Quotes and Sayings about Vietnam

"I would say that the Pentagon Papers case of 1971 - in which the government tried to block the The New York Times and The Washington Post that they obtained from a secret study of how we got involved in the war in Vietnam - that is probably the most important case."
- Floyd Abrams
(Related: Government, War, Post, Study, Vietnam, Washington)

"My mind-set is Munich. Most of my generation's is Vietnam."
- Madeleine Albright
(Related: Mind, Vietnam)

"The American invasion did not succeed in Vietnam, and will never succeed in Iraq."
- Mohammed Aldouri
(Related: American, Iraq, Succeed, Vietnam, Will)

"The war in Vietnam I thought a dreadful mistake."
- Stephen Ambrose
(Related: War, Thought, Mistake, Vietnam)

"Johnson had been the most powerful man in the world, yet the North Vietnamese and the Vietcong had resisted, overcome his power, broken his will."
- Stephen Ambrose
(Related: Power, Man, Will, World)

"Neither Johnson nor his party nor the government as a whole were willing to raise, train, equip, and then send Vietnam sufficient manpower to do the job."
- Stephen Ambrose
(Related: Government, Job, Party, Vietnam)

"I was too young for Korea and too old for Vietnam."
- Stephen Ambrose
(Related: Old, Vietnam)

"The American Dream has run out of gas. The car has stopped. It no longer supplies the world with its images, its dreams, its fantasies. No more. It's over. It supplies the world with its nightmares now: the Kennedy assassination, Watergate, Vietnam."
- J. G. Ballard
(Related: Car, Dreams, American, Assassination, Vietnam, World)

"I had the good fortune to be able to right an injustice that I thought was being heaped on young people by lowering the voting age, where you had young people that were old enough to die in Vietnam but not old enough to vote for their members of Congress that sent them there."
- Birch Bayh
(Related: Age, Thought, People, Being, Congress, Fortune, Injustice, Old, Right, Vietnam, Vote, Voting)

"It seems to me the American people never really forgave the Democrats for being right about Vietnam."
- Paul Begala
(Related: People, American, Being, Democrats, Right, Vietnam)

"So one important lesson of Vietnam is, the first casualty of an unwise and unjust war are the American troops called on to fight it. Their service should be honored."
- Paul Begala
(Related: War, American, Fight, First, Service, Troops, Vietnam)

"The brave men who died in Vietnam, more than 100% of which were black, were the ultimate sacrifice."
- Marion Berry
(Related: Men, Sacrifice, Vietnam)

"In revealing the workings of government that led to the Vietnam War, the newspapers nobly did precisely that which the Founders hoped and trusted they would do."
- Hugo Black
(Related: Government, War, Newspapers, Vietnam)

"It's a weird scene. You win a few baseball games and all of a sudden you're surrounded by reporters and TV men with cameras asking you about Vietnam and race relations."
- Vida Blue
(Related: Men, Baseball, Games, Race, Vietnam)

"I always felt more emotionally attached to Cambodia than I did to Vietnam."
- Ed Bradley
(Related: Vietnam)

"I had a lot of fun in Cambodia, much more so in Cambodia than Vietnam."
- Ed Bradley
(Related: Fun, Vietnam)

"Better still - your history has shown how powerful a moral catharsis expressed through popular resistance to injustice can sometimes be; I have in mind the grassroots opposition to the Vietnam War."
- Breyten Breytenbach
(Related: History, War, Injustice, Mind, Opposition, Popular, Vietnam)

"We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war."
- Zbigniew Brzezinski
(Related: War, Opportunity, Giving, Now, Vietnam)

"Vietnamese must be made to feel that they are racial inferiors with no right to national identity."
- Wilfred Burchett
(Related: Identity, Right)

"Ho joined the French socialist party, the first Vietnamese to be a member of a French political party."
- Wilfred Burchett
(Related: First, Party)

"And just as there was something of every Vietnamese in Ho Chi Minh so there is something of Ho Chi Minh in almost every present-day Vietnamese, so strong is his imprint on the Vietnamese nation."
- Wilfred Burchett
(Related: Nation, Present)

"In 2003, Congress authorized the construction of a visitor center for the Vietnam Memorial to help provide information and educate the public about the memorial and the Vietnam War."
- Dennis Cardoza
(Related: War, Congress, Help, Information, Public, Vietnam)

