The bullshit circus

“It was characteristic of a lot of Americans in Vietnam to have no idea when they were being obscene, and some correspondents fell into that, writing their stories from the daily releases and battlegrams, tracking them through with the cheer-crazed language of the MACV Information Office, things like ‘discreet burst’ (one of those tore an old grandfather and two children to bits as they ran along a paddy wall one day, at least according to the report made later by the gunship pilot), ‘friendly casualties’ (not warm, not fun), ‘meeting engagement’ (ambush), concluding usually with 17 or 117 or 317 enemy dead and American losses ‘described as light.’ ” – Michael Herr, Dispatches