Wizard 6 Reviews

Military mindset

Author Douglas Bey Reflects on “trying to be normal in an abnormal situation” while serving in Vietnam.

As a combat psychiatrist during the Vietnam War, Douglas Bey, MD ’64 was charged with treating American soldiers for psychiatric conditions and returning them to battle as soon as possible. Yet, like the men he treated, Bey struggled with the stresses of living in a war zone and often relied on alcohol and counterphobic coping mechanisms to make it through his two year service. In Wizard 6: a Combat Psychiatrist in Vietnam (Texas A&M University Press, 2006), Bey recounts his war experiences and theorizes how Vietnam impacted the psyche of those who were there --- himself included.

You refer to Vietnam as a “crazy place.” How did you maintain your sanity?

Well, I’m not sure I did! {laughing} The way I coped with it was to study it. I tried to be very objective, take notes and pay attention to what was going on around me in order to distance myself from the situation. But it didn’t work all the time. Sometimes {the other psychiatrist and I} were just like the troops: We’d get drunk and scream and let out our anger.

Did your psychiatric training help you deal with the stresses of Vietnam?

It helped a little to have some intellectual understanding of what was going on. But also, we {the psychiatrists} focused on doing something positive for people and making them feel better, which gave us a little boost.

In Wizard 6, you say that many soldiers used counterphobia as a coping mechanism.

We all did. When I first arrived in Vietnam, the guys waiting to go home told us, “You’re going home in a body bag!” Even though we felt like crap that the time, everyone figured, “Well, they made. So can we.”  ------ Rachel Parker UIC alumni magazine Sept/Oct 2006

Quick Read: “He described in detail the way he tortured and killed Vietnamese…It was chilling to him do this in a calm monotone with the same emotion you would use to describe washing your car.” –Wizard 6, pp.26