Vietnam Veterans and Postwar Homecoming

American service personnel returned from Vietnam throughout the years of the conflict and after the withdrawal of United States forces. Homecoming could involve physical disability, grief, family disruption, unemployment and symptoms later widely recognised as post-traumatic stress disorder, while the political controversy surrounding the war complicated public acknowledgement of veterans’ experiences.

Women veterans faced additional barriers because military service and combat-zone nursing were often excluded from popular images of the veteran. Access to treatment, recognition and stable reintegration varied greatly, and many families absorbed the consequences of trauma without adequate explanation or support.

Kristin Hannah’s The Great Alone portrays a former prisoner of war whose trauma destabilises his family, while The Women follows an Army nurse struggling to have her service and psychological injuries recognised after returning home.