A Word on Words; 3221; David Moraniss

don johnson you know once again welcome to word on words our guest has an old friend a bit nervous you been here before and it's great to be that welcomed by david maraniss the biographer of of vince lombardi of bill clinton or al gore owned openness session david jay love story about migrants and i've been working on piracy james k polk and he came into my office windows write on deadline then he secures oh he said to me looking at all of the books on pope on monday us including thirteen gallons of oil is po po po po po grand we need another vote for that i picked up as an organizer the first question america's economy david do we need another book on vietnam an announcement and i realized we really do this book on it is a it is a good wrenching

story it's three gut wrenching story hit almost a trilogy talk about the three hour special yeah i absolutely get it but there's a lot of wonderful literature on the war in vietnam as you're suggesting not quite as much about the anti war movement and then that i'd seen that have tried to interweave the war the anti war and the washington that washington of lyndon johnson together to one narrative i decided to do that by picking a very finite time and digging as deep as i could so i picked two days in october of nineteen sixty seven a protest at the university of wisconsin where i was a freshman that year and not in the book until the epilogue that that event a protest against all chemical company the makers of napalm an agent orange was the first protest on a college campus that turned violent and it stuck in my memory i then went to the washington post librarians of what was going on in vietnam that they in fact this incredible battle involving a battalion of them big red one the first infantry

division that went out on a search and destroy mission and got destroyed i was sixteen and kill another sixty wounded out of a hundred and forty nine and i'm in a brutal and bush then i said what was going on in washington that they would double the lbj library and found that at that moment in time johnson was already thinking about not running for reelection and just in the tora bora difference between the time i was in vietnam and washington at the same moment in the morning in vietnam even it washed through the battalion is marching toward its nest johnson turns to his war council says how are we ever going to win and that's when i decided to bring together the one book has three well and has done so well but you've got not only not telling these very powerful stories and explaining how they intersect but human human interest story surge of all wrapped up in this

track called the gut wrenching book three gut wrenching stories i mean almost every anecdote have pain and poignancy end you know we don't need to forget the holocaust that are racism in this country are innocent of them in this country but for althea we don't need to forget vietnam willing to relive that we don't need and i think you're right we don't need to re live the end of that there certainly are echoes of it today and it i started this book before they attack and twenty hours before the war in iraq but it's certainly reverberates in them the thing that john that i came out in this book i mean i knew i was against the war in vietnam by i knew that part of the story so more for what this point did to me as a reminded me that no matter what your etiology your philosophy about war it's the guys who

are there are these eighteen year old boys mr officers call of the field for the rest of their lives either the dire they suffer from and then i think that sometimes we forget that part of the last true and what was about the black lions fans are the oldest battalion in the first infantry division in world war one a very proud battalion that came to vietnam in nineteen sixty five right wing league big american presidents began long they do they were based northwest of saigon toward the cambodian border their sole mission was to go and find regular army regiment of the vietcong the north vietnamese army and theoretically find and fix them and destroy them and they're operating in an area where there are no frontlines really did know was a friend of the enemy we just have to try to go out and find these these these vietcong on they were led by terry allen jr one of the gut wrenching characters in this boil for

sure on he was a son of a general terry on the terrible terry de la mesa run out and they will use it comes from a grandmother great grandmother who's whose father was a spaniard who came over to fight in the civil war and the allens it ended up in el paso where that the heritage was very valuable in terms of the spanish land terry allen senior the old man terrible carry on and lead the first division in world war two it once on a cold and sunny fall into lived that life terry allen the old man never became a four star general was considered too much of a soldier's journal well this song you say the best the best soldier you know i will serve under literally had a great reputation that his reputation if the sun was different more cerebral little little more passive on didn't

have that same fire that that that the dead and that was considered a good manager and then there is a lot of hope that you would someday be a four star general although he wasn't sure of that what he wanted to be he had in nineteen sixty seven he was a lieutenant colonel his wife back in el paso had three girls under the age of five she was somewhat the pressure is turning against the war herself you know between she was safe beyond beauty queen from el paso the songs on carnival queen anywhere there's trouble in the marriage and terry cable to try to save the marriage right before we went back to leave his battalion of this talk about the us are solid characters and i think somehow such id is such a story in such an incentive for storage it seemed to me the best way we might help our view is related to it is talk about personalities what about clarke well our quotes is the hero of the book in my opinion a soldier's soldier

sort of is always sort of guy or gary cooper i guess you could say he was commissioned in the field he didn't go through officer training school or or west point he was just such a good soldier that made him of first lieutenant he was the only first lieutenant in the first division in vietnam where his own company use that got most of the commanders were kept its court welch was given his own company to build from the start delta company they're just forming these new companies and i got all of his letters home or a city has to make the best game company in vietnam he believed in what he was doing he believed it is now but the critical moment of the veil takes place he knew the marching the way they were in that morning was a big mistake they had done the same thing the day before he tried to talk terry allen jr out of it but he failed because as i say in the book there's all this pressure coming down from above from lbj to get it comes from general westmoreland to winter

