Soldiers in Revolt: GI Resistance During the Vietnam War''' was the first comprehensive exploration of the disaffection, resistance, rebellion and organized opposition to the Vietnam War within the ranks of the U.S. Armed Forces. It was the first book written by David Cortright, a Vietnam veteran who is currently Professor Emeritus and special adviser for policy studies at the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 22 books. Originally published as the war was ending in 1975, it was republished in 2005 with an introduction by the well known progressive historian Howard Zinn. Despite being first published , it remains the definitive history of this often ignored subject. The book argues persuasively, with encyclopedic rigor, the still under appreciated fact that by the early 1970s the U.S. armed forces, particularly its ground forces, were essentially breaking down; experiencing a deep crises of moral, discipline and combat effectiveness. Cortright reveals, for example, that in fiscal year 1972, there were more conscientious objectors than draftees, and precipitous declines in both officer enrollments and non-officer enlistments. He also documents "staggering level[s]" of desertions, increasing nearly 400% in the United States Army from 1966 to 1971. Perhaps more importantly, Cortright makes a convincing case for this unraveling being both a product and an integral part of the anti-Vietnam War sentiment and movement widespread within U.S. society and worldwide at the time. He documents hundreds of GI antiwar and antimilitary organizations, thousands of individual and group acts of resistance, hundreds of GI underground newspapers, and highlights the role of Black GIs militantly fighting racism and the war. This is where the book stands alone as the first and most systematic study of the antiwar and dissident movements impact and growth within the U.S. armed forces during the Vietnam War. While other books, articles and studies have examined this subject, none have done it as thoroughly and systematically.
"Quasi mutiny"
After an initial chapter outlining the break-down within the U.S. military, Cortright examines this collapse more deeply. He describes what happened as a "quasi mutiny"an armed force just short of full mutiny and insurrection, especially within the ground troops in Vietnam where U.S. military operations became "effectively crippl[ed]". He describes a crisis manifesting itself "in drug abuse, political protest, combat refusals, black militance, and fraggings." He argues this was an army refusing to fight, and calls it an "unofficial troop withdrawal" where soldiers improvised their own methods of avoiding combat. "Search and avoid" missions became commonplace, with troops deploying short distances outside base permitters to hide until returning to report no enemy contact. For page after page he compiles numerous incidents of these and other refusals, including one reported by the New York Daily News on August 26, 1969, under the frontpage headline, "Sir, My Men Refuse to Go!" In this case an entire company of sixty men refused an order to advance. According to military code, refusing orders in combat is mutiny, punishable by death. That none of these men were ever even reprimanded speaks to the general state of the army's disintegration at the time.
Cortright highlights the impact of Black soldiers in these activities, both because in the early days of the war they were disproportionately sent to the front lines, and because many of them became bitter opponents of their treatment and the war itself. He describes Black-led prison rebellions, Black soldiers refusing combat operations and protesting discrimination in field assignments, and the formation of political groups like the Black Liberation Front of the Armed Forces and the Black Brothers Union; all in Vietnam. According to Cortright, the resistance of Black soldiers "was a key factor in crippling U.S. military capabilities in Vietnam."
He was also one of the first scholars to examine in detail what came to be called fragging, the murder or attempted killing of a superior officer or non-com by his own troops. He uses official Army records to report 551 fragging incidents between 1969 and July 1972, but argues this is an obvious under-count as it only included assaults with explosives devices, which failed to include numerous similar deaths by firearms which were more available. He estimates that a full count of assaults against commanders during the war would have "reached into the thousands." He calls this the army's "other war" with "the insurgents in its own ranks" and argues that even the threat of fragging, perhaps by the "unexpected appearance of a grenade pin", could severely hamper a unit's effectiveness. It was "the final manifestation" of military collapsean army "at war with itself."
GI movement
Cortright then moves on to examine in detail the unprecedented organized political opposition and resistance to the war and the military that both figuratively and literally exploded during this period inside the armed forces. He calls it a phenomenon "never before experienced", and notes that his book will be the first "to seriously examine its development". As a participant himself in antiwar activity within the U.S. Army from 1968 through 1971 at Fort Hamilton and Fort Bliss, he begins with an insider's knowledgethat political activism within the "Draconian legal structure of the military...can be suicidal." Even with this prospect deterring many and disrupting countless attempts, the resistance movements within the U.S. military reached levels during the Vietnam War not seen before or since. Importantly, he documents that it was, in fact, those with combat experience that became the "most militant and committed activists". All of which, of course, amplifies the full dimension "of the military's internal crisis."
