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.

As American involvement in Vietnam escalated in the 1960s, the military's need for medical personnel rose as well. A shortage of qualified nurses in the United States coupled with the requirements of providing adequate troops abroad meant increased opportunity for male nurses. To meet the needs of Army personnel, the Army Nurse Corps actively recruited men, a segment of the nursing population that had previously faced daunting restrictions in the Army Nurse Corps (ANC). Amidst mounting tension, the Army Student Nurse Program began accepting men and provided educational funding and support. Additionally, Congress extended commissions in the Regular Army to previously excluded male nurses. Men answered the call and actively took advantage of the new opportunities afforded them by the demands of war. They entered the educational programs and committed to serve their country through the ANC. Once admitted to the corps, a large percentage of male nurses served in Vietnam. Their tours of duty proved invaluable for training in trauma medicine. Further, these men experienced personal and professional growth that they never would have received in the civilian world. They gained confidence in their skills and worked with wounds and diseases seldom seen at home. For many, the opportunities created by the war led to a career in military medicine and meant the chance to seek additional training after nursing school, often specialized training. Relying heavily on oral histories and the archives of the Army Nurse Corps, this study examined the role these nurses played in entrenching men as a vital part of the ANC.

Thesis (MA)--Macquarie University (Division of Society, Culture, Media & Philosophy, Dept. of Media and Communications), 2006. / Bibliography: leaves 176-188. / Precursors -- An imperfect war -- Interregnum -- The perfect war -- Conclusions. / This thesis explores how war reporting on Australian television has been dramatically reshaped over the last 40 years, particularly by new technologies. Specifically, it seeks to answer these questions: 1. How did differing cultural, social, political and professional contexts, available technology and battlefield experience affect the attitudes, editorial content and narrative forms of two generations of television correspondents - in Vietnam and Iraq respectively? 2. How did technological and other industry changes over the 30 years between Vietnam and Iraq reshape the power relationship between the war correspondent in the field and his news producers and managers? What impact did these changes have on the resulting screened coverage? What are the longer-term implications for journalism and for audiences? / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / 192 leaves ill. (some col.)

Bonnie Singleton, wife of United States Air Force helicopter rescue pilot Jerry Singleton, saw her world turned upside down when her husband was shot down while making a rescue in North Vietnam in 1965. At first, the United States government advised her to say very little publicly concerning her husband, and she complied. After the capture of the American spy ship, the U.S.S. Pueblo by North Korea, and the apparent success in freeing the naval prisoners when Mrs. Rose Bucher, the ship captain's wife, spoke out, Mrs. Singleton changed her opinion and embarked upon a campaign to raise public awareness about American prisoners of war held by the Communist forces in Southeast Asia. Mrs. Singleton, along with other Dallas-area family members, formed local grass-roots organizations to notify people around the world about the plight of American POWs. They enlisted the aid of influential congressmen, such as Olin "Tiger" Teague of College Station, Texas; President Richard M. Nixon and his administration; millionaire Dallas businessman Ross Perot; WFAA television in Dallas; and other news media outlets worldwide. In time, Bonnie Singleton, other family members, and the focus groups they helped start encouraged North Vietnam to release the names of prisoners, allow mail and packages to be sent to the POWs, and afford better treatment for prisoners of war.

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The struggle between the President and the Congress over the power to control the use of military force is an enduring dimension of U.S. foreign policy. In the 20th century Arthur Schlesinger labeled the growth of Presidential war power the “Imperial Presidency.” While some scholars have attempted to explain the expansion of Presidential power based on the Cold War or nuclear weapons, there has been little work studying the link between America’s ascending role in international legal frameworks and this domestic legal transformation. In this dissertation, I argue that America’s participation in international legal frameworks, such as the United Nations and NATO, has been a central factor in enabling the growth of Presidential war power. These international frameworks allow the President to circumvent Congress and to assert that the use of military force was something other than a ‘war’ that would need Congressional authorization. In case studies of pre-WWII aid to Great Britain, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Gulf War, I demonstrate how the rise of executive war power relied on America’s growing participation in international legal frameworks. The dissertation contributes to the nexus of International Relations and Constitutional scholarship. It offers a unique interpretation of Presidential war power while also offering new insights on the nature of the United States’ relationship with international legal frameworks. I argue that participation in international legal frameworks has been ‘democracy-undermining’ as the President utilizes those frameworks to circumvent the Constitution’s restrictions on Presidential war power.

