Parallels of Vietnam and Iraq

Phil Klay, a Marine veteran of the Iraq War and author, recently published "Redeployment," a collection of short war stories. In an interview with Jeff Baker of the Oregonian, he answers a few questions regarding his writing and his experiences as a Marine in the Iraq War. When asked about his return to civilian life, Klay replied  it was "both amazing and weird...coming back to the country that ordered you over there only to realize that a lot of Americans are not really paying attention." Iraq is not the first war in American history to receive apathy and selective ignorance from civilians.

As a drafted and generally unfavorable war, soldiers and veterans of the Vietnam War were often treated poorly or ignored during their time at war and upon their return home.This concept of an ignorant society during wartime and how this can negatively affect soldiers is explored in Tim O'Brien's books, The Things They Carried and If I Die in a Combat Zone: Box Me Up and Ship Me Home, fiction and  nonfiction accounts of soldiers' experiences in the Vietnam War. O'Brien illustrates in his novel, The Things They Carried, scenarios similar to Klay's realization that America was "not really paying attention" (Klay) to the Iraq war. Both America's ignorant attitude and a soldier's wounded reaction is demonstrated when a soldier returned from Vietnam contemplates America's interest in the war and concludes "the place could only blink and shrug. It had no memory, therefore no guilt. The taxes got paid and the votes got counted and the agencies of government did their work briskly and politely. It was a brisk polite town. it did not know shit about shit, and did not care to know" (O'Brien).
In recent history, the location of the war may vary from Southeast Asia to the Middle East, but ultimately parallels will be found among the attitudes of the involved parties and war stories will remain true across generations.