Personal Narrative: My Vietnam Experience

History 2200
April 9th, 2014

My Vietnam Experience
The sudden noise of a dog bark, doorbell, loud noise, or a certain smell can trigger the flashbacks from the war. The flashbacks can take me back to a helicopter ride by a small inhale of diesel, or the smell after a tank explodes. Loud noises can trigger memories of my nighttime guard duty and fights against our enemies. These noises and smells would make a “normal” person just jump or not even notice a common smell, but for me, a scare or smell instantly transports my memory back to my experiences in Vietnam. The images I thought I left behind in the war torn land of Vietnam soon become unraveled and vivid in my mind, as real as they were when I experienced them as a 19 year-old boy.
Little did I realize that the images would be engrained in my mind for the rest of my life. This PTSD is one of the many problems my fellow soldiers and I faced when coming back from Vietnam. I have been asked many times by many people about my thoughts on the war. Questions such as, “Do you resent the United States for putting you through that?” kept coming up in conversation. Honestly I don’t resent my country. I am and will always be a man of honor. When my country needs me, I respond bravely and do my job and don’t ask questions. The only problem I really had with that time in my life was the treatment my fellow soldiers and I received when we returned. We thought the least we could ask for was support. The Vietnam War was long and extremely drawn out.
The war was carried through many presidencies. The official dates of the war were 1959-1975 but many believe Vietnam talk and planning began long before this. It is said that we first started training forces in South Vietnam in 1956. France had just left Vietnam and our government saw this perfect opportunity to intervene and make it look extremely necessary to the American people. Communism was a huge threat to our life style in the states and we couldn’t risk Southeast Asia being a communist area because there were resources there that we wanted (Farber). This war was the United States aiding South Vietnam from being engulfed by North Vietnam and their
Communism.
I remember first hearing talk about the Vietnam War when Eisenhower came into office. The roots seem to begin here. The U.S. decided to make a policy of militant anti-Communist forces that opposed Communism all over the world (Kaiser). The government had been building a strong national security bureaucracy since the Second World War (Kaiser). This was made so that the United States could resist any further Communist expansion and that the US should resist the Communist spread whenever possible (Kaiser). The real core of the Vietnam War lays in Eisenhower’s administration, to build up pro-American, Anti-Communist regimes in Southeast Asia. These policies Eisenhower had made deeply influenced Kennedy and Johnson’s presidencies (Kaiser). 1960 marks the end of Ike Eisenhower’s and the beginning the great John Kennedy’s administration. During Kennedy’s presidency they tripled the number of administration in Vietnam twice (lecture). Kennedy’s main reasoning for sending over troops was to help South Vietnam. A quote from Kennedy about this decision was, “The United States is determined to help Vietnam preserve its independence, protect its people against communist assassins, and build a better life through economic growth” (Farber). This war was the first that Americans could literally watch from their living rooms Kennedy did not finish out what he had started because he was assassinated on Friday November 22, 1963. After this national tragedy, Kennedy’s vice president, Lyndon Johnson, took the position of commander in chief.
“Peace without conquest.” I remember sitting in my living room and listening attentively to every word that came out of President Lyndon Johnsons mouth. Johnson informed the American citizens that we had made a pledge with South Vietnam to help defend their independence from North Vietnam, a communist country (Yuravlivker). Johnson, along with John F. Kennedy, were strong believers that if South Vietnam fell to communism, then other countries would be affected by it too. So, pulling out of this war was not an option.
The most controversial part of Lyndon Johnson’s presidency was he was elected as a peace candidate. I have to give a little credit to LBJ solely because the questions of how to proceed with Vietnam fell right into his lap. We the people wanted a war less country. We were exhausted from World War 2 and our nation thought we weren’t ready to dive into another war but little did the people know that we were way beyond that and war in Vietnam was more or less inevitable. After Johnson gave his “Peace without Conquest” speech Americans were optimistic and seemed almost comforted by Johnsons promise to “defend” South Vietnam. This peaceful atmosphere was soon to be very disturbed when Johnson announced to the U.S. that the military would be fully committed to the full-scale war in Vietnam (Kaiser). This was when I first realized I was going to be assigned to a combat outfit in Vietnam. After this nation wide announcement, optimism changed to hatred and the support for Johnson vanished. We