As Seymour Hersh has reported in “My Lai: A Report on The Massacre and Its Aftermath,” Lieutenant William Calley Jr. was a reflection of the type of soldier recruited during the Project 100,000 initiative.
On March 16, 1968, a company of Americal Division troops led by Captain Ernest Medina and Lieutenant William Calley slaughtered hundreds of civilians in a South Vietnamese hamlet known as My Lai (referred to as "Pinkville" by the troops).
He strongly criticized the court-martial of Lt. William Calley, the commanding officer of the U.S. troops involved in the My Lai massacre, because it did not include higher-ranking officers.
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Entitled "Off Limits" the programmes contained specially written songs and interviews with American deserters, critics, contemporary news clips, a Vietnamese girl, survivor of the 1969 My Lai Massacre and an extract from the US television interview by journalist Mike Wallace of Lt. William Calley, who was convicted for ordering the massacre.
He also covered the U.S. - U.S.S.R. Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT), the Sadat-Begin Peace Talks, the William Calley trial, several Civil Rights demonstrations, anti-Vietnam War protests and national political conventions from 1964 to 1988.
Thereafter, he drew the proceedings for NBC at major trials around the country, including the Chicago Seven, the Harrisburg Seven, Jack Ruby, James Earl Ray, Clay Shaw, Arthur Bremer, Benjamin Spock, the Gainesville Eight, Billie Sol Estes and most famously the court martial of Lt. William Calley convicted in the My Lai Massacre trial.
In 1975, Stanley Kramer and Lee Bernhard directed a docudrama Judgment: The Court Martial of Lieutenant William Calley with Tony Musante as Lieutenant Calley, and Harrison Ford as Frank Crowder.