There are more ways than ever to listen to History Daily ad-free. Listen with Wondry Plus in the

Wondry app as a member of NoisorPlus at noisor.com or in Apple Podcasts, or you can get all of

History Daily plus other fantastic history podcasts at IntoHistory.com.

In my sophomore year of high school, I was becoming a bit of a Vietnam war expert.

Over the previous four years, the movie's platoon, full metal jacket, Good Morning Vietnam, Hamburger Hill,

Born on the Fourth of July, and others were released.

I'd read A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo, Chicken Hawk by Robert Mason, and a small bookshelf of others. So I was steeped in Vietnam stories at the time. But it was Tim O'Brien's 1990 book,

The Things They Carried, That Was Probably the Hardest Hitting. Such a piece of visceral writing, whipsawing between humor and horror, tragedy and triumph.

It's a book that will make you feel for sure, but also think deeply about morality,

what it is, what it isn't, when it matters and when nothing does.

But for men like Tim O'Brien, who was himself stationed in Vietnam, and drew on his own

experiences to write the book, it all mattered.

It mattered so much that a whole generation of young men came home shaken and shattered,

and the Americans at home didn't really understand.

They couldn't understand.

Until revelations came out, stories corroborated by photographs and eyewitness

testimony, telling of a massacre, an atrocity, a mass murder of innocence at the hands of American soldiers

covered up by a complicit chain of command. On today's Saturday matinee, we're bringing you the story of

the massacre at Mili from one of my other podcasts, American Scandal.

It's a story of failed leadership and lost humanity, and I hope you enjoy.

While you're listening, be sure to search for and follow American Scandal.

We put a link in the show notes to make it easy for you.

...