Echoes of the Vietnam War

Good Morning, Vietnam is entertaining. But art, in this case, is a thin imitation of real life. For six months in 1967, John Bagwell was an Armed Forces Vietnam Network disc jockey, playing rock and roll to the First Cavalry Division out of a bunker in An Khe. He'll tell you it was the best job in Vietnam — until it wasn't. This 104-pound deejay came home with a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star with a V for valor.

In July 1969, Job Gonzalez was lowered into a tunnel where his enemy was waiting. When he resurfaced minutes later, he was out of the frying pan and into the fire. His valor that day earned him a Silver Star recommendation that lost its way in the chaos. A mechanical engineer, Job describes trauma in the only language that fits: the point where a material bends and can't spring back.

Ross Meador was just a 19-year-old kid with $500 and a one-way ticket to Vietnam, thinking he'd play with some kids for a few weeks before continuing his trip around the world. Instead, he found himself at the center of one of the most dramatic humanitarian evacuations in American history.

In Part 1 of this two-part series we explored how families navigate the system designed to find America's missing warriors. This episode examines the hopes and the frustrations flowing from that continuing effort, questions about closure, what Vietnam MIA families should expect, and what they can do in the meantime.

What happens when the stories we tell about war take on a life of their own? In this episode, a Vietnam veteran-turned-historian explores how memory, myth, and personal testimony have shaped America’s understanding of the Vietnam War and why resilience and truth matter as much as remembrance.

We all have heard the proverb, "Like Father, Like Son." Patrick Naughton is a military historian and a combat veteran of the Global War on Terror. His father is a combat veteran of the Vietnam War. Patrick recently published his first book, in which he compares his father’s experience in Vietnam to his own experience in Iraq.

In this final episode of our series about the Vietnamese-American experience over the past 50 years, we’ll explore how that community has evolved from refugees to contributors, from survivors to leaders, and how their success stands as perhaps the most enduring testament to what American service members fought to preserve.