Essay on Shattered Youth: How the Vietnam War Changed a Generation

Overall, the United States should have never taken part in the Vietnam War. We lost many heroic men in this war and really didn't gain a single thing as a result. The United States aims in Vietnam were meant to be a defensive campaign, but eventually turned very offensive indeed. Running around a jungle and continually losing men because of booby traps is completely ridiculous. The United States should have stayed out of this war from the beginning and let the Vietnamese fight there own war. Caputo's frame of reference is beyond reliable as he documents a first-hand experience in the Vietnam War with great detail. The Rumor of War is an excellent book that really helps capture the true essence of the Vietnam war and as stated by Caputo, "This book does not pretend to be history" (xiii). What Caputo means by this is that history books only cover a small part of what the Vietnam War was all about; his book leaves nothing out and captures the reader with the true reality of what really happens in the war atmosphere. Caputo's frame of reference is deeply portrayed to those people out there who want the real truth behind the war. The Rumor of War helps to create a thorough understanding of the

It is generally recognized that Tim O’Brien’s Going After Cacciato (1978) is most likely the best novel of the Vietnam war, albeit an unusual one in that it innovatively combines the experiential realism of war with surrealism, primarily through the overactive imagination of the protagonist, Spec Four Paul Berlin. The first chapter of this novel is of more than usual importance. Designed to be a self-sufficient story (McCaffery 137) and often anthologized as one, this chapter is crucial to the novel in that it not only introduces us to the characters and the situation but also sets the tenor of the novel and reveals its author’s view of this war in relation to which all else in the novel must be

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.

When fighting the Vietnam War many did not think it possible for the United States to loose. Those fighting underestimated the power of the Viet Cong. With a foreign land and foreign customs Marines struggled to get accustomed to the way the war was fought. Philip Caputo addresses these learned lessons in A Rumor of War. Lessons that were learned in Vietnam also have relevance to the current war in Afghanistan. The men in both wars fought against an enemy that blends in with the locals. Philip Caputo’s first hand account of the Vietnam War shows the mistakes that were made and how those lessons taught the United States not to make the same mistakes in Afghanistan.

In the words of Vice Admiral James Bond Stockdale, USN, “integrity consists of knowing one’s situation through education and thus understanding the limit of your responsibility.” Stockdale, a former Vietnam P.O.W., writes the importance of integrity in “The World of Epictetus.” In September of 1965, Commander Stockdale ejected from his plane only to be captured by the Vietcong during the Vietnam War. In eight years of captivity, the Northern Vietnamese tortured and isolated Stockdale; and in that time, he observed the actions of his men. He witnessed honorable, high-ranking officers cave into their oppressors, while common soldiers refuted any luxuries offered. Stockdale did not solely witness actions, but integrity; how a man acts when

Vietnam was an entirely new type of war for the United States. It still remains morally and historically problematic in today’s society. The Vietnam War had a tremendous impact on American society and culture, primarily because it was the first war to be televised. The American press played a significant

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.

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.

If Philip Caputo’s memoir is meant to be the story of an American soldier, Trâm’s diary becomes the story of the Vietnamese people and their struggle. On May 7th 1970 Trâm recounts her feelings on the history of war in Vietnam, and how the people still remain undeterred. “Twenty-five years immersed in fire and bullets, we are still strong.” Not only after all this fighting and after all that Trâm herself has witnessed and endured she is still confident in her country. “We will persevere and be courageous and hold our heads high and take the offensive.” Trâm’s diary makes it clear that there was never any doubt in

The mass disapproval of the Vietnam War arose on the account of Americans losing faith in the government. Americans began condemning the war based upon the moral implication of the military conducting chemical warfare and the unnecessary interference of the United States in foreign affairs. Due to these ramifications, the public upheaval resulted in a massive social movement against the entirety of the war. However, the brunt of the public’s outcry was felt by the returning soldiers. The primary source is of a young draftee Sebastian Ilacqua, who recounts his experiences in Vietnam and his unforeseen homecoming from the war.

Philip Caputo joins the Marines for the same reasons most young men leave their home city or town. He wants adventure, an escape

Men in the Vietnam War did not know why they were there fighting in Vietnam and what their purpose was there. The United States justified their involvement in the war by asserting that they were

The book "A Rumor of War" tells the sad truth about Vietnam. Philip Caputo is a great writer with his choice of words and detail. For instance, sadness was expressed in one of Caputo’s chapters. Philip Caputo’s the main character, tells of what he went through during the war. The book has a lot of emotional parts.

After four months since he was deployed, Caputo returns to Vietnam after being sent to Japan when he learns of his friend Sullivan’s death. While this is not the first death Caputo has encountered, it is definitely the first death that has affected him this deeply. Caputo writes, “Sullivan flashed in my mind. Tall, skinny, looking even younger than his twenty-two years…and picturing Sullivan as he was then, I felt something draw tight inside myself, tighter and tighter until I thought it would snap” (1996: 158). Through his intense writing style, readers can feel the same deep sorrow that Caputo no doubt felt at that moment. Caputo continues, “And then I saw an image of Ingram, big, barrel-chested, striding out of the galley on the morning on the company’s first operation, striding powerfully and singing in his rich baritone, and that emotional wire inside me tightened again and broke…Ingram crippled and Sullivan dead. Dead. Death. Death” (1996: 159).

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.