"Emmy Lou Harris introduced me to the work of the Vietnam Veterans of America foundation and the Campaign for a Land Mine Free World."
- Mary Chapin Carpenter
(Related: Work, America, Land, Veterans, Vietnam, World)

"It's not right to say that our loss in Vietnam turned out to be a gain. But lessons were learned. And they were the right lessons."
- Tom Clancy
(Related: Gain, Loss, Right, Vietnam)

"John Kerry's service did not end in Vietnam. It began there."
- Max Cleland
(Related: End, Service, Vietnam)

"South Vietnam faces total defeat, and soon."
- William Colby
(Related: Defeat, Faces, Vietnam)

"My film is not a movie; it's not about Vietnam. It is Vietnam."
- Francis Ford Coppola
(Related: Film, Vietnam)

"What are we blaming? Is this Vietnam? We made a movie, it didn't make much money. I'm gonna be really happy if somebody watches it in 10 years' time and really enjoys it."
- Kevin Costner
(Related: Time, Money, Vietnam, Years)

"If John Kerry had a dollar for every time he bragged about serving in Vietnam - oh wait, he does."
- Ann Coulter
(Related: Time, Vietnam)

"I remember being a kid and the Vietnam War was huge and looking at Watergate."
- David Cross
(Related: War, Being, Vietnam)

"I couldn't be happier that President Bush has stood up for having served in the National Guard, because I can finally put an end to all those who questioned my motives for enlisting in the Army Reserve at the height of the Vietnam War."
- Larry David
(Related: War, Army, End, Motives, President, Vietnam)

"I was so opposed to the war in Vietnam that I initially refused President Nixon's urgings for me to go there."
- Sammy Davis, Jr.
(Related: War, Nixon, President, Vietnam)

"Back then when Chomsky and Herman wrote, the left, myself among them, all knew that something terrible was happening in Vietnam, though most now claim to remember otherwise."
- James Donald
(Related: Now, Vietnam)

"The crimes committed by the North Vietnamese regime against the Vietnamese people were minor compared to the crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge against the Cambodians, but for us on the left they were emotionally far more significant."
- James Donald
(Related: People)

"I think Operation Smile is in more than 22 countries, mostly Third World. It just happened that my schedule opened up at the time they were heading to Vietnam."
- Roma Downey
(Related: Time, Countries, Smile, Vietnam, World)

"Any of these Vietnam vets that have been there and know the deal, they don't feel that any Hollywood endeavor about the Vietnam era has ever gotten it right yet."
- Sam Elliott
(Related: Hollywood, Right, Vietnam)

"Nixon did have a secret plan, and I knew that it involved making threats of nuclear war to North Vietnam."
- Daniel Ellsberg
(Related: War, Nixon, Vietnam)

"There are two types of courage involved with what I did. When it comes to picking up a rifle, millions of people are capable of doing that, as we see in Iraq or Vietnam. But when it comes to risking their careers, or risking being invited to lunch by the establishment, it turns out that's remarkably rare."
- Daniel Ellsberg
(Related: People, Courage, Being, Careers, Iraq, Vietnam)

"Everybody respects the Vietnam Veterans of America."
- R. Lee Ermey
(Related: America, Veterans, Vietnam)

"Back in the old Corp, we weren't training those privates to infiltrate into the peacetime Marine Corp. We were training those privates to go to Vietnam."
- R. Lee Ermey
(Related: Old, Training, Vietnam)

"And the Blue Angels are coming back to scare the local population. I remember seeing old Vietnamese women ducking under the benches in Washington Square; they thought they were back in the war."
- Lawrence Ferlinghetti
(Related: War, Women, Thought, Angels, Old, Population, Washington)

"The crusades of Vietnam and Watergate seemed like a good idea at the time, even a noble one, not only to the press but perhaps to a majority of Americans."
- Howard Fineman
(Related: Time, Idea, Americans, Majority, Press, Vietnam)

"I wanted to have the opportunity to travel to Vietnam and Sydney, and have the chance to work there."
- Brendan Fraser
(Related: Travel, Work, Opportunity, Chance, Vietnam)

