Chapter 22: The Vietnam War Years Section 3: A Nation Divided

California Academic Standards: 11.9.4, 11.10.4, 11.10.7, & 11.11.2 11.9 Students analyze U.S. foreign policy since World War II. .4 List the effects of foreign policy on domestic policies and vice versa (e.g., protests during the war in Vietnam, the "nuclear freeze" movement). 11.10 Students analyze the development of federal civil rights and voting rights. .4 Examine the roles of civil rights advocates (e.g., A. Philip Randolph, Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcom X, Thurgood Marshall, James Farmer, Rosa Parks), including the significance of Martin Luther King, Jr. 's "Letter from Birmingham Jail" and "I Have a Dream" speech. .7 Analyze the women's rights movement from the era of Elizabeth Stanton and Susan Anthony and the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the movement launched in the 1960s, including differing perspectives on the roles of women. 11.11 Students analyze the major social problems and domestic policy issues in contemporary American society. .2 Discuss the significant domestic policy speeches of Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton (e.g., with regard to education, civil rights, economic policy, environmental policy).

Objectives: Following lecture and reading of this section, students will be able to: Explain the draft policies that made the Vietnam War a working-class war. Trace the roots of opposition to the war. Describe the antiwar movement.

Overview: Controversy over the escalation of the Vietnam War divided the nation into supporters and opponents of the conflict. Despite nationwide campus protests, in 1967 most Americans remained committed to the war.

A Working-Class War Draft policies favored young men from privileged backgrounds. Those who attended college or could get medical deferments did not have to go. Many college students at the time were white and relatively well-off. 80% of American soldiers in Vietnam are minorities and lower-class whites.

African Americans make up a high percentage of U. S African Americans make up a high percentage of U.S. ground combat troops. During the first several years of the war blacks accounted for more than 20% of combat deaths but only represented 10% of the U.S. population.

In 1967 Martin Luther King Jr In 1967 Martin Luther King Jr. lashed out calling it a “cruel irony” that American blacks are dying for a country that still regarded them as second-class citizens. Racial tensions were high and in 1967 and 1969 race riots broke out between U.S. soldiers leading to another factor of low morale.

What about today’s society needs to be changed? Most American women in Vietnam serve as military nurses or volunteers, because they were not allowed to serve in combat roles. The Roots of Opposition What about today’s society needs to be changed?

Students of the 1960s were more socially and politically active and an atmosphere of protest existed in the country. The New Left movement, including such activist groups as Students for Democratic Society (SDS) and the Free Speech Movement (FSM), pushes for social and political change demanding sweeping changes in American society.

The SDS called for a restoration of participatory democracy and greater individual freedom from the government and big business which had taken over America. The FSM, led by Mario Savio a student at UC Berkeley, focused its criticism on the “machine,” the nation’s faceless and powerful business and government institutions.

The Protest Movement Emerges The SDS and FSM tactics spread to college campuses nationwide. College students begin joining together to protest the Vietnam War. The Protest Movement Emerges

Campus protests mount as more college students become eligible for the draft when Johnson changes college deferments to students only in “good academic standing.” The SDS calls for civil disobedience and counsels students to flee for Canada or Sweden.

Those who opposed the war did so for different reasons: 1) it was a civil war we had no part in 2) U.S. should not police the world 3) Vietnam was taking our attention away from other matters in the Middle East and Europe. More young Americans resist the draft.

10,000 draftees were suspected to have gone to Canada. Some spend time in jail, 4,000 of the nearly 200,000 that were accused of draft offenses. 10,000 draftees were suspected to have gone to Canada. In 1967, 75,000 protesters march on the pentagon, which was considered “the center of the war machine.” The American public became deeply divided into opponents of the war (doves) and supporters of the war (hawks).

In 1967, 20,000 pro-war marchers marched in Manhattan, and a poll at the same time showed that 2/3 of Americans still felt the war was justified. Only 10% approved of the administration’s present level of commitment in Vietnam. 50% felt that increased attacks would help to win the war.

In 1967 a poll showed that 70% of Americans felt the war protests were “acts of disloyalty.” Read a personal Voice on page 740 “America-Love it or leave it” became a popular slogan among supporters of the U.S. war effort.

Johnson continued his policy of slow escalation which did not seem to make anyone happy, the doves wanted him to pull troops out immediately and the hawks wanted the effort stepped up quickly and forcefully Johnson saw the protesters as misguided and misinformed.

By the end of 1967 the stalemate began to create tension with the administration, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara resigned, and in 1968 the war and Johnson’s presidency would take a dramatic turn for the worst.