Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
During the summer of 1971, in the midst of protests and demonstrations in the United States against the Vietnam War, it became public for the first time that something horrific had happened in the remote South Vietnamese hamlet of My Lai. Three years previously, in March 1968, a unit of American soldiers engaged in seemingly indiscriminate violence against unarmed civilians, killing over 500 people, including women and children. News filtered slowly through the system, but was initially suppressed, dismissed, or downplayed by military authorities. By late 1969, however, journalists had pursued the rumors, and when New York Times reporter Seymour Hirsch published an expose on the massacre, the story became a national outrage.
In his book, Howard Jones places the events of My Lai and its aftermath in a wider historical context. Jones' compelling narrative details the events in Vietnam, as well as the mixed public response to the court martial that followed, which charged Lieutenant William Calley's and thirty other officers with war crimes. Jones shows how pivotal the My Lai massacre was in galvanizing opposition to the Vietnam War, playing a part nearly as significant as that of the Tet Offensive and the Cambodian bombing.
A trenchant and sober reassessment, My Lai delves into questions raised by the massacre that have never been properly answered: questions about America's leaders in the field and in Washington; the seeming breakdown of the U.S. army in Vietnam; the cover-up and ultimate public exposure; and the trial itself, which drew comparisons to Nuremberg. Based on extensive archival research, this is the best account to date of one of the defining moments of the Vietnam War.
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Synopsis
On the early morning of March 16, 1968, Truong Thi Le and her six-year-old son were eating breakfast in their small village when they heard the arrival of troops and gunships. Assuming the Americans had returned to the remote South Vietnamese hamlet-called My Lai 4 by the Americans-to interrogate villagers about the Viet Cong, who controlled this region, Le was ordered outside alongside her neighbors, where the soldiers began shooting them from close range. Le and her child feigned death as bodies piled on top of them, and after the shots ceased, only the muffled clicks of a camera broke the silence. When she eventually emerged from the crumpled corpses, Le gathered her son and husband-miraculously still alive-and left her home village forever.
In November 1969, in the midst of growing protests against the Vietnam War, news began to spread that American soldiers had slaughtered over 500 Vietnamese civilians-most of whom were elderly residents, women, or children-in a place called My Lai. Military authorities attempted to suppress, dismiss, or downplay news of the massacre, but some of those who had been there and refused to participate in the slaughter began to talk about what they had seen. Internal investigations commenced, and the official line was that the villagers had been killed by artillery and gunship fire rather than by small-arms. But that line soon began to fray. Attention shifted toward a young lieutenant in Charlie Company who admitted he had gunned down unarmed Vietnamese but insisted that he had acted upon orders from above. After a journalistic expose of the cover-up along with photographs of the carnage incited national outrage, congressional and U.S. Army inquiries were undertaken. A military court charged Second Lieutenant William Calley and nearly 30 other officers with war crimes, but in the wake of the court martial and the months-long trial, Calley alone was convicted of premeditated murder. The sentence polarized American sentiment and immediately became politicized. Many felt it was unfair; some felt it was just; most saw Calley as a scapegoat. The controversy continues nearly half a century later.
In this raw, searing new narrative account, Howard Jones reopens the case of My Lai by examining individual accounts of both victims and soldiers through extensive archival and original research. Jones evokes the horror of the event itself, the attempt to suppress it, as well as the response to Calley's sentence and the seemingly unanswerable question of whether he had merely been following orders. My Lai also surveys how news of the slaughter intensified opposition to the Vietnam War by undermining any pretense of American moral superiority. Compelling, comprehensive, and sobering, Howard Jones' My Lai chronicles how the strategic failures and competing objectives of American leaders resulted in one of the most devastating tragedies of the Vietnam War.
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Synopsis
On the early morning of March 16, 1968, American soldiers from three platoons of Charlie Company (1st Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment, 11th Brigade, 23rd Infantry Division), entered a group of hamlets located in the Son Tinh district of South Vietnam, located near the Demilitarized Zone and known as -Pinkville- because of the high level of Vietcong infiltration. The soldiers, many still teenagers who had been in the country for three months, were on a -search and destroy- mission. The Tet Offensive had occurred only weeks earlier and in the same area and had made them jittery; so had mounting losses from booby traps and a seemingly invisible enemy. Three hours after the GIs entered the hamlets, more than five hundred unarmed villagers lay dead, killed in cold blood. The atrocity took its name from one of the hamlets, known by the Americans as My Lai 4.
Military authorities attempted to suppress the news of My Lai, until some who had been there, in particular a helicopter pilot named Hugh Thompson and a door gunner named Lawrence Colburn, spoke up about what they had seen. The official line was that the villagers had been killed by artillery and gunship fire rather than by small arms. That line soon began to fray. Lieutenant William Calley, one of the platoon leaders, admitted to shooting the villagers but insisted that he had acted upon orders. An expose of the massacre and cover-up by journalist Seymour Hersh, followed by graphic photographs, incited international outrage, and Congressional and U.S. Army inquiries began. Calley and nearly thirty other officers were charged with war crimes, though Calley alone was convicted and would serve three and a half years under house arrest before being paroled in 1974.
My Lai polarized American sentiment. Many saw Calley as a scapegoat, the victim of a doomed strategy in an unwinnable war. Others saw a war criminal. President Nixon was poised to offer a presidential pardon. The atrocity intensified opposition to the war, devastating any pretense of American moral superiority. Its effect on military morale and policy was profound and enduring. The Army implemented reforms and began enforcing adherence to the Hague and Geneva conventions. Before launching an offensive during Desert Storm in 1991, one general warned his brigade commanders, -No My Lais in this division--do you hear me?-
Compelling, comprehensive, and haunting, based on both exhaustive archival research and extensive interviews, Howard Jones's My Lai will stand as the definitive book on one of the most devastating events in American military history.