Dangerous Grounds: Antiwar Coffeehouses and Military Dissent in the Vietnam Era

by David L Parsons

As the Vietnam War divided the nation, a network of antiwar coffeehouses appeared in the towns and cities outside American military bases. Owned and operated by civilian activists, GI coffeehouses served as off-base refuges for the growing number of active-duty soldiers resisting the war. In the first history of this network, David L. Parsons shows how antiwar GIs and civilians united to battle local authorities, vigilante groups, and the military establishment itself by building a dynamic peace movement within the armed forces.

Peopled with lively characters and set in the tense environs of base towns around the country, this book complicates the often misunderstood relationship between the civilian antiwar movement, U.S. soldiers, and military officials during the Vietnam era. Using a broad set of primary and secondary sources, Parsons shows us a critical moment in the history of the Vietnam-era antiwar movement, when a chain of counterculture coffeehouses brought the war's turbulent politics directly to the American military's doorstep.

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction

176 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2017

Reviews

[Mills College Library]

959.70431 P2676 2017

[Adam Schendel · Rating 4 out of 5]

"During the relatively brief time that...antiwar [GI] coffeehouses dotted the American landscape, they brought the civilian antiwar movement in direct contact with U.S. soldiers and in the process became potent symbols of a significant crisis for both the military and the nation itself. The Vietnam War had a dramatic impact on the American armed forces, and nothing demonstrated this impact more sharply than the rise of the antiwar GI movement, which created a set of institutions and resistance activities that sought to organize the soldiers' anger toward the unpopular and devastating war."

-David L. Parsons

[Craig Werner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent mongraph on an under-remembered part of the anti-war movement. Parsons centers on three coffee house--the UFO near Ft. Jackson, the Oreo Strut near Ft. Hood, and the Shelter Half near Ft. Lewis (I remember the Homefront near Ft. Carson, but the story's essentially the same). Complements Winter Soldiers and The Turning on the history of the GI anti-war movement. I would have liked a few more GI voices, but the material on Fred Gardner and the other organizers is good to have.