Last Days in Vietnam (2014): Oscar-Nominated Documentary Now Streaming

For those of us who came of age in the mid to late 1960s, America’s involvement in the Vietnam War was a politically defining moment.  One was either righteously opposed to the war as unwinnable and morally repugnant, charging the Johnson then Nixon administrations and their supporters with needlessly and heartlessly sending thousands of American boys to slaughter Vietnamese or be slaughtered themselves; or a hawkish patriot, imagining the war as a necessary struggle against the cancerous evil of communism, while vituperatively attacking the war’s opponents as unpatriotic cowards or dupes.   History has sided with the opponents, although political opinion is still somewhat divided fifty years on.

In January 1973, the Paris Peace Accords were signed, which called for a negotiated ceasefire and cessation of all hostilities; and President Nixon declared victory (“peace with honor”). Within a couple of months all US combat troops were withdrawn from South Vietnam, leaving only about 5000 military advisors (from a high of over a half million American soldiers a few years earlier); that December, Henry Kissinger and North Vietnam’s Le Duc Tho were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the truce, although Tho declined to accept it, since there was still no peace in Vietnam.   The war between North and South Vietnam continued on at a low simmer for a while until the Watergate scandal forced Nixon’s resignation in August 1974, at which point Hanoi stepped up its offensive and things quickly fell apart in the South.   By the end of April 1975,  with North Vietnamese troops about to enter the capital, it became clear that the Saigon regime was no longer viable, and the last of the Americans prepared to vamoose.

They were not the only ones. Tens of thousands of South Vietnamese military leaders, politicians and civilians - drivers, translators, informers, office workers, suppliers, who had worked for or with the Americans over the previous decade realized that their goose likely was cooked. Also at risk were thousands of Vietnamese spouses, girlfriends, and offspring of American personnel.  These people expected that the Americans would help them leave, because, well, that’s what had been promised.   

Last Days of Vietnam shows what happened next. It is a fascinating and relatively apolitical  examination of a rescue effort by turns chaotic and blundering, noble and altruistic, surprisingly successful and, at the same time, woefully inadequate. It illustrates the logistical and moral quandaries facing the Americans on the ground and the callous and/or thoughtless indifference to consequences exhibited by those who had the power to do something about it. First and perhaps foremost among these folks was the US Ambassador in Saigon, Graham Martin, who would not believe that the situation was hopeless until the very last - despite very clear reports to the contrary from the intelligence services and his closest advisors – and accordingly refused to allow any planning for an eventual evacuation until the very last moment.Then there was the US Congress, which refused to authorize funding for an evacuation of at-risk Vietnamese (no doubt reflecting the war weariness and skepticism of an American public who had sickened of the entire Vietnam enterprise and belatedly come to understand the extent to which it had been lied to in the past); and the fledgling administration of President Ford, which chose not to press the issue.

In the event, the US succeeded in evacuating tens of thousands of Vietnamese by means of an extraordinary, eleventh hour helicopter airlift, and thousands more were able to evacuate themselves and their families by use of South Vietnamese aircraft and boats. (Those left behind, numbering in the hundreds of thousands, faced years of incarceration in “reeducation camps”; an estimated 30,000 or more were executed.)

The documentary focuses on the extraordinary evacuation, using first person recollections, footage of the events shot at the American embassy compound and on several carriers and other vessels of the US Seventh Fleet, which was cruising offshore, and contemporaneous news videos of American commentators and politicians of the day. 

Documentarian Rory Kennedy pulls this material together with considerable skill and panache to create an intriguing and compelling story. Kennedy, a daughter of RFK and Ethel Kennedy, is not one to shy away from controversial subject matter. Her prior credits include Ghosts of Abu Ghraib (2007), The Fence (2010) – about the $3 billion 700 mile fence constructed by the US along the Mexican Border, and Ethel (2012), about her mother.  

Last Days in Vietnam raises, but does not answer, the question of whether those who threw in with the Americans all deserved to be rescued and evacuated. This was certainly the point of view of many of those interviewed for the film, but did America owe protection and sanctuary to the politicians and generals or to the profiteers and informers of South Vietnam, and to their families, when the walls came tumbling down? Were we there to help them with their war, or were they collaborating to help us with ours? Does the answer make any difference?

Regardless of your philosophical viewpoint, this film poignantly suggests that the efforts made by many Americans in the last days of Vietnam were heroic indeed.

Last Days In Vietnam is available for streaming on Amazon Instant Video, Xfinity On Demand, GooglePlay, and iTunes.