Home from the War: Vietnam Veterans: Neither Victims Nor Executioners

by Robert Jay Lifton

Book Overview

In "Home from the War," the award-winning author and noted psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton offers a powerful critique of American militarism during the Vietnam War. Recognized as the ultimate text for... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0671215450
• ISBN13: 9780671215453
• Release Date: June 1973
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 478 Pages
• Weight: 1.76 lbs.

Customer Reviews

As important now as then...

R.J. Lifton has made a career out of reckoning with horror - interviewing people who committed terrible deeds, who survived terrible deeds, who witnessed terrible deeds - asking how people could do such things, how people could survive such things, and what happens to both groups on the other side. Lifton says in the title that Vietnam veterans are "neither victims nor executioners" - having spent several years in the early 1970's working in group therapy with veterans returning from Vietnam, he is faithful to asking what happened and respectful of the men involved. From men who admitted partaking in abuses to those who tried to stop their fellow soldiers from abusing to those who dealt with the pain of fear and loss and death, Lifton presents these soldiers' stories in their own words while exploring the psychic processes at work in those stories. He returns to his concept of "psychic numbing," developed and explicated in earlier works (including Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima and The Nazi Doctors) to reckon with the way many soldiers distanced themselves from the effects of their actions - via euphemistic "officialese," by technological and bureaucratic means, among others. Key for him is the humanity of these soldiers, some of whose deeds demanded means of maintaining their psychic integrity. Lifton's style can be tediously thick with detail at times, but it is worth the effort - the nuggets that can be mined from his works are pure gold. An important work in its own right, but the ideas it develops about the human psyche go far beyond the Vietnam War to having something crucial to say about all of us - soldiers and civilians - in any era. As a side note, an interesting dialogue could be had between Lifton, a pacifist, and Col. Dave Grossman (On Killing), a career military man and psychologist, who comes to many of the same conclusions as Lifton, but from a very different place. Lifton's conclusions about the psychic processes involved in war have strong resonances, I think, with Grossman's statement that the history of the modern military can be seen as a history of overcoming the innate human resistance to killing.

Illuminating the Lie/still healing

I have had this book on my shelf since 1992 when it was re-published. I first saw the book with my friend Robert McLane, who is quoted in the chapter on "Zones of Rage and Violence." Bob was one of my healers during a time of ongoing depression back in the 1980's. We went our seperate ways so hello BOB! I next saw the book with a vet in Phoenix during the winter of 87-88 again with depressions. He helped me along my journey. I was afraid to open it up. My healing took a long time. I can say that Lifton's advice about encountering the false, counterfiet cliches about that war are essential for healing and now as I am reading it in retrospect, I can see how much work I really did. The reinforcement about not-lying to oneself or others about the heinous dimension of the Vietnam War and the anti-war activity that we were engaged in is of great historical importance, for all time. All wars that may evolve from this great country are encased in a fabric of semi-truths. It is up to us, the citizenry, to interpret reality without blindly following orders.Lifton has done us a service. We are healers and so he has given us new life. Jim Willingham