Vietnam War

Vietnam War

IndochinaFrance controls Indochina since late 19th Century

Japan took control during WWII.

After the war, France tries to recolonize it with help from the USA.

Ho Chi Minh

Leads the struggle for Vietnamese independence. Had already led resistance groups against the Japanese.• Leader of the Vietminh and a communist.• Defeats the French at the Battle of Dien Bien

Phu in 1954. How?• Guerilla tactics, more troops and aid from Mao.

Geneva Agreement 1954

• Independence for Laos and Cambodia• Vietnam temporarily divided at the 17th parallel.• Ho Chi Minh controls the nationalist forces in the

North.• Ngo Dinh Diem, a French-educated, Roman Catholic

who is backed by the USA, controls the South. • Elections to be held in 1956 and then reunification.

However the elections are never held.

Why did the USA back Diem?

Diem refuses to hold the elections and the USA doesn’t press him. Why?• Fear a communist victory.Diem’s rule is repressive and corrupt. Buddhist majority is persecuted. Peasants demand land reform like what the communists had done in the North. Yet, Eisenhower sends financial and military aid. Why? • There is no other alternative leader and…

…the Domino Theory

If one country falls to communism, the neighboring countries would also fall.

Reasons for American involvement

• Primarily, the Vietminh and its successor, the National Liberation Front (NLF); and the government of North Vietnam, led by Ho Chi Minh were agents of global communism and therefore the enemy.

• In 1949, when the Communist Party came to power in China, Washington feared that Vietnam would become the next Asian domino. That was one reason for Truman's 1950 decision to give aid to the French who were fighting the Vietminh.

4 Different Presidentsbetween 1950 - 1965

• US enters the war in steps between 1950 – 1965

• None of the presidents wanted to lose a country to communism.

• The US had promised assistance to the South Vietnamese. US credibility was at stake

In 1950, Truman approved economic and military aid to the French to retain control

of Indochina.

• It would help the development of non-Communist nations of Southeast Asia.

• Free trade in the region would provide markets for Japan, recovering with American help after World War 2.

• It reassured the British, whose postwar recovery was linked the rubber and tin industries in their colony of Malaya.

• With U.S. aid, the French could concentrate on economic recovery at home, and hopefully oversee the rearmament of West Germany, a Cold War measure deemed essential by the Americans.

Dwight D. Eisenhower1953-1961

• Attempts to build a nation and gov’t in South Vietnam. Takes over control from the French, dispatching military advisers to train a South Vietnamese army.

• Does not want loss of North Korea to be in vain.

John F. Kennedy (1961-1963)

EscalationIn 1961 he secretly sent 400Special Operations Forces to teach the South Vietnamese how to fight a counterinsurgency war against Communist guerrillas in South Vietnam.

When Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963, there were more than 16,000 U.S. military advisers in South Vietnam.

Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-69)

The US is now at war. Johnson committed the US most fully to the war. In August 1964, he secured from Congress a functional (not actual) declaration of war: the Tonkin Gulf Resolution.

In February and March 1965, he authorized the bombing of targets north of the 17th parallel, and on 8 March dispatched 3,500 Marines to South Vietnam. “Operation Rolling Thunder”

Operation Rolling Thunder

• US bombing raids to destroy the North Vietnamese economy and force her to stop helping the guerilla fighters in the south. Bombing was also directed at NLF territory in South Vietnam.

• It was suppposed to last 8 weeks but went on for 3 years. ( 1 million tons of bombs were dropped on Vietnam more than what was dropped on Germany, Japan and Italy during WW 2.)

NLF’s response to the bombing

• The response of the NLF was to attack US airbases in the south. The US was unable to defend them and more soldiers are requested.

• The first official US combat troops arrived later that year (’65). The use of napalm is also authorized by President Johnson.

• Soldiers from the S. Vietnamese army begin to desert and 50% of the countryside in the south are under the control of the Vietcong.

Tactics of the NLF: Guerilla Warfare

• Organized into small cells of 3 – 10 soldiers.• Knowledge of each other kept to bare minimum. • Involve the enemy in a long, drawn-out war.• Gain support of peasants and take control of villages. Had strict

code of behavior. • In exchange for land, the villages helped to feed and hide the

NLF.• The peasants were motivated by fear of the US marines or ARVN

and gratitude to the NLF.

( South Vietnam / US ”Strategic hamlets” eroded peasant support )

Tunnels and Trails

In the villages they controlled, the NLF• built tunnels which led out into the jungle• often contained caverns to store equipment

The Ho Chi Minh Trail• Complex web of different jungle paths from North

Vietnam to areas close to Saigon. • Impossible to identify from the air.• Estimated 60 tons of aid per day reached the NLF.

The iconic photo taken on June 8, 1972 in Trang Bang by AP photographer Nick Ut shows Phan Thị Kim Phúc at about nine years of age running naked on a road after being severely burned on her back by a South Vietnamese napalm attack.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phan_Thi_Kim_Phuc)

”Too hot! Too hot!”

US public opinion turnsAfter the Tet Offensive 1968• Although a Hanoi failure, General Westmoreland requests 200,000 more

soldiers. • Johnson is advised against further increases in number of ground troops. • He would restrict the bombing of North Vietnam and pursue a

negotiated settlement with Hanoi.

• Anti-war movement begins 1964, but now gains momentum as casualties and costs rise.

• Over 14,000 Americans are killed in action this year – the highest annual death toll of the war.

• TV coverage brings the war into ”the living room”.

Anti-war demonstrations

Draft from age 18. College students were exempt. 3 million served, most from working class homes. Minorities were more likely to serve.

Song My or My Lai Massacre March 16, 1968

The worst US war crime of the conflict.Mass murder of 500 unarmed civilians.Sparks global outrage when made public in 1969.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:My_Lai_massacre.jpg

Beginning of the endRichard Nixon elected in 1968.

National security advisorHenry Kissinger states 3 options:• escalation• withdrawal• status quo

The policy chosen is gradual withdrawal andVietnamization. US would prepare the South Vietnamese to gradually take over the military and politicalcontrol of South Vietnam.

Aerial bombardment and troop reductions

• In 1969 Nixon secretly began to bomb neutral Cambodia which had provided a sanctuary for Vietcong and NVA forces.

• Ground war continues even as troops withdraw. The morale and discipline of the soldiers declines. Futile endeavor!

• To support Vietnamization, in 1970 – 71 Nixon sends ground units into Cambodia and approves heavy air attacks on communist supply lines in Laos and Cambodia.

Nixon’s diplomatic initiatives in 1972

With Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. USSR provided material support to North Vietnam

With Chairman Mao. China helped to transport Soviet materials into North Vietnam.

Peace talks 1969-1973By April 1, 1973• US forces were out of Vietnam.• 587 POWs returned. 2500 still MIA.• Congress cuts off funds and air war ends in Cambodia.

In November 1973 a new law is passed to limit presidential power: War Powers Resolution. • It states that the President can send U.S. armed forces into action

abroad only by authorization of Congress or if the United States is already under attack or serious threat.

The Paris Peace Accord of 1973The agreement:• US to end its military involvement in Vietnam.• North and South Vietnam agree to a ceasefire.• South Vietnam to hold free elections. Any unification to

occur peacefully.The reality:• South Vietnam’s future is unsolved. Its military forces

deteriorate.• In Spring 1975: NVA and the Vietcong take Saigon.• South Vietnam falls and is reunited under a communist

government.