The Vietnam War was one of the most violent and scarring wars in recent history. The soldiers who fought in this war were put through the hardest times of their lives and felt the repercussions from it for years. These soldiers are known for having higher levels of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and other psychological disabilities from their service than previous wars.  During the war they not only carried their issued equipment but things from their personal lives, which is what Tim O’Brien discusses in his book The Things They Carried. Through research on the Vietnam war one can see that the physical and the emotional burdens the soldiers carried caused psychological distress in the soldiers and this is important because it offers a deeper perspective on what war is truly like.

The Vietnam War was a war fought between America and the North Vietnamese militaries that took place from 1964 and 1975. This is considered one of the most horrific wars to fight in. The war was full of ambushes, civilian brutality and a major lack of will to fight on the American side. The brave men who fought this war joined for many different reasons, some of them had a family history of military service, others thought “it was their duty to fight for their country and for freedom. The Majority of them were drafted without a prior notice.” (Hochgesang) This being said many of the soldiers were inexperienced before the war and had trouble adjusting to the conditions of war. The soldiers who fought this war had higher levels of PTSD than the soldiers of WWII and the War on Terror. According to the Department of Veteran Affairs “30 out of every 100(30%) of Vietnam Veterans have had PTSD in their lifetime.” (PTSD) Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is defined as a mental health condition caused by experiencing or seeing a terrifying event. The symptoms include distressing recollections, the feeling of the event recurring, avoidance of thoughts, difficulty sleeping, outbursts of anger, and exaggerated startle response (Bison 789). So these soldiers had to re-experience this war for years after the event actually takes place, making their lives harder than they already were during the war, and they had a hard time during the war dealing with emotional stress as well aa the physical.

In his book, The Things They Carried, O’Brien discusses all the things that soldiers carry on them and the physical weight that the equipment burdened the soldiers with. He describes the types of weapons, ammunition, and equipment in detail. He also talks about the personal items that each soldier carries with them. For example, Cross carries letter from Martha, his love interest back home, and Kiowa carries a hatchet that belonged to his grandparents. One of the things that this provides insight to is that the soldiers carry pieces of their old lives desperately trying to hold on to who they were before the war. The personal item he focuses on the most is the letters that Cross carries with him from the girl back home. Cross desperately tries to hold on to that part of his life in order to keep being the person he was before the war. After the death of Ted Lavender, he realizes that he can no longer hold on to his old self and his love for Martha. He has to let go of these things so he can do his job better and get his men through the war, so he burns the letters and becomes stricter with his men. In his article, “The Psychological Effects of the Vietnam War,” Josh Hochgesang describes the scenarios as “Imagine if you had just graduated out of high school and were sent to guerrilla warfare far away from your home… then you were sent back home with no readjustment” (Hochgesang). This relates to Cross in that he is a young soldier who was just getting his life started and then got sent to war, now he has to change who he was and who he wanted be in order to survive the war. Then he will be sent back home and is expected to be the same person he was before he left but “it changed their sense of identity and perspective of society” (Hochgesang). This sudden change in a person’s character can cause a lot of long lasting emotional damage and confusion which makes reentering society difficult. They lose their sense of identity because they are trapped between the person they were before the war and the person they were during the war. This emotional turmoil can lead to PTSD and other emotional issues later down the road. 

The Things They Carried brings up topics of more than just the equipment that the soldiers carry with them. One thing that comes up is how the soldiers choose to handle their emotions. O’Brien states that “they carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing- these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity” (O’Brien 338).  There are two approaches to how to handle their emotions, one being embracing your emotions and trying to find inspiration from them, the other is to leave your emotions behind. Cross chooses to carry his emotions with him, this is evident when he begins to cry after Lavender is killed. He blames himself for the incident and has to try to deal with this emotionally, which he knows will never leave him. These emotions motivate Cross to be a better leader by making him not to experience that sort of event again. After Lavender’s death Cross becomes more focused and by the books, trying to make his men more effective and better prepared. Some of the soldiers chose to leave their emotions behind, Kiowa is one of the soldiers that represents this approach to emotions. This is seen when he discusses the death of Ted Lavender, he feels nothing when he sees one his friends die. He says that “there was no twitching or flopping… it was like watching a rock fall, or a big sandbag or something – just boom, then down- not like the movies where the dead guy rolls around and does fancy spins… the poor bastard just flat-fuck fell. Boom. Down. Nothing Else” (O’Brien 330).  He has chosen not to carry his emotions in order to help him get through the war, this makes him more adjusted and numb to the horrible things that he sees in the war. The idea of dropping things you see as not necessary is a recurring theme among the soldiers. It is described how during marches the soldiers drop equipment, waste ammo, and blow off explosives so they do not have to carry the extra weight. They also know that they will be given more during resupplies. In both cases the men are just trying to improve their chances of survival by taking with them only the things they see as necessary to make it through their ordeal, they also know that both the equipment and the emotions will be plentiful in the war. These actions change a person’s mindset from living a meaningful life to pure survival instinct. The transition in how the soldiers go through life makes regular life back home and readjusting to society more difficult.  

Knowing about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and other psychological disorders can lead to different interpretations of The Things They Carried because people can see the early signs of emotional damage in how the soldiers act during the war. This is important because it offers a deeper perspective on the book. It transforms the book from just being about the equipment that is needed to fight a war and the personal items soldiers carry to a book showing how and why soldiers change during war and displays the early signs of PTSD.  It shows what war really does to people, giving us a better picture of what veterans and current members of the military go through, giving people a better appreciation and more awareness to the armed forces. 