search and destroy missions of attrition just killing the enemy from the grid from the division commander to be more aggressive solar carport said we're making a big mistake though he was listening he touches company into this battle he saw half of his boys children about how he fought valiantly save as many as he could and his life was changed forever the government of the united states for what they've done that the leadership of the military for putting in that situation and struggled with those conflicted feelings of loving what he in was doing the fighting it all destroyed by people not less than you know the rest of his will get it and there's a picture of everything so briefing very elements and a nail ranking officers in la during the training period as you point out telling

writing officers you're wrong and they had a way of believing him he was such a good soldier there is that moment twenty five the weapon oh and java girl oh no that is that the that is the most haunting moment of my interviews with him and then when we were when i went back to vietnam with them and esau girl who reminded him of that singing girl that because of the reasons you broke about while he was on a night ambush they'd set up a night ambush along a trail or they knew that that the viet cong were worshipping munitions and they set up this emotional was successful they killed all the people were coming through down the path and as he started to search the first person for a weapon he felt this person and realized that it was a woman a girl

and it was just an overwhelming sensation of a reminder of what ought to hear some of what the positions that war can put people in the remains so incredibly conflicted in a new mini remember that we had an all american and with donald howard or john was flying that day was in an interview and i hate to say this but he was killed the way donald holder would be killed if he he he was a great football player at west point the dove real must've been sort of he ran away to know we wanted to tackle and he was such a good leader that red lake the coach at west point turned him into a quarterback from being an all american and because he could throw a lackey through like was a field goal being cured but he was a leader he gets to vietnam he didn't have to go we

could've played football manager at a goal or he was the brigade major bomb during this operation which might use up and helicopters to the abortion unfolded helicopter lands he persuades the his boss to let him going back into the jungle try to pull people out he starts running down this dream bad just like he was running up and mikey stadium at west point on polling way ahead of the man that he rounded up to go with them to get killed by a sniper i'm mike for his letter how you rank the full text like troy or it was one of the many privates of young guys who i interviewed him about the letters of for this book many of them came over from vietnam on a troop ship together they're called c packet when they came over and then they got out into

the delta company of the black lions together troyer was the son of a labor leader in an ohio man and his letters became increasingly cynical over the course of the weeks that i traced until the bottle and on this one long classic water always those you know that we have to do everything by the book but charlie can't read and so we get killed that i think what a law known since the launch and they were doing things by the book silver stars went to kunming are us to joe costello yes manager and joe castello are now very close friends of mine and they're part of this little group of survivors of the battle will go up to west point to around the time of the anniversary every year and go for full human trait can tell lies

tough love but they were both an alpha company of the store with joe he was eighteen years old and he was a great a deer he was part a half of his platoon was killed immediately wondered trap was sprung he was part of a small group to get out he's on his way out of the jungle and you hear somebody say they're still some men back there something washes over me told me just said i have to go back and i know i'll be protected if i go back you walk back into the jungle into the battle didn't get hurt founder radio he was in a radio telephone operator be found a strong radio there and managed to pick up the signal again general up in a helicopter that help save these men eventually on end that was the moment for joe crystals like you said everything after that was great for those are you just a newer talk and they were nervous about

his new book they marched in the sunlight that much of the sunlight that's from a poem i had not read your book it for no other reason that the many reasons but but i really love that moment it is so moving from cutting arizona so describes them listen and it's by a great poet named bruce weigel who is himself a vietnam veteran and i called bruce until i wanted to use the phone in terms of the one of them young soldiers killed in the battle was from lorain ohio where bruce also grew up into the sky i have to confess that inverted the first phrase of the poll that it starts in the sunlight they march which i think is beautiful but to many people tripped over one admits you want to tell your block and so innocent so if they marched in the sunlight apologies to bruce what it's about a military unit walking into the sunlight into dog day into know saves day and getting

cut down into an ambush and it's one of the most powerful pieces of portugal wore i'd ever read but i also thought would apply to everybody in sixty seven lbj blinded by the servitude of we are uncertain of what he was going to the protesters marching in an ambush of sorts on the administrators at the university certainly arm everybody at that moment in time the show's star also went to a lot on all we have yeah i wrote there is one of the low points you know i had so many different motions as i reported this book when i discovered the silver star going to general haig who was the commanding general of the first division was in saigon when the battle took place will arrive very late was not in any of the accounts of anything that happened in the battle the only account i've heard of and as you get into the field can very

late and chewing out some people for crying people who'd been through the battle general hey also in interviews i found spoke disparagingly of terry allen jr the tank upton was killed in the battle they generally get some silver star and written up account of his activities in the battle over that to a soldier who fall about was completely out of thin air and i find that very demoralized now a great question arises as to whether it was indeed an ambush men westmoreland you say was getting on metal no phone service to survive an early twenty out of them then and they keep telling him as an ambush ambush ambush he doesn't want guzzling don't believe that runs counter to what he needs to say

