This is what a real hero looks like.What real bravery looks like.
Warrant Officer Hugh Thompson
A 25-year-old Army warrant officer and helicopter pilot from Georgia, Thompson risked everything, including his life, to stop fellow soldiers from slaughtering Vietnamese civilians.
Thompson, flying over My Lai with his two-man crew in an observation helicopter, repeatedly landed to confront superior officers and other soldiers engaged in the massacre. He repeatedly reported it over the radio and again in person when he returned to base camp. What was supposed to be a several-day mission and could have resulted in thousands more deaths, was called off.
For years his heroic acts brought him disdain and hostility. It “broke Hugh’s heart,” his gunner, Lawrence Colburn recalled. But it didn’t break his will.
Over the course of two years of hearings on My Lai, Thompson told the truth “despite peer pressure, ostracism, threats of prosecution and a nationally televised congressional browbeating,” according to the Army’s chief prosecutor.
Thompson continued to fly observation missions in Vietnam, despite suspicions he’d been assigned missions purposely to get him killed. He was hit by enemy fire a total of eight times and in a final crash after his helicopter was brought down by enemy machine-gun fire, he broke his back.
In 1998, the Army did an about-face. Thompson and his crew were awarded the Soldier’s Medal in a ceremony near the Vietnam Memorial.