"If you run an Internet search on Vietnam and the war, most of the information you get begins at about 1962. I think this is telling. It is missing the whole period that led up to the reasons the war happened in the first place."
- Brendan Fraser
(Related: War, First, Information, Internet, Vietnam)

"What they fear, I think rightly, is that traditional Vietnamese society cannot survive the American economic and cultural impact."
- J. William Fulbright
(Related: Society, Fear, American)

"We are trying to remake Vietnamese society, a task which certainly cannot be accomplished by force and which probably cannot be accomplished by any means available to outsiders."
- J. William Fulbright
(Related: Society, Force, Trying)

"I'm sure that President Johnson would never have pursued the war in Vietnam if he'd ever had a Fulbright to Japan, or say Bangkok, or had any feeling for what these people are like and why they acted the way they did. He was completely ignorant."
- J. William Fulbright
(Related: War, People, Feeling, President, Vietnam)

"The biggest lesson I learned from Vietnam is not to trust our own government statements. I had no idea until then that you could not rely on them."
- J. William Fulbright
(Related: Government, Trust, Idea, Vietnam)

"Henry Kissinger is the greatest living war criminal in the world today, with the blood of millions of people in Vietnam and Cambodia and Laos and Chile and East Timor on his hands. He will never appear in a court or be behind bars."
- George Galloway
(Related: War, People, Blood, Court, Living, Today, Vietnam, Will, World)

"Since There are so many questions about what the president was doing over 30 years ago, what is it that he did after his honorable discharge from the National Guard? Did he make speeches alongside Jane Fonda denouncing America's racist war in Vietnam?"
- Jeff Gannon
(Related: War, America, President, Questions, Vietnam, Years)

"But although Australia was also involved in the Vietnam conflict, I can remember my dad telling us that if we were in Australia, we wouldn't be drafted until we were 20."
- Mel Gibson
(Related: Dad, Conflict, Vietnam)

"I got my head bashed in at a demonstration against the Vietnam War. Police were losing control because they were up against a world they really didn't understand."
- Terry Gilliam
(Related: War, Control, Losing, Police, Vietnam, World)

"I could have ended the war in a month. I could have made North Vietnam look like a mud puddle."
- Barry Goldwater
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"Some people think my father was a spy, because of working for that government agency in Vietnam, but he can't find his car keys, much less keep a national secret."
- Lauren Graham
(Related: Car, Government, Father, People, Vietnam)

"The entire deaths of Vietnam died in vain. And they're dying in vain right this very second. And you know what's worse than a soldier dying in vain? It's more soldiers dying in vain. That's what's worse."
- Mike Gravel
(Related: Dying, Right, Soldiers, Vietnam)

"More than half the combat deaths in Vietnam occurred after Richard Nixon was elected on a promise to bring the war to an end, and after the American people had already decided that they did not want one more soldier to die in Vietnam."
- Raul Grijalva
(Related: War, People, American, End, Nixon, Promise, Vietnam, Want)

"The fact is that the Vietnamese held Americans after 1973."
- Bo Gritz
(Related: Americans, Fact)

"There have been two popular subjects for poetry in the last few decades: the Vietnam War and AIDS, about both of which almost all of us have felt deeply."
- Thom Gunn
(Related: Poetry, War, Popular, Vietnam)

"Because our homeland and very survival are once more at stake, the American people can't afford to treat this new war against terrorism like they did Vietnam."
- David Hackworth
(Related: War, People, Survival, American, Terrorism, Vietnam)

"I'm sure it is, I'm not for any kind of war, we've been engaged in several wars since the second world war and we lost in Korea, we lost in Vietnam, they are political wars, they have nothing to do with any real threat, nor does this one."
- Larry Hagman
(Related: War, Nothing, Vietnam, World, World war)

"We didn't lose Vietnam. We quit Vietnam."
- Alexander Haig
(Related: Vietnam)

"Because the GIs were sent massively to South Vietnam, maybe it's a good idea to have a broadcast for them."
- Hanoi Hannah
(Related: Idea, Vietnam)

"This is the voice of Vietnam Broadcasting from Hanoi, capitol of the Democratic republic of Vietnam."
- Hanoi Hannah
(Related: Vietnam, Voice)

