‘Da 5 Bloods’ Explores the Possibility of Reparations for Vietnam Vets

From the romanticization of bloodshed to the white savior trope, films about the Vietnam War have received their fair share of often well-deserved criticism. Many have come to view these films as a failed attempt made by American directors to justify the United States’ actions in Vietnam by glorifying individual soldiers. It's a relief, then, that Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" takes a decidedly different approach as Lee refuses to perpetuate this characterization of the war. Starting the film with excessively violent and authentic footage from the Vietnam War (which lacked a much-needed trigger warning), Lee makes himself clear: He has no desire to glamorize the brutality that millions of people endured.

Forty-five years after the end of the war, four Black veterans: Paul (Delroy Lindo), Otis (Clarke Peters), Eddie (Norm Lewis), and Melvin (Isiah Whitlock Jr.) reunite in Vietnam for what they claim is an expedition to find the remains of their squad leader Stormin’ Norman (one of Chadwick Boseman’s final roles). They seek to reunite the five “Bloods,” the nickname they created for their squad during the war. It is later revealed, however, that this is only part of the goal, as the veterans are also searching for $17 million worth of gold bars that their squad took from the United States’ government as “reparations.” Now that recent mudslides have revealed the squad’s old landmarks, they, along with Paul’s son, David (Jonathan Majors) who added himself to the mission, return to the Vietnamese countryside for the first time since the war ended.

As the aforementioned violence Lee uses to open his film foreshadows, the veterans are unable to easily remove the gold from the hillside. Whether by active minefields or clashes with armed local Vietnamese gangs, several of the Bloods and the French members of LAMB (Love Against Mines and Bombs) meet untimely and extremely gruesome deaths. The only Blood who survives the trip is Otis, along with Paul’s son, and they distribute the wealth amongst themselves, the families of their fallen friends, LAMB, and a chapter of Black Lives Matter. The film concludes with Norman’s remains finally being returned to the United States and a segment of a speech given by Martin Luther King Jr. at Riverside Church.

Spike Lee deviates from the standard white-focused Vietnam War film by centering Black veterans. Lee is well known for telling stories of Black heroes largely ignored by Hollywood or the history books. Though "Da 5 Bloods" may be a fictional story, the dilemmas that Lee’s characters face are not. Like the rest of the United States, the Black community was divided by the Vietnam War. Many, such as Martin Luther King Jr., opposed the war, describing it as another form of American colonialism. Many Black citizens also refused to risk their lives in Vietnam when they were still treated as second-class citizens in the United States. On the other hand, others in the Black community believed that by serving in the Vietnam War they would gain respectability: By demonstrating their patriotism, perhaps they would come home to an America that no longer oppressed them.

"Da 5 Bloods" seems firmly convinced that those promises to Black soldiers were a false hope. In one scene, while the Bloods are idly waiting for orders, they listen to a radio broadcast, where Lee seems to address this idea directly. A Vietnamese woman addresses the Black GIs, questioning why they serve in higher proportion than white Americans, and fight the Vietnamese “so far away from where [they] are needed,” referring to the violence against Black Americans during the Civil Rights Movement.

Later on during the war, the United States sent gold to pay local Vietnamese soldiers fighting alongside American troops, and tasked the five Bloods to recover that gold when the plane went down. With the gold symbolizing reparations or the civil rights Black Americans had yet to receive even after the Civil Rights Movement, Lee’s message becomes apparent: those Black Americans who had chosen to fight in Vietnam in hopes of gaining more rights returned to the States without them. This is reinforced by the excerpt from King’s speech Lee includes: “America would never be free or saved from itself until the descendants of its slaves were loosed completely from the shackles they still wear.” Hunting for the gold even after the war, the five Bloods demonstrate Lee’s argument that Black Americans are still seeking reparations today and only gained a portion of them despite their bloodshed and sacrifice.

Spike Lee’s film comes at a time when, unfortunately, many Black Americans are still fighting for the “gold” left by the Bloods in Vietnam. Although Lee critiques the idea of Black Americans using military service to gain favorability with white America, "Da 5 Bloods" serves as a timely reminder of the countless contributions Black Americans have made to the United States. In its critique of the false promises made to Black veterans of the Vietnam War, "Da 5 Bloods" serves as a larger reminder of the many ways America's promises of equity for Black Americans have gone unfulfilled.