<<Another rare case of critical journalism was Charles Lane's article "The Legend of Colin Powell" in The New Republic
(4/17/95). Focusing on Powell's second year-long stint in Vietnam, the article highlighted research done by British authors
Michael Bilton and Kevin Sim in their book, Four Hours in My Lai (Penguin, 1993). The authors had discovered in the
National Archives a letter from specialist fourth class Tom Glen, who was a young soldier in the Americal Division.
In November 1968, Glen wrote a letter to Gen. Creighton Abrams about the Americal's extreme abuse of Vietnamese civilians
and captured Viet Cong suspects. Glen's overall complaints encompassed some of the atrocities later dubbed the My Lai
massacre (which had occurred on March 16, 1968). Though Glen included no specific reference to My Lai, he expressed deep
concern about American troops who "without provocation or justification shoot at the people themselves."
In early December 1968, Glen's heart-felt letter landed on the desk of a fast-rising officer in the Americal's 11th Brigade, which
included the unit that had carried out the My Lai slaughter. The officer, Major Colin Powell, conducted a cursory investigation
and then -- without even contacting Glen or urging that anyone else do so -- dismissed the young soldier's concerns as
unfounded. Powell's memo, dated Dec. 13, 1968, was to serve as the basis for the Army's official dismissive reply to Glen's
letter. Powell wrote: "In direct refutation of this portrayal is the fact that relations between Americal soldiers and the Vietnamese
people are excellent."
In his account of these events, Lane noted that "there is something missing...from the legend of Colin Powell, something
epitomized, perhaps, by that long-ago bureaucratic brush-off of Tom Glen." >>
PS; Didn't I read lately how this hero was excorcising his Iraq guilt by involving himself in some kind of education for poor kids in NA.?? |
