Author: Jackson Irby
Interviewer: Henry Ford VI
Lurking in the forests and villages of Vietnam, a second force affected US soldiers during the Vietnam war. They confronted an enemy even more dangerous than the Viet Cong soldier: opium. The use of opium and marijuana was rampant throughout the Golden Triangle of Southeast Asia. It did not take much time for these drugs to spread into Vietnam and into the hands of the US Army. During the Vietnam War, U.S. Soldiers experimented with drugs as get away from the war experience. The drug culture in America during the 1970s bled into the warfront in Vietnam, infecting soldiers and affecting their lives back home. The U.S. was unable to control the drug scene during the 1970s and the return of the addicted soldier only elevated that culture. Despite the fact that many soldiers used heroin while in Vietnam very few came back to the U.S. with addictions