All language subtitles for The.War.at.Home.1979.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG2_English

♪ [Marching band music]

Madison, Wisconsin 1963...

Year-end news in review.

Madison, Wisconsin, 1963...

The city voted "the Best Place
to Live in America,"

and the home of
the University of Wisconsin.

Fanning out along 4 lakes,

surrounded by dairy farms
and cheese factories,

Madison's elm-lined streets
stretch like slow dancers

from the state capitol.

♪ [Marching band music
continues]

Madison, Wisconsin, 1963...

It was an unprecedented
boom year for Madison.

More than 50 new
retail stores opened,

the University's enrollment
jumped 8%,

the suburbs grew and
commuter bus ridership swelled.

♪ [More marching band music]

Everyone did "“The Twist."”

Stiletto thin pants are worn so
tight they look like tattoos,

and bouffant hair-dos
balloon out just like

madras shirt-waist dresses.

Ron Vander Kelen, the Badgers'
star quarterback,

hurled the pigskin in the
3rd largest football stadium

in the Big Ten,

leading
the University of Wisconsin

all the way to the Rose Bowl.

Madison is
the American prescription.

It's the All-American town.

♪ [Marching band music fades
out]

Ken, why do you plan to burn
your personal check in front of

the Internal Revenue Service
building

here in Madison this morning.

I would like to protest
against the income tax system

because of where
most of the money goes.

Fifty cents
on the dollar goes for

what the government likes
to call "national defense,"

euphemistically, "defense."

And 10% is earmarked
especially for Vietnam,

which I consider to be
an immoral war.

I should really know
how to start a fire,

I was an Eagle Scout
when I was a kid.

♪ [Guitar music with harmonica]

♪ Oh the foes will rise with
the sleep still in their eyes

♪ and they'll jerk from their
beds and think they're dreamin'

♪ But they'll pinch themselves
and squeal

♪ and they'll know
that it's for real

♪ the hour that the ship comes
in

♪ And they'll raise their hands,
say we'll meet all your demands

♪ and we'll shout from the bow
your days are numbered

♪ And like Pharaoh's tribe,
they'll be drownded in the tide

♪ And like Goliath
they'll be conquered

It was just a year ago
that you ordered

stepped up aid to Vietnam.

There seems to be a good deal
of discouragement

about the progress.

Can you give us your assessment?

No, we are putting in
a major effort in Vietnam.

As you know, we have about

10 or 11 times as many men there
as we had a year ago.

They are...

We've had
a number of casualties.

We've put in
an awful lot of equipment.

We're going ahead with
the Strategic Hamlet proposal.

Some phases,
the military program

has been quite successful.

There is
great difficulty however

in fighting a guerilla war.

You need 10 to one or 11 to one,

especially in terrain
as difficult as South Vietnam.

But I'm...

So we're not...

We don't see the end of
the tunnel but I must say,

I don't think it's darker
than it was a year ago.

In some ways, lighter.

When I first came to Madison,
I was looking for something

I could do to help change
what was going on,

and I just happened
to run into some people

who were working with

Americans for Reappraisal
of Far Eastern Policy.

In working with that group,
I looked into

a lot of U.S. foreign policy.

And foreign policy
was directed to getting control

of the Far East
or the Pacific Basin.

So I began to see this

as I looked through
Eisenhower's statements

and some of the others.

Now let us assume
that we lose Indochina.

If Indochina goes,

the tin and the tungsten

that we so greatly value from
that area would cease coming.

Somewhere along the line,
this must be blocked.

It must be blocked now.

So by the time Vietnam
really became an issue I was...

I had already looked into the
background of our policy there.

Today, the United States
is in Vietnam...

The first
antiwar demonstrations

specifically involving Vietnam

took place in October,

about mid-October of 1963,

a month before President Kennedy
was assassinated.

And the main thrust
of the demonstration was to

to attack the presence of U.S.
military advisors in Vietnam.

It seemed there must have been
about 150, maybe 200 people

who were present, listening
to a number of speeches.

I don't know that anybody felt
that they were

going to accomplish anything
by being there.

They were there more
as a matter of principle.

...we become totally receptive
and we walk along like sheep.

♪ [Dramatic background music]

Swift and sure has been
U.S. retaliation

for communist P.T. Boat attacks
on the high seas.

This is theMaddox,

one of the two destroyers
that were attacked while

patrolling international waters

in the Gulf of Tonkin
near North Vietnam.

Warplanes from two carriers,

theTiconderoga
and theConstellation

avenged the unwarranted
red assault

with 64 sorties to
North Vietnam P.T. bases.

The U.S. sorties were launched
for one purpose...

as a warning to the communists

that unprovoked attacks
will bring prompt response.

Now the story was false
to begin with

because the destroyer Maddox
was not on a routine patrol

in international waters.

She had penetrated the coastal
waters of South Vietnam.

She was within their waters.

She was a spy ship.

She was not on a routine patrol
like a destroyer.

She had been equipped
the week before with

elaborate electronic devices,

and she was doing this
at a very time when

South Vietnamese P.T. boats,

supplied by the United States,

with crews trained by
the United States,

were bombarding
the North Vietnamese ports.

In other words, we were engaged
in an act of aggression

at the very time Johnson
was preparing to claim

that we were
fighting aggression.

We Americans know,

although others
appear to forget,

the risk of spreading conflicts.

We still seek no wider war.

One...

Two...

Three...

Four...

Five...

Seven...

Six...

Six...

Eight...

Nine...

Ten, nine, eight, seven,

six, five, four, three,

two, one, zero.

[Thunderous nuclear blast]

[President Lyndon B. Johnson]
These are the stakes...

To make a world in which
all of God's children can live.

Or to go into the darkness.

We must either
love each other...

Or we must die.

[Narrator] Vote for
President Johnson on November 3.

The stakes are too high
for you to stay home.

A month before the election,

President Johnson said that
he was not going

to send American troops

to fight a war that

Asian troops
should fight themselves.

♪ Fighting soldiers from the sky

♪ Fearless men who jump and die

♪ Men who mean

♪ just what they say

♪ The brave men

♪ of the Green Berets

On this Monday morning
in Vietnam,

at my direction,

United States aircraft

have struck the lines of supply
which support

the continuing movement

of men and arms

against the people and
the government of South Vietnam.

Our air strikes on North Vietnam

from the beginning

have been aimed
at military targets

and have been controlled
with the greatest of care.

[Explosion]

So when the bombings start,

the demonstrations immediately
pick up,

and the community in effect
was ready to react to it.

There was already
a highly mobile,

politically sophisticated group

that was the core of
a couple hundred people

who over the next 4 or 5 years
were really

in my estimation, the heart
of the Antiwar Movement.

What do you think of
this protest demonstration

against the actions in Vietnam?

All they're doing is
giving propaganda to

the North Vietnamese,
the Red Chinese

or the Communists.

And I think...

if they would sit down
intelligently...

go over what is
being done in Washington,

they might go along
with President Johnson,

cause he is trying
to get out of there,

but he's doing it in a little
bit more diplomatic way.

The first day I got off the bus
almost in Madison,

I saw the literature table of

The Committee to End
The War In Vietnam.

That was quite a shock,
cause I was still

basically coming out
of northern New York,

an all-American boy

whose political values
were conservative.

But also I was quite curious,
so I always took the literature.

This was after I'd already
been enrolled in ROTC.

When I first went to the
university, my father said,

"Don't get involved
in any organizations.

"Don't get involved
in any demonstrations

"because the government
will get your name

"and they'll put it
in their file and

"they'll use it against you
for the rest of your life."

So I said, "Well," I said
to myself, "I'm not getting...

"I'll just stand by
the sidelines,

"and watch
and see what's going on here,

"but I don't want
to get involved."

I finally decided I was gonna go
to an SDS meeting.

I remember the night
I decided I was gonna go,

I ate dinner and then
I decided I wasn't gonna go

cause I was sure
there was something that

I was going to get in trouble
about for going to the meeting.

Then I decided I would go,
then I decided I wouldn't.

I decided I'd walk down
by the union

and see what was going on.

Maybe I'd go in,
maybe I wouldn't.

Finally, I said,
"To hell with it,

"I'm being intimidated,

"I'm supposed to be able
to do what I want."

So I went to the meeting.

What attracted me about SDS
was the fact that

they were interested
in the total picture.

It wasn't an antiwar group
in any sense at all.

My feeling was that
there had to be a total change.

