Body Shop
Subtitle: Recuperating from Vietnam
Edition: 1st Stein edition
Publisher: Stein and Day
Published: September 1987
Format: Paperback
ISBN-13: 9780812862744
Subjects: Vietnamese Conflict, 1961-1975; Asia - Southeast Asia; Veterans, Disabled; History - General History; Medical care; Amputees; Rehabilitation; United States
Description: Written by:Bernie Weisz   e mail address:BernWei1@aol.com   Pembroke Pines, Florida November 6, 2009                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   Corrine Brown's book "Body Shop: Recuperating From Vietnam" is a fascinating glimpse of men freely talking to the author about a variety of subjects concerning the war in Vietnam. The interviewed all have several things in common. They all were severely wounded in the war with resulting traumatic amputations of their limbs. They all were waiting for their wounds to heal and were learning to use their new, artificial limbs. They were all patients, when this book was written, at "Letterman General Hospital, in San Francisco, California. And most revealingly, they give the reader in 2009, almost 40 years after this war has ended, information about this conflict no history course, academian, nor book will ever reveal! 365 Days 

Corrine Brown uses close to 10 patients' stories, bouncing back from one to another. Where one story leaves off, another picks up, with these men horrifyingly describing what it was like to "be hit" in "the 'Nam.  The largest story is of a vet named "Woody", who lost both his legs and gives a vivid account of this. He begins his story by explaining that he no longer reads newspapers. This book was written after American involvement officially ended in Paris, France, with Henry Kissinger successfully extricating the U.S. from what appeared as a never ending conflict. To that, Woody remarked: "Since I've been back from Nam I gave up on papers. It seemed what you read was untrue. even on TV news, They show you what they want you to see". 
Woody received his draft notice on September 3, 1969. He wrote that alot of his friends "copped out" in phony ways, like telling the army they were gay, or running to Canada. Woody gave the following reasons as to why he went: " It would have been neat to go to Canada and still have my legs, but I would always be running. I had friends who'd been killed, who could say I should cut out? I've never run from anything in my life. I was glad to get it over with. My dad would have been ashamed, he wouldn't have been able to go to the VFW and face his friends if I'd backed out. I figured, how many people have fought and died, who am I to live here and say I won't go?" Northern Passage: American Vietnam War Resisters in Canada 

Not waiting for the draft to scoop him up, Woody volunteered and opted for jump school, NCO and Ranger training. Blood Trails: The Combat Diary of a Foot Soldier in Vietnam After arriving in Vietnam , and being placed with Echo Recon, 5th of the 46th of the 198th Americal, his opinion shortly after arriving "In Country" rapidly changed. Of the war and the Vietnamese, he asserted: "I thought I was going to fight Communism, but it's a useless cause in Nam because as soon as we leave it will happen. If we want the Communist's out, we will have to stay there. It doesn't matter to the people there. They only want to eat. And we won't stay there". [[ASIN:1574411438 The Twenty-Five Year Century: A South Vietnamese General Remembers the Indochina War to the Fall of Saigon] 

Woody vividly described his various patrols of the South Vietnamese countryside, describing the use of "sensor devices" on trails to detect for enemy presence. Wiring Vietnam: The Electronic Wall He also discussed getting G.I.'s out in the bush receiving "Dear John" letters from their unloyal wives and girlfriends "back in the world", the negative effects it had on their morale, and how his thoughts on the war changed prior to getting "hit". On treatment of the enemy, it's easy to see why atrocities could occur. Woody wrote: "They used to send us on body snatch missions, but we never got any POW's. People we saw were all killed. We used to laugh when they told us to take POW's. I always wanted to make sure a guy was dead. It's no fun tramping in the bush and finding a wounded guy. It's just like tracking a wounded animal". How did Woody's "Vietnam Experience" warp his thinking process? To this, he explained: "It's weird how experience teaches. For example, when you see a pigpen, you don't think one way or another about it. In Nam you see a pigpen and you say, "Where there are animals, there are people" Or you find eaten fruit. People have been there. You think a different way. You are always on the lookout". The Killing Zone: My Life in the Vietnam War 

Aside from the problems of intense jungle heat, wild insects, leeches, and being taught not to get attached to anyone in Vietnam, least they get killed, Woody related information in "Body Shop" that truly illustrated why the U.S. did not see this war through to a victorious conclusion. Woody shamefully conceded: "Sometimes we'd phone in and say we were in a place we weren't. Sometimes in the bush we wouldn't go anywhere. We'd say we had an ambush somewhere, phone in the next morning, and say "negative results". About the standard one year tour required of a grunt in the field, Woody stated: "That's a bummer about this war, a guy get's a year's combat experience, they pull him out and send a fresh guy in". A Life in a Year: The American Infantryman in Vietnam About Americans getting killed by "friendly fire", Woody scornfully wrote: "In Nam alot of mistakes were made. One time we were skinny dipping in a river that fed into a village. The water was clean and we were all nude. We heard an explosion. Guys were scrambling like crazy till we found out it was some dumb ARVN (Army Republic of Vietnam, i.e. South Vietnamese soldier) fishing with concussion grenades 50 yards upstream. Another time somebody told me tracks had cleared a minefield. They hadn't, and alot of people were blown up". 

