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      The Ken Burns Vietnam War Documentary Glosses Over Devastating Civilian Toll

      The Ken Burns Vietnam War Documentary Glosses Over Devastating Civilian Toll

      While most American soldiers approximately 12 months serving in Vietnam, the civilians of that nation lived the war week after week, month after month, year after year, from one decade into the next.

      Nick Turse
      Sep 29, 2017

      "I think that when Americans talk about the Vietnam War ... we tend to talk only about ourselves. But if we really want to understand it ... or try to answer the fundamental question, 'What happened?' You've got to triangulate," says filmmaker Ken Burns of his celebrated PBS documentary series "The Vietnam War." "You've got to know what's going on. And we have many battles in which you've got South Vietnamese soldiers and American advisors or ... their counterparts and Vietcong or North Vietnamese. You have to get in there and understand what they're thinking."

      "War is not combat, though combat is a part of war."

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      Opinion
      Leaker, Speaker, Soldier, Spy

      Leaker, Speaker, Soldier, Spy

      The charmed life of David Petraeus

      Nick Turse
      Jul 05, 2016

      I ran into David Petraeus the other night. Or rather, I ran after him.

      It's been more than a year since I first tried to connect with the retired four-star general and ex-CIA director -- and no luck yet. On a recent evening, as the sky was turning from a crisp ice blue into a host of Easter-egg hues, I missed him again. Led from a curtained "backstage" area where he had retreated after a midtown Manhattan event, Petraeus moved briskly to a staff-only room, then into a tightly packed elevator, and momentarily out onto the street before being quickly ushered into a waiting late-model, black Mercedes S550.

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      Opinion
      Writing as an Act of Generosity

      Writing as an Act of Generosity

      Every now and then, I teach a class to young would-be journalists and one of the first things I talk about is why I consider writing an act of generosity. As they are usually just beginning to stretch their writerly wings, their task, as I see it, is to enter the world we're already in (it's generally the only place they can afford to go) and somehow decode it for us, make us see it in a new way. And who can deny that doing so is indeed an act of generosity?

      Tom Engelhardt
      May 03, 2016

      Every now and then, I teach a class to young would-be journalists and one of the first things I talk about is why I consider writing an act of generosity. As they are usually just beginning to stretch their writerly wings, their task, as I see it, is to enter the world we're already in (it's generally the only place they can afford to go) and somehow decode it for us, make us see it in a new way. And who can deny that doing so is indeed an act of generosity? But for the foreign correspondent, especially in war zones, the generosity lies in the very act of entering a world filled with dangers, a world that the rest of us might not be capable of entering, or for that matter brave enough to enter, and somehow bringing us along with them.

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      Opinion
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