Prompt: Discuss the role that media sources played in the creation of pro-Vietna
Prompt: Discuss the role that media sources played in the creation of pro-Vietnam or anti-Vietnam sentiments in the U.S. and the World. In what ways might these sources have fueled resistance to the Vietnam War? Specifically examine the below article on Kent State, the image Napalm Girl, the video “Know Your Enemy,” and the article “The Draft: Protest, Debate, Renewal.” Make sure to reference and analyze at least TWO of the works in your analysis. Do you think resistance to the war would have been so wide spread without Americans’ exposure to the stories and pictures that were circulated during this time? Use evidence from these sources as well as Give Me Liberty! to support your argument.
Then, find a song (any style is fine) from the 1960s or 1970s that covers the Civil Rights movement or the war in Vietnam. Once you have identified a song (make sure to include the song’s title and artist in your post), listen to it and find the lyrics. Analyze what the song is about and why. Use specific lyrics from the song to support your argument (note: lyrics should be cited too). Next, tie specific lyrics from your song to an event, idea, or moment within the Civil Rights movement or Vietnam War protests to demonstrate, via the use of a primary or secondary source, the historical significance of the lyric. For example, if the song lyrics is about only poor boys going to war, find evidence to support if this was true (or not). What impact did this song have at the time? Answer this question by looking at where the song was used, how it was referenced by others, or how popular it was via top hit lists, etc.
*for song ideas, see the links below at the end of Readings and Resources*
Readings and Resources:
Between 1945 and 1954, the Vietnamese waged an anti-colonial war against France, which received $2.6 billion in financial support from the United States. The French defeat at the Dien Bien Phu was followed by a peace conference in Geneva, in which Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam received their independence and Vietnam was temporarily divided between an anti-Communist South and a Communist North. In 1956, South Vietnam, with American backing, refused to hold the unification elections. By 1958, Communist-led guerrillas known as the Viet Cong had begun to battle the South Vietnamese government.
To support the South’s government, the United States sent in 2,000 military advisors, a number that grew to 16,300 in 1963. The military condition deteriorated, and by 1963 South Vietnam had lost the fertile Mekong Delta to the Vietcong. In 1965, Johnson escalated the war, commencing air strikes on North Vietnam and committing ground forces, which numbered 536,000 in 1968. The 1968 Tet Offensive by the North Vietnamese turned many Americans against the war.
The next president, Richard Nixon, advocated Vietnamization, withdrawing American troops and giving South Vietnam greater responsibility for fighting the war. His attempt to slow the flow of North Vietnamese soldiers and supplies into South Vietnam by sending American forces to destroy Communist supply bases in Cambodia in 1970 in violation of Cambodian neutrality provoked antiwar protests on the nation’s college campuses.
From 1968 to 1973 efforts were made to end the conflict through diplomacy.
In January 1973, an agreement was reached and U.S. forces were withdrawn from Vietnam and U.S. prisoners of war were released. In April 1975, South Vietnam surrendered to the North and Vietnam was reunited.
As a consequence, Congress enacted the War Powers Act in 1973, requiring the president to receive explicit Congressional approval before committing American forces overseas.
The Meaning of the Vietnam War at Home
The Vietnam War was the longest war in American history and the most unpopular American war of the 20th century. It resulted in nearly 60,000 American deaths and an estimated 2 million Vietnamese deaths. It was the first war to come into American living rooms nightly, and the only conflict that ended in defeat for American arms. [The United States won every battle it fought against the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong, inflicting terrible casualties on them. Yet, it ultimately lost the war because the public no longer believed that the conflict was worth the costs.] The war caused turmoil on the home front, as anti-war protests became a feature of American life. Americans divided into two camps–pro-war hawks and anti-war doves.
The first large-scale demonstration against the war in Vietnam took place in 1965. Small by later standards, 25,000 people marched in Washington. By 1968, strikes, sit-ins, rallies, and occupations of college buildings had become commonplace on elite campuses, such as Berkeley, Columbia, Harvard, and Wisconsin.
The Tet Offensive cut public approval of President Johnson’s handling of the war from 40 to 26 percent. In March 1968, anti-war Democrat Eugene McCarthy [no to be confused with Joseph McCarthy] came within 230 votes of defeating Johnson in the New Hampshire primary. Anti-war demonstrations grew bigger. At the Democratic convention in Chicago, police beat anti-war protesters in the streets while the Democrats nominated Hubert Humphrey for president. Ironically, the anti-war protesters probably helped to elect Richard Nixon as president in 1968 over Humphrey and in 1972 over George McGovern. Anti-war demonstrations peaked when 250,000 protesters marched in Washington, D.C., in November 1969.
President Nixon’s decision to send American troops into Cambodia triggered a new wave of campus protests across the nation. When National Guardsmen at Kent State University shot four students to death in northeastern Ohio, 115 colleges went on strike, and California Governor Ronald Reagan shut down the entire state’s university system. Copyright 2016 Digital History (found at: http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/era.cfm?eraID=18&smtID=2).
The primary sources you will be analyzing are:
“The Draft: Protest, Debate, Renewal” Newsweek; May 22, 1967; 69, 21; News, Policy & Politics Magazine Archive (feat. Newsweek) pg. 25;
“4 Kent State Students Killed by Troops: 8 Hurt as Shooting Follows Reported Sniping at Rally” John Kifner New York Times (1923-Current file); May 5, 1970; 1;
‘napalm girl,’ Nick Ut, photographer, Associated Press, June 8, 1972;
“Know Your Enemy: The Vietcong (Links to an external site.)”, 1968 (19:18) documentary film released by PeriscopeFilm.com on YouTube. Wade through the advertisements at the beginning of the film. (Links to an external site.) http://www.socialismonfilm.amdigital.co.uk/Documents/Details/BFI_ETV_Vietnam_Land_Of_Fire_25SD_ProRes-174#MediaSummary. Please note that the video, Vietnam: Land of Fire, was produced in North Vietnam in 1966 and is a North Vietnamese film. If you are off campus and cannot access the link above, go to YouTube and search: Vietnam: Land of Fire 1966.
Links to websites with songs that are political in nature (you don’t have to pick a song from here if you do not wish):
https://www.liveabout.com/anti-war-protest-songs-of-the-60s-and-70s-748278
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protest_songs_in_the_United_States
https://www.azcentral.com/story/entertainment/music/2021/01/12/best-civil-rights-protest-songs/6602985002/
https://www.npr.org/2010/01/18/99315652/songs-of-the-civil-rights-movement