AMERICAN SOCIETY DURING THE VIETNAM WAR ERA

The American involvement in the war in Vietnam lasted from 1964 to 1975. At the time it was the longest military engagement in American history, only recently being surpassed by the war in Afghanistan. The war also had a significant impact in other ways. Failure to win the war damaged the American psyche, including ordinary American views on the state of the nation as well as trust in the federal government.

Why was the USA involved in Vietnam?

Primarily out of the fear that the whole country could fall to communism.

American interest in what was then called French Indochina began in the late 1940's as a war of independence raged between the French and Vietnamese communists, led by Ho Chi Minh. This interest heightened following the French defeat (at the battle of Dien Bien Phu) in 1954. At the Geneva Peace Accords of the same year, Vietnam was divided into two along the 17th parallel into communist North Vietnam and non-communist South Vietnam.

The USA immediately pledged financial and diplomatic support for South Vietnam. By the late 1950's, South Vietnamese communist rebels began launching a range of guerrilla and terrorist attacks against the South Vietnamese government, especially in the capital Saigon. Therefore, concerned by communist threats to South Vietnam, President Kennedy increased US support for the South to include military aid and 'advisers' in 1961.

By 1963 it was clear to the American government that South Vietnam was in no position to adequately defend itself from communist aggression and that further US involvement might be necessary. By 1964, following two attacks on American warships by North Vietnamese forces in the Gulf of Tonkin (although evidence of the second attack is still disputed), President Johnson secured permission from Congress to expand the 'conflict' in Vietnam. The first US marines landed near Da Nang in 1965.

Why were the USA so concerned about a communist takeover of South Vietnam?

There were concerns that the fall of South Vietnam could lead to the collapse of other countries in Asia- the so-called 'Domino Theory- which lead to massive communist expansion. A failure to prevent the fall of South Vietnam could eventually lead to a communist takeover of Thailand or India or even Australia. Additionally, the Truman Doctrine committed the United States to opposing communism all over the world, militarily if necessary. Fear of communism still loomed large in American society during the 1960's (the McCarthy/Red Scare era had only ended in 1954 and the Cold War had arguably reached a peak with the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962).

What were American attitudes towards the war in 1964?

Resistance to the war in the mid-60's, with the exception of two incidents in 1965, was limited. The majority of the American public were broadly in favor of war in Vietnam- the effects of the Red Scare were still prevalent in US society and the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 had only heightened these fears. At first, resistance was based around moral opposition to the war and pacifism. Early examples of this occurred in November 1965, when Norman Morrison and Roger Allen LaPorte set themselves on fire in protest outside the Pentagon in Washington D.C. and the UN building in New York City respectively. After 1965, the bulk of the protest was based around the draft and predominantly came from students.

How and why did these attitudes change during the war?

The anti-war movement had grown in size by 1967. It had also became more of an 'umbrella' movement, with different factions opposing the war for different reasons. The reasons for opposition towards the war by 1967 were:

1. The moral consequences of the war. The US tactics in the war, such as the use of napalm and Agent Orange, had resulted in many Vietnamese civilian casualties and caused massive environmental damage that threatened to traditional Vietnamese rural agrarian society. Vietnamese peasants were forcibly moved from their villages containing ancestral homes (a hugely significant spiritual symbol), which were then destroyed. All these tactics had been deployed by American forces to isolate and eliminate communist insurgents but had the effect of also severely damaging American relations with villagers, something South Vietnamese communists were able to use to their advantage.

American public knowledge of these aspects of the war was informed by the American media, who were entrenched with American troops and able to report freely.

2. The cost of the war.