The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory, and the Legacy of Vietnam [Paperback]

Guess what? I found most all of the references agreed with the author's point of view. Most all referred to this as an "Urban Legend", where those people who state this theory in discussions do so after having only read about it once, or who are so committed to the Vietnam War - and I think one can make a noble case for it - that they are willing to try anything to discredit anyone who felt otherwise.

Ironically, the author notes that the relatively few cases in which there is evidence of it having taken place...mostly came from prior war veterans, dismayed that returning veterans "couldn't do what we did". In some cases, the reporting of drug use by some overseas veterans, sadly, helped feed some of this animosity.

The author, a Vietnam Vet himself, emphasizes that very, very few cases of this exist to begin with. All the more reason to treat this as the Urban Legend that it is.

For one thing, Lembcke is himself a rabid leftist who refuses to acknowledge the possibility of any other viewpoint. At one point, he says, outrageously, that the left always argues a point by using reason, logic, and empirical evidence whereas the right uses myth and legend and appeals to emotion. A person of wider reading and more profound learning would not say such a thing. You're going to tell me that writers like David Hume, Edmund Burke, Thomas Jefferson, and T.S. Eliot (all rabid conservatives by today's standards) were a bunch of dummies who didn't know how to argue. And hell, I think George Will is a lot more witty and lively than all the dime-a-dozen academic morons trying to sound like Lacan and Foucault.

But I found myself disagreeing with the author so vehemently not because I was a vet who got spat on (I was a toddler during Watergate) but because of a few personal experiences which, to me, do lend great weight to the "myth" of a vicious antiwar left meting out abuse to returning vets. First, my father and my uncle were Vietnam veterans who remain quietly proud of their service (and no, they don't put bumper stickers on their vehicles or wear t-shirts advertising that fact). I have often asked them about what their homecoming was like. They were never spit on, but they do vividly recall a very chilly atmosphere back in the states for vets, especially in college. Peers shunned you. Contrary to what Lembcke says, the only guys that showed them any kindness were the old-timers in the VFW hats. Although Nixon and the right held the reins to the sinews of power, the left, by the early 70s, DOMINATED the media and popular culture and public perception. To be a vet in those days was highly uncool, unless you chose to get up in front of a Senate committee and tearfully blabber about atrocities the government made you commit or let yourself be manipulated by the antiwar movement (and the Tom Haydens and Dave Dellingers, who never set foot on a real battlefield, were always looking for "credible" witnesses).

I can accept the idea that the story of hippie girl spitting on the returning vet is a sort of urban legend. And sure, Nixon and his guys used the POWs and pro-war vets for cynical political purposes. But to say that the "spitting image" was some sort of sinister government conspiracy that has had everybody hoodwinked for the last three decades is a bit much.
What proof does Lembcke have that this never happened? "There is not a single documented case" of spitting that he can find. Never mind the question of how in the world a "case" of spitting would ever be documented (were the spat-upon vets supposed to file complaints with the sherriff's department, or what?), Lembcke overlooks the possibility that the "spitting" is a convenient figural device to represent a whole range of hostile behaviors which were more subtle and did not involve the exchange of bodily fluids. For a good example of what I'm talking about, read the "prologue" in Frederick Downs' "The Killing Zone", where the author of this memoir recalls his feelings of hurt and bewilderment when some jerk on a college campus asked him (Downs) if he'd lost his arm in Vietnam. When Downs replied "yes" the guy said "Serves you right."

It doesn't take any stretch of the imagination, for me, to believe that this actually happened, and was perhaps, in some areas of the country, typical. Why? Because of a conversation I once got into with a professor and a graduate student (who was old enough to have served in Vietnam but didn't) about the NLF's strategy of terror. When I made a passing remark about how horribly brutal the guerillas could be when dealing with their Vietnamese and American enemies, I was made to understand, in very strident terms, that US soldiers and Vietnamese collaborators with the RVN DESERVED to die horrible deaths. "They should have never gone over there in the first place," I was told. This conversation took place five years ago but I will NEVER forget it. And no matter how much Lembcke tries to get me to believe that the antiwar left recieved returning vets with hugs and kisses, this incident will always get in the way of being able to believe it.

I realize that I'm not going to be able to discount Lembcke's book based on what a couple of relatives or some old fuzzy tenured leftist tell me--I'm not a professional scholar but I know enough to see that anecdotal evidence isn't acceptable to a wider audience of readers who don't know you personally. But I can't help thinking that Lembcke is slightly guilty of that same trick. He is a former member of VVAW, and just because HE was treated well and welcomed with open arms by antiwar activists he thinks that every other vet had the same experience.

I have no problem believing that most segments of the antiwar movement showered love and flowers all over vets who wanted to join them and speak against the war. We all know how much a church loves a repentant sinner--he's always useful for melodramatic testimonials.

But thank God we live in a society (unlike the "Democratic" Republic of Vietnam) where we can have public disagreement and heretical opinions openly expressed with impunity and without fear of retribution. I disagree with Lembcke, but I have to admit that he writes well and that this book is never boring, and readers like myself thrive on argument and define ourselves through opposition!

For an interesting counter-perspective, read "Stolen Valor": a devastating study of Vietnam vet fakery.

"...Ironically if the real [emphasis added] Vietnam War had been remembered, the Gulf War might not have been fought. We need to take away the power of political and cultural institutions to mythologize our experiences. We need to show how myths are used by political institutions to manipulate the decision making process. And we need to dispel the power of myths like that of the spat-upon Vietnam veteran by debunking them."

"...instances of attacks of U.S. officers by their own men are all but forgotten in the popular remembrances of the Vietnam War. Many Americans today "know" that GIs were mistreated upon their return from Vietnam. Their images of Vietnam veterans run from the hapless sad sack to the freaky serial killer; for them post-traumatic stress disorder is a virtual synonym for the Vietnam veteran. But they have never heard of "fragging," the practice of soldiers killing their own officers. The true story of the widespread rebellion of troops in Vietnam and the affinity of GIs and veterans for the politics of the left has been lost in the myth of the spat-upon Vietnam veteran."

This is a must read for anyone fighting to keep the real legacies of the Vietnam War alive. Lembcke goes into the history of how important past wars, their veterans, and the common summation of the public, are invaluable in building for support for the next war. He's also got a great filmography and references for further study.

"...How Vietnam is to be remembered looms large on the agenda of the turn-of-the-century legacy studies. Remembered as a war that was lost because of betrayal at home, Vietnam becomes a modern day Alamo that must be avenged, a pretext for more war and generations of more veterans. Remembered as a war in which soldiers and pacifists joined hands to fight for peace, Vietnam symbolizes popular resistance to political authority and the dominant images of what it means to be a good American. By challenging myths like that of the Spat-upon Vietnam veteran, we reclaim our role in the writing of our own history, the construction of our own memory, and the making of our own identity."

StormWarning! five-fist salute to Jerry Lembcke.