Nurses in fatigues: The Army Nurse Corps and the Vietnam War

"Nurses in Fatigues: The Women of the Army Nurse Corps and the Vietnam War" challenges the notion of war as the exclusive domain of men and will demonstrate that women were in combat situations in Vietnam. Utilizing oral histories, I will first explain their decision to become nurses amidst the cold war ideology of women and domesticity and the growing feminist movement of the 1960s. Understanding the atmosphere in which these women made their choices helps us to better understand their experiences and their response to war. Next, this study examines how women lived and negotiated the male-dominated atmosphere of war and the military. Living and working in the combat zones of Vietnam, they were vulnerable and unprotected in the male-centered atmosphere of war and the military and exposed to almost every horror and every tragedy of war. In addition, their experiences reveal the physical and mental strains of wartime nursing and expose the moral and ethical dilemmas associated with a profession dedicated to healing, yet part of the military whose business is war and the inevitable death and destruction that follows. Despite the horrific nature of wartime nursing, many of these women also remember their service in Vietnam as a time of tremendous professional and personal growth and fulfillment. This study will also document the lingering physical and emotional effects of the Vietnam War on these women and their struggle for recognition, recovery, and reconciliation.