VIETNAM

Vietnam's postwar reality is more complex than the victory narrative suggests. The men who fought the Americans are now in their 70s and 80s, many suffering from PTSD that has never been clinically addressed — in a culture that celebrates them as heroes, admitting psychological damage feels like dishonoring the victory. Their children inherited both the trauma and the expectation of invincibility, and their grandchildren — the Đổi Mới generation born after economic liberalization — navigate between traditional Confucian filial piety and global consumer culture without a map.

Agent Orange's legacy is Vietnam's most visible male health crisis: the defoliant sprayed by American forces during the war has caused cancer, neurological damage, and birth defects across three generations. Men who served in affected areas and their descendants suffer from conditions that are militarily caused but individually experienced. The Vietnamese government acknowledges the crisis domestically but international compensation has been minimal. The alcohol crisis is less visible but equally devastating: Vietnamese men drink at levels that would trigger public health emergencies in other countries, with bia hơi (draft beer) culture normalizing daily consumption from lunchtime onward. The drinking is social, convivial, and killing men at rates that the health system can't track because the deaths are attributed to liver disease, accidents, and violence rather than the alcohol that caused them.