File:Oct 15, 1969, Vietnam Moratorium Day in memory.jpg

Exposition Park, Los Angeles, Moratorium for Peace, October 15, 1969. Photo by Harvey Smythe.

University of Southern California student activism in 1969-1970 held a key role in starting up the first Earth Day ...

* https://www.greenpolicy360.net/w/Earth_Day_Memories_on_the_50th_Anniversary

Senator Gaylord Nelson, who proposed the first Earth Day Teach-in, credited the nationwide student-led Vietnam Moratorium peace movement for inspiring him to believe in the potential of a nationwide student-led environmental movement.

Senator Nelson at USC, Earth Day 1970

The foundation of the "Decade of the Environment" came about as a result of students proposing, planning and organizing the Moratorium teach-ins, peace marches, then Earth Day. USC students were out in front in this history-making era. A 16 mm USC film school documentary by Robert Carroll follows students who organized the Moratorium, beginning with the committee's DC founding in the summer of '69...

Excerpt from Doomsday Machine / Published 2017:

Daniel Ellsberg: Nixon Almost Took Vietnam War Nuclear In November 1969

Revelations: the Vietnam Moratorium may have prevented use of nuclear weapons

“Nuclear targets were picked.”

Ellsberg speculated that the plans would have gone ahead in November 1969.

Instead, a huge demonstration on Oct. 15, 1969, the Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam, combined a general strike with nationwide protests and teach-ins.

About 2 million people came out to protest across the country, even “little towns that had never protested before,” Ellsberg recalled.

“Without the Moratorium, there would have been an escalation, possibly the use of nuclear weapons in November 1969.”

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