Defeat in Vietnam: Resistance

Summary

History As It Happens: Defeat in Vietnam – Resistance
Episode Release Date: April 25, 2025
Host: Martin Di Caro
Guests: Carolyn Eisenberg, Frederick Logeval, Paul McBride

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Introduction

In the episode titled "Defeat in Vietnam: Resistance," host Martin Di Caro delves deep into the multifaceted anti-Vietnam War movement, exploring its origins, evolution, and lasting impact on American society and politics. Accompanied by esteemed guests Carolyn Eisenberg, Frederick Logeval, and Paul McBride, the discussion not only recounts historical events but also draws parallels to contemporary protest movements.

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The Genesis and Growth of the Anti-War Movement

The anti-war movement's roots trace back to early dissent on university campuses. Frederick Logeval recounts his initial involvement in 1963, highlighting the small gatherings and significant moments that catalyzed broader resistance:

"In 1963, there were only about 25 people picketing Madame Nhu outside the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago. It was the beginning, but it set the stage for the massive movements to come."
(14:35) – Frederick Logeval

As the movement gained momentum, it expanded beyond students to include diverse groups such as lawyers, business executives, and women’s organizations. By 1967, protests had swelled to hundreds of thousands, exemplified by the landmark Pentagon March where protesters attempted to peacefully "levitate" the Pentagon through collective humming—a symbolic gesture that underscored the movement's creativity and determination.

"The Pentagon didn't lift as promised, but the spectacle demonstrated how diverse and widespread the anti-war sentiment had become."
(20:08) – Carolyn Eisenberg

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Personal Narratives and Turning Points

Paul McBride shares his transformative journey from a military lieutenant to an active anti-war protester. His disillusionment began during his service in Vietnam when he observed firsthand the lack of coherent strategy and the inefficacy of military leadership:

"When we met General Walt, his briefing on the 'Red Tide' moving across Europe was an insult. It was clear we didn't know what we were doing."
(15:40) – Paul McBride

Carolyn Eisenberg reminisces about witnessing the brutality of the war, which fueled her commitment to nonviolent resistance:

"As I walked among desperate young men, I knew that social change must come through nonviolent action, not through the violence of war."
(65:09) – Carolyn Eisenberg

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Political Impact: The 1968 Election and Beyond

The anti-war movement significantly influenced the political landscape, particularly the 1968 presidential election. The candidacy of Eugene McCarthy, supported by widespread anti-war activism, challenged incumbent Lyndon B. Johnson's re-election prospects. Despite Johnson's initial strength, the relentless pressure from the movement and pivotal events like the Tet Offensive led to his decision not to seek re-election.

"The anti-war movement was indispensable in turning America's attitudes toward the war and giving politicians like McCarthy the courage to stand against Johnson."
(30:06) – Carolyn Eisenberg

Frederick Logeval emphasizes that Johnson’s withdrawal from the race was a direct consequence of the movement’s effectiveness, leading to a shift in U.S. policy under Richard Nixon.

"Even though Nixon continued the war in some capacity, the policy was already changing due to the movement's influence."
(35:35) – Frederick Logeval

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Strategies, Ebb and Flow of Protest

The movement experienced periods of intense activity and relative calm, often influenced by external events such as military actions or political decisions. Notable moments include the Moratorium Day protests in 1969, which mobilized millions across the nation through coordinated small-scale actions, fostering widespread participation.

"Moratorium Day was brilliant in its approach, allowing non-professional protesters to engage and feel part of the larger movement."
(56:16) – Frederick Logeval

However, Calvin McBride notes that as the war wound down and troops began to withdraw, some momentum was lost as the immediate threat to soldiers lessened.

"As troops started to come home, the direct personal connection to the war diminished, affecting the movement's energy."
(42:17) – Paul McBride

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Comparisons to Modern Protests

Drawing parallels to contemporary events, the guests discuss the challenges faced by today's anti-war protesters, particularly those opposing U.S. support for Israel in Gaza. Paul McBride highlights the complexities of modern activism, such as the conflation of anti-war sentiments with accusations of anti-Semitism, which complicates the movement’s message and reception.

"Today’s protesters are vulnerable to being labeled anti-Semitic, which undermines legitimate criticism of U.S. policies in Gaza."
(56:39) – Paul McBride

Frederick Logeval compares the historical influence of university presidents advocating against the war to the current erosion of academic institutions' authority, suggesting that modern universities struggle to mount a unified front against governmental policies.

"The Ivy League presidents in the 1960s were able to galvanize support against the war—a feat modern institutions find challenging today."
(57:34) – Frederick Logeval

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Conclusions and Lessons for Today

The episode concludes with reflections on the enduring legacy of the anti-Vietnam War movement. Carolyn Eisenberg underscores the importance of nonviolent resistance and maintaining moral integrity in protest:

"For the sake of our nation’s integrity and the lives affected by war, we must engage in meaningful, nonviolent action."
(65:09) – Carolyn Eisenberg

Paul McBride expresses hope that contemporary movements can learn from the past to effectively challenge current conflicts without falling into the traps of misinformation and divisive tactics.

"The opposition today is critical, and without swift and unified action, the negative legacy of past movements could repeat itself."
(62:17) – Paul McBride

Frederick Logeval adds that understanding historical movements provides valuable insights into navigating present-day challenges, emphasizing the need for informed and strategic activism.

"The work is far from over, and the lessons from Vietnam are more relevant than ever in shaping effective resistance today."
(64:04) – Frederick Logeval

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Final Thoughts

"Defeat in Vietnam: Resistance" offers a comprehensive exploration of the anti-war movement’s rise, its strategic successes and challenges, and its profound influence on American political and social landscapes. By weaving personal anecdotes with scholarly analysis, the episode not only honors the past but also provides a roadmap for future activism.

For those seeking to understand the complexities of resistance movements and their impact on history, this episode serves as an enlightening and thought-provoking resource.

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Stay Tuned:
Part Three of this series, titled "Defeat in Vietnam: Consequences," will feature discussions with Jeremy Suri and Jeffrey Engel. New episodes are available every Tuesday and Friday on all major podcast platforms. Subscribe and sign up for Martin Di Caro’s newsletter at historyasithappens.com.

Transcript

[Martin DeCaro]

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[Paul McBride]

You'Ll stand out and make your mark.

[Martin DeCaro]

Don't wait. Get yours today. History as it happens. April 25, 2025. Defeat in Vietnam Resistance.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Let us save our national honor. Stop the bombing and stop the war. The whole world is watching.

[Frederick Logeval]

The whole world is watching.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

The estimated 125,000 Manhattan marchers include students, housewives, beatnik poets, doctors, businessmen.

