Vietnam quotes
200 quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
"I remember the day I found out my draft status. I was really floored and kind of staggered around in a daze. It just hadn't occurred to me that I could end up in Vietnam"
"Because the GIs were sent massively to South Vietnam, maybe it's a good idea to have a broadcast for them."
"What is this demilitarized zone? Whatever it is, I like it! Gets you on your toes better than a strong cup of cappuccino."
"I used to love going into local hardware stores, to look at little things they made locally. Nowadays it's harder, though you can still do it in Vietnam."
"Freedom-loving people around the world must say . . . I am a refugee in a crowded boat foundering off the coast of Vietnam. I am Laotian, a Cambodian, a Cuban, and a Miskito Indian in Nicaragua. I, too, am a potential victim of totalitarianism."
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"One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam."
"The worst nightmare I ever had about Vietnam was that I had to go back. I woke up in a sweat, in total terror."
"You have a row of dominoes set up; you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is that it will go over very quickly."
"In the '60s we fought for peace, when the Vietnam war was on. We were against the cops and against the politicians, and there was a lot of waving banners and all that. And I think in a way, just as they were enjoying that machoism of war, we were enjoying the machismo of being anti-war, you know?"
"Now we have a problem in making our power credible, and Vietnam is the place."
"We had the Vietnam War in the '60s, and there was a draft. The students didn't believe in it, and it unified them."
"My film is not a movie; it's not about Vietnam. It is Vietnam."
"I wrote a novel about the combat experiences I didn't have in Vietnam."
"I can tell you exactly where the economy is going. It's going to China, Honduras, Guatemala, Cambodia, Vietnam, Cipan, and any other place where you can pay people peanuts and have them work like dogs."
"I saw the Vietnam Veterans Memorial not as an object placed into the earth but as a cut in the earth that has then been polished, like a geode."
"Vietnam was really an idealistic thing to stop the spread of communism, which, incidentally, it did. It was a pretty costly way to do it, but it achieved its goal."
"My film isn't about Vietnam. It is Vietnam. It's what it was really like. It was crazy. And the way we made it was very much like the way the Americans were in Vietnam. We were in the jungle, there were too many of us, we had access to too much money, too much equipment and little by little we went insane."
"The hardest thing for me in Vietnam wasn't seeing the wounded and dead. It was watching the big transport jets come in, bringing loads of fresh new boys for the war."
"During the Vietnam War, Abbie Hoffman announced that the new high was banana peels taken rectally. So then FBI scientists stuffed banana peels up their asses to find out if this was true or not."
"It would be good for the workers in Vietnam even as it helps make sure that they're not undercutting competition here in the United States."
"When we do work in places like China and Vietnam, research tends to be really effective as a way of getting change, whereas in more open places, mobilization and the creation of public pressure through the media often seem to be the things we try."
"I was terrified of the Vietnam War when I was 13. I thought I was going. The draft was such an ominous thing, I felt as if it was going to trickle down to me."
"During the Democratic presidential debate Howard Dean started off by apologizing to the crowd for having a cold. Then John Kerry apologized for once having a cold while serving his country in Vietnam."
"I get very sad when I think about Vietnam where there seems to be no choice but violence. This violence goes on for centuries perpetuating itself."
"The signs of the Vietnam War protestors said "Make Love not War!" It didn't seem to me that they were capable of either."
