Vietnam War
By Hrant Nalbanidan
Background
The Vietnam War was a long, costly armed conflict that pitted the communist regime of North Vietnam and its southern allies, known as the Vet Cong, against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The divisive war, increasingly unpopular at home, ended with the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973 and the unification of Vietnam under Communist control two years later. More than 3,000,000 people died that war including Americans were killed.
Media and perspective
media played a major role during the Vietnam war. Thousands watched on their television as Walter Cronkite and other news anchors showed film and photographs of American and South Vietnamese soldiers fighting the Vietcong.
MEDIA AGAINST WAR
Many media sources held a critical attitude against the war. Those sources were against U.S. Involvement in Vietnam.
media against war
For almost a decade in between school, work, and dinners, the American public could watch villages being destroyed, Vietnamese children burning to death, and American body bags being sent home. Though initial coverage generally supported U.S involvement in the war, television news dramatically changed its frame of the war after the Tet Offensive.
media against war
The visual element of television allows viewers to feel as if they are part of the action. When news programs aired images of battles and death, Americans at home felt as if they too were in the jungles of Vietnam.
historical
The Vietnam War was the longest in U.S. history, until the war in Afghanistan that began in 2002 and continues at this writing 2013. It was extremely divisive in the U.S., Europe, Australia and elsewhere. Because the U.S. failed to achieve a military victory and the Republic of South Vietnam was ultimately taken over by North Vietnam, the Vietnam experience became known as the only war America ever lost.