Peter Koepp
English 476
Dr. Helstern
10/22/13
The Looming Threat of Moral Infection
The Vietnam War was the first American conflict that received heavy media attention.
The American public was able to vicariously experience the horrors of war through their
televisions, radios, and newspapers, and what they saw was not good. Aside from the obvious
horrors of war, the people of the United States began to find other sources of moral objection,
including drugs. In Jeremy Kuzmarov’s article “From Counter-Insurgency to Narco-Insurgency,”
he notes that in the early 1970s, amidst growing reports of drug use amongst GIs, “Media
portrayals made the rate of [heroin] abuse seem to be far worse” and “warned exaggeratingly
about addicted soldiers returning to the United States to exacerbate domestic unrest and crime,
feeding into a conservative social agenda.” Despite these media reports, Kuzmarov cites a 1973
study of Vietnam veterans/heroin users in which it was determined that “less than 10 percent
used any drugs at all back in the United States.” However, he goes on to state that “Ensconced in
a culture of fear, the public was falsely imbued with the impression that America’s social fabric
was being torn apart at the seams by half-crazed and doped-up soldiers from whom nobody was
safe” (348). The plot of Robert Stone’s 1973 novel Dog Soldiers plays heavily into this public
fear. Set during the declining years of the Vietnam War, the characters in Dog Soldiers find
themselves thoroughly entangled in a heroin deal gone wrong. In an article for Commonweal, a
periodical focusing on religion and public affairs in literature and other arts, author James Finn
points out that Stone often places his characters in positions “where the concepts of good and
evil are meaningful and where their possible incarnation in particular people is believable” (Finn
11). Despite the religious symbolism frequently present in the text, the struggle between good
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and evil takes form primarily in the heroin deal; the drug itself represents a source of ultimate
moral corruption, a direct result of public fear during the time. In essence, the characters
themselves are neither good nor evil, but three of the plot’s essential characters, Converse, Hicks,
and Antheil, each represent distinct stages of moral decay through their involvement in the
heroin operation: Converse, a man on the outer fringes of falling into depravity, Hicks, wholly
consumed by his moral struggle, and Antheil, the symbolic protector who is entirely corrupt.
Throughout the novel, Converse narrates the moral path he has embarked upon,
recognizing a distinction between its good and evil aspects and dealing with them accordingly.
Early in the text, the reader gathers an image of the moral state in which Converse dwells during
his conversation with the woman in the park, which touches on the evils the woman has
witnessed in Vietnam: “’Deliverance from evil would be nice.’ It seemed to Converse that she
was leaning on him. ‘Yes,’ she said smiling, ‘it certainly would. And we have God’s promise.’”
(Stone 8). The tone of the conversation seems of no surprise to Converse. The horrors
encountered by the woman do not shock him and he seems to fully agree with her religious
declarations: “’Satan,’ she called to him, ‘is very powerful here.’ ‘Yes,’ Converse said, ‘he
would be.’” (9). From this, the reader gains a bit of insight into Converse’s mind. He is no
stranger to evil. During the initial stages of the heroin deal, Converse recognizes the act of
smuggling the potent drug as being something beyond his normal dealings, yet he rationalizes
with himself: “‘I desire to serve God,’ Converse said, laughing himself. ‘And to grow rich, like
all men.’” (15). In this instance, he blames the temptation of money for his upgrading of evils, so
to speak, from the likes of marijuana to heroin. In a later conversation with Hicks, Converse
blames the war: “‘I thought you were a moralist. You and your old lady—I thought you were
world-savers. How about all these teenyboppers OD-ing on the roof? Doesn’t that bother you?’
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‘We’ve dealt with the moral objections,’ Converse said.” (54). Here Converse confirms that he
has dealt with the moral implications of becoming associated with heroin, going on to say “‘I
feel like this is the first real thing I ever did in my life. I don’t know what the other stuff was
about . . . Let smiles cease . . . let laughter flee. This is the place where everybody finds out who
they are.’” (56). Displaying justification that could very well be the product of Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder or some other war-related distress, Converse tries to convince Hicks that he is
fully behind his actions, in a moral sense.
Not long after this, however, Converse begins to show cracks in his demeanor: “‘I’ve
been waiting my whole life to fuck up like this’” (126) he says when conferring with his fatherin-law. In this instance, Converse shows his weakness, a weakness that becomes concrete as he
recollects his traumatic encounter during an ambush in the war, during which he “lay clinging to
earth and life” (185). His confrontation with June reminds him that “He had lain there—a funny
little fucker—a little stingless quiver on the earth. That was all there was of him, all there ever
had been.” (186). Converse finally admits that he is no hero, no brave dweller of the moral
basement; he is weak and afraid, but he understands he has no escape from the mess he has
made. Accepting his choices, he becomes intent on seeing the mess to its end.
According Stephen Knox, author of “A Cup Of Salt For An O.D.: Dog Soldiers As AntiApocalypse,” “If Converse is a man who has severed himself from the world because of his
existential fear, Ray Hicks is the man who has no fear and engages the world as enemy” (64).
