What does a 31 year old Iraqi Navy veteran have in common with a 61 year old Air Force brat? This is the question that fueled my interest for the completion of the audio documentary featuring Adam Nehls (Navy veteran) and Kate Baird (Air Force brat). Nehls served for five years in the Iraqi war as a fire control technician1 in the Navy. On the other hand, Baird’s father served as an Air Force pilot in the Cold War, Vietnam War, and the Korean War. Though Nehls and Baird experienced war in different eras, the concept of friendship appeared to be timeless throughout their interviews. Even so, an article written by Janet Butler, a member of the Australian Historical Association, titled ‘Friendships in war was not just confined to bonds between men’ provided more historical context to the significance of friendships in war. The article focuses on Australian nurses who participated in World War I, and extracts historical information about friendships from the diaries of army nurse Kit McNaughton. I used the article on the World War I Australian nurses to shape the outline of the audio documentary for Nehls and Baird. The article serves as a guide for the three main points discussed by the interviewees in the documentary: the stability that friendships provided in war, the volatile nature of friendships due to military transitions, and the persevering sense …show more content…
The article explains that “McNaughton’s diary contains much evidence of the nurses “yarning” with the soldiers and of the soldiers confessing their fears and the harshness of their experiences” (Butler, 2015). Friends were able to give emotional support and a listening ear to confide in. Nehls details that military feels more comfortable around other military due to their shared experiences. Similarly, Baird presently has friendships that have resulted from the united experience of being military
At the outbreak of World War I, Lucy Paignton-Fox enlists in the Australian Army Nursing Service and leaves her family’s cattle station in the Northern Territory to join the war effort. During the Gallipoli campaign she serves in hospitals in Egypt, but when the Anzacs are posted to France she moves with them. A talented and spirited nurse, with dreams of one day becoming a doctor, Lucy finds more opportunities than she ever imagined: working alongside doctors and surgeons, sharing the soldiers’ dangers, helping them through their pain, and making lifelong friends. But with war comes suffering.
Maj. Chris Faris talked about was the affect that war had on his and his daughter’s relationship. The talk he had with his daughter allowed him to see the pain and hurt that comes from him being away at performing his military duty. His daughter, now 118 years old, reminded him of the last time he was home for her birthday, which at that time she was 10 years old. Each time he was only home for 2 months at a time; this made it difficult for him to have a positive relationship with his wife and children.
This extends to going to war. Shaun Tan and Gary Crew’s ‘Memorial’ represents how the bonds of friendship have led Australians into the most horrific of circumstances. The tree in the book embodies the memories of soldiers of past. It represents three generations of war in which Australia has fought and remembering the fallen comrades that died in battle. The book demonstrates an image of patriotism within Australia.
The Anzac Spirit is a concept that suggests that Australian and New Zealand soldiers’ possess shared
The role nurses played during the Civil War was truly an extensive one, as the war carried the most casualties in American history and so many more injuries. Despite their invaluable work, though, their experiences have not been related in depth. Civil War Nurse: The Diary and Letters of Hannah Ropes by Joseph Brumgardt is a much-desired addition to the primary collection depicting the story of the United States medical corps during the Civil War. The book’s thesis claims that these men and women who served in the medical end of the conflict deserve attention as full participants in the war rather than as mere helpers of the main actors, more interesting than substantial. As evidence of this, the book focuses on the story of Hannah Ropes, who
On returning from Vietnam, he grappled with PTSD, “… spending all his money on booze and drugs.” (Wiest 352). Although McTear eventually managed to turn his life around, his story mirrors the path many Vietnam veterans had to tread. Overall, the stark difference in public opinion on both wars and the contrasting post-service careers of the soldiers demonstrates the fundamental disparities highlighted in 'A Band of Brothers and 'The Boys of
(O’Brien 188) He had built a relationship with the platoon and when he was sent to base camp, he felt that he lost that relationship. He related with them and when he got shot, he lost that relationship. This is why it is important to tell stories so that you can remember the connections you had with people.
Friendship. It is something that is essential to human life. Without it, life can be miserable. However, spoiling children is something the world should be without. It happens constantly, though.
Canadian Nurses are the Unspoken Heroes of the War Casualty numbers continue to rise as the Great War rages on in Europe, leaving Canadian Armed Medical Corp (CAMC) staff stretched and facilities full, according to a report released last Sunday. Tirelessly working in a chaotic environment sun rise to sun down, nursing sisters are the unspoken heroes of the war, their efforts largely unappreciated and unrecognized. Nicknamed “bluebirds” from their blue dresses, white aprons and sheer white veils, nurses in the CAMC are known as diligent individuals who risk their lives on a daily basis to serve and protect. Often placed on the frontlines of battle, nurses face exhausting, dangerous work on a daily basis, and are exposed to the effects of war
When faced with war soldiers change, for better or for worse. Modern culture celebrates the glory of patriotic sacrifice. However, this celebration often leaves out the gritty details and trauma of violence behind war and the way it affects people. Homer’s The Odyssey and William Wyler’s The Best Years of Our Lives clearly discuss these details. Both debate the long-awaited return of warriors that went off to fight a war and the way the experience changes the protagonists.
In the book All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, the author utilizes juxtaposition and situational irony to demonstrate the negative impacts of war on a soldiers’ relationships, more specifically how being a young soldier isolates one from their family and pre-war life. Erich Remarque uses situational irony to indicate that the Great War influences the soldiers’ connections to their families, by secluding themselves from their parents and siblings. Near the end of Paul’s leave of absence, he felt isolated and full of regret, “I ought never to have come here. Out there I was indifferent and often hopeless-I will never be able to be so again.
The chapter “Friends,” is a very good chapter showing friendship. There are many details of how good of friends people can become during a war. Dave Jensen and Lee Strunk weren 't good buddies for a while but they eventually started to trust each other. “In late August they made a pact that if one of them should ever get totally fucked up- a wheelchair wound- the other guy would automatically find a way to end it,” (O’Brien, 62).
The Vietnam War in American history exceeds a reputation of being one of the most unpopular, violent, and unnecessary in its time. Although there was a big support basis at the beginning of the war, many soldiers that were drafted or enlisted to fight realized the dangers of the event amongst each other, and had to help each other strive through to make it out alive and hopefully maintain a healthy conscious. During the times of war, relationships in the platoon can be rough, undesirable, and even violent in certain moments, but in reality, soldiers culminate into a brotherhood and family. At some points in war, many soldiers have rough relationships with their comrades.
In Tim O'Brien's “Enemies” and “Friends”, O'Brien shows the effect the nature of war has on individuals and how war destroys and creates friendships. These two stories describe the relationship between two soldiers, Lee Strunk and Dave Jensen. In “Enemies”, friendship is broken over a fist fight about a stolen jackknife, which leaves Strunk with a broken nose and Jensen paranoid of whether or not Strunk’s revenge is coming. While in “Friends”, you see how the nature of war creates a bond of trust, even between people who first saw each other as enemies.
The story “Soldier’s Home” by Ernest Hemmingway depicts the wounding and post-traumatic experience of the First World War of the main character Harold Krebs and his family. Like most soldiers’ experience of the war, upon return to their lives back home, their lives virtually had no more meaning to them. Krebs presents a painful realization in this manner in which he interacts with his mother. She tries to think of her son as a hero and make him feel like one by encouraging him to re-tell his tales from the war. Krebs knows that the impressions his mother is making are not authentic and she, just like the rest of his fellow town folk are tired of hearing and reading the same stories from the war (De Baerdemaeker 24).