Some Wounds Don’t Bleed: An Examination of Unresolved Trauma in Vietnam Veterans and Its Ethical Implications Through the Lens of One Man’s Story and Beyond

2014 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 140-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikhaile Spence ◽  
David Rose ◽  
James A. Tucker
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Moral Injury ◽  
Psychological Consequences ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
The Military ◽  
Unresolved Trauma ◽  
The U.S

The Vietnam War left in its wake not only physical casualties but psychological ones as well. Among the most significant features of the war’s aftermath are numerous and well-documented cases of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Despite having been observed by writers, scholars, and others as early as biblical times, it was not until the emotional and psychological aftereffects suffered by Vietnam veterans became too numerous and significant to ignore that medicine, psychology, and the U.S. military undertook serious study of the disorder. David Rose, himself a veteran, shares his personal PTSD journey, having been diagnosed some 45 years after his return from Vietnam. David’s story and poetry paint a picture that is both deeply personal and yet all too common among veterans of military conflict. Through David’s story, we explore the questions of what PTSD is and how it has been addressed by the military as well as those charged with providing treatment. Also explored is the concept of moral injury and the ethical implications of exposing service members to circumstances, which inevitably bear psychological consequences.

In the Crossfire or the Crosshairs? Norms, Civilian Casualties, and U.S. Conduct in Iraq

2007 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin H. Kahl
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Culture ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Iraq War ◽  
Military Culture ◽  
Noncombatant Immunity ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
The Military ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Over Time

The belief that U.S. forces regularly violate the norm of noncombatant immunity (i.e., the notion that civilians should not be targeted or disproportionately harmed during hostilities) has been widely held since the outset of the Iraq War. Yet the evidence suggests that the U.S. military has done a better job of respecting noncombatant immunity in Iraq than is commonly thought. It also suggests that compliance has improved over time as the military has adjusted its behavior in response to real and perceived violations of the norm. This behavior is best explained by the internalization of noncombatant immunity within the U.S. military's organizational culture, especially since the Vietnam War. Contemporary U.S. military culture is characterized by an “annihilation-restraint paradox”: a commitment to the use of overwhelming but lawful force. The restraint portion of this paradox explains relatively high levels of U.S. adherence with the norm of noncombatant immunity in Iraq, while the tension between annihilation and restraint helps to account for instances of noncompliance and for why Iraqi civilian casualties from U.S. operations, although low by historical standards, have still probably been higher than was militarily necessary or inevitable.

Covert Warriors for Hire

2018 ◽  
pp. 86-117
Author(s):  
Kyle Burke
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
The United States ◽  
Military Officers ◽  
Special Operations ◽  
High Ranking ◽  
The World ◽  
Reagan Era ◽  
The U.S

In the late 1970s, a new set of Americans took up the dream of a global anticommunist revolution. Many were high-ranking CIA and military officers who had been forced from their jobs by the Ford and Carter administrations in the wake of the Vietnam War. As Congress passed new laws constraining the United States’ clandestine services, these ex-soldiers and spies argued that the state’s deteriorating covert war-making abilities signaled a broader decline in U.S. power. To remedy that, retired covert warriors such as U.S. Army General John Singlaub, a thirty-year veteran of special operations, entered the world of conservative activism, which promised both steady pay and power in retirement. Working in the shadow of the state, they sought to revitalize a form of combat to which they had dedicated their lives. Some even started private military firms to fill in for the U.S. government. Meanwhile, hundreds of American men, mostly disgruntled Vietnam veterans, sought new lives as mercenaries, first in Southeast Asia and then in Rhodesia and Angola. In the late 1970s, these two camps of revanchist Americans—retired covert warriors and aspiring mercenaries—established patterns of paramilitarism that would transform the anticommunist international in the Reagan era.

