Manpower & Morale after Tet

SATURDAY, APRIL 27, 2019

ADAMS ALUMNI CENTER

THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS

How did the U.S. military leaders understand the extent and significance of the morale “crisis” so widely reported in the American press from 1968 on—the stories of malaise and desertion, drug use, racial conflict, combat refusal and challenges to legitimate authority? And then, given their own analyses, what did they do? How did they attempt to manage the problems they confronted?

This full-day symposium brought together scholars of the U.S. war in Vietnam for conversations about how the U.S. military defined this “crisis” and wrestled with solutions that ranged from the mundane and predictable to the unexpectedly creative.