The US and the Vietnam War
History 1053
Background
• ■Argument
• no disrespect to the troops in the america’s most controversial war: we put the finest troops in
battle, but our national leadership
• inevitable to get involved. there are commies involved, and in the middle of the cold war,
there was no way we couldve stayed out of this
if we had read the crystal ball correctly, this could have been avoided, but given our containment
policy, and the monolithic view of communist, there was no way to stay out of it.
3. inevitable that we would lose
we didnt lose because of our troops, we lost because we applied a flaw strategy, and flawed
means
we failed to question containment
we failed to analyze whether this communist insurgency in vietnam was lead nationalization by
commies, or was a serious national security threat to the USA
it really wasn't a threat
we were militarily superior, but that didnt matter because we couldn't accomplish our goal
our goal was creating a friendly south vietnam friendly to the USA, and we did not achieve that
goal.
inevitably got involved, and inevitably lost
• ■Setting the stage
• unlike any other war because there are no front lines unlike conventional warfare, and every
other war fought
• the further you are away from the front line, the safer you are
• you measure your progress by how much territory you gain by pushing past the line, or behind
the line
• this does not apply to vietnam
• the war is an enigma (its everywhere, and no where at the same time)
• our troops could go weeks and months without seeing any action, only to have it erupt in gorey
violence in an instance, and fade away quickly
• this made the troops very on edge and anxious
• location meant nothing, war was in the cities, in the forest, in the rice patties
• our primary enemy was not a regular army, we were facing an insurgence
• they were guerrillas (terrorists)
• they enemy acted on their own, the viet kong
• until 1968, the primary enemy was someone we could not really identify
• americans could not distinguish the civilians from guerrillas, so the troops never knew who
they could trust, or who there were safe with
• created a great deal of anxiety and tension among the troops
• there was limited rules of engagement
, • this was a limited war
• we did not use all of our military capability to destroy the enemy
• we selected certain places at certain times with certain weapons
• and REACTED to battle
• we had no clear measure of success
• no one surrendered
• we didnt know if we were making progress or not
• the normal rules of war don't apply here, and that is part of what leads to our eventual loss
• domino theory: that if one country in a given region falls to a communist revolution, then that
revolution will spread to the surrounding countries and knock them out (like dominoes)
• we identified south vietnam as the first domino in South East asia, and we dedicated ourselves
to making sure that first domino didnt fall
Into the Quagmire
• quagmire: swamp, quicksand, easy to get into, difficult to get out of
• we thought we were doing the right thing, but once we got into vietnam, it was actually more
difficult to operate. the more we struggled, the more we sunk
• easy in, hard to get out
• our involvement is based on NSC68- the global application of containment
• its ideological: we have no strategic interest in this little part of the world, if we want to stop
communist from spreading in vietnam, we couldve used the asian countries we dominated like
s korea and philippines to stop the spread of communist
• we also have no ecominc interest in vietnam, they didnt have things we could buy
• our involvement is based on the ideology to stop communism wherever it appears
• ■Independence movement after
WWII
• the ethnic vietnamese people were under the control of the chinese, and the french (french
inso-china).
• in ww2, japanese push french out and occupy vietnam and then got pushed out by ww2
• at the end the ww2, vietnams was a vacuum
• Ho Chi Minh starts a group known as the “Viet Minh” (vietnamese people)
• purpose of Ho Chi Minh was to throw out japenese, and let vietnam be ruled by the vietnamese
• Ho was a communist
• the french inform usa that he is communist
• viet Minh writes a dec of independence almost similar to ours
• Minh says that nobody should own colonies, and he thought that USA would recognize us as
being an independent nation
• we were triggered by him being noted a communist
• french move back in and try to win back their indo-china
• french must regain control for the health and well being of their empire (1946-1950)
• this was noted as the first indo-china war
• french want their colonies, and Minh want their independence
• under truman doctrine, france redirected the supplies
• french are stronger in south, in the cities
History 1053
Background
• ■Argument
• no disrespect to the troops in the america’s most controversial war: we put the finest troops in
battle, but our national leadership
• inevitable to get involved. there are commies involved, and in the middle of the cold war,
there was no way we couldve stayed out of this
if we had read the crystal ball correctly, this could have been avoided, but given our containment
policy, and the monolithic view of communist, there was no way to stay out of it.