[Paul McBride]

Because as the Vietnamese know better than anyone, we American people face more problems.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

And more contradict and more hardships in building a movement for social change than.

[Frederick Logeval]

Any country in the world.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

So brainwashed are we. I shall not see and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president.

[Frederick Logeval]

Strike. Strike. Strike.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Strike. Strike. They've got grievances, they've got demands.

[Martin DeCaro]

They're demands on both sides.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

We have to talk. Leave this area immediately.

[Martin DeCaro]

And all of a sudden I heard the shooting.

[Frederick Logeval]

Strike.

[Paul McBride]

Strike.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Tonight to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans, I ask for your support.

[Martin DeCaro]

As the war shattered Vietnam, it violently divided American society. It generated the largest anti war movement in our history. Massive demonstrations, silent vigils, the burning of draft cards. A diverse number of Americans resisted their government's misbegotten war in Southeast Asia. Did they make a difference? And what can their efforts teach us today? That's next as we report history as it happens. I'm Martin DeCaro.

[Paul McBride]

If I gave a kid a bad grade and caused him to have to leave school, I could be sending him to Vietnam. My students were vulnerable to this terrible monster that kept growing all around us.

[Frederick Logeval]

There were things that people in the anti war movement did that were tailor made to annoy other Americans, right? They were inflammatory. You know, so if you are a parent whose kid is in Vietnam fighting and you're scared and worried about the whole situation and then you see young people marching around with a flag and yelling, Ho Chi Minh is going to win, that's, you know, not very helpful.

[Martin DeCaro]

In the spring of 1967, the anti war movement trying to end US involvement in Vietnam's civil war was ready to move from the campuses to the streets of major American cities. There had been a large anti war protest in Washington organized by Students for a democratic society. Two years earlier in April 1965. As many as 25,000 college students and others picketed outside the White House and listened to speeches and folk music at the Washington Monument. But two years later, April 1965, an estimated 400,000 people demonstrated in New York City.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Anti war demonstrators protest US involvement in the Vietnam War in mass marches, rallies and demonstration. Central park is the starting point for the parade to the UN Bill let us save our national honor. Stop the bombing and stop the war. Let us save American lives and Vietnamese lives. Let us take a single instantaneous step to the peace table. Stop the bombing.

[Martin DeCaro]

A few months later, October 1967, 100,000 showed up at the Lincoln Memorial. Another 30,000 at the Pentagon where protesters clashed with police. The so called pentagon riot.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

The two day protest ends with over 600 arrested and the widespread opinion that the demonstration made everyone a loser.

[Martin DeCaro]

Rising public anger was directed at rising US troop levels in far off Vietnam. In the official lies that simply did not square with reality. There was no light at the end of the tunnel.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your president.

[Martin DeCaro]

Vietnam destroyed Lyndon Johnson. His successor Richard Nixon would expand the war to Cambodia, inciting another surge of anti war fury.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Mr. Richard. Mr. President, have you been surprised by the intensity of the protest against your decision to send troops into Cambodia and really protest affect your policy in any way? No, I have not been surprised by the intensity of the protest. I realize that those who are protesting believe that this decision will expand the war, increase American casualties and increase American involvement. And those who protest want peace. They want to reduce American casualties and they want our boys brought home.

[Martin DeCaro]

But as B52s rained hell on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, Nixon did withdraw U.S. ground forces. His Vietnamization plan. The last American combat troops left Vietnam on March 29, 1973.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

We have adopted a plan which we have worked out in cooperation with the South Vietnamese for the complete withdrawal of all US combat ground forces and their replacement by South Vietnamese forces.

[Martin DeCaro]

For a long decade, countless Americans from all walks of life had opposed the war. And the anti war movement, as our guests in this episode will discuss, flowed into other overlapping streams of protest. The civil rights movement, women's liberation, the fight against poverty and class related issues. It permeated culture, the counterculture.

[Paul McBride]

Well, come on all you big strong men. Uncle Sam needs your help again. Got himself in a terrible jam way.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Down yonder in Vietnam.

[Frederick Logeval]

Put down your books and pick up a gun. We're gonna have a whole lot of fun.

[Martin DeCaro]

As many young Americans rebelled against the World War II generation. This is the second episode in a three part series marking the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon, April 1975. In part one, historian Frederick Logeval delved into the origins of Americanization of the Vietnam War and the lessons or warnings about fighting unnecessary wars in countries we don't understand, the difference between core national interests and peripheral ones, and the limits of military power. In this episode we'll ask what did the resistance to the Vietnam War accomplish? Was it persuasive? Do protest movements have to be persuasive to be effective? Historian Carolyn Eisenberg is the author of the Bancroft Prize winning Fire and Nixon Kissinger and the wars in Southeast Asia. She was once involved in the anti war movement starting in October 1963 and as a student at the University of Chicago in the spring of 68, she and her husband went to Wisconsin to campaign for Eugene McCarthy. Paul McBride is Professor Emeritus of History at Ithaca College, where I took his class back in the 1990s. He was an army lieutenant in Vietnam who turned against the war and joined the movement to end it. Our conversation next History is defined by the names that stand the test of time.

[Paul McBride]

Names that inspire, unite and lead.

[Martin DeCaro]

Now it's your turn to create a.

[Paul McBride]

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[Martin DeCaro]

Whether you're running for office, driving change or rallying support, a dot Vote domain.

[Paul McBride]

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[Martin DeCaro]

Those in the history books. Visit GoDaddy.com, type in your name.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Vote and secure a web address that stands out.

[Martin DeCaro]

Claim your place in history with dot vote. Paul McBride, welcome back, my friend.

[Paul McBride]

Thank you very much, Martin. It is good to be here.

[Martin DeCaro]

Yeah, it's been a bit. My loyal, longtime listeners will recall that you were on the program in 2021, 2022. Carolyn Eisenberg, welcome back.

[Frederick Logeval]

Oh, it's a pleasure to be here and wonderful to talk with you.

[Martin DeCaro]

And allow me to say again, congratulations on your Bancroft Prize winning book, Fire and Rain. I continue to think about that book a year after reading it. So first I want to touch on your personal stories. Paul McBride, we'll start with you. You were an army lieutenant before you turned against the war.

