One of the events that stuck out to me from this book is when Le Ly agrees to have sex with an American soldier for $400, about eighty times what the usual Danang prostitute gets for the same service. The person that I see as responsible for this event is Big Mike, an American MP. Here is his side of the story:
I had been dealing with this crap my whole life, whenever somebody needs something they call me, Big Mike. Most of the time it's nice because I can get a tidy profit from my dealings. Sometimes, like today, I end up losing out on more than profits.
To start from the beginning, I was working over at the Freedom Mill talking shop with some of the Marines, when these two kids who look to be about my son's age walk up with a colonel. The colonel introduces them as Privates Williams and Jensen, and says they are on their way back Stateside. He also adds that they have had a pretty dreary tour and our looking for something fun before they have to go home to their girlfriends and wives. The colonel looked straight at me when he said that last part and I realized that it was going to be my job to go find some 'bum bum' for these two bums. Wanting to impress the colonel I stepped up with a big cheesy grin on my face, "I think I catch your drift Colonel, sir. Let me take care of these Privates." A few of the surrounding officers laughed at my innuendo, but the two privates just smiled sheepishly to each other. The colonel smiled, agreed, and handed me a wad of bills to pay for their good time. It added up to four hundred dollars, more than enough for the thirty minutes they had before they had to be on the plane home.
I started to leave the hangar with them and walk towards the Hoa Phat bar, which I knew to have a few nice clean girls. As we started walking I noticed a familiar figure with a red bucket standing by the gate. It was Le Ly, a black marketeer that I turned a blind eye to in the past in exchange for choice weed and Chinese jade. Now here was a pretty, clean girl. With the boys only having about twenty-five minutes before they had to board the plane I decided to try and bargain with her.
We all know that from the beginning, Marines are engrained with the mindset to “never back down” regardless of circumstances and regardless of all odds. This is one of the many reasons Marines have become known as the most elite fighting force today. However, imagine this: in your unit there are eighty-nine wounded, twenty-six dead and three are missing. Everywhere you turn there are the bodies of Chinese casualties; later you find out it was over two-thousand confirmed casualties to be exact. To any normal person, this would probably be quite a shocking sight, but as the book “The Last Stand of Fox Company” by Bob Drury and Tom Clavin expresses, to the 10,000 Marines in Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, Seventh Marine Regiment, this grew to be the usual for them.
Appy’s book is valuable to its readers in showing how Vietnam became the template for every American war since, from novelties like the invasion of Grenada to the seemingly never-ending conflicts post-9/11. But before all that, there was Vietnam, and, larger lessons aside, Appy’s book is a fascinating, insightful, infuriating and thought-provoking study of that conflict, from its earliest days
...f the innocent is what captured my attention the most. Hundreds and thousands of innocent civilians were killed for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Caputo mourns not only for the dead, but also for the men that are now emotionally and psychologically scarred for life. The images and sounds of death will forever be carved into their minds. Throughout this history class, I have been able to learn and understand new vocabulary and apply it to my reading. I would not have been able to understand the book, as well as I do, without becoming familiar with the terminology. A Rumor of War changed by view on the Vietnam War. Before reading this narrative, I did not realize the number of lives lost or the poor environments soldiers were subjected to. Philip Caputo was extremely detailed in his descriptions and painted a brilliant picture of the war.
A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo, is an exceptional autobiography on a man's first-hand experiences during the Vietnam War. Philip Caputo is a Lieutenant during the Vietnam War and illustrates the harsh reality of what war really is. Caputo's in-depth details of his experience during the war are enough to make one cringe, and the eventual mental despair often experienced by soldiers (including Caputo) really makes you feel for participants taking part in this dreadful war atmosphere. Giving way to the parties and the common fun associated with college kids, Caputo failed out of college and realized what he really wanted to be was a Marine. He joined the Marines and went through a lot of officer training until he eventually reached what would be known as his final rank of Lieutenant. Introduced to the Vietnam War in 1965 as a Platoon leader, Caputo walked into the war a little scared but with a lot of determination. Caputo started the war with a lot of field work including jungle expeditions and shooting escapades, and eventually was sent to keep track of the everyday deaths occurring during the war and all the paperwork associated with such a job. Later he was put back in charge of a platoon which eventually lead to his downfall following an unethical order he gave his men that resulted in the killing of a couple Vietnamese pedestrians believed to be part of the Viet Cong. Caputo was acquitted of all charges and was given a letter of reprimand from the general. About ten years later he continued his Marine endeavors as he reported to Vietnam and witnessed the surrender of the Saigon Government to the Communist North Vietnamese. Caputo's war experience was plagued by...
Fussell, Paul. "Vietnam." The Bloody Game: An Anthology of Modern War. Ed. Paul Fussell. London: Scribners, 1991. 651-6.
"The Rape of Nanking." Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. History: War. Detroit: Gale, 2009. Student Resources in Context. Web. 2 Apr. 2014.