it's interesting to me to find out how we're able to document the casualty count on via con man was inflated because they would take eleven survivors seen by one soldier fifteen seen by another and on and on and on but many times they would have parties are duplicate our trip again i was so lucky to find that out and it was so powerful me to me to be able to literally documented fabricated barnicle which is part of the lore of vietnam that they did it in this case i have the documents that show it because at an oral historian who work for the owner of the center for military history in washington was in saigon right of western a battle called up there to do a secret investigation funded out of this happen and he did all the interviews of non live forty survivors but of different people find out what the real body count was

indeed determined that they were coming the same bodies over and over again to fabricate this body count less talk about johnny cash to johnny cash is so was live isn't that a big black guy who served it on like my coffee beautiful mane black in this is in nineteen sixty seven alone he gets lot actually i don't think this is the book i'm not sure yeats he fought in the the idea the battle that joe galloway and more made famous in on in the rebellion and that he came back he wanted to be an historian on and he started writing histories of different firefights in vietnam he wanted this to be one of the history zone be in a book called seven firefights in vietnam but once he dug up what really happens battle they really wanted nothing to do with telling the true story of john cash as it turns out not only was involved invested in this battle but two years later ends up at the university wisconsin which

is the other sites that sort of the third somebody on portuguese and so south american history to be an attache in brazil and on says that when he walks when he first walked into a clash really felt ostracized by the other students because he was wearing a uniform and on but sometimes if not more attention in wisconsin and he didn't so you know that he was such a personality that he ever to military is no doubt that his this has historians view of it was an ambush ambush and there is no doubt that they will sprung the trap that clark had it called men knew that it will as dangerous deadly danger is foolhardy almost let's now go to the north to wisconsin follow up secondly i'm sure that that's where i was a freshman university wisconsin on one of perhaps

five campuses in the country where were most intensely had the most intense active opposition to the war in vietnam and in those early years on built from a strong history of dissent that wisconsin a progressive tradition there which attracted a lot of students from the east coast and other places where there was more activism on the euro there've been protests against a chemical company going on for about six months on but the faculty voted overwhelmingly to get let down a lot the recruiter there but one of the faculty members william sewall a great sociologist elect has another poignant story in this book what i have to become the chancellor that year he had voted against the lighting dow recruit on campus we became chancellor li believe deeply in freedom of speech and assembly and then the democratic process and so tried his own ineffective way to

enforce that long been allowed to recruit and he was caught in the middle of this kind of in my opinion the quintessential liberal that you're caught in an impossible situation where you read that do with the border regions that interrogation him for ridding it's an interrogation him but what you come away with when you read that this is a man who does not suffer fools brazil know so that they let go the question comes off of what he does not want to sell for what about paul saw fosse are going to was history student than on active in the antiwar movement one of those who participated in the obstructive sittin inside the commerce building where dow was recruiting long always a little bit of a politician on the make even them six months later you'd become a city councilman and six years later mayor of madison almost mayor for life so i found

him to be an interesting character to focus on because if you number one of the clashes of that era was to tell young radicals work within the system well paul did and he became pretty successful at over the course of the rest of his life but he was inside the congress building thought it would be an act of civil disobedience where he would be arrested goal of hold out when the paddy wagon all the way and study found himself caught in the mall a being beat on by about four or five police officers will lead you believed when i see that the violence in vietnam with one thing it was devastating but the brutality of the police attack in dallas turn into a police riot a mom action by police who just unleash these billy clubs well and there was a largely at least a lot of feelings going for most of the police officers were more culturally akin to the soldiers in vietnam working class kids from the east side of medicine which is the working class side of that

predominantly some of them had a hostile feelings feelings toward these long haired hippie protesters as they would call them their work ill trained to handle anything like this matter fact the few rabid trainer gym but richard by the chicago police force which only a few months later would do with the democratic convention in a worse way and there was no no one was smart enough to do know how to diffuse the situation that the rule in which the obstruction took place was almost like being in a submarine was so small and compact lee recently people in there and what's the police came in and that was the least bit of of shoving movement without any training had just started banging heads with her and the clothes are very old now as little and i mean actual colors the moon bright sun would flutter winning over here but as you said earlier when we're just the peninsula

london is having second thoughts about himself is really struggling at that point and very suitable echoes of today till it's like you start to realize they're losing the war of perceptions which is this important some ways is the reward doesn't know how to do or if he doesn't he doesn't have any clue how to win the war at this point either with the american public or the real war in vietnam and you can see that that agony aunt in in his presidency just are in the ville and five months later is just announcing it on you with russia well what a great read one of the great stories are coming at a deeply that really haven't gotten around to a gene surgical or a volvo so we'll buy your next quote you have to be working on why a letter asking about roberto clemente baseball player who died at her or death i think like lombardi i can use him to write about sports

and someone who i thought was a beautiful person a baseball player but also more than that because of what his life and death represented he died delivering humanitarian aid to do when i work after the earthquake there a puerto rican who thought that the somoza government in nicaragua was misusing the eight after this devastating earthquakes we thought if i go and it's like people we got on a plane in and died in a plane crash which was the end of a fascinating life and i hope i can do it justice to open combat we run out of time one of the tougher and they did manage for coming to talk about they march in the sunlight one like all of you for watching for the words i'm john singing glory deep reading