WEBVTT 00:00:48.908 --> 00:00:54.319 As World Fairs had in the past the fair in 1964 provided a timely glimpse 00:00:54.319 --> 00:00:58.519 of the planet's current realities and future expectations. 00:01:01.935 --> 00:01:05.495 The New York Times described it as a "glittering mirror 00:01:05.495 --> 00:01:07.385 of our national opulence." 00:01:07.805 --> 00:01:09.440 It seemed to portend a future 00:01:09.440 --> 00:01:11.564 where the biggest worry for average Americans 00:01:11.564 --> 00:01:14.001 would be how to spend their leisure time. 00:01:14.435 --> 00:01:19.277 I just took it for granted that I, you know, I'd always have a roof over my head and enough to eat. 00:01:19.277 --> 00:01:23.881 I never thought that I'd have to worry about where my next meal was coming from. 00:01:23.881 --> 00:01:25.918 These thoughts just didn't occur to me. 00:01:25.918 --> 00:01:28.213 But of course part of the reason we could think that way is that 00:01:28.213 --> 00:01:30.955 we took prosperity more or less for granted. 00:01:33.070 --> 00:01:36.017 In his speech at the World's Fair, President Lyndon Johnson 00:01:36.017 --> 00:01:38.422 touted a world of prosperity. 00:01:38.422 --> 00:01:46.415 "But that people, people: they shall have the best. All of these dreams." 00:01:48.214 --> 00:01:50.430 Only to find himself interrupted in mid-speech 00:01:50.430 --> 00:01:54.955 by demonstrators who felt themselves froze out of the world. 00:01:58.991 --> 00:02:02.172 Despite a lengthy struggle, millions of Black Americans 00:02:02.172 --> 00:02:04.920 still did not share in the nation's prosperity 00:02:04.920 --> 00:02:08.232 or enjoy the full rights of their citizenship. 00:02:08.232 --> 00:02:11.895 In 1964, many expected that such inequities 00:02:11.895 --> 00:02:13.600 would soon be addressed. 00:02:13.911 --> 00:02:17.694 We thought that essentially the material problems of the world had been solved 00:02:17.694 --> 00:02:22.006 and that the important thing now was to solve the moral problems. 00:02:22.850 --> 00:02:25.996 It was a society that had to be changed and there was not gonna be a change 00:02:25.996 --> 00:02:30.085 unless some people decided that they would dedicate their lives to changing it. 00:02:30.085 --> 00:02:32.126 It was not gonna change spontaneously. 00:02:34.498 --> 00:02:37.453 The World's Fair that year was held in Flushing Meadows, New York. 00:02:37.453 --> 00:02:39.120 It was supposed to promote the culture 00:02:39.120 --> 00:02:43.345 and customs of people everywhere, in keeping with its theme 00:02:43.345 --> 00:02:45.302 of "peace through understanding." 00:02:45.302 --> 00:02:50.774 But it would not be long before Americans would be driven apart by societal disagreements 00:02:50.774 --> 00:02:54.570 within their own borders, and a terrible, costly war 00:02:54.570 --> 00:02:56.940 on the other side of the globe. 00:02:56.940 --> 00:03:01.008 The country was not about to experience much of either peace or understanding. 00:03:03.744 --> 00:03:07.433 "We shall overcome" 00:03:07.433 --> 00:03:11.290 In the mid-1960s, the determination to challenge traditional boundaries 00:03:11.290 --> 00:03:14.428 seemed to be growing in almost every arena. 00:03:14.428 --> 00:03:18.165 Perhaps most striking was a broadening struggle for civil rights, 00:03:18.165 --> 00:03:21.878 a struggle that many whites now joined in large numbers. 00:03:25.462 --> 00:03:30.251 In the summer of 1964, hundreds of college students, white and black, 00:03:30.251 --> 00:03:36.397 headed south to Mississippi, where many Blacks were still mired in a Jim Crow world 00:03:36.397 --> 00:03:39.314 of poverty and political impotence. 00:03:40.871 --> 00:03:44.122 These students from the North hoped to register Black voters 00:03:44.122 --> 00:03:48.228 and establish so-called "Freedom Schools" to teach literacy skills 00:03:48.228 --> 00:03:50.261 to those who'd been denied them. 00:03:51.198 --> 00:03:55.144 They were traveling into a world where many people were set in their ways. 00:03:55.144 --> 00:03:57.556 President Lyndon Johnson warned the students 00:03:57.556 --> 00:04:01.575 that the federal government could not guarantee their safety. 00:04:02.502 --> 00:04:05.006 They received a lot of training in order to prepare them 00:04:05.006 --> 00:04:06.719 for life in Mississippi, which was not gonna 00:04:06.719 --> 00:04:10.587 be very easy--it wasn't easy for us--and we tried to make that very clear to people. 00:04:11.027 --> 00:04:15.754 I mean, our lives were in imminent danger every minute of the day. 00:04:17.014 --> 00:04:19.671 When we crossed the line into Mississippi 00:04:20.116 --> 00:04:22.459 and it said 'Mississippi welcomes you," 00:04:23.733 --> 00:04:26.259 it was the first time I felt really afraid. 00:04:29.110 --> 00:04:31.392 In the first group to arrive in Mississippi 00:04:31.392 --> 00:04:35.799 were students Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner, and James Chaney. 00:04:36.040 --> 00:04:39.181 Within days, all three of them were missing. 00:04:44.072 --> 00:04:45.534 Bob Moses, who was the head of the 00:04:45.534 --> 00:04:50.938 Mississippi summer project, brought the group together, 00:04:50.938 --> 00:04:52.951 told us that they were missing, 00:04:52.951 --> 00:04:55.597 and it was clear to all of us that it was 00:04:55.597 --> 00:04:58.859 extremely likely that they were dead. 00:05:04.582 --> 00:05:06.524 Six weeks after their disappearance, 00:05:06.524 --> 00:05:09.974 the three were discovered buried in an earthen dam 00:05:09.974 --> 00:05:11.475 shot in the head. 00:05:17.544 --> 00:05:20.468 In that summer of 1964 the Ku Klux Klan 00:05:20.468 --> 00:05:23.528 was still trying to stop the forces of change 00:05:23.528 --> 00:05:26.069 but among the students and in the homes and churches 00:05:26.069 --> 00:05:27.132 of the Black community, 00:05:27.132 --> 00:05:30.586 the feeling grew stronger that change could not be prevented. 00:05:35.765 --> 00:05:38.039 We went up to the home 00:05:38.039 --> 00:05:40.197 of a very poor Black woman, 00:05:40.197 --> 00:05:41.518 sharecropper shack, 00:05:41.518 --> 00:05:43.105 she had a bunch of kids. 00:05:43.105 --> 00:05:45.124 She came to the door, she looked at her feet, 00:05:45.124 --> 00:05:46.941 she said "Yes'm" "No'm" 00:05:46.941 --> 00:05:48.610 to everything we said. 00:05:48.610 --> 00:05:51.385 And we tried to persuade her to sign this. 00:05:51.385 --> 00:05:52.889 And it was very clear if she signed it she might 00:05:52.889 --> 00:05:54.350 get thrown out of her home. 00:05:54.687 --> 00:05:56.978 After a few minutes of talking 00:05:56.978 --> 00:05:59.644 she suddenly straightened up, looked us in the eyes, 00:05:59.644 --> 00:06:03.525 and said 'I'll sign it.' And she signed it. 00:06:03.525 --> 00:06:05.254 That's how powerful the movement was. 00:06:12.473 --> 00:06:14.814 And the movement expanded to other causes 00:06:14.814 --> 00:06:17.174 at the end of the so-called "Freedom Summer." 