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CNN: Trump Is Furious After Being Humiliated in the Alabama Primary

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whitebeach9/27/2017 4:08:25 pm PDT

re: #179 HappyWarrior

Guang, that’s a fascinating read. I definitely agree with that about how Americans tell the story of Vietnam. In most Vietnam War movies like Full Metal Jacket, Platoon, etc, we don’t even really see them. So yes they do kind of become side characters to something that was ultimately more about them than it was us as Americans.

It’s true. In most Vietnam War movies, the enemy are portrayed more or less as the Japanese are portrayed in virtually every WWII movie: as devious, suicidal zealots with no regard for human life. (In truly idiotic movies like The Green Berets, the VC are little more than a copy of the African forces in the laughable Zulu, charging madly and repeatedly into massed firepower.) Even our ARVN allies are often depicted in essentially racist terms, usually as Oriental versions of Stepinfetchit, who will run from battle and rob you while they’re running. Sometimes there’s a sympathetic local character, who usually ends up dead. And of course there’s sometimes a beautiful young Saigonese woman who speaks wonderful English and becomes an American soldier’s love interest, until of course it turns out that her brother is a VC cadre or some such shit.

But then, really good war movies are few and far between no matter what the war.