The Hollywood star Jane Fonda infamously earned herself the nickname “Hanoi Jane” during the Vietnam War after she was pictured straddling an enemy anti-aircraft gun. Fonda, 85, was asked about this controversy in a new interview with Chris Wallace, and while she started out apologetic, she quickly shifted to being defiant.
Fonda Questioned About Hanoi Jane
“Your most famous protest was 50 years ago when you went to North Vietnam at the height of the war there,” Wallace reminded Fonda, according to Mediaite. “And you were photographed sitting on an anti aircraft gun. Here’s the picture that was used to shut shut down American plants, critics, and there were millions of them, called you a Hanoi Jane and said you were a traitor. And the question I have is 50 years later, how do you look back on that particular chapter?”
“It was a terrible mistake,” she replied. “I mean, the reality is, there were 24,000 American troops on the ground in South Vietnam. That all the ground troops were going home. The war was being fought by the air during during the Nixon administration.”
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‘It Was A Mistake To Go’
Wallace pressed on Fonda to explain what she meant by “terrible mistake.”
“It was a mistake to go, I never wanted to go to any military installations. It was the last day of my two week time there,” she explained. “And I was I was like a limp noodle, what I had experienced and what I had seen, I just I wasn’t able to resist.”
“They said we’re gonna take you out here today,” Fonda continued. “And I didn’t even think and they sang me a song and it made me laugh. I sang a song. That’s what made me laugh. And it was a terrible mistake because of the image that it showed, which was not at all what the reality was. And you know, maybe I was set up but I was an adult…I’m gonna take responsibility for it.”
“If I was Vietnamese, I probably would have tried to do the same thing, you know, but I should not have gone,” she added. “Hundreds of Americans had gone to North Vietnam, journalists diplomats, our Secretary of State Ramsey Clark, Vietnam veterans, but I said a movie star hasn’t gone and maybe if I go it will draw more attention, and that’s what it did. And four months later, the bombing stopped of the dikes.”
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Fonda Gets Defiant
While Fonda started out apologetic, she got defiant when Wallace asked how she felt about her “Hanoi Jane” nickname.
“Well, I didn’t like it. I mean, you know, of all manner of slings and arrows were thrown my way,” she said. “But when you know why you did something, and you’re willing to admit the mistakes that you made, but stand up for the things that you did that that mattered? You’re gonna come through it, okay.”
“And I refused to have them scare me away from being actively against the Vietnam War,” she continued. “And, you know, I think they thought, ‘Oh, she’s this white privilege rich, famous daughter of all of that stuff. You know, we can we can scare her,’ and boy did they try? And the more they tried, the more I…”
“The more you what?” Wallace asked, to which Fonda replied, “I know what I’m doing. I dug in my heels. Screw you. I’m not you know, they all went to jail.”
“Who, the people in the Nixon administration?” he asked, to which she responded, “Yeah.”
The more Fonda tries to justify her entire Hanoi Jane scandal, the worst it looks to the bulk of the American people. Fonda might want to quit while she’s ahead and stop talking about it altogether, because all she’s accomplishing is making herself look worse.
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