I wasn't really interested
in politics,

I was just tired of the life

that was being presented to me,
and I wanted to change that.

I recall now that at that time

it was a relatively
quiet campus.

And someone told me
when I took the job that

my most difficult job would be
dealing with the ruffled dignity

of a professor who had a problem
with his parking ticket.

Well, of course, that's
all changed...

And I soon saw that the campus
was anything but

a quiet campus.

There were extensive
demonstrations

all over the country,

not just in the Madisons
or the Berkeleys

or the East Coast universities.

I remember Iowa and
the University of Illinois

had had demonstrations
and in reaction

to the bombings in Vietnam.

So what happened is
the government sent out

these "truth teams"
to the campuses.

And they were gonna go
from campus to campus,

and tell us the morality
of what was taking place

and the political
justification for it.

I think one of the problems
you people are gonna have is

you think by coming here and
telling us what the policy is,

then we will agree with it.

I think you're working
under the assumption

that we don't realize
what the policy is.

I don't think anything...

This is what Johnson has told us
and this is what we understand.

This is what we understand
by these missions.

Have I said anything
to you at all?

I'm telling you
what I understand.

All I plan to do is,
as I said earlier,

to come here with this group

to share our experience
with you

to discuss this question
with you.

They would go and they'd lecture
for half an hour, 45 minutes.

I remember the kind of thing
we went through...

The representative of the
Defense Department was asked,

"What does napalm do?"

So he gave a technical
description of napalm,

being a gel and so on.

The crowd was rumbling.

Question came up,
"What does napalm do?"

He says,
"Well, it can catch on fire."

Kept on hitting away,
"What does napalm really do?"

The general said, "You really
want to know what it does?

"It burns, it burns people."

Finally out of frustration,

he decided
to just tell the truth,

which everybody already knew.

It was a good thing
to confront students

with what you called
a "truth squad".

And a lot of students
are much more convinced now

than they were before
that we're not very likely

to get candid answers from
anyone in the administration

in defense of our policy
in Vietnam.

It was in the spring of 1965
that we saw the first...

overt action
against the government.

About 8 to 12 people, I can't
remember the exact number,

went out to the airbase
here in Madison to, in effect,

a citizen's arrest of the
base commander for war crimes.

The airbase was a symbol of the
military in our community and

that's where the confrontation
had to take place.

The leaders of the Antiwar
Movement were infuriated.

The whole issue
of civil disobedience

threatened the hell out of them

because they felt that only
legalistic methods would attract

the majority of middle class
students they hoped to reach

as members of the community.

There were threats that came
into us from Truax Airbase

that we would be shot.

The place was covered
with journalists.

We asked to see the head of the
airbase to have him informed

that we wanted
entrance to the base

and that we planned
to arrest him.

He refused to come out.

We maintained
our presence there and

people were arrested
and carried away to jail.

[Protesters chanting]

What do you think of the
Peace Movement in this country?

I don't think that the people
that are advocating it

or standing behind it understand
the overall situation.

They don't understand
the Asiatic mind

and they don't understand
that we're endeavoring to stop

communism on the line
over there,

and not permit it to spread
to free nations.

A number of us, including

Congressman Ben Rosenthal,
who is here today with me,

had asked that the Foreign
Affairs Committee hold hearings,

public hearings,
on the question of Vietnam.

They have not done so.

It is my feeling then

that if there are not to be
hearings in Washington

on this crucial question,

we ought to have hearings
at the grassroots, back home.

And this, as far as I know, is
the first effort of this type.

This hearing is a brave thing.

And it is good that it is
first held in the Midwest

which has often been called
"“a hotbed of lethargy."”

What is not good is that we
must wait until a time of crisis

before putting the machinery
of democracy into high gear.

Gentlemen...

I ask you
to tell your colleagues

that we in the Peace Center

like thousands of students
throughout this country

are willing
to defend and support

democratic and social revolution

if only this government
has the courage to do so.

But if it does not,

we believe that
this government must be changed.

After having heard
about the hearings,

I felt it my duty
to speak out my concern.

I have four children
and I'm a housewife.

I have never done anything
political other than voting,

and I'm not particularly
interested in politics.

But I do read the papers,
and I'm confused by the news.

I talk to people

and I don't like what I hear.

If this war is so unpredictable
and goes on for 6 years,

7 years, decades...

my children could be drawn
into this horror.

I have read and heard about
some of the atrocities,

and it is unbearable
for me to know

that our boys are taught
and made

to use
napalm and phosphorous bombs.

I try to teach my children
the value

of individual human worth,

and I don't want this
destroyed by my country.

I do not have
a solution to the war,

but I do want a solution,
and I want you to find it.

Thank you.

[Applause]

♪ Oh I marched to the battle
of New Orleans

♪ at the end of
the early British war

♪ The young land started
growing,
the young blood started flowing

♪ But I ain't marchin' anymore

♪ For I've killed
my share of Injuns

♪ in a thousand different fights

♪ I was there at
the Little Big Horn

♪ I heard many men a-lying,
I saw many more a-dying

♪ but I ain't marchin' anymore

♪ It's always the old to lead us
to the wars

♪ Always the young to fall

♪ Now look at all we've won
with the saber and the gun

♪ Tell me is it worth it all?

[Protesters]
Hell, no! We won't go!

Hell, no! We won't go!

I wasn't gonna go,
that much I knew.

I had already made a decision,
no matter what happened,

I wasn't going.

So it wasn't that difficult
to cope with the situation.

This is just at the time now

when the draft card burnings
were taking place.

And the draft then
was just merely

a means of which to attack

the military and try
and disrupt the military effort.

The draft was very important
at that time

to our young people because

everyone at college age
was a potential for

serving in the armed forces.

This meant an interruption
to their education.

Also it meant potentially
the effect of them

fighting in an unpopular war.

That was spring of '66.

The government was trying to get

more and more people
to fight in Vietnam.

For the first time,

they were talking about
drafting college students.

so this meant that
not only poor people

were going to have to
fight in Vietnam,

but also children
of the middle class.

If you took this test
as a college student,

you passed the test,
you got to stay in school.

If you flunked the test,
you got sent to Vietnam

is basically what it was.

You lost your student deferment.

So they would have these tests
out at the Field House,

and we went out there
and we would picket.

And eventually some demands were
drafted against the university,

insisting that they not

participate with the
Selective Service System,

that they not send in
grade points,

that they not give
the test on campus.

And these demands were delivered
to the university

with an ultimatum.

Well...

"Do it or else."

I don't remember
whether we said

what "the else" was.

Well some of the politicos,
shall we say,

the professional
BS-ers that we had around them

were up negotiating
with the administration.

a meeting was held in front of

the administration building

to hear the answer.

Well, none of the politicos
were there yet,

so myself and Bob Zwicker
and John Cumbler

moved that we take over
the Administration Building.

And the people who
were there said, "Sure".

And we all walked in
and sat down.

The sit-in started.

There was an underground network
of people

putting out the word to go in...

to sit in at the new
Administration Building.

It was fairly ingenious.

People were being asked
to go in

and get copies
of their transcripts duplicated,

saying that they'd
lost their student ID cards.

All kinds of things like that.

to get into the building and
have access

prior to the time
the building closed,

so as not to alert the fact that
there was something coming down.

And slowly over the hours,
it begins to grow,

so that by after dinner
that evening,

I guess there probably were
1,000, 1,500 in the building.

I was in the building
most of the time.

I was down there in a sense
for temperature control.

And my observations
were such that,

that I saw no evidence
of any hostility here.

But in evening,
during the evening hours,

the crowds would swell.

There would be various speakers

speaking on the issue of
the war in Vietnam and

and the draft
and how it affected

young people who had them.

This is what I'd come
to the university for

and never found it
in any classes.

There was a real feeling
of openness, of learning,

that people were studying
together actually

right there in the building

because the draft was not
the only issue.

The wider issue was
the war in Vietnam,

and people were talking about
the war in Vietnam.

I was learning things
I had never learned before

and I was learning them in a way
I had never learned before.

The major thing that
I got out of that sit-in,

I think everybody else did was
a sense of doing things together

of fighting back together.

There was an incredible
sense of community that

I don't think anybody had ever
experienced in there before.

The thing lasted
for maybe 4 or 5 days,

and during the course
of that time,

the Wisconsin Student
Association voted its support,

the first political stand
it had ever made.

The Inter-Fraternity Council
voted its support.

