TOS and Viet Nam

[RobertScorpio]

Several episodes seemed to go into the 'viet nam' issue. But I often wondered were they pro or con? PRIVATE LITTLE WAR does show how the escalation can get out of control....but Kirk seems to think its better than letting one side win. Irony perhaps???

So what do you think? Was TOS for our involvement or was it against? And if against, how would you know?

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Sir Rhosis]

Don Ingalls, who wrote A Private Little War, was opposed to the war, and when many of his anti-war sentiments and Vietnam parallels were toned down by GR, he substituted the pseudonym Jud Crucis on the script, which, he avowed (in an old Starlog interview he gave), was his way of saying, "Jesus crucified" -- that GR crucified his script, I've always gathered.

Sir Rhosis

 

[RobertScorpio]

Don Ingalls, who wrote A Private Little War, was opposed to the war, and when many of his anti-war sentiments and Vietnam parallels were toned down by GR, he substituted the pseudonym Jud Crucis on the script, which, he avowed (in an old Starlog interview he gave), was his way of saying, "Jesus crucified" -- that GR crucified his script, I've always gathered.

Sir Rhosis

So did GENE make the cuts because he was affraid of the censors at the time? Or was he pro viet nam? I wonder if Ingalls wondered about that too.

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Red Ranger]

As I recall, Democrats eventually were torn over the Vietnam War even in the mid-60s, leading to the major break between President Lyndon Johnson and then-NY Senator Robert F. Kennedy. So it doesn't surprise me that there'd be disagreement on the set of ST at that time. Many people at the time believed in the domino theory -- allow one country to fall to communism, and all the rest in that region will go communist. -- RR

 

[Outpost4]

Vietnam tore the whole country apart. Any disagreements on the set were just part of that.

 

[RobertScorpio]

Vietnam tore the whole country apart. Any disagreements on the set were just part of that.

I'm not talking about the set, I'm talking about Gene Roddenberry. GR is made out to be some 'utopian' pseudo 'communist' by some in TREKDOM, especially the GR of the 70s...I wonder if he was for the viet nam war if we are to take the message of some of TREK's material..

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Outpost4]

I think GR was anything but a utopian pseudo communist. Remember, he was an ex-cop. GR was a law-and-order kind of guy. It's not surprising to me that two of his series had strong military overtones (The Lieutenant and Star Trek). You can't easily use current political definitions to describe the '60s. The modern conservative movement had taken a beating in '64 with Goldwater and was not an issue. Even a staunch anti-communist Republican like Nixon imposed wage and price controls. The most liberal Democrats wouldn't have the balls or even the desire to do that with, say, gas prices today. Liberal Republicans were more liberal than most Democrats now-a-days. Liberalism was the rule. I grew up in a very conservative town in Southern California and in high school in the '60s, I was taught that socialism and capitalism were merging towards a common middle. Try teaching that in school today! You'd be fired.

If I was to try to apply a modern political definition to Roddenberry it would probably be libertarian, but even that would be incomplete. While he didn't want anybody to interfere with his alcohol, drug or sex addictions, he was also a well meaning, "don't tread on me" liberal, wanting to integrate his show and use man's intolerance as a theme. It was Eisenhower that first forced integration in the south. This wasn't a Republican/Democrat issue. Same for Vietnam, for that matter. Opposition to the war first came from Democrats during a Democratic administration and continued with Republicans disagreeing with their Republican president.

And by "disagreements on the set", I was including the front office and network suits, too, not just the shooting cast and crew. As I said, Vietnam divided everyone.

 

[The Squire of Gothos]

I always thought A Private Little War was pro and A Taste Of Armageddon anti Vietnam.

Reminds me of the old Twilight Zone episode where a man mourns his son's death in Vietnam, fairly early into the war too.