Vietnam
Many believe that America's involvement in the Vietnam War was a disaster. The majority of the men and women fighting in the war had little or no idea why they were there in the first place. The staggering number of lives that was lost cannot and will not be overlooked. The importance of this war was decimated, and the actions of political leaders were scrutinized by there own people as well as other countries. One question that comes to mind when thinking about the Vietnam War is our reasoning for entering the war and what our enemies thought about America's intervention in the war. America's intervention in Vietnam changed the lives of many people and families in our country today.
The Political leaders of our country took, in a sense, moral authority in there involvement in Vietnam. According to Loren Baritz, Author of God's Country and American Know-how, Moral authority has been imbedded in American culture before America was even a country. I believe the quote by Herman Melville best explained moral authority when he said, "and we Americans are the peculiar, chosen people -- the Israel of our time; we bear the ark of the liberties of the world." After analyzing this statement one can make a direct connection to moral authority and America's actions at the time of the Vietnam War. Whoever gets in the way of the human races right to live their lives with virtue, liberty, and with God is an enemy. The role of the "worlds police" was assumed by America in the Vietnam War partly due to Americas need and want for everyone to live in peace and happiness, our involvement ended up being an experience on what not to do.
Along with moral authority American political leaders felt they had a promise to keep to themselves, America, and the citizens of their country. After WWII concluded America installed what they call the containment theory. The containment theory pledged, According to George B. Tindall and David E. Shi, America's opposition to the advancement of communism anywhere in the world. This goes back to moral authority, why would we control another countries fate, and even over a political ideology such as communism. President at the time Lyndon B. Johnson believed that, "to leave Vietnam to its fate would shake the confidence of all these people in the value of American commitment.
...untry to war at anytime and anywhere in the world. Because of this, the American people want to have confidence in its leader’s abilities. Plus, the actions of the President and his staff have a direct influence on the thoughts and perceptions of the people towards interference in foreign countries. Most people did not find the threat of Vietnam falling to communist rule as justification for the number of lives that were lost.
The Vietnam War was one of many. One reason some people argue the US should have been in the Vietnam War is because of the belief the US was trying to help establish a democracy there. The Vietnam war helping America win the cold war was another reason people believe the US was justified in the Vietnam war. Others believe that the US should not have been there because they were supporting a corrupt government, another reason is that American warfare was excessive and abusively killed many innocent civilians and ruined the land. While it appeared that the US was trying to spread democracy and win the cold war, but in truth, the US was supporting a mini Hitler, and our strategy had little chance of
In conclusion, I think that the United States became increasingly involved in the Vietnamese War because of the policies they had made as a promise to fight communism, and because they had sorely underestimated Vietcong’s ability to fight back using Guerrilla warfare. They refused to pull out of the war in fear of losing face before the world, but this pride factor scored them massive losses in the war. In the end, with both side sustaining heavy losses, the US were still seen as mutilators in the war, with advanced showing what their intervention had costed, and Vietnam was still fully taken over by Communism – they had achieved nothing and lost a lot.
The initial policy decision made by President Lyndon B. Johnson was to “Americanize” the Vietnam War (Tindall and Shi, p. 1341). This meant that American troops would be sent to Vietnam in large numbers to fight. The goal was to keep South Vietnam from falling to Communism, and
The Vietnam War was the longest and most expensive war in American History. The toll we paid wasn't just financial, it cost the people involved greatly, physically and mentally. This war caused great distress and sadness, as well as national confusion. Everyone had that one burning question being why? Why were we even there? The other question being why did America withdrawal from Vietnam. The purpose of this paper is to answer these two burning questions, and perhaps add some clarity to the confusion American was experiencing.
So many things influenced our involvement in the Vietnam War, and Lawrence examines the decisions we made in a greater context than just our own. He argues that international pressures controlled the attitudes and ideas of the United States, for the most part.
The Vietnam War created one of the most dividing periods of American history. Many saw the war as an unnecessary conflict that cost dearly in both money and lives. The United States’ involvement in the war was also considered to be unjustified. Despite the many difficulties faced during the controversial time, many activists raised issues in opposition to the United States’ involvement in the Vietnam War because of its unjust nature with acts such as the high casualty rates, scorched earth policies, and the lack of an immediate threat.
“It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder,” Albert Einstein. The Vietnam War was a war that America did not need. America believed they were doing good. They believed that they were protecting the people of Vietnam. America did not realise that they were only making a bad situation worse. America stopped nothing. They didn’t stop communism; they didn’t save the people of Vietnam. America caused the number of casualties in Vietnam to increase and had their own people killed. They caused diseases and destroyed the environment with the help of Agent Orange. America sent soldiers on a mission with a result of hundreds of civilians murdered. America did not help anyone. America sent people out to murder others and to be killed in the line of duty.
The war effort in Vietnam was quite possibly one of the most controversial the United States has ever been involved in. Almost the entire country was divided over their thoughts, with the majority being against this war. The people of the United States weren’t always opposed to involvement in Vietnam, that is until the truth started leaking to the public. Over the course of roughly twenty years somewhere between one and two million Vietnamese lives alone were lost (Overview of the Vietnam War). The Vietnam war has become widely known as an American mistake. Over time the general population began to see the war for what it was: one of the deadliest, most corrupt, and hardest wars to fight that we’ve ever been involved in.