The student newspaper,
The Daily Cardinal,

supported it, the first
thing it had ever done.

That forced fraternity people
to think about the war.

And I was much more,
I guess I was

in the liberal wing
by that time of my fraternity.

And we supported the sit-in.

If you can show us how to
get out of Vietnam without

destroying the freedom,

what little freedom
is left there,

we'll put the placards
that are around here

in the hall of fame...

rather than the hall of shame.

The truth is that the protest

has but one alternative...

Just leave.

Just leave.

That's what Hitler said.

We do not intend to just leave.

[Bombs exploding]

[More bombs]

[Panicked voices, sirens]

The decision
to strike these targets

was made to restrict and
to make more costly

the enemy's
infiltration efforts.

We believe this is essential
to help safeguard

the freedom of South Vietnam

and to save the lives
of those South Vietnamese,

Americans, Australians,

New Zealanders and Koreans

who are fighting
to insure that freedom.

I think the bombing of Hanoi
and Haiphong struck me so deeply

because it brought back a memory
of my own childhood.

One of the earliest memories
I have as a kid is

having to wear a copper dog tag
in a public school in New York.

I asked the teacher,
"Why do we have to wear

"these identification tags?"
And she said,

so that when a bomb hit us,

and in case we were incinerated,

these tags would allow us
to be identified.

I remember the day
that Hanoi-Haiphong was bombed

by the United States,

thinking about that incident.

♪ [Vietnamese instrumental
music]

♪ [Vienamese music fades out]

We were trying to build
a mass movement.

What I mean by that is

a movement dealing
with all the issues,

of as many people as possible.

we spent the summer working on
forming a tenant union,

setting up our own newspaper,

trying to develop
communications.

I mean we were trying to build
a whole counterculture.

And at that time,
I for one thought

the war in Vietnam
would be over within months.

I felt that the war in Vietnam

was not the right place
to center the organizing,

that the right place
was on all social issues,

to try to create
a new society...

I was head of SDS
during that time,

for the next year and
that's the way I guided it.

In 1966 when
I first came to Madison...

The black students

weren't really that involved
in the war issue...

their main concern was
the Black Power question,

the question that Stokely
Carmichael had raised that year

as a result of
the James Meredith march

through Mississippi.

We wanted to make it
well known to ourselves

and to the community at large

that we wanted
to identify ourselves

as black students
in particular.

And we didn't want
to just fall into

the general organization,
as it were.

We had announced on
the first day of school

that we would
not allow any speakers

from the federal government

to speak
at the university campus.

So several people in turn,
including Hubert Humphrey,

had cancelled planned speeches.

They sent Teddy Kennedy sort of
as a junior brother lackey

to test out the water
to see how hot it was.

We went out to the,
I don't remember...

the Cow Palace.

Teddy Kennedy
was coming in to speak.

Pat Lucey
was running for governor.

In walks Kennedy and

people were well-placed
throughout the audience.

I was in the audience

because I was still taken
by the Kennedys,

and was really excited about
seeing Teddy Kennedy.

So our strategy for
the Kennedy demonstration

was to put
a large number of people,

maybe 30 or 40,

behind the platform
so that when we shouted,

the microphones on the platform
would pick up our voices

and carry them out
into the auditorium.

At the same time,
a member of the audience,

one of our group
was to start speaking

and addressing questions
to Senator Kennedy.

What is that, what's your...?
Why don't we...

Are you a spokesman?

Would you like to ask
the first question?

So there I am sitting

and all of a sudden people
start screaming,

"What about the war?
What about the war?"

You know, you know the...

We know what you're against.

The real question is
what you're for.

It was an interesting situation
because he actually

invited one of our members
onto the platform with him

and was able

in the course of a few quick,
if you will, wise-ass remarks,

to win the audience to his side.

I'd like to talk about the war,
it's a complicated issue.

Now I think we can extend

that wonderful bargain
that we had and...

Oh no, it wasn't a bargain.

You asked me to stay,
and talk for 3 minutes.

The only thing that I'd like
to hear and which, I would,

is what the solution is.

At that point,
the question before us was...

Do we allow him to finish

because he has won
a rhetorical victory over us?

Or do we stick
to our political principles

that our campus is
not gonna be used as a platform

for the administration?

And we quickly made
the latter decision,

and disrupted the speech.

Let me say that under the...

under the questions of...

Under... I hear the question.

[Disruptive yelling]

I was caught in the middle
because here I was again,

the ROTC cadet.

I thought Kennedy
had a responsibility

to talk about it,

and I thought that he was
shirking that duty.

I also thought that, well,

maybe that the committee
did more to discredit themselves

by disrupting the meeting.

Cause I don't think that you'd
hope to list a persuasion

with the kind of representation
you've made this afternoon,

but I'm delighted to
at least express

what my position would be.

I'd be unalterably opposed
at the present time of

unilateral withdrawal of
U.S. troops in Southeast Asia.

The next day, petitions went out
all over the campus.

But at that time, I was really
torn personally

between the guilt of feeling,

"Wow, we really did something
to embarrass Senator Kennedy,"

But on the other hand,
we were right.

I felt guilty that I didn't know
whether to sign it or not.

So I eventually didn't sign it.

The embarrassment
of confrontation,

I hadn't yet come to terms
with personally.

[Sounds of helicopters,
machine guns firing]

We had to tell the government

in unmistakable terms

that we would not
support the war,

that we thought it was
immoral and illegal.

And we wanted to make a protest
that they could not ignore...

They couldn't just wash off.

♪ [Vietnamese instrumental
music]

In 1967, I left Madison to go
to North Vietnam

with a group of Quakers
to deliver medical supplies

to the North Vietnamese
civilians.

We sailed from Japan
on a 50-foot boat,

which was a ketch,
a two-masted schooner.

We carried $10,000 worth
of medical supplies

lashed to the deck of this boat.

There were 8 men
and myself on the trip.

As you can guess,
I got the job of cooking.

Mrs. Boardman, has it been
difficult for you to arrive at a

very overt commitment
such as this?

Emotionally and intellectually?

Oh anything like this is hard.

But once you've carried a sign,

once you've made the first step,
it's easier the next time.

You always feel like a fool.

Is that what you mean?

Some people thought that
I was some kind of a heroine.

And a lot of people thought
that I was a traitor.

I was very confident that
what I was doing was right.

It just didn't occur to me
that it might not be,

even though some people
said it wasn't.

I was sure it was
the right thing to do.

As it turned out here in 1967,

Dow was accused not only by
students here at Wisconsin, but

by students practically
across the country of

manufacturing napalm.

And a napalm bomb,
when it shatters on impact

is supposed to severely burn,

destroy whatever it comes
in contact with.

Dow Chemical was
a big corporation here.

And Dow Chemical recruited
chemical engineers

and other professional people
from the campus

for careers
in their various operations.

So we decided that since Dow
was coming in February,

the Dow recruiter, we would
also have a demonstration.

So at our
15-person meeting still,

we moved that we would sit-in,

and hold the guy there until
he was willing to leave campus.

So it was decided
that we were gonna have

a picket
around these recruiters.

What we had was these pictures
from Ramparts Magazine

of napalmed kids.

Almost everybody had
a picket sign like that.

And we were gonna go
into the buildings

and stand
right outside the office

and form a gauntlet,

and force these people who
were gonna recruit for the jobs

to see what
they were getting into.

The idea was to confront people

and make them face up
to what was going on.

We took the attitude that,

and I think SDS took this
all along

through its whole history,

that you don't
talk people into things.

You take an action and force
them to confront the situation.

What really seared
my mind in the Dow demonstration

was the counter-pickets.

They were my fellow ROTC cadets.

And they were carrying signs.

The only one that
I really remember was,

"Napalm is good for V.C. acne."

It just confirmed everything
that the...

the anti-Dow
demonstrators were saying.

In the fall,
Dow was coming back and...

the university had really

challenged us
to try to stop them

by its actions the last time.

It was clear that the university
was gonna protect Dow.

There was a lot of talk
about free speech...

People were...
free speech for the recruiters,

free speech for capitalists
to make money,

free speech
for people to kill people.

Today along with my "Roseleip
attacks Cardinal" stories,

down below is an item by
the Students

For A Democratic Society

to block a chemical company
from operating

because it's helping
the boys in Vietnam,

furnishing material
for those boys.

I think that's very un-American.

There were protest activities
going on across the country

and that this is the week
that they were to

culminate their activities

at the Pentagon building
in Washington, D.C.

