Draft beer, not soldiers

I don't think we have discussed Vietnam since Old Dog joined the forum.

Since none of us were there, what's to discuss?  I was never privy to any inside poop and I don't think you guys were either.  To the best of my understanding, the US got mired in a civil war between different factions, meddled a bit with their leadership, and we ended up not winning, not losing, exactly, but forfeiting, making the whole matter an exercise in futility and a total waste.  Weren't some dominoes supposed to fall?  Well, they didn't, and now we have trade agreements with Vietnam and they are selling us textiles, fishery products, and big surprise, crude oil.

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I like those Ken Burns documentaries; there is enough information in the voice-over that you don't need to look at the images, and the music is always nice.  I haven't seen the new one but it's supposed to be pretty good, lots of historical info preceding US involvement.

Uncle Ken mentions that a different film may have been used in the movie clips to give it a period feel, but I'm suspicious.  Not having seen any of the clips, my guess is that the clips were shot on 8mm or Super8mm, maybe with some 16mm film, which would make the clips appear more grainy than we are used to seeing with 35mm film stock.  If the colors look strange, I would attribute it to processing the film in a hot and humid environment.  Color film is very touchy, you need to have the  chemicals at a precise temperature, some with only half a degree variance allowed, and there are a lot of chemicals involved.  Also, if those newsreels have been sitting in storage under less than ideal conditions the colors will definitely get wonky.  But I freely concede that artistic liberties may have been taken, and I'm talking out of my keister in which case, forget I said anything.

I think Vietnam was the first war in which the guys in the field took a lot of their own pictures and movies.  The larger installations had Special Services shops where you could develop your own film; other shops taught carpentry, ceramics, fine arts, and other good stuff for the welfare and morale of the troops.  There was a lot of grisly stuff being printed in the photo shop on Okinawa, usually during off hours when there weren't any dependents (wives & kids) hanging around.  I stayed away from that kind of stuff, and couldn't imagine why some guys thought those kinds of prints would make good keepsakes.  I guess saving pictures is better than collecting ears like some of the troops did.  War is hell.

And think of it, the US has been at war in Afghanistan for sixteen years, much longer than the Vietnam entanglement, but with fewer US lives lost (thus far).  Ken Burns will have a hell of a lot of material, assuming we ever get out of that place.