[Paul McBride]

Well, indeed I was. In fact, Carol and I did a little bit of searching on the Internet about you and you had given a, an interview where you said that you began your interest in history at Age 4 When your, when your mother used to feed you cereal in the shape of presidents. And you said that in the, in 1948 election, your mother was for Henry Wallace and voted for him. And your father voted for Truman. Well, I come from an entirely different part of the cosmos. I was born and reared in Youngstown, Ohio, which was then a big steel town and heavy into labor because of the steel mills and therefore kind of New Deal CIO Liberal. But although everyone in 1948, I remember it pretty well, I was 8 years old then. Almost everyone was for Harry Truman. But my mom and dad were rock ribbed Republicans, conservative, pro McCarthy. After all, Joseph McCarthy was Irish and Catholic. What else do you need? And so what it tells me is that the anti war movement, which I later got into, had many doors and mine was much, much different than yours. So when I went into the military in 1966, when I active duty through ROTC, I had no particular objections to the war. I was fairly well informed about it, but I wasn't especially excited about the, about the issues. And it wasn't until I got to Vietnam that I began to rapidly turn around because I quickly could see we just didn't seem to have any idea what we were doing there. I was in civil affairs, so that got me into, into some of the political side of the war. And the people that I met there were shockingly disappointing because they didn't seem to know what they were doing either. But what really got me into the anti war movement was Howard Levy, a medical doctor, that when he received his orders to go to Vietnam, he refused to go because he said that it violated his Hippocratic oath and that his trial, they court martialed them, convicted him some to three years and served more than two of it. When I later got out of the military and went to the University of Georgia, there as I went through matriculation for my doctorate, was a big poster of Captain Levy being led out of the court martial trial in handcuffs. And I followed the case very carefully because I knew one of the prosecuting attorneys, Blair Schick, who kept telling me that they should have just gotten him out of the service, given him a general discharge. It was a black mark on the military. And I followed the case. It was an international case. And there was SDS with this poster. The caption was the new mantra for the army, the new army. And it showed Captain Levy in handcuffs. And that got me into sds. So I entered very late having been disillusioned by my experience in Vietnam, and I entered the college scene of anti war protest about five or six years older than all of my undergraduate compatriots.

[Martin DeCaro]

You were in Vietnam in 65?

[Paul McBride]

66.

[Martin DeCaro]

66. All right, so that's one year after LBJ sent in the Marines to Da Nang.

[Paul McBride]

In fact. In fact, my civil affairs unit was attached to the Marine Corps. He sent in the Marines in 65, and they were in charge of I Corps, which was the northernmost section of South Vietnam. And we were attached to the Marine Corps.

[Martin DeCaro]

Carolyn, you were involved earlier.

[Frederick Logeval]

I definitely wasn't fighting in Vietnam. He was in the. Began being involved in the anti war movement when it was like 20 people, which was in the fall of 1963, when Madame Nhu, so many of your listeners wouldn't even know who she exactly is, but she was the wife of President's brother in law, South Vietnam. In South Vietnam, she had become famously obnoxious because when Buddhist monks immolated themselves, you know, in the center of Saigon, she said every time one of these people barbecued themselves, she clapped. So that sentence kept, you know, getting repeated. By the time she's in the U.S. she made an American tour. One of the reasons I even, like paid any attention to this at all was that a professor of mine at the University of Chicago, Hans Morgenthau, was already against the war. He brought Matt Anew's father to campus. He was the Vietnamese ambassador to the UN and he came and spoke on my campus in 1963 and denounced the regime and explained why he thought it was terrible and he was quitting his ambassador and also how embarrassed he was about his daughter, which I remember him saying, she was such a nice little girl. I don't know. She's turned into this person. So some combination of Morgenthau and the Vietnamese ambassador, like, got me to pay some attention to what was happening.

[Martin DeCaro]

There was no peace movement really then. It was the inklings of it. 63. Right.

[Frederick Logeval]

I was with 25 people outside the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago who were picketing Madame Nu. So that gives you this idea about size. Very little.

[Paul McBride]

63 is still the 50s, right?

[Frederick Logeval]

Right.

[Martin DeCaro]

Madame Nhu visited in October, the month before the coup d'toppol.

[Frederick Logeval]

It hasn't happened yet.

[Martin DeCaro]

Yeah, Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Nhu. Madame Nu, as you mentioned, was mocking the Buddhists. And that was the beginning of the end, really, for Diem in the summer of 63, when the country, South Vietnam, was falling apart in the crackdown on the Buddhists. So I want to move on now to where we saw the anti war movement coalesce. But, Paul, I do have another question for you. I do want you to share an anecdote that you've shared with me in the Past about what helped turn you against the war while you were in Vietnam. Your commander, General Walt, he was one of the most decorated, influential military commanders of that whole mid century period. And he gave you a presentation in Vietnam. This was really amazing.

[Paul McBride]

We arrived there in 1966. We started out at Cameron Bay, which is the Saigon port, and then made our way up to Da Nang, which was his headquart and Ang East. And as soon as we arrived, we had this briefing from General Walt. And by the way, you had sent me his Wikipedia article. This man was a. A deservedly hallowed figure in the military. He served in World War II and Korea and he was truly a war hero. And I'm not trying to cast aspersions on him, but when we met him, that is our entire civil affairs unit, he gave us a personal briefing on what we were doing in Vietnam. And it included a map that I've seen many times since of the Red Tide moving from. From the Soviet Union across Eastern Europe and on its way to Western Europe. All of us were college graduates and, and of course the scholarship of the Cold War by this time, by 66 was rapidly turning around. And so his briefing was an insult to us. And we talked about us junior officers A later, we were shocked by the lack of sophistication of what he was telling us. And that was the first hint, the very first day I was there, the first hint that, whoa, we didn't seem to know what we were doing. We were fighting a war based on a mythology. Euro Communism was being torn apart and looked at very carefully by the scholars and so on. So none of this made sense. And this was coming from the commander of the Marines in Vietnam. That was a shock.

[Martin DeCaro]

Showing you a map with the Kami zone and here it comes.

[Paul McBride]

That's right. The Red Tide was coming across Europe.

[Frederick Logeval]

Yeah, well, if you were a little younger, I think we have a slight age difference, you would have been encountering that in elementary school where they, the weekly readers that we got, you know, had these maps of the Red Tide.

[Paul McBride]

Yes.

[Frederick Logeval]

And the free world and the Red Tide. And you know, that was kind of drummed into us, you know, from the time we were very little, was that this was, this is what we were facing in the world especially.

[Paul McBride]

You went through a Catholic school, by the way, because every, every day we. We prayed for the conversion of Russia.

[Martin DeCaro]

I kid you not, right now I'm laughing, but it's crazy. Well, it eventually happened in 1991. So when we look back to the opposition to the war in Vietnam, where did it begin? How did it begin? How did it gain momentum? Was it from the media first? Did the news media lead or was it Congress or was it Carolyn Eisenberg, the campuses?