"Fonda was neither wrong nor unconscionable in what she said and did in North Vietnam."
- Tom Hayden
(Related: Vietnam, Wrong)

"I felt just overwhelmed by input: the Vietnam war and the collapse of the '60s and the proliferation of media' it just felt like everything was too much to handle and you just tuned out."
- Richard Hell
(Related: War, Media, Vietnam)

"I was with some Vietnamese recently, and some of them were smoking two cigarettes at the same time. That's the kind of customers we need!"
- Jesse Helms
(Related: Time, Smoking)

"Vietnam was what we had instead of happy childhoods."
- Michael Herr
(Related: Vietnam)

"All the wrong people remember Vietnam. I think all the people who remember it should forget it, and all the people who forgot it should remember it."
- Michael Herr
(Related: People, Forget, Vietnam, Wrong)

"It's shades of Vietnam again, folks: body counts."
- Seymour Hersh
(Related: Body, Vietnam)

"Although I wasn't able to get a visa for Vietnam, I was able to talk with swift boat veterans to get a feel for the time and place, and I visited a tropical prison in the Philippines to get a sense of what a Vietnamese prison might have been like."
- Tony Hillerman
(Related: Time, Prison, Sense, Talk, Veterans, Vietnam)

"You don't attack the grunts of Vietnam; you blame the theory behind the war. Nobody who fought in that war was at fault. It was the war itself that was at fault. It's the same thing with psychotherapy."
- James Hillman
(Related: War, Blame, Fault, Theory, Vietnam)

"But despite their heroic acts, the Vietnam Veterans of America continued to struggle to establish a combat badge in honor of these brave pilots and medics."
- Tim Holden
(Related: America, Honor, Struggle, Veterans, Vietnam)

"Your generation and mine have had very little real experience; we've been severed from the direct experience of war by some very good things. By the end of the draft, and by the defeat in Vietnam."
- Michael Ignatieff
(Related: Experience, War, Defeat, Draft, End, Vietnam)

"The US military still blames the media for stories and images that turned the American public against the war in Vietnam."
- Bruce Jackson
(Related: War, American, Media, Military, Public, Vietnam)

"Vietnam is often called our only uncensored war, but that only means that the government wasn't vetting the pictures and words."
- Bruce Jackson
(Related: Government, War, Vietnam, Words)

"Well, I think everybody's a little jealous of the Vietnam Wall, even people from wars that already have good monuments. You have a monument like the Wall and nobody ever forgets your war, you can bet on that."
- Bruce Jackson
(Related: War, People, Monument, Monuments, Vietnam)

"Senator Albert Gore Sr. was one of the first outspoken critics of the Vietnam War."
- Peter Jennings
(Related: War, First, Vietnam)

"George W. had a plan. He arranged to join the Air National Guard in Texas, which meant he would not be sent to Vietnam."
- Peter Jennings
(Related: Vietnam)

"Our numbers have increased in Vietnam because the aggression of others has increased in Vietnam. There is not, and there will not be, a mindless escalation."
- Lyndon B. Johnson
(Related: Aggression, Numbers, Vietnam, Will)

"Our purpose in Vietnam is to prevent the success of aggression. It is not conquest, it is not empire, it is not foreign bases, it is not domination. It is, simply put, just to prevent the forceful conquest of South Vietnam by North Vietnam."
- Lyndon B. Johnson
(Related: Success, Purpose, Aggression, Conquest, Vietnam)

"When I was a boy we didn't wake up with Vietnam and have Cyprus for lunch and the Congo for dinner."
- Lyndon B. Johnson
(Related: Vietnam)

"I believe we can continue the Great Society while we fight in Vietnam."
- Lyndon B. Johnson
(Related: Society, Fight, Vietnam)

"Now we have a problem in making our power credible, and Vietnam is the place."
- John F. Kennedy
(Related: Power, Now, Vietnam)

"I saw courage both in the Vietnam War and in the struggle to stop it. I learned that patriotism includes protest, not just military service."
- John F. Kerry
(Related: Patriotism, War, Courage, Military, Protest, Service, Struggle, Vietnam)

"It was definitely a part of our life. I mean, my mom had both her brothers and her fiancee in Vietnam at the same time, so it wasn't just my dad's story, it was my mom's story too. And we definitely grew up listening to the stories."
- Vanessa Kerry
(Related: Mom, Life, Time, Dad, Brothers, Listening, Vietnam)

