Off. The plane is taking off. As the north Vietnamese Army close in on saigon and South Vietnamese resistance crumbled, the skeletal staff of military personnel began to consider the imprisonment of their coworkers. With an official evacuation of South Vietnamese held up individual americans and South Vietnamese took matters into their own hands to execute the evacuation and save as many South Vietnamese as possible. Ms. Kennedy talks about her career as a filmmaker. She is the daughter of Robert F Kennedy and ethel kennedy. Rory kennedy, can you remember when you first were even aware that there was a vietnam war . Well, i was 7 when the events took place that we document in the film of the last days of the war, which was 1975. You know, there is not a moment where i remember vietnam, but i feel like it was kind of in the ether of my childhood. It was in my consciousness. I have always felt this is a kind of seminal event in our nations history, and i was really happy to have the opportunity to revisit vietnam and through this particular story of the final days of the war. Did you go there at all . I never went to vietnam. My intention was to go there. You know, the story that i wanted to tell, from the vietnamese perspective, is about the vietnamese who were left behind and what happened to them. But we were told that, and i did extensive research, that nobody in vietnam would talk to us about this time in history particularly who had been imprisoned or tortured or where, you know, they kind of struggled in the aftermath of the war. That there is still fear and concerns of government retaliation and repercussions. So that because our story is 100 in 1975, you know, really in those final days, theres not really a big story to be told about whats going on in vietnam today, other than what happened to the people left behind, which is, obviously, a significant part of our story. But we ended up finding a number of people who are in america who helped provide that perspective. How do you and your husband divide up the responsibilities on Something Like this . Well, technically, im the producer and director, and hes the writer. But mark is really my partner in all of my feature documentaries. You know, we decide whether i should do them together, often and he, from the beginning when im doing interviews and selecting characters and kind of the general direction of the story, he is a part of all of those discussions. Sometimes theyre formal in the office. Sometimes, you know, its over dinner or with the kids screaming across from us. He really plays an essential role and particularly in this film which, i would say, the biggest challenge for us was in the edit room because it was such a complicated story. There were so many perspectives so it was trying to kind of orient the audience, some of whom are familiar with vietnam some of whom arent, to know what was happening. And we didnt use a narrator. We didnt use any historians or experts looking back. Its all kind of in real time. So that made it challenging. So he played a huge role, along with my editor, don kleszy, and we had a great producerwriter kevin mccallister. What was the biggest help initially, in getting your kind of parameters on this story . And how many days are involved in the documentary . Well, we knew we wanted to take on the last days of vietnam, and, you know, i think a lot of us are familiar with the iconic image of the helicopter going off of what we think is the embassy. Its, in fact, not the embassy. What is that building, by the way . It was a cia outpost, basically. Initially, the plan was there was 13 buildings that helicopters if they had to resort to what was option four four options, which was a helicopter airlift. There was 13 buildings that they were going to have helicopters leave from. But once they called for the evacuation by playing the song White Christmas throughout the streets of saigon, if you recall from the film, then the streets got so crowded and overrun with people, you know, largely South Vietnamese that nobody could get to those buildings. So they ended up centering the entire evacuation out of the embassy. But what was it that you saw or read that capsulized all this for you early . Well so there were i would say there were two things. One is so i was familiar with that iconic image and i wanted to understand that more and what had happened, right . And i thought i knew a lot and you know, as i did the research, i was really blown away by the actual events and what took place and how dramatic they were and how i knew very, very little of it and how important it seemed. So part of my interest was to share those events with people because i found that a lot of other people didnt know what happened. And then, we started to uncover these really extraordinary stories of americans and vietnamese who went against u. S. Policy, which, at that point, was to just get the americans out of the country because the north was coming in so fast. And saigon fell so much quicker than anybody expected. South vietnam fell much quicker than anybody expected. So the policy there was about 6,000 americans on the ground, at that point. We had signed the paris peace accord in 1973 and so there was a peace. So there were no troops in the country and so it was people who were military personnel who were protecting the embassy and, you know, advisors and whatnot. So the idea was to just get them out of the country. And these americans who were on the ground basically said not so fast. We have our South Vietnamese allies, people we worked with, many of them had wives and children who were South Vietnamese and they werent about to just leave them behind. And so, you know, once i started uncovering and getting deeper into those stories, then i was you know, really excited because i felt like these stories nobody knew. And for so many americans, vietnam is such a dark moment in our history. And the acts of these men who were there were so heroic and courageous. And, you know, when i watch the film, even though ive seen it so many times, it really makes me proud of