"Both buildings and rulers are the work of our hands."

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SOCIALIST ACTION OCTOBER 1987 13 man who has not a farthing will demand an equal voice with any other. ,18 Around the country, the merchants and planters hastened to restore the old "bonds of government" against the power of the revolutionary committees. John Adams was the main author of a new Massachusetts constitution, passed in 1780, that actually raised property requirements for voting over what they had been in colonial times.

By 1787, when the U.S. Constitution was written, the ruling classes could portray the state constitutions framed during the previous decade as being "too restrictions. Only in Pennsylvania and Georgia were propertyless mechanics permitted to vote.

High prices and big profits Despite their fight with people of the "lower order," many merchants found that the revolutionary war had a silver lining just for them. Some of these "patriots" gained fortunes from privateering on the seas. Others were able to take over the trade and property of those merchants who had sided with Britain.

Still others had the profitable task of selling supplies to the army. In 1779, for example-mainly because of concerted action by the merchants—prices increased over 700 percent.

Speculation in currency man from the disposal of his property on such terms and for such considerations as he may think fit."

"A new revolution?"

Prices fell in the depression that followed the end of the war. Cheap British goods flooded in, and new war—a trade war— began. The mechanics were aroused against the merchants, both British and American, who allowed imported products to kill the business of local artisans. A new "Boston Tea Party" was threatened.

In the farming districts, meanwhile, soldiers returned home to find their lands mortgaged and their money worthless. They were further oppressed by taxes that the state governments levied to pay the interest on war debts. The level of taxes during the 1780s was 10 to 20 times that of the colonial period.

Debt-ridden farmers undertook armed actions to obtain relief. Shays' Rebellion, an uprising in Western Massachusetts, caused the ruling classes around the country to sound the alarm. Poor people were organizing "a new revolution" to redistribute property, they warned.

That threat, although somewhat illusory, strengthened the hand of leaders of the merchant class who were demanding a strong national government that could regulate commerce and finance. A standing army, they emphasized, was needed to both protect trade and put down rebellions.

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Hamburger Hill: A film directed by John Irvin, distributed by Paramount Pictures.

"Hamburger Hill" is a terrible movie.

Hamburger Hill—the event—was a 10day battle in May 1969 in which American troops sustained heavy casualties while assaulting Ap Bia Mountain, near the Laotian border. Unfortunately, "Hamburger Hill"-the movie-is nothing more than a dramatized army training film.

Even establishment critics have lashed out at this Vietnam War movie for its open MOVIE REVIEW hostility toward the antiwar movement and its blatant distortion of a politically significant battle.

A friend of mine, John Horton, who was a helicopter crew chief/door gunner during the real Battle of Hamburger Hill, thought the movie was a "piece of crap."

A piece of State Department crap is more like it. "Hamburger Hill" is nothing more than a slick, action-packed coverup for the needless and criminal slaughter of American GIs during a period when the war was supposedly "winding down."

Outrage in the U.S.

Although the film doesn't show it, the May 10-20, 1969, battle caused considerable protest and outrage throughout the United States and, most decisively, among GIs in Vietnam.

Even Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) was forced to speak out against the senseless slaughter. Of course, this didn't stop Kennedy from voting for all the appropriations needed to fight the war— thus continuing the real slaughter.

The American people were livid because the costly battle exposed the aggressive character of U.S. military operations at a time when the Paris Peace talks were in session. Nixon had promised to end the war; Hamburger Hill showed he was intensifying it. The weekly U.S. death figures for the week of the battle (430 killed) were the second highest for 1969.

A subsequent investigation revealed that the United States was stepping up the fighting by initiating twice as many smallunit (platoon and company-size) operations which increased contact-and casualties.

Between the time Nixon became president in 1968 and the final withdrawal of U.S. troops in 1973, over 20,000 additional Americans and hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese would die.

A.k.a. "Blackjack"

Ironically, a movie about the Battle of Hamburger Hill could have been the most antiwar and political cinematic treatment yet of the U.S. role in Vietnam. This movie should have been a graphic indictment of the U.S. military brass (and the government) for their cold-blooded sacrifice of so many American lives to take a hill that had no strategic significance.

This movie should have portrayed the hatred and bitterness of the GIs for their commanding officer, Lt. Col. Weldon Honeycutt-code name: Blackjack—who ordered and pushed the 11 assaults in 10 days that caused 564 casualties among the paratroopers (84 killed and 460 wounded).

"That damned Blackjack won't stop until he kills every damn one of us," one wounded GI snarled in the June 2, 1969, issue of Newsweek magazine.

In the movie, however, there mention of Col. Honeycutt.

John Horton knew Col. Honeycutt, a.k.a. Blackjack, quite well. His helicopter battalion was assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 101st Airborne, the unit commanded by Honeycutt which bore the brunt of leading the assaults.

"Blackjack was the most widely hated field commander in Vietnam," Horton said. "Even among 'lifers' he was considered 'gung-ho.' The overwhelming feeling was that he was nuts."

Indeed, shortly after the costly assault on Hamburger Hill, the underground GI newspaper in Vietnam, GI Says, publicly offered a $10,000 bounty on Col. Honeycutt. Despite several attempts, unfortunately, "Blackjack" managed to live out his tour in Vietnam. The same, however, could not be said for hundreds of young men of the working class under his command.

After the Battle of Hamburger Hill, "fraggings" and "refusals to advance" by rank-and-file GIs increased by over 100 percent. The American soldiers correctly perceived that their survival in Vietnam was in conflict with and antagonistic to the goals of the U.S. government.

Antiwar movement slandered The movie also attacks the antiwar movement with self-serving vignettes: one GI gets a letter from his girlfriend telling him she can't write anymore because her college friends told her it was immoral; another GI says he volunteered for a second tour because bags of shit were thrown at him when he arrived in Oakland after his first tour. Even worse, when he got home his wife was living with some "hippie."

The truth is that the anti-Vietnam War movement was the one force that could save the lives of GIs by demanding "Bring the Boys Home Now!" After "Hamburger Hill," most GIs couldn't agree more.

No reference is made in the movie to the fact that some units had to be coerced to continue the senseless and meaningless battle. Even the last scene of the movie is a distortion of the reality. When the GIs finally take the hill (which they abandoned one week later) a sign is posted with the words "Hamburger Hill."

What the sign really said, according to the Newsweek issue right after the battle was: "Hamburger Hill—was it worth it?" The answer to this question is the same for both the movie and the battle.

It's easy to see why "Hamburger Hill" is the worst of the recent deluge of Vietnam War movies. The film's producers sought and received the cooperation and collaboration of both the U.S. and the Philippine Departments of Defense.

The U.S. military provided the movie with F-4 fighters and C-46 helicopters to make the battle as "accurate" as possible. And its chief military advisor was Col. (Retired) Joseph P. Conmy Jr., who was a brigade commander at the Battle of Hamburger Hill.

However, as my friend Horton said, "This movie was more like a cartoon." He couldn't have been more on the mark.

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radical." Actually, most of the state constitutions retained undemocratic suffrage