Were central so for example, the ways in which an american president or policymaker referred to vietnam as she. The american man that is going out to bring democracy and spread american foreignpolicy. All of these issues were tied into gender so no one knew what the vietnam story would look like if we put women and is gendered ideas at the center of the story. They are at the star the start e vietnam war and maybe 1 of them were women. They also served the next biggest number in the army corps is the only has about 800 american women that served in vietnam over the course of the military presence from 1965 to 1972, 73 and then they also served in vietnam as civilians through humanitarian organizations, through churches, mainly through the red cross. In terms of vietnamese women from the american perspective, vietnamese women served a couple functions for the u. S. Military in vietnam. One of the functions was to serve as Domestic Workers on american bases. So, women who are watching American Military uniforms, cook would come to the base and cook meals for american servicemen. Other types of domestic work, housekeeping, cooking and that sort of thing. Interestingly in that case would americans sometimes for the discover is that these were women who were serving with the National Liberation front or with americans understand that the viet cong so they were essentially spies coming in to be working on american bases, and in those capacities they would either be getting information about what the u. S. Military was going to be doing in areas that they were in or they would be measuring the distance from the base to a position in the field for them later for the launching of attacks at that particular base, American Veterans with talk about this, they would be counting the clicks as they are leaving the base to measure the difference from whatever the field position was where the attack was going to be launched to bear th where the base was. American women served entirely in South Vietnam. That is where the u. S. Ground forces were, so the u. S. Military was involved in North Vietnam in terms of bombing in North Vietnam, that the u. S. Troops were all in South Vietnam and they were fighting in the south union army against the National Liberation front or the viet cong in South Vietnam. So, american women who served in South Vietnam or in the south. Some of them are statione were n saigon, the capital of South Vietnam. Others were stationed at bases throughout South Vietnam. So one of the major bases in South Vietnam had a number, quite a number of American Women Army Corps personnel that served. Americans ar nurses served in sh vietnam and then the red cross civilian volunteers served anywhere the red cross needed them to be, so they could be in saigon, they could be at another major city or they could be at small military installations out in remote areas in the jungle, held in rural areas and so really they were serving all throughout vietnam. American women served in vietnam found that the way they were treated depended in part on who they were interacting with. Many of the women i interviewed for beyond combat said that the enlisted men treated them much better than the officers, that there were some officers who assumed that even though these are american women either listed in the military are coming with major organizations like the red cross that they are somehow there to be available to officers anything to be invited to officer parties and be there and be pretty and be an example of a pretty American Woman or something more insidious a they are available, so they are sexually available to officers, whereas almost every woman i interviewed for beyond combat said the enlisted men they worked with appreciated them, treated them as their sisters, as a loved one, as someone they wanted to protect and take care of so that helped those women feel because they felt a closeness and they developed bombs with v. And listed men come if needed them feel like their job was more valuable, however it also could have the result of making their jobs really difficult. For example, one of the women i interviewed from beyond combat is talked about getting to know and enlisted men very well. So, this was a woman that was serving the red cross. And sheand shed gotten to knoe unit of men, particularly when they both played guitar and she brought hers, so they kind of sit around and play American Fork music on their guitars together and entertain the troops while they were waiting to go out and fight. And then one day, she found out that this particular guy that she had become good friends with was killed and after that she stopped learning names. There were guys on the wall that i knew but i dont know their names because it became too hard for me to get close to these guys. So i decided a way to protect myself emotionally was to stop learning their names because then if a group of men got killed and someone started talking about their name, i wouldnt know where to place the name so that was a way to protect herself emotionally. And protecting themselves emotionally is something that a lot of the women i talked with had to deal with, whether they were in the red cross and they were running entertainment programs for servicemen or they were nurses who were dealing with mass casualties they had to figure out a way to protect themselves emotionally from what they were seeing it for them but was probably the most difficult aspect of the job, just as american women were found by ideas of femininity, the example being the girl nextdoor that american women were meant to look a certain way, they were meant to interact with servicemen in a certain way, american men that were serving in vietnam also were bound by gender roles, the idea that the american soldier is the ultimate american man, the American Fighting man is rugged, brave, doing a job for this country, fighting communism to prevent this threat of communism to further american ideals in the world. American men are also held to those ideas and some american men who served in vietnam, they actually began to their experience led them to reject these gender ideals that the way to prove your manhood is to fight in the war and so thats led to development of the Antiwar Movement as a result of being in the bomb, seeing combat and feeling not like you are a man, thats like youve are dehumanized. And so, american men began talking about opposing the war, and the g. I. Antiwar movement developed both in vietnam and back in the u. S. Stateside on bases where gis and veterans were publishing newspapers, speaking out against the war, joining antiwar organizations against the war and one of the things that the antiwar g. I. Is talked about was this idea that going to the war makes you a man. What they found is that actually, no, what im fighting anand im telling people what im seeing my friends and my comrades being killed, i dont feel like a man. I feel like i am less of a human. I feel dehumanized by this experience. So, not only am i against the war, but i also against the use gender ideals constraining men and women into these particular boxes saying in order to prove your manhood you have to fight and in order to prove your womanhood, you have to be pretty and wear a dress and a mind of man come home both men and women are calling for both men and women that served in vietnam are calling for a rethinking of the gender war as the war ends into the postwar period. When the women came back from the vietnam war they faced a couple of things. Some american women i interviewed talked about once theyve been in vietnam became that opposing the war. But even if they had gone believing in the cause, they saw what was happening in vietnam at the u. S. Military was doing and they came back opposing the war they didnt feel welcomed in the Antiwar Movement or even in the Womens Movement, so those who felt that because of gender but they could do in the war was limited they didnt feel welcomed in the Antiwar Movement or the Womens Movement because they had been in the war and so they felt as if they would go to a rally or try to join a womens group once they came out that they had served in the war they felt that they were rejected because they were an extension of the American Military machine, so even if they wanted to oppose the war or talk about how we can rethink gender norms in the u. S. , they didnt feel welcome in the groups that were doing that. Another thing women faced coming back is would have been normal to them before they went to the war was no longer normal. They came back and their friends wanted to, say go shopping or go to a party or talk about men and to them some of those things just seemed frivolous. They couldnt relate to that kind of life anymore because of what they had seen and their service in vietnam. Other women felt that what they did in vietnam was the most powerful work that they had ever done. I interviewed a nurse named Linda Alexander was a military nurse in vietnam and came back and worked as a hospital nurse in the u. S. After served. And when i interviewed her, she talked about how nothing but she did in her career ever again matched the importance of what she felt she was doing as a nurse in vietnam. But it was hard coming and she still cries. In our interview she broke down in tears talking about what she had seen in terms of the casualties and the destruction of the young men that she saw as shes working in military hospitals in vietnam. But she said even though that was so hard, nothing in my career since then has compared to how powerful and how important i felt like i was when i was serving in vietnam. And i also hope people will understand how central the ideas are to the war experiences. Would it mean ea man or woman, how we define our allies and our enemies, how we define countries that we engage with. We use gender and gender language to make those definitions and that continues to be the case so i hope people will understand the deep connections between the gender and war if they are to read beyond combat. During the recent visit to mississippi, we spoke with suzanne on the codirector of the center for the study of the war and society at the university of southern mississippi about letters and entries from soldiers and their families during the civil w