Luis Le's Experience During The Vietnam War

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.

War is a problem that seems inevitable. America was founded thanks to a war, yet many Americans such as Michael Herr and William James do not support it. They both wrote essays to show the negative effects of war and to shine a new light on the subject. The essay, “Illumination Rounds” by Michael Herr, was published in The New American Review #7 in 1969. Herr speaks of his experiences in Vietnam and shares the abundant coping methods the soldiers use to deal with PTSD. He asserts that war is not worth all of the negative effects.

“Everybody get down!!!” He freezes for a second and then it suddenly strikes him--his heart beats almost out of his chest, and his hands are shaking uncontrollably; this is war. This is Vietnam, a cruel war between the Americans and Vietnamese that takes place in a jungle. War is undoubtedly frightening and may seem like the number one threat for the soldiers, but it is not; it is not remotely close. The true threat at a time of war, especially in a place such as Vietnam is isolation. The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien illustrates the danger of isolation and why it is the greatest danger in Vietnam. Soldiers are aware that they are detached from society; this continuously haunts them, and as a result, they damage themselves emotionally.

Wars are a difficult place to be. “THE VIETNAM WAR transformed a generation” (Roberts 1). With all that happened during the war such as exposure to

War, the principle cause of pain and loss, not only affects an individual, but also the land on which it is fought. Soldiers, both men and women who take part in this type of action undergo changes that completely transform them into a distinct person to the one they were before the war. This sort of combat also affects the normal civilians and their ways of living in such a zone since they must find ways to survive, which was the case of the people who lived in the Vinh Moc Tunnels along the demilitarized zone of Vietnam.

To this day the Vietnam War is still considered to be one of the most devastating wars in history and has been a topic of resentment to the American culture thirty-three years after its end. For the American public it’s marked as being the point in history where distrust in our government was at an all-time high, mainly because most of the war’s carnage was witnessed on television for the first time. For all the bloodshed American and Vietnamese soldiers suffered through, the war has left a perpetual mark not only on the United States but ultimately has left a permanent scar on the soldiers who fought and managed to survive the war. Renowned war poet, Bruce Weigl, like most young American men during the time was only nineteen when he

The Vietnam War was largely considered a failure, a waste of resources, time and precious lives. It was simply a war that did not need to be fought. But in order to combat the ever prevailing communist forces; the capitalists and in particular, America, decided that Vietnam would be the land where these differences would be disputed. Men were sent in to fight in this war and they came back with very different experiences. As seen in both perspectives held in “A Rumor of War” by Philip Caputo and in “We were soldiers once... and young” by Hal Moore and Joseph Galloway; they explore the varying perspectives and experienced seen and learnt within war. Whereas in “A Rumor of War”, it tackles the consequences of being sent into such harsh warfare, only because Philip Caputo saw the harsh reality firsthand as he was a soldier in the war. The former, “We were soldiers once... and young” tackles the glorification of war because it’s not solely a soldier’s account. A journalist was in company of these men and as such details get skewed for the public’s perception. Regardless, both these books share a telling tale of the war in Vietnam through their radically different views.

The Vietnam War was a controversial conflict that plagued the United States for many years. The loss of life caused by the war was devastating. For those who came back alive, their lives were profoundly changed. The impact the war had on servicemen would affect them for the rest of their lives; each soldier may have only played one small part in the war, but the war played a huge part in their lives. They went in feeling one way, and came home feeling completely different. In the book Vietnam Perkasie, W.D. Ehrhart describes his change from a proud young American Marine to a man filled with immense confusion, anger, and guilt over the atrocities he witnessed and participated in during the war.

War is woven into the familial aspects of this novel. It not only separated families, but also separated Vietnam itself, dividing the people and therefore compromising the idea of unity and cultural identity. The Vietnam War left a residue of resentment

The Vietnam War is one of the most controversial wars the United States has ever been involved in. This is due to the lack of reason for the United States’ involvement in the conflict; it was not necessary to have Americans fighting in Vietnam (Cornish). Regardless of the lack of need for soldiers, young men from the United States were still drafted to fight and were shipped off to Vietnam, despite not knowing what they were fighting for. While there, most of them experienced horrific events that ended up following them after Vietnam, resulting in a condition called post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which would weigh on the veterans’ shoulders for the rest of their lives. Tim O’Brien, author and Vietnam veteran, is not an exemption to

American soldiers who participated in the Vietnam War came into the war as young men experienced deaths of their loved ones and seeked escapism to cope with it. “From deep fear to a lack of trust, the death of loved ones presents the harboring of a constant remembrance of Vietnam and it’s cruelties” many years after the war (Kaplan 1). The Vietnam soldiers faced unique were severely impacted by the death of their fellow soldiers dying. For example, the death of Kiowa still haunts Lieutenant Cross’s mind and it will always replay back when he wonders if he could have saved Kiowa or not. “More than 50 percent of troops engaged in active disobedience”, much politically motivated (Bahr 2). The soldiers experience discontent for the war although many of the soldiers don’t seem particularly political.

“War is hell, but that's not the half of it, because war is also mystery and terror and adventure and courage and discovery and holiness and pity and despair and longing and love. War is nasty; war is fun. War is thrilling; war is drudgery. War makes you a man; war makes you dead.” Tim O’Brien wrote in his novel The Things They Carried. There are many different ways to connect with a reader through pieces of writing. Tim O’Brien captured many readers through his detailed writing and telling of Vietnam War stories throughout the novel The Things They Carried. In the memoir If I Die in a Combat Zone, his writing lacked thorough description and feeling compared to The Things They Carried. Tim O’Brien connects with the reader through his writing

The Vietnam War was not only a battle, but it also marked the lives of those involved.

Throughout the book, the characters talked about how they felt about the war, how they deal with the war. These soldiers go through things that no person would want to go through, it wasn't just physically draining, but it's also emotionally draining. “The war was over and there was no place in particular to go.” The thoughts of sorrow and loss overwhelms these Vietnam veterans upon their

It can be hard to fully comprehend the effects the Vietnam War had on not just the veterans, but the nation as a whole. The violent battles and acts of war became all too common during the long years of the conflict. The war warped the soldiers and civilians characters and desensitized their mentalities to the cruelty seen on the battlefield. Bao Ninh and Tim O’Brien, both veterans of the war, narrate their experiences of the war and use the loss of love as a metaphor for the detrimental effects of the years of fighting.