3. inevitable that we would lose
we didnt lose because of our troops, we lost because we applied a flaw strategy, and flawed
means
we failed to question containment
we failed to analyze whether this communist insurgency in vietnam was lead nationalization by
commies, or was a serious national security threat to the USA
it really wasn't a threat
we were militarily superior, but that didnt matter because we couldn't accomplish our goal
our goal was creating a friendly south vietnam friendly to the USA, and we did not achieve that
goal.
inevitably got involved, and inevitably lost
• ■Setting the stage
• unlike any other war because there are no front lines unlike conventional warfare, and every
other war fought
• the further you are away from the front line, the safer you are
• you measure your progress by how much territory you gain by pushing past the line, or behind
the line
• this does not apply to vietnam
• the war is an enigma (its everywhere, and no where at the same time)
• our troops could go weeks and months without seeing any action, only to have it erupt in gorey
violence in an instance, and fade away quickly
• this made the troops very on edge and anxious
• location meant nothing, war was in the cities, in the forest, in the rice patties
• our primary enemy was not a regular army, we were facing an insurgence
• they were guerrillas (terrorists)
• they enemy acted on their own, the viet kong
• until 1968, the primary enemy was someone we could not really identify
• americans could not distinguish the civilians from guerrillas, so the troops never knew who
they could trust, or who there were safe with
• created a great deal of anxiety and tension among the troops
• there was limited rules of engagement
, • this was a limited war
• we did not use all of our military capability to destroy the enemy
• we selected certain places at certain times with certain weapons
• and REACTED to battle
• we had no clear measure of success
• no one surrendered
• we didnt know if we were making progress or not
• the normal rules of war don't apply here, and that is part of what leads to our eventual loss
• domino theory: that if one country in a given region falls to a communist revolution, then that
revolution will spread to the surrounding countries and knock them out (like dominoes)
• we identified south vietnam as the first domino in South East asia, and we dedicated ourselves
to making sure that first domino didnt fall
Into the Quagmire
• quagmire: swamp, quicksand, easy to get into, difficult to get out of
• we thought we were doing the right thing, but once we got into vietnam, it was actually more
difficult to operate. the more we struggled, the more we sunk
• easy in, hard to get out
• our involvement is based on NSC68- the global application of containment
• its ideological: we have no strategic interest in this little part of the world, if we want to stop
communist from spreading in vietnam, we couldve used the asian countries we dominated like
s korea and philippines to stop the spread of communist
• we also have no ecominc interest in vietnam, they didnt have things we could buy
• our involvement is based on the ideology to stop communism wherever it appears
• ■Independence movement after
WWII
• the ethnic vietnamese people were under the control of the chinese, and the french (french
inso-china).
• in ww2, japanese push french out and occupy vietnam and then got pushed out by ww2
• at the end the ww2, vietnams was a vacuum
• Ho Chi Minh starts a group known as the “Viet Minh” (vietnamese people)
• purpose of Ho Chi Minh was to throw out japenese, and let vietnam be ruled by the vietnamese
• Ho was a communist
• the french inform usa that he is communist
• viet Minh writes a dec of independence almost similar to ours
• Minh says that nobody should own colonies, and he thought that USA would recognize us as
being an independent nation
• we were triggered by him being noted a communist
• french move back in and try to win back their indo-china
• french must regain control for the health and well being of their empire (1946-1950)
• this was noted as the first indo-china war
• french want their colonies, and Minh want their independence
• under truman doctrine, france redirected the supplies
• french are stronger in south, in the cities