The United States began to send troops to Vietnam to support French in 1950’s. During the following 25 years, the ensuing wars would cost 5 million people’s life and create a series of domestic tension in the U.S, like Vietnam War protest movement and the Military Draft. Even though the Vietnam War had been considered as the only war that American ever lost, but many Americans believed it was a noble cause. Like President Johnson had said in 1965, “We have made a national pledge to help South Vietnam defend its independence. To dishonor that pledge, to abandon this small and brave nation to its enemies, and to the terror that must follow, would be an unforgivable wrong.” But was it really a noble cause? I don’t think so. There are several reasons why I think it was a shameful venture: First, we want South Vietnam keep its independence is not just because for Vietnamese freedom, but also is we want to make South Vietnam to become an obstacle that could stop the spreading of communist. Second, why did our government kept so many secrets to public during the war? Why our embassy was occupied by Vietcong just after our government said: “American is standing on the brink of triumph.” Third, do we really know a country 8000 miles far away from us? Knowing them so well that we are sure they would like our ideology. Fourth, our government had sent a “boy scout” to fight with those sophisticated Vietcong, some of our troops were composed by those people who just graduated from high school.
The Vietnam War took place in between 1947- 1975. It consisted of North Vietnam trying to make South Vietnam a communism government. The United States later joined this conflict because of the stress North Vietnam was putting to South Vietnam to become a government that America did not want. The main reason why America joined was because of a theory called the Domino Effect. America and Russia were going through what has been dubbed the Cold War. The Domino Effect is the theory that communism will spread form one country to another. United states does not want this because our government is a democracy and communism opposes everything we stand for. America fearing communism was growing, stepped into Vietnam with America’s interest in mind, instead of Vietnam’s. There are several reason why American should have not gotten involved with this war. The most important reason was that America government officials made to much of a big deal about communism. This might sound cynical, but America to a certain degree did over react. Let it be said that it is much easier to say this after the fact. By looking back at McCarthyism, we can see the silliness of this fear. There is a serious side though. Thousands of people dies for a government that has no impact of their daily life. What regime Vietnam was going to change over to had no effect on the every day cycle of the United States. So truly, one can say, this can not one thing to do with America, its government and people.
“In July 1965, Lyndon Johnson chose to Americanize the war in Vietnam.” Although Johnson chose to enter America into the war, there were events previous that caused America to enter and take over the war. The South Vietnamese were losing the war against Communism – giving Johnson all the more reason to enter the war, and allowing strong American forces to help stop communism. There were other contributing factors leading up to the entrance of the war; America helped assist the French in the war, Johnson’s politics, the Tonkin Gulf Incident, and the 1954 Geneva Conference. President Johnson stated, “For 10 years three American Presidents-President Eisenhower, President Kennedy, and your present President--and the American people have been actively concerned with threats to the peace and security of the peoples of southeast Asia from the Communist government of North Viet-Nam.”
The Vietnam war has been referred to by many names, one of the longer ones was 'the cornerstone of the free world southeast Asia'. It was called that by John F. Kennedy. He was talking about Vietnam being and essential country in a non-communist world. He believed that if Vietnam became a communist country, all of the surrounding countries would also become communists. This is the main reason America was involved in the Vietnam war. Another reason was that America wanted to spread their “political ideas around the globe”. They wanted to do this so that their anti-communism stance was clear. The public also wanted to keep communism from spreading. To soldiers, the war was like a crusade, a great journey to purge the communists from Vietnam. Sadly, this is not what happened. The Viet Cong (VC) had far better tactics than the US. The VC was told to 'nibble at the enemy' so that he could 'neither eat or sleep'. This worked very well. Another demoralizing tactic the VC used was their landmines; they were designed to blow the limbs off the soldiers without killing them. This tied up hospital beds and meant the soldiers had to carry the wounded back to the base.
The Vietnam War was an extension of Cold War An Ideological conflict between Capitalism and Communism. In this protracted war scores of critical events happened and many proxy wars were fought between Nations belonging either of the Capitalist/ Communist bloc. The contrasting ideas of West and East about Government and economy was the driving force between the than two major forces of the World. The Western Nations were in favor of bringing democratic system of Government and Capitalist economy in the newly liberated Nations whereas, Russia considered it to its right specially on Eastern European countries. United States considered Communist's expansion more threatening in 1949, when Mao communists took control of China. Truman and Acheson inaugurated a plan called "Containment". Through this plan United States sent a message to all the newly liberated Nations and Europe that it will deploy all its resources in defending these Nations against expansionist Communist bloc. Its all-economic, Technical, Military assistances to such countries would be meant to block Communism. It considered Soviet expansion a fear for itself and its Allies. It therefore further made a Master Plan to build the dwindling economies as well as North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In this purview United States continued its involvement in the World politics, to maintain its role as World leader. To show the Third World that United States was willing and capable to standup to communism anywhere in the World.
Vietnam was a struggle which, in all honesty, the United States should never have been involved in. North Vietnam was battling for ownership of South Vietnam, so that they would be a unified communist nation. To prevent the domino effect and the further spread of communism, the U.S. held on to the Truman Doctrine and stood behind the South Vietnamese leader, Diem.