The materials of war, defined as what soldiers carry into battle and off the battlefield, have much to offer as a means of identifying and analyzing the culture of those combatants. The Vietnam War is extremely rich in culture when considered against the changing political and social climate of the United States during the 1960s and 70s. Determining the meaning of the materials carried by Vietnam War soldiers can help identify why a soldier is fighting, what the soldier’s fears are, explain certain actions or inactions in a given situation, or describe the values and moral beliefs that governed that soldier’s conduct. “Carry,” as a word, often refers to something physical that can be seen, touched, smelled, or heard, but there is also the mental material, which does not exist in the physical space, that soldiers collect in their experiences prior to, during, and after battle. War changes the individual soldier, and by analyzing what he or she took (both physical and mental), attempts at self-preservation or defense mechanisms to harden the body and mind from the harsh realities of war are revealed. In the same respect, what the soldiers brought home is also a means of preservation; preserving those memories of their experiences adds validity and meaning to their experiences. An approach employing aspects of psychology, sociology, and cultural theory demonstrates that any cookie-cutter answer or characterization of Vietnam veterans is unstable at best, and that a much more complex picture develops from a multidisciplinary analysis of the soldiers who fought the war in Vietnam.

This thesis explores what Telford Taylor called the “ethos of Nuremberg” and how it shaped antiwar resistance during the Vietnam War in the United States. The Vietnam War was a monumental event in the twentieth century and the conflict provided lawyers, academics, activists, and soldiers the ability to question the legality of the war through the prism of the Nuremberg Principles, the various international treaties and U.S. Constitutional law. As many legal scholars and historians have lamented, the Cold War destroyed hopes for the solidification of an international court empowered to preside over questions of war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes against peace. In the absence of cooperation among the international community, the antiwar movements in the United States and around the world during the Vietnam War utilized these legal instruments to form what I call a war crimes movement from below. A significant component of this challenge was the notion that individual citizens – draft noncooperators, military resisters, tax resisters, and the like – had a responsibility under the Nuremberg Principles to resist an illegal war. In the numerous United States military interventions after World War II, none had been challenged as openly and aggressively as the war in Vietnam. As this thesis will demonstrate, the ideas that crystallized into action at Nuremberg played a major role in this resistance.

Vietnams krig från 1945 till 1975 är en historia om hur kommunisterna och Nordvietnam med stödav Kina och Sovjetunionen besegrar kolonialmakten Frankrike och stormakten USA och etablerarkommunistisk regim. Under krigen var det två händelser som allvarligt skadade Nordvietnamsmotståndare; Dien Bien Phu 1954 och Tet-offensiven 1968.Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka vilka asymmetriska metoder som revolutionär krigföringinnehåller och hur dessa metoder, mer eller mindre omedvetet, har använts av Nordvietnam 1954och 1968. Som teoretisk utgångspunkt används Beaufres teori om indirekt strategi, dels för attfinna förklaringar till det asymmetriska karaktären och dels för att pröva Beaufres teori somförklaringsmodell. Arbetsmetoden har varit kvalitativ innehållsanalys och uppsatsen är ihuvudsak disponerad enligt kronologisk respektive tematisk ordning.Undersökningen visar att Frankrike och USA/Sydvietnam kontra de vietnamesiska kommunisternahade en diametralt motsatt syn på tid, operativt djup och mänskliga offer och därför praktiseradekontrahenterna vitt skilda operationskonster vilket utgjorde grunden för ett asymmetrisktförhållande. / The Vietnam wars from 1945 to 1975 tell the story of how the communists and North Vietnam,with the support of China and the Soviet union, defeat the colonial power France and the superpower US and establish a communist regime. There were two episodes that seriously damagedNorth Vietnam´s enemies; Dien Bien Phu 1954 and the Tet offensive 1968.The object of the thesis is to investigate the asymmetric methods used in revolutionary warfareand how these methods, more or less consciously, were used by North Vietnam in 1954 and 1968.Beaufre´s theory about indirect strategy is used a theoretical starting point, partly to findexplanations to the asymmetric nature and partly to evaluate the value of Beaufre’s theory as anexplanatory model. The method used has been a qualitative analysis of content and the thesis ismainly disposed in a chronological and thematic order.The thesis shows that France and the US/South Vietnam versus the Vietnamese communists haddiametrical opposing perceptions of time, operative depth and human sacrifices, which led thecontracting parties to use widely different conduct of military operations that formed the basis foran asymmetric relationship. / Avdelning: ALB - Slutet Mag 3 C-uppsHylla: Upps. ChP 02-04

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Central Florida, 2009. / Adviser: Terri Fine. Includes bibliographical references (p. 120-123).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 80-94). / Microfiche. / vii, 94 leaves, bound 29 cm

Thesis (M.M.A.S.)--US Army Command and General Staff College, 2006. / Cover title. AD-A463 835. Includes bibliographical references (p. 58-60). Electronic version available on the Public STINET.

Thesis (M.A.)--West Virginia University, 1999. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 96 p. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 95-96).

Thesis--School of Advanced Air and Space Studies. / "June 2003." Includes bibliographical references (p. 100-103).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 143-155).

"Thesis presented to the faculty of the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama, for completion of graduation requirements, academic year 2003-4." / "August 2006." Includes bibliographical references (p. 53-55).