00:06:19.009 --> 00:06:20.719 The first amendment didn't apply to any 00:06:20.719 --> 00:06:22.942 campuses in the country. 00:06:22.942 --> 00:06:25.079 You couldn't give a speech 00:06:25.079 --> 00:06:27.716 without getting it cleared by the administration. 00:06:28.281 --> 00:06:31.644 When Freedom Summer veterans at the University of California at Berkeley 00:06:31.644 --> 00:06:34.427 tried to recruit others to their cause 00:06:34.427 --> 00:06:36.670 they were barred by university regents. 00:06:38.755 --> 00:06:42.602 It just set off this explosion among the students 00:06:42.602 --> 00:06:46.295 and people who had never had a political thought in their head 00:06:46.295 --> 00:06:49.031 just got fired by the idea that someone couldn't 00:06:49.031 --> 00:06:53.122 tell them when and where to say what they wanted to say. 00:06:57.588 --> 00:06:59.971 United by what they saw as an injustice 00:06:59.971 --> 00:07:02.453 thousands of students began a series of protests 00:07:02.453 --> 00:07:04.119 that lasted eight weeks. 00:07:05.169 --> 00:07:07.299 When college officials threatened to expel 00:07:07.299 --> 00:07:09.429 several of the student leaders 00:07:09.429 --> 00:07:11.460 the conflict reached a boiling point. 00:07:13.664 --> 00:07:17.033 "There's a time when the operation of the machine 00:07:17.033 --> 00:07:20.822 becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, 00:07:20.822 --> 00:07:23.138 that you can't take part. You can't even 00:07:23.138 --> 00:07:24.658 passively take part." 00:07:24.658 --> 00:07:27.382 You have to put your body on the wheels 00:07:27.382 --> 00:07:29.716 and we're gonna go in there 00:07:29.716 --> 00:07:32.018 and we're gonna take over this building. 00:07:32.438 --> 00:07:35.990 And so the crowd began to move. I just went with it. 00:07:40.552 --> 00:07:41.982 Some people looked a little scared because 00:07:41.982 --> 00:07:43.886 they'd never done anything like that before. 00:07:44.676 --> 00:07:45.840 I was scared. 00:07:49.090 --> 00:07:51.566 "We're pissed off and we're sick and tired." 00:07:53.724 --> 00:07:56.286 When the student takeover of a campus building 00:07:56.286 --> 00:07:58.765 resulted in more than 800 arrests, 00:07:58.765 --> 00:08:00.816 the university faculty finally 00:08:00.816 --> 00:08:03.485 weighed in on the side of the demonstrators. 00:08:05.956 --> 00:08:08.357 Cornered as they were, the regents 00:08:08.357 --> 00:08:11.336 granted free speech to the students 00:08:11.336 --> 00:08:16.223 and thus began an era of confrontation at American universities. 00:08:17.316 --> 00:08:21.080 In late 1964, another fight was looming for Americans, 00:08:21.080 --> 00:08:23.596 this one thousands of miles from home, 00:08:23.596 --> 00:08:27.070 and with far more devastating consequences. 00:08:27.645 --> 00:08:29.069 For several years, American advisers 00:08:29.069 --> 00:08:30.852 had been sent to South Vietnam to help 00:08:30.852 --> 00:08:32.999 prevent what the administration said 00:08:32.999 --> 00:08:36.299 was a takeover by the Communist North. 00:08:36.299 --> 00:08:38.749 Things were not going well in the South. 00:08:38.749 --> 00:08:40.419 President Lyndon Johnson decided 00:08:40.419 --> 00:08:44.546 to dramatically increase the US military commitment to Vietnam. 00:08:45.448 --> 00:08:48.863 And just as they had throughout history, young Americans 00:08:48.863 --> 00:08:51.292 answered the call to arms. 00:08:53.110 --> 00:08:54.451 I didn't wanna see my son go 00:08:54.451 --> 00:08:56.993 and he promised nothing was gonna happen to him, 00:08:56.993 --> 00:09:00.135 you know, and that it was gonna be over very shortly 00:09:00.135 --> 00:09:03.309 and he'd be home before I knew it. 00:09:04.353 --> 00:09:06.743 You grew up watching those John Wayne movies 00:09:06.743 --> 00:09:09.549 where the good guys always win. 00:09:10.752 --> 00:09:12.206 I was being John Wayne, 00:09:12.206 --> 00:09:13.789 I was gonna go and I was gonna beat them 00:09:13.789 --> 00:09:15.744 and nothing could hurt me. 00:09:21.058 --> 00:09:23.445 Like many other young men in 1965, 00:09:23.445 --> 00:09:26.174 Jack Bronson knew very little about war 00:09:26.174 --> 00:09:29.085 except that America didn't lose them. 00:09:29.085 --> 00:09:32.467 This one looked at first to be no exception. 00:09:32.986 --> 00:09:37.779 Th United States, which had defeated Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and held back 00:09:37.779 --> 00:09:39.171 the Communist Chinese 00:09:39.171 --> 00:09:42.397 in Korea, now faced a third world army 00:09:42.397 --> 00:09:44.677 of North Vietnamese soldiers 00:09:44.677 --> 00:09:47.821 and South Vietnamese Vietcong guerrillas. 00:09:48.987 --> 00:09:52.624 American commanders confidently predicted a swift 00:09:52.624 --> 00:09:54.325 and positive conclusion. 00:09:54.595 --> 00:09:55.990 I was excited about going to war. 00:09:55.990 --> 00:09:58.526 The whole battalion was excited about going to war. 00:09:58.526 --> 00:10:01.196 We were gung-ho. 00:10:07.286 --> 00:10:09.573 With 125,000 fresh troops 00:10:09.573 --> 00:10:13.578 and an armada of helicopters ranging all over South Vietnam 00:10:13.578 --> 00:10:16.580 American generals were spoiling for a good fight. 00:10:18.351 --> 00:10:20.419 They were about to get one. 00:10:25.079 --> 00:10:28.662 On November 15th 1965 Lieutenant Larry Gwen's unit 00:10:28.662 --> 00:10:31.395 was helicoptered to a valley in central Vietnam 00:10:31.395 --> 00:10:33.229 near the Cambodian border. 00:10:34.235 --> 00:10:39.145 They had gone to intersect the North Vietnamese supply routes to the south. 00:10:39.470 --> 00:10:42.112 North Vietnamese soldiers watched them arrive. 00:10:43.094 --> 00:10:46.050 It was my first real hot landing zone. 00:10:49.750 --> 00:10:52.747 And it was so hot that I had exited my ship, 00:10:53.734 --> 00:10:56.951 knelt on the grass for about 10 seconds, 00:10:56.951 --> 00:11:00.414 and a guy pops up next to me, whom I knew had just been shot through the shoulder 00:11:00.414 --> 00:11:01.793 and said 'I'm hit, Lieutenant.' 00:11:03.192 --> 00:11:04.695 A major battle with the enemy was just 00:11:04.695 --> 00:11:07.297 what the military brass had been hoping for 00:11:07.297 --> 00:11:09.900 only it was not going according to plan. 00:11:10.734 --> 00:11:14.602 At 10 in the morning Lieutenant Gwen was fighting for his life. 00:11:14.840 --> 00:11:17.214 Our first Lieutenant was overrun 00:11:17.214 --> 00:11:20.613 our second Lieutenant was pinned down by mortar fire. 00:11:20.613 --> 00:11:22.938 I saw about 40 North Vietnamese soldiers 00:11:22.938 --> 00:11:25.608 coming across the landing zone at us. 00:11:27.873 --> 00:11:29.641 And all I did was say 'here they come' 00:11:29.641 --> 00:11:31.126 and start shooting at them. 00:11:32.347 --> 00:11:34.981 1:00 PM the American commander sent out 00:11:34.981 --> 00:11:40.864 an emergency signal: "Broken Arrow. US troops in danger of being overrun." 00:11:46.135 --> 00:11:47.844 Every available aircraft was called in 00:11:47.844 --> 00:11:50.724 against the North Vietnamese positions. 