Fallen Angels Vs Vietnam War

America is well known and hated across the globe for its involvement in foreign conflicts and affairs. The self proclaimed police of the world, America often goes too far when it comes to its involvement overseas. Many times the outcomes of these conflicts is overlooked and the effect it will have on america and other countries. Often times the American news media and politicians will claim that America 's goal is to bring freedom and liberty to other countries. However, this is a ploy to get the public on board and in reality war is used to make politicians and corporations richer. Tim O’Brien experienced this firsthand when he was shipped off to Vietnam in 1969. When he came back he finished his education at Harvard and was inspired to write a memoir about his experiences. “If I Die in a Combat Zone Box Me Up and Ship Me Home” tells his story as a foot soldier and the effects it had on himself and other soldiers physically, emotionally, and mentally. The books starts with O’Brien as a child playing war games and then moves to when he was drafted. In the bootcamp O’Brien had contemplated deserting but ultimately decided not to so that his family would not be disgraced. He was then sent off to Vietnam where he was placed in the Alpha company. O’Brien talks about things like his involvement in ambushes to his interactions with locals. With this piece O’Brien was trying to show the horrors of war and and how it affected the soldiers sent to fight in

During war, many people change physically, mentally, and socially. War itself is disturbing to the mind. In Walter Dean Meyer’s Fallen Angels, the characters undergo many changes as they learn the true meaning of war. Perry, Peewee and Johnson all change in the sense of their personalities and their outlooks on life. In the beginning of the novel all the characters have very distinct characteristics. As the story progresses they start to see how war can have a huge impact on your life.

The Vietnam War that commenced on November 1, 1955, and ended on April 30, 1975, took the soldiers through a devastating experience. Many lost their lives while others maimed as the war unfolded into its full magnitude. The book Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam by Bernard Edelman presents a series of letters written by the soldiers to their loved ones and families narrating the ordeals and experiences in the Warfield. In the book, Edelman presents the narrations of over 200 letters reflecting the soldiers’ experiences on the battlefield. While the letters were written many decades ago, they hold great significance as they can mirror the periods and the contexts within which they were sent. This paper takes into account five letters from different timelines and analyzes them against the events that occurred in those periods vis a vis their significance. The conclusion will also have a personal opinion and observation regarding the book and its impacts.

In her book The Vietnam Wars, 1945-1990, author Marilyn Young examines the series of political and military struggles between the United States and Vietnam, a nation that has been distinctively separated as the South and the North. Young chooses to express the daily, weekly, monthly progresses of the affairs collectively called the Vietnam Wars, focusing on the American interventions in the foreign soil. She seeks to provide an answer to a question that has haunted the world for years: What was the reason behind the United States interfering in the internal affairs of a foreign country in which it had no claims at all? Young discloses the overt as well as covert actions undertaken by the U.S. government officials regarding the foreign affairs with Vietnam and the true nature of the multifaceted objectives of each and every person that’s involved had.

In Kyle Longley’s, The Morenci Marines, nine young Morenci boys took the call to duty, not knowing that only three will return from the warzone of Vietnam. These boys, some of who were Native American, Mexican American, and Caucasian, joined the fight in Vietnam despite their social, racial, and economic differences. Although the nine men are from a small mining town in Morenci, Arizona, the Vietnam War was, in the words of Mike Cranford, “a lower middle class war,” that was fueled by small towns all around the United States (Longley, 246). Many of these men felt the call to battle and the will to fight, which was engrained in their heritage and gave these men the right to be Americans. Small town America, mostly lower class, was looked upon to aid the war effort with countless men, where as the rest of the nation, the upper to middle class college educated students, were protesting the war and they believed that it was unjust.

The Vietnam War started on the 1st November 1955, however full U.S military involvement was not until over ten years later in 1965 following the Gulf of Tonkin incident in which a U.S Destroyer was reportedly fired upon by North Vietnamese forces. Once again, as with the Korean War five years previous, the North part of the country was the Communists and the South part was the Capitalists. The Vietnam War was a lot more forthcoming than the Korean War, given the ten year period in which military advisers resided in Vietnam before the outbreak. Despite this build up the interest in Vietnam by war correspondents was at a minimal level. It is reported that even in 1963, just two years prior to the full involvement of the U.S military, there were only enough full-time correspondents to fill a table at a restaurant . The lack of media personnel in the country until 1965 shows that despite the indications shown in Korea for the USA to protect their interests, there is not much pull unless there is a full military involvement. The number of correspondents around in Vietnam before 1965 was at a measly eight. However, signifying the size of the war, the peak number in March 1968 hit 645 correspondents in Vietnam . Amongst this number saw a large quantity of female correspondents make their way to Vietnam. In all 467 women were accredited to being correspondents during the war, the most ever in any war . This may have been as a result of the

     Michael Shaara’s fictional novel, The Killer Angels, is based on the Battle of Gettysburg in the American Civil War. The novel allows the reader to recognize the heart and courage of the more than two million men that fought in the war. Shaara focuses the reader to better understand the reason why these men fight and the meaning of the war. Ultimately, the reader observes that the war is fought on an individual level as much as a governmental level. These men are there to fight for what they believe is truly right. The Confederates fought for their rights to hold slaves, their freedom tyranny of the Federal Government, and their

