Chapter 5 - War and Sexual Violence Come to Vietnam

Summary

Men’s adventure magazines presaged sexual violence in Vietnam by opening rhetorical space for some men to think along the lines of sexual conquest and see “Oriental” women as opportunities – for sex, to prove one’s virility, or to demonstrate power over the “savage” other. Americans often failed to differentiate between “available” and “unavailable” women, and magazines helped create a culture that bred indifference to, if not hostility toward, the local Vietnamese population. Some US soldiers viewed prostitution and sexual violence as acceptable, or at least normal, due to the influence of men’s magazines. Other GIs took this further, viewing women’s bodies as lesser, sexually loose, and perhaps even “rapeable” to the “righteous” American man. In South Vietnam, many Americans also saw themselves fighting a war on behalf of the Vietnamese and some felt entitled to dominate both the allied and the enemy’s women. Yet Vietnamese women were not simply passive victims or damsels in distress as seen in adventure magazines. Rather, they were an integral part of a communist insurgency that wielded political and military influence over the population and key members of a South Vietnamese community defending against what many saw as an assault against a burgeoning, if flawed, noncommunist state.