00:12:00.300 --> 00:12:03.188 Including the giant B-52 bombers. 00:12:03.881 --> 00:12:09.421 The B-52 is terrible, terrible in many ways. 00:12:09.421 --> 00:12:14.231 Because firstly, there was no way you can fight back. 00:12:15.307 --> 00:12:16.468 You can't run. 00:12:16.673 --> 00:12:18.304 There's no time for you to run. 00:12:21.580 --> 00:12:25.940 You just lay there, wait for the death to come and grip you. 00:12:39.099 --> 00:12:41.916 And thousands of men died in those desperate 00:12:41.916 --> 00:12:44.679 hours. By the time the battle was over 00:12:44.679 --> 00:12:49.135 3500 North Vietnamese and 305 Americans 00:12:49.135 --> 00:12:50.275 had been killed. 00:12:50.783 --> 00:12:54.334 It was obvious to the men in the field what lay ahead. 00:13:05.018 --> 00:13:07.425 Preoccupied as he was with the growing 00:13:07.425 --> 00:13:09.492 war in Vietnam, President Johnson knew 00:13:09.492 --> 00:13:12.586 that he had to address problems at home. 00:13:12.586 --> 00:13:14.533 Despite America's prosperity, 00:13:14.533 --> 00:13:18.426 40 million citizens still lived below the poverty line. 00:13:19.059 --> 00:13:23.799 "And this administration today here and now 00:13:23.799 --> 00:13:28.904 declares unconditional war on poverty in America." 00:13:31.344 --> 00:13:35.149 In May 1964 the president unveiled the grand plan 00:13:35.149 --> 00:13:37.181 for what he called "the Great Society." 00:13:38.175 --> 00:13:41.008 Mr. Johnson hoped to match the power and vitality 00:13:41.008 --> 00:13:43.392 of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal 00:13:43.392 --> 00:13:46.796 with a list of welfare, job and educational opportunities 00:13:46.796 --> 00:13:49.133 to aide underprivileged Americans. 00:13:51.809 --> 00:13:55.028 But the privilege that many southern Blacks most desired 00:13:55.028 --> 00:13:58.202 was the right to vote, still often denied them. 00:13:59.642 --> 00:14:05.677 In Selma, Alabama, 97% of 15,000 eligible Black voters 00:14:05.677 --> 00:14:06.811 were unregistered. 00:14:07.433 --> 00:14:10.439 Some because of cynicism or apathy, 00:14:10.439 --> 00:14:13.552 but most because they faced violence and intimidation 00:14:13.552 --> 00:14:15.225 from local authorities. 00:14:15.645 --> 00:14:18.360 People could only attempt to register 00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:21.358 on the first and third Mondays of each month. 00:14:21.536 --> 00:14:23.579 "The voter registrar is not in session 00:14:23.579 --> 00:14:26.029 this afternoon, as you were informed. 00:14:26.029 --> 00:14:27.464 You came down to make a mockery 00:14:27.464 --> 00:14:29.332 out of this courthouse..." 00:14:29.800 --> 00:14:32.215 And you had to get some white person 00:14:32.215 --> 00:14:34.137 to vouch that you were of good character. 00:14:34.137 --> 00:14:36.375 No white person in his right mind 00:14:36.375 --> 00:14:37.842 in the state of Alabama 00:14:37.842 --> 00:14:39.225 was going to vouch that a Black person 00:14:39.225 --> 00:14:40.536 was of good character. 00:14:41.106 --> 00:14:42.250 "If we're wrong, why don't you 00:14:42.250 --> 00:14:43.291 arrest us?..." 00:14:43.618 --> 00:14:46.888 Selma rapidly became the new flashpoint 00:14:46.888 --> 00:14:48.925 of the Civil Rights Movement. 00:14:49.441 --> 00:14:52.001 On March 7th 1965 00:14:52.001 --> 00:14:55.404 600 Civil Rights activists planned a march 00:14:55.404 --> 00:14:57.041 that was to take them from Selma 00:14:57.041 --> 00:14:59.267 to the state capital in Montgomery 00:14:59.267 --> 00:15:00.973 some 54 miles away. 00:15:02.944 --> 00:15:05.624 Their route would take the non-violent demonstrators 00:15:05.624 --> 00:15:08.142 through what amounted to enemy territory. 00:15:08.142 --> 00:15:10.108 Roads and highways controlled by 00:15:10.108 --> 00:15:11.875 the Alabama state police. 00:15:16.658 --> 00:15:18.591 They came toward us 00:15:18.831 --> 00:15:20.524 beating us with nightsticks 00:15:21.444 --> 00:15:22.458 with bullwhips 00:15:23.500 --> 00:15:25.584 and trampling us with horses. 00:15:26.361 --> 00:15:28.696 I was hit in the head 00:15:28.696 --> 00:15:31.267 and just left lying there, and 00:15:31.267 --> 00:15:36.661 I felt like it was the last protest. 00:15:40.150 --> 00:15:43.038 The violence and brutality which ended this march 00:15:43.038 --> 00:15:44.272 quickly provoked plans 00:15:44.272 --> 00:15:46.942 for a much larger one, now joined 00:15:46.942 --> 00:15:49.148 by Dr. Martin Luther King. 00:15:49.492 --> 00:15:52.197 "We've gone too far now to turn back." 00:15:52.481 --> 00:15:54.053 Dr. King was determined to focus 00:15:54.053 --> 00:15:56.453 national attention on Selma 00:15:56.453 --> 00:15:58.255 and he enlisted the help of supporters 00:15:58.255 --> 00:15:59.857 from New York to Hollywood. 00:16:00.323 --> 00:16:05.763 "The reverend said 'The white man can't 00:16:05.763 --> 00:16:07.856 cool it because he never dug it.'" 00:16:08.368 --> 00:16:09.550 Marlon Brando was the one who 00:16:09.550 --> 00:16:12.434 got me involved in Civil Rights, honestly. 00:16:14.474 --> 00:16:15.474 I was walking down the street 00:16:15.474 --> 00:16:17.605 and he just pulled up in a car 00:16:17.605 --> 00:16:22.447 and he said 'How'd you like to go down to Selma?' 00:16:24.919 --> 00:16:27.540 and I said 'Selma?' 'Selma, we're gonna have a march 00:16:27.540 --> 00:16:29.489 from Selma to Montgomery. You wanna come?' 00:16:30.188 --> 00:16:31.645 and I said, 'Sure.' 00:16:35.533 --> 00:16:37.395 Before the second march had even begun 00:16:37.395 --> 00:16:40.178 the reverend James Reeb, a Civil Rights sympathizer, 00:16:40.178 --> 00:16:42.906 was beaten to death by a white mob. 00:16:42.906 --> 00:16:45.260 But rather than intimidating the marchers 00:16:45.260 --> 00:16:48.048 that violence seemed to give them a powerful ally. 00:16:49.012 --> 00:16:52.305 That night I was with Martin Luther King Jr. 00:16:52.305 --> 00:16:54.670 in Selma when we heard Lyndon Johnson 00:16:54.670 --> 00:16:57.512 we watched him make one of the greatest speeches 00:16:57.512 --> 00:17:00.199 any American president ever made 00:17:00.199 --> 00:17:01.782 on the whole question of Civil Rights. 00:17:02.951 --> 00:17:03.950 "Their cause 00:17:03.950 --> 00:17:06.860 must be our cause too. 00:17:06.860 --> 00:17:09.559 It's all of us 00:17:09.559 --> 00:17:11.394 who must overcome 00:17:11.394 --> 00:17:13.934 the crippling legacy of 00:17:13.934 --> 00:17:16.657 bigotry and injustice. 00:17:18.226 --> 00:17:20.730 And we shall overcome." 00:17:22.993 --> 00:17:28.015 Just think of a President with a southern accent 00:17:28.015 --> 00:17:32.185 from Texas saying to the Congress of the United States 00:17:32.185 --> 00:17:33.579 "We shall overcome." 00:17:34.282 --> 00:17:39.090 Finally, popular protest and public power 00:17:39.090 --> 00:17:40.230 had come together. 00:17:40.542 --> 00:17:42.529 And Dr. King literally started crying. 