It is very hard to read Woody's description of the day he lost his legs. He was out on patrol as a blocking force with 20 G.I's and 20 ARVN, working reconnaissance, west of Chu Lai. At night, while his troop was in it's D.N.P (defensive night position), the N.V.A. attacked with a sapper force. A Communist sapper, attempting to overrun the U.S. position, threw a Chicom (Chinese Communist grenade) at Woody. He related about this: "Then the satchel charge hit. The charge threw me against the wall. I remember laying there. I was insane for 5 seconds. One leg was blown off. Two guys went by me. I asked them to help me. They kept on moving. I called the medic, but I knew he wasn't going to come and get us. He knew he'd get killed if he came out, and a medic's job is to save as many wounded guys as he can. Corpsman Up Woody continues his gruesome ordeal. "The NVA was over the hill. I took off my belt, put it around my left leg, as tight as I could get it. The other leg was okay. A sapper came by and threw a second Chicom grenade at me. I figured "Man, I'm done. I remember seeing the blast for so long. Everything slowed down so much. When the guy threw the grenade, it seemed to take forever. Your mind sinks. I just knew, "I'm dead". That's why I feel I don't know how I made it. I heard that pop, knew he was pulling the pin. I'll never forget his face. If I was an artist, I could draw it. The way he looked down at me. He looked, saw me, he was just doing his job. After it went off I thought, "Wow, I'm still here". He got my other leg. I didn't feel any pain because the other leg was hurting pretty bad. I thought I was going to die, and I thought I was going to hell. I said a prayer". As a reader of this account, I am very grateful that this is only a vicarious experience! 

As with 6 similar accounts that Corrine Browne included, Woody described being medically evacuated in a "dust-off", and following initial treatment in Vietnam, a painful journey to Letterman General Hospital with a stabilizing stop in Japan. The horror of describing one's loss of limbs in combat is painful, graphic and gut wrenching, and the reader of these accounts needs to be prepared to encounter much gore within the pages of "Body Shop". One amputee veteran at Letterman named Tyson, related to Browne how bad of a problem heroin was in his unit. Smack! With heroin being 98% pure in powdered vials sold by the South Vietnamese to G.I.s as cheap as a dollar a vial, Tyson claimed: "My whole last month in Nam I was sniffing 2 vials a day". Incredibly, the day Tyson stepped on a booby trap and lost his leg, he recalled: "The day I was hit the medic was laying on his stomach and no one knew how to use his pack, so no one got morphine. I thought I was going insane from the pain. I took half a vial of heroin, threw the other half away. It nearly killed me, my heart was beating so fast. But the pain stopped. It was lucky I had it 'cause when they were carrying me to the plane they dropped me". 

Tyson's story of American drug use in Vietnam exist in virtually every anecdote. Other themes that are prevalent are the corruptibility of the South Vietnamese population, the farce of a program called "Chieu Hoi" where an enemy soldier was lured into the U.S./ARVN fold with financial compensation, food and lodging, South Vietnamese treachery where the populace appeared to be pro U.S. during the day and pro Communist as soon as the sun set. One final comment stuck out in my mind that was like a metaphor for the rest of the interviewed. It was written by an amputee named Paul Thurlhill, age 20, who lost both legs to a booby trap. Thurlhill, expressing universal American frustration with this war that was never fought with intentions to win, scornfully wrote: "A lot of GI's wanted to get hit so they could come back. I've seen a guy blown to hell. He'll wave 2 fingers and say, "Take it easy, guys, I'm going home!" Half the guys that die, their last words are "it don't mean nothin'. It's not up to us to fight other people's battles. We're playing big brother. Our economy is based on war. And GI's can't find jobs. Anyone who enlists for Nam and gets it, it's their own fault. It's okay to die for your own country, but why push it. I was lucky. I hated Vietnam with a passion. Charlie, damn disease infection, bugs, snakes. Nam is filthy. Your skin comes off if you scratch, it's so humid. Mosquitos are at you day and night. You wake up covered in welts. Anyone with kids should show them what war is like before they go". 

In conclusion, I initially noticed that before I purchased this book, no one had reviewed "Body Shop". I have read hundreds of books about what it was like to be in Vietnam, and some of those beg to have a movie made out of it's manuscript. This unknown book is not one of them. In fact, it's realism is so acute, striking and accurate, that it should be a primer for anyone attempting to comprehend the ultimately futile American attempt at thwarting Communism in S.E. Asia that was sadly destined for failure. This book will help you understand some of the reasons why that occurred. I could write another 10 pages of other subjects this book brought to light, but you, as the reader, must take it upon yourself to read this book I am recommending. Undoubtedly, "Body Parts" will serve you as one of the most realistic and thought provoking books I have ever come across about what most Americans age 30 or younger sadly know little about.
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