Ben Dodson-Exploration Six

"I was atrocity--I was jungle fire,jungle drums--I was the blind stare in the eyes of all those poor, dead, dumbfuck ex-pals of mine--all the pale young corpses, Lee Strunk and Kiowa and Curt Lemon--I was the beast on their lips--I was Nam--the horror, the war." After reading this statement from "The Ghost Soldiers," Tim O'Brien was truly able to convey how war forever changes someone. Even past stories throughout the book, such as the "Sweetheart of  the Song Tra Bong" cannot compare to how this story sets in a certain amount of realism. This short passage depicts how war can entirely capture rational thoughts, and erase the enjoyment out of the life one may have had before they entered into conflict. O'Brien is referencing himself in this story, where he absolutely needed to get revenge on the new medic who unfortunately, by not acting quick enough, caused O'Brien to be unable to perform on the front lines anymore. His friends, the comradery, and the need for the feeling of danger he had grown to love were "in the bush" while he had to stay back, pent up at a resupply station. This passage explains how he changed; Even if O'Brien didn't wan't to get revenge anymore, he still had to. He had to make Jorgenson feel any sort of fear, pain, agony. He became the very thing that had killed his friends. He became fear. He became Vietnam.

Honestly, I could relate to Tim O'Brien's character within this book the most. Going back to the previous paragraph, O'Brien doesn't want to let go of the thing that he has come to love. Without combat, he's just another soldier, but now without the sense of dignity and brotherhood that grew on him. I feel that if I was put in that situation I would act in the same manner, with anger and uncertainty. When something you love is taken away from you, you act out in awful ways, but usually regret your actions later on. Everyone messes up at some point, and O'Brien realized that, but for some reason he needed to put his mind at ease by getting even with the person that put him in this situation. The memories of someone who did something wrong or took something from you never go away, making coping without revenge almost impossible.

Kiowa, the young Native American who grew up on the values of religion, relates so closely to Ling Young, a burn victim from the 9/11 terrorist attacks. They both essentially put their situations on the back burner, realizing that life could be much worse. Kiowa knew what he had been put into, though the travesties and hardships of Vietnam War didn't slow him down at all. He constantly shrugged awful situations off like nothing was ever wrong, realizing although this war was a grind, but you had to keep pushing on, even sometimes adding adding comical relief. Ling Young's attitude toward what she was put through is just as motivated. In the documentary "Rebirth" she even mentions that she could be much worse off, after meeting the other burn victims of the attacks. Their drive and relentless self motivating attitude give them a characteristic that most people do not have.