The Terror Of War Summary

The photo The Terrors of War by Nick Ut demonstrates his experience as a Vietnamese-American photographer by showing children screaming in pain from napalm followed by undisturbed soldiers in the face of a bombing. Ut is a photojournalist for the Associated Press whose projects include extensive documentation of the the Vietnam war in South Vietnam. This photo emotionally appeals to the viewer by depicting a naked girl screaming in pain from the war. The girl is surrounded by other screaming children and nonchalant soldiers walking over a desolate, smokey wasteland, showing the destruction caused by war. Ut’s photo serves as anti-war propaganda by showing how war affects the powerless Vietnamese that are killed by the horrors of war every single day.
The children scream in horror as their previous lives are destroyed by a war that they have no control over and are left helpless from its consequences. They are left to flee to the closest glimpse of hope, an unknown photographer. The soldiers provide no hope to these children, and remain as faceless power figures that show no remorse about the situation around them. They show the viewer how scarcely soldiers are affected by the situation, and what little they do to help those who cannot help themselves. The photo gives Americans a view into the destruction caused by war, it shows the viewer the sense of hopeless, grief, and anguish felt by the children and the indifference of the soldiers. The emotional impact of the photo is only heightened by the bombed wasteland that was once possibly a rich Vietnam