The Elusiveness of War and the Tenuousness of Morality in Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried,” “How to Tell a True War Story,” and “Style”
Olson, James S., and Randy Roberts. My Lai: A Brief History With Documents. Boston: Bedford, 1998
Bao Ninh's The Sorrow of War is a contrapuntal reading to American literature on the Vietnam War. But rather than stand in stark contrast to Tim O' Brien's The Things They Carried, The Sorrow of War is strangely similar, yet different at the same time. From a post-colonialist standpoint, one must take in account both works to get an accurate image of the war. The Sorrow of War is an excellent counterpoint because it is truthful. Tim O' Brien writes: ". . . you can tell a true war story by its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil." (O' Brien, 42) Bao Ninh succeeds in this respect. And it was for this reason that the Vietnamese government initially banned The Sorrow of War. A thorough textual and historical examination of both the war and post-war experience of Vietnam reveals that its experience was similar to, if not worse than, that of America.
General Norman Schwarzkopf notes that, "We Were Soldiers... Once and Young is a must reading for all Americans." And indeed it is. Lieutenant General Harold Moore and Joseph Galloway did a remarkable job writing a historiography that critically examined a variety of authentic sources and wrote an unbiased work that will stand the tests of time. We Were Soldiers is not just a story about the battles of X-Ray and Albany. It tells the stories of Americans and Vietnamese soldiers who endured the atrocities in the Ia Drang Valley. It is an impartial piece of literature that does not demonize the Vietnamese soldier, yet still praises the American soldier. The book is a marvelous account of history, absent of political opinions, detailing the true story of the Ia Drang Valley. And just as General Schwarzkopf stated, it is a MUST read for all Americans.
...eased soldier, Tung, whom Kien has forgotten. “ ‘Maybe it was Tung. What do you think, Kien?’ ‘Tung who?’ asked Kien. ‘Crazy Tung. The guardsman, don’t you remember?’” (Ninh, 97). Yet, after the war, Kien cannot quit remembering all that died. “He mistook her first for a jungle girl named Hoa…Then, horribly, for a naked girl at Saigon airport on 30 April 1975.” (Ninh, 113). Kien returned to his pre-war culture of remembering the dead.
And this has often times served me rather well. However, the most memorable and possible the most effective vicarious learning it seems has always come from those things my peers and counterparts have done wrong, and for which they faced group and public score and ridicule above and beyond simple and meaningful punishment as set down in the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) (military.com, 2016). Such incidents while rare have always remained memorable and relevant to me and have served to remind me that you simple do not want to be “that guy”. One such example of these memorable public shaming’s that served to teach all of us, who had to bear witness to it, was a calling out of the offenders by the commander in front of our formation. Wherein the commander proceeded to declare publicly the wrongs these men had done, steeling ammunition, and then explaining the how these selfish and petty acts had brought embarrassment on our entire Regiment. At which time the commander ripped every patch and emblem from their uniforms, symbolically casting them out of our tribe and down to the ranks of common soldiers. This was followed by weeks of extra-duty, supervised by the First Sergeant, for these men; in additional to the money garnished from their pay; before they received their reassignment orders and could get on with their lives. The less learned by our entire formation, and all who witnessed this public skeptical on that day, was; do not do wrong things period; like steeling valuable resource. And do not do such things for selfish motives. Or else you too may face the gauntlet of public shaming and ridicule; as you are formally cast out of our honorable tribe of
The reports in this novel are prefaced with a quote by Robert Shaplen, which sums up the feelings of those Americans involved in the Vietnam conflict. He states, "Vietnam, Vietnam . . .. There are no sure answers." In this novel, the author gives a detailed historical account of the happenings in Vietnam between 1950 and 1975. He successfully reports the confusing nature, proximity to the present and the emotions that still surround the conflict in Vietnam. In his journey through the years that America was involved in the Vietnam conflict, Herring "seeks to integrate military, diplomatic, and political factors in such a way as to clarify America's involvement and ultimate failure in Vietnam."
O’Brien begins the chapter by explaining about Bob (Rat) Kiley. O’Brien says that Kiley is his close friend in Vietnam, and explains how Kiley’s friend Curt Lemon was killed in the war, and Kiley starts to write a letter to the Lemon’s sister about what happened. Kiley starts talking about all the positive stuff about his friend to O’Brien, and Kiley is in tears when he talks about the things that make them close friends. Rat finally mails the letter, but his friend’s sister never mails him back. O’Brien explains that almost all war stories are immoral. He explains that war stories are never positive, and mostly told by a negative light. O’Brien explains that if someone wanted to hear a true war story, they should talk to Rat Kiley. Later on, O’Brien explains that the guy name is Curt Lemon. The smoke grenades caused Lemon’s death. He explains that some of the soldiers were playing with the grenades and they were not careful with it. This led to his death, and O’Brien explains that Lemon’s death was almost beautiful with Lemon’s handsome face when the sunlight reflecting on him. O’Brien explains that the author has a difficult explaining what is the reality and what they “think” happened in their books. He
Being a forty-three year old author writing about war decades after his experiences, it is of little concern to O’Brien whether he tells tales solely in line with the facts. He does not want the reader to care whether the stories he weaves actually happened, for he is only writing to “try to save lives with [his] stories” (232). His stories may be made up and his stories just might be complete lies, but the truth is irrelevant. More importantly, his stories save lives. They save his own, they save yours, and they save society’s.