The Green Berets (film) - Production Notes

Production Notes

• Columbia Pictures, having bought the book's pre-publication film rights, was not able to produce a script that was approved by the Army while producer David L. Wolper, who also tried to buy the same rights, could not obtain finance for filming. A screenplay was written by George Goodman who had served with the Special Forces in the 1950s as a military intelligence officer and had written a 1961 article about the Special Forces called The Unconventional Warriors in Esquire Magazine. Columbia sent Goodman to South Vietnam for research. Robin Moore felt the Pentagon pressured Wolper into breaking an agreement with Moore. Wolper acquired the rights to film The Devil's Brigade, an account of the World War II 1st Special Service Force in 1965, and produced that film instead.

• The film's origins began in 1965 with a trip by John Wayne to South Vietnam, and his subsequent decision to produce a film about the Army special forces deployed there as a tribute to them. Wayne was a steadfast supporter of American involvement in the war in Vietnam. He co-directed the film, and turned down the "Major Reisman" role in The Dirty Dozen to do so.

• Wayne's character, Colonel Mike Kirby, was based on United States Army Captain (later Major) Lauri Törni. He is known as the soldier who fought under three flags: Finnish, German (when he fought the Soviets in World War II) and American (where he was known as "Larry Thorne"). He originally was a Finnish Army captain who led an infantry company in the Finnish Winter and Continuation Wars. He emigrated to the United States in the late 1940s, and in 1954 joined the U.S. Army. In November 1963 he joined the Special Forces unit A-734 in South Vietnam and fought in the Mekong Delta. He disappeared during a mission on 18 October 1965 and was reported MIA (Missing In Action). Posthumously promoted to Major, his remains were found in 1999 and formally identified in 2003. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery, section 60, tombstone 8136, on 26 June 2003.

• Much of the film was shot in the summer of 1967 at Fort Benning, Georgia. The United States Army provided several UH-1 Huey attack helicopters, a C-7 Caribou light transport, and the United States Air Force supplied two C-130 Hercules transports for use in the film. The Army also provided authentic uniforms for use by the actors, including the OG-107 green and "Tiger Stripe" Tropical Combat Uniform (jungle fatigues), with correct Vietnam War subdued insignia and name tapes. Some of the "Vietnamese village" sets were so realistic they were left intact, and were later used by the Army for training troops destined for Vietnam. The commander of the United States Army Airborne School at Fort Benning can be seen shooting trap with John Wayne in the film. He can be identified as the only soldier wearing the Vietnam-era "baseball" fatigue cap; the rest wear green berets. The soldiers exercising on the drill field which Wayne shouts to were Army airborne soldiers in training.

• The defensive battle that takes place during the movie is very loosely based on the Battle of Nam Dong, during which two Viet Cong battalions and the PAVN attacked the Nam Dong CIDG camp located in a valley near the Laotian border of the South Vietnam Central Highlands. The camp was defended by a mixed force of Americans, Australians and South Vietnamese troops on 6 July 1964. For his actions at Nam Dong, Captain Roger C. Donlon was the first American to receive the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War. Australian Warrant Officer Kevin Conway was the first Australian to be killed in action in the Vietnam War during the battle. The A-107 camp scene used in the film was realistically constructed on an isolated, hilly area of Fort Benning, complete with barbed wire trenches, punji sticks, sandbagged bunkers, mortar pits, towers, support buildings and hooches for the combined strike force. The camp set was largely destroyed by the producers using several tons of dynamite and black powder during the filming of the battle sequence.

• George Takei missed working on the "The Trouble with Tribbles" and "The Gamesters of Triskelion" episodes of the original "Star Trek" series to work on this movie.

• David Janssen was working on this film when the final episode of his series "The Fugitive" aired.

• The famous supposed-goof at the end of the movie where Hamchuck and Kirby walk along the beach into the sunset and watch the sun set over the ocean in the east is not necessarily impossible. Since no previous scenes take place on the coast, this scene could have taken place, as Vietnam does have a west coast, albeit a short one. Others have pointed out that it could be a sunrise that was filmed instead of a sunset. 09°57′26″N 105°05′42″E / 9.95722°N 105.095°E / 9.95722; 105.095.