Hugh Thompson’s Fight Against the My Lai Massacre

So much about human nature can seem depressing: we unthinkingly follow orders, allow confirmation bias to skew our views, and commit horrible acts of violence against people we don’t even know. However, the opposite is also true, and history has many examples of people who have disobeyed authority and risked their lives for total strangers. It is worthwhile thinking about why we can exhibit the best or the worst aspects of our natures.

This is Hugh Thompson, as a young officer in the U.S. military. He died back in 2006 aged 62, but he was only 25 when his duties as a helicopter pilot in Vietnam brought his life into sharp relief. The turning events happened during the Vietnam War, when an inexperienced company of American ground soldiers following the directions of Lieutenant William Calley attacked the inhabitants of the village of Son Mý, and went on a horrific killing spree known as the Mý Lai Massacre.

The company killed between 350 and 500 unarmed civilians, gang-raping women and shooting children under mothers who died trying to hide their offspring under their bodies. The entire village was set on fire. As the army was shooting, Hugh Thompson and two of his helicopter crew members saw combat from above and were immediately confused by the violence. When Thompson saw a group of women, elderly men, and children huddled together and armed Americans approaching them for the kill, he landed his helicopter between the villagers and the soldiers, and stopped the ground troops from further slaughter.

Why had Thompson been able to rise to the occasion? Behavioral anthropologist Robert Sapolsky points out that Thompson had been taught from his youth to disdain ethnic prejudice, possibly enabling him to see the Vietnamese as fellow humans. He also was partially descended from Indian Americans who lived through the Trail of Tears, and perhaps was aware of his country’s foibles. Thompson was also not a member of Calley’s company, which probably helped strengthen his resistance to orders.

In short, Thompson had a broad perspective, an upbringing that stressed anti-racism, and an awareness of history — important qualities that can draw out the best in our nature.