FREE ESSAY ON VIETNAM

VIETNAM

American intervention in Vietnam began with a 
generation of boys born to the veterans of the second 
World War. Boys who lived in the afterglow and dreamed 
of the glory. Patriotism was thick in a country who 
came out of the second great war stronger than it had 
entered. We were unbeatable. America had survived to 
continue it's fight against injustice and for liberty. 
The new fight was against communism.
The war might never have taken place had the 
United States aided Ho Chi Minh in the fight to 
liberate Vietnam from the French, a fight the Americans 
had experienced themselves not all that long ago. In 
light of France being an ally the United Stated did not 
see their way clear to assist a colony from French 
rule.
Philip Caputo's book, "A Rumor of War" is full of 
painful honesty about the fighting in the jungles of 
Vietnam. The boys from working class families were 
doing the fighting and the dying in a land ten thousand 
miles from home. Caputo speaks of a nation divided in 
it's opinion on the war and the soldiers who fought in 
it. 
Born on the Fourth of July tells the story of the 
return of a Vietnam veteran. The country the veterans 
returned to was one that wasn't proud of it's soldiers, 
nor was it grateful for the sacrifice they made. They 
came back to a community that was largely disgusted 
with their behavior.
Taken together, the book and the film tell a great 
deal about the impact the war had on Americans. 
Considering that hindsight is 20/20, the reasons seem 
obvious now. On one hand, the military is creating a 
favorable report from the field to make it appear as if 
the war will soon be over, the newsmedia is flooding 
television with images of burning villas and dead 
civilians and the politicians keep insisting they are 
reducing US involvement and that the war is soon to 
end. It doesn't end. Not for ten years, and 
fifty-eight thousand American lives.
For the returning soldiers, the country didn't 
want to hear the war stories, their painful memories. 
"People didn't want to know about the tumults of the 
warrior's heart, to hear the cries that came howling 
straight out of the heart of darkness, the belly of the 
beast." (Caputo,349) Instead they were pushed aside 
and not given the respect due them for having given 
their lives, bodies and souls to the cause in Vietnam. 
These men didn't create the situation, they served 
their country and were ridiculed for their behavior.
It was in the embarrassment and in the 
indifference that Americans found reason to blame the 
men who fought the war. America never rallied behind 
the war. The protesters protested, the enlisted men 
fought and died, and the rest didn't pay much 
attention. The best illustration of this point is the 
scene in Born on the Fourth of July when Kovic's mother 
is in front of the television and there is a news 
report on about the protesters in Washington and she 
changes the channel to watch Laugh-In. It is a subtle 
illustration, yet represents an important faucet of 
America's indifference to the war. 
Initial support for the war quickly waned as it 
became apparent the war was unwinnable. Even so, the 
United States could not back out and loose face. The 
leading nation in the world could not back out of a 
conflict it had custom created simply because it had 
backfired. Without the nations support, major 
escalation was avoided and thus defeat was eminent. 
The US military was defeated in a third world 
country.
America's image of itself and its role in the 
world after Vietnam were forever changed. The nation 
had gone into the war a super-power and had failed. 
For the first time in it's history, the United States 
failed to achieve it's stated war aims: to preserve a 
separate, independent, noncommunist government in South 
Vietnam. Americans were embarrassed. "Our self-image 
as a progressive, virtuous, and triumphant people 
exempt from the burdens and tragedies of history came 
apart in Vietnam..." (Caputo, 353)
The book and the film both reach the same 
conclusion: A nation that is finally ready to listen to 
and hear what these men have to say. The people are 
ready to lift the blame from the soldiers shoulders and 
give them the respect they deserve. 
There are still differing opinions about US 
involvement in Vietnam and there always will be. The 
issue that remains is whether or not politicians 
learned anything. Only time will tell.
Bibliography
Works Cited
Caputo, Philip. A Rumor of War. Henry Holt and Co,Inc. 
New York, New York. 1977,1996
Born on the Fourth of July, Universal Pictures. 1980