The Phoenix Program (Vietnamese: Chiến dịch Phụng Hoàng, a word related to fenghuang, the Chinese phoenix) was a counterinsurgency program designed, coordinated, and executed by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), United States special operations forces, and the Republic of Vietnam's (South Vietnam) security apparatus during the Vietnam War.

The Program was designed to identify and "neutralize" (via infiltration, capture, terrorism, torture, and assassination) the civilian infrastructure supporting the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam (NLF or Viet Cong) insurgency. The major two components of the program were Provincial Reconnaissance Units (PRUs) and regional interrogation centers. PRUs would kill suspected VC, and terrorize and capture civilians who were thought to have information on VC activities. These civilians were then taken to the interrogation centers where they were tortured in an attempt to gain intelligence on VC activities in the area. Few of the prisoners survived -- most of them were tortured to death, and those that survived the torture sessions were generally killed afterwards. The information extracted at the centers was then given to military commanders, who would use it to task the PRU with further capture and assassination missions.

3-2-1 Contact is an American science educational television show that aired on PBS from 1980 to 1988, and an adjoining children's magazine. The show, a production of the Children's Television Workshop, teaches scientific principles and their applications. Dr. Edward G. Atkins, who was responsible for much of the scientific content of the show, felt that the TV program wouldn't replace a classroom but would open the viewers to ask questions about the scientific purpose of things.

3-2-1 Contact was the brainchild of Samuel Y. Gibbon, Jr., who had been the executive producer of The Electric Company for CTW from 1971 to 1977. (Gibbon actually left CTW before Contact's production began, though he was still credited as "Senior Consultant.")

The first season of 65 programs began airing January 14, 1980 on select PBS member stations; it featured a cast of three college students who discussed science in an on-campus room known as the Workshop. The first season came to an end on April 11, 1980, but funds for more episodes were not sufficient until 1982.