Resisting The Viet Nam War 1968

Resisting The Viet Nam War 1968

Resisting the Viet Nam War in 1968 was an emotional choice that separated families and friends and divided America. What follows is a chapter from my novel, The Garden of What Was and Was Not, about one young man's immediate experience:

After months of paperwork submitted by me at the last possible moment to qualify, stretching it out, my draft board put me on their agenda for a face to face interview. I took for granted I’d get another rejection and follow it with another formal appeal, the last I'd get locally. I dressed for the occasion as I normally did, blue jeans, T-shirt and necklaces, all of which still stood for something, and went in alone, a hairy oddball of Arlo Guthrie-like proportions. No one in my family, all of whom had shifted a conspicuous distance from me, even knew this was going on, and Cindi and I had taken it as kind of a lark not requiring her attendance or that of one of the other draft counselors as witnesses or support troops.

For the first time in my life, I was seated at the head of an executive conference table. It may have been the first time I ever touched one. The other chairs were already occupied by a collection of unsmiling men, all of them wearing dress shirts and ties. Marion, the board’s secretary whose name I recalled from the many notices and updates I received, sat off to the side with a note pad, recording the interview in shorthand.

The room was windowless and near the center of the office space, segregated from clerical activities, that colorless routine of processing boys off to war, very drab and what was then considered businesslike, lots of metal file cabinets, dull shades, unadorned wood furniture, an impoverishment of black and white photos of unidentifiable historical scenes precise on the walls. There was the inevitable flag in the corner, a reassurance that everything was just okay.

When I first sat down and leaned forward, trying to find a comfortable posture in this huge, hard seat, the clunky metal peace symbol I had around my neck clattered against the hardwood. The men turned to look at me with something that resembled disdain more than alarm. American men had not previously worn visible necklaces, and I had three. I also had a polished wooden cross and my astrological sign for luck. Fine hair full of split ends sliding down passed my shoulders suddenly seemed ridiculously sloppy.

There were only two board members I still remember well, one a cheerful, friendly, younger guy, the type you’d expect to see behind the counter at a pharmacy, who asked most of the questions, the other a red-faced, surly Leo B. Hershey replica, complete with eye patch, both men seriously balding. They played a good guy-bad guy routine with me, hoping I’d take the bait and confide something foolish or contradictory in trying to curry partisanship. Except for a couple of stray questions about religion, these were the only members who asked me anything. The others, mostly much older, seemed adrift in a sort of waiting-for-my-life-support-to-be-plugged-in zone of inattention.

“Mr. McCarthy,” the warmer guy began, lobbing an obvious softball, “all of us here are veterans of the wars of our own times. In our day, taking a position like yours would've been seen as a stigma on our patriotism. How would you respond to an accusation like that?”

“A true patriot,” I began in a tone more smart-ass than intended, “has to do what he believes is best for his country, not just go along with the government’s case like sheep. If the war is wrong and hurts your country, you have to try to end it. Unlike World War II, there’s no threat here.”

I kept reminding myself not to pull on my stringy beard, the only one on the planet worse than Bob Dylan's. This just made me seem more nervous, which I was, although confidently nervous. I had no illusions about winning here and, of course, a trailing assumption that I couldn’t lose either. Whatever happened today was meaningless, going through the statutory motions.

“Do you believe in the Bible?” This question came from one of the very old guys, probably a veteran of The Revolutionary War, a believer in both Washington and the scriptures, having ridden with the general when he brought those tablets down from the mount or some such inspirational fiction.

“Yes, especially the commandment, 'Thou Shalt Not Kill,'” I responded, trotting out the too cliché to mean anything anymore, standard response.

“So, then, what would be your solution to the problems of the day?” my primary inquisitor pressed on, returning to the subject.

This was the ‘How big of an airhead is he?’ question, and I fielded it deftly.

“Which problems? Civil rights? Poverty?” I asked, implying there were way too many to assume the war was what he was asking about.

“Well, let’s say, Viet Nam?” he clarified, spreading his palms out toward me, as if sustaining a neutered hell between his fingers.

“I'd withdraw our troops immediately and pay the Vietnamese reparations for what we’ve done to their country.”

“Would you be willing to serve your country as a medic? Quakers and others have been very heroic in such roles,” Leo B. Hershey in locus asked.

“No, that would still mean supporting the war and killing, and the war is wrong.”

“If we determined that you were not qualified for the classification you’re requesting and you were ordered to report for duty, what would happen then?” This from Leo B. Hershey's antipode.

“I guess I'd just go to jail,” I answered, looking him straight in the eye, meaning it.

For the last several minutes, I was asked some personal questions which I didn’t mind answering until they started trying to identify Cindi and who her family was. At that point, I asked them if that was relevant and, when the answer was fumbled, refused to tell them what they wanted to know.

I can never be sure what I said while I sat across the table from them that got the members to vote me in as a federally approved conscientious objector. Because their decisions took place in secrecy, I don’t even know if it was an unanimous or a split decision.

Years later, when the times finally came that you could publicly, even jokingly, own up to your stand against the war and military service, I took the position that, with my ragged clothes, long hair and necklaces, I just was not the kind of weirdo they wanted disgracing their Army, even as a medic. An obvious screw up, I could never be counted on in a crisis. If that was their thinking, of course, the real question then became, why was I someone they also didn't want to see removed to their jail? Maybe, they were afraid I'd eventually accept induction, extracting altruism from the sacrifice as a rationale. But patriotic veterans were not appointed to draft boards because of their sweet spirited generosity. I came to see their decision eventually as more sour rejection than grudging recognition, although I might just have been lucky to catch them on a relatively venom-free day.

Some related articles:

Making Choices

Waking Up In A Strange Place

A Writer's Life

Flight of A Statutory Rapist

Binghamton, New York–My Hometown

A Once Upon A Time America

This chunk of story is excerpted from my novel, The Garden of What Was and Was Not, and witnesses an element we no longer have to face in this country, the military draft. Much of the resistance to the Viet Nam War was generated by the hatred toward the draft. As now, not that many people carried so much about a war as long as someone else was fighting it.

Public sentiments have changed a lot toward the war since the 1960s. At the time, those of us taking anti-war positions were often shunned, even by our own families. Later, before the romance of war took shape again under Reagan, it seemed like everyone who talked about the conflict had been against and probably an activist as well, which made it odd that I couldn't remember that much company on the protest lines. Today, pacifist and anti-war positions are again out of favor, and we seem to reflect on Viet Nam with a kind of nostalgia. This seems weird to me, but in reality, only a minority fraction of those alive to day were around to experience those times. It's probably impossible to capture it all in a book or a movie.