folks like samuel williams is going to be sort of creating these academic institutions, professorships where are going to be sort of identifying that, you know, american students be learning about this place. they be learning about these sues and yeah, i look forward to your dissertation to learn more about how that plays out in korea case. that's fantasticevyone, this hat been a phenomenal, phenomenal panel. i ju want to remind everybody that diplomacy is available down e cornell. but exhibit, 40% off and it's f dung the conference. exactly. and when you go down there and icker, because you are going to go buy it out, please make surego site and buy because it is very important that we support each it's very important that we buy books and we educate as many people who are possible during this time and i will say, really, can we just all in this

by celebrating emily this phenomenal panel and this phenomenal. well, joining us on american history tv is beth bailey, a professor at the university of kansnd lawrence, the author of this book, an aus army confrs racial crisis in the vietnam era. we'll talk about that in a minute. but dr. ba, teach at duke? mainly military history. us military history, occasionally history, gender and sexuality, which was my previous incarnation before i became convert to military history. how did you get into military history? i hate say it, but it was actually a televisionommercial

army recruiting commercial. they weredvertising post-cold war pre 911. and really how do ll the army when supposedly is the end of history and it's all resolved they were selling the army as social good as you know taking men who were either at risk potentially problematic for society and helping them become the people that they could be helping them not disappoint their third grade teacher or their mother, whomever who believed in all along. and i got fascinated by that commercial and thought would write about the army as social. and at some point my husband, who also historian you can't just write about commercials, you're going to write about the u have to understand the army. so i spent several years trying to get to that point. and the military historians were really welcoming. so i had a conversion moment. was the commercial true. now, this many years later.

the commercial is true. the way that commercials are true. they take something that has enough of it to be compelling and they find something that resonates either the people they're trying to reach or people who influence the people they're trying to reach. but what they were trying to do at that moment was to sell the idea that the army fulfilled a purpose, not simply to recruits. they were trying to get into boots, but to the taxpayers to vote for congress representatives and senators allocate budgets question spendd multiple audiences. and in time when the army is primarily doing operations, other war and humanitarian and peacekeeping missions instead of wars they needed to think of. how do you pitch the army at a point when their budgets are being cut, they're being downsized. d so providing a social good waythey tried tocitizens was

do. throughout our history. how much of that history includes a template. not much of the u.s. had traditionally relied on some form conscription, not federal conscription, until the civil war, when when wars broke and then it would go back very quickly to a peacetime, regular force with the notion that it be ite small. and at the beginning of world war two is is speaking coming clearer and clearer that the united states is going to be movingnt conflict. franklin roosevelt creates t first peacetime draft in 1940, which was not received with a t of support. it was breaking an enormously important. and then the assumption was after wahe.s. was going to go back the same kind of smaller volunteer force.

but it wasn't able to fill the ranks sufficiently in the face of the growing cold war. and so with a brief exception, the united states, conscription from 1940 to 1973. but that's the ly u.s. history outside of a at t t it was long enough for it to start to seem. december 7th, 1941, pearl harbor. how big was the volunteer force that came in? well, i mean, over the course of world war t, 6 million americans served so massive it was total war, but a lot more conscripted. they werescried. it was understood the best way tollocate what was then called manpower was through conscription, which would take into account all of needs of society. so people might red, were consc.

most everybody is conscripted as opposed to volunteering. but that it wasn't e was a lack of volunteering. who knows how that would work t? bailey were there separate conscription for white men and black men? there were units for white men black men and they were can sit. i mean, conscription was handled locally and so the draft boards would berelocals. so societies tby segregated societies that had a ea lesser degrees of racial discrimio prejudice that was reflected in they conscripted and how but the us military officially segregated its troops. how many african-americans do u know served in world war two? out of that 6 million to, you know? offhand? i don't know offhand. so47.

