In the narrator’s quest for information about the bombing of Dresden, he wrote to the Air Force, hoping to gain more knowledge about what went into the decision. His only official response at the time was “that the information was top secret still” (11). How bombing of Dresden could ever be considered classified when it had such a devastating effect on so many people is just one of the many absurdities pointed out by the narrator in his quest to provide a balanced view of the war.
One novel, The Execution of Private Slovik by William Bradford Huie, details the only execution of an American soldier for desertion during World War II. The narrator quotes from the opinion of a staff judge advocate who supported Slovik’s sentence, stating: “If the death penalty is ever to be imposed for desertion, it should be imposed in this case, not as a punitive measure nor as retribution, but to maintain that discipline upon which alone an army can succeed” (45). The view that a soldier should have to die in order for the military to maintain unit cohesion and essentially teach a lesson to other draftees who may want to desert their post is a hard one for those not in the military to sympathize with. Furthermore, it illustrates the paradoxical nature of militaristic actions, where one is forced to fight against enemies who wish to do them harm, or face death at the hands of their fellow servicemen if the choose not to fight.
During a Lions Club luncheon meeting Billy attends back in Ilium, a Marine Corp Major who had served in Vietnam addressed the attendees. The Marine spoke of his experience serving in Vietnam, and his view that “the Americans had no choice but to keep fighting… until the Communists realized that they could not force their wa...
... middle of paper ...
...cation of the bombings of Dresden as tit for tat in an attempt to rationalize civilian killings is abhorrent to those who see life as sacred, regardless of which side of the civilian line one falls.
Saundy is much more sympathetic than Eaker to those who lost their lives in the Dresden bombing. Saundy believed “that the bombing of Dresden was a great tragedy none can deny”, and that it wasn’t necessary to the Allies efforts to win the War (187). However, he does defend those who directed the bombing, stating they “were neither wicked nor cruel”, but instead forced into making a tough decision in a decisive time in the War (187). Saundy presents a much more humane view of the bombing of Dresden than Eaker. Saundy doesn’t attempt to justify or condemn the bombing; he instead portrays it as one of the many horrors of war that can only be viewed in hindsight as such.
In 1971, John Kerry stood in front of the Senate and spoke about his experiences in Vietnam as a soldier. There would be many that would agree with his position, some that would disagree and ultimately some that had no strong opinion at all. John Kerry knew that although he was speaking to the senate he was also speaking to the American people and through his intentional way of speaking he used this to his advantage. In John Kerry’s speech, strongly opposing the Vietnam War, Kerry successfully uses his persona as one who experienced the war head on, to reveal the lack of morality in Vietnam and paint the war as barbaric acts with no true purpose behind them.
Ward, Geoffrey C. and Burns, Ken, The War, An Intimate History 1941-1945. (New York: Knopf 2007)
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
Lawrence’s purpose in writing this book was concise and to the point. In recent history, due to the fall of the Soviet bloc, new information has been made available for use in Vietnam. As stated in the introduction, “This book aims to take account of this new scholarship in a brief, accessible narrative of the Vietnam War… It places the war within the long flow of Vietnamese history and then captures the goals and experiences of various governments that became deeply embroiled in the country during the second half of the twentieth century” (Lawrence, 3.) This study is not only about the American government and how they were involved in the Vietnam conflict, but highlights other such countries as France, China, and the Soviet Union. Lawrence goes on to say that one of his major goals in writing this book is to examine the American role in Vietnam within an international context (Lawrence, 4.) Again, this goes to show that the major purpose of Lawrence’s study included not only ...
The Vietnam War has become a focal point of the Sixties. Known as the first televised war, American citizens quickly became consumed with every aspect of the war. In a sense, they could not simply “turn off” the war. A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo is a firsthand account of this horrific war that tore our nation apart. Throughout this autobiography, there were several sections that grabbed my attention. I found Caputo’s use of stark comparisons and vivid imagery, particularly captivating in that, those scenes forced me to reflect on my own feelings about the war. These scenes also caused me to look at the Vietnam War from the perspective of a soldier, which is not a perspective I had previously considered. In particular, Caputo’s account of
During the Vietnam Conflict, many Americans held a poor view of the military and its political and military leadership. Protestors met returning soldiers at airports, train and bus stations, and in hometowns with open hostility. Following the conflict, and perhaps the maturing of the ‘60s generation, the view towards the military began to change somewhat. The hostility declined, but an appreciation for the military never really re-emerged during the ...
