This proved to be important in connecting the students with history. Ali was drafted by the United States military in 1966 and called up for induction in 1967. Examining Long Island high school student newspapers represented the high watermark of their research. affair policies for Vietnam included only military action and started For teachers and students who are not so lucky, there are other ways to accomplish the task. public supported the Vietnam War during his time as Commander-in-Chief. office in 1964, and continued to support American’s involvement in Asia. Now in POLLING MATTERS: Why Leaders Must Listen to the Wisdom of the People, The Gallup Organization reveals: What polls really are and how they are conducted Why the information polls provide is so vitally important to modern society today ... Specifically, I want them to dig deeper into problem solving—namely, asking the “how” and “whys” of events, personalities, and actions. President Teaching a college course, “Major Themes in American History,” enabled me to compare the quality and level of work produced by both groups. Every local community in America has its own story to tell about the war in Vietnam. The real thrust was getting them out into the field and away from the teacher-centered classroom.[5]. United States Army in Vietnam. The role of the media in the perception of the Vietnam War has been widely noted. troops to report on the conditions of South Vietnam. policies and expressing their own opinions on the war itself. Changing public opinion in the USA and abroad. Interviews and acquisition of personal letters can then be arranged. At last, the story of the entire antiwar movement from its advent to its dissolution is available in Antiwarriors: The Vietnam War and the Battle for America's Hearts and Minds . President Johnson’s foreign American Public Opinion and the War in Vietnam 23 Vietnam war ended in 1973, complete withdrawal had become the majority prefer-ence, despite administration opposition to this course.10 Before exploring these trends in public opinion about the war in detail, how-ever, it is important to know how opinion was measured and what problems of Aug 19, 2013 â This year, North Country Public Radio is looking in-depth at America's forty year long drug war. Fifth, almost all counties in the nation have a historical society. A Creeping Doubt: Public Support for Vietnam in 1967. February 6, 2007. While some protests of a violent nature captured the headlines, he pointed out that the vast majority of antiwar protests were peaceful in nature. This book will be of great interest to students of the Vietnam war, intelligence and strategic studies in general. Indeed, reading their research papers turned out to be a personally rewarding exercise for me. Cultural diversity gave the student peace movement an enriched political vision seldom seen in the history of mass movements in America.”[11]. Women. I enco⦠Causes of Vietnam War 1883-1945 - Cochin-China, southern Vietnam, and Annam and Tonkin, central and northern Vietnam, along with Cambodia and Laos make up colonial empire French Indochina. In general, I encourage students to know the historical context in which the document was written, the timeframe in which the document is set, and the main idea. He details how the culture and work routines of Congress and the media influenced political tactics and daily news stories. Today, the Vietnamese view the U.S. in a positive light. For the most famous athlete on the planet to openly decry the war was, at the time, blasphemous. which was also used by President Johnson to keep the critics quiet and to The public opinion split over the Vietnam War because some of the public felt that it was right for America to fight in the war while others did not share that opinion. My objective in this and other similar projects is simple: I want students to remove themselves from an emphasis on fact-oriented teaching to the test to one of encouraging them to recreate a piece of the Islandâs history through their own efforts. allowed President Johnson to take any measure necessary to promote His study had examined non-elite universities. That our policymakers, in cutting vital military aid, betrayed and abandoned South Vietnam? World Jan 31, 2018 4:13 PM EDT. Incorporating a variety of methodological approaches, the book looks at: -British policy at the Paris Peace Conference -French policy in the era of 1930s appeasement -Policy choices of the US during the Vietnam War -Global responses to ... One of the most rewarding aspects of this project was the open forum I held in the classroom. An archivist should be available to provide leads and contact people. It would be challenging to trace the opinions expressed in these papers. But, perhaps more importantly, the research project enabled all of my students to arrive at basically the same conclusions about local public opinion that university scholars have learned about national public opinion. The seventeen essays break new ground on questions relating to gender, religion, ideology, strategy, and public opinion, and the book gives equal emphasis to Vietnamese and American perspectives on the grueling conflict. What differing opinions did President Johnson's advisers have about Vietnam? Public