"I wrote a novel about the combat experiences I didn't have in Vietnam."
- Tracy Kidder
(Related: Vietnam)

"One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
(Related: War, Society, Vietnam)

"East Asia has prospered since the end of the Vietnam War, and Northeast Asia has prospered since the end of the Korean War in a way that seems unimaginable when you think of the history of the first half of the century."
- William Kirby
(Related: History, War, End, First, Vietnam)

"The Vietnam War required us to emphasize the national interest rather than abstract principles. What President Nixon and I tried to do was unnatural. And that is why we didn't make it."
- Henry A. Kissinger
(Related: War, Interest, Nixon, President, Principles, Vietnam)

"South Vietnam had to be built from scratch and, from the very beginning, depended far too much on the Western superpowers. As in the case of a person on public welfare, this dependency, which became greater with each day, was quite difficult to shake."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: Beginning, Day, Public, Vietnam, Welfare)

"If the war has faded into history, democracy's defeat in Vietnam has left deep marks in the consciousness of both nations."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: War, History, Consciousness, Deep, Defeat, Democracy, Nations, Vietnam)

"After the 1954 Geneva international conference, Vietnam was divided into two parts. On paper, North and South Vietnam were twin countries born at the same moment."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: Countries, Vietnam)

"During the Fifties, political and military activities in Vietnam were heavily influenced by the French, who as recent colonial masters, made all-important decisions."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: Decisions, Military, Vietnam)

"By the mid-sixties, the United States had poured more than half a million troops into South Vietnam."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: states, Troops, United, Vietnam)

"After Watergate, America was a ship without a rudder. Vietnam was left to its own devices, drifting along towards its fate."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: America, Fate, Vietnam)

"From its inception, South Vietnam was only considered to be an outpost in the war against communism."
- Nguyen Cao Ky
(Related: War, Communism, Vietnam)

"We should bomb Vietnam back into the stone age."
- Curtis Lemay
(Related: Age, Vietnam)

"My solution to the problem would be to tell the North Vietnamese Communists frankly that they've got to drawn in their horns and stop their aggression or we're going to bomb them into the stone age."
- Curtis Lemay
(Related: Age, Aggression, Solution)

"I learned a lot from Vietnam veterans, especially as some of them turned against their own war."
- Robert Jay Lifton
(Related: War, Veterans, Vietnam)

"When I was building the Vietnam Memorial, I never once asked the veterans what it was like in the war, because from my point of view, you don't pry into other people's business."
- Maya Lin
(Related: Business, War, People, Building, Veterans, Vietnam)

"I deliberately did not read anything about the Vietnam War because I felt the politics of the war eclipsed what happened to the veterans. The politics were irrelevant to what this memorial was."
- Maya Lin
(Related: Politics, War, Veterans, Vietnam)

"The Vietnam War was happening, but Lubbock was... They put a pinch on it."
- Bob Livingston
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"I wasn't for Vietnam. When I told that to the hippie newspaper, all my people got nervous."
- Loretta Lynn
(Related: People, Vietnam)

"In Vietnam we have no political prisoners. No one is arrested or jailed for his or her speech or point of view. They are put in jail because they violated the law."
- Nong Duc Manh
(Related: Law, Speech, Vietnam)

"I was not able to stop or slow down the Vietnam War."
- Mike Mansfield
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"We pretended there was no problem with Agent Orange after Vietnam and later the Pentagon recanted, after untold suffering by veterans."
- Jim McDermott
(Related: Suffering, Veterans, Vietnam)

"Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of America - not on the battlefields of Vietnam."
- Marshall McLuhan
(Related: War, America, Comfort, Living, Television, Vietnam)

"We wait here to meet the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam to discuss together a ceremony of orderly transfer of power so as to avoid any unnecessary bloodshed in the population."
- Duong Van Minh
(Related: Government, Power, Ceremony, Population, Vietnam)

"I believe firmly in reconciliation among Vietnamese to avoid unnecessary shedding of the blood of Vietnamese."
- Duong Van Minh
(Related: Blood)

