Who is Cameron Sullivan?
Cameron Sullivan was one of the many returnees from the Vietnam conflict. Like many other former soldiers, Sullivan returned with what he and some other soldiers derisively referred to as spoils of war. In his case, they were a piece of a wooden trap removed from his body, a scar, and some both pleasant and traumatic memories. His hometown was the same as Norman Bowker, Des Moines (O’Brien 143). Sullivan was aware of Bowker and had heard of his platoon and the tragedy of Kiowa’s death. However, these were of secondary importance to him, as the paradoxes and dualities of the American setting are what captured his mind right from the moment he returned to the United States.
Sullivan’s Initiation
Sullivan was an individual who preferred to adapt to life’s circumstances and follow the most visible path. He was not a pioneer, discoverer, or inventor in the philosophical sense. His high school and college male friends and peers responded boldly and positively to the Vietnam War draft, and so did he. Like many other American men, Sullivan was a believer in the American military and thought the conflict would not last long and with almost zero casualties on both sides. However, his eight months in Vietnam shattered those expectations and his learned viewpoint for life. His parents, high school, and school taught him that the reality and the situations involved could not be dual and straightforward; he learned that all things are multifaceted and nuanced. The Vietnamese guerrillas and the jungle showed him that life has only light and darkness.
Sullivan’s Vietnam Conflict
Sullivan’s Vietnam War experience was similar to what most American soldiers in that war had, which was survival in a tropical hell. He almost failed this physiological and mental endurance test when trapped with Punji sticks. Conrad Jackman managed to catch his body flying into the deadly pit in time so that Sullivan was only injured in the foot. Jackman also helped Sullivan get to an allied hospital where a Vietnamese doctor performed surgery and removed a piece of wood and splinters from Cameron’s foot. Jackman was another conscript who turned into a bully during military training, and Sullivan suffered from him a lot. When the American environment changed to a Vietnamese one, his demeanor turned around. These two were assigned to the same squad and gradually became best soldier friends. For Sullivan, it was among the many proofs that the world is radical and only had interchangeable light and darkness. His soldier’s path consisted entirely of such encounters of American or Vietnamese brutality with American or Vietnamese humaneness.
Sullivan’s Post War Period
Now Sullivan lies on the bed sleepless in his room at his parents’ house, and it is nighttime. As in previous nights, he tries to understand the current environment, specifically, the American reality. The flow of thought is stronger and more intense than usual today as it’s raining heavily outside, and another catchy anti-war rock song is playing on the radio. Returning to his home country, Cameron witnessed social duality and division, the coexistence of a pro-war movement and an anti-war one. Politicians and television told him and other young adults that their patriotic duty must be fulfilled and the Vietnam War must be won.
In contrast, activists on the streets and the radio were making pacifist and government-criticizing statements daily. Sullivan has been in between these realms of light and darkness for months now because he did not know which side was true and which was compatible with his view. His introspection brought his mental state to the point where he ceased to perceive his thoughts and actions as manifestations of his intentions but as those generated by either the light or darkness of reality. Cameron craved the morning coming because his father promised him to assist in finding an occupation at his workplace. Cameron was rescued from the death trap but fell into the one of perception.
Work Cited
O’Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried. Mariner Books, 2009.