Le mémoire historiographique qui suit a comme sujet principal l’étude de l’évolution des perceptions françaises sur l’implication américaine au Vietnam. Nous nous sommes basés sur l’historiographie de deux périodes distinctes, soit celles des années 1960-1970 et 1990-2000. L’objectif était de voir s’il y a eu une transformation du regard que portent les auteurs sur l’implication américaine et, si oui, quelles en sont les causes. Le travail est construit de façon thématique et se divise en trois chapitres. Le premier aborde le choix et l’ampleur des armes utilisées, le second se penche sur la notion du communisme et de la démocratie, et le dernier traite de la conception de l’impérialisme et du colonialisme. Pour tous les thèmes examinés, nous résumons la perception qui ressort de chacun des auteurs afin de comparer les tendances idéologiques propres aux deux périodes étudiées. Nous conclurons qu’il s’est effectivement produit une importante transformation des perceptions. Cette transformation se traduit par une approche de moins en moins critique envers l’implication américaine au Vietnam. Dans chaque chapitre, nous avons pu soulever des causes de changement propres au sujet abordé. Toutefois, une tendance générale et sous-jacente se dégage et s’avère des plus révélatrices, soit le glissement en France des valeurs politiques et morales de la gauche vers la droite, doublé d’un rapprochement idéologique avec les États-Unis. / The main topic of this historiographical thesis is the evolution of French perceptions on American involvement in Vietnam. We based our study on the historiography of two distinctive periods, those spanning from 1960-1970 and 1990-2000. The aim was to see whether there has been a real transformation in writers’ views on American involvement and, if so, what were the causes. The work is constructed thematically and is divided into three chapters. The first addresses the choices and the magnitude of the weapons used, the second examines the concept of communism and democracy, and the third deals with the notion of imperialism and colonialism. For all themes analyzed, we summarized the perception that emerges from each of the authors in order to compare the ideological tendencies of the two specific periods. We have concluded that there has indeed been a significant transformation of perceptions. This transformation has resulted in a less critical attitude towards American involvement in Vietnam. In each chapter, we have been able to observe specific causes of change. However, an underlying tendency emerges and is more revealing, namely the drift of France’s political and moral values from left to right, coupled with an ideological reconciliation with the United States.

This study examines how the Toronto Anti-Draft Programme (TADP) assisted American war resisters who came to Canada in response to the Vietnam War. It illustrates how the TADP responded to political decisions in Canada and in the United States and adapted its strategies to meet the changing needs of war resisters who fled to Canada. The main sources of material used for this research were the TADP’s archival records, newspaper accounts and secondary literature. This study traces the organization’s origins in the Canadian New Left before looking at how TADP released the Manual for Draft-Age Immigrants to Canada; a document that advised war resisters on how to successfully prepare for immigration. It will also explore how TADP provided immigration counselling, employment, housing services and emotional support to American war resisters. Some of the organization’s principal actors and its relationship with other Canadian aid organizations are also examined. As the number of draft resisters coming to Canada decreased during the war, the number of military resisters entering the country increased. This shift led to a change in the type of counselling the TADP provided, a reorientation that is also discussed here. As well, the unexpected numbers of African-Americans and women resisters who crossed the border presented a unique set of challenges to the TADP. Finally, this thesis examines the TADP’s attempts to aid American war resisters in Sweden, spread the word about the Canadian government’s liberalized immigration regulations in 1973, and address the issue of amnesty for resisters in America.

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