"To See Them As People"

As a Vietnam combat vet(1st Cav)I do ot have that reaction at all. I may, say again, may over compensate. I work at the post office as a letter carrier and was asked to assist a new employee. She was doing her best, and in the process of helping her (she was Asian) I asked her her origin. She said she was Chinese, and when I pressed her further, she said she was from Vietnam (Saigon). In the process of explaining how to do the job more efficiently, she explained she was eager to learn and not afraid of work, in fact she had been working since she was 5 years old and is now 35. I can't have but the utmost respect for a person who has left their home for a new country and managed to work and thrive in our country. I feel not one bit of hostility towards any such person, quite the contrare. A moment of full disclosure is called for though. My wife of 37 years is Japanese, so I must admit a certain bias.

Duke, Thanks for your feedback. We are trying to get a good picture of how many Vets do have some kind of adverse reaction to current encounters with former enemies.

Our resident Psychologist has done some research on this issue and has found that the range of emotions that Vets may have include anger, guilt grief, despair, fear, indifference, sadness, and denial. These are only the most likely reactions that Vets may have.

Again, thanks for the feedback

Allen

YOU have feelings much like many of us. I still wonder how many of them came to this country to live and survived with 8 million of us around. I was there in 1968 and served as a grunt. I believe it is okay because even with all the anger than smoulders within sometimes, we are a forgiving nation. If we can tolerate our own blemishes I suppose we can appreciate why those people left a Communist country and sought refuge here. We must remember that many of them wanted us there because of the way they lived. Don't judge by the words of our press. The media only tells what it thinks brings fame and fortune and we, as a society have fed that, rather than turn off our tvs. I softened a bit when my uncle helped two sisters find peace and new lives here. He could not get their entire family out of country but he got them in 1973 or 74. He was in Nam for 5 years. They were members of a family that worked on his base and were very definitely pro-American. I have not seen them since he got them relocated 30 years ago after having hidden them with my parents in our small midwestern town. They were warm, sweet people. He gave them new lives. They were what they were and now they are what they are. Americans. I suspect they are more loyal than some of our own native born people. We are not taught that much anymore. I understand your concern and identify with it, however I was lucky enough to experience two lovely young women in a non-combative situation and it probably did much to help me adjust to the intrusion.

Re: Allen Gandy - See Them As People Allen, don't forget to ask the obverse question. Perhaps it was the time of service or a function of political or cultural awareness, but some of us never felt that the enemy soldiers we faced or the Vietnamese people in general were that different from us. Many of them were draftees or forced into military conscription. A personal experience talking with our "Kit Carson" scout was revealing. A farmer, he had been abducted by the Viet Cong and forced into combat. He was captured by the Americans and "re-educated" in an ARVN camp. Then he came to serve with us. His statement was "Working with the Americans was number one, the Home Guards number 3, the ARVN number 5, and the VC number 10." He didn't want to fight, he just wanted to live his own life on his farm. The ratings were a matter of power, the ability to live as a free human being, and the likelihood of surviving. He said he had no real options. Although we Americans bitched about spending a year in Nam, the Vietnamese were forced into some form of military service from the age of 17 until they were 35. I often wonder what happened to him after the U.S. pulled out. As for the general Vietnamese population, you couldn't have contact with the common people and children and not see them as victims of the overwhelming forces controlling their lives. Had our leaders taken a different approach before plunging us into a long war, we might have have a better result and influence on the history of that country.

Some of our soldiers got to see and associate with the Vietnamese as people. I never felt comfortable with our people who could only see "gooks."

Allen; Mr. Button is right on. They had their lifers and we do too but if they are anything like us they had a job they had to do and they wanted to survive. Actually I think we despised Communists more than we did individual people or a race of people. Then enemy had that face in a general sense or collective sense. Well said Cotton.

Thanks for the feedback. It appears that the adverse reaction to meeting a former enemy in current times is not universal to all Nam Vets, but is evident in some subset of that group. That is part of what we are trying to find out about, to determine in the program - To See Them As People - that we are producing.

Again, Thanks

Allen Gandy

In a response to this posting, Mike stated - "YOU have feelings much like many of us." Mike, we are trying to determine how widely spread these feelings go - how many Vets have them - how deeply ingrained are they. Yes - I had feelings at the party that I attended. How many others - from whatever military conflict - have some kind of reaction to a situation where a former enemy is present in a current encounter? That is what we are dealing with in the production - To See Them As People. Thanks for your comments.

Allen,I am surprised you have not gotten more responses here. It is an interesting quest. I despised those we fought. I thought the people who were neutral were fairly graceful and calm in their lives. They had very little and we never really socialized except on a very coarse level, but following scripture is more easily said than done. I also despised the kids who spat on when I returned home. I had more anger here than there.

These comments have been invaluable to me as is this whole site. I thank you for your comment.