Vietnam stab-in-the-back myth

The signing of the Paris Peace Accords on January 27, 1973

The Vietnam stab-in-the-back myth asserts that the United States' defeat during the Vietnam War was caused by various American groups, such as civilian policymakers, the media, antiwar protesters, the United States Congress, or political liberals.[1][2][3]

Used primarily by right-wing war hawks, the name "stab-in-the-back" is analogous to the German stab-in-the-back myth, which claims that internal forces caused the German defeat during World War I. Unlike the German myth, the American variant nearly always lacks an anti-Semitic aspect.[4] Jeffrey Kimball wrote that the United States' defeat "produced a powerful myth of betrayal that was analogous to the archetypal Dolchstoßlegende of post-World War I Germany."[1]

The myth was a "stronger version of the argument that antiwar protest encouraged the enemy, suggested that the antiwar movement might in the end commit the ultimate act of treachery, causing the loss of an otherwise winnable war."[5]

  1. ^ a b Kimball, Jeffrey (2008). "The Enduring Paradigm of the 'Lost Cause': Defeat in Vietnam, the Stab-in-the-Back Legend, and the Construction of a Myth". In Macleod, Jenny (ed.). Defeat and Memory: Cultural Histories of Military Defeat in the Modern Era. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 233–250. ISBN 978-0-230-51740-0.
  2. ^ Kimball, Jeffrey P. (April 1988). "The Stab-in-the-Back Legend and the Vietnam War". Armed Forces & Society. 14 (3): 433–458. doi:10.1177/0095327X8801400306. S2CID 145066387.
  3. ^ Gawthorpe, Andrew (2020). "Ken Burns, the Vietnam War, and the purpose of history". Journal of Strategic Studies. 43 (1): 154–169. doi:10.1080/01402390.2019.1631974. hdl:1887/138556. Moyar's critique shows that a line of argument that Jeffrey Kimball long ago called the 'stab-in-the-back legend' remains alive and well. The stab-in-the-back legend displays classic characteristics of what psychologists call in-group/out-group bias, in which every action by an in-group is rationalized and justified whereas every action by an out-group is criticized and seen as inspired by perverse motives. Through this pattern of thought, the 'stab-in-the-back' interpretation externalizes blame for U.S. defeat entirely to civilian policymakers. A virtuous and effective military had its hands tied by villainous civilians who, pandering to base political instincts, betrayed the soldiers (and eventually South Vietnam) by failing to allow them to do what was needed to win.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Mikics was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Strassfeld, Robert (2004). "'Lose in Vietnam, Bring Our Boys Home'". North Carolina Law Review. 82: 1916. Finally, the Administration suggested a stab-in-the-back theory of the war. This stronger version of the argument that antiwar protest encouraged the enemy, suggested that the antiwar movement might in the end commit the ultimate act of treachery, causing the loss of an otherwise winnable war.