World Reaction: Headlines
On this Page, I wanted to collect a few front page covers of newspapers on their reaction to the Fall of Saigon. I looked at Newspapers dated for April 30th/ May 1st 1975 the day of the Fall of Saigon and the reaction. For this I wanted to say what had been said about the event and in theory the defeat of the United States in the Vietnam War. I wanted to collect a front cover from an American Newspaper, a Vietnamese Newspaper and a British Newspaper. However when I was searching, I found it virtually impossible to find a Vietnamese Newspaper front cover from an archive. So unfortuantley I could not put a Vietnamese Front cover in. So I added a second American Newspaper cover to show a difference in the covers from the East Coast to the West. The British Newspaper was for my benefit, as I from the UK and wanted to see an opinion from them and also an opinion of a country that wasnt invovled in the war. So I have collected a front Page from the New York Times, LA Times and the Coventry Telegraph (UK).
This Cover is taken from the New York Times on May 1 1975, the day Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese army and the Viet Cong. The Paper leads with the headline, "Commuinsts take over Saigon; U.S. Resuce fleet is picking up Vietnamese who fled in boats". Its very interesting to see the NY Times lead with 'Commuinsts' as the title showing the real hatred and tension there was in this period of time for the red scare. The way the headline is wrote indicates the commuinsts have taken over Saigon and this is just the start. There is also a mid section saying the US will shelter 70,000 Vietnamese which is interesting to see after one day they had already started to put plans of giving releif to some of the Vietnamese that escaped during this evacuation. This is supoorted with an image below the article of some Vietnamese evacuees on a boat trying to escape and an American solider helping a small child. Its very interesting to see the reaction from the NY Times on the day of the Fall of Saigon.
This Front Cover comes from the Los Angeles Times on the day of the Fall of Saigon the 30th of April 1975. The Title of the article is "S. Vietnam Surrenders" This headline is again quite controversial. This headline makes it seem like it was the South Vietnamese that surrendered not the United States so it is kind of pinning the blame on the South Vietnamese Army. The subheadline is "Viet Cong Troops, Tanks pour into Saigon as red forces take over city" Again this is focusing on the Commuinsm and Red Scare as the subheadline because of the situation the United States found itself in, in terms of the battle against the Red Scare. The headline seems to pin the blame on the South Vietnamese Army rather than the United States and then focuses on the Commuinst factor that is there with the new occupiers of Saigon being Commuinst. This is the same as the other US paper New York Times both taking the same approach
The Coventry Telegraph is a rather small paper only really big in the City of Coventry in England. I struggled to find a natioanl newspaper from England to report Saigon but I couldnt find one. However I came across this piece which is really a very local paper and the news from Saigon is the main headline so I knew I could use this. The headline states "Festive Air as Saigon falls to Vietcong" this focuses on the festival happening at the time and the city falling to Saigon rather than focusing on Amerian invovlment showing the allies between the UK and USA. then the subheadline leads with "Communist troops rolled into Saigon today virtually unopposed". Again another view at the Commuinst involment showing the viewpoint of the UK on commuinsm aswell. Also they talk about the Vietcong being virtually unopposed showing that the South Vietnamese were weak and didnt put up a fight and there was no mention of the United States in this article. So from this we can see the UK has the back of the USA in terms of media coverage of the Vietnam war and the Fall of Saigon.