Vietnam Research Project
1. Vietnam was a conflict that was originally fought by the French.
They acted this way to follow the 'Truman doctrine' but by 1950, war
had flared up again and America joined. In '54 Eisenhower had come up
with the 'domino theory' as a justification for the involvement. This
theory stated, "If South Vietnam falls to the Communist, Laos,
Cambodia, Thailand, Burma, India and Pakistan would also fall like
dominos. The Pacific Islands and even Australia could be at risk."
After the French were defeated in 1954, Vietnam was split in two; the
north was Communist, led by Ho Chi Minh, and the south was Capitalist
under Ngo Dinh Diem. Diem's regime got billions of dollars from the US
but remained very unpopular with most Vietnamese people. The US
prevented the elections that were promised under the Geneva conference
because it knew that the Communists would win. Vietnamese Buddhist
monks protested against American involvement by suicide, mainly by
burning themselves.Operation Phoenix was organised by the CIA. This
led to the arrest and murder of thousands of Communists in the south.
First the US sent in military advisers, and then President Johnson
sent in troops in huge numbers. This shows that America had one main
reason for getting involved in Vietnam; to stop the spread of
communism. They didn't want to get involved in this conflict, so they
let the French try to resolve it, helping them with a donation of $15
million, including a military mission and military advisors. American
involvement officially began in 1950 when the US government recognized
the Bao Dai government and began sending the French aid to fight off
the communist backed Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh, and also when
Communist forces from North Korea invade the Republic of South Korea
on June 25. In response top this President Truman appealed to the
United Nations to take action. The UN quickly labelled North Korea the
aggressor, and Truman followed up by immediately sending US air and
naval support to Korea. America got involved in this war in stages,
Vietnam was really just a pawn in the much larger game of the Cold War. The main political objective behind the Unites States’ involvement in the Vietnam War was to set forth it’s policy of containment prevent the “Domino E...
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...
During the Lyndon Baines Johnson presidential administration, both those policy makers who supported America’s involvement in Vietnam and those who opposed the war were part of the “containment generation.” They had reached political maturity during World War II and the early years of the Cold War and had experienced the intense anticommunism of the McCarthy era of the early 1950s. These leaders understood and applied the lessons of American nationalism, which had the primary message that the U.S. was the dominating nation that had to embrace its responsibility to aid and improve nations in America’s image. Therefore, when they saw that there was a threat of the spread of communism to areas of Southeast Asia, a majority of the politicians were in favor of the war, which was the most costly U.S. foreign policy intervention during the Cold War. President Johnson and others considered Vietnam a crucial Cold war battleground where an American loss would trigger dire domestic and international repercussions. This view led him to decide to enter the Vietnam War, which was a condemnable action considering that there were intensifying domestic issues that he neglected because he was engrossed in the Vietnam situation. Anti-War protesters, a few politicians, and even the South Vietnamese all pointed out that this war was immoral and was resulting in destruction. Ultimately, Johnson’s decision resulted in a huge price paid on America’s part for its determination to prevent the spread of communism through this war and in the deaths of more 50,000 in an overseas war that was extremely difficult to win and that deepened divisions at home.
Many Americans believed our involvement in Vietnam began around 1965?the beginning of combat with American boys. In reality, engagement began much earlier, around 1945. The US supported France and rejected to recognize the Vietnamese nationalists as an actually body. The leader of the Vietnamese nationalists was Ho Chi Mihn and he was known as a communist. Our reasons for supporting France, more or less, reflected our foreign policy: containment. Post-WWII, our main focus was to contain Communism, as seen through the Truman. Doctrine. ?Truman and his advisors, who saw Communism as a monolithic force, assumed wrongly that Ho took orders from Moscow.? (AP:897) Because they believed that Ho had a connection with Communist Russia, the US wanted to support the more democratic side. American showed its support in aiding over 3/4 of the cost of France?s war.
The French were forced out of Vietnam and Vietnam was divided between communists and anti-communists. The communist regime controlled North Vietnam. Those that supported the French and were against communism controlled South Vietnam. Then trained Communist supporters from the North, the Vietcong, started coming to the South. America decided that they wanted to stop the spread of communism by stopping communism in Vietnam. The United States believed in the Domino Theory. The Domino Theory is the theory that communism will continue to spread around the world unless it is stopped. America sent soldiers over to Vietnam to help the South fight against the North. Then American ships were supposedly attacked of the coast of Vietnam. This is when the United States officially entered the war.
U.S.A Involvement in Vietnam War Direct U.S. military involvement in The Vietnam War, the nation's longest, cost fifty-eight thousand American lives. Only the Civil War and the two world wars were deadlier for Americans. During the decade of Vietnam start in 1964, the U.S Treasury spent over $140 billion on the war, enough money to fund urban regeneration projects in every major American city. In spite of these enormous costs and their accompanying public and private disturbance for the American people, the United States failed, for the first time in its history, to attain its stated war aims. The goal was to preserve a separate, independent, non-communist government in South Vietnam, but after April 1975, the communist Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) ruled the whole nation. (Wittman, Sandra M. "Chronology of the Vietnam War." Vietnam: Yesterday and Today Oakton Community College. Skokie, Illinois. 16 May 1996: n.p.) The initial reasons for U.S. involvement in Vietnam seemed rational and compelling to American leaders. Following its success in World War II, the United States faced the future with a sense of ethical rectitude and material confidence. From Washington's perspective, the principal threat to U.S. security and world peace was monolithic, tyrannical communism emanating from the Soviet Union. Any communist anywhere, at home or abroad, was, by description, and enemy of the United States. Drawing equivalence with the unsuccessful appeasement of fascist dictators before World War II, the Truman administration believed that any sign of communist aggression must be met quickly and vehemently by the United States and its allies. This reactive policy was known as containment. The Vietnam War proved devastating...
