Conflicts at Home

Chapter 29, Section 3

Protests Grow

• Protests grew for several reasons– U.S. should not be involved in another country’s civil war– The methods of fighting were immoral– Costs to the American society was too high

• College Students formed a big group of the protestors• Most people that were drafted were poor

• Protests for Peace• http://video.yahoo.com/watch/1648386/5566785

Links to Civil Rights• An unfair amount of African

Americans were called to serve• They made up 10% of the

combat troops in Vietnam • In 1965 they accounted for

20% of the U.S. combat deaths• The antiwar movement

became linked to the civil rights movement

• Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke out against the war

A Divided Country

• The Vietnam War divided the country ,even families

• Doves- people who opposed the war• Hawks – people who supported the war

A Change in Leadership

• Walter Cronkite, a news anchorman, went to Vietnam and said the U.S. was in a deadlock

• After that, Johnson refused to send in an extra 206,000 troops and said he would look for peace

• Johnson had been mostly successful with his domestic policies with programs to assist the poor, elderly, and to protect civil rights

• The war caused Johnson to lose the support of liberal Democrats and civil rights leaders

Nixon Promises Results

• The chaos at the Democratic National Convention helped Republican candidate Richard Nixon win

• He promised to restore order and end the war honorably

• He said he was going to stop the war fast, but the war dragged on

Morale Sinks• Many soldiers were losing faith• Many Vietnamese soldiers

deserted their army causing U.S. soldiers to wonder why they should fight a war when the Vietnamese themselves don’t want to help

• At My Lai, a U.S. platoon rounded up and shot around 500 civilians, mostly women, children, and old men

• My Lai represented a horrible lack of discipline and a breakdown in the morality of the troops

“Peace With Honor”• In 1969, Nixon announced his strategy of

Vietnamization• It involved the withdrawal of U.S. troops and turning

the fighting over to the South Vietnamese• Nixon did not want to retreat and wanted to force the

North Vietnamese to negotiate a peace settlement

Widening the War• In 1969, Nixon began secret bombing raids of

Cambodia• When people found out, they were furious

that the government had widened the war• This anger grew after people found out that

the four previous presidential administrations had not been honest with the public

Any Questions???