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Vietnam War

Cpl William Thomas Perkins Jr., U.S.M.C. (1966-1967) – Vietnam War Combat Photographer

Cpl William Thomas Perkins Jr., U.S.M.C. (1966-1967) – Vietnam War Combat Photographer

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The only Medal of Honor to be awarded to a combat photographer is now on display in the Medal of Honor Gallery in the "Price of Freedom" exhibition at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. Marine Cpl. William Thomas Perkins Jr Marine Cpl. William Thomas Perkins Jr. died at the age of 20 on Oct. 12, 1967, when he flung himself on a grenade to preserve the lives of three other Marines during Operation Medina, a Marine search and destroy operation in Quang Tri Province, Vietnam. The Marine Corps posthumously awarded him the Medal of Honor for "his gallant actions." Perkins' mother, Marilane Perkins Jacobson of Lexington, Ky., donated the medal, her son's letters and other personal effects to the museum's permanent Armed Forces Collections in 2015. "I didn't want his possessions to end up in somebody's brown box in a basement," Jacobson said. "I figured they should go to the Smithsonian." Perkins' award, his Purple Heart, and photography are exhibited along with his Bell...

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Five Myths About The Vietnam War

Five Myths About The Vietnam War

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Ken Burns and Lynn Novick say their multi-part PBS documentary about the Vietnam War was intended to unpack a complex conflict and to embark upon the process of healing and reconciliation. The series has catapulted the Vietnam War back into the national consciousness. But despite thousands of books, articles and films about this moment in our history, there remain many deeply entrenched myths about the Vietnam War. Vietnam War Myth NO. 1 - The Viet Cong Was a Scrappy Guerrilla Force Fighting a Superpower "Vastly superior in tools and techniques, and militarily dominant over much of the world," historian Ronald Aronson wrote about the hegemonic United States and the impudent rebels, "the Goliath sought to impose on David a peace favorable to his vision of the world." Recode recently compared the Viet Cong to Uber: "young, scrappy and hungry troops break rules and create new norms, shocking the enemy." In reality, the Viet Cong, the pro-North force in South Vietnam, was armed by both...

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Vietnam War – LZ Hereford (1966)

Vietnam War – LZ Hereford (1966)

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Twenty-three Montagnard mercenaries led by Special Forces Sergeants Burton Adams and David Freeman moved quietly through the front gate of the Vinh Thanh Special Forces camp on May 15, 1966, and slipped into the early morning darkness and light fog. Like other patrols sent out over the past week, they were hoping to find anything that would confirm a captured Viet Cong's claim that a combined North Vietnamese Army/Viet Cong force would soon attack their camp. The patrol members moved to the shores of the Song Con River, climbed into small boats and paddled across the deep river making as little noise as possible. On the other side, they picked up a trail heading northeast toward the high, green mountains shrouded in thick morning clouds. Within several hundred yards, the trail narrowed and became steeper and more heavily vegetated. The night slowly gave way to daylight. The men drew their machetes to cut through the tangle of vines and matted foliage. After three hours of struggling...

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