"The object of my relationship with Vietnam has been to heal the wounds that exist, particularly among our veterans, and to move forward with a positive relationship,... Apparently some in the Vietnamese government don't want to do that and that's their decision."
- Ho Chi Minh
(Related: Government, Decision, Positive, Veterans, Vietnam, Want, Wounds)

"I only follow one party: the Vietnamese party."
- Ho Chi Minh
(Related: Party)

"The Vietnamese people deeply love independence, freedom and peace. But in the face of United States aggression they have risen up, united as one man."
- Ho Chi Minh
(Related: Love, Peace, People, Aggression, Freedom, Independence, Man, states, United)

"When it came to political power, blacks need not apply. Add to this steaming stew the growing tensions over the Vietnam War and the movement for civil rights, and you had plenty of elements to fire the imagination of a novice journalist."
- Andrea Mitchell
(Related: Imagination, War, Power, Civil rights, Fire, Vietnam)

"Philadelphia reflected the national turmoil over race and the Vietnam War, often exploding on my watch."
- Andrea Mitchell
(Related: War, Race, Vietnam)

"We managed to put together a compilation that had some creativity to it. In the meantime I was listening to the free radio stations and I noticed that during their war coverage they were playing these songs born out of the Vietnam War that were all critical of the soldiers."
- Joni Mitchell
(Related: War, Creativity, Listening, Soldiers, Songs, Vietnam)

"Idealism that makes no distinction between areas where our national interest lies and those from which it is remote does no good for America. The weariness of the post-Versailles, post-Korea, post-Vietnam eras is never far from the national mood."
- Dick Morris
(Related: America, Idealism, Interest, Lies, Post)

"Forty years ago this country went down a rabbit hole in Vietnam and millions died. I fear we're going down a rabbit hole once again - and if people can stop and think and reflect on some of the ideas and issues in this movie, perhaps I've done some damn good here!"
- Errol Morris
(Related: People, Fear, Ideas, Country, Vietnam, Years)

"I went to Kent State basically to avoid going to Vietnam, I had no idea what I was doing in the world. I was lost, and trying not to get into a fight every day."
- Mark Mothersbaugh
(Related: Idea, Day, Fight, State, Trying, Vietnam, World)

"I'm not so sure that people consider homelessness to be as important as, say, the Vietnam War. One should never even try to equate them because, of course, they're tragedies on both sides of the coin."
- Graham Nash
(Related: War, People, Vietnam)

"It seems to be that when these communist regimes take over - if you look at the example of Vietnam or Cambodia or Nicaragua - that even in conditions of peace they don't seem to be able to figure out how to support their people, and the human suffering is enormous."
- John Negroponte
(Related: Peace, People, Example, Suffering, Support, Vietnam)

"No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now."
- Richard M. Nixon
(Related: History, War, American, Now, Vietnam)

"I would not trade you a billion dollars for the kids I led to combat in Vietnam or in fact any of the Marines that I served with for a quarter of a century."
- Oliver North
(Related: Fact, Kids, Marines, Trade, Vietnam)

"Obviously all of us have thought about Vietnam, particularly in my generation in Australia that were part of conscription and fought there. Our friends came back, forever changed. So there were a lot of questions."
- Phillip Noyce
(Related: Thought, Friends, Questions, Vietnam)

"I remember serving in Vietnam in that war, and many of us at the major Lieutenant Colonel, colonel level were frustrated that no one in the U.S. wanted to debate it that way."
- William Odom
(Related: War, Debate, Vietnam)

"Throughout the 20th century, the Republican Party benefited from a non-interventionist foreign policy. Think of how Eisenhower came in to stop the Korean War. Think of how Nixon was elected to stop the mess in Vietnam."
- Ron Paul
(Related: War, Policy, Foreign policy, Nixon, Party, Republican, Vietnam)

"Millions also perished in the Chinese camps, and there have been terrible genocides in Cambodia and Vietnam."
- Jean-Marie Le Pen
(Related: Vietnam)

"Vietnam was as much a laboratory experiment as a war."
- John Pilger
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"Under this scientific and moral pressure, the Canadian government conceded publicly that the use of these weapons in Vietnam was, in their view, a contravention of the Geneva Protocol."
- John Charles Polanyi
(Related: Government, Pressure, Vietnam, Weapons)

