The Vietnam War: History in an Hour by Neil Smith

Author:Neil Smith [Smith, Neil]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

An anti-Vietnam demonstrator offers a flower to military police at the Pentagon. Arlington, Virginia, October 1967

NARA

The real successes of the anti-war movement occurred during Richard Nixon’s presidency. His victory in the 1968 Presidential election owed much to his pledge to achieve ‘peace with honour’. However, his attempt to win the war through large-scale escalation, was thwarted by a three events. Firstly, increasing public demonstrations, such as the Moratorium March on Washington of 15 October 1969, when 250,000 protestors converged on the Capitol. Secondly, the 1971 Winter Soldier hearings, featuring ex-servicemen ‘confessing’ their crimes in Vietnam. The third, and most significant event was Congress passing the Cooper-Church Amendment prevented US forces from being deployed outside Vietnam, and by the end of 1972 it was clear that it was only a matter of time before Congress ultimately cut funding for the war in Vietnam.

There are very strong arguments to challenge the role of domestic opposition in bringing the war to a swift conclusion. Perhaps the most obvious argument focuses on the actual length of the war. US ground troops were involved for eight years, four years longer than the US involvement in the Second World War. They were involved for a further five years after the Tet Offensive. If the anti-war movement was so effective, why did the war last so long? Secondly, throughout the conflict, public opinion remained broadly supportive of presidential policy towards Vietnam, indeed Nixon won nearly 61 per cent of the vote, carrying 49 out of 50 States in the process in the 1972 election. And this, in a country where Gallup estimated fewer than 30 per cent of the population believed the US should have gone to war in Vietnam. The movement itself was too divided to have any real impact on decision-making. Ironically, this fragmentation occurred at the point when the anti-war movement appeared to have experienced a critical breakthrough: 1968. While establishment figures such as Cronkite calmly called for a negotiated peace, student radicals were prepared to raid draft offices and attack Dow Chemicals, the company which produced napalm. It seems that the most influential factor in turning the people at home against the war, was the lack of any hope of victory, and not the protests on the streets, bases and campuses.

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