Vietnam War Research Paper

Write an essay that offers a critical examination of the concept of the ‘guilty media’ thesis in respect of any war of your choice

This essay will discuss to what degree the media can be blamed for the United States’ loss in the Vietnam conflict ending 1975. It will be based predominantly on key written resources on the subject, but it will also contain - by means of an interview - certain first-hand observations from a Vietnam War veteran.

During the Vietnam War, Americans were greatly influenced by the extensive media coverage of the war. Before the 1960’s and the intensification of the war, public news coverage of military action was constrained heavily by the government and was directed by Government policy. The Vietnam War uniquely altered the perception of war in the eyes of American citizens by bringing the war into their homes. The Vietnam War was the first U.S uncensored war resulting in the release of graphic images and unaltered accounts of horrific events that helped to change public opinion of the war like nothing it had ever been. This depiction by the media led to a separation between the United States government and the press; much of what was reported flouted

‘Television brought the brutality of the war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of America – not on the battlefields of Vietnam.’ (Marshall McLuhan, 1975). What evidence exists to demonstrate that the American media coverage of the Vietnam War influenced its outcome?

Robert Elegant’s quote explains the significant role the media played in the Vietnam War. This essay will argue that the media’s effect was one dominant aspect of why the United States lost the war in Vietnam. Looking in detail at the heavily televised ‘Tet Offensive’, this essay will suggest that this series of battles was the beginning of the decisive part the media played in influencing public opinion. It is worth nothing that there are several factors involved in why the United States lost the Vietnam War, but this essay will focus on just one. Overall, it

The Vietnam War was the first televised war. This allowed news stations to bring the battles right to the television screen in someone’s home. The Vietnamese would use the American media to express their thoughts to the Americans. Americans were also able to see the brutal combat that was happening and get a first-hand experience of the war. Reporters had the ability to skew Americans’ views of the war by the way they reported. Since the Vietnam War was televised many people were influenced by the images they saw on their home television and caused them to take action.

By 1968, more than half of the American people relied on television as their principal source of news. What they saw informed, engrossed, and unsettled them. CBS Evening News anchor Harry Reasoner referred to it as “horrors and failures.” The Vietnam War dominated the network newscast as it never had before. Suddenly the war was everywhere. The impact on the American public would indeed be great. It set off a critical reaction to the war within the American media and gave greater credence to arguments against the war that a vocal protest movement had been voicing for some time. The media coverage of the Tet Offensive had a great influence on the eventual outcome of the fighting and its aftermath. Clarence Wyatt, author of Paper

The Vietnam War was started and based around politics of the country Vietnam. At the time the country was split in half because the country was fighting over what type of government they would have. One side of the split country started to force the other side to give into communism. At first the US did not want to get involved too deeply and only supplied resources to the war. Eventually we supplied troops and the real war began. Once the war had started the US froze all trade to and from Vietnam, making a siege on the country. After years of fighting and a couple million casualties, the communists surrendered ending the war. During the war, the US went billions of dollars into debt while Vietnam’s economy completely crashed(this is a main reason to why Vietnam is so poor today). To this day families suffer from loved ones who suffer from the war. The US altogether also suffers with debt and recovery from that tragic

The Vietnam war was a very hard and emotional time for many people. From the vietnamese to the u.s., the vietnam war was a tradgedy. People said that the vietnam war had been the longest lasting battle that took place in the cold war. The whole thing started because the vietnamese wasnted to have their independence. They no longer wanted to be under the control of france. France did not want to give up the land that they had ruled for years. France was getting supplies and goods from vietnam so they didnt want to give it up so they fought for it. Ho Chi Minh was vietnams president as you can say he was in control of north vietnam. He wanted vietnam to be a communist country much like the soviet union.

The Vietnam War was a long, costly armed conflict that pitted the communist regime of North Vietnam and its southern allies, known as the Viet Cong, against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The war began in 1954 (though conflict in the region stretched back to the mid-1940s), after the rise to power of Ho Chi Minh and his communist Viet Minh party in North Vietnam, and continued against the backdrop of an intense Cold War between two global superpowers: the United States and the Soviet Union. After the French lost power over Vietnam and left, there was a power vacuum that resulted in the war. Due to the terrain of Vietnam being a jungle, the US had many difficulties preventing the Soviet Union and China from sending in weapons to arm North Vietnamese against the South Vietnamese.

The Vietnam war was a civil war between Northern and Southern Vietnam. The two halves of Vietnam were separated because of disagreements in governmental policies. American troops involved themselves in the Vietnam war because they wanted to protect Vietnam from becoming a communist country. The United States was split between those who wanted troops to get involved in the war and those who opposed. So when the US officials decided to enter into the war, uproars and peace movements began. The United States should not have gotten involved in the war because there was a loss of many soldiers and the economy was damaged.

war the enemy would be in uniform and it was clear who to kill who not

Media and American Withdrawal From Vietnam The history of Vietnam is characterised by struggles for independence since French rule in 1859 after the French took Saigon, and a great ability in warfare and continual determined resistance to foreign domination. Major military involvement by American armed forces came after events such as Russian communist revolution in 1917 and the Korean War in the 1950's; these events put the America people in a period of moral panic with McCarthyism, and domino theory. After the French defeat and the following Geneva conference in 1954, where only a verbal military truce was agreed.

In times of War, the media plays a crucial role both in reporting, monitoring and giving updates. During the Vietnam War of 1955-1975, the American press played crucial roles of reporting until it ended up shifting its tone under the influence of occurrence of some events like the Tet Offensive, the My Lai Massacre, the bombing of Cambodia and leaking of Pentagon papers resulting into lack of trust in the press (Knightly 1975). From the beginning of the war up to present times there have been undying debates over the role of media in the war. The have been various criticisms over the American News Media’s actions and influences on the outcome of the war. The debate is embedded on the particular political assumptions perceived across the

The Vietnam War was Armed Conflict, costly, long, which opposed the communist regime of North Vietnam and the southern allies, known as the Viet Cong against South Vietnam and its main ally, the United States. Controversial war, increasingly unpopular at home, and ended with the withdrawal of US troops in 1973 and the unification of Vietnam under communist control two years later. More than 3 million people, including 58,000 Americans