George Mason High School - Mustang Yearbook (Falls Church, VA)

Page 20 text:

IN REFLECTION As the Viet Nam war hopefully draws to an end the morbid task of assesing the cost remains to be done. The casualties of Viet Nam will be measured in terms of lives lost, limbs severed and persons missing. The finan- cial costs will be measured in dollars and cents. But in terms of America, the people and America, the idea, this country has lost much more. For the American people, this has been a very personal yet very distant war. It has been brought to them every evening on the televi- sion news in their living room. Americans have seen their cities burn, their dollar shrink and their taxes rise because of the drain of government funds and attention to Viet Nam. The American people have borne the sacri- fices necessary to support the war, without fully understanding it. This war, which has been fought in far-off places with strange names, for a purpose or goal which the gov- ernment has never made clear, and has dragged on and on. In 1965, at a time when what was needed was a government which could lead the country out of the confusion of Viet Nam, all that was offered was a govern- ment which could only watch in dismay as this country was led further into the war. But dismay is a political weakness, so to cloak this weakness from the people, tactics bordering on deception and deceit were employed to guide the people into the war. Frustration after frustration has occured in this tragedy and gradually the American people have grown to doubt the words of their politicians, the word of their government, the values of their youth. The American people have become defensive about their own values and accomplishments. Americans have embarked on a new wave of reactionary patriotism in an attempt to submerge deep-felt insecurity. In short, Americans have lost a sense of self- respect. To much of the world, America is more than a nation, it is a whole concept or idea. The America envisioned by Jefferson, Madison and Mason has been this nation’s greatest export. Without tanks, or bombs, or bullets, this nation has sold the “product” through advertisements like the “Declaration of Independence” to peoples after peoples. Now, rightly or wrongly, The American idea will also bear the connotation of Viet Nam. The image of America represented by a flight of B-52’s or a burning child has, to say the least, tarnished the world’s concept of America and American values. For just about every student in this school has grown up along with the war. The war was the concern during the sixties. Now, hopefully, with the war ending Americans will turn inward and rediscover those ideals which have made America, and have been temporarily detoured by the tragedy of Viet Nam. - by Steve Kaplow Reprinted from the LASSO 16