D oves A mong H awks : R epublican O pposition to the V ietnam W ar , 1964–1968

Most historians of the Vietnam conflict have extrapolated the Republican commitment to anticommunism generally and in Southeast Asia specifically into full‐scale support for the war within the party. Yet the evidence demonstrates that a number of influential Republicans—including John Sherman Cooper and George Aiken—vocally opposed the Johnson administration's Vietnam policies and advocated negotiations and de‐escalation as early as 1964. Unfortunately, their dissent has been almost totally neglected by the same historians who laud the antiwar efforts of prominent Democratic critics of the conflict. This article seeks to redress this oversight, examining Republican opposition to the war and contrasting the views of GOP doves with their hawkish counterparts.