“Television brought the brutality of war into the comfort of the living room. Vietnam was lost in the living rooms of America-not on the battlefields of Vietnam," said Marshall McLuhan in 1975. The Vietnam War was the first defeat the United States of America had ever known; it was also the longest war fought, lasting from 1955 to 1973. The war, which opposed two forces: the communist (the Vietcong and North Vietnam) and the anti-communist (The United States and South Vietnam), was indeed greatly influenced by the media, as Marshall McLuhan suggests. More than fifty eight thousand American soldiers perished in Vietnam. For the first time in history, a war was filmed by journalists every day, without censorship. Undoubtedly, the images of the atrocities of the war had a great impact on the American citizens as they ceased to believe in this war, which in a way lead to defeat. More generally, the Vietnam War in itself had a negative impact on American society. This essay will first define the effects of the media on public opinion and then focus on the repercussions of the war on American society. The public opinion evolved greatly throughout the Vietnam War, mostly because the media influenced American citizens. The Vietnam War was the first to be filmed freely; however, journalists were able to show the scene they wanted on TV. At the beginning of the Vietnam War, the American veterans were portrayed as heroes fighting against the terrifying communists. Soldiers felt it was their duty to fight in the war because the older generation had fought in the Second World War, as shown in the movie “Born on the 4th of July." John Kennedy’s powerful speeches shown on TV influenced people to have faith in their government. We may wonder why the Americans trusted the television to such an excessive extent. Well, by 1966, 93% of the Americans possessed a personal TV and used it as their primary source of information. Nevertheless, the journalists’ main aim is to make profit, therefore they tend to make stories seem more interesting than what they actually are. The public opinion began to shift during the Tet offensive in 1968, which was one of the lar