"It is unconscionable that 10,000 boys have died in Vietnam. If 10,000 American women had mind enough they could end the war, if they were committed to the task, even if it meant going to jail."
- Jeanette Rankin
(Related: Women, War, American, Boys, End, Mind, Vietnam)

"We should declare war on North Vietnam. We could pave the whole country and put parking strips on it, and still be home by Christmas."
- Ronald Reagan
(Related: Home, War, Christmas, Country, Vietnam)

"It's silly talking about how many years we will have to spend in the jungles of Vietnam when we could pave the whole country and put parking stripes on it and still be home by Christmas."
- Ronald Reagan
(Related: Home, Christmas, Country, Silly, Talking, Vietnam, Will, Years)

"After four or five different wars, I grew weary of that work, partly because in an open war, open to coverage, as Vietnam was, it's not that difficult, really."
- Morley Safer
(Related: War, Work, Open, Vietnam)

"I did three tours in Vietnam. I guess a total of about almost two years."
- Morley Safer
(Related: Vietnam, Years)

"I have been to several wars to draw. I went to Vietnam. And made drawings in Vietnam during that period of the war there, and found that to be a very very sad situation."
- Gerald Scarfe
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"Had there been a reporter along with Lieutenant Calley when he massacred those people in Vietnam, I think that probably wouldn't have happened."
- Bob Schieffer
(Related: People, Vietnam)

"Certainly the Australians were buried in Korea. But I think that from Vietnam on, all the killed were brought home to America or to Australia, in our case."
- Peter Scott
(Related: Home, America, Vietnam)

"If the Mets can win the World Series, the United States can get out of Vietnam."
- Tom Seaver
(Related: states, United, Vietnam, World)

"You remember all those phrases about how "these people" - Asians - don't value human life like we do. Well if you spend any time around them, you discover that they love their children just as much as we love ours. That is certainly true of the Vietnamese."
- Neil Sheehan
(Related: Life, Love, Time, Children, Value)

"These men were wrongfully rejected, the veterans. The fighting man should never have been blamed for Vietnam."
- Neil Sheehan
(Related: Men, Fighting, Man, Veterans, Vietnam)

"I went to Vietnam; it was my first assignment as a reporter for the UPI, and I never could get away from the war."
- Neil Sheehan
(Related: War, First, Vietnam)

"At least I'm at peace with myself. I have done my best to write a book about what really happened there and why it happened and it's done, it's published. I won't write another book on Vietnam."
- Neil Sheehan
(Related: Peace, Vietnam)

"As Bill Clinton said so eloquently at the convention, during Vietnam there was a chance to serve; there was a chance not to serve."
- Mark Shields
(Related: Chance, Vietnam)

"To win in Vietnam, we will have to exterminate a nation."
- Benjamin Spock
(Related: Nation, Vietnam, Will)

"I'm not a pacifist. I was very much for the war against Hitler and I also supported the intervention in Korea, but in this war we went in there to steal Vietnam."
- Benjamin Spock
(Related: War, Vietnam)

"I was proud of the youths who opposed the war in Vietnam because they were my babies."
- Benjamin Spock
(Related: War, Babies, Vietnam)

"Vietnam helped me realize who the true heroes really are in this world. It's not the home-run hitters."
- Willie Stargell
(Related: Home, Heroes, Vietnam, World)

"I remember the day I found out my draft status. I was really floored and kind of staggered around in a daze. It just hadn't occurred to me that I could end up in Vietnam."
- Parker Stevenson
(Related: Day, Draft, End, Vietnam)

"Hollywood never knew there was a Vietnam War until they made the movie."
- Jerry Stiller
(Related: War, Hollywood, Vietnam)

"He's a novice, but he's had these - he's experienced in leadership in tight circumstances. He started - he dropped the first bomb, led the first air strike into North Vietnam."
- James Stockdale
(Related: Leadership, Circumstances, First, Vietnam)

"In point of fact all Americans are automatically turned down by China these days because of the escalation of Johnson's war in Vietnam, which several times has intruded into China."
- Anna Louise Strong
(Related: War, Americans, Fact, Vietnam)

"Vietnam was a lie but at least there was a political agenda. It was the domino theory. Iraq is about nothing but George Bush's ego laced with imperialist ambitions. And it was helped by your government."
- Donald Sutherland
(Related: Government, Lie, Ego, Iraq, Nothing, Theory, Vietnam)