00:17:43.319 --> 00:17:44.920 Tears came down his face. 00:17:45.919 --> 00:17:49.376 I knew then that we would make it 00:17:49.376 --> 00:17:50.864 from Selma to Montgomery. 00:17:56.143 --> 00:17:58.509 On March 21st 1965, 00:17:58.509 --> 00:18:00.980 3200 people set out from Selma. 00:18:05.887 --> 00:18:08.831 Four days later, as the march approached Montgomery, 00:18:08.831 --> 00:18:11.155 there were 25,000 people marching. 00:18:14.190 --> 00:18:15.304 It was an amazing moment. 00:18:15.304 --> 00:18:17.266 It was scary, it was scary. 00:18:17.464 --> 00:18:18.764 There were helicopters everywhere, 00:18:18.764 --> 00:18:22.133 like some sort of angry bugs. 00:18:22.133 --> 00:18:23.593 And there were only confederate flags 00:18:23.593 --> 00:18:25.526 flying, we were the only ones with American flags. 00:18:26.339 --> 00:18:28.411 You know, and Martin Luther King gave a great speech. 00:18:29.445 --> 00:18:31.979 "All the world today knows 00:18:31.979 --> 00:18:34.272 that we are here and we are standing 00:18:34.272 --> 00:18:37.177 before the forces of power 00:18:37.177 --> 00:18:39.111 in the state of Alabama saying 00:18:39.111 --> 00:18:40.381 'We ain't gon' let nobody 00:18:40.381 --> 00:18:41.581 turn us around.'" 00:18:44.886 --> 00:18:47.220 There's very few times in your life that you know 00:18:47.220 --> 00:18:49.427 that you're someplace that, you're in a moment 00:18:49.427 --> 00:18:52.829 where--this is one of those things that as long as there's time 00:18:52.829 --> 00:18:54.887 there's gonna be this moment, and that was it. 00:18:56.179 --> 00:18:58.464 On August 6th, Lyndon Johnson signed 00:18:58.464 --> 00:19:00.277 the Voting Rights Act, 00:19:00.277 --> 00:19:02.602 finally guaranteeing Black Americans 00:19:02.602 --> 00:19:04.538 the right to vote. 00:19:05.638 --> 00:19:07.475 But just as it reached a high point 00:19:07.475 --> 00:19:09.012 the Civil Rights Movement seemed 00:19:09.012 --> 00:19:11.981 to split into warring factions. 00:19:11.981 --> 00:19:14.480 A revolution of rising expectations 00:19:14.480 --> 00:19:16.817 stirs people to believe that 00:19:16.817 --> 00:19:18.352 the promised land is there. 00:19:19.134 --> 00:19:21.758 It was when change was coming, when there was 00:19:21.758 --> 00:19:23.725 a sense of possibility, 00:19:23.725 --> 00:19:27.428 that everything broke loose and went wild. 00:19:28.465 --> 00:19:30.902 "You're better than the white men. 00:19:30.902 --> 00:19:33.003 You are better than the white men. 00:19:33.003 --> 00:19:34.505 And that's not saying anything." 00:19:34.739 --> 00:19:36.540 Despite the gains of recent years 00:19:36.540 --> 00:19:38.540 it seemed to many Blacks that the pace of change 00:19:38.540 --> 00:19:41.043 was too slow, that Martin Luther King 00:19:41.043 --> 00:19:41.978 was too accomodating. 00:19:42.782 --> 00:19:45.652 These Blacks began to adopt the separatist 00:19:45.652 --> 00:19:48.325 rhetoric of the charismatic Malcolm X. 00:19:48.755 --> 00:19:50.696 I used to hear Malcolm say, "If a man 00:19:50.696 --> 00:19:53.360 slaps me in the face, I'm not turning my cheek. 00:19:53.360 --> 00:19:55.857 If I slap him back, he won't slap me again." 00:19:55.857 --> 00:19:57.477 That made a lot of sense. 00:19:58.865 --> 00:20:00.203 Malcolm at that time said "Clearly, alright, 00:20:00.203 --> 00:20:01.415 what we need is power" 00:20:02.037 --> 00:20:03.874 while King would say "What we need is morality 00:20:03.874 --> 00:20:06.732 to help..." Malcolm said "Forget about them 00:20:06.732 --> 00:20:08.766 just get guns and that's how they gonna regulate the problem." 00:20:09.270 --> 00:20:11.072 The contradiction, however, was that 00:20:11.072 --> 00:20:12.642 Martin Luther King was involved in action, 00:20:12.642 --> 00:20:13.943 confronting the enemy, 00:20:13.943 --> 00:20:16.747 Malcolm X was not. 00:20:16.747 --> 00:20:17.713 So what you had to do was 00:20:17.713 --> 00:20:19.653 take the confrontation of King, 00:20:19.653 --> 00:20:20.910 and match it as best you can with 00:20:20.910 --> 00:20:22.121 the philosophy of Malcolm X, 00:20:22.121 --> 00:20:23.656 which is precisely what we did. 00:20:24.582 --> 00:20:25.828 "We want black power." 00:20:28.786 --> 00:20:30.769 The response was overwhelming. 00:20:36.561 --> 00:20:39.623 In 1966, militants in Oakland California 00:20:39.623 --> 00:20:42.619 founded the Black Panther party for self-defense 00:20:42.619 --> 00:20:44.848 and told America that the fight for Civil Rights 00:20:44.848 --> 00:20:46.512 would never be the same. 00:20:49.737 --> 00:20:51.716 If you come down here jumping on us 00:20:51.716 --> 00:20:53.284 and beating us up like you were beating up 00:20:53.284 --> 00:20:54.952 the peaceful protesters with your dogs, 00:20:54.952 --> 00:20:55.621 your cattle prods, 00:20:55.621 --> 00:20:57.267 and are shooting them up, 00:20:57.267 --> 00:20:59.623 murdering these peaceful protesters, 00:20:59.623 --> 00:21:01.161 we're not gonna take it. 00:21:02.349 --> 00:21:04.752 When you start shooting, we're shooting back. 00:21:04.752 --> 00:21:08.401 "The revolution has come" 00:21:09.682 --> 00:21:12.442 The call by militant leaders for total revolution 00:21:12.442 --> 00:21:14.333 received a sympathetic ear in 00:21:14.333 --> 00:21:17.340 many of the nation's impoverished inner cities, 00:21:17.340 --> 00:21:20.710 where the Great Society was still nowhere to be seen. 00:21:21.610 --> 00:21:26.515 We're in the south, where we had a powerful, nonviolent movement. 00:21:26.515 --> 00:21:29.787 People had a way to channel their frustration. 00:21:29.787 --> 00:21:31.732 In many poor areas of America, 00:21:31.732 --> 00:21:34.350 especially outside of the South, 00:21:34.350 --> 00:21:36.629 the fires of frustration, 00:21:36.629 --> 00:21:38.775 the fires of discontent, 00:21:38.775 --> 00:21:40.598 were beginning to burn. 00:21:41.699 --> 00:21:45.027 In 1967 that anger and discontent exploded 00:21:45.027 --> 00:21:47.750 into violence in Newark, New Jersey, 00:21:47.750 --> 00:21:50.412 Detroit, Michigan, and more than 100 other cities. 00:21:50.412 --> 00:21:54.274 80 people died in urban riots that summer. 00:21:59.730 --> 00:22:03.121 Lyndon Johnson was shocked, I think, 00:22:03.121 --> 00:22:04.026 at the riots. 00:22:04.732 --> 00:22:05.575 And angry. 00:22:06.073 --> 00:22:07.756 He took it personally 00:22:07.756 --> 00:22:11.886 and he got angry at Blacks for being 00:22:11.886 --> 00:22:15.438 ungrateful for these great laws that had been passed. 00:22:16.708 --> 00:22:18.006 Despite his disappointment, 00:22:18.534 --> 00:22:20.235 Lyndon Johnson believed that his 00:22:20.235 --> 00:22:22.137 war on poverty could still succeed. 00:22:22.569 --> 00:22:24.206 All he needed was more money. 00:22:24.807 --> 00:22:26.039 Well, the president said to me, you know, 00:22:26.039 --> 00:22:29.445 "We have this war going on now in Vietnam. 