On Wednesday night, actress Jane Fonda was asked about her controversial activism during the Vietnam War. 
 
 In opposition to the Vietnam War, Fonda visited the capital of Hanoi and during her 1972 visit, she was photographed standing on top of an anti-aircraft gun used to kill American soldiers, causing decades of outrage from her critics, nicknaming the actress “Hanoi Jane.” 
 
 During her appearance on The Late Show, Stephen Colbert took a moment to address that moment in her life. 
 
 “Have what we’ve learned about that war in the decades since changed your attitude toward that war or changed your attitude about what you did at the time?” Colbert asked. 
 
 “No, I have- from the moment that I did the bad thing I did, which was I sat on an anti-aircraft gun in north Vietnam,” Ford responded. “I wasn’t even thinking what I was doing and photographs were taken and that image went out and the image makes it look like I was against our soldiers, which was never the case. I had been working with soldiers prior to that and for years after that. It’s why I made the movie Coming Home. But that image is there and I will go to my grave regretting that. I knew right away that that was wrong.” 
 
 She later told The Late Show host that she doesn’t regret going to Vietnam since she learned a lot while being there. 
 
 Earlier this year, NBC’s Megyn Kelly invoked the “Hanoi Jane” photo in her feud with Fonda after the award-winning actress criticized the daytime talk show host following her appearance. 
 
 Watch the clip above, via CBS. 
 
 Have a tip we should know? tips@mediaite.com ||||| "The image of Jane Fonda, Barbarella, Henry Fonda's daughter, sitting on an enemy aircraft gun was a betrayal, the largest lapse of judgment I can imagine," she said in 2005 of her controversial trip to Vietnam. 
 
 Almost 45 years after she climbed into the seat of a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun vehicle and smiled for photographers, Jane Fonda, now 79, still finds herself targeted by U.S. military veterans. 
 
 The actress and activist, who took to the L.A. streets for the Women's March to protest Donald Trump's policies, already was one of Hollywood's most outspoken opponents of the Vietnam War when, at 34, she made a two-week trip to Hanoi in July 1972. By then, more than 60,000 U.S. soldiers had lost their lives in the conflict; Vietnamese casualties were close to 1 million. 
 
 In 2011, Fonda wrote on her website that the photo op — which earned her the nickname "Hanoi Jane" and incensed millions of Americans — came about after Vietnamese soldiers serenaded her with a Communist folk song. "I heard these words: 'All men are created equal; they are given certain rights; among these are life, liberty and happiness,' " she recalled. Then someone led her to a weapon that had shot down countless American aircraft, and flashbulbs went off. "It is possible it was a setup. I will never know." 
 
 Fonda told 60 Minutes in 2005 that the trip, where she met with peasants, artists and intellectuals, was worthwhile — but the photo was a mistake. "The image of Jane Fonda, Barbarella, Henry Fonda's daughter, sitting on an enemy aircraft gun was a betrayal," she said, "the largest lapse of judgment I can imagine." 
 
 This story first appeared in a February standalone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe. ||||| Jane Fonda and Megyn Kelly appear to be gearing up for a war of words. 
 
 One day after Fonda told Variety she felt the NBC news anchor was “inappropriate” when she asked her in September about her cosmetic surgery, Kelly devoted a segment of her “Megyn Kelly Today’ to the simmering imbroglio. 
 
 “Look, I gave her the chance to empower other women, young and old, on a subject which she purports to know well and she rejected it. That’s okay. But I have no regrets about the question. Nor am I in the market for a lesson from Jane Fonda on what is and is not appropriate. After all, this is a woman whose name is synonymous with outrage,” said Kelly, speaking Monday during her program. “Look at her treatment of our military during the Vietnam war, many of our veterans still call her ‘Hanoi Jane’ thanks to her radio broadcasts which attempted to shame American troops. She posed on an anti-aircraft gun used to shoot down our pilots.” 
 
 Fonda seemed offended in September during an interview early in the program’s tenure, but told Variety she would consider returning to “Megyn Kelly Today.” “It wasn’t like I was upset. I was stunned. It was so inappropriate,” Fonda said about the question. “It showed that she’s not that good an interviewer. But if she comes around and learns her stuff, sure.” 
 