opinion shaped out the One of the more interesting facets of the students’ research was uncovering what high school students at the time felt about the war. The Vietnam War ended with 58,220 But sadly, citizens have increasingly become subjects of the media â s influence resulting in a potentially dangerous control of public opinion, especially in times of war. %�쏢 And why they failed. Blending Vietnamese and American political, diplomatic, and military history, this book presents U.S. involvement in southeast Asia as an episode in the forty-year Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. In a lesson on the Vietnam War, Ms. Morrison explores how public opinion was shaped by key events. By April 1, 1973 all His documents raised the interesting question of how successful the nonviolent aspects of the antiwar movement were in helping to sway public opinion—locally and nationally. Vietnam. [15] In large measure, protests were nonviolent and carried more weight with the populace than college protests did. 1968: The Year That Changed America Forever. Learning this did strike close to home. I began approaching this project with one very important objective: working with the real evidence of historical research rather than a textbook-centered approach to learning. 1965: 24% March 1966: 26% May 1966: 36% November 1966: 31% January 1967: 32% April 1967: 37% July 1967: 41% October 1967: 47% December 1967: 44% February 1968: 46% April 1968: 48% August 1968: 53% September 1968: 54% January 1969: 52% September 1969: 55% January 1970: 52% April 1970: 51% May 1970: 56% January 1971: 59% Ma Tellingly, but not surprisingly, these papers revealed that the views of Long Islanders were generally consistent with those of the nation at large, At first, there was strong support for the men fighting the war only to be followed by growing disillusionment and distrust. Casualties, Public Opinion, and Presidential Policy During the Vietnam War Author: Mark A. Lorell Subject: Examines the relationship between U.S. casualties and public support for U.S. military intervention in Korea and Vietnam, and concludes that a strong inverse relationship existed between the ⦠and media including advertisements and commercials. Protests against the Vietnam War The main opposition came from students. Did they remain generally supportive of the nation’s conduct of the war or did they gradually change course and express disappointment? Casualties, Public Opinion, and Presidential Policy During the Vietnam War Author: Mark A. Lorell Subject: Examines the relationship between U.S. casualties and public support for U.S. military intervention in Korea and Vietnam, and concludes that a strong inverse relationship existed between the two. Americans dead, and the increasing divide between the government and the Very often, I ask my students to bring in one of their documents for a brief discussion about its historical relevance. Created Date: 5/1/2007 11:03:10 AM war used propaganda and media to try to sway the public to support the war and The Turning Point. What tactics did the Vietcong use that made them hard to beat? Create your own unique website with customizable templates. In general, their research reveals that the movement on Long Island reflected the national movement, but lacked its divisive acrimony among the many groups involved, the exception being the ideological differences among college protestors on campus. In 1964, the USS Maddox was allegedly stalked and attacked by North Vietnam torpedoes. They interacted and helped one another, regardless of academic ability. They came to an appreciation of how the 1960s antiwar movement compelled many communities throughout the nation to speak out in the name of peace and justice. Public Opinion - Nixon and the vietnam war. Vietnam War Public Opinion Essay. The all-volunteer army and a grateful public In the same CBS poll, 94% said Vietnam vets should have received the same respect. Opposition to the war grew more heated and contributed mightily to Lyndon Johnson's decision not to run for re-election in 1968. Nixon was criticized greatly by the citizens of the US and by the international In 1968, the country seemed to be having a nervous breakdown as battles erupted over the Vietnam War, cultural values and race. As Iraq spiraled into civil war that same year, the U.S. occupation became more unpopular and more Americans began to see the war as a failure. It is particularly relevant to my high school students. Fredrik Logevall provides a concise, comprehensive and accessible introduction to the origins of the Vietnam War from the end of the Indochina War in 1954 to the eruption of full-scale war in 1965, and places events against their full ... by Julian E. Zelizer. <> Often when people hear that news coverage from Vietnam had a decisive impact on public opinion on national policy , they think of the popular television clips or pictures. Myth: Common belief is that most Vietnam veterans were drafted. In reality however, this article of faith is quite wrong, as Telltale Hearts convincingly demonstrates. Found insideIn You Donât Belong Here, Elizabeth Becker uses these womenâs work and lives to illuminate the Vietnam War from the 1965 American buildup, the expansion into Cambodia, and the American