What Did The Media Reporting Of The Tet Offensive...

To what extent did the media reporting of the TET offensive influence US crucial decision making in 1968. â€Å"Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room.† Marshall McLuhan, a Canadian philosopher of communication theory, told the Montreal Gazette in 1975. Vietnam is often referred to as the television war and it’s been widely said that the outcome of the war was decided not on the battle field but on the television screen. Today I will be exploring the extent to which media reporting on the Tet Offensive influenced US crucial decision making in 1968. The aspects that I will be investigating are; the media coverage of the war and it’s influence on public opinion as well as how the result of these two aspects impacted on how the government formed their decisions. Tet is the celebration of the lunar New Year. In previous years it was had been the occasion for an informal truce. However, on the 31st of January 1968 North Vietnamese troops staged a surprise attack on 36 provincial capitals and five major cities in South Vietnam including an attack on the U.S. embassy in Saigon and the presidential palace. The North Vietnamese soldiers seized the US embassy and held it for six hours until U.S. paratroopers landed on the buildings roof and routed the Viet Cong. Although it was not a military victory for the Vietnamese it can be seen as a strategic victory as the Tet Offensive marked a turning point in the Vietnam War and the beginning of AmericanShow MoreRelatedWhat Evidence Exists to Demonstrate That the American Media Coverage of the Vietnam War Influenced Its Outcome?2591 Words   |  11 PagesVietnam was lost in the living rooms of America – not on the battlefields of Vietnam.’ (Marshall McLuhan, 1975). What evidence exists to d emonstrate that the American media coverage of the Vietnam War influenced its outcome? There are only two comprehensive inferences that can be drawn upon when assessing the impact and legacy of the reporting of the Vietnam War on America and its media; the impact was enormous and its legacy unending. More than thirty years have passed since the American militaryRead MoreThe Dichotomized Media During Vietnam War2522 Words   |  11 PagesBlanchard Due 12/6/14 The Dichotomized Media in Vietnam War Introduction The Vietnam War was the longest, most costly and brutal war the US had ever fought during the cold war era. Even back to as early as 1950, the United States had been sending military advisers to Vietnam. With the escalation of the US evolvement in the early 1960s, the peak of the evolvement of 1968 followed by the Tet Offensive, and the final withdraw in 1973, it is still hard to imagine that the US have committed itself in this regional