The movie shows the best case of the deception of the Vietnam War

Rating: 9/10 (19 April 2007)

Well, there is only one movie that can rival that of "Full Metal Jacket." That is "The Green Berets". But "Full Metal Jacket" is better than the former because "The Green Berets" was a little bit too grainy in depicting the Vietnam War.
Well, the example of the deception of the Vietnamese in the Tet cease-fire scene in "Full Metal Jacket" was just only one of the famous stories in the so-called ugly war America had with Vietnam. As the Vietnamese fireworks started to go off outside the U.S. Marines base at Da Nang in honor of Tet New Year, the Marine soldiers had thought that it would be a relief that the only sounds of war were pyrotechnics and that's all. But it was only short-lived.
Then the Marines recognized that there was two very big booms. What saved their lives was that the booms would have been from the largest firecracker or fireworks device but when the lights flickered on and off in the barracks, the marines knew that the cease-fire on Tet was a ugly deception. The soldiers ran out of the barracks, heavily armed, and ran into the gun holes as two more explosions hit the base (probably the explosions are from Saiper rockets). Then they see an enemy truck trying to ram into the main gate of base. The truck does hit the gate and blows up (because it was loaded with explosives)...and then a platoon of Vietnamese soldiers (I think this was about 100 soldiers) followed. The Marine soldiers were able to gun them all down before the enemy could do further damage.
No wonder the Tet cease-fire caused the Vietnam War to be even uglier than the U.S. involvement in the Korean War.
There was one little scene that I liked that reminded me of what was happening in Iraq. In one area of war-torn Vietnam, a Marine named Craze was finding, across damaged buildings. a toy doll on top of a heap of debris. Craze thinks that the doll could be his token of hope in an war that America would never win. He touches the hand of the doll and then... BOOM! Craze is pushed back hard and falls to the ground, getting the full brunt of the explosive blast at point-blank range. The other Marines try to help Craze but it is too late. Then the other Marine says "Craze has been hit....booby-trap." Such an explosion reminds me of the roadside bombs and explosively-formed projectiles that are currently happening in Iraq.
But the sniper shooting, where a lady Vietnamese soldier sprayed deadly bullets on two of the over 10 people of the U.S. platoon out of Parris Island, reminds me quickly of the 1966 shooting in the University of Texas, where the Parris Island USMC drill sergeant mentions over about 200 Parris Island "maggots", as the sergeant calls them. The sniper shooting dwarfs the booby-trap killing of Craze.
The sniper then manages to kill one of the platoon's radio man before the rest of the platoon realize that there is only one thing to do...neutralize the sniper. As day turned into night, they throw smoke grenades and head inside one of the dilapidated buildings, and then, the sniper comes out, with her automatic weapon. The first Marine sees the sniper and gets ready to shoot but it will be all for not as a second Marine shoots the lady soldier down to the ground, wounding her.
The platoon leader and the rest of the squad see that they accomplished the mission, saying "We've got the sniper!". But then, a conflict emerges---should the platoon kill the soldier that was already wounded and disarmed, or should she be shot because of the carnage, risking a date with the court-martial for violating the rules of engagement. A platoon member who was for peace is picked to do the unimaginable--shoot the sniper dead, which, after several hesitations, does. Now, the one who killed the sniper realizes that if the war mongers can kill, the same goes for those who are for peace.