1948. harry truman makes an executive order. what does he do? exutive order that calls for the end of racial and calls for the enactment of equal in the us military. he does not actually desegregate 'how it'sate the military that understood, is that that's what's going to happen. it doesn't finally happen until 1954. and in fact, the secretary of the was more or less received of his position because he refused to desegregate the army after after the executive order. so there was and what happened in 1954. how it gradually a korea a jump started the actual integration of the military because of the demands of combat. and by 1954 it was just a a before we felt that point.

there was aman th new york times sort of announcing that the us military isesegregated or integrated. but would it be fair to say that vietnam this ties into your book, an army of fire was the fully first fully integrated war that the us fought it the first war that was fought from its beginning with a fully integrated force and the military made a big point of that. the military emphasized the extent to which it was successfully moment. and you know, in the initial years it seemed like things were pretty well in terms of racial integration. i mean there certainly continuing prejudice and discrimination and there were nfli among white and black soldiers. but what happened compared what was going on in civilian society. the said look we're doing really

well. leaders said i see only one color in that saudi olive drab civilian leaders pointed to the military a sign of how well things were going. whitney young was the leader of the national urban league, said it's a disgrace that. black men in vietnam byreater dignity on the front lines in vietnam than they find in there was a sense that even though it wasn't complete, event america could aspire be in terms ial integration and what were some of the issues that they dide?i mean, what happenedn 1968, simmering following the as marn luther king and the the widespread racial violence that was taking united states in general started break out in the us army. so i their in the streets during thetic convention in chicago along been jail in vietnam explodes. ers a racial uprising of

black prisoners overtake ds pris and guards seize control of the jail. the the head of the prison who had a .d penology. he was a reformer. he thought he had great rapport ple who were imprisoned. there. he wanted to try to talk toem. they beat him. he never recovered from brain. they killed a white private, seized contr othe prison. i mean, this just kept going on, spilling o barracks and bars. it got to the point in west germany w, ers and ncos said they go into the barracks unless they were armed. , international incidents. it was a crisis and it got to the point where the chief staff of the army and the secrymy saie racial conflict in the army had gotten bad, that it threatened thetyf fulfilling its mission of national defense and had to do something about it, which was

not the story they expected to be telling. what did they do about it? uh, they anything they could think. i mean, it was. it was a problem that had been cropping up, so had been trying ad hoc decisions and ad hoc programs. the first thing they did was, the secretary of the army, stanley razor, out before the association of the us and he said, we can't be colorblind use color blindness was the solution that the army had tried toetti past the race consciousness of segregation.in my ways it was is well-intended. they got rid of racial designations on forms they thought would somehow undermine people's ability to be treated equally such. but he said, know you don't you n't lose somebody's racial experience and identity by just putting them in olive drab uniform. we've got to take race into. and alsot t wh was happening was that olive

drab i see only one color colorblindness defaulted white an institution and where the standard haircut was referred to a white wall right. where the military justice system was almost all white in terms of implementation ation and it was highly disproportionately black in terms of prisoners. ot rid of race and they said this is a priority you've got to do something. and they tried a whole of things. they tried leadership. eynd training. they tried dealing post discrimination. they tried affirmative action. they military justice reform and they tried questions of, ltymbolism, which was something that was really important to the young men at the time, such i've a young black man wanted be able to wear an afro. they saw it as a symbol of black identity and black pride. the army hired of the famous black barber and sent him around the world teaching.

local barbers how to cut black hair, to cut black afros and stopped charging people extra for them. they came forward and said, we can solve thisro yeah, it isn't right. we look at ourselves and what we have are ts te soldiers. we have country music, don't have soul music. we carrygazi. we don't carry ebony. you're right. if your christmas time, all thes are white. what about the black families? and so they did what the army does. ey did intensive studies and they wrote reports, and they came up with a list of hundred o be kept in stock that were aimed, quote, ethnic consumers and black consumers. and it hazjanuse what soldiers and their families could get what theyantemore. but it also had an impact on black businesses because it was the thirorouh largest retail outlet in the world. and so know if if the packs the the system decides that they're

going carry your record, suddenly you're going to do well if they decide they're going to carry your afro kick or afro. shame. it's a b to black businesses. so, you know, that was kind of a weird thing. even as my lai is still on the frontpers, less the six months after hamburger hill. a survey at fort carson found that 21% of soldiers thought hair was their issue. how they could wear their hair. but evenor leaders thought the best way to approach this is by thinking about edation or leadership, you know, young black soldiers, young white soldiers as well thought the cultural symbolism mattered in their daily lives. an enormous sum now. so beth bailey for the majority, the vietnam war or the whole of the vietnam war, the majority of soldiers were conscripted with some volunteers. tatement? no. there were a lot of draft

