Readers of this book will understand how important it is to keep the "Vietnam Syndrome" alive, to grasp and never forget the awful truth of that war and steadfastly oppose U.S. imperial militarism. The government and the titans of capital it supports never cease their efforts to erase critical historical memory, to rewrite the past as a heroic struggle to bring freedom and democracy to the rest of the world. Uhl notes in his essay "Heeding the Call," that President Obama has inaugurated a thirteen-year "Commemoration" of the War in Vietnam, to last from Memorial Day 2012 until 2025. As the president's Proclamation announcing the Commemoration makes clear, the government is indeed intent on turning the truth into a set of grotesque falsehoods, myths worthy of The Third Reich:
As we observe the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War, we reflect with solemn reverence upon the valor of a generation that served with honor. We pay tribute to the more than 3 million servicemen and women who left their families to serve bravely, a world away from everything they knew and everyone they loved. From Ia Drang to Khe Sanh, from Hue to Saigon and countless villages in between, they pushed through jungles and rice paddies, heat and monsoon, fighting heroically to protect the ideals we hold dear as Americans. Through more than a decade of combat, over air, land, and sea, these proud Americans upheld the highest traditions of our Armed Forces.
Among the objectives of the Commemoration is "To highlight the advances in technology, science, and medicine related to military research conducted during the Vietnam War." In light of Uhl's reporting on the use of Agent Orange and other weapons of mass destruction developed by the military during the war, as well as the complete lack of a moral compass by complicit U.S. scientists from the Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Forest Service, this has to be one of the most outrageous justifications for mass killing ever made."