Vietnam affected everything in the 60's. The only popular media (TV news) was broadcast from there every night. It changed popular culture, economics, and politics. And it spilled over onto college campuses, the only refuge for young men 18 to 21 who didn't want to go to Vietnam or Canada. This was the environment that produced today's retiring generation of professors cited by OP, which never even mentioned Vietnam.

Vietnam and Iraq have little in common stateside by design. Today's political leaders weren't about to make the same mistake twice. So no TV news and no draft. Amazing how well it's worked, huh?