Vietnam War Casualties – Infographic

The aim of this project is to understand the scope of the Vietnam War on the United States. Nearly 60,000 servicemen and women died from hostile action or other causes between 1957-1975.

The first section of the project will not involve all 58,193 names. Rater, I will be providing a small focus on one soldier in particular: John Phelen Roe. Mr. Roe was one of four men from my hometown killed during the war. He was a Captain in the U.S. Army and a helicopter pilot. On July 24, 1969, he and six others were in a low hover engaging enemy troops when the downdraft from their Huey detonated a booby trap below them, causing the helicopter to crash and killing everybody on board.

The purpose of providing information on a single soldier is to add a voice to these thousands of soldiers that were killed. After an initial call for information from a local social media group I belong to, I was overwhelmed with the number of people that want the stories of their loved ones to be told. I hope to expand this project in the future to include all the local Vietnam veterans that were killed.

Next, I will create a map of the United States in which each state will have the total number of casualties. Each state will be navigable, allowing users to travel to a second page which will provide the entire list from their state. I was initially going to include each hometown in this map but decided it would be too much information on a single map which is why links will be embedded.

The Battle of Hue is considered the bloodiest battle of the war as well as the turning point against the United States. From January 30, 1968 – March 3, 1968, Communist forces launched what has come to be known as the Tet Offensive. During Hue, Allied forces were unprepared for a full-scale attack on their city and for over a month, both sides waged total war in the city streets. I would like to include a timeline of the war’s deaths and point of Hue to compare before and after statistics.

Next, a map of Southeast Asia will show each casualty country with a similar embed link as the United States map which will show total casualties, reason, date, etc.. Provinces are listed for each soldier but since the end of hostilities, many of these names have changed which make it difficult in pinpointing location.

The Vietnam War took place during a period of extreme social inequality throughout America. While all military branches were desegregated by this point, how did the total number of deaths compare between each race? Were minorities represented proportionally in the higher ranks?