And according to the rhetoric,

they were to
confront the war-makers.

On the first day, it was
a very peaceful, orderly,

well-organized and
legal demonstration.

They leafleted people,
they used a bullhorn and

explained their reasons to

anybody that wanted
to listen to them.

And I ask you to think it over,

to go to your newspapers,
to go to the editors,

explain what your position is.
They don't understand you.

They don't understand
what kind of weapon this is.

And I think
it's incumbent upon you

not only to see your editors,

but to engage in some kind of
political activity in this city.

[Chanting "Dow Must Go!"]

The climate on campus was

to really do a job
on Dow the next day.

So the plan was that

people were going to go up
to the Commerce Building again

and sit down and be carried off.

Another
nonviolent demonstration.

[Chanting, drumming,
horns blowing]

People at that time's
consciousness about the war was

at a stage
of conscious active resistance.

There was
a straight determination

to resist being removed
from that building

if the police entered.

[Crowd noise, drums beating]

[Protesters singing]
♪ We shall not be moved...

There was some noise,
there was some singing.

I recall that, "“Dow must go!"

"Bring the troops home!"

"Ralph must go."

I was not there as a protester,

I was not there was as
an observer for the university.

I was there to observe
for myself what was going on.

Within maybe 5 or 10 minutes of
looking out over this corridor,

you could just feel a tension
mount in the air.

You felt that
somebody was going to blunder.

In following procedures that
we've gone through before,

I simply called
the chief downtown and

indicated that I needed
some more help on the campus.

He said that
he'd provide the help

and would come
to campus himself,

which is exactly what he did.

I cannot quote this exactly,
but these are the words

that I remember
to the best of my ability,

"Let's go in and
take a crack at 'em."

[Protesters yelling, booing]

Fascists!

Fascists!

I was in the building
at Dow II...

standing right by the door when
the head of the campus police

comes in and announces,

"Everybody,
you have one minute,"

...or something like that...
"to evacuate the building."

And without even another word,
in come 35 policemen.

To this day it's debatable
as to what happened

when the police made their first
move into the building.

But once they made
that first move,

regardless of what happened,

all they did was come in,
4 or 5 at a time,

with clubs swinging and

beat the hell out of everybody
in their path

as they swept down the corridor.

Everybody then just ran for it.

At one moment, the police appear
at the front of the corridor,

swinging.

And it seemed to me, it was
like 10, maybe 5 seconds,

suddenly I was
in the front of the group.

Just everybody in front
of me disappeared.

I don't know
where those people went.

They couldn't have gone
into the walls.

That's how fast
they moved down that corridor.

people in the rear were
trying to go out the back door,

not panicking,

but there just wasn't time to
get everybody behind us out.

And that's when
they started swinging at us.

I had a heavy lambskin jacket
which I pulled up over my head.

The cops were chasing people.

One guy got chased
into the bathroom.

Soglin was on the floor
in the corner of the hall.

There were 3 cops around him

and they were just pounding
the crap out of him.

He was all curled up in a ball
and he had a leather jacket on.

And I remember,

I can clearly remember
the sound of those clubs

hitting that leather.
[Clubbing sound]

After this initial impact,

it was a relatively
short period of time

when we were able to accomplish
the objective of

clearing the corridor area.

As a matter of fact
it took 12 minutes,

but the problem then transferred
itself from within the building

to outside of the building.

[Protesters screaming,
police beating]

[More student screaming]

[Female protester]
Dow must go!

[Panicked shouting]

I was working in my office,

a couple of students came
screaming into the office

and said that the students are
getting smashed over the heads

in the Dow demonstrations and
moved out bodily,

and rounded up.

And I should come and stop it.

I was naive enough
to dash out in the belief that

I could tell the police
to stop it.

The students were naive enough
to believe that if

a professor told police
to stop beating students,

that they would stop it.

It seems to me that that
really sums up

the historic episode,
and so you see...

This famous picture, there are
about 6 students right there

that were all my students.

I was standing there,
telling the students to leave.

I turned to the police officer
and I said,

"I'm a professor, I want the
students to clear out of here,

"and you clear out of here."

Obviously while I was
explaining to one cop,

another one swung at me,

the students jumped on him and
there's that historical picture

and it just turned into
another fray.

[Panicked yelling from crowd]

The whole place was
like a war zone.

The teargas was going off
at that point

and that was what...

The critical moment was
the crowd began to gather

because classes were just over
when the cops moved in.

And so suddenly,
with the crowd getting larger,

and the crowd getting meaner,

they start using the teargas.

And suddenly it's like
4,000, 5,000 kids

who were being affected
by this thing.

They wanted
to produce casualties.

They sent 65 people
to the hospital.

So we were outraged
and I can just remember...

All I can remember is rage,
just screaming...

"Seig Heil."

[Crowd chanting "Seig Heil"]

Suddenly all these fine,
middle class kids

at the University of Wisconsin

are being tear-gassed
and clubbed.

I don't know if it's
a time shock or what,

but there was an awful lot
of political...

politicalization that took place
in that 15 - 20 minutes

when the cops just let go
with everything they had.

And that night,
something called a strike began.

...A general strike!

♪ There's something
happening here

♪ What it is ain't exactly clear

♪ There's a man
with a gun over there

♪ telling me I got to beware

♪ I think it's time we stop,
children, what's that sound?

♪ Everybody look
what's going down

Reports will indicate that
a squad of 50 Madison policemen

were called to the scene,

and were met by an angry,
vicious mob

of 300 or more protestors

led by in many cases,

professionals
from out of the city.

And that virtually individual
officers' reports would indicate

that at times they were fighting
for their own lives.

♪ There's battle lines
being drawn

♪ Nobody's right
if everybody's wrong

♪ Young people
speaking their minds

♪ Getting so much resistance
from behind

♪ Time we stop, hey,
what's that sound?

♪ Everybody look
what's going down

♪ What a field day for the heat

♪ a thousand people in the
street

♪ singing songs
and carrying signs

♪ Mostly say,
hooray for our side.

♪ It's s time we stop,
hey, what's that sound?

♪ Everybody look
what's going down

[Explosion]

In the period that followed Dow,

from the last week of October 67
through the spring of 68,

there was really very little
that happened on the campus.

And yet it was in that
4- or 5-month period of time,

from the end of October
through April

that the movement turned
from student movement

to a community movement
against the war.

There were great attempts
made by the students

to get material and...

it was not the logic
of a pamphlet

or the political sense
of a pamphlet,

it was the club of a policeman

who made the remaining part
of the community

pay attention to the war.

I went through some

very trying times
during the Nazi time.

First in the church resistant
movement against Hitler

and then in the political
resistant movement.

I was arrested several times,
starting 1936...

I was quite young.

And eventually, I was
2 and 1/2 years in jail

and concentration camp
and sentenced to death

at the end of the war.

And I was always politically
active during the Nazi time.

I was very politically active
after the war.

In late '67, I began
systematically to try

to organize a group
within the community

to put the war in Vietnam
on the ballot.

One function of
local government is to

inform the national government

what the views of citizens are
about issues of national moment.

We had no illusions that
in putting a referendum

to bring the war to an end

on the ballot
of the city of Madison

that we would stop the war.

But the purpose of it
was very clear

and our objective was immediate,

which was that
we would take people

who were already opposed
to the war

and who had a clear conception
of that war

off the campus.

So I was particularly concerned
to go into the homes of people

and to explain our opposition
to the war to them.

So my 12 year-old daughter
and I went around.

I wasn't going to go alone.

And we went around and we talked
to the neighbors and asked them

all the questions that
were on the list that we had.

And got signatures
for the referendum.

That's how I got into it.

This was at a time
when Americans

have lost so many lives
over there in Vietnam

that the subject could not
be avoided anymore

by the general population.

The time was right
for some real changes.

That's what the people wanted
in Madison and naturally

that had a national effect too
with Eugene McCarthy.

[Crowd applause, cheering]

[Delegates cheering, applauding]

♪ [Dixieland jazz music]

[Crowd cheering]

We've begun...

Made a great beginning
in New Hampshire.

The next and significant step

here is in the state
of Wisconsin.

Something really happened,
something clicked in Madison.

There were all kinds of people
with McCarthy buttons on,

and people would smile
at each other

who had McCarthy buttons on
in the library,

and everyone knew
what that smile meant.

And then by the time
the Wisconsin primary came,

it was almost as if there was
a total transformation

of the sororities and
fraternities on Langdon Street.

