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Detachment of Reality
2
Detachment
From reality
Thank you
Conclusion
Idea of detachment advanced through the characterization of soldiers and command
A political message:
- American involvement was wrong
- The reality of war must be conveyed
Ka Eun (Kelsey) Lee
Detachment from humanity of both soldiers and command:
- Treatment of the dead
“We had this gook and we was gonna skin him” (a grunt told me), “I mean he was already dead, and everything, and the lieutenant comes over and says, ‘hey asshole, there’s a reporter in the TOC, you want him to come out and see that? I mean, use your fucking heads, there’s a time and place for everything…’”
“God damn it, Sergeant,” he said through the static, “I thought you were a professional soldier,”
“I waited as long as I could, Sir. Any longer, I was gonna lose my men.”
“This outfit is perfectly capable of taking care of its own dirty laundry, Is that clear Sergeant?”
“Colonel, since when is a wounded trooper ‘dirty laundry?’”
“At ease, Sergeant.”
Detachment of soldiers from reality:
- Their fear of death and disfigurement
Characterization by Michael Herr to convey his Anti-war views
Detachment of command from reality:
- preoccupation with hygiene
Guys would pray and pray – Just you and me, God. Right? Offer anything, if only they could be spared that: Take my legs, take my hands, take my eyes, take my fucking life, You Bastard, but please, please, please don’t take those.
“What about the Marines at Khe Sanh?” someone asked.
“I’m glad we’ve come to that… I want to tell you that those Marines are clean! Their mood is good, their spirits are fine, morale is excellent and there’s a twinkle in their eye!”
Detachment from reality of 'Mayhew':
- blind optimism
- detachment from the possibility of death
“Boo-sheeit! Ain’t never getting hit in Vietnam”
“what I gonna do with you, poor fucker?... Here, man, here’s a grenade. Why you jus don go up backa the shithouse an pull the pin an lie down on it?”
“anxiety was a luxury, a joke you had no room for once you knew the variety of deaths and mutilations the war offered”
Detachment of soldiers from reality:
- The reliance on "flip religion"
"Guys stuck the ace of spades in their helmet bands, they picked relics off of an enemy they’d killed, a little transfer of power; they carried around five-pound Bibles from home, crosses, St Christophers, mezuzahs, locks of hair, girlfriends’ underwear, snaps of their familes, their wives, their dogs, their cows, their cars, pictures of John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, martin Luther King, Heuy Newton, the Pope, Che Guevara, the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, wiggier than cargo cultists"
Detachment of soldiers from life:
- A depiction of the soldiers' exhausted mentality
- the psychological impacts of war
“overloaded and crushed and snappish, ripping packs off of corpses angrily, cutting gear away with bayonets, heaving bodies into green bags”