Re: Kent State Conspiracy
"The Kent State killings effectively ended political action against the war and destroyed the student movement."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposi...he_Vietnam_War
1970
- Kent State/Cambodia Incursion Protest, Washington, D.C.: A week after the Kent State shootings, on May 4, 100,000 anti-war demonstrators converged on Washington, D.C. to protest the shooting of the students in Ohio and the Nixon administration's incursion into Cambodia. Even though the demonstration was quickly put together, protesters were still able to bring out thousands to march in the Capital. It was an almost spontaneous response to the events of the previous week. Police ringed the White House with buses to block the demonstrators from getting too close to the executive mansion. Early in the morning before the march, Nixon met with protesters briefly at the Lincoln Memorial but nothing was resolved and the protest went on as planned.
- National Student Strike: more than 450 university, college and high school campuses across the country were shut by student strikes and both violent and non-violent protests that involved more than 4 million students, in the only nationwide student strike in U.S. history.
- A Gallup poll in May shows that 56% of the public believed that sending troops to Vietnam was a mistake, 61% of those over 50 expressed that belief compared to 49% of those between the ages of 21–29.[25]
- On June 13, President Nixon established the President's Commission on Campus Unrest. The commission was directed to study the dissent, disorder, and violence breaking out on college and university campuses.[26]
- On August 24, 1970, near 3:40 a.m., a van filled with ammonium nitrate and fuel oil mixture was detonated on the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the Sterling Hall bombing.
[edit] 1971 and after
- On April 23, 1971, Vietnam veterans threw away over 700 medals on the West Steps of the Capitol building.[27] The next day, antiwar organizers claimed that 500,000 marched, making this the largest demonstration since the November, 1969 march.[28]
- Two weeks later, on May 5, 1971, 1,146 people were arrested on the Capitol grounds trying to shut down Congress. This brought the total arrested during the protest to over 12,000. Abbie Hoffman was arrested on charges of interstate travel to incite a riot and assaulting a police officer.[29]
- In August, 1971, The Camden 28 conducted a raid on the Camden, New Jersey draft board offices. The 28 included five or more members of the clergy, as well as a number of local blue-collar workers.
- In August 1971, a bombing conducted by Karlton and Dwight Armstrong at the University of Wisconsin’s Army Mathematics Research Center destroyed the building and killed a student doing research.[30]
- On March 29, 1972, 166 people, many of them seminarians, were arrested in Harrisburg, PA for encircling the Federal Courthouse with a chain, to protest the trial of the Harrisburg Seven.[31]
- On April 19, 1972, in response to renewed escalation of bombing, students at many colleges and universities around the country broke into campus buildings and threatened strikes.[32] The following weekend, protests were held in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and elsewhere.[33]
- On May 13, 1972, protests again spread across the country in response to President Nixon's decision to mine harbors in North Vietnam[34] and renewed bombing of North Vietnam (Operation Linebacker).
- On July 6, 1973, four Sisters of Norte Dame de Namur on a White House Tour stopped and began praying to protest the war. In the next six weeks, such kneel-ins became a popular form of protest and led to over 158 protestors arrests.[35]
[edit] Public opinion
Public support for the war decreased as the war waged on throughout the sixties and beginning part of the 1970s.
William L. Lunch and Peter W. Sperlich collected public opinion data measuring support for the war from 1965-1971. Support for the war was measured by a negative response to the question: "In view of developments since we entered the fighting in Vietnam, do you think the U.S. made a mistake sending troops to fight in Vietnam?"[36] They found the following results.
| Month | Percentage who agreed with war |
| August 1965 | 52% |
| March 1966 | 59% |
| May 1966 | 49% |
| September 1966 | 48% |
| November 1966 | 51% |
| February 1967 | 52% |
| May 1967 | 50% |
| July 1967 | 48% |
| October 1967 | 44% |
| December 1967 | 48% |
| February 1968 | 42% |
| March 1968 | 41% |
| April 1968 | 40% |
| August 1968 | 35% |
| October 1968 | 37% |
| February 1969 | 39% |
| October 1969 | 32% |
| January 1970 | 33% |
| April 1970 | 34% |
| May 1970 | 36% |
| January 1971 | 31% |
| May 1971 | 28% |
After May 1971 Gallup stopped asking this question.
Re: Kent State Conspiracy
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by Star Man:
...the Kent State killings effectively ended political action against the war and destroyed the student movement....
That blocking action by Obama officials includes an apparent unwillingness ....
thanks, Miles. Good detail.
If you want to be simplistic about it, it was the end of the draft that "ended" the anti-war movement. Once your own ass isn't on the line it's harder to be socially disruptive!
and "apparent unwillingness". Pretty damning charge.
Much of the article itself is correct; no-one's playing Pollyanna here about the actions of the various levels of government in those days. That was when Governor Reagan was quoted as saying "if it's to be a bloodbath, let it be now. Appeasement is not the answer. " Those tendencies of those in power are still evident. But where's the conspiracy?