U.S. STUDENT PROTESTS FROM VIETNAM TO PALESTINE

While thousands of miles apart in geographical distance, the Vietnam War and the ongoing genocide in Palestine share a legacy of Western intervention, colonialism, and imperialism. Student solidarity protests for Palestine demonstrate numerous similarities with the student anti-war movement.

In this piece, we contextualize the history of student activism in the United States during the Vietnam War and make comparisons to the Palestine student encampments to draw out lessons we can learn and apply to our current moment. Because our organization is primarily based in the Seattle area, we include examples of student protests from the University of Washington to situate our local political context.

The Anti-Vietnam War Student Protests

The foundation of the student protest movement can be traced to two organizations: the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).

The SDS was formed in 1960 by a small group of students organizing around civil rights and anti-imperialism. By 1966, the SDS was focused on anti-war efforts, which consisted of many protests and teach-ins.

SNCC was also formed in 1960 as part of the civil rights movement. Composed mostly of Black college students, this organization conducted sit-ins and other protests to fight against segregation. There was a great deal of overlap between the SDS and SNCC, and they often collaborated on events. One such event was when Bob Moses, a SNCC leader, spoke at the SDS March on Washington Against the Vietnam War in April 1965. Many prominent activists, including Diane Nash and John Lewis, got their start organizing in SNCC. SNCC also had ties to the Black Panther Party through leaders such as Kwame Ture, who got his start as the chairman of SNCC before becoming the Black Panther Party’s Honorary Prime Minister.

The student protesters espoused two lines of thought: one was peaceful protests, which included sit-ins, walkouts, and other nonviolent demonstrations. The other line of thought was focused on direct action, which included graffiti, destruction of property, and armed protest. In 1969, armed members of the Afro-American Society occupied Cornell University’s student union, asking for better mental health care for marginalized students, more enrollment and employment of marginalized students and faculty, and for professors to learn more about Black perspectives. Cornell University eventually agreed to their demands.

Ed Whitfield (far right) leads protestors from Cornell’s Willard Straight Hall.

At the University of Washington, a similar protest occurred in 1968. On May 20, members of the Black Student Union (BSU) and allies marched into then-President Odegaard's office to demand the recruitment and retention of more marginalized students and faculty, and the creation of a Black studies program. Members of the local Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party were among the 150 participants. After negotiations, President Odegaard agreed to the BSU’s proposal, and the sit-in ended.

Student protests against the Vietnam War began to escalate against the backdrop of these civil rights protests. Student protests, both peaceful and armed, had won many victories in the fight for Black studies and more resources for marginalized students.

Unlike the Civil Rights Movement, protests against the Vietnam War had a personal impact on the majority of Americans, regardless of their race. The draft meant that most young American men could be pulled by lottery to fight in the war in Vietnam. Draft resistance was a big part of drawing students and the white petty-bourgeois into the anti-war movement. This was a time when white Americans had a clear and direct material connection to the war, and thus a clear reason to support its end. Students became eligible for the draft immediately upon graduating college, so there was much activism based around the draft. Students resisted by publicly burning their draft cards, refusing to report for induction, or fleeing the country.

Students at the End the War in Vietnam March on Washington in 1965.

Additionally, as young people continued to organize, many learned more about and spoke out against American imperialism. Students in SNCC pointed out parallels between U.S. treatment of Black and Vietnamese people. In a statement on the Vietnam War, SNCC declared:

We believe the United States government has been deceptive in its claims of concern for the freedom of the Vietnamese people, just as the government has been deceptive in claiming concern for the freedom of colored people in other countries such as the Dominican Republic, the Congo, South Africa, Rhodesia, and in the United States itself . . . Our work, particularly in the South, has taught us that the United States government has never guaranteed the freedom of oppressed citizens, and is not yet truly determined to end the rule of terror and oppression within its own borders.

Much of this organizing was in full force on April 30, 1970, when then-President Nixon announced the U.S. expansion of the Vietnam War into Cambodia. In his inauguration speech, Nixon had said he was going to try to end the war as soon as possible, so many students felt betrayed and enraged. The Joint Committee in Higher Education of the Washington State Legislature conducted a poll revealing that 69 percent of students in the country had serious doubts about the expansion of the war into Cambodia.

In response, hundreds of people, including university and college students, protested. Students conducted sit-ins, walkouts, and vandalized buildings. The student strike was officially declared the very next day on May 1, 1970.

