There are no winners in war, it negatively affects those involved whether it be soldiers or just innocent civilians. Repetitive abuse on the physical and psychological boundaries can fuel one’s need to find an escape, with a combined effect of war it reveals the worst in one’s self. In the novel, 'Dispatches’ written by Michael Herr, his personal and truthful realism of the violence during the Vietnam War is developed by the psychological effect he displays in his writing, which is enhanced by the importance of music, the extensive use of illegal drugs, the growth of racial inferiority in the war, and the loss of trust among one another.
For many Americans and Vietnamese, the war has been long forgotten and has left in the past. many lives were lost throughout the hardship during the 60s and 70s, as much as 2 million civilians perished during the war including 1.4 million Vietnamese fighters and 60,000 American soldiers, who were willing to pay the toughest price. The war had an impact on everyone involved, whether it be soldiers.
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Music has also been an essential part of human evolution and has acted as a form of expression felt emotionally. Music throughout the course of many battles and war has been a key factor or so say ritual to those who are most closely in combat. Music has been used as an instrument to relay commands, for example, the Greeks used trumpets to “synchronize soldiers on the march and rowers aboard galleys”. Although throughout history music has not only acted as a relay in commands but also to help warriors and soldiers get ready mentally for the battle ahead of them, for instance, “ Native American fighters would assemble on the eve of battle around a campfire and one by one stand and sing of the glorious victories of their ancestors”. Though, through the development of the Vietnam war, music has acted as a form of relief and expression. Throughout, the novel the use of music is displayed and used to show the significance of how music can impact one’s behavior and demeanor on the battlefield. In his novel, Michael Herr describes this phenomenon through the perspective of the soldier and their journey to escape the prospect of ones degrading mental anxiety. Many of the soldiers who fought in the war belonged to a generation of just reaching adulthood, around the age of 19-23. Thus, the music listens during the war were keeping up with the current time which was the ‘rock and roll’ ages. Given this, many soldiers did not want to lose this energetic youth momentum, thus they leaned on music to hide away and bring by the energetic feeling they had lost through joining military service. Many soldiers took pieces that reminded them of home, and their music was a keystone to that. They would try to find music that they could relate to, rock and roll in fact was popularized at the time due to the lyrical significance and how it could relate to the soldiers through their struggles. One artist in particular that soldiers could relate to was ‘Jimi Hendrix’, he authored songs such as Purple Haze which was based on soldiers in the war. Evidently, when he describes a Jimi Hendrix song which physically and mentally affects one of the soldiers, he describes it as
“Page took the record that was playing on the turntable off without asking anybody and put on Jimi Hendrix: long tense organic guitar line that made him shiver like frantic electric ecstasy was shooting up from the carpet through his spine straight to the old pleasure center in his cream-cheese brain, shaking his head so that his hair waved all around him”.
Undoubtedly, Jimi Hendrix music played a sizable factor in helping soldiers cope with the realization that they are in Vietnam.
The use of intoxicants has spanned throughout centuries, to the use of morphine in the civil war, amphetamines in WWII, and the wide use of pill and opium in Vietnam. Servicemen in Vietnam used more drugs than any generation for servicemen in U.S history, it was widely publicized that many of the veterans who were involved in Vietnam suffered extensive drug addictions. Given facts that around ‘51% of armed forces had smoked marijuana, 31 percent had used psychedelics, and an additional 28 percent had taken hard drugs,’ it was a known fact that many had turned to hard drugs to help numb their feelings and to help cover and hideaway reality. Furthermore, soldiers were prescribed pills to enhance their performance on the field, in which many abused prescription drugs to relieve anxiety and help with depression. Marijuana was the first choice of the drug earlier in the war, which was very accessible in many rural towns in Vietnam, many soldiers would look into marijuana to help mellow themself from all the restlessness during the war. Although, as word throughout revealed the over abuse of marijuana the U.S military decisively enacted a ban on usage of marijuana. After the ban on Marijuana many seek alternatives which led to the many soldiers turning to other drugs such as opium (heroin).
The quantity of heroin thus quickly increased as the demand was now higher, and from the unrest of the war smuggling in heroin from bordering countries like Cambodia was now easier, prices were inexpensive thus over abusing it was just a matter of time. In Herr’s perspective of the war, he describes how the frequent use of heroin has now evolved into a habit, and no longer a necessity but an essential need, he describes it as “Sometimes sleeping at Khe Sanh was like sleeping after a few pipes of opium, a floating and drifting in which your mind still worked” (Herr 130).
The impacts American soldiers faced first hand in Vietnam, whether it be physical or psychological, was most evident in their treatment of the Vietnamese people. Racial divergence led to the breach of military and societal expectations in Vietnam. The term ‘Gook’ was emphasized thoroughly in Herr documentation of the war. Gook was a term military personal would use as a racial slur to refer to their native population counterpart. Though the origins are unknown, it is widely confirmed by many scholars that the term Gook was Americanised.
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