Ever since the conclusion of the American Civil War no significant military battles have taken place on American soil. However, American military involvement has been a constant phenomenon throughout modern history. Instead of fighting on our home turf soldiers took their weapons and military training abroad. Fighting on foreign lands benefited the American people in a number of ways. Unlike the American wars of the 1700 and 1800s, average US citizens from modern times enjoyed the luxury of leading largely normal lives during wartime. Cities did not need to be evacuated and opposing troops did not devastate the American land. The distance between the home front and the actual violence of war was so far and unreachable that at times Americans failed to realize the horrific atrocities that are inherent to war.
During the 1970s the journalists brave enough to throw themselves into the midst of the bloodshed that overwhelmed Vietnam, discovered that the snap of their camera could potentially be more powerful than a shot from an American soldier’s M60. Battlefield photographs existed long before the Vietnam War. Photographers captured American soldiers in battle dating all the way back to the American Civil War. However, the photos taken in Vietnam proved more shocking and disturbing than the majority taken before them. Photographers exposed the absolute chaos and inhumanity that characterized the Vietnam War and terrorized the innocent citizens living in the war stricken villages. The particular photo that I shared is of a nine year old girl running naked after being severely burned on her back by a napalm attack. The expression on her face is one of pure terror and agony. When newspapers published this photo, along with others like it, Americans back home had no choice but to be confronted with the war’s atrocities. Although American children did not suffer the same fate as those running unclothed through the streets in Vietnam, Americans could not remove the haunting image from their minds. Verbal descriptions of wartime atrocities do not have the same lasting impact as a graphic visual. These photos, as well as a general public distaste for the government, instigated the many anti-war protests that ensued throughout the late 1960s and into the 1970s. The aggressive public protests put pressure on the American government to end the conflict in Vietnam.
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