Path to War
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Movie Reviews of Path to War
Movie Review: 3.5 stars out of 4
Summary: 5 Stars
The Bottom Line:
An exceptional, if long, TV movie that has the good sense to portray the Johnson administration as a tragedy, Path to War is fascinating both as a piece of history and a piece of filmmaking.
Movie Review: Great Item!
Summary: 5 Stars
I know Johnson had his flaws, But If I were in his shoes maybe I would of done the same thing.Movie Review: Great Movie
Summary: 5 Stars
We could not stop watching, a great movie.Movie Review: Lesson of Vietnam: Post Truman....Democrats lose wars
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a very good film. Top notch acting by all of the cast. The film, based on all I've read, is also quite true to history. It's really revealing to see the degree which Johnson fought such a limited and overly-analyzed war. In the movie, he is portrayed as having a huge amount of guilt of any deaths, on either side. Look, this is war......either don't wage it......or wage it to win.
What is not known by many people is that militarily , The US was winning most battles and exacting a heavier toll than the VC was inflicting on us. However, due to Johnson's (and his administration's) guilt and reluctance to wage a war to WIN, the peace movement at home who was rooting for the vc, and the media who was against the war and constantly referred to it as "unwinnable".....the Viet Cong leaders acquired courage and took heart. These anti-war elements gave the Viet Cong the fortitude to keep fighting.
For example, after the Tet Offensive....which was a great military victory for the USA....our military having utterly repelled the offensive of the VC....the North Vietnamese leaders began to notice reports from the USA which were reporting the battle as different from what it was. One VC leader was quoted to have said that he felt they were defeated after their route at Tet.....yet upon seeing reports from the US, by the anti-war US media, that reported it was a defeat for the US.....his communist troops took heart and knew they must continue the fight.
In several parts of the film.....Johnson and members of his adminstration expound upon how tough and unbeatable the Viet Cong were. They seem to almost be fawning over the fact of the invincibility of the foe. This coupled with the limited war.....over-analysis by washington bureaucrats on actually picking targets.....not letting the military sweep into the North.....lead to our eventual demise there.
After Johnson was voted out...because of his squeamishness in fighting the war....Nixon was elected. He did his best to end the war nobly....scaling back troops while escalating the bombimg. At the Paris Peace Accords, he created a truce between the North and the South which was backed up by the threat of U.S. military action should the North reneg and invade the South.
But, alas, the congressional democrats, using the cover of watergate, frantically went after Nixon causing him to resign, thus in effect closing the door on the South. Gerald Ford subsequently pleaded with the democratic congress not to turn our backs on the South....but they did.
The legacy that followed was one of death and blood. The North swept into the south. Laos and Cambodia were invaded by the commies. Hundreds of thousands were thrown into conmmunist concentration and reeducation camps and in Cambodia....the killing fields ensued. Children watched as their parents were murdered ( often beheaded or garroted )by the red regime.
In all, a good film that accurately gets across the mindset of the Johnson administration. Recommended.
Movie Review: Best film portrayal of LBJ and his affliction with Vietnam
Summary: 4 Stars
As president, the Texas Lyndon Baines Johnson had bigger ideas about the USA than the size of longhorns in his native state. He believed he could fuel the world's largest burgeoning economy, build a Great Society of wealth and equality, end the racial divide and conquer communism all at the same time.
When he found he couldn't do all this -- and that he failed miserably in some efforts -- he turned away from politics and delivered his famous "I shall not seek..." speech from spring 1968.
This movie probably better captures the spirit, emotion and personal drive of LBJ -- especially as it regards his decisions to engage in all out war in Vietnam -- than any of docudrama or film treatment of the man. It shows the man that was LBJ, a president that publicly picked up his beagle by the ears and once showed the White House press corps his surgical scar.
While LBJ's handling of Alabama Gov. George Wallace and a few other events get some time in the biopic, it is the decision making about the Vietnam War that HBO best captured in this movie. Directed by John Frankenheimer and with significant roles for Donald Sutherland and Alec Baldwin as Clark Clifford and Robert McNamara, this film faithfully displays the network of advisors that surrounded LBJ, played well by Michael Gambon.
Perhaps most moving of all scenes is the one where Clifford confronts the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Vietnam military commanders. "What is the plan to win the war in Vietnam?" Clifford asked. Stunned, no one has an answer. No scene, real or fictionalized, better summarizes the political life displayed in this film.
Lovers of McNamara's embarassing self-serving documentary, "The Fog of War", will not be pleased to see their hero dethroned in this movie. In the early moments of the conflict, McNamara first straddles the fence on Vietnam, then pushes against doves including George Ball to get LBJ to commit big manpower in southeast Asia (just like he did in real life according to White House transcripts and the book "The Pentagon Papers"). It is a far cry from the story the real McNamara wanted you to believe in his own foggy film.
Whether all or none of the remaining scenes are true is not of much consequence. We all know what happened in Vietnam and we are seeing it played out day after day in Iraq right now, another quagmire in the making. American invovlement in the Vietnam war gave rise to a famous theory of irreversability -- that says the longer you move in one direction, the more difficult it is to reverse that direction.
The time frame on Vietnam in this film is through 1968, when American sentiment turned against the war, as well as the thinking of most American politicians. Still, it was two presidents and seven years later before our involvement terminated. That's why the decision making on display in this movie is as important in 2005 as it was in 1968. This is a fine slice of political life that anyone who has an interest in politics or history should see.