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, I think that the anti war movement got hatched in the campuses. I mean that, that was really the location of that early dissent. And I don't think it really spreads beyond the campuses. Probably as of 1965. Right. And even then it's mostly a student driven movement. I would say by the time you get to 1966, 67, a lot of other Americans in different walk of life had begun to protest. You know, that was actually a change. You know, by the time that it got to the fall of 67 and the big Pentagon march that there was, and your listeners may not be familiar with it, that march to the Pentagon, you had a countercultural aspect to it because the organizers said that we were going to go to the Pentagon and we were going to levitate it by, you know, hummingbirds. So, you know, it was kind of a put on. But by the time you got to that level in 67 at the Pentagon, you had a lot of other groups of people. You have lawyers, anti war lawyers, you have anti war business executives, you know, that were there. You have women's strike for peace at that point. So, you know, now it's gone really beyond the campus. Probably the exact plan to levitate the Pentagon, some of the older people had probably left and did not participate. But you had, you know, thousands of people surrounding the Pentagon humming. And of course the Pentagon didn't really lift off the ground as had been promised.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Demonstrators opposed to the Vietnam War assembled in the nation's capital for a mass protest. For the most part, orderly minor scuffles did occur between the demonstrators and hecklers. A three hour parade takes the demonstrators across the Potomac on their way to the Pentagon. The crowd, estimated at about 50,000 persons, was a loose confederation of some one hundred and fifty groups and included adults, students, even children. It is at the Pentagon where the first test of strength comes.

[Frederick Logeval]

This was really the anti war movement broadening out, you know, having a much wider range of people that were participating. So and then when you get to 1968, of course, then it's, you know, the dissent is very widespread in the United States.

[Paul McBride]

I certainly agree with that analysis that the campuses were the start of it. I would go back a little bit further. I can recall this doesn't seem related, but I think it is. As a young kid, my mom and dad and I every Saturday watched your hit Parade. And so we all listened to the same music. How much is that doggy in the window? Yeah. And by the time I started high school in 1954, along comes Bill Haley and the Comets and Rock around the clock. And that was a moment. I didn't realize it then. But from that point on, young people went one direction and their parents stayed where they were. And so by the time of the 60s, youth had developed its own culture, its own music, its own language. And when the Port Huron State when came out in 62, it was a message to the young people of America, stop being brainwashed. To hell with this Cold War mentality. It's dividing the world and creating terrible dangers of atomic bombs and so on. And so by the time the war came along as the captivating issue, in addition to civil rights, by the way, it seems to me that the youth was really primed to march off in its own direction.

[Frederick Logeval]

I really agree with Paul that you have a number of different streams that are building an anti war movement. And so there is this countercultural scheme. And you know, in that time, you know, the Beatles become, you know, very major. And again they are just by their essence, you know, kind of anti authoritarian. So you have a counter culture. And then I would also really emphasize, and we talk about this in my classes, that is the role of civil rights movement. Because what sometimes gets forgotten because so much focus is on Martin Luther King, is that the civil rights movement in the south was really young black students, black college students, black high school students that were doing a lot of the most dramatic things. If you are a white student in the north, you have already, by 63 and 64, you have actually a model of young people who are really on the move and who are really making important changes. You also have some amount of white students who go south, you know, who work in, in Alabama, they work in Mississippi, and that's a very important experience for them. They bring that back to the campuses. So you have a number of different streams.

[Paul McBride]

As the anti war movement got moving, we white middle class kids began to understand that African Americans were not the only ones being oppressed by American government.

[Frederick Logeval]

Right.

[Paul McBride]

I can still recall an article I came across in, in Ramparts magazine, which was kind of a bible of, of ours back then.

[Frederick Logeval]

Right.

[Paul McBride]

General Hershey, who was in charge of the draft, had put out a directive. It was called channeling. Channeling. And the idea was that the draft was a very important instrument in social challenging because people who were faced with college education understood that as they enter that stage of their lives. They had a number of different ways they could go. But what the draft did was make them choose those kinds of options that would keep them away from going to Vietnam. And so the draft was a very important instrument in social control. Then we learned that Prager Press was being subsidized and used by the CIA for publication of books that we all thought were independent scholars. And then we saw that the ida, the Institute for Defense Analysis, was deeply involved in our universities, even involved in determining whether certain deans had to be cleared, top secret cleared, because they had faculty that were working on top secret projects. And so it was over and over again that the anti war movement began to give us an entirely different picture of the relationship between our citizenry and our government.

[Martin DeCaro]

There was a lot of resistance to the First World War. But it sounds like what you're saying here in the 1960s, after the very. How should I put it, stayed 1950s in the 1960s. This is the first time an entire generation. Well, I shouldn't say an entire. A large part of a generation is saying the government is lying to us.

[Frederick Logeval]

Yes, but I think also that there's so many aspects of, you know, what about Vietnam made people upset? A lot of different things. Right.

[Martin DeCaro]

That was going to be my next question. You're channeling me, Carolyn. Yes.

[Frederick Logeval]

Among the things that were relevant back then, a growing sense that the people in charge actually didn't know what they were doing. You know, so that has the kind of generational thing, anti authority thing. But it isn't just that. It just becomes over time. You know, you're listening to Robert McNamara. How many times are you listening to Robert McNamara, who has that clipped way of talking as if he knows everything. And at some point you begin to think he doesn't even know what he's talking about.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

I believe I'm correct in saying that.

[Paul McBride]

In the past four and a half.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Years, the Viet Cong, the Communists, have.

[Paul McBride]

Lost 89,000 men killed in South Vietnam.

[Frederick Logeval]

Then you have Lyndon Johnson, who is, you know, expressing these sort of the same ideals that Paul was talking about earlier, this very simplified idea of the Cold War. A certain point with him, also you sort of a combination, the guy's lying, but also he actually doesn't know what he's doing. The sense of incompetence at the top, which then ramifies, you know, to some extent, people start feeling that way about their professors and their parents. The sense of that they don't know what they're doing, you know, gets bigger.

[Martin DeCaro]

And bigger, a disconnect between what you're seeing with your own eyes and what the government is telling you. And TV has a huge role here. When the networks were in Vietnam and they started to show things like villages being burned down, the old and the very young. The Marines have burned this old couple's.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Cottage because fire was coming from here. Now when you walk into the village, you see no young people at all.

[Frederick Logeval]

They were. Although, you know, one of the things I think in retrospect is the news media didn't show as much as we imagine, you know, that the way it gets described is, oh, you know, the press inundated us with images of the war that actually didn't really happen until very late. But I think the important point is that it did a little bit. In other words, you're a reader of the New York Times. You would begin to have a sense of what was going on in Vietnam. It didn't take a lot to make people realize the brutality and cruelty of the war and why are we there, you know, all that. So you didn't need massive coverage in order for that to happen. The television station wasn't daily inundating us with information, but whatever they did really was enough to shake the model. One of the things that I've been very struck with is with regard to Gaza and what's happening in Gaza, any person who cares to look is getting, on an almost daily basis, information, pictures, whatever, about the fact that people are just being massacred in Gaza with American weapons. You're inundated with it way beyond anything in the war. And there I think the question is really, you're inundated, and why is that not producing more dissent than it is? But I think it's important to have that comparative perspective.

