Fifteen years ago, I wrote a cover story for The New York Times magazine and co-produced a 60 Minutes segment about war, memory and the corrosive power of a secret that Bob Kerrey had kept for 30 years after his Navy SEAL team committed what many Americans considered to be an unforgivable atrocity.
The revelation that Kerrey’s Raiders, as they were called, killed as many as two dozen unarmed women and children and one old man in Vietnam in 1969 set off a national bout of soul searching on the rules of war, and still serves as a cautionary tale today for America’s military.
This tragic and haunting story, and the war that great segments of the nation turned against for its moral and political failings, became news during President Barack Obama’s recent visit to Vietnam. While there, the president announced that both governments had formalized an agreement to allow the new Fulbright University Vietnam to open its doors in Ho Chi Minh City.