Hicks’s steeper decline into depravity can be seen as a direct result of his physical possession of
the heroin. In his first appearance in the novel, Hicks questions Converse about the drug deal,
expressing the moral objections that should exist. But as he becomes further involved in the
smuggling operation, Hicks begins to quickly descend into the heroin’s evil grasp. At one point
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during his frantic journey with Marge, Hicks finds himself in a similar mindset to that of
Converse: “In the end, if the serious man is still bound to illusion, he selects the worthiest
illusion and takes a stand . . . This is the one. This is the one to ride till it crashes.” (Stone 168).
At this point, Hicks recognizes the evil impact the drug may have on his sense of morality, but
decides he must, just like Converse, see the mess to its end. Yet the drug causes Hicks to fall
further. Knox notes Hicks’s negative influence over Marge: “. . . she soon shoots up (at Hicks’s
behest) . . . becomes the user that whom Converse so neatly has discounted in overriding his
moral objections” (66), moral objections which Hicks himself had originally called into question.
This particular instance shows Hicks betraying his own morality, direct evidence of his decline, a
fall which is cemented during his intentional overdosing of Gerald, and, even more so, during the
deranged, violent battle at Dieter’s compound. He even views his old pal, Dieter, as an enemy,
killing him despite Dieter’s intentions to rid Hicks of the curse of the heroin. Upon his own
death, Hicks views himself as a martyr, carrying “Pain, man. Everybody’s. Yours too, if you
only knew it.” (329). He dies fully believing that he had done the right thing, that carrying the
heroin had been his rightful mission. In the end, he sees no evil in what he has done; his fall into
depravity is swift and fatal.
At the forefront of easing the American public’s fear of corruption from the Vietnamese
drug culture was the government’s counter-narcotic effort. In Kazumarov’s article, he cites a
1971 speech by Senator Edmund Muskie, in which Muskie claims that the mission in Vietnam
had become as much about “[saving] our own citizens from the devastation of heroin addiction”
as it had about combating Communism. This lead the Nixon administration to deny claims that
“local officials of whom we are in contact have been or may still be involved in the drug
business” and forcefully begin counter-narcotics initiatives. This lead to the formation of the
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Joint Narcotics Investigation Division, lead by a former CIA operative. “Receiving more than $2
million in foreign aid, JNID officers became known for their ruthlessness and corruption” (353354). This sense of corruption within official government actions is directly displayed in Stone’s
novel by Antheil, the main antagonist to Converse and Hicks. A federal narcotics agent,
Antheil’s task is to track down the heroin stash and, in theory, bring those transporting it to
justice. Yet, despite his persistent pursuit of the heroin, Antheil’s true character is revealed in the
final pages of the text: “It was a bit untidy, but there was no compromising evidence and even if
some entertained doubts, the agency might be content to let him withdraw gracefully.” (Stone
340). Antheil reveals his corrupt nature, that justice was never one of his true intentions and that
he intends to lie about keeping the stash for himself. A man in a position to supposedly protect
the American people from the media-publicized horrors of the Vietnamese drug trade is
ultimately the most morally corrupt character presented by Stone. However, Antheil still draws
similarities to Converse and Hicks: “If you stuck with something . . . faced down every kind of
pressure, refused to fold when the going got tough . . . the bag of beans at the end of the rainbow
might be yours after all.” (340). Antheil’s persistence in his goal mirrors that of Converse and
Hicks, each character directly stating the override of their moral compass. Antheil’s official
position simply makes his depravity even more prominent. At the very end of the novel, Antheil
even hints at his future betrayal of his partner-in-crime, the symbolically named Angel, further
signifying the intense moral corruption caused by the heroin, and bringing Stone’s religious
themes full-circle.
Robert Stone’s tale about a Vietnam War era drug smuggling operation in the United
States speaks directly to the public fear of moral corruption present at the time, due in large part
to the media attention directed to nearly every aspect of the conflict. Stone presents his
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characters in various stages of this greatly feared process moral decay, featuring a physical
package of heroin as the main source of evil. Though he does present this moral war within
through a religious lens at times, centering the novel around the American fear of heroin
addiction at the time works more effectively, presenting vivid images of the destruction and
depravity that this evil in physical form can create, images from a fictional story that coalesced
with a very real public trepidation of the moral infection of the United States.
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Works Cited
Finn, James. "The Moral Vision Of Robert Stone." Commonweal 120.19 (1993)
Knox, Stephen H. "A Cup Of Salt For An O.D.: Dog Soldiers As Anti-Apocalypse." JGE: The
Journal Of General Education 34.1 (1982): 60-68.
Kuzmarov, Jeremy. "From Counter-Insurgency To Narco-Insurgency: Vietnam And The
International War On Drugs." Journal Of Policy History 20.3 (2008): 344-378.
Stone, Robert. Dog Soldiers. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1973. Print.