[Martin DeCaro]

That's a good point. So, Paul, I have a question for you and Carolyn. You can weigh in on this as well as a historian friend of mine who listens to the show likes to remind me, protesting is fine, but it has to be tied to or generate a political project because that's how you get change. And we're talking about a long period of time here. The Vietnam War lasted a very long time. And maybe in retrospect we can say the anti war movement had a good deal to do with its conclusion. But probably at the time you're wondering, how the hell much longer did this war have to go on? So may sound like an obvious question, Paul, but what was the political project? Was it as simple as end the war? We are here to end the war. End US Involvement in the war.

[Paul McBride]

That's a really complicated question because obviously the big obstacle to that, when our movement started to really take off was that Lyndon Baines Johnson was extremely powerful and probably the most adept politician we had had in much of the 20th century. So he was able to have gotten through a wide range of legislative victories that was almost mind boggling to keep track of. So when I got into the military and I, I started in 65 and I listened to Lyndon Bain Johnson speak on behalf of the Voting Rights act and end his speech with the words we shall overcome, I would have, I would have followed him anywhere.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

But really it's all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.

[Paul McBride]

It took a long time to realize that if we're going to move on this war, we've got to get rid of him. And that seemed to be an absolutely herculean task. You know, those of us who lived through it remember how absolutely stunned we were when he announced he wasn't going.

[Martin DeCaro]

To run for reelection March 31, 1968. So was that the anti war, was that the anti war movements doing?

[Frederick Logeval]

If I could just come in on that because I worked in the McCarthy campaign and was actually in Wisconsin just before the primary, was actually in Wisconsin when he announced. So I want to speak to that. This is one clear case where political opposition really mattered. Now it was expected that Johnson was going to win, you know, get the nomination. That was going to be it. Nixon was clearly going to be the nominee on the other side. So that was the way it was. Then the TED offensive happened in 1968, where despite the fact that we were at the light of the end of the tunnel, actually we weren't. And there's uprisings across South Vietnam which really damaged Johnson. But the other piece, and I actually think this is pretty important, was the candidacy of Gene McCarthy. The anti war movement was looking around for somebody to challenge Johnson. Bobby Kennedy of course wanted to be the President. He just thought it was too risky at first. So Gene McCarthy, who nobody knew, comes into the race, he sought to have no chance. And then he just about. You have young people pouring into New Hampshire to clean for Gene, which meant you cut your hair, you shaved your beard, you know, you look like a normal human being. If you were a young woman, you wore a skirt, you went knocked on doors for weeks and weeks and you've had thousands of kids doing that. And in the end he, I mean Johnson squeezed through in New Hampshire, but it showed very dramatically how vulnerable he was. And then Bobby Kennedy comes into the race, he is too late for the Wisconsin primary. So again in Wisconsin, we were in, my husband and I were, and our friends were in Milwaukee. You cannot even imagine the number of college students that are streaming into the state. People just open their homes because, you know, all these young people are arriving with sleeping bags. Nobody has a place to actually stay. So you have all these kids all across the state, plus from the university going and canvassing for Jim McCarthy. And what I want to say is it was so clear if you were there that Johnson was going to lose. And you could see that not just for the number of students, but as you're going door to door with pre mainstream people, they're now disgusted with the war. So what Johnson's aides were telling him was, you're going to lose in Wisconsin. So when he gives that speech, remember, it's a speech in which what he does is he talks first of all about changing the policy, right, because he's now going to really try to get negotiations which he hadn't really done. He's going to stop most of the bombing over North Vietnam. Those are important changes in U.S. policy.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

Thus, there will be no attacks around the principal populated areas or in the food process producing areas of North Vietnam. Even this very limited bombing of the north could come to an early end if our restraint is matched by restraint in Hanoi.

[Frederick Logeval]

And then that surprise thing at the end about that he was leaving the election, you know, and he was not going to run for President. People were totally stunned.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

I do not believe that I should devote an hour or a day of my time to any personal partisan causes or to any duties other than the awesome duties of this office, the presidency of your country. Accordingly, I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your President.

[Frederick Logeval]

I can tell you of all the times in the anti war movement, this was the most euphoric moment I can remember. This family had taken in like eight of us. We have sleeping bags on their floor, we're all watching television. Everybody starts screaming, went down to McCarthy headquarters, places some pandemonium. I mean, it's actually the one moment where you actually felt that you could see some relationship with what you did and what the outcome is. And sometimes we forget the importance of that because we remember that Hubert Humphrey became the nominee and it was Nixon, he won. All that stuff was true. But in actuality, the policy was changing because of that electoral effort, even though the effort itself was not a success. I really want to emphasize that as an Ongoing. That a lot of things that look like failures weren't and were actually impacting our policy more in Nixon. But that was the moment, but the.

[Martin DeCaro]

Success, if you will, of getting rid of lbj. Well, then you get Nixon, who hated you and escalated the war.

[Frederick Logeval]

I don't think that Nixon did escalate the war. I mean, that's what's said, but I actually don't think it's accurate. We could come back to that, but I think that's actually a misconception that the changes that had begun under Johnson were meaningful changes. It doesn't mean that U.S. policy then became wonderful in January 1969. Why would I have written my book? But it was a case that the policy was changing. So we can talk about that a little bit later about.

[Martin DeCaro]

We can talk about it now. I want to hear Paul's view on this as well.

[Frederick Logeval]

Yeah, go ahead, Paul.

[Paul McBride]

Yeah. Well, first of all, I think that you're absolutely right about the impact of Eugene McCarthy. But I would add that I think that what gave people like McCarthy the idea that it was sensible to come in against Lyndon Baines Johnson was the growing power of the movement. By 1968, the crowds were massive when demonstrations were held. I'm fairly convinced that the anti war movement was really indispensable in turning America's attitudes toward the war around and giving space for politicians who were worried, of course, about fundraising and getting reelected, the courage to really jump in. But I can't see that happening if there had not been the massive anti war movement that was created, beginning from the campuses and then, as you put it pointed out, Carolyn, spreading to other parts of American society.

[Frederick Logeval]

But I think, you know, it is relevant, you know, just to come back to Martin's question originally, when all of this organizing ended up, you know, giving us Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey, that was very demoralizing. And there was a feeling that we had failed. Right. In general, I would say when I look at the whole Nixon period, there were lots of things and efforts that were undertaken, and probably after they're all over, there's a feeling that we had failed about a lot of things. I mean, that was one thing that was just so interesting. Doing my research was like realizing how many things were not failures, but we didn't really see that at the time. And going back to Paul's point, one of the other things that's a result of that electoral challenge in 68 is you have now many more U.S. senators and members of the House of Representatives who are now coming out as anti War people. But you've got now a whole new generation of politicians coming into Congress now who have identified with the anti war movement rather than the pro war movements. It's really important, for it seems now.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

More certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy and did the best they could.

