Summary of Michael Herr's Dispatches

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

#1 I knew one 4th Division Lurp who took his pills by the fistful, downs from the left pocket of his tiger suit and ups from the right, one to cut the trail for him and the other to send him down it. He told me that they cooled things out just right for him.

#2 I was waiting for a helicopter to take me out of there. The rest of the team had caught a chopper straight into one of the lower hells, but it was a quiet time in the war, mostly it was lz’s and camps.

#3 The more you moved, the more you saw, and the more you saw, the more you risked death and mutilation. The system was geared to keep you mobile if that was what you wanted, but it began to make sense only if you were there to begin with.

#4 Flying over jungle was almost pure pleasure, but flying over jungle and landing in it was always painful. I never belonged in there. Maybe it was what the people had always called it, Beyond.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Apr 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781669382201

IRB Media

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Insights on Michael Herr's Dispatches

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 5

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

I knew one 4th Division Lurp who took his pills by the fistful, downs from the left pocket of his tiger suit and ups from the right, one to cut the trail for him and the other to send him down it. He told me that they cooled things out just right for him.

#2

I was waiting for a helicopter to take me out of there. The rest of the team had caught a chopper straight into one of the lower hells, but it was a quiet time in the war, mostly it was lz’s and camps.

#3

The more you moved, the more you saw, and the more you saw, the more you risked death and mutilation. The system was geared to keep you mobile if that was what you wanted, but it began to make sense only if you were there to begin with.

#4

Flying over jungle was almost pure pleasure, but flying over jungle and landing in it was always painful. I never belonged in there. Maybe it was what the people had always called it, Beyond.

#5

The American military was extremely drunk during the Americal Division’s camp visit. The colonel in charge could barely speak, and when he did, he said things like, We aim to make good and ensure that if the Viet Cong try anything cute, we won’t catch them with their pants down.

#6

Mobility was just mobility, it saved lives or took them. But what you really needed was a flexibility greater than anything the technology could provide. You needed to be able to accept surprises and not control everything.

#7

The ground was always in play, being swept. Under the ground was his, above it was ours. We had the air, we could get up in it but not disappear in to it, we could run but we