wanted a war less country and not to get involved in a war that was irrelevant to the U.S. and that’s why we voted Johnson commander in chief. We felt betrayed and lied too, was peace too much to ask for? The decision to fight the war in Vietnam, to the day, is a dramatic one because the war was said to be logical, but it was by no means essential (Kaiser). When I think about the Vietnam war and all the distress and darkness it brought to my life and the lives of the people of my nation the event that sticks out most is Tonkin Bay. I knew men on that American destroyer who lost their lives that day. The North Vietnamese blew up our ship and when I learned about it I decided right then and there that I was going to stand up for what I believe in and I believe in America. When this happened the Johnson administration depicted this event as an unsolicited affront on international waters (lecture). Later to find out this was actually an intelligence gathering exercise that involved the destroyer using a distortion signal to appear as though it was a much larger force, hoping the North Koreans would activate their communications when the destroyer would make runs at the coast (lecture). After this occurrence we sent more destroyers to send a vital message to the Vietnamese. These are also later blown up. Lyndon Johnson later used these events to pass the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that gave the president a free hand to protect American forces in Southeast Asia (Lecture). Another major controversy during this time was what we called agent orange. Agent orange was a powerful chemical defoliant mixture. This chemical mixture was used during the Vietnam War to eliminate forest cover for North Vietnam and Vietcong troops. This defoliant was also used to eliminate crops that were being used to feed the troops (The Things They Carried). The government was not aware, or maybe they were, about the ramifications this would have on the Vietnamese people. Babies were being born with devastating birth defects such a cleft pallet. Innocent civilians were being harmed from Agent Orange, not just communist troops. This was one of the only major problems I had with the war. Tet Offensive was launched in revolt against the U.S.
and South Vietnam. Tet Offensive began January 30, 1968. This day was in fact considered the most important holiday in Vietnam. North Vietnam bombed and attacked several cities in South Vietnam on this day. The main communist operation began the next morning when Vietcong troops attacked hundreds of cities in Vietnam. The Vietcong was the communist North Vietnam (Farber). The attacks were taken by surprise but the South was quick to fight back (The Things They Carried). Johnson and the administration were too confident that we would win this war, but this backfired. This shattered all notions that the war was nearly won (Johnson). It killed many soldiers and it was a devastating military setback to the US. It was a surprise attack that shocked the US and ignited fury. That March Johnson withdrew from the presidential campaign (lecture). He pretty much knew it was doomed (lecture). Nixon was then elected president and slowly pulled our troops out of South Vietnam, for the war was hopeless in
wining.
All of the fury and dissent towards the war caused many protests through out our nation. Unfortunately, fellow soldiers and I received the bitter end of these retaliations. When soldiers retuned home from this long and bitter war we were not treated with proper honor and respect for fighting for America and were even spit on (The Things They Carried). It seemed like it was easier for the Americans to blame the soldiers for what was happening in Vietnam instead of rioting against the true source of this war, the American government. The government was a harder target and it was easier for the anti-war activists to break the soldiers to get the point across about the hatred of sending the U.S. to war. The soldiers were easier to get to, they walked the streets and were trying not to hide from everyday life, whereas the government worked behind closed doors and were hard to get to. It is still not known why the anti-war activists took all of the anger of the war out on the soldiers; the majority of the soldiers were drafted and many volunteered in hope to stop the spread of communism; the soldiers were serving in hope to help the cause. Richard Nixon said “Let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.” Nixon was talking about all of the rioters against the Vietnam veterans and the insensitivity the anti war activists had towards us.
The truth is, I could go on and on for days about this fascinating war that I was a part of. Do I disagree with this war? No. I disagree with some tactics used by the American Government such as Agent Orange but as a whole we did what we needed to do to keep our country safe and free. I am proud of the sacrifices I made for my country. I am proud to be a Vietnam Veteran.

Works Cited

O 'Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried. New York: Broadway, 1990. Print.

Kaiser, David E. American Tragedy: Kennedy, Johnson, and the Origins of the Vietnam War. Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard Univ. Press, 2000. Print.