Everyone was against the war.

Now it was respectable
to be against the war.

And suppose I was speaking
for McCarthy.

You know what they'd say
in the question,

"Senator Morse, where was he
on this vote and this vote

"and this vote
and this vote and this vote?"

Go right on down the line,

where he's never given us

a single vote
on the Vietnam issue

except one procedural vote.

We've never had a single vote.

Not a single vote...

from most of the doves.

We backed Eugene McCarthy

because there wasn't
anybody else there.

And he was not the best,
we thought,

but it was a body.

You put together Soglin's
election in that year

with the President withdrawing
from the Democratic ticket

with McCarthy winning
the primaries that he won,

and I, at that point,

Susie Cream Cheese here again,

believed I think that
anything was possible.

[Crowd roaring, band playing] ♪

I'd wanted to go
to the convention,

but I hadn't had the time
cause I was working.

I found a way to get
off from the job

that I was on at the time.

So I decided to hitchhike
to Chicago.

Well, the first time that
I remember Karl being

active in the war movement
was in...

Well, I saw him out at the
university demonstration,

and he hollered to me
from the group

that was demonstrating there,

He saw me on the sidewalk, says,
"Come on, Dad, come on along."

It was like this.
I didn't do this at that time.

But right after that time,

he started to become
active in the McCarthy campaign,

and he went to Chicago for
the 1968 convention down there.

I felt it was important
for me to be at Chicago,

just to show that
I'd been present

when the convention
was going down.

It was apparent from reading
in the newspapers

that they were going to have
the police out and

that these people were...

were going to react violently
to any kind of a demonstration

that they might have down there.

I didn't want him
to go down there.

What impressed me
at the time was

the presence of the military.

They had snipers up on
the Chicago Natural Museum,

they had machine gun placements
on the bridges,

and then they had thousands
of troops

surrounding the whole area,

plus thousands
of Chicago police.

So we marched on
the Conrad Hilton

where Humphrey was waving out
the window at us.

And we'd just heard
the news about Prague,

that the Soviets
had invaded Czechoslovakia.

The repression that was used
in Czechoslovakia was compared

to the repression being used
in Chicago that day.

I was a delegate to the...

I was a delegate
to the convention in Chicago.

There was, of course, lots of
emotion, lots of fights.

Mr. Chairman, the state
of West Virginia passes.

Wisconsin!

Mr. Chairman...

Most delegates to this
convention do not know

that thousands of young people
are being beaten

in the streets of Chicago.

[Delegates screaming]

And for that reason,
and that reason alone,

I request the suspension
of the rules

for the purpose of adjournment

for two weeks...

[Delegates yelling]

to relocate the convention
in another city

of the choosing of the
Democratic National Committee

and the presidential
candidates...

Wisconsin is not acknowledged
for that purpose!

[Delegates erupting]

I'm trying to state
my statement, sir.

We want to relocate
this convention...

Wyoming!

We got in front
of the hotel and...

the whole demonstration was
stopped for a two-block area.

And then we were blocked off at
the other end by Chicago police.

And then up between the hotels,

the Blackstone Hotel
and the Conrad Hilton came

some more cops

with TV cameras and so forth,
so this was just after dark.

And the police marched
up the street into our ranks.

And I told everybody around me
to sit down and be arrested.

You know peacefully arrested.

I would say about a dozen people
around me started sitting down.

Police came in and just started
hitting people over the head.

I mean they weren't interested
in arresting anybody.

Just hitting people and then
dragging them off by the hair.

I remember seated
right on the asphalt,

and trying to get up and
people tripping over people,

and my face going
into the asphalt.

[Crowd chaos, sirens wailing]

It was bedlam.

While I had my face
in that asphalt,

and that split second, I said,

"I'm never going to be caught in
a position like this again.

"If they're going
to make war on us,

"we're going to make
war on them."

Last night in Chicago, it was
a pretty shameful affair.

Pretty shameful.

And they're only beginning
and I think,

when the public gets through
watching this battle of Chicago,

where they're really
censoring the news

by the way they're handling
the press,

the American people
won't be willing

to turn over the leadership

of this country to that kind of
a party for the next four years.

If you do become president,

would you consider using
atomic weapons in Vietnam?

No...

I would not consider using
atomic weapons in Vietnam,

and I'll go further.

I take a very firm line
on Vietnam,

as you probably are aware.

But I would not
use atomic weapons in Vietnam,

I would not invade
North Vietnam,

and incidentally,
I would not invade any of

the other countries
in the area of Vietnam

for a fundamental reason.

The goal of the United States
in Vietnam

must be to end this war
in a way

that does not produce
a bigger war or another war.

The American people
are faced with...

a very unpleasant situation

that there is no liberal
alternative anymore.

I spoke all over the state
of Wisconsin on the campuses

to groups who were hostile
to Hubert Humphrey.

There used to be a time
when one could think

that one was a little more
liberal than the other.

Mr. Humphrey represents
what we have had.

You've got two choices
I pointed out.

Your choice is Hubert Humphrey
or Richard Nixon.

If you get Richard Nixon,
you won't like it.

I didn't know how badly everyone
would dislike it,

but I knew it would be bad.

Election night 1968

had to be one of the most
depressing nights of my life.

Here we had Richard Nixon,

everyone knew he was lying
through his teeth

about his secret peace plan,
and he was elected.

He won in a squeaker.

All I could do was to go out,

it felt kind of futile,

but I went out with
a lot of other people and

marched down State Street
to protest this sham election.

By 1969, the Antiwar Movement,
which arose out of the

Civil Rights Movement
of the early '‘60s,

returned to its roots

in the form of a black
student strike on campus.

Somebody in SDS got a call
and we were asked...

"How many people
can you get on the hill,

"on Bascom Hill
tomorrow morning at noon?"

We said we thought we could get
about 300 people.

They said,
"Alright, you get them there

"because we're going
to rip this motherfucker off."

"We're going to tear
this motherfucker down."

The black students
of the University of Wisconsin,

embodied in the black council,

have presented not one

but 13 demands to the
university administration.

Our strategy was
to make demands...

create a little ruckus,

and then try to get to the
negotiating table and come out

with something concrete.

There was no discussion of a
black studies program

before the strike.

The real issue is persuading
reasonable people

that this university
has a program...

It's carrying it on.

It's going to be a better
program and a bigger program,

and that this university is
going to go about its functions,

it's going to go about it

without being disrupted
by anybody for any reason.

We are fighting for
the liberation of minds!

Not the liberation of these pigs
and racist society.

We're trying to save
brothers and sisters,

from going to Vietnam.

I distinctly remember
one very vivid image,

and that is of
about 12 or 15 black guys,

all of whom were wearing
combat boots

and green army fatigue jackets.

And I thought
the revolution had arrived.

[Protesters chanting]

On strike, shut it down!

Tuesday afternoon,
we rallied at the library mall,

the center of campus
like we always did,

marched up the hill.

Along the march,
a pink slip of paper

on which were printed
maybe 20 words

was handed out to everybody.

The pink slip of paper
merely said,

"This afternoon's tactics are
obstructive picket lines.

"No one is to be allowed
into the building."

So at that point,

they had completely
upped the level of militancy.

As soon as that happened,

the National Guard
was called in.

I will not in any way
tolerate violence or disorder,

and in carrying out my duties,

I feel I have
a direct responsibility

under the constitution

to call the National Guard
when requested to do so.

People are tense
on this university campus

and the troops coming in jeeps
showing bayonets,

and coming armed and all the
full paraphernalia of war,

have made many people tense.

And this is provocation.

The National Guard were ringed
around the buildings,

there was no way that
we could block the building

unless we did it on the points
of their bayonets,

so we might as well block
traffic, which is what we did.

And they kept on
varying tactics like that

for 4 or 5 days,

which one,
kept people involved,

and two, kept
the administration guessing.

[Protesters]
On strike, shut it down!

And you feel the use of
the Guard was justified

under the circumstances?

Oh indeed I do,

particularly because
it was to avoid violence.

[Protesters chanting]

On strike, shut it down!
On strike, shut it down!

Racism was a very
scary word for everybody...

You know, black students...

It was a tactic, it was
a strategy that we did use

because it was necessary
to cry racism,

because we got reactions
when we did.

People would go from the strike
to the dorms,

and they would talk about it.

They'd go to the bars
and talk about it.

I also saw a consciousness
being raised.

It's kind of hard
to describe that.

