It has been widely accepted that servicemen returning from Vietnam were spat upon by antiwar demonstrators/hippies. This image is repeatedly promulgated as an example of how Vietnam vets were maltreated by their countrymen.
Leaving aside the issue of whether veterans of this war were treated properly, have these stories of mass spitting ever been shown to be anything but a species of urban legend? Specifically, can anyone come up with verifiable news accounts of such action (not anecdotal reports)? It’s always seemed to me that such a vile act would have provoked brawls or even riots, none of which I can remember ever hearing about.
I seem to remember seeing footage of anti-war demonstrators spitting on returning vets, but I’m not 100% sure. If I did see the footage, either the vet(s) were outnumbered by the mob; or they were in ranks and could not respond.
This always struck me as odd, that people would abuse the vets. It’s not as if most of them wanted to go to war.
On the other hand, given the mood of the country at that time, I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a few isolated incidents. I well remember “One, Two, Three, Four we don’t want your fucking war”, student strikes, moratoria and so on. Anybody who thought realized that most returning vets had been draftee’s and, at any rate, weren’t responsible for the policy decisions which were to be the real focus of any protest. But, when things had reached the pitch they had, rationality is bound to go out the window. I’m not sure it would have been seen as such a “vile act” as it would in today’s climate.
One counterbalance might have been that a very visible contigent of vets were usually involved in protests - remember “viet vets against the war”? Another counterbalance was that draft status and how / whether to draft dodge was very much on the minds of most young men, reminding them of the fact that vets were mostly draftees (I was IIS and it was over by the time I graduated - I had a remarkably easy time of avoiding it).
Doesn’t directly respond to the OP, but [WAG] there were probably such incidents with National Guardsmen as opposed to returning vets, which distinction became blurred as the two somewhat overlapped.
By way of example, I do know of a spitting incident as recently as 1991, with Angel Santos of the Chamorro Nation spitting on Marines at the Naval Air Station on Guam [but that had nothing to do with returning Vietnam vets]. Editorials and letters-to-the-editor in the Guam press IIRC expressed outrage at the incident, with soldiers having returned from the Gulf only to be spit upon while guarding a base back at “home”. The incident was sparked by land and sovereignty disputes over the base, which is now closed. A short game of “telephone” switches the meaning from the land dispute to Gulf war issues.
I know of at least two vets who reported being spat upon while coming through airports returning from southeast Asia. Of course, my report is anecdotal. I’m surprised that Jerry Lembcke has written them all off as ULs, however.
I doubt that there were any massive protests in which dozens of protestors lined up to spit at returning vets; that would have made the news. On the other hand, dismissing any report simply because it was not as prevalent as has been claimed by the American Legion seems to go too far in the opposite direction.
(I also have two anecdotal reports from Vietnam Vets about being accosted with harsh words and responding by dragging the protesters into an alley and kicking the tar out of them. I have no more “evidence” of this than I have of the spitting, but I notice that that sort of behavior does not get reported when the issue of treating the vets with respect comes up.)
Dr., The Iron Shiek’s quote was “Iran number 1, Russia number 1, America, hock, ptui.”
Whether the evidence is anecdotal or notof how they were immediately treated once the valiant but doomed soldiers returned home, the treatment, or rather neglect, of Vietnam War vets by the government is well-documented.
I can’t say anything in regards to spitting, but I can personally vouch for the fact (independently verified by three different sources) that my father was called a “baby-killer” to his face by the daughters of my grandparents’ next-door neighbor.