You are on page 1of 4

Leigh Goldstein

The overwhelming unpopularity of the Vietnam War led to the heightened social,
political, and economic tensions in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s. Though it
was motivated by largely the same policies from the Cold War era (domino theory,
containment, etc.), it was felt that those policies were outdated and US intentions in the
war quickly became unclear and misguided. The ambiguity of the war led to social unrest
in America, yielding many protests which drew attention to the economic squandering of
the government, the large inequalities among different social groups, and the
inconsistencies within government policy. Many Americans adopted the belief that
though it had been a mistake to get involved in Vietnam in the first place, we needed to
either win or get out as soon as possible to prevent any further social, economic, or
political casualties.
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (Doc A) passed by in 1964 unofficially entered
the United States into War. As approved by Congress, the Vietnam War became an
executively fought war, giving power to the president to repel attacks against US forces
by any means necessary. That in and of itself was problematic, as the American public
had no voice in the matter of joining the war and the president was given more power
than thought to be democratic. It was not until later that the incident at the Gulf of
Tonkin, which allowed for the resolution in the first place, was found to be questionable
in its accuracy and by no means legitimate enough on its own as a cause for war. As
illustrated in Document D, by 1967 the American foreign policy was thought to be
weighing down the “Great Society” which was America. In the cartoon, Lyndon B.
Johnson’s foreign policy is on the opposite end of the rope as his great society. The Great
Society is desperately trying to pull up the Foreign Policy, but they are both precariously
balanced on an unsteady ledge. This expresses the popular thought that the United States
might not be able to maintain the Great Society while still supporting the Vietnam War.
Following the psychological defeat at the Tet Offensive in January 1968, public
support for the war plummeted. Preceding his assassination in June, Robert F. Kennedy
made a speech to the American public during his campaign for the Democratic
nomination for president addressing the issue (Doc E). He confided in the people that
though the government had wrongly mislead them into the war, and had erroneously
concluded the nature of the war, the young men fighting in Vietnam were not to blame, as
they were “brave and effective.” He explained that the success of the war did not rest on
the shoulders of the United States armed forces, but rather the South Vietnamese people
themselves. He was not the only American political figure who felt entry into the war had
been a mistake. George McGovern was a very strong advocate against the Vietnam War
throughout his years as Senator, and later in his race against Nixon for the presidency. In
one of his later speeches denouncing the current state of America’s involvement in
Vietnam, McGovern proposed to “spend all that is necessary for prudent national
defense, and no more… [to] conserve our limited resources” (Doc H). He was among
many who, at that point in the war, recited an all too familiar rhetoric: it was a mistake
for the US to have gotten involved in Vietnam in the first place; however, we’re there
now so we need to either win or get out. McGovern asserted that the military was wasting
money and manpower, and they needed to rethink their efficiency, size, and weapon
strategies. Money and the economy played a huge role in all of McGovern’s wartime
opposition speeches, especially following the era of the New Deal.
The 1960s quickly became a decade associated with hippies, young protesters,
and the famous slogan “make love, not war.” Many songs emerged from these young
groups, such as “I-Feel-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die” (Doc B), expressing the popular
sentiments towards the war. This song in particular addresses the political, social, and
economic aspects of the war. It firstly connects Wall Street with the war, and indicates
that there is money to be made in the war: “There’s plenty good money to be made
By supplying the Army with the tools of the trade.” It then discusses the uncertainty of
the American people as to why the US was in the war to begin with: “What are we
fighting for? Don’t ask me, I don’t give a damn.” The song closes with a powerful
passage addressing one of the most prevalent issues of war- the large and rising death
toll. This song accurately portrays the feelings of most hippies and young protesters at
that time in the war effort.
The peace and love mindset allowed the anti-war youth to band together with civil
rights activists in the ongoing equality struggle. Martin Luther King was an example of
an African American leader opposing the war. In 1967, he spoke and directly addressed
some of the biggest issues impacting the African American community regarding the
war. He specifically mentioned some of the hardships for African American families,
including “sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and die in
extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population” and “sending them
eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not
found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem” (Doc C). He as well as many other civil
rights leaders could not condone this war which proposed having young men fight for
rights belonging to other people in other countries, when they were not guaranteed those
very rights themselves in the United States. A clear addition to the social tension and
racial divide was apparent in the proportional numbers of Black young men to white
young men sent to fight, as Dr. King mentioned. Though less than 10 percent of
American men in arms were African American, they accounted for almost 20 percent of
all combat-related deaths in Vietnam during that period. In 1965 alone African
Americans represented almost one-fourth of the Army's killed in action. Some argued
that it was the economic divide between the races that led to those numbers, as there was
a disproportionate amount of men who were drafted that did not attend college to those
that did. James Fallow mentioned that fact in his discussion of his 1969 draft board
experience (Doc F). The older, wealthier, more educated youths from Cambridge knew
how to intentionally fail the tests from the military as not to be drafted to Vietnam.
Fallows illustrates the younger men from Chelsea who came, inexperienced, from the
working class area in Boston. They were more naïve about the draft tests, and less of
them had attended colleges- and especially prestigious ones at that. Consequently, the
working class youngsters were also disproportionately drafted in relation to the upper-
class college graduates.
Although the clear anti-war sentiments were constantly being expressed by the
citizens in the US, President Nixon did not fail to try and raise some pro-war, patriotic
feelings (Doc G). He reminded the US people of their duty to free those people oppressed
under a totalitarian rule, and of the need for them to be united for peace and against
defeat. With powerful words Nixon lectured the American people “North Vietnam cannot
defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.” Only Americans who
actively opposed the war, allowed for defeat, and did not harbor patriotic and nationalist feelings
could humiliate themselves. As the president asked in vain for American cooperation,
Congress eventually grew wary of the excessive power given to the executive branch
under the Tonkin Resolution discussed earlier. So in 1973 as the war came close to the
end, they passed the War Powers Act (Doc I). This Act effectively repealed the Gulf of
Tonkin Resolution, and restored the somewhat lost balance of powers within government.
With this act came the hope that the president would never again be able to launch an
unwanted and perhaps unwarranted war without the consent of Congress and essentially
the people, preventing the same social, economic, and political tensions which arose in
the decade of the Vietnam War.

You might also like