00:22:29.445 --> 00:22:32.048 It's going to take up all of the extra money we have 00:22:32.048 --> 00:22:35.688 right now to fight that war. But," he said, 00:22:35.688 --> 00:22:37.311 "Sarg, look, we're gonna be out of that war, 00:22:37.311 --> 00:22:40.181 that'll be finished in the next 12 to 18 months. 00:22:40.181 --> 00:22:42.494 As soon as that's finished, I will take the money 00:22:42.494 --> 00:22:45.065 we are now devoting to the war in Vietnam 00:22:45.065 --> 00:22:46.889 and we'll put it in the war against poverty." 00:22:48.655 --> 00:22:50.269 Obviously, that never happened. 00:23:00.574 --> 00:23:02.688 In 1964, a British rock band 00:23:02.688 --> 00:23:04.245 showed up in the United States 00:23:04.245 --> 00:23:06.087 that was described by one historian as 00:23:06.087 --> 00:23:08.685 "raunchier and more rebellious than the Beatles." 00:23:09.520 --> 00:23:10.255 They were called 00:23:10.255 --> 00:23:11.556 the Rolling Stones 00:23:12.263 --> 00:23:14.989 and in the mid-1960s they created 00:23:14.989 --> 00:23:17.594 a song that became an anthem. 00:23:18.529 --> 00:23:20.263 I had one of the first early 00:23:20.263 --> 00:23:23.034 Norelcos, sort of cassette players 00:23:23.034 --> 00:23:27.439 and I'd put it next to the bed 00:23:27.439 --> 00:23:30.212 and with the guitar 00:23:30.212 --> 00:23:31.685 and I crashed out 00:23:31.685 --> 00:23:33.244 and when I woke up in the morning 00:23:33.244 --> 00:23:35.584 I noticed that the tape had gone to the end 00:23:35.584 --> 00:23:37.074 and I'd put it in at the beginning 00:23:37.074 --> 00:23:41.826 and I ran it back, pushed play, and 00:23:41.826 --> 00:23:43.677 somewhere in the middle of the night 00:23:43.987 --> 00:23:45.857 I had woken up and played 00:23:45.857 --> 00:23:50.130 "duh, duh, duh, I can't get no satisfaction." 00:23:50.794 --> 00:23:53.522 And it's there, the verse and the chorus are there, 00:23:53.522 --> 00:23:55.803 and then it stops and the rest of the tape 00:23:55.803 --> 00:23:57.104 is me snoring. 00:23:59.208 --> 00:24:05.768 "I can't get no satisfaction" 00:24:06.541 --> 00:24:08.280 Rock music had accompanied America's youth 00:24:08.280 --> 00:24:09.842 on its journey to the forefront 00:24:09.842 --> 00:24:11.645 of the nation's consciousness. 00:24:11.645 --> 00:24:14.282 With songs like "Satisfaction," #1 on the charts 00:24:14.282 --> 00:24:17.986 in 1965, the journey took quite a radical turn. 00:24:25.418 --> 00:24:27.969 The message is the ordinary 00:24:27.969 --> 00:24:30.171 order of things is 00:24:30.171 --> 00:24:33.242 either broken or corrupt. 00:24:34.469 --> 00:24:36.168 I can't get no satisfaction, 00:24:36.168 --> 00:24:37.772 I gotta do something wilder. 00:24:37.772 --> 00:24:39.273 That's how you get your satisfaction. 00:24:42.176 --> 00:24:45.581 The message it sends is "cut loose" 00:24:48.818 --> 00:24:50.620 It was music that gave us 00:24:50.620 --> 00:24:51.627 as an entity 00:24:51.627 --> 00:24:54.904 as a community, a sense of cohesion 00:24:54.904 --> 00:24:56.392 and a sense of existing. 00:24:56.392 --> 00:24:59.130 A real sense of being more than a few demonstrations. 00:25:00.288 --> 00:25:02.788 The Rolling Stones, Janis Joplin, the Doors, 00:25:02.788 --> 00:25:05.472 Bob Dylan, all of them sang in a way that 00:25:05.472 --> 00:25:07.115 invited challenge 00:25:07.115 --> 00:25:08.340 to the establishment. 00:25:08.972 --> 00:25:10.267 I think people were absolutely 00:25:10.267 --> 00:25:12.408 waking up but they didn't know exactly 00:25:12.408 --> 00:25:14.350 how to get out of bed yet. 00:25:14.350 --> 00:25:15.552 And what to do when they put their feet 00:25:15.552 --> 00:25:16.522 on the floor. 00:25:20.714 --> 00:25:22.051 We began to look around for 00:25:22.051 --> 00:25:25.991 things to do which would alert people 00:25:25.991 --> 00:25:28.098 to other possibilities, other ways 00:25:28.098 --> 00:25:28.826 of living. 00:25:35.132 --> 00:25:37.292 For some, other possibilities meant completely 00:25:37.292 --> 00:25:39.391 rejecting the values that had united 00:25:39.391 --> 00:25:41.236 their parents' generation. 00:25:43.072 --> 00:25:44.819 I mean, where is it written in stone 00:25:44.819 --> 00:25:47.577 that people have to work from 9 to 5? 00:25:48.744 --> 00:25:50.817 The Haight-Ashbury section of San Francisco 00:25:50.817 --> 00:25:52.807 became the center of the counter culture. 00:25:53.540 --> 00:25:57.277 Suddenly, there was an environment 00:25:57.277 --> 00:26:00.295 where your personal history did not matter. 00:26:00.295 --> 00:26:02.196 Nobody cared who your parents were, 00:26:02.196 --> 00:26:05.101 whether you were rich, whether you were poor, 00:26:05.101 --> 00:26:06.871 you get up every day 00:26:06.871 --> 00:26:09.963 and you had no idea what the day would bring. 00:26:10.998 --> 00:26:13.443 There were the greatest looking women 00:26:13.443 --> 00:26:16.072 parading up and down the street 00:26:17.571 --> 00:26:20.077 There was a sense of adventure 00:26:20.077 --> 00:26:22.269 random combinations 00:26:27.865 --> 00:26:29.895 You could catch a woman's eye and 00:26:30.651 --> 00:26:32.390 offer her your arm 00:26:32.390 --> 00:26:35.192 and without a word, walk away 00:26:35.192 --> 00:26:36.360 and spend an afternoon 00:26:36.360 --> 00:26:38.901 making love and if you didn't talk 00:26:38.901 --> 00:26:40.338 that was okay. 00:26:41.226 --> 00:26:43.363 I was looking for a new way to express myself. 00:26:43.363 --> 00:26:45.299 You know, and I think everybody was. 00:26:45.865 --> 00:26:50.838 And unfortunately, a lot of people went to drugs. 00:26:50.838 --> 00:26:53.615 Because it came naturally out of 00:26:53.615 --> 00:26:55.410 it came naturally out of what we were doing 00:26:55.410 --> 00:26:56.244 at the time. 00:26:56.912 --> 00:26:58.548 "It's a food for the soul. 00:26:58.548 --> 00:27:00.482 Right now I'm on LSD. 00:27:00.482 --> 00:27:03.553 Every color is going through my mind." 00:27:04.153 --> 00:27:05.689 The psychedelic drug LSD became 00:27:05.689 --> 00:27:08.626 a rite of passage for many in the counter culture. 00:27:10.328 --> 00:27:12.063 These were awfully hard on people 00:27:12.063 --> 00:27:14.331 who were in their 40s at that time. 00:27:14.331 --> 00:27:15.432 Just awfully hard, 00:27:15.432 --> 00:27:18.011 with the hair and the drugs and the music, 00:27:18.011 --> 00:27:19.470 and the dirty clothes, 00:27:19.470 --> 00:27:22.445 and the foul language. It all became 00:27:22.445 --> 00:27:25.608 regardless of the political position one took. 00:27:26.942 --> 00:27:28.979 "Brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, 00:27:28.979 --> 00:27:30.471 if you truly care about your country..." 00:27:30.471 --> 00:27:32.859 Despised by many people in the older generation, 00:27:33.325 --> 00:27:36.050 the social ferment of the 1960s would nonetheless 00:27:36.050 --> 00:27:38.919 change forever the way young Americans 00:27:38.919 --> 00:27:40.559 looked at themselves. 00:27:42.541 --> 00:27:44.495 A long-dormant struggle for equality 00:27:44.495 --> 00:27:46.362 was revived by the new freedom that many 00:27:46.362 --> 00:27:47.832 young women were feeling. 