The United States became increasingly involved with the War in Vietnam mostly thanks to their enmity with Russia due to the fact they were Communist, and how the USSR spread claiming countries that could’ve been turned democratic and become trading partners of the US. While Russia, Britain and the USA were all allies in WW1, they disagreed on many things, especially on how Germany should be punished and how should Europe be handled. THE USSR AND THE USA. During 1940-1970, the USSR and the USA were the world’s leading superpowers. After WW2, it was the US money that helped rebuild nearly all of Western Europe, putting nearly half a dozen countries into debt. They opened trade and helped Europe’s ravaged economy to get back onto its feet. They did so by creating the ‘Marshall Plan’ on June the 5th, 1947. The plans aim was to reconstruct Western Europe and at the same time to stop Communism spreading to them – the Americans were avid believers in the Domino Theory, and believed that communism would take over all of Europe if they did not intervene. They also created other policies such as the Truman doctrine on March the 12th, 1947 (which is a set of principles that state that the US as the worlds ‘leading country’ will help out other democratic governments worldwide) and NATO, 4th of April 1949. The Russians, who were also strongly affected by the war, were not deciding to retreat back to their borders without gaining anything - they were not allowed to attend the Treaty of Versailles or take part in agreeing on the terms and reparations that Germany was to pay off, thus getting no reward from participating in the war. Bitter with this prospect, Stalin decided to answer with his own set of policies, such as the ComEcom, ComInfor... ... middle of paper ... ...h Americans used planes and helicopters to deploy sustained heavy bombardment over Vietnam. During this one operation there were more bombs dropped than in the entire WW2 – 864,000 tonnes in total. CONCLUSION. 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.
To start off the Cold war, Russia had lost twenty-seven million soldiers in World War II. Stalin was not going to allow the Germany to attack Russia again . To make sure of this , Stalin made East Europe his buffer zone.The United states could not allow the this to contunie to happen. The first example was the Truman Doctrine, that declared the the Untited States would support “free people”. The Doctrine was followed by the Marshall Plan which gave 12 billion dollars in aid European democracies so that communist ideas would not be so attractive. These were some of the long term , patient policies the United States did to
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.
The Soviet Union and Eastern Europe became the East nations, and the United States, centered on NATO formed the West nations, dividing the world in two. Belonging to neither the East nor the West, developing countries were called Third World nations and became a stand-in for wars between the East and West (Gaddis, The Strategies of Containment 70-78). The end of WWII and the beginning of the C... ... middle of paper ... ... a, from containment to rollback in Korea; welcoming European integration because it portended the creation of an economic unit that encouraged technological innovation; building a configuration of power in the international system, nurturing free markets while safeguarding American interests, a constant in Washington for more than 35 years; and, free political economy at home were just a few of the strategic methods used to change, influence, and shape American domestic policy (Leffler, The Specter of Communism,100-129).
The participation of the United States in the Vietnam War was Archer 2 the subject of much debate with the American public throughout the duration of the war. The war in Vietnam did not cause any direct harm to the United States. The conflict was between the Vietcong, rebel communists in North Vietnam, and the South Vietnamese. The U.S. became involved in preventing the attack. the spread of communism.
Vietnam is a time in American history that most of us would like to forget, but really, we must learn from it. Vietnam is a time where we didn't look at the whole picture, it was 'perceived through the lens of Cold War politics.' (MP:420) With the new ?domino theory,? Americans feared for their safety and the safety of the 'free world.' If they didn't step in, they would inevitably lose the world to communism.
Red army originally was established as a means to protect the soviet people from the old bolsheviks during the october revolution. So as ww2 began the soviet union signed an anti-war pact with germany in august 1939 for a 4 year time period. why would germany and russia have an agreement like this ? well soviets tested their air force against germany’s during the spanish civil war and russia lost its planes and men . Stalin realized that the military he had now was weak and need to improve before the next war broke out. So he needed time to prepare his armies,then in 1941 germany invaded russia and Russia had 4.8 million soldiers and another 1.5 million stationed in the western fronts . Germany started Operation Barbarossa (a plan where germany splits its army in three and simultaneously invade the different major cities in the soviet union Leningrad,Moscow and Kiev.) on july 22 1941 and by july 1 germany captured riga dvinsk lvov and minsk.on july 3 stalin put the scorched earth policy in place which soldiers and civilians would burn anything that can be of use to the german army food shelter crops bridges roads,etc. In september 1941 german forces moved deep into russia c...
