THE SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENTS: On March 16, 1968, American soldiers did their best to exterminate the entire civilian population of a village filled with Vietnamese women and children in the Mỹ Lai massacre.

Approximately five hundred unarmed people were massacred by U.S. troops.

Helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson risked his life, defying orders, to save as many villagers as he could from his rampaging fellow soldiers. He paid a high price for his heroism.

It was a horror. Green troops expecting to find enemy Viet Cong decided that instead of leaving this peaceful village alone, they’d slaughter everyone.

Then they realized, oh, wait, we can do some raping first. Yeah, that happened. While the boys in Company C were displaying the worst of humanity, Thompson was flying a small observation helicopter with two other crewmen.

He witnessed the massacre taking place, and rather than say ‘None of my business,’ he made it his business.

Thompson landed his craft and confronted the heavily armed American soldiers who were in the process of raping and slaying the civilians.

He challenged the lieutenant, who said he was ‘just following orders.’

Thompson replied with ‘Whose orders?’. The lieutenant said, ‘It ain’t your concern’. He told Thompson to get in his chopper and fuck off.

At that point, one soldier began to open fire on wounded civilians lying in a ditch to kill anyone still moving.

In disbelief at what he was witnessing, Thompson went to look for any civilians he could save.

He found eleven people and called in a gunship to transport them out. He and his two crew members stood guard over the terrorized civilians until evacuation arrived.

He told his crew that if any Americans tried to shoot the civilians they were protecting, that they were to open fire on their fellow Americans. As a small mercy, the evacuation was successful.

When they returned to base, Thompson saved many more lives by reporting the massacre to his superiors.

The operation–turned–mass slaying was to include forays into many more hamlets that likely would have suffered a similar fate, but a halt was commanded.

Thompson was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his actions. He threw it away because the commendation said it was for rescuing a child caught in crossfire, with no mention of the massacre.

When the story broke the following year, Thompson was summoned to appear before Congress where they ripped him apart. The critics said he was the one who should be court-martialed, for pointing his weapon at fellow soldiers.

Thompson became an outcast, saying people thought ‘I was a traitor. I was a communist. I was a sympathizer. That went on for about thirty years.’

There were death threats and dead animals left on his porch. In terms of ‘justice,’ the man leading the massacre, Lieutenant William Calley, was the only one punished.

He was sentenced to life in prison. President Nixon intervened, and he only served three and a half years’ house arrest.

NOTE: Hugh Thompson Jr., the U.S. Army helicopter pilot who intervened to stop the Mỹ Lai massacre, survived the war. He spent much of his life dealing with backlash, trauma, and later recognition. He died on January 6, 2006, at age 62.

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