00:27:48.274 --> 00:27:49.501 Women were given more choice 00:27:49.501 --> 00:27:50.534 with the introduction 00:27:50.534 --> 00:27:52.181 of the birth control pill. 00:27:52.637 --> 00:27:56.307 We could now control when and if 00:27:56.307 --> 00:27:58.176 we chose to have children. 00:27:59.866 --> 00:28:01.169 And it helped to propel 00:28:01.169 --> 00:28:02.634 I think, the development of 00:28:02.634 --> 00:28:04.182 the Women's Movement. 00:28:04.725 --> 00:28:07.429 In the 1960s, discrimination against women 00:28:07.429 --> 00:28:09.224 was solidly entrenched, 00:28:09.224 --> 00:28:10.458 particularly in the workplace. 00:28:11.126 --> 00:28:14.525 Job ads were divided into sections 00:28:14.525 --> 00:28:16.255 marked "male" and "female." 00:28:16.924 --> 00:28:18.259 Airline stewardesses were 00:28:18.259 --> 00:28:20.464 simply dismissed on their 32nd birthday. 00:28:21.731 --> 00:28:23.634 "The great majority of American women 00:28:23.634 --> 00:28:25.833 are not participating in terms of 00:28:25.833 --> 00:28:27.470 their full potential ability." 00:28:27.838 --> 00:28:29.874 In 1966 a group of feminists, 00:28:29.874 --> 00:28:31.733 most notably Betty Friedan, 00:28:31.733 --> 00:28:34.614 founded the National Organization for Women. 00:28:35.247 --> 00:28:36.387 This was a turning point 00:28:36.387 --> 00:28:37.822 in the Women's Liberation movement 00:28:37.822 --> 00:28:39.078 that was typical of many struggles 00:28:39.078 --> 00:28:39.842 at the time. 00:28:40.644 --> 00:28:42.947 Thus began another era of militancy. 00:28:43.583 --> 00:28:45.287 "Women have been particularly oppressed 00:28:45.287 --> 00:28:46.402 and now women are on the move 00:28:46.402 --> 00:28:47.818 and there ain't gon' be no stopping us." 00:28:48.754 --> 00:28:50.991 This one was--was my struggle, 00:28:50.991 --> 00:28:52.495 in which I was the actor. 00:28:52.961 --> 00:28:56.468 "Miss America stands 5 feet 7, 125 pounds 00:28:56.468 --> 00:28:59.793 and measures 36-24 1/2-36." 00:29:00.307 --> 00:29:02.977 On September 7th 1968 00:29:02.977 --> 00:29:04.580 the new Miss America was crowned 00:29:04.580 --> 00:29:06.615 in Atlantic City, New Jersey. 00:29:07.917 --> 00:29:11.877 Outside, 200 women demonstrated against the pageant. 00:29:12.480 --> 00:29:15.415 They threw their bras and their high heeled shoes, 00:29:15.415 --> 00:29:18.251 which they called "instruments of oppression," 00:29:18.251 --> 00:29:20.723 into so-called "freedom trash cans." 00:29:21.160 --> 00:29:24.426 "Women, use your brains, not your bodies." 00:29:29.000 --> 00:29:31.137 We had learned that from the Civil Rights Movement. 00:29:31.574 --> 00:29:33.367 You demonstrate, you stand up, 00:29:33.367 --> 00:29:34.702 you get in their face, 00:29:34.702 --> 00:29:35.871 and you get behind the scenes 00:29:35.871 --> 00:29:37.337 and you pass your legislation. 00:29:37.735 --> 00:29:39.374 We learned. We were political. 00:29:46.555 --> 00:29:48.658 For American soldiers in the field, 00:29:49.044 --> 00:29:50.993 it was grinding and bloody. 00:29:50.993 --> 00:29:54.596 But by mid-1966 the Vietnam war was 00:29:54.596 --> 00:29:56.990 settling into just the kind of conflict 00:29:56.990 --> 00:29:59.058 that General William Westmoreland 00:29:59.058 --> 00:30:00.561 believed America would win, 00:30:01.429 --> 00:30:02.463 a war of atrition. 00:30:06.849 --> 00:30:09.006 What General Westmoreland didn't recognize 00:30:09.386 --> 00:30:10.808 was that the North Vietnamese 00:30:10.808 --> 00:30:13.646 also saw a war they could win. 00:30:13.646 --> 00:30:16.404 As long as they didn't meet the Americans head-on. 00:30:17.086 --> 00:30:20.311 The booby-trap, the land mine, 00:30:20.881 --> 00:30:23.802 the raid, the ambush, 00:30:26.482 --> 00:30:29.061 any square yard of Vietnam 00:30:29.455 --> 00:30:32.292 could be this absolutely utterly peaceful place 00:30:32.292 --> 00:30:33.427 one second. 00:30:34.160 --> 00:30:36.162 And the next second, 00:30:36.162 --> 00:30:37.968 it was the end of the world. 00:30:42.242 --> 00:30:44.907 We are not fighting a conventional war. 00:30:44.907 --> 00:30:48.502 We would go in a kind of surprise attack 00:30:48.502 --> 00:30:50.450 and then withdraw immediately. 00:30:53.230 --> 00:30:54.297 Very effective. 00:30:56.648 --> 00:30:59.184 As the US grew frustrated by its inability 00:30:59.184 --> 00:31:02.463 to score decisive victories against the North Vietnamese 00:31:02.463 --> 00:31:04.325 and the Vietcong, 00:31:04.325 --> 00:31:06.604 the administration continued to pour more men 00:31:06.604 --> 00:31:09.697 and more machinery into Vietnam. 00:31:09.697 --> 00:31:12.837 By mid-1967, close to half a million Americans 00:31:12.837 --> 00:31:14.939 were involved in the fight. 00:31:18.812 --> 00:31:20.435 In the face of these escalations, 00:31:20.435 --> 00:31:22.593 the North Vietnamese continually 00:31:22.593 --> 00:31:24.836 adapted their strategies. 00:31:25.187 --> 00:31:28.319 The only option they never discussed among themselves 00:31:28.319 --> 00:31:29.489 was surrender. 00:31:29.990 --> 00:31:33.996 As long as alive Vietnamese there, the resistance 00:31:33.996 --> 00:31:35.698 would go on. 00:31:38.323 --> 00:31:41.194 We just wouldn't accept two Vietnams. 00:31:53.786 --> 00:31:56.484 For American troops, most of whom left Vietnam 00:31:56.484 --> 00:31:58.743 after one year of duty, things were not quite as clear 00:31:58.743 --> 00:32:01.906 at all. Almost anyone was a potential enemy. 00:32:01.906 --> 00:32:03.826 As the North Vietnamese and the Vietcong 00:32:03.826 --> 00:32:07.522 enjoyed widespread sympathy in South Vietnam 00:32:07.522 --> 00:32:09.792 in such an atmosphere of confusion 00:32:09.792 --> 00:32:12.464 areas were conquered and then abandoned. 00:32:12.464 --> 00:32:15.432 Villages saved, and then destroyed. 00:32:15.835 --> 00:32:18.949 "I believe I am correct in saying that in the 00:32:18.949 --> 00:32:21.306 past four and a half years 00:32:21.306 --> 00:32:27.648 the Vietcong have lost 89,000 men." 00:32:29.919 --> 00:32:31.678 Many Americans were dying, too, 00:32:31.678 --> 00:32:34.224 without ever understanding what they'd been fighting for. 00:32:40.005 --> 00:32:41.996 There was one kid who was previously injured 00:32:41.996 --> 00:32:43.760 and I had my arms around him 00:32:43.760 --> 00:32:48.006 trying to comfort him, but he was losing consciousness, 00:32:48.006 --> 00:32:50.390 and he just kept staring up 00:32:50.390 --> 00:32:52.008 with an expression on his face of 00:32:52.008 --> 00:32:56.237 "Why? Why? What's happening to me? What's happening?" 00:32:57.038 --> 00:33:00.407 By then, 1967 and 68, 00:33:00.407 --> 00:33:02.575 when we were losing hundreds a week 00:33:02.575 --> 00:33:04.745 in that same fashion, you had to start 00:33:04.745 --> 00:33:07.113 questioning how much longer could this go on. 00:33:13.496 --> 00:33:16.561 On January 20th 1968 US Marines 00:33:16.561 --> 00:33:19.500 got involved in a battle with the North Vietnamese 00:33:19.500 --> 00:33:22.222 near the American base at Khe Sanh. 00:33:22.222 --> 00:33:25.140 It was the beginning of a critical campaign. 