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Not just Vietnam, not just troops
Posted by Michael Putzel • May 25, 2020
When the Covid-19 body count passed 58,276, countless media reports compared the death toll of the virus to that number of Americans killed in the Vietnam War. There are, of course, many ways to show statistics, but the comparison was an easy way to portray the enormity of loss to a familiar casualty count that has left an enduring scar on the nation’s psyche for decades.
On Sunday, The New York Times shocked its readers by devoting its entire front page and three pages inside to the names and brief descriptions of 1,000 victims of the novel coronavirus in the United States alone. And, the newspaper acknowledged, its printed list was a mere 1 percent of the actual number that is certain to surpass the 100,000 mark any day now.
The relentless climb up the charts of those sickened by the disease and those who succumbed to it has stunned the millions of Americans who believed their country was strong enough, rich enough and smart enough to avoid or conquer a disease that ravaged other nations around the world. And as conflicting messages from political leaders and medical experts sowed confusion and anger, the populace has begun to split along partisan lines that crippled the nation during the war and have only grown worse in recent times.
In one way, however, a lesson learned from the Vietnam experience has helped shower a beleaguered group of coronavirus combatants with widespread public admiration and honor. The veterans who returned the from war were all too frequently disrespected and blamed for the service they performed when their government ordered it. This time, there has been little but heartfelt appreciation for the courage, determination and sacrifice of the frontline health workers and emergency responders who have gone to help, knowing they were risking everything, too often shamefully ill-equipped and dreadfully exposed.
This time, they have been celebrated with cheers, songs, banners, meals, aerial salutes and a widespread outpouring of gratitude from those who witnessed their heroic deeds from the relative safety of homes and social distance.
Sadly, popular support has not saved all of them from harm. The first person whose death from the virus touched my world was Tran Mong Chi, sister of a fondly remembered colleague in the Saigon bureau of The Associated Press during the war. Chi and several members of her family escaped to the United States when South Vietnam fell, and she was working in a nursing home in Washington state when Covid-19 swept the vulnerable residents and their caregivers. She died at 73 on March 16, one of the early victims of the pandemic in this country.
Kaiser Health News and The Guardian have joined in an effort to collect the names of doctors, nurses, technicians, first responders and support personnel who have died trying to help other victims of the pandemic. The list is hardly comprehensive yet, but it provides faces and descriptions that make the statistics more human.
Those frontline workers who have fallen deserve to be in our memories as well on this Memorial Day.
9 thoughts on “Not just Vietnam, not just troops”
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Thank you Mike, well said. It is all really quite unbelievable. As an active objector to the Vietnam war, I am appalled that the objectors to staying home, social distancing and masks have been treated so lightly for breaking the law. In my time we were clubbed by police, arrested and put in jail for our civil disobedience. These morons walking into the Michigan State House with rifles deserve the same!
Thanks for your comments… Really sad and makes me cry…
Very good Michael! The comparison in number is tremendous but, the way most of the Coronavirus deaths occured doesn’t even compare to how our Vietnam veterans died! Just respectfully saying!
Gary, thanks for your comment. There are other differences, too. Consider that the average age of Americans who died in Vietnam was 23. I don’t have an exact comparison for those killed by Covid-19 in the United States, but about 70 percent have been 65 or older.
Good piece, Mike. Thanks for writing it. The sad thing, journalistically, is that the New York Times likely is the only U.S. news publication with the staff and the will to publish such an article. Also of note: the full column in agate type of all the news organizations throughout the nation that the NYT researched to get the names of the one thousand as well as a brief comment about each one. Unfortunately, those sources of local reporting are shrinking each year.
This is the worse journaliam. II was appalled I and disgusted they would even try to steal Valor of our fallen troops whom sacrifice the ultimate of war.
Worse yet, they probably had no clue what Valor is? Stealing Valor is a crime. Stealing any Valor away from the Military is a huge moral deficit of the perpetrator.
Perhaps you should read my book, The Price They Paid: Enduring Wounds of War before accusing me of stealing valor.
Memorial Day is a time for remembrance of the fallen Soldiers who gave the ultimate sacrifice for Our great Country, the United States of America. Each and everyone one who did so took an oath of protecting our Constitution defending Our Freedoms where ever the Commander in Chief directed them to do so. I do not believe our front line HealthWorkers of Covid19 fall under the direction and scope of the true reason associated with Memorial Day. Covid19 was a Pandemic not a War!
Thank you for your comment, and I don’t disagree with you about the will of Congress in establishing Memorial Day. My proposal was simply that on this Memorial Day, falling as it does while others are dying to save their countrymen and women, it is appropriate to remember the heroes who make the ultimate sacrifice to combat a different–but also terrifying–enemy.