Surviving Vietnam

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce P. Dohrenwend ◽  
Nick Turse ◽  
Thomas J. Yager ◽  
Melanie M. Wall
Keyword(s):  
Longitudinal Study ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
Public Attitudes ◽  
Psychological Impact ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Psychological Consequences ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
The Impact

Surviving Vietnam: Psychological Consequences of the War for U.S. Veterans presents a unique combination of historical material, military records of combat exposure, clinical diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and interviews with representative samples of veterans surveyed both a little over decade after the war’s conclusion in the National Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Study (NVVRS), and again nearly four decades after the war’s conclusion in the National Vietnam Veterans Longitudinal Study (Longitudinal Study). It focuses specifically on veterans’ war-zone experiences and the development in some of PTSD, a relatively new and controversial diagnosis. The monograph begins with a brief history of the Vietnam war that provides context for the discussions of the relevance to their mental health outcomes of the severity of veterans’ exposure to combat, their personal involvement in harm to civilians and prisoners, their race/ethnicity, and their military assignments. It discusses nurses’ experiences in Vietnam and the psychological impact on families of veterans’ chronic war-related PTSD. The monograph then examines factors affecting surveyed veterans’ post-war readjustment, including the effects of changing public attitudes toward the war and the veterans’ own appraisals of the impact of the war on their lives after the war. It concludes by discussing the policy implications of its research findings.

scholarly journals Military cooperation between the United States of America and the Republic of Vietnam (1969-1973)

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. first
Author(s):  
Le Thi Nhuong
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Military Cooperation ◽  
Internal Security ◽  
Military Forces ◽  
South Vietnam ◽  
The Republic ◽  
The Military ◽  
The U.S

President M. Richard Nixon took office in the context that the United States was being crisis and deeply divided by the Vietnam war. Ending the war became the new administration's top priority. The top priority of the new government was to get the American out of the war. But if the American got out of the war and the Republic of Vietnam (RVN) fell, the honor and and prestige of the U.S will be effected. Nixon government wanted to conclude American involvement honorably. It means that the U.S forces could be returned to the U.S, but still maintaining the RVN government in South Vietnam. To accomplish this goal, Nixon government implemented linkage diplomacy, negotiated with the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) in Paris and implemented "Vietnamization" strategy. The aim of the Vietnamization was to train and provide equipments for the RVN's military forces that gradually replace the U.S. troops, take responsibility in self-guarantee for their own security. By analyzing the military cooperation between the United States and the RVN in the implementation of "Vietnamization", the paper aims to clarify the nature of the "allied relationship" between the U.S and the RVN. It also proves that the goal of Nixon's Vietnamization was not to help the RVN "reach to a strong government with a wealthy economy, a powerful internal security and military forces", served the policy of withdrawing American troops from the war that the U.S could not win militarily, solving internal problems but still preserving the honor of the United States.

Epidemiology of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Adults

2012 ◽  
pp. 83-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi Breslau
Keyword(s):  
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Psychiatric Disorders ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Posttraumatic Stress ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Specific Response ◽  
Epidemiological Surveys

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was established in 1980, when it was incorporated in the DSM-III. The PTSD definition brackets a distinct set of stressors—traumatic events—from other stressful experiences and links it causally with a specific response, the PTSD syndrome. Explicit diagnostic criteria in DSM-III made it feasible to conduct large-scale epidemiological surveys on PTSD and other psychiatric disorders, using structured diagnostic interviews administered by nonclinicians. Epidemiologic research has been expanded from Vietnam veterans, who were the center of DSM-III PTSD study, to civilian populations and postwar regions worldwide. This chapter summarizes information on the prevalence estimates of PTSD in U.S. veterans of the Vietnam War, soldiers returning from deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan, and civilian populations. It outlines research findings on the course of PTSD, risk factors, comorbidity with other psychiatric disorders, and the risk for other posttrauma disoders. It concludes with recommendations for future research.

Some Psychological Effects of Changing Public Attitudes on U.S. Vietnam Veterans

2018 ◽  
pp. 257-270
Author(s):  
Bruce P. Dohrenwend ◽  
Eleanor Murphy ◽  
Thomas J. Yager ◽  
Stephani L. Hatch
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
Public Attitudes ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Substantial Effect ◽  
Psychological Effects ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Memory Distortions ◽  
The Vietnam War ◽  
The U.S

This chapter discusses the substantial effect that changing public attitudes toward the Vietnam war had both on veterans’ own attitudes toward the war and on demoralization in the U.S. armed forces toward the end of the war. In addition, as hypothesized, veterans’ negative attitudes at the time of their own entrances and exits from Vietnam, and negative changes in veterans’ initially favorable attitudes, were related to the period of the war in which they served and positively associated with demoralization. Because measurement of veterans’ attitudes toward the war at their entrance and exit occurred long after their service in Vietnam, it is possible that memory distortions played a role in these findings. However, the data indicate that retrospective bias cannot account for the differences in declining favorable and increasing negative attitudes toward the war related to veterans’ time of war entry.

