Reading any work of literature without knowledge of the historical time place in which the text exists only limits one's potential understanding. Without this knowledge one can still develop an understanding of the text, but it is just the tip of the iceberg. Before reading "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien, knowledge of the outcome and drug usage of the Vietnam War is crucial to develop a deep understanding of the text. 

When looking at the military success of the United States, Vietnam is a blemish in our decorated history. The Vietnam war is not looked at with great pride, as the motivations of the United States' involvement in the war is constantly brought into question. When first reading the text, one of the first things I picked up on was the overall depressed state that the story was narrated in. This did not fulfill the expectation I had coming before reading the book, as I assumed the stories of battle would be looked back on with great pride. The way O'Brien refers to the death of soldiers in the Vietnam War was very causal, like Ted Lavender, who "was dead weight" (O'Brien, 305). These characters death's aren't described with great suspense or detail, but instead just stated. O'Brien makes these deaths seem very insignificant, as if there was no one who cared about the safety of Vietnam soldiers. This didn't make sense to me when reading the book, but as soon as one understands the background of the Vietnam War, it all starts to make sense. O'Brien makes the death's seem insignificant because in a very dark way they were. Many U.S. citizens didn't even want soldiers in Vietnam in the first place, and went out of their way to try and end the war. On October 21, 1967, "100,000 protesters gathered at the Lincoln Memorial" in protest of the war in Vietnam (Vietnam War Protests). This depressed tone finally makes sense because there was more support to end the war than there was in support of the troops out fighting. How would a soldier be motivated to fight a war without support on the home front? A pretty disturbing section of the text occurs when O'Brien informs us of the lucky charm that Norman Bowker carried. Bowker carried a present given to him by Mitchell Sanders. This present was the thumb of a young Vietcong boy, cut off his corpse when the group stumbled upon his dead body. His fellow soldiers questioned this action, as, "Henry Dobbins asked what the moral was. Moral? 

You know. Moral" (O'Brien, 309). 

Sanders leaves the reader without a real answer to this question, but with a little knowledge about the outcome of the Vietnam War, the answer is easy to uncover. Sanders implies that there is no morality in war when he cuts off the boys thumb. The Vietnam War was a disgusting and savage battle, where if a soldier didn't have a mindset similar to that of Sanders, he wouldn't last long. In the war, "58,202" American soldiers lost their lives fighting for a questionable cause (Statistical Information of the Vietnam War). They were not fighting the war because they wanted to, but they had to. The general attitude of the soldiers was very similar to the general attitude of the home front, information that can easily be obtained with a little background research of the war. If this research is done before reading the text, a much deeper understanding of O'Brien's message is guaranteed.    

The use of drugs in the Vietnam War is not something that the U.S. Government likes to advertise to the public. Unless one decides to do some research on the topic, chances are they will never run across this information I their daily lives. Before reading this text, I had no knowledge of the widespread use of marijuana and even heroin by U.S. soldiers. Marijuana use was something that was accepted by fellow soldiers, as "Ted Lavender carried 6 or 7 ounces of premium dope, which for him was a necessity" (O'Brien 303). This is another important statement that is thrown out by O'Brien extremely casually, because not only is 6 to 7 ounces of marijuana a large amount, but nobody thinks twice about Lavender having it. I personally thought this was pretty significant when I first read it, because I never envisioned drug use as being a prominent part of warfare. Little did I know, drug use, "was rampant among soldiers. Marijuana was grown all over Vietnam, and many soldiers had their first experiences smoking it overseas" (Vietnam War Drug Use). Once the reader knows how prominent Marijuana was in Vietnam, it is really no surprise that many soldiers indulged in smoking it. Before knowing this background I thought the use of marijuana was bizarre, and one of the last things I would expect to read in a war story. Once this background is understood, the reader is able to relate the text to this information and develop a further understanding of the book. Marijuana wasn't the only drug widely used by soldiers, but harder, and more serious drugs found their way into the hands of soldiers. O'Brien recalls downtime when soldiers got a chance to catch their breath; "Ted Lavender pooped a tranquilizer and went off to pee" (O'Brien 308). The use of drugs by Lavender escalates from some dope to a tranquilizer pill, something that would certainly affect his combat skills. This was another event that surprised me in the text, because I thought as a First Lieutenant and the leader of your troops, a main concern of yours would be how ready your men were to fight. Lieutenant Cross has yet another very calm reaction to this, in which he does absolutely nothing. This confused me until I finally understood that soldiers just accepted that some of their fellow men were addicted to doe or other drugs. All these men were clearly depressed to be involved in the war, and "Some soldiers [had] religion, others [had] girlfriends waiting for them at home, others [had] dope" (Vietnam War Drug Use). All these soldiers had something motivating them to press on and complete their mission, and for some of these men, it was because they were addicted to drugs. Cross understood this, and knew in order to get his men to be compliant and actually make progress in the war, he had to accept their unique vices. Whether we like to admit it or not, drugs were very prominent in the Vietnam War, but when the research is done, the reader can understand why these drugs were so popular and accepted. 

The Vietnam is truly a unique war in United States history, because, first and foremost, we didn't win. Although this knowledge is assumed before reading the text, they way we lost the war and the countries emotions towards Vietnam are extremely significant to develop an understanding of O'Brien's message. The emotions towards the war explain the heavy drug usage by soldiers in combat, and even help explain why we could have lost the war. A reader is guaranteed to walk away from the text with a very different understanding if they know this information beforehand rather than jumping into the story clueless. 

