My Lai: American Hypocrisy- By Fraser Brown

In 16^th of March 1968, one of the worst atrocities to place during the Vietnam War, known as the My Lai Massacre. The unit known as Task Force Barker, led by a Lieutenant William Calley, moved into the small village of Tu Cung and by the afternoon, over 300 innocent people were killed, mostly women, old men and children. It is important to keep in mind that these villagers’ were all South Vietnamese, who you would expect the Americans to see as allies, and had no affiliation with Viet Cong members1. However this is not the reason to why this Massacre is so gruesome, as there have been plentiful of times in war that innocent civilians were murdered, no, this event is much worse than that. The reason being is that the gang- raping and mutilations of some of the women and children’s bodies2. Here lies the hypocrisy of the American value of the 1960s, of being the ‘leader of the free world’. America entered the Vietnam war in the attempt to ‘help’ countries combat communism and provide there with assistance to achieve this. When the massacre ended and the troops came back to America not one of the Task Force bar one was sentenced in any way at all. That one who was sentenced was the very Lieutenant William Calley and he only ended up serving a mere three years under house arrest. This whole event feels unjust as, even when the news about what happened became public, no one was punished deservedly. Even when he was originally sentenced to life, the public felt that this was unfair due to Calley being the only one singled out 3. However the problem with this is that it appears to show the some American values are flawed due to the fact that they see a man being sentenced for life as unjust but at the same time this also implies that they don’t see his and his teams actions in Vietnam as unjust.

In conclusion, the My Lai has to be one of the most significant atrocities that America played a part in. Not only did it show the true hypocrisy of America fighting for 'freedom but it also resulted in the murder of the innocent has always has of course always happened but never to such a disgusting level by a First World democracy. The main thing that was learnt is the utter hypocrisy that was acted by the American government. These events might be awful and terrible but it is important that for America to continuing to spout in its rhetoric that they are the 'leader of the free world' and the most democratic country, then they must learn to put those claims into action, so events like My Lai do not happen in the future.

1Oliver, Kendrick (17^th April 2006) The My Lai Massacre in American History and Memory, Manchester University Press

2BBC News (20 July 1998) Murder in the name of war- My Lai

3Katz, Andrew (17^th Aug. 2013) Field of Dishonour: Famous American Court-Martials: Lieut. William Calley, TIME