In 1960’s, according to American government’s “Domino Theory”, if the Vietnam came under control of the communism, then the entire southeastern Asia would fall in communism too. American had already lost China, we certainly wouldn’t allow the southeastern Asia follow in China’s footsteps, otherwise we would lose an access to the huge resources and markets of Asia. The South Vietnam was struggling with the communism at the North Vietnam by chance, and we had a promise to protect their freedom. So our government got a chance to use the South Vietnam as a hindrance to prevent the happen of Domino Theory. We started to send troops, money and military advisors to the South Vietnam government. And we supported Ngo Dinh Diem who became the Vietnam president through a false poll. Our government knew Diem wasn’t a good leader, but we still supported him because he was an intense anti-communism.
“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.”
Communism has been and still remains as one of the biggest threats to a democratic government. The tensions between North Vietnam, which was communist, and non-communistic South Vietnam’s governments occurred over the desire to gain absolute control and eradicate the other opposing rival government. Vietnam, during this time period, was fighting a civil war composed of the Northern regions and Southern regions in which the North wished to change the democratic governments that were currently in effect. The speech “On Vietnam and Not Seeking Re-election” by Lyndon B. Johnson, explains the Vietnam War and why he did not seek to be re-elected.
There are many ethnicities and nationalities that have developed a keen sense of cultural obligations that are inherited from the history of their own countries. From a time period of over a few thousand years ago, our foreign predecessors have developed characteristics that are hereby passed down for future generations to enjoy. Particularly speaking, Vietnam has affected a majority of the world in ways that are both positive and negative. Based on this knowledge, a person can infer that Vietnam has influenced the modern world greatly due to its prominent culture, religion, government, and scientific discoveries.
The conflict in Vietnam for the United States started when President Dwight D. Eisenhower went along with the domino theory and sent in military advisors in South Vietnam to stop the communist movement from taking place in South Vietnam. The Vietnam conflict was between the communist’s and the United States. North Vietnam was led by Ho Chi Minh, and Ho Chi Minh led the Viet Cong, a guerilla group to help spread communism. The United States were supporters of the South Vietnam because they wanted them to maintain their government rather than falling to the domino theory of communism. After Eisenhower’s term ended John F. Kennedy became president and took control of the situation of Vietnam but on November 22, 1963, Kennedy was assassinated. Lyndon B. Johnson succeeded presidency and the problems of Vietnam were left to himself. In 1963, the Tonkin Gulf incident occurred where, the U.S.S Maddox was attacked by North Vietnamese naval ships on august 2 1964. Two days later an even more controversial attack happened where it was reported another ship was attacked again but has later been proven false. Johnson used these events to gain congressional approval to enter into Vietnam. However the Tonkin Gulf Incident was questioned to have even happened which makes the war undoubtedly questionable Immediately after the incident . Many troops were killed in Vietnam and the United States eventually lost the war and does not achieve their goal to stop communism. Despite the large amount of conflict in Vietnam that needed to be resolved, escalating the war was the wrong idea by Johnson, as the many consequences of the war for the United States outweighed the potential spread of communism.
War in Vietnam is the longest military conflict U.S. were involved in during 20th century. However, 20 years before the official war declaration, in 1944, no one would have ever guessed that the area of South East Asia is going to experience such development. Having approached the Vietnam situation with wrong policy, underestimating the motivation and determination due to historical memory, in the hostile conditions caused US were unable to suppress the communist insurgency in South Vietnam, which later turned into a David vs. Goliath type of conflict.
...ng the democratic election. Once the Vietnamese people chose their president, the country will be unified again. Although many of the Vietnamese people loved Ho Chi Minh since he freed them from colonial oppression. The United States refused to allow Vietnam to reunify under a communist regime since the national policy was containment. Also, President Eisenhower felt that the countries in Southeast Asia would participate in the domino theory, which was if one country in Vietnam became communist than the rest of Southeast Asia would also become communist. Prime Minister Diem canceled the election process which was influenced by the United States in order to stop the spread of communism and not allow Ho Chi Minh from becoming the leader of Vietnam. Since this was the time period for the Cold War, the United States, the USSR, and the PRC began the Second Indochina War.
The Ho Chi Minh Trail played a very significant role in Vietnam War and helped the North Vietnam with the war against South Vietnam. The construction of trails started when North Vietnam wanted paths to travel to South Vietnam. United States tried many ways to block and destroy the trail to stop the travel of supplies from North to South. Ho Chi Minh trail was very dangerous since it went through jungles and mountains. The trail was used to transport supplies from North by foot until roads were improved for transportation. Vietnam government is transforming the trail to highway to help the poor. The Ho Chi Minh Trail was made up of dangerous series of paths used by South Vietnam to link supply bases in North Vietnam.
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.