defeat and its aftermath. Indeed, of all the lessons the students learned from this worthwhile project, there is one that truly stands out: local communities can overcome their own resistance to change and develop forms of protest enabling diverse coalitions to call for change in national policy. Then it took just over a month to go from 300,000 to 400,000 and about two months to climb from 400,000 to the brink of 500,000. The US recorded an estimated 405,000 deaths in World War II, 58,000 in the Vietnam War and 36,000 in the Korean War. Work and Labor. Drawing on a rich array of evidence, including National Archives data on the hometowns of more than 400,000 American soldiers killed in World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq, this book is the most ambitious inquiry to date into the ... community for the bombings shortly after a peace deal had failed to be signed during the Vietnam War changed Americas view to support the war by implementing An important focus today is the battle for public opinion on Iraq -- as eventually it was in Vietnam. Subsequently, students went about their tasks of interviewing Vietnam veterans and antiwar activists, searching for personal letters available from family members, reading commentaries by community leaders, patriotic organizations, and church and protest movement groups, examining whatever opinions could be found in local village presses and high school student newspapers, and, lastly, visiting historical societies. War. Shortly before the 1973 peace accords were signed, for example, one West Islip student aptly summarized the situation in an article entitled, “Political Football.”, The students’ research, moreover, led to additional examples of opposition to the war. One of the more unique discoveries was the movie production made by six students from Levittown’s Division Avenue High School. Drawing largely on Vietnamese language sources, Heather Stur demonstrates that the conflict in Vietnam was really three wars: the political war in Saigon, the military war, and the war for international public opinion. Dwight D. Eisenhower decided to prevent a communist takeover of South Vietnam and to undermine the new communist regime of North Vietnam; that Pres. The final directive is for students to write a basic set of questions to be answered—age, background, education, if in the military was service performed in Vietnam, if a student protestor what were the issues motivating the protest. In Vietnam, no one called 1967 the Summer of Love. Whether it is about a local son who lost his life in combat or a young college student living away from home expressing anger about the draft and the morality of the war, there is information waiting to be uncovered. Ninety-seven percent in a 1979 poll agreed that veterans who served during the time the Vietnam War was going on deserved respect for having served their country in the armed forces. Pro-war and anti-war demonstrations served as an appropriate starting point. The second requirement is that the taped interview be held in a quiet setting, one avoiding any background noise. Television brought the horrors of war into millions of homes, as did photos like this one of a young Vietnamese girl fleeing a napalm bombing. %PDF-1.4 Seminar paper from the year 2005 in the subject Sociology - War and Peace, Military, grade: 1,0, Indiana University (Sociology Department ), course: S 660: Politics and Public Opinion Research, 10 entries in the bibliography, language: ... place throughout the bloodiest times of the war. The report, now known as The public opinion split over the Vietnam war because some of the public felt that it was right for America to fight in the war while others did not share that opinion. Lastly, what effect, if any, do grassroots movements have in waging a campaign of resistance against established national policies? Given the diversity of the participants, the general consensus that emerges will surprise and enlighten many readers. The book corrects various myths that continue to influence American thinking about Vietnam. Le Monde Diplomatic, a French newspaper wrote United States democracy. "This is a study of U.S. government policymaking during the 30 years of the Vietnam war, 1945-75, beginning with the 1945-1960 period. This study examines the role that public attitudes have played over the last generation in the making of United States foreign policy. [2], This assigned project dealing with the Vietnam War era required students to flesh out public opinion on the war. 1972, the Nixon administration raided and bombed the North Vietnam two major The merits and pitfalls of campus activism were thoroughly discussed, raising the issue of the purpose of learning and the goals to which it should be directed. There were mid-year reports that merely wetted my students’ appetites. Cronkiteâs nightly newscasts helped shape public opinion about Vietnam, which became known as âthe living-room war,â in the words of Michael Arlen of the New Yorker. More than 100 towns and cities throughout South Vietnam were surprisingly attacked ⦠Much of the public seems also to assume that the media in Vietnam were a threat to military security, judging from polls that show support for tight restrictions on journalists in the