On 16th March, 1968 Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson Jnr was flying helicopter reconnaissance for an attack on an alleged North Vietnamese-controlled village at My Lai.
As the ground attack developed below, Thompson realised he was in fact witnessing something something else:
A massacre.
He decided to act. /1 🧵 #history #histodons
@perigee @ailbhe That is absolutely not the intention here, and I do feel a misreading.
If anything it's the opposite. To highlight just how entrenched that idea was, how incorrect and the disastrous consequences of that.
In terms of 'white saviour'. The documented proof is that Thompson's actions were the ones that brought what was happening to an end. That this was true, and the enormous cost to him of doing so, shows again how horrific US imperialism had become.
@perigee @ailbhe ultimately, the implicit assumption that the US presence in Vietnam was just is precisely the excuse everyone else present was using for themselves, and continue to use to this day.
Indeed it's notable that Thompson remains a figure the US Army teaches about internally, but largely fails to in any way acknowledge publicly. Because doing so would require highlighting their complicity and that of individuals who are now senior there or in politics.
@annietime When the Army reluctantly agreed to investigate My Lai, Powell was one of the investigators.
The report - unsurprisingly - was largely a whitewash, which went with the classic 'a few bad apples' narrative.
In Powell's words:
“although there may be isolated cases of mistreatment of civilians and POWs, this by no means reflects the general attitude throughout the division.”
@annietime Powell would later testify to congress and minimise the events there and elsewhere, and push the narrative that if things HAD got out of control at My Lai it was an unfortunate one off etc. etc.
As you can probably imagine, his efforts in this area were both noted and appreciated by the Army and those within the political establishment.
@annietime as I remember something saying at the time, when it was suggested Powell wouldn't lie about WMDs given the risk to his reputation/conscience/honour etc:
"Well he's lied about atrocities before."
"the general attitude throughout the *division*" is a particularly clever way of using averages to obscure reality. Because, I'm sure he's right that the general attitude of the DIVISION (of which Charlie Company was a small part) weren't bent toward massacre. But, where it is dishonest, IMHO, is he is using a unit of 10,000 soldiers as a lens to analyze the actions of a specific and tiny portion of that division on a specific day. It uses the general to rationalize the specifically terrible.
If that makes sense? You're totally right about Powell's report sounding like a white wash. And his use of a blind like that makes me think he was also given a speech about how he could help his career if he just slow pitched his findings. So, kudos on the reporting and background. I've never seen the whole story like this before, thanks!
You are correct, I guess that use of scale as an intentional obfuscation stood out to me as egregious. And It took typing that all out to figure my thoughts out, sorry, lol.
John Bull
Mal 甄/kalessin/Peri
Ailbhe
Annietime
Robert Denby