them, you know, in this kind of wave of history moving against them and this tide, that they did the right thing. Where did you go to high school . I went to madeira. Right out here in the suburbs of washington. Yes. And you went to Brown University . Yes, i went to brown. Did anyone at madeira or at brown teach you anything about the vietnam war . At brown, yes. I took a course on vietnam. So there was a course really dedicated to vietnam, which i took. But this story was not part of that curriculum. So i did not know this story. So many people today say that no one ever teaches them about the vietnam war. And there isnt a lot taught. But why isnt there a lot taught, in your opinion . And what are the lessons of vietnam . Before we get into that, were going to show some excerpts from the film. Right. Well, i would say there are many lessons about vietnam. In terms of what i feel like ive learned in making this film is and having a deeper appreciation for getting out of a war after having made this film, that i feel that there were very few options available by april 29, 1975, or even in early april when it became pretty clear that the country was going to fall. And, you know, we were trying to get congress or kissinger and ford were trying to get congress to pass a bill that would, you know, provide 722 million to the vietnamese during those final hours. I think that wouldve been helpful and made some difference, but i dont think it wouldve changed things so dramatically. So what it says, to me, is that the real choice that you have is when you enter a war. And once you enter a war especially when it goes a direction that you dont anticipate, which is losing, there are virtually no options. So, you know, that decision of entering a war and understanding, i think, from the beginning, what the exit strategy is, what the goals are, what the timeline is, and having an appreciation for what the impact is going to be, because you know, another thing that, i think in making this film has taught me is the reminder of the human cost of war, you know, which is significant and which you see in watching this film. And i think, sometimes, gets lost in the debate about what were doing and the strategies and the plans. You know, what is whats the cost on the ground to the people who are most directly impacted and affected . Lets watch about two minutes of this. And it shows the north vietnamese coming south back then and get you to explain some more. [video clip] this is the way my map looked mid april. The north vietnamese just rolled down the coast. Saigon was clearly threatened. The situation was urgent. Urgent understates it. At this time, ambassador martin had been back in washington, trying to persuade washington to vote additional aid. He came back to saigon, and my boss, the cia station chief, said, go down and tell the old man whats happening. I went in and i said, mr. Ambassador, half of the south Vietnamese Army has disintegrated. Were in grave trouble. Please, sir, plan for an evacuation. At least allow us to begin putting together lists of South Vietnamese we should rescue. And he said, no, frank. Its not so bleak, and i wont have this negative talk. Young officers in the embassy began to mobilize black operation, meaning a makeshift underground railway evacuation using outgoing cargo aircraft that would be totally below the radar of the ambassador. People, like myself and others, took the bull by the horns and organized an evacuation. In my case, that meant friends of mine who were Senior Officers in the South Vietnamese military. As the north vietnamese came closer and closer to saigon, these people were dead men walking. Go back to the ambassador Graham Martin. What part did he play in this . So Graham Martin was the ambassador, and he was really the gatekeeper, in some sense. And he had the ability to green light the evacuation plan. The evacuation plan is created by the military but the ability to approve it and to put it in motion is really left in the hands of the ambassador. Graham martin had lost a son in the vietnam war. He was very dedicated to preserving South Vietnam. He didnt want to see us walk away from South Vietnam. And i think, largely, for those reasons, he was resistant to putting an evacuation plan into place and green lighting it when everybody, most people, both on the ground and, to some degree in washington, realized that South Vietnam was going to fall and that it was inevitable. Frank snepp, former cia agent, and very controversial, was sued by our own government. Why did you pick him as a spokesman . Well, we were really committed to finding people who were on the ground who had who were, you know, in the embassy, who were in saigon at the end of april when things were falling. And he was he was there. He was he was sued by our government because he wrote a book about the events that took place. I dont believe that he was sued because he misrepresented those events. I think he was sued because he wasnt supposed to share them in the capacity that he did. So but the reality is that he had very good firsthand knowledge and, i think, helps us explain the story for folks and to understand exactly what happened. Where is he today . Hes in los angeles. Doing what . What kind of work . I know that he is writing some scripts or pitching some ideas to make into films. But i dont know if he has a job behind that. And Scott Herrington you see stu herrington. I mean, stu herrington. You see a lot of him during the film. Who is he . Yeah. So stu herrington was a captain in the u. S. Army. And he plays a significant role, both because he was kind of at the forefront of these event as we document them, and he also helped on a number of levels getting vietnamese out of the country. He was one of the people, as this clip shows, started black operation, black ops, in mid april when it was very clear to him that the country was going to fall and that the he wasnt getting approval from the ambassador. And so he started getting highrisk vietnamese out of the country with a group of other people. He would, basically, have a