Valencia resident and Vietnam veteran Paul Berkowitz is being featured in a new documentary titled “Unseen Warriors: Army Combat Cameramen in Vietnam.”

Berkowitz moved to Valencia right after coming home from Vietnam, where he was a combat cameraman from 1968 to 1970.

He worked at CalArts for five-and-a-half years, and raised his family in the Santa Clarita Valley, with two daughters who are both Hart High graduates.

“Our unit was stationed in Vietnam, and documented the war, for five years,” Berkowitz said. “A lot of people don’t realize that there was a camera man — or woman, right there too.”

Bryan Grigsby, Department of the Army Special Photo Office. The caption should read: A Viet Cong soldier emerges from a spider hole in Saigon in May 1968.

Berkowitz was a theater arts major at UCLA in between his bachelor’s and master’s degrees when he enlisted in the Army. He was assigned to the 221st Signal Company as a lieutenant and camera team leader. 

The documentary, which is more than four hours, was produced by Traditions Military Videos and was released in February, according to Ellen Holzman, co-owner of Traditions Military Videos.  Photos and film clips are available upon request. The documentary is described on the company’s website here.

“His photographs and expertise were invaluable in putting together the documentary,” said Holzman. “In addition, film footage that he kept as memorabilia from the Vietnam War provides viewers of the documentary with a feeling of being there with him.”

The process took about three years, Berkowitz said. Fifty different camera people were involved in the process of putting the film together, which is very extensive.

Marty Katz films soldiers operating on the Mekong Delta aboard a PBR during the Vietnam War.
Photo Courtesy Marty Katz, 221st Signal Company.

“Camera people are still there, still doing it, still risking their lives,” Berkowitz said. “People don’t want to just hear about the war, they want to see it.”