Social effects
The Chief Executer and most of the politicians had a contrary opinion from the public. Their concern of the war was the economic and political potentialities and they tried to keep it. When the influence of the Soviets and the Chinese increased in Vietnam, the US interfered in. Although the Vietnamese mention this period as war of independence, in the American books, it's a good deed to prevent the spread of communism. That's the preconception of the parties, but still strange how different it is between the strata of the USA.
As the effect of the Vietnam War, the American society was divided to many groups, such as generations, attitude to politics or financially etc. The American people was divided to two or three parts. One group of them were those, who were against the war, the other was pro-war and there were some people who weren't concerned, didn't tell their opinion and weren't interested in it at all. They were the least since the war affected everyone. The elderly people, who had been fighting in the World War II and came home as a hero, agreed with the politics, of course. The US must help the South Vietnamese being endangered. Mothers cursed the war that demanded their son's life. The young just realised that their fellows were called up, sent to Vietnam and turned back disabledly, if they returned. Soldiers went with their father's glory in their heart. They thought that the goal was right. Later, it turned out to be just a dream and felt to be expelled when they're back. Many of them returned as drug addicts, the others were alienated that they became criminals.
The consequences of the war are usually the economic and the political efefcts. This time, the social effects were the most important. For the first time, the USA get to a situation that they had not only the external pressure, but the major part of the society was against the war and remained this way till now. Neither the invasion against Iraq because of Iraq's invading Kuwait, nor the operations against Iraq in 1998, nor the two-month-long bombardment against Serbia didn't made the public opinion discontent and didn't make such a great gap in the American society than the Vietnam War.
When the air strikes against North Vietnam were the most fierce, when the number of the soldiers was the highest (more than half a million American and approx. 200 thousand Australian, New Zealandian, Korean etc.) and when the public eye caught sight of the photos presenting the massacre of My Lai, American people demanded the end of the manslaughter in Vietnam. The last shot was the carnage in My Lai where two hundred innocent, unarmed Vietnamese were brutally killed by some Americans. These photos were shown to the public in August, 1968 and made the protesting students more active, more and more people supported them. Not only the humanitarian thinking was the reason of these protests, but also the lack of military success and the war dragging on. Some demonstrated not against the war, but the methods that were used, such as strategic villages, elementary chemical weapons and defoliants that was used to see the Vietcong (VC). The principal claims were the limitation of military operations, the stop of the destroying bombardment and the participation of the VC in the South Vietnamese government. The largest organisations were the SDS (Students for Democratic Society) and the YIPPIE (Young Interational People's Party) that sounded for hours:
"What do we want? - Peace!
When do we want it? - Now!"The visit of the Hollywood star and activist for peace in Vietnam, Jane Fonda to Hanoi also had a great publicity. To that time, the now cliché phrase was formed:
"Make love, do not war!"Those, who are for the war often claimed that it was a war against the spread of communism, as an American diplomat, Dulles said: "Henceforth, our task is to prevent the spread of communism in Southeast Asia and the Southwest region of the Pacific Ocean." If the VC win, entire Indochina will be under Soviet influence and that might be fatal for the US. That was the another argument, the Western coast may be endangered. The US would discuss if North Vietnam accepted it - it was commonly sounded. They want peace but Ho Chi Minh and his government wouldn't rest without the Southern regions, therefore they must defend South Vietnam, as a poor country that wouldn't be able to repel the North Vietnamese.
The fact is that the demands of the demonstrators weren't unfounded, till November, 1968, 25 thousand American young died in the jungles and on the battlefields in Vietnam. The North Vietnamese defense destroyed 143 vessels and shot down 3234 aircrafts. The bombardment failed, the morality of the North Vietnamese didn't lessened. To the pressure of the public opinion, the destroying warfare was stopped and they started vietnamizing the war, that is the training of South Vietnamese soldiers against the VC.
Although the war sparked demonstrations in Japan and in the West European countries, the most fervent protests were taken place in the US, most of the protestors were young. Let's see a life of a family with two children about 20 years. The boy joined the army and went to Vietnam. His father encouraged him and the son wanted to turn back as a hero, as his father had done after the World War II, while his mother worried about her son's life. She had a look at the post box everyday to reassure that the typical envelope, that would inform her about her son's death, was there or not. Of course, the father believed in the good goal of the war and even if he changed his mind, he didn't rise up against his country's policy. He was old and his patriotism was stronger than a young's. Meanwhile their girl was protesting all the day with her YIPPIE fellows. She took LSD, her outlook was torn. That was enough to raise debate in the family not mentioning her political view. That was a sample about the divisive effect of the war in a family. In some families, the disagreements were so serious that family members didn't talk to each other since then. The disabled young was a trouble for many families, at worse, he was drug addict, too. For a veteran, his life wasn't easier after the war. He had to have a good relationship and good luck not to feel as an exiled. For many of them, the adaption to the society was difficult. They were left in lurch, or: "If I said that I had been a veteran in Vietnam, I was named as murderer." That was said by a former soldier, who survived the war without any addiction and serious injuries, but couldn't find a job. The society blamed them, because the politics made a mistake. Of course, those who war pro-war didn't think this way, but that was a sign that they were in minority. Those, who was born in a wealthy family and could stayed home protested the most fervently, not the layer from which most of the soldiers originated, though. Many times, the whites were in majority in spite of the fact that many Blacks joined the forces. That was a small comfort for soldiers in the front, but they were surprised at the hostility when they came back. To this effect, many of them continued taking drugs, many of them became criminal and ended up in the jail. The general opinion of the veterans about Vietnam's largest effect to the US was the loss of sympathy. Many of them thought that the war wasn't worth comparing with the loss.