meeting spot, put them in vans take them to the airport, and send them off on cargo aircraft. So he kind of helped initiate that effort. He also continues on, where our story ends up, landing, which is embassy on aril 29, 1975 when the evacuation is really underway, and he helped start that evacuation. And he is there to the bitter end. He was in a particularly difficult predicament where he stayed throughout the night. And the ambassador doesnt come across very well in that clip, but he does, to some degree, redeem himself later in the film when you see that he was asked to be one of the first the first person to leave the embassy on a helicopter. He was told he needed to go. And he refused to get on the helicopter. He wanted to get as many vietnamese out as possible. And so he, among others, were trying to fill the helicopters with South Vietnamese knowing that once all the americans got out that the u. S. Government would stop the evacuation. So he played a big role in that. But, in any case so coming back to Stuart Herrington, he, then, stayed there throughout the night, also helping vietnamese get on these helicopters. And about 3 45 in the morning, martin got a president ial order saying that he had to get on the next helicopter out which i think was the second to the last helicopter. So the ambassador left at 3 45 and then probably the third to the last helicopter. And then, they were told that there were going to be no more helicopters sent for vietnamese. So stu herrington was in a terrible position where he had to tell the 420 vietnamese who were left behind who were still in the embassy, and he had to tell them that, you know, they werent on american soil so while he wasnt going to leave until they all left, and he left them in the courtyard and he said he was going out to go to the bathroom and he walked around the backside of the building and he walked up the staircase to a helicopter that was waiting on the roof. And so as the sun was coming up, he looked down at these 420 people who were left behind. And, you know, he thought how wrong this was and how it kind of encapsulated the whole vietnam war in that moment. Do you have any idea we have about a million and a half vietnamese with some connection. I mean, there are a lot of children that have been born since those days. We have very few iraqis very few iraqis are even allowed into the country after that war. Why did we bring so many into this country from vietnam and so few from iraq or even afghanistan . Right. Well, the events of this film and in those few those last moments, there were about 130,000 vietnamese who were able to get out of the country. And then, over the next couple decades, there were, you know, the plight of the boat people where millions of vietnamese fled vietnam. And some of them were able to get to america, but hundreds of thousands died during those voyages. I think you know, its a curious thing. I think, with vietnam and the vietnamese people, we did have a profound connection to them. And, you know, i dont think you you see the marriage rates that you know, in iraq and afghanistan between soldiers and iraqis and afghanis. You know, our soldiers married a lot of vietnamese and had a lot of vietnamese children. So i think the relationship between the two countries and we really fought side by side with them in a pretty united fashion. So i think that it was there were different wars and different cultures and different people. So i think it speaks to kind of those larger cultural issues and the natures of those wars. Heres some more video for somebody my age. I remember this like it was yesterday. The helicopters being pushed off the ship. The ship is the name of the ship . The u. S. S. Kirk. And the helicopters belonged to . The helicopters belonged to the South Vietnamese air force which had then fallen apart. And so if i can you give me a moment to set this up . Sure. So what was happening is there was a fleet out in the south china sea, the u. S. Fleet. And there were helicopters going from that fleet. U. S. Helicopters going to the embassy, picking people up bringing the back to the fleet. And then what happened is the South Vietnamese air force had disintegrated, but the pilots were still there, and they still had their helicopters. So they then started getting in their helicopters, filling them to capacity and beyond, with their families and friends and chasing the u. S. Helicopters out to sea, not knowing where they were going, if they would be able to land, having no communication with the United States, but feeling that the risk of going out to sea and not knowing where youre going to land was less than the risk of staying behind and what might happen to them. So the u. S. S. Kirk was monitoring the waters between the fleet and the land and so was the first point for these helicopters to see. The u. S. S. Kirk didnt know who they were or what was happening but they took the risk to take the first one down. And heres the clip. This is less than a minute. Well watch it. [video clip] we had to disarm them. None of them have ever landed on a ship before. They were a Vietnamese Air force. Everybody had a gun and [indiscernible] and about five minutes later another one came in and landed. And we pushed his airplane over the side. That was the second one, and i helped push that one over, too. And the third plane came in. It landed also. We pushed it over the side. So meanwhile, weve thrown three helicopters in the water so far. This is incredible. I know you probably dont believe any of this but its all true. How many helicopters were pushed over the side . I know for the u. S. S. Kirk, i think it was 17, is my recollection. I think there were about 157 people that they saved due to pulling bringing the helicopters down. The issue with the u. S. S. Kirk is it was not one of the ships from the fleet, and so it wasnt meant to land helicopters. So it only had space for one helicopter. And so then, you know, the question was, well, what do we do . We cant land another helicopter if we keep these helicopters on board. So then the captain said,