The arguments of Christopher Browning and Daniel John Goldhagen contrast greatly based on the underlining meaning of the Holocaust to ordinary Germans. Why did ordinary citizens participate in the process of mass murder? Christopher Browning examines the history of a battalion of the Order Police who participated in mass shootings and deportations. He debunks the idea that these ordinary men were simply coerced to kill but stops short of Goldhagen's simplistic thesis. Browning uncovers the fact that Major Trapp offered at one time to excuse anyone from the task of killing who was "not up to it." Despite this offer, most of the men chose to kill anyway. Browning's traces how these murderers gradually became less "squeamish" about the killing process and delves into explanations of how and why people could behave in such a manner.
Raymond, Michael W. "Imagined Responses to Vietnam: Tim O'Brien's Going After Cacciato. Critique 24 (Winter 1983).
Hynes, Samuel Lynn. "What Happened in Nam." The soldiers' tale: bearing witness to modern war. New York, N.Y., U.S.A.: A. Lane, 1997. 177-222. Print.
The events which have become to be known as The Holocaust have caused much debate and dispute among historians. Central to this varied dispute is the intentions and motives of the perpetrators, with a wide range of theories as to why such horrific events took place. The publication of Jonah Goldhagen’s controversial but bestselling book “Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust” in many ways saw the reigniting of the debate and a flurry of scholarly and public interest. Central to Goldhagen’s disputed argument is the presentation of the perpetrators of the Holocaust as ordinary Germans who largely, willingly took part in the atrocities because of deeply held and violently strong anti-Semitic beliefs. This in many ways challenged earlier works like Christopher Browning’s “Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland” which arguably gives a more complex explanation for the motives of the perpetrators placing the emphasis on circumstance and pressure to conform. These differing opinions on why the perpetrators did what they did during the Holocaust have led to them being presented in very different ways by each historian. To contrast this I have chosen to focus on the portrayal of one event both books focus on in detail; the mass shooting of around 1,500 Jews that took place in Jozefow, Poland on July 13th 1942 (Browning:2001:225). This example clearly highlights the way each historian presents the perpetrators in different ways through; the use of language, imagery, stylistic devices and quotations, as a way of backing up their own argument. To do this I will focus on how various aspects of the massacre are portrayed and the way in which this affects the presentation of the per...
Jaspers, Karl. The Question of German Guilt. Trans. E. B. Ashton. New York: The Dial P, 1947.
The narrator appreciates Lot’s wife deeply because she “looks back” which is what American society fails to do after World War II and, in doing so, fails to recognize their own faults. Rumfoord epitomizes this attitude when he tells Billy, a survivor of the Dresden firebombing, that the bombing of Dresden “had to be done” (253). The diction of ‘had’ and the emphasis placed on it indicates an attitude that America’s obliged to destroy the unarmed, civilian city. Furthermore, ‘done’ has a double meaning in the...
The soldiers feel that the only people they can talk to about the war are their “brothers”, the other men who experienced the Vietnam War. The friendship and kinship that grew in the jungles of Vietnam survived and lived on here in the United States. By talking to each other, the soldiers help to sort out the incidents that happened in the War and to put these incidents behind them. “The thing to do, we decided, was to forget the coffee and switch to gin, which improved the mood, and not much later we were laughing at some of the craziness that used to go on” (O’Brien, 29).
In WW I, the United States faced a dilemma with draftees deserting in the midst of their service. General Pershing’s proposed solution certainly took a more stringent, deterrent-based approach to put it lightly. While the threat of death may prove to be effective initially, I feel that the change would prove to be short-lasting. In fact, some soldiers may make the conscious choice to die a more humane death from their superiors, instead of the risking dying at the hands of their enemies.
John Kerry once said, “I saw courage both in the Vietnam war and in the struggle to stop it. I learned that patriotism includes protest, not just military service.” The Vietnam War was not supported by everyone, and with the large peace movement in the 1960’s, the war was protested across the United States. Boys from all over the country were sent to Vietnam to fight in a foreign land, likely to die. “Beyond Vietnam- A Time to Break Silence” by Martin Luther King Jr. uses a plethora of rhetorical devices, such as well known allusions and rhetorical questions that emphasize the importance and meaning his speech possesses.