[Martin DeCaro]

So about Nixon and the escalation and your point, Carolyn, about what we thought didn't work in retrospect, now that we know amor the documentation records your scholarship, but the war did continue. There were 16,000Americans casualties in 1968, that's Johnson's last year, 11,000 casualties in 1969. But then they drop a lot in 1970 to 6,000 because Nixon was withdrawing U.S. forces. So maybe it was wrong for me to say he escalated the war, but the air campaign which you cover in your book Fire and Rain, I mean, that was ferocious. And there's also the issue of what were Nixon and Kissinger doing? Was it in response only to the anti war movement or was it to the realities on the battlefield and their decent interval of prolonging the war to the point where it wouldn't hurt them in the 1972 election? Right. So there's a lot of layers to this.

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, right. And there's a lot of aspects to what you just said. There are a lot of different pieces to talk about your point about. Well, the war did continue for four more years. Right. Which is why people would say, well, we really weren't that successful. But now one effect of being plunged into the declassified documents, which by the way is like, so such vast amounts of material have been released. It's just kind of mind blowing is one of the effects I think it has is that if you're reading these things, what you realize is how much worse things would have been if you didn't have an anti war movement. I mean that's really. So I think some of my sense of we're more successful than we thought is coming because of how many things they would have preferred to do but actually really couldn't in that context. Just start with the last point you made, Martin, which Nixon withdrawing the troops was a really big deal. And I could tell you, being in the anti war movement, every time he announced that he was going to bring out another 30,000 or 40,000 troops, whatever, anyone I knew who was active Said, this is another one of his trips. He's tricking the American public again. He's really escalating, but he's deceiving us. In actuality, he took the troops out, which, by the way, Hemney Kissinger never wanted to do. Nixon and Kissinger are quite different. Kissinger never wants to take out troops until he can get a better deal. But Nixon is doing that and he's doing it because of the political realities and it did make a difference. And one of the things that I think just to come to the end of this in a way, you know, that again was something we didn't appreciate back then, is by the time you're In November of 1972, there were really no combat troops left in Vietnam. That's like very real. And I remember people always saying George McGovern was the peace candidate. He did terribly. People said, oh, the American people are so dumb and stupid and blah, blah, blah. It's not true. Nixon brought half a million troops home. And one of the things I think the Neanderthal movement, we didn't really appreciate is what it meant to people that their sons had come home, they're out of Vietnam, that there are towns across this country that had young people over there and they're terrified for those young people and then they're out. Would it have been better if they all came out in 1969? Yes, but what I am saying is this whole end game would not have been what it is if you didn't have that opposition.

[Paul McBride]

Paul, that raises an interesting question as to whether with those large numbers of American troops coming home, whether that in itself was a beginning of the weakening of the anti war movement, of the troops coming home. Yes. Because, you know, you, you were saying, and I think you're absolutely right, this affected a lot of people directly. That, I mean, is your uncle, it's your cousin, it's your husband. That would have a mollifying effect to where, you know, we are getting out, Johnny's back. That is that that cohort that might have been an active part of the anti war movement would be disinclined to take that step when Johnny is back home again. But I don't know.

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, that might be a fair point, I think, probably in saying that you're thinking about people not on the campuses but off.

[Paul McBride]

Oh, yes. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

[Frederick Logeval]

And of course, probably the largest gathering of people and protests was really 1970, you know, with the invasion of Cambodia. At that point, the anti war movement is actually quite vigorous. And at some point, my experience as an activist and my experience as a scholar diverge a little bit in terms of what you're seeing. I think that in the spring of 1972, after there is a North Vietnamese offensive that takes place, there's a lot of activity on the campuses right then that the protest is still pretty strong about that bombing. I'm not talking about the Christmas bombing, talking about the spring of 72, when the US accelerates what it's doing at that point. But I think you're right that the ability of the anti war movement to keep spreading, which I would say is the case up until Cambodia, that its ability to spread starts to be reduced.

[Martin DeCaro]

Well, I said escalation before, but yeah, broadening the war. When Nixon invaded Cambodia, well, first there was the secret bombing. He did not inform Congress. It wasn't a secret to the people who were being bombed. And then the land invasion of Cambodia, which was a fiasco. Right.

[Paul McBride]

One of the reasons that the campuses remain a separate part of American life throughout this whole period is that as the war continued, there was no way to get away from it on the campuses. I was a grad assistant at the University of Georgia, a teaching assistant, and I was unable to escape the war because I realized if I gave a kid a bad grade and caused him to have to leave school, I could be sending him to Vietnam. It meant that in my grading policy, I had to be aware that my students were vulnerable to this terrible monster that kept growing all around us. And in addition, we began to find out about cointelpro and we had FBI agents watching us all the time. And we thought that we went into about professional advice. We might really be talking to a recruiter for the CIA or the nsa. So. So all I'm saying is that the campuses were in the drumbeat all the time. They were particularly ground zero in how Vietnam and the anti war movement affected you.

[Martin DeCaro]

Personally, I have a question about the intensity of the movement, because all protest movements have an ebb and a flow. You know, when we watch documentaries, or at least when I watch documentaries about Vietnam, you get the impression that every day massive demonstrations and protests and actually do want to ask you about different forms of protest and resistance. It wasn't just filling the streets with slogans and signs. Right. But Carolyn, you mentioned Tet. You know, that led to an upsurge in protest because it showed us that the government had been lying. And then the Cambodia invasion, that also infuriated the movement. Was there an ebb and flow to this over this long decade from 65 to 75.

[Frederick Logeval]

I would say, first of all, the ebb and flow is a little bit seasonal. In other words, it tended to ebb when the weather was cold and to flow when weather, when the sun was out. I mean, that's not, you know, a small factor in terms of what, what really emerges. I wanted to just say one more thing about 1972 and the spring, because again, there's a kind of mythology about that, that that's the anti war movement is dead or dying or something. But in actuality, when Nixon started to bomb North Vietnamese cities, which, and you could say that was an escalation, the protest level was very high. So by the time 1972 happened, I was actually by then a professor at Dartmouth College. There was massive protests there, including, we had faculty civil disobedience. We blocked a draft bus, and you have like 20 faculty getting arrested. But just to put it in a wider context and compare it to today, one of the things that's interesting, which I discovered in the files, is in the spring of 72, when you've got this bombing and, you know, protests on the campuses, all of the Ivy League presidents go to Washington and demand to see Nixon. Eventually, Nixon hates them, so he doesn't want to see them. But they meet with Henry Kissinger. And I had the minutes of that. And basically what they're saying to Henry Kissinger is, you know what? This policy is ruining our university and it's over. There's nothing more to be accomplished. Why don't you people stop this now? It's enough. And then these Ivy League presidents go to Capitol Hill and make contact with their congresspeople and tell them that as educators, they feel that what the government is doing is destabilizing their educational institutions. So I'm using that as an example of a late phase of that. And of course, it's on my mind right now because the conscience to the present is like, right. I mean, you know, finally they're taking a stand. But, you know, you've seen Harvard and Columbia officials handling things in quite a different way. But my point, Martin, is that. So here we are, we're in the spring of 72, and you've still got a pretty, you know, strong anti war thing going on in the campuses. I mean, that's very clear.