In this historical text, Reluctant Witnesses: Children’s Voices from the Civil War, Emmy Werner retells the events of the Civil War through the eyes of children who are male, female, black, and white. Werner worked to sift through the reactions and experiences of the young men and women who were involved in the Civil War. Each chapter articulates a different portion of the battle and the events during the Civil War. Chapter two, five, six, eight, and nine capture the eye-witness accounts from young soldiers and young women who lived through the Battle of Shiloh, the Battle of Gettysburg, the siege of Vicksburg, the burning of Atlanta, and Sherman’s march to the sea. Chapter three, four, seven, and ten depict the responses the young children had at Andersonville, during the bread riots, the triumph at Washington D.C., and the voices of the former slaves of the south. Werner thrived to increase the knowledge on the involvement of children within the Civil War. Werner’s historical picture was to present the realities children faced on and off the field of battle. Werner’s argument focused on children’s perspective of the Civil War. She supports her claim by providing diary, letter, and journal excerpts from one hundred and twenty children ages four to sixteen, by being focused on their subjective experiences of the hardships they endured and how they managed to cope with them drawing, where appropriate, parallels to the experiences of children in contemporary civil strife.

The Vietnam War was a major controversy for the United States compared to World War 1 and World War 2. With both of the previous wars that the United States had been a major part of they had brought the people of the country together to fight  and work hard to show their support to the soldiers that were fighting. During these two wars we saw the rise of women in the workforce as they came into the picture of taking the jobs that the men held while they went away to fight in the way. And then there was the avid signing up to fight. Men as young as teenagers signing up to fight in both of these wars. The difference is that with the Vietnam War it was met with disdain from the public and also the soldiers as well. With this war people

Penned during two distinctly disparate eras in American military history, both Erich Maria Remarque's bleak account of trench warfare during World War I, All Quiet on the Western Front, and Tim O'Brien's haunting elegy for a generation lost in the jungles of Vietnam, The Man I Killed, present readers with a stark reminder that beneath the veneer of glorious battle lies only suffering and death. Both authors imbue their work with a grim severity, presenting the reality of war as it truly exists. Men inflict grievous injuries on one another, breaking bodies and shattering lives, without ever truly knowing for what or whom they are fighting for. With their contributions to the genre of war literature, both Remarque and O'Brien have sought to lift the veil of vanity which, for so many wartime writers, perverts reality with patriotic fervor. In doing so, the authors manage to convey the true sacrifice of the conscripted soldier, the broken innocence which clouds a man's first kill, and the abandonment of one's identity which becomes necessary in order to kill again.

    A little ten year old boy is snatched out of his life as he was taken as a prisoner of war. He is destined to die when others lived. His death actually happened in history, but also in the novel, My Brother Sam Is Dead. It is the year 1775, the Revolutionary War just stirring among the people. The narrator is Tim Meeker, the youngest son in a family that runs their tavern in the town of Redding. The Meeker family goes through lots of sufferings at the cost of war. His older brother Sam is a Yale student who goes to war to fight the British against his father’s wishes. As the war goes on life gets tougher and the Meekers experience the hard reality of war. Tim is split between the sides of war, but realizes neither side is right. As Tim goes through story the authors show the reader of the difficulties of war. In My Brother Sam Is Dead although both sides are shown, authors Collier and Collier argue that war is futile.

Walter Dean Myers historical novel, Fallen Angels takes place in Vietnam during the war. The main character Perry, recently enlisted in the army, to fight in the Vietnam war. Perry could not afford to go to college because of his rough childhood in Harlem, also growing up with no dad. He faces many problems throughout war even when he is homesick for his family in the beginning. One of the closest warriors and his bestfriend he finds in the army is Peewee a very experienced veteran who is a great leader. Perry and his fellow warriors have to fend off the Vietnamese and use determination to win the war. The theme expressed in this story is that personal experiences enable people to mature.

The Viet Nam War has been the most reviled conflict in United States history for many reasons, but it has produced some great literature. For some reason the emotion and depredation of war kindle in some people the ability to express themselves in a way that they may not have been able to do otherwise. Movies of the time period are great, but they are not able to elicit, seeing the extremely limited time crunch, the same images and charge that a well-written book can. In writing of this war, Tim O'Brien put himself and his memories in the forefront of the experiences his characters go through, and his writing is better for it. He produced a great work of art not only because he experienced the war first hand, but because he is able to convey the lives around him in such vivid detail. He writes a group of fictional works that have a great deal of truth mixed in with them. This style of writing and certain aspects of the book are the topics of this reflective paper.

Edited by Bernard Edelman, “Dear America” is a collection of letters written by soldiers during the Vietnam War. Their letters are written to love ones back home such as parents, siblings, and spouses but they are a great depiction of the Vietnam War. The soldiers would write these letters to help keep hope alive and to keep sane. Throughout the book the letters are categorize into those who are barely arriving into the war to those who have been there a long time. The stress and anxiety grows more and more as the letters continue and the soldiers begin to contemplate their situation. I’ve learned a lot of factual things about the Vietnam War throughout my life such as how it began and what the outcome was but reading this book was the

Hundreds of bodies littered the ground. Sounds of explosions and endless gunfire filled the air. Soldiers, with their uniforms splashed in crimson, fought viciously and ruthlessly. Their main objective, which was to win the battle, took a backseat to their newfound desperation to stay alive. After all, war is not a game, especially one such as the Vietnam War. The Vietnam War claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, and left its survivors haunted by a multitude of atrocious events. Terry Erickson’s father and George Robinson, who were two fictional characters from the short stories “Stop the Sun” and “Dear America”, respectively, were veterans of the Vietnam War. The differences and similarities between Terry’s father and George Robinson are striking, and they merit rigorous scrutiny.