00:33:26.070 --> 00:33:27.895 For several weeks the North Vietnamese 00:33:27.895 --> 00:33:30.464 hammered Khe-Sanh and its defenders. 00:33:34.334 --> 00:33:35.470 We were moving our way up 00:33:35.470 --> 00:33:39.186 the trench line and we came to a machine gun book. 00:33:39.186 --> 00:33:41.723 Someone was firing a machine gun. 00:33:41.723 --> 00:33:43.423 And I said "Where's everybody else?" 00:33:43.423 --> 00:33:44.794 and he said "There isn't anybody else." 00:33:44.794 --> 00:33:46.348 And I said "Where is your crew?" 00:33:46.348 --> 00:33:47.787 And he said "They're gone." 00:33:48.753 --> 00:33:50.458 The siege continued throughout February 00:33:50.458 --> 00:33:52.429 and into March. 00:33:59.267 --> 00:34:02.038 At home television viewers were shocked 00:34:02.038 --> 00:34:03.874 by the spectacle. 00:34:08.313 --> 00:34:10.574 Jack Bronson was a medic. 00:34:11.279 --> 00:34:13.454 They screamed for me, 00:34:13.454 --> 00:34:15.189 they screamed for their mothers. 00:34:15.189 --> 00:34:17.459 It is not like the movies; 00:34:17.459 --> 00:34:20.667 you are looking at this person 00:34:20.667 --> 00:34:24.189 who is begging not to die. 00:34:24.189 --> 00:34:26.491 And the first question they always would ask me: 00:34:26.491 --> 00:34:27.960 "Am I gonna make it, doc?" 00:34:27.960 --> 00:34:29.964 And I had to lie a lot of times. 00:34:34.234 --> 00:34:37.832 When I was hit, I knew I was hurt bad. 00:34:37.832 --> 00:34:39.546 And I can remember laying there 00:34:39.546 --> 00:34:40.750 and I could hear the Vietnamese. 00:34:40.750 --> 00:34:43.609 Cause they kept throwing grenades at us. 00:34:43.609 --> 00:34:44.844 I could hear them talking. 00:34:44.844 --> 00:34:47.211 And I can remember saying to myself, 00:34:47.211 --> 00:34:48.719 "You are going to die." 00:34:49.390 --> 00:34:51.621 I got the telegram telling me 00:34:51.621 --> 00:34:55.754 that he was very seriously hurt 00:34:55.754 --> 00:34:58.796 and that the prognosis was not good. 00:35:00.030 --> 00:35:03.526 He was so far away that if I could only see him 00:35:03.526 --> 00:35:05.839 it wouldn't be so bad. 00:35:05.839 --> 00:35:07.745 But he's way out there... 00:35:07.745 --> 00:35:08.912 he didn't know whether I loved him, 00:35:08.912 --> 00:35:12.636 or if I could only hold his hand or something 00:35:12.636 --> 00:35:15.042 cause I didn't expect to see him again. 00:35:16.513 --> 00:35:18.715 Severely wounded Jack Bronson would return 00:35:18.715 --> 00:35:22.274 home to a country unsure what to make of his sacrifice. 00:35:23.023 --> 00:35:25.463 In late March, the North Vietnamese simply 00:35:25.463 --> 00:35:29.031 melted away and Khe-Sanh became another 00:35:29.031 --> 00:35:32.058 in a growing tally of dubious victories, 00:35:32.058 --> 00:35:34.530 a base desperately fought over, 00:35:34.530 --> 00:35:36.129 and then abandoned. 00:35:38.240 --> 00:35:41.207 "Yeah, I don't know, they say we're fighting for something. 00:35:41.207 --> 00:35:42.531 I don't know." 00:35:42.831 --> 00:35:45.149 By now many Americans on the homefront 00:35:45.432 --> 00:35:48.412 didn't see the Vietnam war as one of national survival. 00:35:49.746 --> 00:35:52.215 Opposition to the high price being paid 00:35:52.215 --> 00:35:54.547 in American servicemen began to build. 00:35:56.421 --> 00:35:59.656 As we began to see what was happening 00:35:59.656 --> 00:36:02.459 in that war, watching on television, 00:36:02.459 --> 00:36:03.491 it was stunning. 00:36:03.864 --> 00:36:05.295 You know, it was something that 00:36:05.295 --> 00:36:07.820 we had never seen--we'd never seen that face of war-- 00:36:07.820 --> 00:36:09.412 you know, it was always World War II. 00:36:09.412 --> 00:36:12.618 The Good War. And nobody ever saw the Korean War 00:36:12.618 --> 00:36:15.005 I mean, how many pictures have you seen of the Korean War? 00:36:16.004 --> 00:36:19.764 Suddenly, there it was, 6:00, and you know, there were bodies, 00:36:19.764 --> 00:36:21.446 and firefights. 00:36:21.712 --> 00:36:25.020 What made the experiences of the Vietnam war generation 00:36:25.020 --> 00:36:28.546 so different from those of the World War II: 00:36:28.546 --> 00:36:30.284 their parents hadn't had TV when they were kids. 00:36:30.782 --> 00:36:32.488 That made them different from every generation 00:36:32.488 --> 00:36:33.621 that had gone before. 00:36:37.025 --> 00:36:39.034 The anti-war demonstrators in the United States 00:36:39.034 --> 00:36:41.968 now took their protest to a new level. 00:36:45.033 --> 00:36:47.204 took part in one of the growing number of demonstrations 00:36:47.204 --> 00:36:48.402 against the war. 00:36:49.519 --> 00:36:51.464 The confrontation was very intense, 00:36:51.464 --> 00:36:54.834 the cops very suddenly had moved in on people 00:36:54.834 --> 00:36:56.595 and started to crack heads. 00:36:56.595 --> 00:36:58.851 And they beat people pretty badly. 00:37:01.161 --> 00:37:02.450 There was a lot of blood, 00:37:03.084 --> 00:37:05.723 there were a lot of injuries, 00:37:05.723 --> 00:37:07.712 and all of a sudden people understood 00:37:07.712 --> 00:37:12.398 themselves as being at odds 00:37:12.398 --> 00:37:14.534 with the powers that be. 00:37:14.534 --> 00:37:16.070 That, for us, was a signal that we needed 00:37:16.070 --> 00:37:18.511 to come back strong, 00:37:18.511 --> 00:37:20.074 become more militant. 00:37:20.607 --> 00:37:22.610 In trying to stop the war in Vietnam 00:37:22.610 --> 00:37:25.604 the demonstrations intensified the war at home. 00:37:32.814 --> 00:37:36.585 There was a class dimension to the Vietnam protests. 00:37:36.751 --> 00:37:39.021 To a large extent it was college kids 00:37:39.021 --> 00:37:41.056 saying they didn't want to go fight this 00:37:41.056 --> 00:37:43.914 war that they didn't see much point in 00:37:44.261 --> 00:37:47.386 so the blue collar kids did. 00:37:47.832 --> 00:37:49.491 It was one of the uglier things about 00:37:49.491 --> 00:37:53.337 the Vietnam war, to an extent 00:37:53.337 --> 00:37:55.395 it was fought by the less fortunate 00:37:55.395 --> 00:37:57.164 in the society. 00:38:01.815 --> 00:38:03.917 In February and March 1968 00:38:03.917 --> 00:38:05.719 television brought another set of horrifying 00:38:05.719 --> 00:38:07.755 images home to Americans. 00:38:17.027 --> 00:38:19.425 US soldiers were fighting for their lives 00:38:19.664 --> 00:38:20.800 from one end of South Vietnam 00:38:20.800 --> 00:38:21.935 to the other, 00:38:21.935 --> 00:38:24.706 the US embassy in Saigon was being overrun. 00:38:30.396 --> 00:38:32.871 This was the Tet Offensive, a military defeat 00:38:32.871 --> 00:38:34.636 for the North Vietnamese, 00:38:34.636 --> 00:38:37.178 but ultimately a political victory. 