War has been waged by man since the beginning of our existence. There have been many wars in history, but none can compare to the Vietnam War in the aspects of brutality, psychological damage, and war time atrocities. The short story The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien, depicts a platoon of soldiers lead by love stricken 1st Lt. Jimmy Cross as they came in contact with the horrendous realities and casualties of the Vietnam War. America and its government got involved with this debacle to stop the spread of communism throughout southeast Asia. Unlike previous wars, the U.S. stood alone. Although almost all the skirmishes fought were won, we ultimately withdrew due to pressure from the neighboring countries of Vietnam and the uprising American public on the Homefront. These two articles, Military Conflict and the Politics of Narrative: Explaining the Rise and Fall of the Cold War Consensus, by Ronald R. Krebs, and Traumatized Soldiers, by Kenneth Fuchsman show both the overall feelings of the American public on the war, and how the soldiers on the frontline dealt with what the saw and did.  

The Vietnam War was referred to by the American public as a possibly the biggest foreign policy mistake in the countries history, and it caused extreme amounts of civil unrest. The government enforced the draft during the time of this conflict, outraging those who would choose not to fight. The U.S. government claimed they needed to stop what they called the “Domino Theory” regarding the Vietnam War and the spread of communism throughout Asia (Krebs 15). People in opposition of the war held protests. The public’s view on the War from the very beginning was bad but after the Kent State massacre there was complete unrest throughout the country. The end of the Vietnam War showed “…historical accounts credit the Vietnam War with its collapse … as a large and unanticipated policy failure.”, bringing psychological damage of American soldiers and a high death toll (Krebs 37). After the war was over the American public’s pride had been stamped on, the once invincible United States military had been beaten. Krebs wrote about those post war feeling when he referred to Holsti and Rosenau from 1986 saying, “Scholars and contemporary observers alike identified Vietnam as “the acid that dissolved the postwar foreign policy consensus.”” (Krebs 5), which was completely true. The war convinced the public for a long while that American should not and would not be the world’s police force. These angry and defeated feeling shared by the whole country formed a new way the public viewed the military and how they would deal with future foreign policies.

Through the struggles of war comes immense stress to the soldiers who see constant frontline battle. Intense fighting with many casualties and nonsensical violence towards civilians caused many men to have PTSD if not some sort of stress. Fuchsman relays the idea of, “Bringing life and death so close together, can engender extraordinary stress.” (Fuchsman 74) and this was proven throughout the Vietnam War and a long time after its end. The men who went into Vietnam looking fight a war to free an “entrapped” people from the hands of communism, only later found themselves wondering why they were there and what they were fighting for. In truth, the war seemed like a farce to many of those men who were laying their lives down. There were no true major victories only skirmishes over large piles of dirt, which created a sense of no progression further deteriorating the moral and psychological health of the soldiers. The stress and anger from the war caused many men to outlandish acts, “about 20 percent of the men admitted to having witnessed atrocities during their tour of duty in Vietnam, and another 9 percent acknowledged personally committing atrocities” towards undeserving citizens and causing huge amounts of unnecessary damage (Fuchsman 76). Towns were burned, people being shot on a whim, and crops were destroyed all because the insanity of frontline combat created malicious feelings towards those who called Vietnam their homeland. Another factor of extreme stress for the soldiers in Vietnam was the fact nobody at home or abroad supported their fighting. The Homefront was disgusted with its soldiers, and there were no allied European countries were willing to assist America in its campaign.  The soldiers were ultimately alone, and the feeling of being alone can be extremely stressful especially under the circumstances of war.

Moreover, the short story The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien was extremely similar in relation to the atrocities and extreme stress experienced on the frontlines. 1st Lt. Jimmy Cross was ultimately like every other soldier in Vietnam, he was alone except for the men in his platoon, and his “love” Martha. All through the story he expresses his stress at not knowing if Martha will return his love once he returned. His loneliness took hold, and mentally he latched on to her as an escape from the war until it became a danger to the rest of his platoon. The soldiers in the story carried the mental weight of what they had seen and the weight of what they physically had. Ted Lavender, a focal point in the story was shot and killed, Kiowa a Native American soldier was the only one to see. Kiowa was shocked by the event that unfolded before his eyes, “the bastard flat-fuck fell” (O’Brien 330). Lavenders death was extremely heavy on the conscious of one man, Lt. Jimmy Cross, because “Witnessing death is another source of severe stress.” (Fuchsman 75). Cross was stricken with anger at himself for putting Martha in front of his men, and Martha for causing him so much stress. After the event the men committed an atrocity that was all too common during the Vietnam War, they “burned Than Khe” a town undeserving of such destruction (O’Brien 331). Those same soldiers like many others throughout the war lost their sense of purpose, the stress created an overload in their heads and they became numb to everything. The soldiers, “…moved like mules. By daylight taking sniper fire, at night they were mortared…the endless march, village to village, without purpose, nothing won or lost.” becoming more and more numbed by all the stress put upon them by intense fighting, those experiences became a normalcy (O’Brien 335). The stress that crushed down on these men was the same for many of those who fought day to day on the front lines in Vietnam.

The goal of all the soldiers, including Lt. Jimmy Cross and all those from Tim O’Brien’s story The Things They Carried, was to free an oppressed people, but they only ended up losing their purpose for fighting. The soldiers, as well as Cross had no one at home who truly supported them, and had no allies to fight alongside. Overall the extreme stress effected almost all who partook in heavy front line combat, and sometimes it showed through in the carnages some soldiers committed. Whether it was Martha’s questionable love, or the death of Ted Lavender, the stress was too great for Lt. Jimmy Cross to complete his job as leader affectively. The extreme emotional toll that the event during the Vietnam War took on American soldiers was huge. The defeated the soldiers returned home broken, and then were pushed even further by a public who did not except them. The extreme stress that weighed on Lt. Cross after the death of Lavender lingered on in his mind, driving him mad, not only about his failure as an officer, but also due to his new hatred for Martha for making him so distracted.
