Some stories and photos from earlier anti-war demonstrations.

When I get time, I will add more photo and stories.

For now, here is a photo that William Blum wanted an anti-war photo for his latest book West-Block Dissident: A Cold War memoir, Soft Skull Press 2002.

I remembered a rather dramatic and radical one from "In The Teeth Of War," a "PHOTOGRAPHIC DOCUMENTARY OF THE MARCH 26th, 1966, NEW YORK CITY DEMONSTRATION AGAINST THE WAR IN VIETNAM, published by The Fifth Avenue Vietnam Peace Parade Committee. Here is the photo by Robert Parent (deceased) from page 38:

Medium sized version of this photo - Full sized version

Other photos had the usual collection of Doves, children, heartfelt signs and some of the full of hate pro-war hecklers.

Anti-war Signs at demonstrations since then.

Here's another that shows one of the many side streets that would feed into the larger demonstration. Remember, this was 1966 and contrary to the pro-war propagandists today who argue that the peaceniks spat on the veterans, check out the signs in these photos of the typical collection of Bring the Boys home, etc. Almost no one was against the draftees or even the GI volunteers. We understood that it was some of the political and military leaders who were to blame. From the beginning of the war, the peace movement seriously organized for and among the GI's. Many of the earliest and most determined anti-war organizers were veterans who had been through enough to see through the latest propaganda. (If you have DSL, click here for a larger version)

(Guess who the stern looking guys on the lower right were?)

Medium sized version of this photo - Full sized version, very slow download

RIGHTS IN CONCORD, The Response to the Counter-Inaugural Protest Activities in Washington, D.C., January 18-20, 1969

This was a "Staff Report" of the Task Force on Law and Law Enforcement to the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence. This grand title was actually a lie and immensely hypocritical. During the height of the US war on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, the White House had established this "National Commission" which actually, as an historical reading of this report will show, looked into how to cover up US military violence in Indochina and make excuses for police violence at home. I will add some information about this report in the coming days, but you can just consider what happened as a result of "the war at home." Cointelpro assassinations and instigation of violence. Infiltration and instigation of violent acts by mostly peaceful demonstrators. Massive and illegal arrests such as the thousands at the May Day Demonstrations in 1971. The list is long and continues to today.

[This report was compiled about 43 years ago and published in "Nay 22, 1969." Yes a small typo, but a report that was intentionally fraudulent, designed to blame the demonstrators and make the White House commission look good. Now in 2012, they are still doing the same, just with much more sophisticated tools. Beware the propaganda.

I will post a PDF of this report here, and an album of the photos with comments here.

Walter Teague, 6/17/2012.

Some links to Vietnam War (U.S. war on Viet Nam) demonstrations......

Roz Payne has some interesting stuff
Robert Altmans archives of the 60's He has a number of galleries of photos from the 60's.
Leaflets from the Anti Vietnam War Movement. There was a site, but has now been reserved. Try this Google
An interesting Peace Page on a Veteran's web page. He has some interesting links
A High School Teacher created a project page on Kent State -- Check his links page too.
Some photo links at a Wellesley College page, scroll down to Antiwar Movement
Lots of stuff on Vietnam and the war. Mixed quality.
E. Kenneth Hoffman's photos
Jo Freeman's page on the 1967 March on the Pentagon - leaves out a lot.
Student Protests against the war This one has good links.
The Sixties Project Lots of stuff here. You may have to search a bit.
PsyOps Study of NLF leaflets This is an odd one, but distinguishes between real and fake leaflets. It would be interesting to psychologically and politically analyze this site.

Anti-War (US war on Vietnam) Videos:

Here are some more videos from TV news at that time. While mostly pro-war and never objective or presenting an in depth or analytical coverage from the anti-war point of view, watching these videos so many years later, the essense still comes throgh.

1. 1967 Anti-war Demonstration in New York City. Walter's Committee shown briefly at 0:50.
2. 1967 Anti-War Demonstration at the Pentagon.
3. I will fill in examples in days to come.
5. 1969 Film Showing of Vietnamese films in NYC. Walter interviewed.
6. April 23rd 1971, the Vietnam Veterans Against the War held historic demonstrations in Washington, DC.
7. 200,000 at Washington Peace march (circa 1971 John Kerry speaks
8. April 24th 1971 Peace March Against the War in Vietnam After the Veterans and before the May Day demonstrations, there were demonstrations by a broad coalition.
9. April 24th 1971 Peace March Against the War in Vietnam Pt. 2
10. May Day Demonstrations May 1-3, 1971. First time the pacifists and more militant demonstrators joined in civil disobedience and led to briefly shutting down the government function in Washington, DC and the largest mass arrests in US history. More than 12,000 people arrested over the days of this demonstration. Keep in mind that much of what happened to organize and carry out these demonstrations have yet to be written. Do a Google search. I will add more in the coming days. Also, see Walter's Draft comments on this May Day Demonstrations.
11. 2012 Series "Who Rules America" Episode 3 by Danny Schechter. Walter interviewed at 15:49 and 17:40.

Anyway, there is a lot more out there, so...
A fairly good way to find more anti-war photos or other images on the web, is to use Google's Image Search.
For example here is the page where I simply typed in "Vietnam war protest": It brought up 7 pages of photos. Of course, all these photos can be seen in larger format and saved to your computer.

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Updated: 03/27/2013