The Aftermath of the Vietnam War

The Vietnam War had a wide range of effects around the world. Its dizzying influence on the foreign policy and domestic affairs in the United States cannot be overstated.

In "The Vietnam Sydrome" by Jennifer Caspari, we see the effects that the bloodshed and ultimate failure in Vietnam had on the confidence and cohesiveness of the American policy makers. The popularly termed "Vietnam Syndrome" of Vietnam raised new questions and divisive controversies that outlived the war itself.

These controversies clearly left their mark on American culture as well. In "Post Vietnam War Society" by Marjorie Conlon, we find the shadow of the Vietnam War throughout the artistic and popular expressions of the United States in the decades that followed the war's end.

In this cultural turmoil, there was confusion about how to treat returning veterans of the war. Many in the public wanted to forget the war entirely and those that did want to commemorate it did not easily agree on how to do so. But, in Melissa Chin's piece, "The Wall of Names," we find the story of the origins of the Vietnam Veteran's Memorial in Washington D.C.

No such memorial exists, however, for the tragedies that occurred in Laos and Cambodia. In Ryan Cofrancesco's piece, "Forgotten Tragedies: Laos and Cabodia," we see how American involvement in the Vietnam War led to starvation, cultural oppression, and genocide.

This page was created in November of 2001 by Jennifer Caspari, Melissa Chin, Marjaroie Conlin, and Ryan Cofrancesco. As students at American University in Washington D.C., they turned it in for a grade to Professor Robert Griffith's history class, "The History of the United States Since 1945."

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