0:45:42 > 0:45:47Diem claimed to have won 98.2% of the vote.
0:45:49 > 0:45:56On October 26th, 1955, Ngo Dinh Diem named himself the first president
0:45:56 > 0:46:00of the brand-new Republic Of Vietnam.
0:46:02 > 0:46:05The election to reunify the North and South that had been promised
0:46:05 > 0:46:08at Geneva would never be held.
0:46:10 > 0:46:15He became our ally, or rather, our master,
0:46:15 > 0:46:19because the goal of preventing the Communists from taking over
0:46:19 > 0:46:25the South was so strong that we couldn't afford for him to lose.
0:46:25 > 0:46:29So Diem started to boss us around.
0:46:29 > 0:46:31And this was the typical relationship.
0:46:31 > 0:46:34You need any ally you believe to be the centrepiece
0:46:34 > 0:46:39of your foreign policy, they understand that right away,
0:46:39 > 0:46:40and the tail wags the dog.
0:46:46 > 0:46:48Meanwhile, in North Vietnam,
0:46:48 > 0:46:52Ho Chi Minh was focused on rebuilding his country,
0:46:52 > 0:46:55devastated by more than a decade of war.
0:46:59 > 0:47:02The Communists imposed brutal land reforms,
0:47:02 > 0:47:05modelled on those underway in China.
0:47:05 > 0:47:09With a ruthlessness that left thousands of people dead,
0:47:09 > 0:47:13including not only landlords, who had sided with the French,
0:47:13 > 0:47:16but also many villagers who had fought with the Viet Minh.
0:47:19 > 0:47:23Ho Chi Minh was still determined to reunite Vietnam.
0:47:23 > 0:47:26But he cautioned his comrades in the South
0:47:26 > 0:47:30to put their faith in political agitation, and avoid violence.
0:47:33 > 0:47:38That message rang hollow among embattled southern revolutionaries
0:47:38 > 0:47:42struggling to survive under Diem's increasingly harsh regime.
0:47:46 > 0:47:51Diem had imprisoned tens of thousands of citizens without trial,
0:47:51 > 0:47:53and ordered the executions of hundreds more.
0:47:56 > 0:47:59Now the Communists took matters into their own hands
0:47:59 > 0:48:03and began attacking South Vietnamese officials.
0:48:44 > 0:48:48As violence in South Vietnam intensified,
0:48:48 > 0:48:50new leaders emerged in Hanoi.
0:48:50 > 0:48:55Ho Chi Minh would remain the face of the revolution around the world,
0:48:55 > 0:48:59but he now began to share power with men who were growing impatient
0:48:59 > 0:49:01with his caution.
0:49:01 > 0:49:05Men about whom Americans knew almost nothing.
0:49:07 > 0:49:10The most important proved to be a carpenter's son
0:49:10 > 0:49:13from Quang Tri Province in
0:49:13 > 0:49:16the South named Le Duan.
0:49:16 > 0:49:20He had helped found the Indochinese Communist Party,
0:49:20 > 0:49:23survived nearly ten years in a French prison,
0:49:23 > 0:49:26and proved himself a shrewd political infighter
0:49:26 > 0:49:30as he rose to become First Secretary of the party.
0:50:05 > 0:50:10By 1959, Le Duan and his hardline allies were gaining influence
0:50:10 > 0:50:13within the North Vietnamese Politburo
0:50:13 > 0:50:15and beginning to change its policy.
0:50:17 > 0:50:21They now argued that Hanoi should do everything within its power
0:50:21 > 0:50:25to help Southern revolutionaries remove Diem by force.
0:50:47 > 0:50:52Now bands of 40 to 50 armed Viet Minh began slipping back home
0:50:52 > 0:50:55into South Vietnam, following jungle paths hacked
0:50:55 > 0:50:59through the Laotian mountains that the Americans
0:50:59 > 0:51:02would soon call the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
0:51:04 > 0:51:08We must prove all over again to a watching world,
0:51:08 > 0:51:14as we sit on a most conspicuous stage, whether this nation,
0:51:14 > 0:51:18conceived as it is, with its freedom of choice,
0:51:18 > 0:51:20it's breadth of opportunity,
0:51:20 > 0:51:23its range of alternatives,
0:51:23 > 0:51:28can compete with the single-minded advance of the Communist system.
0:51:28 > 0:51:30On November 8th, 1960,
0:51:30 > 0:51:35John Fitzgerald Kennedy was elected President of the United States.
0:51:35 > 0:51:38His vice president was Senator Lyndon Johnson.
0:51:40 > 0:51:43They had narrowly beaten Vice President Richard Nixon
0:51:43 > 0:51:46and his running mate Senator Henry Cabot Lodge.
0:51:48 > 0:51:51Six weeks after Kennedy's election,
0:51:51 > 0:51:54representatives of Southern revolutionary groups met
0:51:54 > 0:51:58to form a new organisation to replace the Viet Minh,
0:51:58 > 0:52:01dedicated to overthrowing Ngo Dinh Diem
0:52:01 > 0:52:04and ousting the foreigners supporting him.
0:52:06 > 0:52:11Behind the scenes, Le Duan and his communist comrades in Hanoi
0:52:11 > 0:52:13were orchestrating everything.
0:52:15 > 0:52:17The new organisation would be called
0:52:17 > 0:52:20the National Liberation Front,
0:52:20 > 0:52:21the NLF.
0:52:23 > 0:52:26The armed wing of the NLF was called the
0:52:26 > 0:52:29People's Liberation Armed Forces,
0:52:29 > 0:52:30but its enemies in Saigon
0:52:30 > 0:52:33and Washington preferred a more
0:52:33 > 0:52:36disparaging term. In their eyes,
0:52:36 > 0:52:37the revolutionaries were
0:52:37 > 0:52:41Communist Traitors to the Vietnamese Nation,
0:52:41 > 0:52:43the Viet Cong.
0:53:33 > 0:53:37Let every nation know,
0:53:37 > 0:53:41whether it wishes us well or ill,
0:53:41 > 0:53:48that we shall pay any price, bear any burden,
0:53:48 > 0:53:53meet any hardship, support any friend,
0:53:53 > 0:53:59oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
0:54:13 > 0:54:19MUSIC: A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall By Bob Dylan