Departments

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Vietnam War

  • 1/29/2023

    No Golden Anniversary for the Paris Peace Accords

    by Arnold R. Isaacs

    While the West observes January 27 as the anniversary of the agreement, it was already January 28 in Vietnam when the accords took effect, a telling symbol of the disjunction between American and Vietnamese views of the conflict and its stakes that contributed to their tragic failure. 

  • SOURCE: The Baffler
    12/14/2022

    Why the POW-MIA Flag Now Flies Over America

    by John Thomason

    The mandate to fly the black banner over many government buildings across the nation reflects the organized power of a New Right faction that crafted a myth of soldiers left behind to air broader cultural grievances about militarism, masculinity, and a supposedly wayward nation. 

  • SOURCE: New York Times
    12/6/2022

    Don Luce, Activist Against Vietnam War, Dies at 88

    Luce helped expose the torture and human rights abuses carried out by the government of South Vietnam, and campaigned against the war after being expelled from South Vietnam as an aid worker. 

  • 12/4/2022

    Farewell, Brother Staughton

    by Carl Mirra

    Staughton Lynd was always in the trenches fighting for a better world, and for that he remains a “admirable radical” and, for that matter, a beautiful person.

  • 11/6/2022

    Russian Soldiers' Calls Home Echo Moral Injury Testimony of Vietnam Vets

    by Elise Lemire

    Translations of intercepted calls from Russian soliders in Ukraine reveal guilt, shame, anger, and loss of faith in national institutions and leadership that echo the testimony of Vietnam Veterans Against the War. Will these veterans help launch resistance to Russian militarism? 

  • SOURCE: Tropics of Meta
    10/21/2022

    Screaming Past Each Other at Christmas: Debating the End of the Vietnam War

    by Ryan Reft

    In December 1972 the United States launched a massive bombing campaign, notionally to force the North back to the bargaining table and secure an "honorable" peace. The fierce debate between Anthony Lewis and Robert Conquest over the merits of that reasoning would resonate for years. 

  • 5/1/2022

    1968: A Year of Dashed Hopes

    by Walter G. Moss

    While people seek to confront life's challenges with hope and courage and banish fear and doubt, some years, like 1968, don't make that easy. 

  • 5/1/2022

    Ukraine Evokes Past "Eve of Destruction"

    by Richard Aquila

    In 1960s America, popular songs gradually roused the conscience of many Americans against the war in Vietnam. What forces might make Russia (as well as Ukraine and the west) push away from the brink of unthinkable acts mass destruction? 

  • SOURCE: The New Yorker
    2/16/2022

    When Eartha Kitt Disrupted the Ladies Who Lunch

    In 1968, real life imitated "Batman" as the Catwoman actress broke the veneer of politeness at a luncheon hosted by Lady Bird Johnson to denounce the war against Vietnam. But while Catwoman always got away, Kitt's career was destroyed for a decade.

  • SOURCE: TomDispatch
    1/23/2022

    A Very Long War: From Vietnam to Afghanistan

    by Andrew Bacevich

    The interpretive frameworks – from the "domino theory" to the war on terror –  guiding the political decision to wage war are usually rendered incoherent by facts on the ground in combat. This cluelessness survived the end of the cold war intact and suggests a longer campaign of American empire. 

  • 10/24/2021

    The Women Who Won the Vietnam War

    by Sherry Buchanan

    Fifty years on, the history of the women who defeated a superpower, while celebrated in Vietnam, remains largely unrecognized and undocumented in our history of the war.

  • SOURCE: TomDispatch
    10/17/2021

    Seeing the Future When No One Believes You

    by Rebecca Gordon

    The recollections and rehabilitations occasioned by the 20th anniversary of the War on Terror are, predictably, giving short shrift to the voices of dissent who questioned the ability of American military power to resolve political conflicts. Like their mythical namesake, those denounced as Cassandras in 2001 were right. 

  • SOURCE: History.com
    9/1/2021

    Vietnam's Postwar Refugee Crisis

    “The United States doesn’t take enough into account how refugee migration and displacement are a part of all of our foreign policy interventions,” says historian Phuong T. Nguyen. “We need to be prepared to handle the humanitarian crisis that inevitably follows.”