The Vietnam War In America During The 1960's

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The 1960’s was a decade of wars, Civil Right protests, assassinations of significant and public figures, and the first man on the moon for America. The Vietnam War, in particular, was a huge issue both outside the country and inside the country. Nowadays people believe the only war during this time was the one over in Vietnam but another significant war was taking place inside America. The Vietnam War practically split America into two different groups: the war supporters and the anti-war protesters. Many protesters were enraged that the Vietnam War was causing so much death and destruction. Also, many celebrities and artist protested against the war that influenced the growth of even more protesters. A very important musical artist that …show more content…

According to sources, “Vietnam was split by international agreement between North and South, with communists occupying the north, and nationalist forces, supported by France and the United States and led by Ngo Dinh Diem, occupying the south” (“The 1960s: Vietnam War”). Northern Vietnam wanted to spread communism to the South and the US and France fought to stop communism. The war lasted about 20 years ending in April of 1975. The battles fought in the war were very graphic resulting in thousands of lives lost. In this document, it explains that “Many thousands of civilians were killed during the North Vietnamese occupation of Hue, and the battle to retake Hue was the bloodiest single battle of the Vietnamese War”(“The 1960s: Vietnam War”). Just in a single battle thousands of people died and that number is several times larger in regards to injury. The overall result of the war was catastrophic. According to this report, the war “killed more than 58,000 American soldiers and millions of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. The war grew out of a military conflict between French colonial forces and Vietnamese communists”(“The 1960s: Vietnam War”). All in all, the Vietnam War was a deadly war that resulted in death and destruction of …show more content…

In the song Edwin Starr quotes “War has caused unrest, within the younger generation .Induction then destruction. Who wants to die?”(“War”). Throughout the history of war, war has been criticized as being decided by the old and fought by the young. This is why the majority of war is young protesters because they are the majority of people who die. Starr goes on to saying that “They(war supporters) say we must fight to keep our freedom.But Lord knows there's gotta be a better way.”(“War”) What he is saying is that he believes there are other ways in protecting our freedom other than killing ourselves and he believes we should fight to find a way other than war. During this time war supporters believed war is the only way in protecting our liberty. The most significant quote in the song is “(War, what is it good for?) Absolutely nothing”(“War”). This is the central idea of the song. Starr is obviously saying that war is does absolutely nothing in the world but cause more problems. War doesn’t get rid of the problems it just creates new ones. Starr repeats this line the most out of all the lyrics in the song to stress the importance of anti-war and to hopefully influence war supporters to find a different way to solve problems other than

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