Uncategorized, American Military History, Page 2

FYI: Special Forces in Vietnam

Course member Philip F sent some links you might enjoy looking at, relating to our study of the Vietnam War this week:

The Navy Seals in their original format were part of the UDT teams (nicknamed “Frogmen” which the Seal members still call each other, often) that came ashore on Normandy Beach early on and then were used to some extent in Korea. However, their modern day predecessors were established by President Kennedy during Vietnam. Most people are not aware of their participation then, but are more focused on the role of the Green Berets. Some interesting links and books are listed below:

Navy Seals:

https://navyseals.com/nsw/navy-seal-history/

In Vietnam, One Navy Seal received the Medal of Honor for saving another Navy Seal who also happened to receive the Medal of Honor, which was very unusual:

https://www.warhistoryonline.com/instant-articles/never-give-up.html

Three books of interest:

First Seals by Patrick K. O’Donnell (2014);

The U.S. Navy Seals, From Vietnam to Finding Bin Laden by David Jordan (2011)

Trident K-9 Warriors by Mike Ritland (2013) about Special forces dogs

The Green Berets had a truly unique and different role in Vietnam than the Navy Seals:

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/11/the-green-berets-and-the-montagnards-how-an-indigenous-tribe-won-the-admiration-of-green-berets-and-lost-everything.html

Ballad of the Green Berets:

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/staff-sergeant-barry-sadler-hits-1-with-ballad-of-the-green-berets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG3izg9FXEE

Hopefully some of the above you will find both interesting and useful.

Follow-Ups from April 9 re: Vietnam War up to 1967

We had a good discussion in our Zoom class today, including a review of the Red Scare and McCarthyism, and a presentation on the early years and strategy of the Vietnam War.

Part of the conversation talked about American internment camps during World War II, and someone recommended Farewell to Manzanar as a first-person memoir of life in the camps. I second that, and also recommend JARDA, the Japanese American Relocation Digital Archive, a rich online collection about the Japanese-American internment experience (1941-1945).

We also discussed the extent to which fears of Communist subversion and espionage in U.S. government and research (not to mention in television, Hollywood, business, education, and other spheres of life) were justified or exaggerated. We can all agree McCarthy wasn’t making good-faith attempts to keep Americans safe. The Rosenbergs, we know in hindsight, weren’t innocent. I mentioned a cache of documents declassified from Soviet archives, known collectively as the VENONA Project, which showed — unbeknownst to many except in the intelligence community at the time — how hard the Soviet Union was indeed working to gather American secrets and destabilize American society through misinformation and propaganda campaigns. Two historians named John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr wrote a book based on the declassified VENONA cables, back in 1999 — here’s a NYT review of the book.

For more on the Vietnam War, here’s a roundup of good books and movies mentioned in today’s discussion.
Books: Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried
Films: The Green Berets (1968), Apocalypse Now (1979), Platoon (1986), Full Metal Jacket (1987), Born on the Fourth of July (1989), Forrest Gump (1994), We Were Soldiers (2002).
Documentaries: many good ones, including Ken Burns’ Vietnam (2017)

World War II in the Pacific (March 12)

Links for today:

Pacific War: Animated History (Armchair Historian)

British / BBC World War II: The War at Sea

Milestones in History of US Foreign Relations, 1937-1945 (State Department)

World War II in North Africa and Europe, 1942-1945

Links for today:

Department of Defense Film, “Tunisian Victory” (American / British, US National Archives)

Trailer, Mighty Eighth: The Air War in Europe

Importance of Ultra (UnknownHistory)

Saving Private Ryan (1998) opening – Omaha Beach, 6 Jun 1944

CBS reporter Edward R. Murrow accompanying troops liberating Nazi concentration camps, May 1945

On a Note of Triumph – CBS Norman Corwin broadcast after V-E Day, 13 May 1945

World War II: Planning and Early Years (March 5)

Links for today:

World War II Museum (New Orleans)

World War II Poster Collection (Library of Congress; Northwestern University)

It’s Everybody’s War (1942, written by Eugene O’Neill, narrated by Henry Fonda)

German U-Boats off the East Coast: New England / New Jersey / North Carolina

Captured German U-505 Boat (Chicago Museum of Science and Industry)

The Interwar Years (Mar 3)

Links for today:

Tulsa Massacre / Race Riot, 1921 (Washington Post)

“Forgotten Man” from Gold Diggers of 1933

Plan Dog Memo (Navy), Nov 12, 1940

Please listen to FDR’s Arsenal of Democracy fireside chat, December 29, 1940 (also on YouTube). The first link has a full transcript to read along.

Textbook Link

The Army Center for Military History website seems to be down this week, which makes it hard to access our textbooks online (especially with the midterm tomorrow!). Here’s a link to a Google Drive folder with both books as giant PDF files. I recommend downloading them for offline use, if you haven’t already.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ueo_wA6MojPwlf5F11kCuqNM3o_0En9i?usp=sharing

I’ve also added this folder link to our course website sidebar –> to make it easier to find.