The amount of division in the United States during the vietnam war is astonishing as it symbolizes a country set at odds. Since the vietnam war caused a large amount of division between citizens it also stirred up controversy. So many americans began to think that we were meddling in a civil war that had nothing to do with us. However south vietnam was an ally of ours and we felt obliged to assist our weaker ally. The U.S.feared the domino theory which states “ if one land in a region came under the influence of communism
This investigation will attempt to answer the following question: To what extent did the Marshall Plan aid Western Europe amidst the devastation of post-WWII? Two main sources, including Stephen E. Ambrose and Douglas Brinkley’s Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938, and The USA and the Cold War, 1945-63 by Oliver Edwards, will be assessed on their origin, purpose, value, and limitation. This essay will focus on how, through the economic aid of the Marshall Plan, America was able to prevent further westward Soviet expansion in Europe, and restore power to the Great Powers of Western Europe. This essay will not, however, assess the initial congressional and public resistance to the plan, the change in public opinion, or the Soviet rejection of the Marshall Plan, and the origins of European division and the Cold War. By stimulating the post-WWII recovery of Western Europe through American economic aid, the US was able to protect the capitalist nature of Western European governments from further Soviet expansion and political seizure.
The Vietnam war was taken place mostly in Vietnam, eastern part of Indonesia and Southeast Asia. The Vietnam war was a long conflict that the communist hated and the southern allies, viet cong, and the its ally the United States. The war was worth millions of lives which most of them were Vietnamese civilians. We can because of need president Harry Truman sent around $160 million for aid to the Trench warfare. He also sent the Military Assistance Advisory Group or MAAG to help assist them there. Many of these conflicts were affecting the Domino theory espicslly the war in general. The Domino theory is if a country became communist if would soon start spreading it like a Domino when fallen. Because of this threat of communism in the air the United
The Vietnam War was a war the Americans fought in. Communism was spreading and the United States got involved because we didn’t want to see communist takeover. The North Vietnamese government were fighting to reunify Vietnam. This could perhaps outspread and we need to stop communist in the world. In 1954 conflict in the region had stretched back (Vietnam War). Economic aid, diplomacy, politics, presidential personalities, and military force were included with the process (Stur). At the time, President Lyndon Johnson said, ““ I am not going to be the President who saw Southeast Asia go the way of China” (Hoobler & Hoobler pg. 69). This is why the U.S.
The Vietnam War was only a small part of a much bigger conflict involving the United States, The Cold War. By helping the South Vietnamese defend themselves against communism, the United States was fighting for freedom and standing up for what its people believe. South Vietnam was not the only country at risk; if the United States did not support its own interests and the interests of South Vietnam then not only would South Vietnam become communist but many of the countries bordering South Vietnam would also become communist. This war was a good example of the Domino Theory.
The Vietnam War started in large part because of unavoidable consequences resulting from the Cold War, and the widespread fear amongst Western democratic governments of Communism taking over all of Southeast Asia. The major powers in the conflict, the United States and the Soviet Union, did not want to risk fighting each other, but both had their own “client states” that would carry out a fight for them instead. The United States had been anxious of the Communists’ cause to spread to Southeast Asia as the Soviet Union armed China who would then in turn arm North Vietnam, making higher odds of Communist Increase.
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.
America, from the onset of the war did not have any precise strategies to achieve their goals. Vietnamese leader, Diem noticed this stating, “It was as if the United States could never quiet decide what policy to pursue.” The official reason for US entry was to defeat the Communist threat. President Kennedy stated, “The enemy is the Communist system itself-implacable, insatiable, unceasing in its drive for world domination…” There were two significant faults with this objective. Firstly the Americans assumed that, without evidence, the Vietnamese people would be swung by the power of democracy. Secondly, disputes occurred between the major Communist nations during the Vietnam war: the Sino-Soviet split destroyed the idea of a unified world-wide takeover by Communist nations. Vietnamese scholar Luu Doan Huynh attacked the US many years later, “…you were not only wrong, but you had, so to speak, lost your minds. Vietnam a part of the Chinese expansionist game in Asia? For anyone who knows the history of Indochina, this is incomprehensible.” America was trapped, the original premise of invading Vietnam became void as the war progressed.
The American’s involvement in the Vietnam War took a huge death toll as well as a huge financial toll. Many believed that our involvement was unnecessary and waste of the money and lives lost (Romo, Zastro, Miller). But, with the harsh French ruling the Vietnam had, and soon shared control over Vietnam with Japan, some Vietnamese got tired of that and wanted to declare it a free country. Of course, that thought wouldn’t come easy to all, and a fight starts to break. With the U.S. nervous about the possible spread of communism to other countries surrounding and eventually making way to the Americas, the United States were soon involved in the Vietnam war that ended up lasting 16 years long.