The Disillusionment of the Vietnam War

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Recommended: Vietnam war from the Vietnamese point of view

President Dwight Eisenhower conditionally pledged to support South Vietnam’s new nation in 1955. In the time period between 1955-1961 the United States pumped seven billion dollars in aid so that Vietnam would not “go over quickly” like a “row of dominoes” (McNamara 31). In the next 6 years Vietnam would cost America billions of dollars, thousands of lives, and the disaffection of much of the United States public. Yet in the end, South Vietnam would fall to the North less than 2 years after the United States military involvement ceased.

From the year 1955 when the United States vowed to help support the South Vietnamese fight off the Northern communist, a total of about 60,000 soldiers dead and 300,000 wounded. The soldiers who offered their lives were on average the age of 23 meaning many gave up education and a family to fight for the lives in the bloody massacre we call the Vietnam War. At the beginning the United States only gave minor assistance to South Vietnam, but as the years continued and the Northern Communist began crippling the South, the United States offered more military aid. In 1961 after President John F. Kennedy sent a group of officials to assess the progress of preventing the spread of communism. It became evident that more military support was needed. “Working under the "domino theory," which held that if one Southeast Asian country fell to communism, many would follow, Kennedy increased U.S. aid, though he stopped short of committing to a large-scale military intervention”(History 1). After a group of generals over threw Ngo Dinh Diem the president of the government of the public of Vietnam the South Vietnam government become very unstable. Three weeks later President John F. Kennedy was assassinated befo...

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...ere so many were killed and crippled, and billions of dollars spent is incomprehensible. The object of war is to defeat the enemy. Young men’s lives should not be spent when war is fought for body counts, dictated by inane rules of engagement. Who can blame student protestors not wanting to continue a war that had no positive goal? Vietnam was a war fought in the wrong place for the wrong military and political goals.

Works Cited

Brigham, Robert K., and E. Kenneth Hoffman. "Battlefield:Vietnam | History." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 19 Sept. 2011.

Canfora, Alan. Kent May 4 Center. 2011. Web. 19 Sept. 2011.

McNamara, Robert S. "The Early Years." In Retrospect. New York: Times, 1995. 1-390. Print.

"Vietnam War — History.com Articles, Video, Pictures and Facts." History.com — History Made Every Day — American & World History. Web. 19 Sept. 2011.

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