Sacrifice In The Things They Carried

Fischer
Mr. Michaud
English 11
17 January 2023
A Soldier, a Human The burden of people dying can cause guilt even if there is no personal blame. For soldiers, specifically, seeing their brothers, who they go through challenges and trials with, dying can cause uncalled for guilt. Because the Vietnam War lacked purpose, soldiers morale was often quite low due to the pointless death of those around them. In The Things They Carried, O’Brien suggests that war causes innocent people to feel guilt over their brothers’ death.
O’Brien shows that soldiers struggle with the purpose of the Vietnam War. Tim shows how innocent normal human beings are drafted to war for a purpose that is unknown to them. Tim tries (colon)to figure out why he was chosen:

Tim, along with others, felt as if those fighting were dying for no reason. Fighting in the Vietnam War lacked purpose and structure. The soldiers spent most of their time adapting to their surroundings. When someone would die, those next to them would feel blame because oftentimes, the death could have been prevented. However, the soldiers who survived were innocent but would carry the responsibility of others’ deaths with them. Tim also struggles to grasp that those who he once was close with and loved are now gone. When Tim was asking himself who had the idea to make men go to war :“Once people are dead, you can't make them undead,” (39) Tim and his brothers’ faced many challenges during war and many times felt that in situations when one died they could not do anything about it, leaving them in guilt and unable to bring them back. During war, the soldiers were faced with constant fear and hiding from the truth; however, (semicolon) below it all they have guilt for not being able to save one of their brothers. During war when soldiers create relationships, they have a hard time adjusting to the reality that they no longer have someone they loved forcing them to feel unconditional guilt for their brothers’ death. Tim’s character shows

As he struggles to get past his current state, Norman “Clockwise, as if in orbit, he took the Chevy on another seven-mile turn around the lake” (133). Norman returns home from war and feels not accepted and lost. (dash) He is out of his comfort zone – he has been in a spot, Vietnam, for so long – that he is unsure how to conform back to life as it once was. He drives around in circles, but in clockwise circles, which shows that he is trying to move on. However, the circling shows him unable to adjust. One reason that he struggles is because of the death of his brother, Kiowa, for which he carries guilt. This guilt causes him struggle to move on and eventually leads him to taking his life. Norman Bowker tries to restart his life after war by taking in the good things, the things he was grateful for and also getting back on his feet by getting a job. As Norman writes to to another brother about the struggle to adapt he tells him that “none of these jobs, he said, had lasted more than ten weeks” (149). During war soldiers are surrounded with rough and complicated tasks, however when they get back home everything changes. For Norman Bowker the inability to sustain himself with after war activities