if the viet cong come here, they will shoot him just as just as well. since he's a deserter. oh, so i recorded him and it one of the most beautiful voices i recorded that whole year of traveling from the south and the mekong, way up to the city away where recorded members the last royal dynasty. let's hear. okay, thank you. so we're going to hear this piece and then we'll talk just a bit more. some shall i yeah, i guess i'll go. no mai mai, no photos, i'm look how long look back now. who my look. okay. yeah. i. who look. wing. yeah. yea way mad i'm the new. oh, thank you what an extraordinary experience that have been for you to have been open to this whole body of, poetry and song in a world far from your own. so thank for sharing that with us. so as we conclude the panel, i'd like to ask each of you to the really the purpose of being together today to think about what we've learned from vietnam, the experience of vietnam, the vietnam war, 50 years after withdrawal of troops. so what have we learned from the world of cultural creativity? what if you were to each of one or tw

if the viet cong come here, they will shoot him just as just as well. since he's a deserter. oh, so i recorded him and it one of the most beautiful voices i recorded that whole year of traveling from the south and the mekong, way up to the city away where recorded members the last royal dynasty. let's hear. okay, thank you. so we're going to hear this piece and then we'll talk just a bit more. some shall i yeah, i guess i'll go. no mai mai, no photos, i'm look how long look back now. who my look. okay. yeah. i. whlook. wing. yeah. yea way mad i'm the new. oh, thank you what an extraordinary experience that have been for you to have been open to this whole body of, poetry and song in a world far from your own. so thank for sharing that with us. so as we conclude the panel, i'd like to ask each of you to the really the purpose of being together today to think about what we've learned from vietnam, the experience of vietnam, the vietnam war, 50 years after withdrawal of troops. so what have we learned from the world of cultural creativity? what if you were to each of one or two

viewed, but what was left out of this narrative was that a few minutes before that happened, that viet cong, just up the street, they had wiped out the entire family of one of the colonel's friends and had executed them in the way that the romanoff family was executed in the basement. and if a picture of that event, side-by-side with the eddie adams picture of the execution of the viet cong, i would argue that world opinion would have been mitigated. it would have not been so categorical as it was. >> as you write in the noise of typewriters, there are 1000 ways of telling the truth and even more ways of lying. the storyteller needs a narrative line and the hope of a laugh has led writers astray, leading them to bear for -- false witness. that afternoon and thank you for joining us on book tv. one author, his or her body of work and your phone calls a longtime journalist, lance morrow, the author of several books as well. he has written over 150 cover stories for time and profiles for that magazine. he is also the author of these books. his first came out in 1984, called the chief. fishing

well was i went up to quinlan, which is the capital of indian province, finding out who had been a viet cong forever. i mean, it might as well have been in the north. and the americans were putting on an enormous more than operation. it went on for a couple of weeks and somehow the first place i got to was the hospital. and they said, well, it's over there. so i went and this beautiful old french building, i went inside the courtyard and there was nobody there at all. so finally i saw this american leaning over one of the balconies and so i went up to him and he was a doctor who was there for six months. and he said he was practically his hair out. he said, you just can't believe how terrible it is. you can't believe it. you can't believe it. you can't believe it. and he showed me along this corridor where we're there. there were stretchers with people lying on every one of them not able to get into the rooms and the people were so horribly disfigured, they they they were up to twice their size. and a lot of them had terrible wounds as well. and of course, it was napalm or c-4 that had done

with me and also to find the battlefield and we find it and we not only found the but we found the viet cong first division commander who had fought against that day and had won in the battle. and that day going to the battlefield, which was 44 miles northwest of saigon toward the cambodian border, was the most unforgettable day of my life, because we we drove out there. kyle horst was my interpreter he's in the audience today. he's brilliant, vietnam and we we walked about a mile after we all the rutted roads which by the way by the way now are all paved according to kyle found a farmhouse near the battlefield. we were with the military the commander and clerk well, jenkins low. we got into this little farmhouse house. and when vietnam was the farmer and he had fought in that battle any environmental threat recognized him and and noticed that he that he had ten children. and for chet was in charge of population control saigon, and he chewed him out having ten kids. but anyway, then we walked toward the battlefield. clark well, he had a g.p.s. i had all of the the i knew exactly where where

well was i went up to quinlan, which is the capital of indian province, finding out who had been a viet cong forever. i mean, it might as well have been in the north. and the americans were putting on an enormous more than operation. it went on for a couple of weeks and somehow the first place i got to was the hospital. and they said, well, it's over there. so i went and this beautiful old french building, i went inside the courtyard and there was nobody there at all. so finally i saw this american leaning over one of the balconies and so i went up to him and he was a doctor who was there for six months. and he said he was practically his hair out. he said, you just can't believe how terrible it is. you can't believe it. you can't believe it. you can't believe it. and he showed me along this corridor where we're there. there were stretchers with people lying on every one of them not able to get into the rooms and the people were so horribly disfigured, they they they were up to twice their size. and a lot of them had terrible wounds as well. and of course, it was napalm or c-4 that had done