00:38:37.648 --> 00:38:38.979 Despite hearing repeatedly 00:38:38.979 --> 00:38:40.790 that there was light at the end of the tunnel 00:38:40.790 --> 00:38:42.750 most Americans came to realize they were not 00:38:42.750 --> 00:38:46.258 going to win the war in Vietnam anytime soon 00:38:46.258 --> 00:38:47.524 if ever. 00:38:48.691 --> 00:38:51.993 On March 31st 1968, with the presidential election 00:38:51.993 --> 00:38:53.474 just a few months away, 00:38:53.474 --> 00:38:55.342 an exhausted Lyndon Johnson 00:38:55.342 --> 00:38:57.669 seemed to come to the same conclusion. 00:38:58.179 --> 00:39:00.181 "I shall not seek 00:39:01.141 --> 00:39:03.304 and I will not accept 00:39:03.954 --> 00:39:06.735 the nomination of my party for another term 00:39:07.219 --> 00:39:08.074 as your president." 00:39:08.608 --> 00:39:10.076 And I looked at the guys in the bunker 00:39:10.076 --> 00:39:12.415 with me and I thought, I said, 00:39:12.415 --> 00:39:14.116 "He's getting out." 00:39:14.218 --> 00:39:15.290 And the other guy says, "What do you mean?" 00:39:15.290 --> 00:39:16.942 I said "He's not gonna run for president, 00:39:16.942 --> 00:39:19.664 he's not running anymore. 00:39:19.664 --> 00:39:21.960 He's getting out, he's the commander in chief. 00:39:21.960 --> 00:39:25.030 If he's getting out, what are we doing here?" 00:39:37.109 --> 00:39:40.441 In America 1968 "peace and understanding" 00:39:40.441 --> 00:39:43.145 were fast becoming distant memories. 00:39:46.128 --> 00:39:50.951 As the Vietnam war became the longest war in American history 00:39:50.951 --> 00:39:55.028 over 100 college campuses were wracked by furious protests. 00:39:56.712 --> 00:39:58.485 In the spring many of the nation's cities 00:39:58.485 --> 00:40:01.563 exploded once again with racial violence, 00:40:03.953 --> 00:40:09.278 propelled by the terrible events of April 4 1968. 00:40:10.173 --> 00:40:11.251 When I heard of the news 00:40:11.251 --> 00:40:12.708 that Martin Luther King had been shot 00:40:12.708 --> 00:40:14.812 in Memphis, and then seconds later 00:40:14.812 --> 00:40:16.780 killed in Memphis, it was 00:40:16.780 --> 00:40:19.878 as if a member of my family had been killed. 00:40:19.878 --> 00:40:21.895 And it said to me, "Here's this guy 00:40:21.895 --> 00:40:23.051 who's been going around 00:40:23.051 --> 00:40:25.986 preaching peace and non-violence 00:40:25.986 --> 00:40:28.392 and peaceful resistance, 00:40:28.392 --> 00:40:29.958 and now someone has shot him dead." 00:40:30.958 --> 00:40:34.400 And it shattered my belief that we could 00:40:34.400 --> 00:40:37.701 work these things out in a peaceful way. 00:40:37.701 --> 00:40:39.098 "It's perhaps well to ask what kind of 00:40:39.098 --> 00:40:42.241 a nation we are and what direction 00:40:42.241 --> 00:40:43.320 we want to move in." 00:40:43.944 --> 00:40:45.212 That night, Robert Kennedy 00:40:45.212 --> 00:40:46.172 the leading candidate 00:40:46.172 --> 00:40:48.143 for the Democratic Presidential nomination, 00:40:48.143 --> 00:40:49.854 announced King's death to a room full 00:40:49.854 --> 00:40:51.108 of campaign workers. 00:40:52.547 --> 00:40:55.315 In Kennedy, many Americans, both black and white, 00:40:55.315 --> 00:40:57.718 saw a man who could turn back the tide 00:40:57.718 --> 00:40:58.686 of violence. 00:40:59.100 --> 00:41:01.156 Two months after the death of Martin Luther King, 00:41:01.156 --> 00:41:03.131 Robert Kennedy was killed. 00:41:05.896 --> 00:41:07.865 My wife came into the bedroom and said, 00:41:07.865 --> 00:41:11.538 "You know what they've done now? 00:41:11.538 --> 00:41:12.839 They shot Bobby Kennedy." 00:41:12.839 --> 00:41:14.373 This "they," a sort of paranoid moment 00:41:14.373 --> 00:41:16.981 of our own, the sense of 00:41:16.981 --> 00:41:19.270 everything coming undone. 00:41:22.675 --> 00:41:24.479 And you never quite get over it, 00:41:24.479 --> 00:41:26.647 you no longer feel safe, 00:41:26.647 --> 00:41:28.751 in your life the way you did as a child, 00:41:28.751 --> 00:41:30.160 when your parents were alive. 00:41:34.046 --> 00:41:35.837 In those turbulent days, 00:41:36.121 --> 00:41:38.896 you felt you never really will be safe. 00:41:40.193 --> 00:41:42.015 "Will the convention be in order" 00:41:42.015 --> 00:41:44.039 In late August the city of Chicago 00:41:44.039 --> 00:41:47.003 was the host city for the Democratic National Convention. 00:41:49.345 --> 00:41:54.092 "Will the sergeant of arms enforce order in the convention" 00:41:55.073 --> 00:41:56.243 Delegates from all 50 states 00:41:56.243 --> 00:41:59.487 arrived to find Chicago an armed camp 00:42:00.283 --> 00:42:02.184 The city's mayor, Richard Daly, 00:42:02.184 --> 00:42:04.823 knew that tens of thousands of young demonstrators 00:42:04.823 --> 00:42:06.329 were also on their way. 00:42:06.490 --> 00:42:10.025 "Chairman, they're here as guests of the Democratic party 00:42:10.025 --> 00:42:12.771 and let them conduct themselves accordingly." 00:42:12.906 --> 00:42:15.730 They were determined to have their say. 00:42:16.462 --> 00:42:18.167 All across the country the new Left was 00:42:18.167 --> 00:42:20.111 trying to provoke people into actions 00:42:20.111 --> 00:42:21.872 that would escalate the whole thing. 00:42:24.631 --> 00:42:26.733 You never saw people so provoked in all your life 00:42:26.733 --> 00:42:28.011 as those Chicago police, 00:42:28.011 --> 00:42:29.536 the things those kids said to them. 00:42:29.972 --> 00:42:32.215 "I take one look at these pigs out here 00:42:32.215 --> 00:42:33.393 and I know what America's about." 00:42:34.053 --> 00:42:35.428 The gestures they made to them, 00:42:35.428 --> 00:42:38.019 deliberately designed to bring on this reaction. 00:42:56.839 --> 00:42:58.943 I volunteered to go to the Democratic National Convention 00:42:58.943 --> 00:43:01.045 because I wanted to see it. 00:43:01.045 --> 00:43:03.143 And I can remember up at 2 in the morning 00:43:03.143 --> 00:43:04.673 trying to get to sleep 00:43:04.673 --> 00:43:06.506 it was a little difficult because 00:43:06.506 --> 00:43:08.922 our windows were open, it was very hot, 00:43:08.922 --> 00:43:10.789 and all we could hear was the chant 00:43:10.789 --> 00:43:12.690 "F you, Daly" 00:43:13.493 --> 00:43:15.061 It was quite an event. 00:43:15.331 --> 00:43:16.598 The Democratic party was coming apart 00:43:16.598 --> 00:43:18.122 right there in the streets of Chicago. 00:43:19.292 --> 00:43:21.162 It seemed to many the country itself 00:43:21.162 --> 00:43:22.574 was coming apart. 00:43:22.997 --> 00:43:26.466 In November, America elected a new president 00:43:26.466 --> 00:43:30.003 who promised to heal the nation's wounds. 00:43:30.003 --> 00:43:32.006 Richard Milhouse Nixon. 00:43:32.006 --> 00:43:33.913 "We're gonna sock it to 'em!" 00:43:50.383 --> 00:43:52.254 Just as American unity and confidence 00:43:52.254 --> 00:43:53.959 seemed to be crumbling, 00:43:53.959 --> 00:43:56.767 a man from Ohio lands on the moon. 00:43:57.422 --> 00:43:58.892 We'll see that on the next episode 00:43:58.892 --> 00:44:01.940 of the Century: America's Time. 00:44:01.940 --> 00:44:03.776 Thank you for joining us. 00:44:03.776 --> 00:44:05.140 I'm Peter Jennings.