Vietnam’s dark legacy, as faced on the West Germany borderWith the torment of Vietnam finally ended, the U. S.

Army is eager to move on, where moving on implies forgetting. Protecting Europe from the threat of Soviet invasion has once more claimed centerstage.

Among the units standing guard alongside the “Iron Curtain” is the storied 16th Armored Cavalry Regiment — known since the Civil War as the Ravens. Major Tobias “Tubby” Hicks serves as the 16th ACR’s regimental adjutant.

Himself a veteran of the Vietnam War, Hicks does not share this inclination to forget. Moreover, as a Black officer in an Army only just committing itself to racial equality, he is wary of belated enlightenment becoming an excuse to avoid reckoning with the immensity of the Vietnam disaster.

Now, a deadly border incident that Hicks is tasked to investigate — followed by the suicide of the 16th ACR’s lone Black unit commander — brings Tubby face-to-face with Vietnam’s dark legacy and tests his commitment to the Ravens’ regimental motto — “Duty, With Honor. ”.