Institutions and individuals representing religious goals and communities had an important, though often overlooked, impact on the course of the U.S. commitment in Vietnam. Beginning in 1954 and growing until 1968, organizations such as Catholic Relief Services, Mennonite Central Committee, Church World Services, Christian and Missionary Alliance, International Voluntary Services, and CARE sent hundreds of volunteers and spent millions of dollars trying to “save” South Vietnam from communism, sin, and poverty. In the decade before military intervention, many private agencies saw themselves representing the moral and compassionate face of America’s presence in Asia. The moral purposes that bound religious agencies with the federal government, however, was permanently strained by the American military intervention. Where there was once unanimity, deep divisions emerged between the religious agencies, between the agencies and the federal government, and between agency volunteers and the homebase, challenging the cooperative nature of religiously based humanitarian services abroad.

This project will engage critical questions about the role and activities of post-World War II American Christianity abroad. By using Vietnam as a lens, the project will shed new light not only on how the largest American religious groups operated within (and against) Cold War foreign policy in Asia, but also how they shaped American policy priorities and the opinions of theft co-religionists regarding the morality of humanitarian assistance, war, national security, human rights, and America’s global responsibilities--issues that remain salient and controversial in a post-Cold War world.