A Prayer for Owen Meany Historical Context

A Prayer for Owen Meany Historical Context

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War forms a constant backdrop in the novel, both in John's diary entries for 1987 and in the story of his and Owen's lives in the 1960s. Irving includes many statistics culled from the Vietnam War Almanac that show the stages by which the war escalated.

America's involvement in Vietnam began in the early 1960s, when the Kennedy administration sent military advisers to aid the South Vietnamese government in its confrontation with North Vietnam. In 1962, there were over 11,000 military advisers in Vietnam, and President John F. Kennedy said that they would fire if fired upon.

In 1964, after attacks on U.S. destroyers by North Vietnamese patrol boats, the U.S. Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, authorizing presidential action in Vietnam. By the end of that year, there were over 23,000 U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam, and in March 1965, the first U.S. combat...
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