"I'm happy that I'm alive. I feel like someone coming back from Vietnam, you know; I'm sure that later on I'll start killing people in a square somewhere, but right now, I just feel happy to be alive."
- Lars von Trier
(Related: People, Killing, Now, Right, Vietnam)

"No one is immune from the larger events of his or her time - the Depression, World War II, civil rights, Vietnam, the spring of 1989 in China. These events intrude upon our lives and radically affect our directions."
- Paul Tsongas
(Related: Time, War, Civil rights, Depression, Events, Spring, Vietnam, World, World war)

"My opposition to the Vietnam War. I was the first Hollywood actor to speak out against it."
- Robert Vaughn
(Related: War, Actor, First, Hollywood, Opposition, Vietnam)

"I was caught up in the hysteria during the Vietnam era, which was brought about through Marxist propaganda underlying the so-called peace movement."
- Jon Voight
(Related: Peace, Propaganda, Vietnam)

"So, I've never been politically correct, even before that term was available to us, and I have really identified with other people who don't want to be read as just a black poet, or just a woman poet, or just someone who represents a cause, an anti-Vietnam war poet."
- Diane Wakoski
(Related: War, People, Cause, Want, Woman)

"The Vietnamese have a secret weapon. It's their willingness to die beyond our willingness to kill. In effect, they've been saying, You can kill us, but you'll have to kill a lot of us; you may have to kill all of us. And, thank heaven, we are not yet ready to do that."
- George Wald
(Related: Effect, Heaven, May, Saying)

"We've committed many war crimes in Vietnam - but I'll tell you something interesting about that. We were committing war crimes in World War II, before the Nuremberg trials were held and the principle of war crimes was stated."
- George Wald
(Related: War, Trials, Vietnam, World, World war)

"The people who were against the Vietnam War thought I was attacking the Army. The guys in the Army thought I was representing their experiences. I was on both sides, and I survived."
- Mort Walker
(Related: War, Thought, People, Army, Vietnam)

"Thank you for the sacrifices you and your families are making. Our Vietnam Veterans have taught us that no matter what are positions may be on policy, as Americans and patriots, we must support all of our soldiers with our thoughts and our prayers."
- Zack Wamp
(Related: Policy, Thoughts, Americans, May, Soldiers, Support, Veterans, Vietnam)

"I believe Johnson understood that the reason was Vietnam. I also believe that he felt that if there was a way to communicate the real issues in Vietnam, that the reasons would be answered or understood. But there was just no way to communicate."
- Lew Wasserman
(Related: Reason, Vietnam)

"As the senior commander in Vietnam, I was aware of the potency of public opinion - and I worried about it."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Opinion, Public, Public opinion, Vietnam)

"By the end of the summer of 1973 I thought it was virtually impossible for South Vietnam to survive. How in the heck could they?"
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Thought, End, Summer, Vietnam)

"I do not believe that the men who served in uniform in Vietnam have been given the credit they deserve. It was a difficult war against an unorthodox enemy."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Men, War, Credit, Enemy, Vietnam)

"Vietnam was the first war ever fought without any censorship. Without censorship, things can get terribly confused in the public mind."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: War, Censorship, First, Mind, Public, Vietnam)

"Militarily, we succeeded in Vietnam. We won every engagement we were involved in out there."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Vietnam)

"President Johnson did not want the Vietnam War to broaden. He wanted the North Vietnamese to leave their brothers in the South alone."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: War, Brothers, President, Vietnam, Want)

"We moved in to help the Vietnamese defend their country and confront the Viet Cong."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Country, Help)

"When I took command in Vietnam, I gave great emphasis to food and medical care - and to the mail."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Food, Medical, Care, Mail, Vietnam)

"When the soldiers came home from Vietnam, there were no parades, no celebrations. So they built the Vietnam Memorial for themselves."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Home, Soldiers, Vietnam)

"The Vietnam memorial is a masterpiece. The names of the dead are listed there, chronologically. Just the names."
- William Westmoreland
(Related: Names, Vietnam)

"The friendlies were South Vietnamese women and children, helpless victims in a war they did not understand."
- John Whitehead
(Related: War, Women, Children, Victims)