Turning Against the War

One important thing happened to the Econ Compound, and it was I think my conversion point. Right outside the compound was the Vietnamese hospital, a tents hospital. Every day they would line up casualties in stretchers dying, the dead, the wounded, that deal. There would be like 15 or 20 of them. Every time I would see them, every time I would leave the compound and come back in, well, it finally got to the point where I couldn't just walk past them.

I was walking into the compound and I just stopped. I walked over towards them. I didn't care if they were Vietnamese or whatever. I sat down with each one of them, offered them a cigarette if they wanted, offering them just at least my eyeballs to know that I cared about them. I could not pass this moment, but I could not just pass them by any longer, I had to recognize them....

Higgins: By recognizing the humanity of these wounded Vietnamese people, how did that start to change how you understood your role in the war or even America's role in the war?

Magnusen: I became very much against it, and I started to act out against it.... A lot of people bought those peace symbols and they were wearing them all around the place. I would wear them. The girls would come to work every day, they'd give me flowers. I'd tape them onto my uniform. I would wear sea shell necklaces. I had rose-colored glasses. In fact, on my last month there, I was hitch-hiking. Some general picks me up, looks at me very casually and goes, 'what unit are you in, son?' He wanted to court martial me for being out of uniform.