“In the end, Vietnam came to be seen as some sort of
bad trip, to borrow an expression from the drug culture of the day. It was
easier that way. The Vietnamese were no longer people who bled when you bombed
them. They became more like figments of our collective imagination. Out of
sight, out of mind and finally out of harm’s way.” —Gary Silverman, “The U.S. Has Forgotten About the Vietnamese,”
Financial Times, Apr. 25-26, 2015
(This is one
of the indelible images of the fall of Saigon—and, for all intents and
purposes, the end of the Vietnam War—on this date 40 years ago: U.S. Marines
throwing Vietnamese back over the American Embassy wall in Saigon.)
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