O’Brien uses vivid imagery in order to portray how gruesome the kill was, increasing his feeling of remorse about killing the young Vietnamese soldier, which in turn further traumatizes him. Additionally, he uses descriptions of the imagined life of the now dead soldier to reveal similarities between the two men to show how he began to believe that he killed the enemy, taking himself with the soldier in the process, further traumatizing him and increasing his regret. Moreover, the use of his point of view of the other soldiers on the situation further reveals that O’Brien has deep feelings of remorse and was profoundly traumatized. This effect is found in most veterans of any war, traumatized and full of regret. This is the fault of the