At this time, Ohio’s Kent State University was a hub of student protest. On May 4, the mayor of Kent, Leroy Satrom, called in the National Guard to disperse a crowd of 600-1,000 students. The National Guard threw tear gas into the crowd and students threw rocks back at them. The Guard then shot into the crowd, killing four students and severely injuring ten.

The shock from this state violence only made the student movement grow. On May 5, students at the University of Washington (UW) joined the strike. The UW coalition was made up of organizations like the Associated Students of the University of Washington (ASUW), the Seattle Liberation Front, the Seattle Mobilization Committee, and the United Socialist Alliance. Students who had previously been uninvolved in organizing were activated by the massacre and joined the movement.

UW students demanded that President Odegaard:

Denounce the death of the four students at the Kent State Massacre.
Pledge to never call National Guard troops to UW.
Terminate all Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) Programs.
End the political repression of the Black Panther Party.
End UW military recruiting and “war-oriented” research.
Sever ties with Brigham Young University over racial discrimination.

Students, faculty, and staff presented these demands to then-President Odegaard, who refused agreement. In response, 6,000 protesters marched onto Interstate 5 (I-5). After they were confronted by the police, the protesters voted to leave I-5 willingly.

On May 6, a group of 10,000 student protesters marched onto I-5 again. This time, they were tear-gassed and beaten by the police. Students began to disagree on whether their protests should be peaceful or militant. Up until this point, their main protest tactics had been classroom walkouts and marches, which had granted them visibility but not agreements. Additionally, strikers at the University of Washington had not reached out to other labor groups in the area, which kept the strike restricted to the campus.

On May 7, some student protesters began to destroy property, smashing windows at the Pacific National Bank, Seattle-First Bank, and the Applied Physics Laboratory. Police arrived and beat groups of students, regardless of whether the students were protesters or not. The state violence continued all night.

On May 8, class was canceled for a “day of mourning.” In the days afterward, students continued to strike and leaflet, but the movement had lost momentum. Concerned about their finals, more and more students crossed the picket line to return to class. Within two weeks, the student strike was over.

There had been some hope among the students that President Odegaard would agree to some or all of the demands since he had agreed to the demands of the Black Student Union less than two years prior. However, not a single one of their anti-war demands was met.

From the Anti-Vietnam War Protests to the Palestine Encampments

Map of the Protests

While over half a century apart, the locations of student protests during the Vietnam War and the Palestine encampments look strikingly similar. Even fifty years later, we see that student protests are still predominantly concentrated in urban areas and have not expanded their reach.

It is important to note that less than a third of Americans live in urban areas, and in recent years, more Americans have left urban areas for the suburbs. Both then and now, college students make up less than a tenth of the U.S. population. It becomes clear that student movements alone are not positioned to reach the majority of the people in the country.

State Repression

Police responding to student occupation of Hamilton Hall, renamed Hind’s Hall by student protesters in honor of Hind Rajab (a six-year-old child murdered by the Israeli army) at Columbia University in 2024.

There are numerous parallels between U.S. state repression of the Vietnam War student protests and the Palestine solidarity encampments. Even when unarmed, student protests and occupations are met with legions of police and brutal violence. In both protest contexts, police have used pepper spray, batons, and rubber bullets to disperse student protesters on their very own university campuses.

What makes state repression “state” repression, and what is its relation to local repressive forces, such as university and city police? When we say state repression, we mean the government’s material and ideological support of ruling class interests. This support manifests through the national, state, and local use of force and violence to brutally suppress movements and organizations that challenge the capitalist ruling class. To effectively maintain control over a large country, federal governmental agencies like the Department of Defense, the FBI, and the CIA work closely with local “law enforcement” to streamline training, tactics, and military-grade weaponry.

While police violence against student protests is overt and publicized, what can be even more damaging and insidious are the long-term repressive state programs designed to break apart progressive student movements. From 1956-75, the FBI deployed COINTELPRO (Counterintelligence Program) to surveil and sabotage civil rights, Black liberation, socialist, communist, and anti-war movements and organizations. Included in COINTELPRO’s target list were student anti-war organizations like the SDS and SNCC. COINTELPRO has created a lasting impact on our movements; we are still rebuilding our organizations, fostering networks, and re-radicalizing our communities.

War Profiteering

In protesting against both the Vietnam War and the ongoing genocide in Palestine, students recognized the university’s symbiotic relationship with war-profiteering companies.

During the Vietnam War, DOW Chemical Company (headquartered in Midland, Michigan) won the contract to produce napalm for the United States and was the number one manufacturer of napalm up until 1969.

In 1967, thousands of students from the Midwest protested, calling for their universities to cut ties with DOW Chemical. However, the universities refused and continued to allow DOW Chemical to recruit from their students.

