Taken from 40 Years Later: Remembering the Legacy of the Vietnam War by Dik Cool:
The PBS documentary "Last Days in Vietnam" is an excellent piece of cold war propaganda. What could be better than to show two hours of Vietnamese fleeing the (gasp!) advancing "communist hordes." The map drips red, the people flee and the talking heads intone that Saigon is "falling to the communists." But wait, aren't the communists also Vietnamese and isn't this their country? So Vietnam has fallen to the Vietnamese? Isn't the US the invader, the occupier, the imperial force that has tried to subjugate a nationalist movement? In 1776, didn't we fight to expel the occupying British? A more accurate description would be that the capitalist invaders had finally been driven out by Vietnamese forces committed to freedom and independence for their country. Their only sin was that they believed in a different economic system, communism, for their country.
Perhaps a brief history will bring perspective to all this.... Read More