One example would be
doing the strikes,

just upgrading the tactics
from demonstration to

destruction of property,
maybe bombings and

just people's attitudes toward
those types of things.

To up the level of militancy
for the white students

meant mainly
the question of violence.

The question of putting
your body on the line,

and it became less a discussion
or an essay

and more something that,

"Hey, I have to make
a decision because I'm in SDS,

"and SDS is talking about this."

I don't think anybody
gets real upset anymore

when they're called "a pig"
or something like that.

That's part of the job.

The thing I keep uppermost or

runs through my mind
naturally I guess is...

"Who is this fellow
standing out here?

"Who is he to be
calling me a pig?"

It's no secret that the police
were called pigs.

And we didn't mind that so much.

So when we began
the undercover operations,

I decided to name are officers
that worked undercover

after breeds of hogs.

And it worked out
very, very well.

They would sign their reports
by a pig's name...

Duroc, Pullose,
Peccary, Poland China.

The FBI around 1968,
a year later,

instituted
a grand master plan to

confuse and disrupt

the youth movement
and the New Left.

I have here a copy of their
master plan of July 5th, 1968,

which is a 12-point program
to be undemocratic basically...

for the secret police
to disrupt public conversation.

The sheriff's department
had people working undercover.

The University Protection
Security had people

working undercover.

So did
the Department of Justice.

The FBI had someone and
even military intelligence

was in the streets.

And we gelled
all of it together.

"Consider the use of
cartoons, photographs

"and anonymous letters

"which will have the effect
of ridiculing the New Left.

"Ridicule is one of the most
potent weapons

"we can use against it."

This is the secret police
talking about the citizens.

This is the grand master
plan of COINTELPRO 1968,

which was probably a response

to the relatively good-humored
gathering together

of the confused citizenry

trying to figure out what to do
with their government.

The lifestyle at that time
was basically

revolved around
political activity,

and people spent their time
doing only a few things.

They'd go to school,
do a little studying,

they'd spend a good deal
of time with politics,

and then they had
their social life.

And somehow on the side,
they'd slip in work.

But all of these things
were brought together,

the kind of work people
would do,

the kind of social life,

all connected to the politics,

particularly to make sure
one wasn't getting co-opted,

whether it was working
in a bar or driving a cab.

I was living on Mifflin Street
from the fall of 1967 on,

and that community sort of grew.

There were a few seedy
ex-beatniks living there...

Then it became more of a sort
of a hippie community.

The coop started.
That was like this big impetus

for people moving
into that neighborhood

to start to relate
to their community.

I think people decided to have
this block party

as a sort of celebration.

That didn't directly connect
to the Antiwar Movement

or to anything else, but was
a sort of community event.

♪ [Band playing, singing]

♪ We can be together

♪ Ah, you and me

♪ We should be together...

[Crowd yelling]

[Police screaming]

♪ We're all outlaws
in the eyes of America...

Two other officers and I were
the ones that were

at the beginning
of the Mifflin Street riots

on May 3, 1969
at 512 West Mifflin Street.

They went out into the street,
they were told

that they couldn't have
their block party in the street.

And ones and twos and threes,
people got arrested.

I got arrested just trying
to drive my car down the street,

which was a bit of an irony
because the police were supposed

to be there to keep the street
open for traffic.

But even those during those
first initial arrests,

there was still an attitude
of levity and gaiety.

Mobs were in the streets
at Mifflin and Bassett.

We tried to clear the streets.

As we cleared the streets,

we were pelted with rocks
and bottles, cans...

We had to keep the streets open,
we had to try to keep

the trouble down,
but we couldn't,

so we had to resort
to mechanical means to stop it.

And all I know is by the time
I got bailed out of jail,

and went down there
about 4 o'clock, 5 o'clock,

2-3 hours later,

it was like a war zone.

Clouds of tear gas,

the rubble, the barricades...

the bleeding, the rocks being
thrown, the armored police...

The whole bit.

These are the examples of
some of the articles that were

thrown at the policemen
last night.

There were rocks, bricks...

This was taken off
of one of the arrested people,

to give you an example
of some of the attitudes

and actions of the dissidents

and their activities over
last night and the night before.

What is the purpose of bringing
these objects here

before the cameras?

To let the people see that this
is not just all fun and games.

♪ [Drum roll]

The issue of the
Army Math Research Center

was first raised in 1967
by people on the Cardinalstaff.

People were looking for
war-related research on campus

and since that was funded
by the army,

it was a logical first choice.

It was impossible to ignore.

They had it right on the front
of the building.

"U.S. Army Math Research
Center."

And what surprised me
is it took so long

for the protests to materialize
against the Center.

But the protests began
against the Center

in the summer of 1969.

By the winter
of 1969 resistance,

the Army Math Research Center
was pretty strong.

I have to admit that that year,
I couldn't understand how this

"abstract mathematics"
was helping the army.

But the more and more
we looked into it,

the more obvious it became
that the Math Research Center

was doing abstractly
what the military wanted.

The AMRC was doing
no secret work,

no classified work
for the campus.

And they were saying it was.
I guess some chap named Rowen

or somebody like that around,

was making some charges
in the Cardinal,

but it wasn't true.

At one point, I requested a copy
of the 1967 Annual Report.

I was told that that report
was never printed,

that they had not made annual
reports until 1968.

So through
Senator Proxmire's office,

we made the same request.

His office made the request
to the army and

the army of course
forwarded to a senator

a copy of the report and
his office forwarded it to us.

It had a large section,
and an 8-page section,

and it was only about
a 40-page report,

censored out with a note saying,

"This material is
is considered classified

"and not for public release."

But in the table of contents,

it listed what that section
would've been,

and it simply said "Assistance
to Project Michigan".

Along with
some other researchers,

we delved into Project Michigan.

There'd been a lot
of publicity about it

at the University of Michigan,

It was a project to use
high-altitude,

infrared photography

to track heat-giving
sources on the ground.

So we felt that there was
quite a clear connection between

what the military was doing,

what the foreign policy
of the country was,

what the Army Math Center
was doing

and the university's complicity
in permitting censored documents

to be published on its behalf.

The tension was building
and building to a point

and all kinds
of peaceful protests,

all kinds
of peaceful discussions

about what AMRC was
meant nothing

because the university
and the army

were not going
to give that up.

Jim Rowen seemed like had

a new article
every day in The Daily Cardinal,

and it was something
that I could really understand.

I could understand
how that worked,

how it was that
mathematicians did work

that caused deaths in Vietnam.

[Massive explosions]

I expected to go to college and
sort of be involved in politics

and it would be fall

and I would be on
this big college campus and

it wasn't like that...

Instead, it was meetings
and meetings and

more meetings for long hours,
late into the night.

And not going to classes.

It was like I felt like
I had to catch up.

Everyone had
these 4 years on me.

Here I was a freshman
in college and had to catch up,

and somehow be
this instant radical.

At that time, we were just
one city in the country,

and it was going on
all over the United States.

The notion of closing down
a school to spend time

reflecting on the war,
and learning about it,

and studying about it,
and talking about it,

and sharing strategies

became a very good
organizing device

and all of our energies
went into pulling off

the October
and November moratoriums.

The question of moratoriums,
closing the university, came up

many times,

and my reaction was
generally the same way...

That the purpose of a university
is to educate people

and to help build
a better world,

and closing it down
isn't the way to do that.

Therefore, we would stay open as
long as I could keep it open.

Part of our program is
to bring home the relationship

of the university's compliance
with the war machine.

For the day,
we've scheduled pickets

at some university buildings
that are closely connected

with the military
industrial complex.

Our position is that ROTC and
the Army Math Research Center

must be eliminated
from the campus.

I'm wondering
what your opinion is

on today's nationwide
moratorium.

Very good.

You think it'll have
an effect on policy?

I doubt that very much.

How about you, sir?

I don't know, the moratorium...

Gotta raise hell or
else no one will recognize it.

So the more hell we raise,
the more Nixon will find out.

I've had quite a few friends
who have been killed over there

for what they're fighting for.

what these students
and these people are doing,

I don't go for at all.

At the University Field House,
they organized 15,000 people

into the moratorium and I was
one of half-a-dozen speakers.

It is up to the people
here tonight

to organize,

propose and enforce

a total moratorium

on military research
and imperial investment

to begin here and now

a reversal of United States
foreign policy.

[Audience applauding]

They carried David
off that plane

in a canvas-covered box.

