Veteran actress Jane Fonda is not proud of America, but applauds the Democratic “resistance” and says she does not regret her 1972 visit to North Vietnam which earned her the nickname of “Hanoi Jane” among her critics.
“Are you proud of America today?” the BBC recently asked Ms. Fonda, now 79 but still plenty active in Hollywood.
“No,” she answered. “But, I’m proud of the resistance. I’m proud of the people who are turning out in unprecedented numbers and continue and continue over and over and over again to protest what President Trump is doing. I’m very proud of them.”
She appeared proud of one other thing as well.
“I don’t regret going to Vietnam,” Ms. Fonda told the British broadcaster. “The United States was bombing the dikes in North Vietnam — earthen dikes in the Red River Delta. If the dikes had given way, according to Henry Kissinger, somewhere around 2 million people could have died of famine and drowning. And we were bombing, and it wasn’t being talked about. And I thought, I’m a celebrity. Maybe if I go, and I bring back evidence. And it did stop two months after I got back, so I’m proud that I went. It changed my life, all for the good.”
She did regret posing with an anti-aircraft gun in Vietnam at the height of that conflict, according to the interview, transcribed by Jeff Poor, a Breitbart political analyst.
“There was a ceremony,” Ms. Fonda observed. “I was asked to sing, and people were laughing and so forth and I sat down. And then I got up and as I walked away, I realized, ’Oh my gosh. It’s going to look like I am against my own country’s soldiers and siding with the enemy,’ which is the last thing in the world that was true.”
• Jennifer Harper can be reached at jharper@washingtontimes.com.
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