Vietnam War perspective: the unreconciled conflict

"On a Saturday morning last January, I witnessed a remarkable reunion of two military veterans," Edward Miller writes in an Op-Ed piece in USA Today.

The meeting was remarkable in part because of where it took place: on the bank of a canal in Vietnam's Mekong Delta. 

One of the veterans was then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who had once patrolled the surrounding waterways as an American naval officer during the Vietnam War. 

The other was Vo Van Tam, a native of the area who spent the war fighting for the communist-led "Viet Cong" insurgency.  In February 1969, Kerry and Tam had been on opposite sides of a firefight on a nearby river.  During that battle, Kerry killed one of Tam's comrades who tried to fire a rocket at Kerry's patrol boat.  But now the two former enemies clasped hands and expressed admiration for each other.  "I'm glad we're both alive," Kerry told Tam. (Full Story)