Kent State – The war came to the streets of the US

From The Pol Pot Journals:

By April 1970, the US had launched an all out invasion of Cambodia with 30,000 US troops and 40,000 South Vietnamese troops. The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong moved west to avoid the troops.
Meanwhile, back home the press found out about the invasion and campus demonstrations erupted all over U.S. universities.
At Kent State University in Ohio protest of the bombing of Cambodia, just as many others. But Governor James Rhodes sent in the National Guard. Some rocks were thrown, some windows were broken, and an attempt was made to burn the ROTC building.
The units that responded were ill-trained and came right from riot duty elsewhere; they hadn't had much sleep. The first day, there was some brutality; the Guard bayoneted two men, one a disabled veteran, who had cursed or yelled at them from cars. The following day, May 4th, the Guard, commanded with an amazing lack of military judgment, marched down a hill, to a field in the middle of angry demonstrators, then back up again. Seconds before they would have passed around the corner of a large building, and out of sight of the crowd, many of the Guardsmen wheeled and fired directly into the students, hitting thirteen, killing four of them, pulling the trigger over and over, for thirteen seconds.
As four student lay dead, others approached in shock. They were horrified that they had been fired on. They were also stunned. None of us can forget that press picture of a woman kneeling over her dead boyfriend as he bleed to death.

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,We're finally on our own.This summer I hear the drumming,Four dead in Ohio.
- Neil Young
“Ohio”
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Nixon and many of his supporters acted with indifference or even delight that this massacre had happened. They felt the students deserved it. The country was divided now more than ever and it was not just the Vietnam war anymore, it had moved over to Cambodia and that involvement was about to increase.