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‘THE QUIET AMERICAN’
By Daniel Whitson

‘We’ve no business here. It’s their country.’
How does ‘The Quiet American’ portray international interests and potential conflicts created by other countries within the text?


‘The Quiet American’, written by Graham Greene, is a fictional text depicting non- fictional events and their outcomes in relation to the Indo-China War. ‘The Quiet American’ does portray the international interests of Vietnam’s occupancy and desired Government and as a result the potential conflicts that arise. Greene describes the interest of Vietnam to be of a global epidemic because of the numerous countries involved. Consequently, the conflicts that emerge from the stakeholders of 1950’s Vietnam were of morbid warfare, fighting for ideologies, colonialism, communism, democracy and nationalism. The principle stakeholders of 1950’s Vietnam were America, as they were fighting for Vietnam to become a democratic society, France because of their constant effort to maintain colonialism of Vietnam, the Vietminh who fought for communist independence and the Vietnamese citizens fight for freedom.
America, in the 1950’s, was a powerhouse nation and battled for supremacy with the communist Soviet Union. America’s involvement in Vietnam occurred only because it feared if Vietnam fell to communism then all the surrounding Asian countries would also follow suit. This was referred to as the ‘domino effect.’ It was thought that a successful intervention in Vietnam was to create a ‘Third Force’, an army independent to the Vietminh and the French, which is what America introduced. Pyle, a pivotal character in the text, is a young idealistic American man, representing the body of America and the ‘Third Force.’ Pyle symbolizes America because his objectives are to better himself and he has no...