My+Lai+Massacre

media type="youtube" key="-4CryeCf6h0?fs=1" height="236" width="409"

My Lai Massacre By James Kim

On March 29, 1969, a letter from an ex-GI whose name is Ronald Ridenhour was sent to thirty members of the Congress and Pentagon officials. Ronald Ridenhour, an ex-GI confessed that several Army officers and infantry soldiers killed Vietnam civilians in the region called My Lai. His confession letter to Congressmen revealed the bloody incidents, My Lai massacre.

According to his confession, My Lai massacre happened on March 16, 1968 in Hamlet of My Lai sector 4 of Quang Ngai Province. The incident broke as a company of American soldiers ordered villagers in My Lai to dig a ditch. Then the soldiers put the villagers mostly elders, women, and children into the dug ditch and shot at them. Most of the soldiers never even attempted to question the violence of their missions. They just simply followed the command regardless of its violent actions involved.

Even though there is a stringent interrogating investigation going on in Army HQ, the army officials cannot afford to form any clear explanations for soldiers’ motivations. Some military experts claim that their motivation was due to the coercion given by the superior rank of the chain of commands. Others dispute the idea. They claim that the soldiers' sense of moral had already been destroyed by the ambiguous distinction between legitimate and illegitimate killing caused by the free- fire zones policy made by the Army. Few of army officials are trying to protect the participants of this event by arguing that their free-fire zones had made them confused.

As a matter of fact, there was some effort to reveal this shocking incident. Several months after the incident, American journalist Seymour Hersh published several articles about the incident. He included some highly detailed facts about the numbers of casualties and army's cunning investigation in his articles. He also published a book called //My Lai 4// in European and South American countries but it wasn't published in United States because of U.S. government's hard efforts to cover this incident. This is the main reason for American public’s unawareness of this event.

Regardless of government's effort, this remorseful fact was eventually revealed by the ex-GI, Ridenhour. As soon as it got spread through the members of the congress who did not support the war, press began to take vehement actions on reporting this incident. The first hint of the tragedy came to the American public by way of news that on September 5, 1969, only two days before Lt. William Calley's discharges. On the news, many of misdeeds done by Lt. Calley and his troops were included. American public became furious about the immorality that U.S. had shown. Their indignation and revelation escalated in late November of 1969 when a repentant participant related the shocking details in a nationwide CBS TV interviews.

After the interviews were aired to the public, different sorts of poll researches were done. They all show the public’s increasing distrust on government.81 percent of the public respondents to a Harris poll believe that there were other incidents like My Lai involving U.S. troops that have been hidden. The interviews of the participants of the infamous incident not only revealed the truth but also made U.S. army as a specious and immoral group. To respond to public's curiosity about events similar to My Lai, now press begins to release the articles that revealed the civilian massacres at war that happened before the My Lai. Those articles are generally about previous events that had been unknown to the public.

Due to the efforts of the journalist such as Seymour Hersh, mass medias and the participants who confessed their actions in My Lai, public is fully aware of the behind scene of the Vietnam war. Their mistrust to the government has been significantly escalated. There are no further signs of showing supports to this war from the public. My Lai massacre would be a crucial momentum to antiwar movement. It will give them more legitimate reason to stop the war. Unfortunate for the Government, they won’t be able to lean on public support. 