GI coffeehouses & underground press
He then traces the arc of internal descent starting with the first publicly known incident in November 1965 when Lt. Henry Howe marched in a small peace demonstration in El Paso, TX, earning him two years at hard labor in Fort Leavenworth; through demonstrations and rallies "occurring almost daily at dozens of bases throughout the world" in opposition to the war and massive U.S. bombing campaigns in 1972; to increasing resistance to the oppressions of daily military life ranging from racism and sexism, to the injustice of the military judicial system. Through five chapters he rigorously details the many courageous and crazy ways soldiers and sailors found to resist. We learn about hundreds of underground GI newspapers put out by disgruntled and rebellious GIs, with creative names like Fed Up, Fort Polk Puke, Offul Times, the Hunley Hemorrhoid, Pig Boat Blues, and A'bout Face by Black soldiers in West Germany. No military branch and few major bases or ships were left unaffected. He covers the rise and fall of the GI Coffeehouse movement, describing places like the UFO just outside Fort Jackson in Columbia, SC; the Oleo Strut at Fort Hood in Killen, TX and the Covered Wagon at the Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho. Over twenty of these antiwar, counterculture-themed coffeehouse were set-up near military bases, mainly by civilian antiwar activists, to encourage opposition to the war and anti-military sentiment and thousands of GIs took part.
Meetings, demonstrations & rallys
Cortright documents in detail the many ways GIs found to resist the military and the war at bases all around the world. We learn about the evening of August 23, 1968 when over 100 Black soldiers gathered on Fort Hood to discuss the prevalent racism they experienced in the Army and their opposition to ongoing preparations for their use against civilians at the coming Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Forty-three of them were arrested for sitting down and refusing to follow orders. They became known as the "Fort Hood 43" and their refusal to deploy was one of the largest acts of dissent in U.S. military history. We hear about what Cortright calls "the first effective national GI-movement action" on Armed Forces Day in May 1970. The U.S. had just launched a ground invasion of Cambodia, followed by massive student protests and the killing of four and wounding of nine Kent State students by the National Guard. The result was "an overwhelming GI response." On May 16, demonstrations and protests took place at 17 different bases with hundreds of soldiers joining with thousands of civilians at several of them. At Fort Bragg, several antiwar leaders, including Jane Fonda, spoke to a crowd of 750 soldiers and 3,000 civilians; at Fort Hood, between 700 and 1,000 soldiers marched through the streets; and at Camp Pendleton, Tom Hayden addressed about 200 marines and several thousand civilians. These were unprecedented numbers given the history of punishment for military dissent, and soldiers publicly protesting gave a huge boost to the broader antiwar movement.
Stockade & other rebellions
Cortright is one of the few scholars to examine the subject of military prison uprisings. He documents rebellions at "nearly every major military stockade" during the war. He shows how the Army's prison population tripled as the war intensified, reaching 7,000 inmates by the end of 1969, most non-white. He argues these numbers directly resulted from opposition to the military and the war. By the Army's own investigation, over 80% of prisoners were charged with going AWOL, and every stockade contained "antiwar, anti-army prisoners" and "determined dissidents." These men were then thrown into broken-down and unsanitary buildings with poor food and medical care, packed into overcrowded facilities, and brutalized by undertrained guards. Here are a few of the many examples he investigated:
These uprisings were not confined to military prisons. Cortright uncovered rebellions at "numerous bases". These were usually described by military authorities as "race riots", however, his research revealed most of them to be anti-authoritarian, similar to the prison rebellionsoften pitting "[B]lack enlisted men, and whites as well, against white MPs and NCOs" (Non-commissioned officers).
Civilian support groups
Cortright highlights the importance of civilian support groups to the GI movement. Because soldiers and sailors are under military discipline and control, they were much more vulnerable than the average civilian antiwar activist. Civilian supporters recognized this and often helped individually and built organizations to assist. The GI coffeehouses mentioned above were one of those methods. He also describes the efforts of groups like the Student Mobilization Committee; the Young Socialist Alliance; the GI-Civilian Alliance for Peace; the GI Office; the Chicago Area Military Project, which counseled GIs and created the GI Press Service, a world-wide newsletter for the movement; the Pacific Counseling Service, a GI counseling service organization that provided assistance in the U.S. and Asia; and the United States Servicemen's Fund (USSF), which he describes as the "most important agency for providing material aid to GIs". USSF supported numerous GI coffeehouses as well as dozens of GI underground newspapers in the US and around the world. They provided financial aid, speakers, films and even staff workers.
"Over there"