Gulf. The first prerequisite is to write a formal letter asking for an interview. A SCHOOL-YEAR RESEARCH EXPERIMENT using primary resources to teach an important national issue—protest movements against the Vietnam War at the local level—is an excellent way to motivate students and energize classroom teaching. Each state historical society publishes a scholarly journal. The documents they found illustrated how extensive and emotionally charged opposition to the war was on Long Island. take over the South and to stop the spread Communism throughout Eastern For high school students, in particular, it is critical that teachers instruct them on what to look for when examining a primary source. If we examine trends in public opinion, opposition to the war crossed an important threshold in 1968 when the majority of Americans decided that becoming involved in Vietnam had been a mistake. From this conflict emerged an ongoing debate between members of the Student Peace Union calling for reform and a larger majority of students preoccupied with career goals. 1976. By 1971, the student newspaper, The Echo, ran the following editorial: “Where Lies the Blame for the War?… It falls on nearly all of us. Sometimes I suggest a thematic approach like this one. When it came to addressing the elements of organization and writing, I referred them to Jacques Barzun and Henry Graff’s The Modern Researcher, the Chicago Manual of Style, Wood Gray’s The Historian’s Handbook, and my own favorite, William Strunk and E.B. Additionally, I provided time after school for students to discuss the progress of their research. With half a million US troops on the ground and almost twice that number of allies, the year was to see the largest-scale battles in the conflict so far. (A secondary purpose of this trip was to promote collaboration between school and university.) When the students reported on their final papers I set aside one week and each student was permitted a five minute discussion. The real joy came, however, when I discovered the quality of writing and analytical skills demonstrated by these amateur historians. Collectively moreover, at the conclusion of the project, the classroom came alive with excitement when they presented their research findings and enthusiastically shared them with their fellow students. The bar was raised. I encourage them “to understand clearly that history puts its emphasis on ‘the facts’ not for their own sake but for the sake of the meanings they can actually be seen to carry.”[1] In particular, I want to impress upon them that sound historical scholarship proceeds best with materials that are original sources. A 2005 analysis of public opinion polls during the Vietnam and Iraq Wars by Frank Newport and Joseph Carroll at Gallup News Service concluded that, In the 1950s, Vietnam descended into civil war, with the Southern government and US forces attempting to stop the spread of communism. about 60% of the public thought that it was a mistake to send troops to Vietnam These protests involved a unique composite of ad hoc protestors and were in tandem with agendas of Old and New Leftists. However, this has not deterred me from challenging my own students to undertake serious scholarly research and apply it to the study of American history. Public Still Has Negative Opinion of Vietnam The latest Gallup poll shows that just 36% of Americans have a favorable opinion of Vietnam -- identical with the public's opinion of China, and slightly more favorable than its views of North Korea (26%). It was later shown in one of their classes.[10]. The impact of the anti-War protests across the nation in the late 1960s and early 1970s fostered an anti-Vietnam Veteran atmosphere here at home that lasted for nearly 20 years after the war ⦠The U. S. government withdrew from Vietnam as the result of public pressure, which jeopardized re-election chances of members of Congress, and cost the Democrats the White House in 1968. All of this proved more valuable to them than reading textbook accounts. How can someone be condemned for a belief in principle?… The U.S. must allow the draft resisters to return home.”[8] Some powerful moral judgments respecting conscience had been made. international peace and security in Southeast Asia. They were led by the ambitious fifteen-year-old writer-producer, Roy Firestone, later of ESPN fame. Vietnam War. “December 1961 White Paper” stated that there would need an increase in A number of questions were posed for student exploration. A classic example is the photo depicting a weeping female student standing over a lifeless body at Kent State University. This assigned project dealing with the Vietnam War era required students to flesh out public opinion on the war. At 90-years-old, Vietnam combat pilot Clyde Bridger, returned to the cockpit of a T-33 Fighter Jet, the same kind he used to fly 65 years ago. Despite the 1967 opinion poll results, it took until 1969 before it was electorally popular to oppose the war. Pro-war and anti-war demonstrations served as an appropriate starting point. 5 0 obj Found insideThis book provides a long-term perspective on the opinions of the British public on foreign and defence policy in the post-war era. 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