answer the following:
1. how old were you during most of the vietnam war era (around 1970)?
2. what were you doing during this period (school, job, etc.)?
3. what was your attitude back then regarding american involvement in vietnam?
also, please choose 3-4 of the following to answer:
1. as the war progressed, did your attitude change? if so, how and why?
2. in what ways did the vietnam war affect your life?
3. what is your most vivid memory of the vietnam war?
4. how did you feel when saigon (america's biggest base in vietnam) fell in april, 1975?
5. what are your feelings about the vietnam war today?
6. what lessons has this experience taught us?
7. what should we teach our children about this defining era of 20th century america?
thank you in advance for your time, it is greatly appreciated.Interview for ages 55 and up (about vietnam war era)?I turned 18 in December 1970
I was in high school when Nam started to get my attention (Grade eight).
I didn't think much about it until a classmate's brother was killed. My classmate was destroyed. That was when I started thinking about it. I could see no good reason for us to be there.
I'm combining questions 2, 5 and seven.
You have to understand that there were a lot of things happening around that time. There was the civil rights movement. Women's lib, gay lib. Music was going through dramatic changes. I was 15 in 1968, and it just seemed like the world was going crazy. The murders of Martin Luther King,jr and Bobby Kennedy were traumatic events. Yes, I'm a white boy, but I thought then and still think that Martin Luther King, jr was the greatest man of the 20th century. Then, that summer, the Police riots at the Democratic Convention in Chicago. And a rigged convention Hubert Humphrey hadn't won a single primary. You can't teach kids about Nam without teaching them the bigger story.
My feelings about haven't changed. How did it affect my life? It ruined my life. I wasn't in the military. I was a C.O.. ANd it ruined my life. See my forthcoming book.