In 1969, DOW Chemical lost the bid for the napalm contract for the United States, and shortly after, it stopped producing napalm. While these students demonstrated great courage and solidarity, there has been no conclusive evidence that these protests alone stopped war-profiteering companies from producing napalm. It is important to note that the contract was simply awarded to another company, and napalm was used in Vietnam up until 1973, four years after DOW Chemical stopped producing napalm.

Here in Seattle, Boeing has maintained a mutually beneficial relationship with Israel for over 75 years. Boeing aircraft, missiles, and bombs have been, and continue to be delivered to the Israeli military so they can attack and kill Palestinians and devastate their land.

There have been numerous protests against Boeing in response, often led by students in the Seattle area. Earlier in May 2024, students formed a United Front and created an encampment called the “Liberated Zone” at the UW. One of the Liberated Zone’s three demands was for the university to cut ties with Boeing. However, after two weeks, when a deal was reached, the UW doubled down and refused to cut ties with Boeing.

University Concessions

Looking at the protests of the 1960s and 70s, we can see that universities have agreed to student demands in the past – specifically those asking for new curriculum and the recruitment of minority students. At the University of Washington, Cornell, Berkeley, and many other schools, student movements led to the formation of ethnic studies programs and new scholarships for marginalized students. However, universities never agreed to the demands of anti-war protesters – calls for divestment from the military, ROTC, and war-profiteering companies such as Raytheon and Boeing.

At the University of Washington, the relationship between the school and Boeing has come under particular scrutiny by student protesters. Boeing contributed the most U.S.-manufactured missiles and munitions sent to Israel between 2021 and 2023. A spokesperson for Boeing, Ted Land, said in an email on the relationship between the company and UW: “In support of our commercial business and community, Boeing has supported the University of Washington for almost as long as the company has been in existence. We are proud to support UW and other institutions of higher learning here in Washington state and around the globe.” In an email to student activists, UW President Ana Mari Cauce stated, “Boeing’s support for the UW in time, talent and funding cannot be replaced by other endowment sources, nor would we choose to sever our relationship if they could be.”

As in the past, the university has refused to divest from war. However, Ana Mari Cauce agreed to “source funds” to provide, over an unstipulated period of time, twenty scholarships for Gazan students, and to create “a center with a focus on the scholarship of Palestine.” This parallels the University of Washington’s previous concessions – the creation of Black Studies and American Ethnic Studies programs and scholarships for marginalized students. In 1968, as in 2024, these concessions failed to include divestment from U.S. imperialism and war profiteering via the ROTC or Boeing.

This does not mean that the students' protests were for naught. Indeed, the existence of Black Studies and American Ethnic Studies at the University of Washington has educated many young activists, and scholarships do have a material impact on many students' lives. However, it’s important to analyze not only student movements, but also the administration's responses to them, and the conflict of material interests between the two. Through understanding history, we can analyze which tactics worked and which didn’t – and why. In doing so, we can improve upon our actions today.

Lessons We Draw

U.S. state repression of the student protests against the Vietnam War and the protests now against the genocide in Palestine are inherently the same. State rhetoric has only changed in wording but not in goal. Anti-communist rhetoric from the 1930s-70s and current-day “war on terror” rhetoric serves the same purpose – to justify U.S. imperialism.

We should be aware of and prepared for something similar to COINTELPRO from the 1950s-70s to happen again, given the rapid development of our movements and organizations in solidarity with Palestine, and growing political consciousness about the role of U.S. imperialism in crises across the globe. We have to remind ourselves that the U.S. state’s role is to preserve a U.S. and U.S.-allied imperialist system of oppression, at home and in Asia-Pacific and West Asia.

While students have been at the forefront of protests during the Vietnam War and the ongoing genocide in Palestine, student protests alone are not equipped to engage the majority of the people. As shown earlier, student-led protests concentrate in urban areas, do not reach the majority of the working class, and thus cannot reach the majority of the people in the country.

We must understand student protests as a tactic to activate and mobilize students. However, student sit-ins, walkouts, and marches cannot be our sole tactic in challenging U.S. imperialism, genocide, and war profiteering. We must recognize that activating and mobilizing can supplement, but not replace, organizing. We still need to organize to build a long-term, sustainable movement that has enough power to achieve the change we want to see. As Kwame Ture says, “One of the characteristics of mobilization is that it is temporary. Organization is permanent and eternal.

We must organize students and all those activated by student protests to confront our current crises. We must organize so we can endure state repression and ensure the continuity of our movement to end U.S. imperialism.