[Paul McBride]

Of course there was ebb and flow. But I. I was at the University of Georgia, which is a conservative institution. When started there in 1966, 67, there was still a dress code for girls, female students. The campus was exploding with all kinds of issues. SDS was was scoffed at by the student newspaper, the Red and Black. When I got there, I wrote because I had seen this poster and made some friends in the sds. I wrote a strong defensive SDS and received a. A scathing attack by a professor of law at the University of Georgia who was a former JAG officer and ended up doing a major debate with him on ROTC on campus. All I'm saying is that it was in utter turmoil in the 1960s and that ebb and flow which was certainly happening didn't affect us when we had these interminable meetings all the time. Sds. We met at the Methodist Chaplains Church, by the way. That's another issue. We probably ought to at least mention the real importance of the religious leaders coming out and taking a stand against the war. That's an important component because that raised the entire moral issue that your book does not let go of. Carolyn, on Vietnam.

[Martin DeCaro]

Well, the anti war movement was diverse. Even if people weren't hippies or joining the street marches, people found different ways to protest. Writing letters, silent vigils, simply being disgusted with the course of events and voting differently. But Paul, I have a question for you because this will tie into what's going on today and that is how the public at large perceives anti war protesters. You mentioned that debate that you got into. You told me about this once. This caused tension within your own family. And of course we know there are plenty of Americans who supported the US war in Vietnam and did not like anti war protests. And there are people today who are angrier at what the students are saying about Israel on the campuses than what's actually happening in Gaza. The mangled corpses of Palestinian children that I see every single day. So maybe you can address that, how you were received by the greater public. Maybe even people who didn't really like the war, but they didn't like these protesters.

[Paul McBride]

Well, you know, the mid-60s is only 20 years after the end of World War II. And so our my parents generation, my dad was drafted into the military. He would have gone into World War II, but he came down with rheumatic fever and had to be released on a medical deferment. But in any case, that meant that as the anti war movement movement began to directly confront the government, it was confronting the government that our parents died for and sacrificed for for just a blink ago. That created a generation gap that I think is unprecedented in American history. And I've done a lot of work on this. I would love to see a book just on that generation gap because When I got active in the anti war movement, my mom and dad became so alarmed that they flew down to the University of Georgia and my dad wanted me to write a letter of apology to the president of. By this time, I was president of SDS for one month. One month because we had to rotate it just in case we had any mad men who wanted to grab power. But anyway, my mom and dad came down to plead with me. My dad wanted me to apologize to the president because. And my mom saw this, the written black, which was about my debate with this colonel. She saw it and she looked, she said, oh, you can't talk to a colonel like that. So the gap was not just music and how much is that doggie in the window? The gap between the World War II generation and our generation was different parts of the universe.

[Martin DeCaro]

And Carolyn, I'd like to hear what you think about this too. I mean, some members of the anti war movement were romanticizing the Viet Cong and Ho Chi Minh, just like you hear this today. Oh, I saw Hamas flags. Well, the same kind of thing happened in the 1960s and 70s during Vietnam, although I would not know how often that was the case.

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, and of course those things were picked up by the media and, you know, repeated. There were two things. I, I think part of the, for the part of the movement that's chanting Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh is going to win, there's a combination of actual knowledge and also rage. When I'm saying actual knowledge is that you went start to learn about Vietnam, which many on the campuses people actually read books and you know, got acquainted. You actually did get a picture of Ho Chi Minh that was, you know, in many ways he was a heroic figure. He had a nationalist and he was, had led the opposition to the French.

[Martin DeCaro]

He cited the words of Thomas Jefferson in 1945 in Hanoi. But go ahead.

[Frederick Logeval]

No, wait. I mean, in other words, so that if you learned about Ho Chi Minh, it turned out he was actually kind of different than the way he was being portrayed, you know, with the red maps. That even focusing on Ho Chi Minh has a certain, had a particular edge to it. On the one hand, it's obviously anti authority, you know, it's expressive of rage. But it also is expressing the fact that people start learning about what's happening, happening in Vietnam and knowing actual things or facts. It's quite different from the portrayal. So there's also at some point a lot of annoyance by people on campuses who are reading books about why are we being brainwashed this way? Why are we being Taught to hate Ho Chi Minh when really his main thing is to get free of France. And also he in fact wanted to work with the Americans in 1945. So that's kind, kind of underpinning it. But you know, in terms of how that connects to your general question, Martin, I think, you know, there were things that people in the anti war movement did that were tailor made to annoy other Americans. Right. That they were inflammatory. You know, so if you are a parent whose kid is in Vietnam fighting and you're scared and worried about the whole situation and then you see young people marching around with a flag and yelling Ho Chi Minh is going to win, that's not very helpful. Right. And turns people off. But I think sometimes those episodes are a little bit exaggerated even back then about the overall tenor of things. One last thing just on the protest issue is in 1969 you have the moratorium day. And as you mentioned to me earlier, there's actually a very good documentary about that, the movement and the madman. And it's talking about November of 69 when there's this massive thing. And that is a very interesting outbreak to look at because here was a time in that particular event where anti war organizers were emphasizing doing small scale things in many places, taking steps that would be relatable that Americans who were not professional protesters could see this activity and be a part of it. And that was brilliant and it was very, very successful. And it allowed anti war sentiment to really emerge in all kinds of places. And I actually think it's kind of unfortunate that the anti war movement itself didn't follow some of the lessons of that and really try to emphasize the patriotism of what we were doing, not the hostility.

[Martin DeCaro]

And that documentary is available on pbs. Carolyn Eisenberg, you are in it. You weren't promoting yourself, but I'll promote you here. Paul McBride, when you look at let's say the anti war movement today, well, where is the anti war look left. Let's just talk about then the campuses today in opposition to Israel's destruction of Gaza. What are the protesters doing wrong in your view?