motivated volunteers. so people who knew that they were likely to be drafted and by volunteering had more control over their terms of service. majority of americans service personnel were not in vietnam a majority of those people in vietnam were not in combat. the united states had a major worldwide during this period. there was, you know, cold war were really high in the 1960s. and of what going on in west germmaormo amount. so, yes, people certainly were conscripted. but because of there was more volunteering, if that makes sense. what was the racial makeup of the army or the armed forces at that? black soldiers served is slightly higher percentages. it was more. 12 13% when the population was about 10.5%. conflict station is where acks men tended have less education thait and

therefore ended up more likely to be in tnf in positions with r demas and higher education. why was that? because the educational system that they were coming of often in the south was poor. there was discrimination and it was egi me, legal. jim crow is just over. by 1968. it hasn't been long at all. and in that, the army leaders ed t reasons for this. but what it led to was initially aietnam, a much higher disproportionately higher death rate forfrican-americans which, you know when recognize as they started to change the despised skin of soldiers but it had a powerful effect on black americans who were seeing their own.ionate death r there was a very powerful sense during this pd wasn't fair and in fact, it wasn't, which is one of the

reasonat is a move to an all volunteer force, because don't support a system is so clearly unfair to the majority of americans. so president nixon's decision in 1973 was greeted with, it depends on who you're talking about. so nixon announced during the in 1968 that he intends to end the draft. he was trying to appeal to yng i draft and antiwar. mo people believe he was actually going to do it. and he did. the military was highly resistant. they had no idea how twe going to ever feel, especially the army, because it's the biggest it has the left withr iw they were ever going to feel all those boots. certainly that changed, but yet it was it was a perfect storm because there was support from all parts of american society for ending the draft. aside from the military had to figure out how they were going to do they had to recruit 20 to0 people a month and stop and

think about that. the army now is failing to recruit 65, 70,000 a year. and they had to recruit those huge n at time when there was not much respect for the military in the wake of a failing war at a time when youth culture was highly hority. and so there was there was a fair amount of panic, but in terms of trying to think what some of that creativity the military leaders decided that o start thinking you're on the gates comssion, which was the president's commission on how to create the all volunteer force thatixon's up just thought of economic humans or economic men really, because they didn't even mention women. they they. okay, we'll just raise how much we them and in the labor market that'll be. and what army leaders doing is saying our market as such. yes. have to go into the market but we're going think more creatively about what a market

and so we're going to turn to marketing. we're going to turn to advertising w'ng ttry to motivate people through those emotional and irrational forces that the the economist who were the staff for the gates commission really didn't take sufficiently into account, but it was still a struggle. the factors that inedue people's choices were not fully susceptible to a good army. impu can be. yes. well, the army advertising initially struggled. by the late 1970s, this is the. there was this one great rd tt said, it's not perfect, but it's not bad. okay. really. so be all you can be. was forward looking. i. people cheered when. they heard it. the recruiters were happy. it was an amazingly successful

campaign. and they just brought it back. right. so it lasted a long time. got to the point where it was wallpaper. now they guess they've got a new generation. they brought it back. 65 to 70000 per year is what the army are, what the armed forces say th need right now. how close are getting? not close. it it's it's every service. it's not just the army that's struggling this time and the air force is not supposed to have to struggle. the air force supposed to be just a given. the marines, it's supposed to be a given. everybody's strgling. and why that? there are a lot of reasons. partly it's propensity, partly it's fewer people want to serve. partly it the people who are qualified to serve. and a lot of that has to do with standards about body weight, body mass standards about

medication, things, you know, many, many of kinds of things, impact. but one of the larger issues is americans in society are ever more removed from those who serve in the military. pa to do with the base closures that created bd fs more and more within a military even as families need that tend to military families whoo increasingly have become kind of a military cple o live in towns and, cities where there is a lot of military pr is increasingly in the south. but bseewer americans, not only part of families who have a history of,o are serving in the military. that's of t rtheoretically at lt propensity to serve is dropping. america army making the all volunteer force is beth book