How Did Forrest Gump Change From The 1980's?

In the movie Forrest Gump, Forrest is faced with many historical events from the 1960’s to 1980’s. Many of those events changed his life and most of the events he doesn’t understand. This movie ties in all these events that make Forrest a millionaire and upholds his character to a brighter aspect. Some of the major events he was presented in are the Vietnam War, the Watergate Scandal, and the Black Panther Party.

Forrest is recruited to the army after he graduates from the University of Alabama. He meets a friend named Bubba and is introduced into the shrimp business. Forrest gives advice to follows orders and he is fast at assembling his gun. He flies out to Vietnam and meets Lieutenant Dan. They walk the country and it never stops raining until one day they are attacked by Guerrilla troops. Forrest

saves his whole platoon and is shot in the butt. He is later awarded the Congressional Medal of honor by President Johnson.
Ho Chi Minh, inspired by communism, formed the Viet Minh to fight both Japan and the French colonial administration. Japan withdrew leaving the French Emperor Bao Dai in control of Vietnam. Viet Minh forces rose up immediately taking control over northern Vietnam with Ho Chi Minh as president. France controlled South Vietnam and conflict continued between the two until French were defeated by Viet Minh forces. The Geneva accords then split Vietnam along the latitude known as the 17th parallel (with Ho in control in the North and Bao in the South). Later Ngo Dinh Diem became president of south Vietnam. President Dwight D. Eisenhower then pledged his firm support to Diem and South Vietnam. With training and equipment from the American military, Diem’s cracked down on Viet Minh sympathizers in the south called Viet Cong. The Viet Cong and other opponents of Diem began fighting back with attacks on government officials and other targets.
Working under the “domino theory,” which meant that if one Southeast Asian country fell to communism that many would follow. Kennedy increased U.S. aid and by 1962, the U.S. military had 9,000 troops in Vietnam. President Johnson further increases U.S. military and economic support. Later Johnson ordered the bombing of military targets in North Vietnam. Congress soon passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave Johnson broad war-making powers. Citizens were then shown horrific images of the war on their televisions and turned against the war. Later Nixon was elected because he wanted to end the anti-war movement by stopping the war. In January 1973, the United States and North Korea concluded a final peace agreement ending hostilities between the two nations. The war between North and South Vietnam continued, until April 30, 1975, when North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon defeating the South (History.com Staff 2009a).
Forrest meets President Nixon after being All-American Ping Pong player. Nixon offers him to stay in the Watergate hotel. Later at night, Forrest calls in that people had flashlights and needed help finding something. He busted the robbers starting the Watergate Scandal. Later it shows on TV that Nixon resigned.
In 1972, Republican President Richard Nixon was running for reelection and the United States was involved in the Vietnam War.

The president and some advisers thought they needed a forced presidential campaign to win. In May 1972, members of Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP) broke into the Democratic headquarters at the watergate hotel and stole copies of top-secret documents and bugged the office’s phones. As the group prepared to break into the office again, a security guard noticed that they had taped the building’s locks. The guard called the police, who arrived catching the spies. Later suspicions rose about the president’s involvement when detectives found copies of the White House phone number among the burglars’ belongings. In August, Nixon gave a speech and swore that his White House staff was not involved in the break-in. Most voters believed him, and in November the president was reelected by a landslide. A few days after the break-in he arranged to provide hundreds of thousands of dollars in “hush money” to the burglars. Then, he and his aides planned to have the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to stop the FBI’s investigation of the

crime.
Later some of Nixon’s aides, including White House counsel John Dean, testified about the president’s crimes. They also testified that Nixon had secretly taped every conversation that took place in the Oval Office. Nixon tried to protect the tapes arguing executive privilege which would allow him to keep the tapes to himself. Archibald Cox, however, was determined to get the tapes and when Cox refused to stop, Nixon ordered that he be fired. This lead several Justice Department officials to resign in a protest known as the Saturday Night Massacre. Eventually, Nixon agreed to surrender edited transcripts of the tapes. In July, the Supreme Court ordered Nixon to turn over the tapes. The House of Representatives voted to impeach him for obstruction of justice, abuse of power, criminal cover-up and several violations of the Constitution. Finally, on August 5, Nixon released the tapes, which provided undeniable evidence of his involvement in the Watergate crimes. In the face of certain impeachment by the Senate, the president resigned on August 8. Six weeks after Gerald Ford was made president, he pardoned Nixon for any crimes he had committed while in office (History.com Staff 2009b).
Forrest returns from Vietnam and meets Jenny at an anti-Vietnam rally. They talk and she introduces him to the Black Panthers. The Black Panthers tell Forrest all the wrong things in the world and Jenny is slapped. Forrest beats up the man who slapped Jenny in front of the whole group. After the fight, Forrest apologizes for ruining their Black Panther party and leaves.
In October of 1966, in Oakland California, Huey Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. The Panthers practiced and taught self-defense to minority communities. They fought against the U.S. government and tried to establish revolutionary socialism through community-based programs. The party was one of the first organizations in U.S. history to militantly struggle against an ethnic minority. On April 25th, 1967, the first issue of The Black Panther, the party's official news, goes into distribution. In the following month, the party marches on the California state capitol fully armed, in protest of the state's attempt to outlaw carrying loaded weapons in public. Bobby Seale read a statement of protest and the police responded by arresting him and all 30 armed Panthers. In October of 1967, the police arrest the Defense Minister of the Panthers, Huey Newton, for killing an Oakland cop. Panther Eldridge Cleaver begins the movement to "Free Huey" and the party forms coalitions with various revolutionary parties.
Stokely Carmichael, a nationally known proponent of Black Power, is recruited into the party and soon becomes the party's Prime Minister in February 1968. Carmichael was against allowing whites into the black liberation movement. In the beginning of 1968, after selling Mao's Red Book to university students in order to buy shotguns, the Party makes the book required reading. Meanwhile, the FBI, under J. Edgar Hoover, begins a program called COINTELPRO (counterintelligence program) to break up the spreading unity of revolutionary groups that had begun from the Panthers. COINTELPRO killed leading members of the party who they know cannot be replaced. Following these mass killings would be a series of arrests, followed by a program of psychological warfare that was designed to split the party. This leads to the party dividing in half and killing each other and it fell apart in the 80’s (Baggins, Brian 2002).
In conclusion, the major events he was presented in was Vietnam War, the Watergate Scandal, and the Black Panther Party. These historical events have shaped the world today and the movie Forrest Gump helps present these events. Forrest had the chance to experience a whole life that is tied to major events, such as the ones presented, that helps people learn about history. Many of these events reflect today's society and are important because it shows all the things people did in such a short time period. This movie I felt was excellent and fit all the events together perfectly.