Lecture 11 – America in the 1960s, 1960-1969

The Cuban Missile Crisis

• On April 17, 1961, about 1400 American anti-Castro ( communist leader in Cuba) exiles trained and armed by the CIA landed in Cuba
• Invaders were unsupported and fell under Castro’s control
• Attempted invasion was a major failure for JFK and looked like an attempt at 19^th century imperialism

The Bay of Pigs

Minutes Before JFK’s Assassination

Lee Harvey Oswald

Jack Ruby Shoots Oswald

The Nation Responds

• The nation mourns the loss of JFK
• Millions watch the return of Air Force One to DC, carrying his coffin and his widow in a bloodstained suit
• Stunned Americans struggle to understand how such an event could happen

Medicare and Medicaid

• LBJ Creates these two programs
• Medicare: provides the elderly with health care
• Medicaid: authorizes federal funding for poor people’s health care

The Black Movement of the 1960s

• African Americans mobilized a large movement that struck down legal discrimination in the South
• Calls for fair treatment in the South, but when the movement calls for changes in other parts of the country, there is major backlash and eventually the movement crumbles
• It also gets fragmented, which we will discuss in the next few slides

Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Gives nation visibility as the leader of a massive civil rights movement
• Expands the movement and brings blacks into direct confrontation with the people and institutions that segregated
• Encouraged peaceful protests, such as sit-ins at lunch counters that refused to serve blacks

Malcolm X

• Led another part of the civil rights movement, calling for economic as well as civic justice
• Challenged the ethos of nonviolence
• Worked for the Nation of Islam, which drew on a long tradition of black nationalism
• Considered himself a Black Muslim
• Called for black pride and autonomy and separation from the “corrupt (white) society”
• Advocated self-defense against white violence
• Attracted a large following in urban ghettos
• A more militant movement
• Both MLK Jr and Malcolm X are assassinated

Black Power

• Leader of a student group, in 1966, gave the movement a new name, demanding “we want black power” at a rally in Mississippi
• Rejects assimilation with white society as it assumed white superiority
• African Americans were encouraged to develop their own businesses, schools, and political organizations
• Black Panther Party was organized to guard against police brutality

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

• An organization (pronounced “snick”) that embraces civil disobedience and nonviolence
• Calls for the fair treatment of blacks
• Lead demonstrations and protests
  • Face hostile treatment from whites
  • Are called racial slurs
  • Had food poured on them

Containment Under Johnson: Cold War Continues

• Vietnam was seen as a place that could fall under communism
• If there was a Communist victory in Southeast Asia it was believed that Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines might then fall as well (called the domino theory)
• It was very important to the United States that communism be contained and did not spread to Vietnam

Problems in Vietnam

• US entered into all out war in Vietnam under Johnson in 1965 and to begin bombing Northern Vietnam, which was particularly under the threat of falling to communism
• Gulf of Tonkin resolution was passed: Congress granted LBJ the right to “all necessary measures to repel any armed attacks against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression.” War widens under Johnson when he rejects overtures of peace from North Vietnam, which called for the US to withdraw and a coalition government in South Vietnam

Student Response to Vietnam

• The war is very costly to American and Vietnamese lives, including Vietnamese civilizans
• The war is widely protested in the United States, especially by students
• This is a part of the counterculture movement that grows in the 1960s

Development of Counterculture

• Many white youths express dissent with the era as well
• Support black freedom struggle, launched student protests, and opposed the war in Vietnam
• Challenged established institutions and traditional values

Kent State

• On May 4, 1970 at Kent State in Ohio, several hundred students protested the war in Vietnam
• Suddenly, some guardsmen opened fire into the crowd and killed four unarmed students

The Election of 1968

• Republican Richard Nixon easily becomes the victor in this campaign
• From the beginning of his political career, Nixon was associated with scandal
• Nixon would inherit the war in Vietnam, be involved in a political scandal, and ultimately resign from office