Of If I Die In A Combat Zone, Box Me Home, By Tim O Brien

Throughout If I Die in a Combat Zone, Box Me Up and Ship Me Home, Tim O’Brien talks of how atrocious and mistaken he feels his time being drafted and shipped to Vietnam was. His reasoning for writing the book is to assert his position that America’s interference in Vietnam was unjustified by showing the true story, with no shortcomings, of life in war, using philosophical teachings of Plato to exemplify unwise courage, and giving dialogue with superiors on the politics of the war. The brutality of war is described graphically as to create a true account of the war and provide basis for his beliefs. The author uses his grizzly account of the life as a troop in Vietnam as a sturdy base for his point. To illustrate, he talks of pieces of his

This leads him through schemes of disappearing until he finally winds up debating a Captain serving as a Chaplain on the base. They argue about politics and O’Brien brings up the point that there is no validity for involvement, as there’s no persuasive affirmation saying that if the U.S. wins the war, Vietnam will be a better place (ch. 6). Assuming the U.S. did win, the dictator in power, Ngo Dinh Diem, is a catholic leader in a largely Buddhist country. Unity would be nearly impossible with Diem as a leader. This is reflected by the fact that he only won power of Southern Vietnam through the help of the U.S. rigging the election in his favor. Maybe the people in Vietnam didn’t want to be ruled by communists, but under somebody like Diem, an informally fought war would have probably never found a conclusion. In the same discussion with the Chaplain in chapter 6, O’Brien argues that the lives being lost due to the U.S. taking action are overall not worth it for either country. On the fight to stop communism America got nothing but a large price tag and many dead soldiers of it’s own. Similarly in Vietnam, America’s participation brought nothing but an extension of war time, and millions of it’s own people dead. O’Brien proves correct in his preemptive assessment of the conflict. He again adds to his credibility during the debate by countering the Chaplains emotional responses with submitting that he is only convinced by facts and conclusive evidence. This shows he is in touch with reality and the points he is making have solid ground to them. By doing this, his argument, again, garners more