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HOW MUCH CREDIT CAN ANTI-WAR MOVEMENTS HOLD FOR ENDING AUSTRALIAN AND AMERICAN INVOLVEMENT IN THE VIETNAM WAR?

SYNOPSIS

Gerster and Bassett assert that “whatever their earnest historiographical intentions” may be, much of the literature written about the Sixties , “are contrived exercises in myth-making” . This essay argues that the historical accounts and assessments, not only of the Sixties as a whole, but parts from that period, which, for the purpose of this essay, will be the Vietnam War and opposition to it, have also become “buttressed by conflicting myths” . The reasons why the term ‘myth’ will be applied to those different arguments concerning the amount of credit anti-war movements can hold, for ending Australian and American involvement in the Vietnam War are as follows. Firstly, the application of the word ‘myth’ suggests that some aspects of that era have been blown out of proportion or, have taken on connotations that may not be entirely correct. Secondly, while such myths may not be wholly true, they are nonetheless important, as they “inform part of ...

Posted by: Jason Pinsky

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