“It’s not the war you know. It’s the war they fought.”
That is how HISTORY describes its new three-part, six-hour series Vietnam in HD, produced by Lou Reda Productions. The first episodes, “The Beginning/Search and Destroy” will air at 9:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday, November 8. The following evening presents “The Tet Offensive/An Endless War.” The series concludes on November 10 with “The Changing War/Peace with Honor.”
As with HISTORY’s popular WWII in HD that premiered in 2009, the network promises this latest effort was created by scouring the globe for rare and never-seen film, much of it shot by soldiers in action. Thousands of hours of uncensored footage, detailing every critical chapter of the Vietnam War, were located, restored and then transferred to High Definition.
The compelling narrative structure of Vietnam in HD comes through the stories of 13 individuals whose lives were forever changed by the war in Southeast Asia. Among them: Karl Marlantes, author of the respected 2010 novel Matterhorn, who was a Marine in a unit that saw some of the fiercest fighting in the A Shau Valley and the Da Krong Valley; Arthur Wiknik, a draftee who led his squad to safety during the 10-day assault on “Hamburger Hill;” Gery Benedetti, a member of the Navy’s “Brown Water River Rats,” who transported infantry soldiers and Navy SEALS to various points of incursion along the Mekong River; Bob Clewell, a pilot in the Comancheros assault helicopter battalion who barely survived an ill-fated mission into Laos; Charles Brown, an African-American Army sergeant who led missions through the deadly jungles of Pleiku and Dok; Elizabeth Allen, an Army nurse who insisted on frontline duty and valiantly saved lives during the Tet Offensive; Joe Galloway, a United Press International reporter who was awarded a Bronze Star with V for Valor for rescuing wounded soldiers under fire at Ia Drang; Anne Purcell, wife of the highest-raking Army officer to be held as a prisoner of war in Vietnam; and Barry Romo, an Army infantryman who transformed from a gung-ho patriot and war hero to staunch anti-war activist.