 During the segment, Kelly showed several pieces of video from other news programs in which Fonda has discussed her cosmetic surgery. ||||| Ann Curry has weighed in on the ongoing Megyn Kelly/Jane Fonda drama — and she thinks Kelly’s decision to blast the actress on air this week was “not journalism.” 
 
 “Journalists are not supposed to be the story,” the former Today show anchor said during a Tuesday appearance on ABC’s The View. “We’re supposed to be — and it’s a struggle, I think, for everyone to be — but we’re supposed to be humble. We’re supposed to use whatever time we’re given to shine a light on other stories. I mean, there are so many stories that we’re not covering. And to take time with this — this is not journalism.” 
 
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 Ann Curry (left) and Megyn Kelly Sylvain Gaboury/Patrick McMullan/Getty; Nathan Congleton/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty 
 
 On Monday, nearly four months after Fonda shut down a question about her plastic surgery during an awkward interview on NBC’s Megyn Kelly Today, the former Fox News anchor concluded her 9 a.m. hour with a three-minute aside on Fonda in which she brought up the actress’ controversial past, invoking the “Hanoi Jane” nickname that was used against her during and after the Vietnam War. 
 
 Kelly’s comments came after Fonda, 80, brought up the initial interview twice in the last week — during a Today appearance with co-anchors Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb, and in a Variety interview over the weekend, calling Kelly’s question “so inappropriate.” 
 
 “I have no regrets about that question, nor am I in the market for a lesson from Jane Fonda on what is and is not appropriate,” Kelly, 47, said Monday. “This is a woman whose name is synonymous with outrage. Honestly, she has no business lecturing anyone on what qualifies as offensive.” 
 
 And Curry, 61, wasn’t the only View panelist who took issue with Kelly. Co-host Meghan McCain, 33, agreed with Curry, arguing that “there are so many more provocative and interesting topics Megyn should be covering.” 
 
 “To drag the Vietnam War into a plastic surgery conversation is a real stretch,” said Joy Behar, 75. “Jane should have just said to her, ‘And how much work have you had, b—-?’ “ 
 
 Asked if Kelly’s actions reflected poorly on NBC and the Today show in general, Curry said “the decision is really what the viewers will accept or not accept.” 
 
 “There is a feeling, listening to some of this, that … we are witnessing a certain amount of meanness which we should not tolerate,” she said. “In general, about everything, we are better than this. We are made of good stuff. We can reach out to each other. We can listen.” 
 
 RELATED VIDEO: Ann Curry Breaks Her Silence on Leaving Today, Says It ‘Hurt Like Hell’ 
 
 Whoopi Goldberg, 62, brought up one of Kelly’s own past controversies. 
 
 “Megyn, if I can forgive you for telling all of my friends’ black children that Santa is only white, you can step back,” she said. “Because you made a mistake. We all make mistakes. You’ve got to lighten up, babe. Jane made a mistake, and she’s copped to it, and as she has said, that will haunt her to her dying day. She’s aware, believe me — she knows how Fox News has used that and how it’s portrayed her. She knows. And she’s doing her best. But for you to do that is so not you.” 
 
 Later in the discussion, Behar backtracked on her “b—-” comment. 
 
 “I want to apologize to Megyn Kelly,” she said. “I didn’t mean to call her a b—-. I like her, actually. I’ve met her at parties and I like her. I just think that she’s struggling for a persona, like a comedian — ‘Who am I, on stage?’ She doesn’t know who she is. That’s the problem.”
– The image was so volatile that it still comes up more than four decades later: Jane Fonda sitting on an anti-aircraft gun used by North Vietnamese soldiers against American planes. On Wednesday night, the 80-year-old actress talked to Stephen Colbert about "the bad thing I did," and said she still regrets it, reports Mediaite. "I wasn’t even thinking what I was doing and photographs were taken and that image went out, and the image makes it look like I was against our soldiers, which was never the case," she says. "But that image is there and I will go to my grave regretting that. I knew right away that that was wrong." The incident landed Fonda the derisive nickname Hanoi Jane, especially an image in which Fonda is seen peering through weapon's scope, as noted by the Hollywood Reporter. Fonda has previously called the photo a mistake, but it keeps coming up decades later, as it did when Megyn Kelly raised the issue anew in her recent public feud with Fonda. Despite the controversy, Fonda tells Colbert she doesn't regret the anti-war trip itself. (See the video here.) HBO has a new documentary about Fonda's life, and she recently discussed the impact of her mother's suicide with People.