It is often edifying to check out “This Day in History” Web sites such as that of The History Channel. This is certainly the case on rainy days when nothing else comes to mind that I might write about. Of course, the blog is strictly voluntary on my part. I don’t have to write if I so choose. But writing helps me keep in touch with my inner haftpflichtversicherung, or as they used to say in Germany: “Personal liability insurance.”
Among the items that I found the most interesting which happened on this day were relative to the Vietnam War. To be more specific: On March 29, 1971, Lt. William Calley was found guilty at a a court martial of premeditated murder in the My Lai massacre. The total number of those slaughtered by U.S. soldiers that day is not certain but is believed to be between 340 and 500 Vietnamese civilians. Also on this day — two years later in 1973 — the last combat troops left Vietnam. The U.S. involvement there would not officially end until April 1975 when U.S. forces helped to evacuate those fleeing from Saigon when South Vietnam fell to the communists.
These two historical items that happened on this day are of significance to me. Part of the reason is that the Vietnam War was a watershed period in my young life and was thus an intensely personal event even though I never served in the war.
Hearing about the My Lai massacre and the subsequent news surrounding Calley’s involvement was the first time that I totally wondered what the hell was wrong with people from our country. With the massacre it was a bit more complex to get at the answer. This is especially so because I know many who served in Vietnam who said you couldn’t tell who was enemy and who wasn’t. But murder is murder is murder. Calley was paroled in 1974 after serving about a third of his 10-year sentence.
If I felt shamed because of what our troops did in My Lai, I felt pride in meeting and interviewing retired Army Chief Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson Jr. Thompson, pictured above, died Jan. 6, 2006, in Lafayette, La. I was fortunate to have talked with him by phone for a newspaper column and later met him at a speech he gave in February 2005. Thompson was the helicopter pilot who saw the massacre taking place on the ground at My Lai, and upon landing with his two crew members covering him, he confronted Calley. Thompson is credited with saving about a dozen villagers. After being threatened by Army officials and members of Congress for telling what happened that day, Thompson was finally awarded the Soldier’s Medal for his heroism almost 30 years to the day after My Lai.
As for this day in 1973, I recall being ecstatic. I was a high school junior then and up until that time I had gone all through high school wondering if I would eventually be drafted and sent to Vietnam. Of course, I also wondered about my options if that happened as well. As it turned out, I would enlist in the Navy some 16 months later. But not until I burned my draft card.
Yep, I was being processed into the Navy in Houston and this guy asked me for my draft card. I asked him what he was going to do with it and was told that he would tear it up and throw it away. I asked him: “Can I burn it?” He agreed. So I torched my draft card and watched it smolder in an ash tray. There might be symbolism there but I’m just too brain dead from tech writing today to figure out what it is.
Oh yeah, also on this day in 1990, record companies agreed to place warning labels on music products that contain potentially offensive lyrics. It might seem funny but I don’t think I have ever even noticed those labels. I wonder why that is?