79-08-B7
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Vietnam War[edit]
Transcript[edit]The Oscar was given on Academy Award Night to the motion picture "The Deer Hunter". I'm sure you all know the movie deals with the Vietnam War. If you haven't seen it then possibly you don't know that it is a story of friendship among young men; that it certainly does not glorify war although it is unashamedly patriotic and it doesn't call down punishment on the United States for being in that war. It is this last point that has caused some to withhold congratulations for its award of the Oscar. Those who in the 1960's and early 197O's saw no virtue in anything America did and only nobility of purpose on the part of North Vietnam cannot of course accept any story about that war which doesn't follow that theme. Indeed they can't accept the truth let alone a fictional version. I wish someone in the world of television or movies would do a film about the men who endured captivity for six, eight and ten years in the Hanoi Hilton as it was called, or any of the other Communist torture camps. Capt. John McCain, U.S. Navy, spent six years in the hands of the North Vietnamese . One day he was told he was to meet an "American actress" who was for peace. Recognizing a propoganda trick he refused. He was beaten, : starved, finally put in an unventilated box five feet long and two feet wide and kept there for four steaming summer months. If the producing gentry in Hollywood want to follow up on "The Deer Hunter" success there is plenty of material at hand. Scott Blakey has written a book called "Prisoner At War - The Survival of Commander Richard A. Stratton". It's published by Anchor Press/Doubleday. Dick Stratton was a prisoner more than six years. His story is one of love as well as war; of a wife who never lost hope. And it's the story of dozens if not hundreds of men who were his fellow prisoners. There are amazing tales revealed for the first time. One such concerns Admiral Jeremiah Denton. If you remember that long night when we all watched television waiting for the landing at Clark field in the Philippines of that first plane bringing our P.O.W's home, Jeremiah Denton was the first man we saw. He made his way down the ramp, saluted the flag and thanked us for bringing them home. You might not remember that you had seen him a few years before on television when his captors forced him through torture to be filmed telling us how well they were all being treated. He stood there before the microphone his eyes blinking in the harsh television lights. But now thanks to Scott Blakey's book we know it wasn't the lights that made him blink. He was spelling out in Morse code the word "tortured" over and over again. When the film was played on network television in America a Naval Intelligence officer recognized and read the message. Naturally this had to be kept a secret while our men were still prisoners. You'll learn a lot from the book and you'll get a little impatient with those who don't like pictures that don't hate America. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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