Historically, the Christmas Truce goes back to World War I and possibly earlier. But we had them in Viet Nam, too, though I only recall the one of 1969 when I was there.
Russ Wheat, an OCS classmate, recalls a ditty his rifle company used to sing about that time: “Jingle Bells, shotgun shells, VC in the grass, you can take your Christmas Truce and shove it da-da-da.”
Of course such truces made a certain sense in a European war, but none at all in an Asian one where the enemy not only did not celebrate Christmas but had few if any Christians. Likewise they didn’t “respect” the red crosses on the medevac birds, no more than the Taliban has in Afghanistan.
The Christmas Truce of 1969 was pure politics, consumption entirely for the home folks for whom the anti-war protests were becoming ferocious. It had little or no effect on us with the misfortune of having to fight the damn war.
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 