And the young officer
stood guard

with a black band on his arm.

Inside that box was
all that was left of my son,

a burned, broken body,

wrapped in plastic,

and covered with a uniform.

What did he die for?

What have over 40,000 other boys
in Vietnam died for?

What have hundreds
of thousands of soldiers,

Vietnamese soldiers,

women, peasants,
even children...

What have they died for?

And what are thousands
of other American boys

going to have to die for
if we don't bring them home?

Merlin R. Allen, Bayfield.

Roscoe Ammerman, Madison.

Dale E. Anderson, New Lisbon.

Gerald R. Anderson, Kenosha.

Richard L. Anderson, Oshkosh.

♪ [Drums beating sadly]

The National Moratorium was
the one thing that if ever

I had any doubts about

being involved
in the Antiwar Movement,

that would've done it.

Carrying signs of people
who had died

was an incredible feeling.

By the time you got
to the White House,

that person was a part of you.

George Kilbuck.

William Hutton.

We dropped off the cards,

we were in a very
somber mood, we left,

and then found out that

the President Nixon
had not watched any of this,

that he was watching
a football game at the time.

You can have 60,000 of us,
or 250,000 of us,

parade in front of
the White House or in DC,

and if Nixon makes a statement,

"I will not in any way
be swayed by it,"

this is going to lead
to frustration.

♪ [Rock music comes up]

♪ [Rock music fades out]

You know we came back
from the war

and the environment here was
real hostile,

especially to us.

People in the peace movement
were down on us, you know.

People that were for the war
were down on us.

I guess I gravitated toward
Vets for Peace

as an organization in terms
of formal involvement

in the Antiwar Movement
at that point.

We had some credibility as guys
who had been in Vietnam,

coming back and saying,
"Hey, it's not working,

"they're lying to you, the light
at the end of the tunnel

"ain't there folks."

Calley and My Lai and atrocities
are not aberrations.

They're not unusual.

It's the day in, day out
routine conduct of the war,

these kinds of things happen
in Vietnam.

They are happening.

Alright, you ready to go?

You ready to go?

Every day you had to look
at the war.

And as the war went on,
every time you read the paper,

every time you saw the news,
you saw not only

more and more scenes
of violence in Vietnam,

the Vietnamese people
being destroyed, but it became

a reality that maybe, to me,

that my sense of urgency grew

because I thought that maybe
that country

would be completely obliterated

before the Vietnamese people
could win.

[Sound of helicopter taking off]

Something concrete,

something specific,
some blast,

some strike against the war
machine as a machine,

needed to happen.

I can remember sitting in the
basement of St. Frances House

in a Vets for Peace Meeting

where we were talking about
more parades,

and more marches and so forth,

and thinking this isn't going
to get us anywhere anymore.

We ought to be talking now
about blowing up

railroad trains coming out of
the Baraboo ammunition plant

where they're building this
stuff, sending it to Vietnam.

If I'd had the courage to do
what Armstrong did,

I would have.

I was just amazed,
I came back and

a group called
the New Year's Gang had bombed

the old red gym
where the ROTC offices were.

I had a hard time
concealing my glee that

the ROTC was getting what
it had been producing.

It had been producing officers
to fight in Vietnam,

and now they were getting
some of that back.

I thought the New Year's Gang
was a good idea

because it seemed to me
like that was the only way

things were gonna be stopped.

The thing that really caught
my imagination was

the fact
that the New Year's Gang

had apparently rented
a plane and

dropped the bomb
on the Badger Munition Works.

Unfortunately it didn't go off.

We had B52s dropping bombs
on Vietnam every day.

I felt that
the psychological effect

of dropping a bomb on the
Badger Ordinance plant

would be such that
people would become...

Their imagination regarding
struggle against the war

would be heightened.

[Protesters screaming]

[Bombs exploding]

[Jet roaring above]

[Siren sounding]

[More bombs blowing up]

The air war had just simply
taken off

and intensified dramatically.

On campus, there was a greater
sense of frustration every day.

It looked like the war
was never going to end.

It was only getting worse.

And then Nixon
invaded Cambodia.

Tonight, Americans and
South Vietnamese units

will attack the headquarters
for the entire communist

military operation
in South Vietnam.

This key control center
has been occupied

by the North Vietnamese
and Vietcong

for 5 years
in blatant violation

of Cambodia's neutrality.

[Protesters chanting]

Power to the people!
Off the pig!

[Tear gas exploding]

[Panicked screaming]

The troops were formed
in a circle

on the practice field
next to Taylor.

They were shooting tear gas...

And it was orderly.
No kids were out of hand.

And about 20 of them,
the whole regiment,

lowered their guns and
opened fire, straight fire.

Three people were dead
on arrival at the hospital.

And one more died later.

Most of them
were just plain gunned down

in cold blood in the back.

As soon as the students
were shot at Kent State,

we knew that all hell
was going to break loose.

And of course we knew it

when we called
that first demonstration.

We stood up on the balcony there

and we looked down
towards the Lakeshore dorms,

and Lakeshore path
was black with people.

We looked up towards
the Southeast dorms,

the Southeast dorms
was black with people.

That first demonstration was
like 5,000, 6,000, 7,000 people.

It was not just
an explosion of rage.

I felt like people had a very
concrete objective in mind,

and that was to try to get
the U.S. government

to stop sending troops
to Cambodia.

But that if the level
of reaction in this country

was strong enough, that they
would start to think

they couldn't afford

another Vietnam in Cambodia
and it would stop.

And that was the objective.

There were hundreds, thousands
in the streets at a time.

It was big.

We had to call up the Guard.

We coped as best as we could
with the vandalism.

We had to use
a considerable amount of gas.

We suppressed the violence
as well as we could.

There was simply a riot
for about 10 days,

the way I remember it.

Nobody went to classes.

Everybody was out into rallies,
demonstrations,

and once it got dark,

there was trashing,
looting, fire bombing.

I remember a cop
going like this with his pistol

down on the edge of the car,
using it as a rest.

I distinctly thought that
he was going to shoot somebody.

I couldn't see
that far up the street.

But I was right there,
next to my friend, Lloyd Guzier.

We were both sitting there,
we both had our guns,

we both put rounds
into the chamber...

We just aimed.

Then the guy lifted his hand up
and he walked away.

That cop never knew
how lucky he was.

There were some people,
the leaders,

said that we are at war
with the state now.

And this is a position
that they took,

and they were serious.

They would like
to have overtaken

the city if they could.

I think there were
a group of people

who saw themselves in a war.

I think we were isolated

from the mass feeling
at the time,

which was to play war.

We thought that all those people
would come right along with us.

I distinctly thought that.

I thought those people
would rise to the occasion,

'cause you gotta remember,
during Cambodia,

there were firebombings
every night.

In one week's period of time,

there was 67 fire bombings
in the city of Madison.

It was inconceivable

that we could turn
this many people

out into the streets
night after night,

take the campus apart...

And it wouldn't mean anything.

That it wouldn't in some way
change the course of history.

[Gunfire]

Vietnam?

No.

Jackson State College
in Mississippi.

When the students
were killed at Jackson State,

there was not that much shock.

By 1970, we had expected
the country to react differently

to the killing of black students

than they would to the
killing of white students.

The white students were
probably in shock at

the difference in reaction,
but for us, we weren't really...

Martin Luther King
had been killed...

So many things had happened that
we just expected these things

and took them right into stride.

Really it's sad to say
but true.

In the middle of the
Cambodia aftermath,

I had received my reporting date
for active duty on July 5th,

So I knew now that I had to make
a decision pretty quickly,

and that decision
really fell into place.

It was clear to me
one alternative was out.

I was not gonna go to jail
in Nixon's America.

Since 1966, when I was
against the war,

not a single day passed when I
had to deal with the fact,

what am I gonna do?

Do I have enough guts to do
what I believe in

and not fight in Vietnam?

Or am I going to be
just like all the liberals

who were advising me
and that is,

"Put your beliefs in
your back pocket,

"sit on them for two years,
come out after the war

"and be a great American."

To me that was bullshit.

So I decided that
what I had to do was

to opt for freedom
and go to Canada.

The frustration that
we felt with the...

If the war was to be
ended at all,

there was only one way
that was going to do it

and that was to make
some big...

impact somewhere.

Whether it was going to be in
Madison or not, we didn't know,

but something had to happen
to stop the war.

