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Hilbert College
Annotated Bibliography:
The Media's Effect on the Outcome of the Vietnam War
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(Note: This paper was written at the University of South Carolina)
Aronson, James. "Mediations." Antioch Review. 50.1-2 (1992): 176-189.
Discusses the governments assault of the media beginning with carefully planned editorials sent in to various papers across the nation. It then escalated to a storm of telephone calls, letters, a telegrams pledging support for the Agnew-Nixon position. Finally, it discusses the volume and "balance" or lack thereof of coverage of major speeches and the reaction to them. He suggests that the forces that control the American press have no quarrel with the political system. If they become restless about a situation, they bend over backwards to demonstrate their fairness, thereby avoiding the other side coming out on top.
Baughman, James L. "The Self-Publicist from the Pedernales: Lyndon Johnson and the Press." Diplomatic History. 12.1 (1988): 103-110.
Highlights the fact that Johnson felt he had a lot to live up to after Kennedy's assassination. His "war on poverty" was highly acclaimed and his dream for a "Great Society" permeated the lives of many Americans. Among the big-city newspapers, Johnson enjoyed considerable favor. Initially, they even endorsed the Cold War state. However, the press began to handle American foreign policy more critically with the Vietnam War. Initially, most reporters and editors were favorably disposed towards the war but that changed as time went on. Many worried that Vietnam would become another Korea.
Berg, Rick and John Carlos Rowe, ed. The Vietnam War and American Culture. New York: Columbia University Press, 1991.
The Vietnam Was has been covered with more intensity that any other war. Soldiers returned from the front and decided to express their feelings about their involvement on paper. Since the war had been a "television" war, literature's function changed. People wanted to be familiar with the cultural, political, and economic forces that led the country to war. This explores how the war was portrayed to the public and also how the enemy was portrayed.
Braestrup, Peter. Big Story. Abr. ed. Boulder: Westview Press, 1978.
This gives an abridged version of the study mentioned below. He puts the numerical values of his research into words. He concentrates on the initial years when the press corps first made its way to Vietnam, discussing the first reports from the country. He also discusses the civilian death toll and its affect on the American public as well as the performance of U.S. troops.
---. Big Story. Boulder: Westview Press, 1977. Vol. 2.
Original study presented by Braestrup. Statistics are presented that indicate when certain news was televised during the conflict and whether it was slanted toward the war movement or against it. The story is summarized and I linked with the television station that aired it. Conversations between reporters and television stations are also excerpted so as to give an indication of whether reporters were sending back tainted information.
Brown, Capt. James B. "Media Access to the Battlefield." Military Review. 72.7 (1992): 10-20.
Chinese philosophy readily admits that all warfare is based on deception. This is stated clearly in Sun Tzu's book The Art of War. These teachings are still relevant to military operations today in reference to the media. During the past generation, the media has been involved in five different conflicts: Vietnam, Grenada, the Persian Gulf escort operations, Panama, and the Gulf War. The Government has handled each one differently in terms of media response. The Gulf War is regarded as the media's best covered war.
Fox, Lt. Col. Terrance M. "Closing the Media-Military Technology Gap." Military Review. 75.6 (1995): 10-16.
The military is concerned because of the advanced technological methods used to gather information now. They question whether anything can be censored with satellite link-ups, etc. This is a cause for concern in relation to American safety abroad. This discusses the cultural lag theory in that when the media adopts an innovation in news-gathering technology, the old rules no longer apply and the military safeguards no longer protect operations security. There must then be a readjustment period at which time the media comes up with yet another technological improvement.
Gitlin, Todd. The Whole World is Watching: Mass Media in the Making and Unmaking of the New Left. Berkley: University of California Press, 1980.
Deals with the mass media, the New Left, and their relations during the Vietnam War, describing the conflict over control of the public cultural space. People's beliefs and loyalties lack deep tradition. They are influenced by rumors, gossip, trend, fashion, and of course come to be reliant on the mass media in order to form their opinions. The mass media distributes ideology. Journalists must conform to journalistic notions in order to offer information that is "newsworthy". Too often, flamboyance is mistaken for "newsworthy" material.
Hammond, William M. Reporting Vietnam: Media and Military at War. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1998.
Discusses media's changing interest in Vietnam and Southeast Asia in general. The followed the breaking news only when something of magnanimous proportion occurred. Official agencies had little control over what was reported. The French Colonial government set up a system of censorship but reporters could easily report whatever they wanted. The deaths of four civilians overseas in 1960 changed all this. Policy makers continued to try to close off information. This deals with the reporting in Vietnam as well as the reactions at home upon receiving such reports.
Hooper, Alan. The Military and the Media. Aldershot, England: Gower Publishing Company, Ltd., 1982.
Introduces the facts about the media, delving into newspapers, television, radio, documentaries, and drama. It includes building a better understanding of the Vietnam lesson as well as the Northern Ireland experience. Reporting and the media's lack of knowledge about the military heavily influenced the two conflicts. The book encourages the military to be educated about the media so as to better deal with public relations issues.
Kennedy, William V. The Military and the Media: Why the Press Cannot Be Trusted to Cover a War. Westport: Praeger Publishers, 1993.
As the title suggests, a strong argument is made against the media's accuracy in wartime situations. The military cannot be insulated from public scrutiny because that would end up destroying the people the establishment was supposed to protect. However, the independence of the free press under the First Amendment may seriously affect the outcome of war.
Levy, David W. The Debate Over Vietnam. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991.
Never before has a war in American history caused so much debate. Families were split in half over the debate. While policy was being made by intellectuals and experts in Washington, journalists were at work raising troublesome questions about such policy. They were often criticized by opponents of the war for repeating government press releases without questioning their authenticity while at the same time they were criticized for depicting a cruel, brutal war that made American's reconsider the reasons they were even involved.
Prochau, William. Once Upon a Distant War. New York: Times Books, 1995.
Mentions the importance of the body count on the reports and how American sympathy could be estimated by the body count for the week. In the beginning, the reporters began to report the conflict but the population was not interested because it did not directly affect them. Slowly, however, the number of soldiers crept up and more people began to tune in. It also describes the desire for American reporters to dramatize in order to add an element of adventure.
Questions the misrepresentation of the antiwar movement as well as the war itself. Critics still contend that the United States could have won the war had it not been for the press's embrace of anti-war arguments and perspectives. In fact, the media was nervous about covering antiwar activities during the Gulf War in 1991 for fear of the same charge. Oppositional mass movements often have a difficult time obtaining fair and favorable coverage.
There is a strong analogy between the Sandinista revolution and the Vietnamese war of national liberation because of the trauma of defeat. Since television was the primary source for information during the era, concern is placed on the documentary and what it showed Americans. Since the war's conclusion, documentaries have come out arguing both sides of the story - that of the media and the military. Many faults are identified with various PBS series that identified the issues in Vietnam.
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