Some aspects of that time period have been over-sensationalized through the years.
There were incidents where vets returning from Vietnam were spit on by protestors. But there were only a few of those incidents. And the circumstances of those incidents were never reported. Were there heated confrontations that led to this? Probably. Were the people doing the spitting former Vietnam vets too? Possibly.
We get this impression that there were hordes of hippies waiting at every airport to yell and spit on soldiers flying back from Vietnam who were just minding their own business. That just wasn't the case. It was a few incidents by a few extremists. And we generally don't know all of the circumstances. 2.6 million vets served in Vietnam between 1965 and 1973. The vast majority did not get spit upon. They were welcomed by their loved ones and driven home from the airport for leave. A few days later, they would head out for their next duty assignment or to find a civilian job.
The fact is that life here in the U.S. was pretty much the same as always and the war and the war protests were a sideline. People sat around their TV's and watched "Batman" or "Green Acres" or "Land of the Giants", etc. They went to work or school everyday. The war was something they heard about occasionally in the news broadcasts. In short, it was pretty much the same as life has been for us here during the Iraq War and during Afghanistan.
Only a minority percentage of our military was sent to Vietnam. The majority were in CONUS or in Germany. Of that minority sent to the theater, approximately 50% were around combat. Of the soldiers sent to Vietnam, only 25% were draftees (
http://history-world.org/vietnam_war_statistics.htm). One in four. This may surprise some of you. But we did have a lot of people who volunteered to go. The idea of going to fight was somewhat popular among a generation whose fathers had fought in "The Good War".
It was, in fact, the whole memory of WWII that created problems for some vets. The WWII generation didn't understand why we "just didn't invade North Vietnam and get it over with!". Like Korea, there were no parades or celebrations because there was no victory. Many former soldiers became disillusioned. What had they fought for over there? Many began exploring the counter-culture.
The counter-culture itself is something that is a bit misunderstood today. Vietnam was just one of the things which created the counter-culture. Civil rights, women's rights, abuse of authority, etc. were also important issues to many in this group. And the group ranged from Timothy Leary to Muhammad Ali to Joan Biaz. It was a pretty diverse group with diverse goals. Some wanted drugs. Some wanted peace. Some wanted rights. But the media tended to lump them all into the same group and call them 'hippies'. It was only a small portion of the country. Woodstock was a big event, true. But most 'hippies' never saw it outside of the news. Eventually, "hippies" actually became a big sell to the media and marketing.
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