[Earthshattering explosion]

It was about 4 o'clock
in the morning,

an explosion went off, and
I turned to my wife and I said,

"That's the
Math Research Center."

That's the only thing it
could be. It was obvious, right?

Something was gonna happen
to that thing,

and when something blew up,
it wasn't an accident.

That's what it had to be.

I was awakened at home
when the bomb went off

that destroyed the Army Math
Research Center and killed a

physics graduate student there.

Of course I immediately
got up and came down,

and like everybody else,
I was tremendously shocked by
it.

I remember thinking,
"Well, I'm not surprised"...

And that the university
should have broken that contract

and gotten Army Math off the
campus because that bombing

was an inevitability.

It was gonna happen
at some point,

as long as the war continued.

We've got damage, serious damage

to millions of dollars
worth of property

belonging to the people
of the state of Wisconsin

and to the people
of the United States of America.

In addition to that, of course
we've got what appears to be

the beginnings of
an outright revolution.

The UW Board of Regents today
pledged a $100,000 reward

for any information
which leads to the conviction

of those who bombed the
Army Mathematics Research Center

at the Madison campus on Monday.

I couldn't believe
any connection here at all.

There just wasn't any.

As a matter of fact,

even after the warrants
were sworn out for him,

I couldn't believe that
they were implicated.

I couldn't put
anything together.

I had in mind that eventually
we would give ourselves up,

and have a political trial.

We found out that a man
had died in the bombing and

there was no way that we could
give ourselves up for a trial.

I just felt that the bombing
was very stupid at that time

because I knew that
politically what had happened,

and I felt morally a sense of
shame for taking someone's life.

I didn't feel it was justified.

The Karl Armstrong incident
brings us back to

the Nuremberg trial and
the whole problem of

who is responsible
for the actions,

the criminal actions
of a nation.

And it always boils down
to the individual.

How do you respond
personally to it?

If you feel truly
responsible for it,

you have to act.

If you feel as responsible
as Karl Armstrong,

you probably blow up a building.

An uneasy calm would probably
best describe the mood here

at the University of Wisconsin

on this first day
of the new school year.

On the surface, everything is
quiet, but there is the memory

of the student disorders
last spring

and the bombing last month

which left one person dead
and four others injured.

Nobody's really sure what's
gonna really go on right now.

There are various moods
going around campus.

Some people really want
to keep school going,

are anxious
to have a good year, but

by and large,
everything's up in the air.

I think that after bombing,

things pretty much
disintegrated.

What the bombing did was that
it changed the sort of

rock-throwing, comic strip
type of revolution

that was going on

into a real revolution
and told people

that people yes indeed
were going to be hurt.

I don't think that
the Antiwar Movement died.

I think that
what happened was that

there was a lot of repression
in this country which affected

the kinds of work
that was going on.

And there was increasingly

new directions that
political people were taking.

They were trying to move into
communities that hadn't been...

That hadn't been touched
by a lot of antiwar organizing,

and trying to talk about

whole new issues
of life in this country.

We've dropped,
as of five months ago,

23 million bombs
on South Vietnam,

each one creating a crater
40 feet across and 25 feet deep.

We have left homeless
25% of South Vietnam,

which would be the equivalent of
50 million Americans homeless.

The cold hard fact
of the matter is,

and I said it on the floor
of the Senate 6 weeks ago, that

South Vietnam
would be better off losing

to North Vietnam
than winning with us.

How many more years
do we have to go before

we can get out
of Vietnam completely?

[Sen. William Proxmire]
How long does this go on?

That war has gone on
for 30 years.

And it'll be 10-15 years
before we get out entirely?

I believe that that war

can continue for
a good many more years.

With us in it?

Ladies and gentlemen,
I am announcing today

the withdrawal of an additional
70,000 from Vietnam

over the next three months.

This means that our troop
ceiling by May 1

will be down to 69,000.

What Nixon was able to do
with the Vietnamization program

which was in effect when I,
right before I went over,

and while I was there, was to...

It was a very shrewd tactic,
I thought, and

accomplished the task of

starting to bring home U.S. GIs,

replace them with Vietnamese,
so people didn't care if

Vietnamese were getting killed,

and escalate the air war
to a great degree.

The death toll
of American soldiers

was gonna drop off
precipitously.

And, wow, they could keep on
spending money and bombing,

which, of course,
they ultimately did.

But the tragedy, of course,
was that

people would buy it as a policy
to continue the war.

[Rifles firing rounds]

For years, Memorial Day had been

kind of
"America Right or Wrong,"

"Love it or Leave it"
patriotic game.

♪ [Drums rolling]

Finally, the Antiwar Movement,
the peace movement,

countered with a parade
around the capital square,

which was quite separate.

I think it was like two hours
after the first one was over.

It was entirely
our own parade.

I think the incidence of GI
reaction

and revulsion to the war

probably peaked
along these periods.

The number of AWOLs
and desertions,

the high incidence of fraggings,

the less-than-honorable
discharge rates,

the drug abuse.

I think all these things
could be seen at that point

as an indication
of the breakdown of the army.

This is an honorable discharge,
it says, from the Armed Forces
of

the United States of America,

"This is to certify that
Allen Wallace Morentz,

"Airman Second Class
regular Air Force

"was honorably discharged
from the United States Air Force

"on the 23rd day of May,
December '66."

Down at the bottom, it says,

"This is an important record,
safeguard it."

[Crowd cheers]

I pray that time will forgive me
and my brothers for what we did.

♪ [Rock music comes up softly]

Second Battalion First Marines.
Power to the people!

Twenty-second Cavalry strike
in Da Nang.

I hope they realize this is
their last goddamn chance.

Paul F. Willis.
Spec four Army retired.

I've taking in 9 Purple Hearts,
Distinguished Service Cross,

Silver Star, Bronze Star,
Army commendation,

and a lot of other shit.

This is for my brothers!

Right on!

We don't want to fight anymore,
but if we have to fight again,

- it'll be to take these steps.
- Right on!

[Crowd cheers]

All power to people!

You came here to testify
for Karleton Armstrong?

I did.

I was asked by Mr. Kunstler
to come and testify.

OK, why did you do this?

Well, I have felt, while I have
not prepared to pass judgment

on this particular offense,

I think that all protest
against the war,

not only justified
but a civic duty.

I think after you appreciate
how we were lied into this war,

and the terrible
consequences of it...

Just think,
as a result of Johnson's lying,

55,000 American boys are dead.

And I think that it's the duty
of every American,

if he knows these facts,
to protest.

And Armstrong was
one of those protestors.

Armstrong had gone
and made a decision,

gotten involved
in blowing up a building,

and everything was gonna
come down on him.

It wasn't going to come down
on the rest

of the Antiwar Movement.

He was a product of
that Antiwar Movement,

whether he was right or wrong.

[Prison door slams shut]

In full coordination
with the Republic of Vietnam,

I have ordered
the following measures

which are being implemented
as I am speaking to you.

All entrances
to North Vietnamese ports

will be mined to prevent access
to these ports

and North Vietnamese naval
operations from these ports.

Rail and all
other communications

will be cut off to
the maximum extent possible.

Air and naval strikes

against military targets
in North Vietnam will continue.

And finally, may I say
to the American people...

I ask you for the same strong
support you've always given

your president
in difficult moments.

It is you, most of all,

that the world will be watching.

Ho Ho Ho Chi Minh!
Ho Ho Ho Chi Minh!

Ho Ho Ho Chi Minh!
The N.L.F. is gonna win!

[President Richard Nixon]
You want peace.

I want peace.

[Explosions, sirens sounding]

♪ [Oriental music]

If I'd known some of the things
that Karl knew,

I probably would have been
very active

in the Antiwar Movement.

But I didn't know
some of the things.

A lot of those things were
by word of mouth and...

And of course I have a tendency
like a lot of older people do

to take and believe
that your children sometimes

exaggerate the situations.

And of course
they weren't exaggerating.

They were telling us the truth
and we weren't listening.

♪ We should be together

♪ Come on all you people
standin' round

♪ Our life's too fine
to let it die

♪ We should be together

♪ C'mon now together

♪ Get it all together

♪ Everybody together

♪ We should be together

♪ We should be together,
my friends

♪ We should be together

♪ We can be

♪ We must begin here and now

♪ A new continent of love and
fire

♪ Tear down the walls

♪ Tear down the walls

♪ Tear down the walls

♪ Tear down the walls

♪ Tear down the walls

♪ Won't you try?

Captioning:
Mistral Artist-New York