This book has been very difficult to finish. Not for the number of pages nor a wandering eye. They Marched Into Sunlight: War and Peace, Vietnam and America, October 1967 has change my understanding about the war in Vietnam in the same way Matterhorn: A Novel of the Vietnam War due to the release of the Pentagon Papers. This book brings home the war to the campus of UW-Madison and the south side of Milwaukee. Half the book is about the campus antiwar movement and the Dow Chemical riot on the same weekend two sons from Milwaukee Wisconsin died in an ambush at Ong Thanh.
Our country is approaching the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War. Enough time has passed to acknowledge tragic mistakes. What makes this very sensitive is the number of Americans who died in a war we know was ‘lost’ even before US soldiers first stepped foot at Da Nang in 1965.
The worst part is that we learned of tremendous loss of life due to poor intelligence and leadership.
Our country has never been able to wrap this around the bigger issue of our long standing efforts in Vietnam that began at the close of World War II.
Must admit I feel a bit numb after reading half of the Pentagon Papers. Reading They Marched Into Sunlight is truly disheartening. I am now more determined than ever to finish all 7,000+ pages of the Pentagon Papers before the end of the year.
The focus at UW-Madison as described in my earlier post showed our nation was in public turmoil well before the Tet Offensive. Can you imagine today a selected minority (of privileged students) who could avoid serving by going to college while those poor middle class sons went to fight and die in Vietnam?
The closing chapters of They Marched Into Sunlight leave me (again) frustrated by 40 years of reflection. Why on earth did the military approach the enemy around Lai Khe in the same way after three consecutive skirmishes? And why –– why after bombing the area the night before Alpha and Delta companies headed out, did the military refuse to provide mortar fire when requested? The ambush was well underway. The Silver Star awarded to Major General John H. Hay, payment to the Michelin tire and rubber company for every tree damaged on their plantations and finally the burial of Danny Sikorski at St. Adelbert’s Cemetery in Milwaukee.