[Paul McBride]

The most important difference, it seems to me, is that those who were protesting the terrible destruction and murder that's going on in Gaza are vulnerable to those who want to manipulate the argument, vulnerable to the charge of anti Semitism. And we have a president who knows that very well. And I don't think he gives one hoot about anti Semitism in America, but he understands that the universities are centers of opposition to him. And this isn't A perfect wedge to go after them. And that's exactly what he's doing. The difference between then and now. And boy, I was intrigued by your thing about the Ivy League presidents demanding a meeting. I didn't know any. That's fascinating.

[Frederick Logeval]

I didn't know it either until I was reading.

[Paul McBride]

And that suggests how powerful the universities were then as institutions. Since then, we have had an erosion of the very concept of university education. I've been following this because I get so disgusted with another article on what major you should take if you want to make a lot of money. Money, the idea of the importance of education to be educated, it's been lost. What has happened is that as a power center in American society, universities have been falling down for a long time. And the result is what happened with Columbia just recently, thank goodness, Harvard, because its faculty and his AAUP unit were already preparing a lawsuit lawsuit on their own if their administration didn't get off the rear ends. Harvard finally decided, because Trump really overplayed his hands, he wants to take charge of the whole place. They finally decided to stand up. And that MEANT the Big Ten man, Ohio State, during the McCarthy period, helped McCarthy fire people. But the Big Ten now has created a kind of a coalition to help each other to defend against Trump. We may be seeing the beginnings of the. The re emergence of universities. I certainly hope so. But we are in a teetering moment right now.

[Martin DeCaro]

Carolyn, Protest doesn't bother me. What bothers me is the war. And while there's nothing wrong with raising public awareness, raising public consciousness about something that's happening, I think ultimately protesters do have to be persuasive and do have to have some political project. Right. To affect change, as you did way back when. Where do you think protesters today, if anywhere, are going wrong?

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, I'm not so convinced they are going wrong. I think what we have now is something that really didn't happen quite in Vietnam, which again, is AIPAC and lobbying organizations that are really making a fake argument about antisemitism as a strategy for quashing dissent. Yes, of course. During the Vietnam War, you know, as Paul was talking about, there were lots of people that had kids over there and they were pro war and so forth. But it's different from aipac. It's different from having our lobbies that are really out there around the clock making trouble and scaring people. Anti Defamation League has gone like, full. They're like full throttle.

[Martin DeCaro]

Not credible anymore. In my view, view what they say.

[Frederick Logeval]

They'Re not credible, but. And they just put out A thing the other day, about 1400 episodes of Anti Semitism, like in a month. But the little trick here is what they're doing is they're defining anti Semitism in a way that everything's anti Semitic. You know, once upon a time in New Jersey, we had an anti Semitic neighbor and he get drunk on the porch and they say he hates Jews and he had a secret plan to kill my brother. And that was really anti Semitic. But what these people have done, you know, is they've said, if you criticize Israel, it's anti Semitic. Right. Anything that you, if you even say anything bad about Netanyahu, that, that can get caused as anti Semitic. Certainly if you think that the idea that, that Israel must be a Jewish state, if you object to that, you must be anti Semitic. So you've created all of this and then you've also telling kids, kids telling Jewish kids in college, oh, this is really dangerous. You need to be on the lookout for antisemitism. So then kids get hysterical and they say they don't feel safe, you know, and then you have a whole blow up about really about nothing. I'm not saying that there's no anti Semitism, but I probably would also say that whether it's on my own campus where I know those students who are great or terrific kids, I'm very sensible, you know, to the fact that I've been in tons of demonstrations. I have not encountered antisemitism, Semitism in those things. I'm not saying that that represents the whole. But I think this issue is being manipulated to make it difficult for people to talk about the fact that Israel is massacring people with weapons that we as taxpayers are paying. And in some ways that is a simpler situation than what was going on in Vietnam. And it is stunning that to this day it is continuing with no, no food or water or medical care, even now being allowed to get into Gaza.

[Martin DeCaro]

It's not about trying to get 500,000 troops out of Gaza. It's about stop sending Israel munitions that they're using to destroy the Gaza Strip. Paul McBride, final thought.

[Paul McBride]

One of the things that has been so dramatic, it seems to me, on the topic that we're talking about right now, is that political opposition was successful enforcing two Ivy League presidents to step down.

[Frederick Logeval]

Right.

[Paul McBride]

And that is. Exclamation point, exclamation point. When has that ever happened? During the Vietnam War, as you pointed out, Ivy League presidents felt themselves authoritative enough that they could demand a meeting with the president. And they met with Henry Kissinger. Can you imagine that happening today? Trying to get into. To see. I don't even know who's in charge in the White House, but certainly the madman is. So we are in an entirely different kind of moment. But it seems to me it's very encouraging to see the emergence of popular unrest and direct action being taken. My wife and I were part of the protest two weeks ago. And here in Durham, North Carolina, we had over a thousand people really angry and disappointed, some depressed, but energized. We got to stop this man. By the way, my own opinion is I don't think we have two years to wait for the 26 election. By that time, this guy will have in charge, will have his hands on all the sinews of power. The opposition right now is absolutely critical.

[Martin DeCaro]

I walked through a protest on my way downtown on Saturday, went for a long walk. I saw it near the White House, and I could tell that many of the people who were there because of their signs were federal workers who had lost their jobs. And they're understandably angry. So now they're part of the movement.

[Frederick Logeval]

Well, I think that we have our work cut out for us. My big concern right now is, I mean, the students who are protesting US Policy towards the Middle east are young people who are informing themselves about the issue. I think, frankly, at my university, as I'm looking around, the students have no idea about the gravity of what's taking place. Right. I mean, the federal government is literally being dismantled in front of us. It's not a hidden fact. You can see it every day. The question is, is it going to be possible to stop what Donald Trump is really trying to do? And not just Donald Trump, but the whole right wing and the heritage people and so forth, can that be stopped? And as of this moment, I actually think young people, for the most part, are silent and that one of the big challenges is will they wake up and notice that everything useful that the federal government does is being destroyed every single day, every single hour. So the work is cut out for us. Whether we'll be successful, you know, remains to be seen. That'll be the future.

[Carolyn Eisenberg]

As I have walked among the desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But they ask, and rightly so, what about Vietnam? They ask if our own nation wasn't using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence, violence in the world today, my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent now. It should be incandescently clear that no one who has any concern for the integrity and life of America today can ignore the present war if America's soul becomes totally poisoned. Part of the autopsy must read Vietnam.

[Martin DeCaro]

On the next episode of History as it happens, the third part of this series, Defeat in Vietnam Consequences with Jeremy Suri and Jeffrey Engel. Remember new episodes every Tuesday and Friday, available wherever you find your podcasts and my newsletter comes out every Friday. Sign [e-mail].