Unarmed and Dangerous: The Holistic Preparation of Soldiers for Combat

2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 95-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clark C. Barrett
Keyword(s):  
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Posttraumatic Stress ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Ethical Training ◽  
The Military ◽  
The U.S ◽  
Do So

Within the U.S. military, incidents of suicide and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) continue to escalate unabated despite efforts to provide reactive, posttrauma treatment. A new focus on proactive, preemptive physical, mental, and moral/ethical training is required prior to combat. Methods pioneered and validated in the early 1990s are available and are ready for implementation, but the military must use a holistic, focused strategy to do so.

Strategy of positive mediatization of war in Vietnam (based on newspapers "Pravda" and "Komsomol’skaya pravda", 1965)

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 351-364
Author(s):  
Irina Trofimovna Vepreva ◽  
Minh Tuan Uong
Keyword(s):  
Vietnam War ◽  
Theoretical Basis ◽  
National Character ◽  
General Idea ◽  
Military Assistance ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The Military ◽  
Russian Linguistic ◽  
Is Value

The article is devoted to the analysis of the strategy of positive mediatization of the Vietnamese War in the Soviet media. The theoretical basis of the work is the concept of mediatization of politics developed as a term in the era of global informatization when the perception of social conflicts and their evaluation are actively formed by the mass-media. The projection of this concept to the events of 1965-1973 allows identifying the features of coverage of the military conflict in the Soviet media which are the mouthpiece of the official authorities. The material for the research is the newspaper resources in "Pravda" and "Komsomol'skaya pravda" for 1965 which is the starting point of the beginning of the USSR’s military assistance to fighting Vietnam. Two polar substrategies of mediatization of the image of Vietnam are found and characterized, based on opposition of ours and theirs: the substrategy of the heroization of the Vietnamese people and the substrategy of the accusation and condemnation of the external aggressor – the United States. The opposition of ours and theirs is value oriented. The representation of ours and theirs dichotomy by means of a totalitarian language has identified hypertrophied and simplified evaluation in the designation of ours and theirs. The first group is characterized by an absolutely positive evaluation, the second is absolutely negative. Among the linguistic means of implementing the substrategy of accusation and condemnation of the external aggressor, evaluative epithets, metaphorical nominations, political labels with negative evaluative connotation, and slogan headings of the accusatory and condemning type are found. The substrategy of the heroization of the Vietnamese people has formed a general idea of the national character of the Vietnamese. The positive mediatization of the Vietnam War has resulted in the enrichment of the meaning of the concept of Vietnam. In the Russian linguistic consciousness, there formed positively estimated views about the Vietnamese as a friendly, hardworking, heroic nation, capable of defending their independence.

Prevalence of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Depression and Anxiety in a Community Sample of New Zealand Vietnam War Veterans

1996 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 253-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nigel Long ◽  
Carol MacDonald ◽  
Kerry Chamberlain
Keyword(s):  
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Posttraumatic Stress ◽  
Vietnam Veterans ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Community Sample ◽  
Anxiety And Depression ◽  
Depression And Anxiety ◽  
Vietnam War Veterans

Objective: The aim of the paper is to investigate the prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression and anxiety in a community sample of New Zealand Vietnam War veterans. Method: Data were collected as part of a national survey on the health and mental health of New Zealand Vietnam veterans. Five hundred and seventy-three randomly selected male Vietnam veterans participated in a postal survey. The questionnaire contained a number of demographic, biographical and psychological measures. Results: The results revealed that 10% of the veterans could be classified as PTSD cases and that these veterans exhibited high levels of depression and anxiety. In PTSD cases, 15% were also classified with anxiety, 6% with depression, and 73% were classified with both anxiety and depression. In PTSD cases 94% were classified with more than one additional disorder. In non-PTSD cases 27% were classified with anxiety, and 1% with depression, while 12% experienced both anxiety and depression. Conclusions: The consequences of comorbidity for research and treatment are discussed and it is suggested that health professionals should be attentive to military experience as a predictor of these disorders.

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