Vietnam ConflictPaper Topics

Vietnam Background

1945-46 First Indochina War 1947: Truman Doctrine 1949: Nuclear Arms race 1954: North and South Vietnam were established

The Vietnam War

Second Indochina War U.S. was officially involved from 1964-5 until their official withdrawal

in 1973. The war ended in 1975 with the military conquest of the South by

the North. http://www.history.com/shows/vietnam-in-hd/videos/arriving-in-

vietnam?m=5189719baf036&s=All&f=1&free=false

New Types of Warfare

Guerilla warfare Tunnels “Humping the Boonies” Lack of Discipline Women’s role in combat

Chemical Warfare

Agent Orange Napalm

Vietnam Conflict

Villagers’ Roles My Lai Massacre: March of 1968 War Crimes

Coverage and Contact

Vietnam was really the first television war. It’s also been called the first “living-room war”

"Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of America--not on the battlefields of Vietnam."

--Marshall McLuhan, 1975

War Letters From Vietnam

Domestic and International Politics Watergate and Nixon Pentagon Papers The Cold War Imperialism

War Protests in the United States

Burning Draft Cards and Draft Dodging Kent State 1970 Protest Music

Soldiers’ Homecoming

Celebrating Veterans = Celebrating War. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder http://www.history.com/shows/vietnam-in-hd/videos/coming-home

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Designed by Maya Lin and dedicated in 1982 Jury called it a “place of healing” and a “memorial of our

own time.” Veterans and others demanded a second memorial.

Writing About the War Postmodernism Nihilism

Tim O’Brien

Born 1946 in Minnesota/ Drafted 1968/ Served 1969-1970 Father served in WWII and had published articles about his experiences at

Iwo Jima and other battles Stationed in the infantry group responsible for the My Lai massacres, less

than a year after they occurred Started Harvard, left to become a journalist and writer Teaches creative writing at Southwest Texas State University

The Things They Carried

Finalist Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award 1990 Collection of vignettes: narrator named Tim O’Brien with same

biography as the author Tim O’Brien Storytelling is the topic as much as war, letting the reader in on

the game of writing, using the form of a memoir Setting of war raises the stakes of any human conflict

Questions to Consider: How do Tim O’Brien’s voice and style add to the themes of his

book? O’Brien dissects the word truth and isn’t sure anyone can ever

tell a true war story. Does he get closer or further away than writers like Hemingway, Canfield, and Ozick?

O’Brien’s subject matter that is appalling, and his details are sometimes appalling. How does he bring his readers into these situations without losing them? Or does he lose them?

What are his arguments? Can language capture war?