Most people don’t know much about what exactly happened in the Vietnam War. Should this war have even happened? Many Americans believe this war was unnecessary for the armed forces to participate in, especially because of the damage caused in WWII. Tim O'Brien's novel, The Things They carry, offers a collection of short stories in which each expresses the different Vietnam experiences. Every story in this novel was impressive for its own unique reason.
War has always carried an amount of uncertainty. The harsh truths about war have often been looked at through rose colored glasses. However, the harsh, unromantic realities of war always seem to dominate . Writers, media, and organizations have portrayed soldiers in countless ways. However, the roles which these men and women have played in the defense of our country cannot be so easily summed up.
Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried is a collection of essays, all centered on anecdotes of American soldiers during the Vietnam War. The seemingly straightforward recollections slowly reveal dense layers of personal and metaphorical meanings upon closer inspection, with the exploration of the characters’ emotions and the underlying motif of love creating the opportunity to trace how war changes a person in the realm of his emotions. The Vietnam warfare acts as a catalyst for all of the unsettling changes in the soldiers’ minds, raising the question whether the battlefield is actively responsible for this result or merely accelerating the inevitable manifestation of these personal issues, inherent in every person. In the collection of essays
Everyone has gone somewhere or seen something for a second time that they hadn’t before. In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried “Field Trip” chapter it is sort of like Deja Vu- going somewhere that you’ve been before although not having the same experience with it. O’Brien wrote The Things They Carried to help readers get a taste of what it was like to fight in the Vietnam war and the aftermath of it. In the chapter "Field Trip", O'Brien uses imagery and compares the experience of returning to Vietnam between him and his daughter to show the significance that the war had on his life.
More often than not, soldiers and people in a war zone will be affected by the war one way or another. Either that being during or after the war, one could have a negative or positive outlook on the war, but one single event could automatically change that person's behavior. During 1957-1973, the longest war in the United States history took place, the Vietnam War. Many soldiers have lost their lives in this battle, but the ones that survived have significantly changed from this event.
Stickoff has very strong points. The vietnam war overall caused many deaths. For some, a war is very scary especially for the ones in it, but at the end of the day soldiers from both sides of the battlefield are affected. Just like any other traumati situation in life, like losing a loved one, will cause psychological damage. At the end of the day, every soldier is seen as a heroe by their own country.
It was 1965 and the first U.S. troops were landing in South Vietnam, there were 3,500 U.S. Marines added to the already 25,000 advisers in the country. This war would define how we view life for decades and generations. Most people thought it was a mistaken war with no purpose other than to stop the flow of communism in Asia and the fear of others would follow, and add to the strength of the Soviet Union during the height of the cold war. Some people turned the war into a racist battle ground to justify the uprising and protest against the war. The troops were poorly armed and on average fought 240 days a year when compared to WW2 with only 40 days a year for infantrymen.
I am on page 50 of “Vietnam a History of the War” by Russell Freedman. So far, the author has written about the many opinions of the Vietnam War, most of them strongly against it. Many people thought this war was pointless, and that the government should end the war immediately. Then the author proceeds to talk about the rough history of Vietnam, and the struggles it took for them to gain independence. They had to overcome wars against the Chinese, French, and the Japanese.
It was in 1775 when my story first started. People described this date as American’s moral triumph, but for a soldier, I did not think as much. We failed to prevail at Bunker Hill, which started our poor track record of working together. We had been losing a lot of battles because we were not a well put together army. One year later, while the British were occupying New York, Washington led us in two surprise victories in the Trenton and Princeton Battles.
Did you know during the Vietnam War a process known as the draft lottery was used to draft soldiers into the Vietnam War? Birthdays were randomly drawn and randomly assigned a number between 1 and 365. Men, ages 19 to 25, were drafted into the Vietnam War if their birthday fell within the 1 to 195 bracket. Tim O'Brien, the author of the novel "The Things They Carried" , illustrates his story about being drafted into the Vietnam Wart and his personal experience. The important themes O'Brien uses to help readers understand his personal experience fighting in the Vietnam War is the felling of guilt and love.
The soldiers of the Vietnam War were mostly innocent young men that were forced to face overwhelming emotional distress like the fear of their own deaths, guilt associated with taking the life of another soldier, and sorrow after witnessing their fellow comrades’ deaths. In The Things They Carried, author, Tim O’Brien, uses fictional stories to display the immense emotional burdens that the soldier Tim and his fellow members of Alpha Company experienced before, during, and after their unforgettably haunting time in Vietnam, and how each handled this “baggage” they carried. O’Brien’s sympathy belongs to the soldiers in the novel, knowing full and well that none of them belonged in the middle of the unjust war. Whether it was by the use of
the reasons for this were that merchant convoys would break up at the end of their journeys to return home, “and because the [Royal Navy’s] strength was deployed to blockade enemies rather than guard the British Isles.” The Argus was meet by the British ship Pelican and chose to stay and fight, rather than run. The battle was quick lasting only 30 minutes, the Argus was outmatched and her gunnery was below the level set by the American ships previously: “before the British could board, the American vessel struck her colours.” This, along with the defeat of the Chesapeake, marked the beginning of the end for the short-lived American naval supremacy.
Day 46 Since we already have a mutual decision, it was time for us to start packing and cleaning up the cave. We picked up the leaves and grasses that served us our bed for quite a while. I started building a fire using them and some wood that he had lying around. We also tried to clean up the mess from the food that we have cooked over the past few days. Emma and Dominic left again to gather some water and more meals if they can and they also ended up taking Bear with them.
Loud noises seemed to scare me, I have no idea why but screeching tires, Revving engines, screaming children, and even the occasional barking dog will get me on edge and paranoid. In my younger years I joined the US Air Force as a way to get away from everyday life, I just wanted to get out of the everyday monotony of work, sleep, wake, repeat. The only thing that brought me any kind of variety was my sweetheart back home, Hazel. We met in high school when I was just 17 years of age, somehow we are still together today through the night terrors and struggles I constantly suffer.
The war has been pretty hard on all of us, with all the constant hustles and bustles it 's hard to ever relax anymore nowadays. Recently, I just got an update today from the Lieutenant that we are moving to Quang Tri. So in the meantime, the guys and I have got a lot of stuff to pack up by tomorrow before we head on out to the next base. From what I’ve heard, the new place we’re going to is pretty nice compared to Dong Ha.
