Blog # 10: The First Television War
General Nguyen Ngoc Loan Woodstock; 1969
Kim Phuc running through the streets of Vietnam
John F. Kennedy is considered to be the “First Television President” and the Vietnam War is associated with being the “First Television War”. I was researching for a history paper and preparing for my exam when I realized the profound effect that media had on the politics and culture during the Vietnam War. It not only defined society at the time, but media was the master mind behind the anti-war movement as well. I had never before paid attention to this side of our countries history and the history of media.
The Vietnam War was a crisis that evoked a plethora of anti-war sentiment. The Lyndon Johnson administration was lying to the people and downplaying the reality of the war. The media was the first corporation to reveal the truth behind deployment, drafts, and the politics of Vietnam. They used the power of images to appeal to the emotional consciousness of America.
At first, the media fully supported the government policy in Vietnam. The media was optimistic and patriotic and hence, the public was too. The Vietnam War soldier was seen as a hero whose duty was honorable. The public took on the medias opinions.
Therefore, when the medias standpoints changed with the Tet Offensive, so did that of the public. Although General Westmoreland announced this to be a victory, the media clearly saw it as a defeat. The images released showed the brutality of American allies (the image above of General Nguyen Ngoc Loan shooting a North Vietnamese officer in the head and Kim Phuc running naked through the streets of Vietnam because her clothes had been burned off by an American bomb that had been dropped are examples—both are shown above) and the defeat of the United States government (the American embassy lay in ruins). After this 1968 event, there was growing polarization between the media (and the public) and the government. The media began to turn against the government and their attitude transitioned into one of negativity—they thought there was no way we were going to win this war; in the words of Walter Cronkite, we need to withdraw as an honorable country who did our best to uphold our promise.
The medias pessimistic view shaped the growing dissent among Americans. There was a massive anti-war movement among college age students who disagreed with the reason we were in Vietnam and the draft. They formed the counterculture, which was propelled by media, particularly radio and music. The 1969 Woodstock festival (in the picture above) was a gathering for members of the counterculture to show their dissent—Billboard hits like Feel Like I’m Fixin’ to Die and Eve of Destruction defined the movement.
The media was instrumental in this era in defining the public stand point on the war. By reading further into it, I realized how media really can manipulate the minds of the citizens. If it goes uncensored by the government, as it did in Vietnam, the people will undermine the stability of the administration. This is exactly what they did. Television was the medium for all the messages of defeat, protest, and brutality during Vietnam. Television and the media had the power to define the movements of the time. They owned the means of production.
The first television war has passed but a second may be in our wake.
3 years ago • 0 notes