The Vietnam War

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The Vietnam War was the longest military conflict in U.S. history. The hostilities in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia claimed the lives of more than 58,000 Americans. Another 04,000 were wounded. The Vietnam War was a military struggle fought in Vietnam from 15 to 175, involving the North Vietnamese and the National Liberation Front (NLF) in conflict with United States forces and the South Vietnamese army. From 146 until 154, the Vietnamese had struggled for their independence from France during the First Indochina War. At the end of this war, the country was temporarily divided into North and South Vietnam. North Vietnam came under the control of the Vietnamese Communists who had opposed France and who aimed for a unified Vietnam under Communist rule. The South was controlled by Vietnamese who had collaborated with the French. In 165 the United States sent in troops to prevent the South Vietnamese government from collapsing. Ultimately, however, the United States failed to achieve its goal, and in 175 Vietnam was reunified under Communist control; in 176 it officially became the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. During the conflict, approximately to 4 million Vietnamese on both sides were killed, in addition to another 1.5 to million Lao and Cambodians who were drawn into the war.

In the 150s, the United States began to send troops to Vietnam, during the following 5year period, the ensuing war would create some of the strongest tensions in US history. Almost million US men and women were sent thousands of miles to fight for what was a questionable cause. In total, it is estimated that over ,5 million people on both sides were killed. For much of Vietnams history it has been under foreign rule, primarily by the Chinese. In 1860, France began its domination of the area and had, by the late 1th century, implemented its colonization in a number of regions around the Gulf of Tonkin. During WWII, the Japanese government took control of much of the area and set up a puppet regime that was eventually forced out by the Vietnamese at the end of that war in 145. After WWII and until 155, France fought hard to regain their former territories in the region, but with a poorly organized army and little determination among the troops, their efforts soon collapsed. The French were finally defeated at Dien Bien Phu on the 8th of May 154 by the communist general Vo Nguyen Giap. The French troops withdrew, leaving a buffer zone separating the North and South and set up elections in order to form a government in the South. The communist regime set up its headquarters in Hanoi under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh. Many North Vietnamese left the country and fled south where the self-proclaimed president, Ngo Dinh Diem had formed the Republic of Vietnam. Between 155 and 160, the North Vietnamese with the assistance of the southern communist Vietcong, tried to take over the government in South Vietnam, and in November 16 President Diem was overthrown and executed. The following year, the North Vietnamese began a massive drive to conquer the whole country aided by China and Russia. Fearing a communist takeover of the entire region, the United States grew more and more wary of the progress of Ho Chi Minh and the Vietcong. Communism had become the evil menace in the United States and with expansion of Soviet rule into Eastern Europe, Korea and Cuba, the Americans were bent on stopping communism from spreading any further.

With the cold war at its height, the US leaders were worried that an attack on North Vietnam by the US would create tensions with the Chinese and Russians that would, in turn, lead to a larger conflict and possibly WW III. This created a difficult situation for the US and would eventually lead to many internal conflicts, which ultimately prevented the US from forming a firm policy for the region. The US was also faced with a number of cultural differences between the two countries, and what was considered corrupt by the US government was considered legitimate by South Vietnamese standards. It was difficult for the US to portray South Vietnam as a hard working, hard fighting democracy; corruption was widespread among officials and the armed forces. The Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) was disorganized due to the low morale of its leaders and their singular interest in personal gain. Therefore the US had a great deal of difficulty in holding the army together in South Vietnam and saw only one solution, that was to start taking care of things for themselves. By 150 the US began sending their first troops, firstly in an advisory role, which slowly escalated into a full blown commitment.

The large-scale involvement of the US came under the tenure of President Lyndon B. Johnson and his Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. Johnson had replaced John F. Kennedy after he was assassinated in Dallas, Texas 16. As president, he was torn between the differing strategies the US had for Vietnam. The increasing involvement and the escalation of troop involvement meant there were more casualties and more problems at home. But Johnson, who was always concerned about his image, and as president, held the power to halt the war in Vietnam, could not face the thought of being regarded as the first president in US history to loose a war. The pressure around him grew so intense, that he was only left with one option and that was not to run for a second term. Basically, he handed the hot potato to Richard M. Nixon.Order Custom Essay on The Vietnam War

The top US commander in Vietnam was General William Westmoreland; he had to face an army full of young men placed in an environment that was totally alien to them. There was no clear front to the conflict and basically, the enemy could be hiding anywhere and everywhere. Life in the jungle was tortuous and there were no home comforts. Drugs and other stimulants filtered their way into the daily routine of many servicemen and morale quickly started to fall. For the first time, people in the US resisting the draft were given acceptance although still not by the majority of citizens. Riots and demonstrations against the war became the norm in the US, with numerous veterans taking part in the efforts to stop the war, strengthening the issue. Finally, the US government saw that it was in a no-win situation and began making plans to withdraw. After great efforts by the US to withdraw, and the establishment of a cease-fire on January 7th, 17, American soldiers began leaving Vietnam for good. The North Vietnamese finally conquered South Vietnam in early 175, totally ignoring the cease-fire and on July nd, 176, North and South Vietnam were officially united as a single communist state. It had cost an estimated million lives and the injury or disablement of many millions of others.

The Second Indochina War, 154-175, grew out of the long conflict between France and Vietnam. In July 154, after one hundred years of colonial rule, France was forced to leave Vietnam. Communist forces under the direction of General Vo Nguyen Giap defeated the allied French troops at Dien Bien Phu, a remote mountain outpost in the northwest corner of Vietnam. This decisive battle convinced the French that they could no longer maintain their Indochinese colonies and Paris quickly sued for peace. As the two sides came together to discuss the terms of the peace in Geneva, Switzerland, international events were already shaping the future of Indochina. The Geneva Peace Accords, signed by France and Viet Nam in the summer of 154, reflected the strains of the international Cold War. Drawn up in the shadow of the Korean War, the Geneva agreement was an awkward peace for all sides. Because of outside pressures brought to bear by the Soviet Union and the Peoples Republic of China, Vietnams delegates to the Geneva conference agreed to the temporary partition of their nation at the seventeenth parallel. The Communist superpowers feared that a provocative peace would anger France and its powerful ally, the United States. Moscow and Peking did not want to risk another confrontation with the West so soon after Korea. Furthermore, the Communists believed they were better organized to take southern Vietnam by political action alone, a prediction that did not come to pass. According to the terms of the Geneva Accords, Vietnam would hold national elections in 156 to reunify the country. The division at the seventeenth parallel would vanish with the elections. The United States and many anti-Communists did not support the Accords. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles thought that the political protocols of the Accords gave too much power to the Vietnamese Communists. He was not going to allow the Communists to take southern Vietnam without a fight. Instead, Dulles and President Dwight D. Eisenhower supported the creation of a counter-revolutionary alternative south of the seventeenth parallel. The United States supported this effort at nation-building through a series of multi-lateral agreements that created the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). The SEATO Treaty provided for the mutual defense of all signatories, including the newly-created and U.S.-supported, Government of the Republic of Vietnam (GVN), or South Vietnam. In 156, Ngo Dinh Diem, a staunchly anti-Communist figure from the South, won a controversial election that made him president of South Vietnam. From his first days in power, Diem faced stiff opposition from his opponents. He urged the United States to support his counter-revolutionary alternative, claiming that the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV), or North Vietnam, wanted to take South Vietnam by force. In late 157, with American aid, Diem began to counterattack. He used the help of the American Central Intelligence Agency to identify those who sought to bring his government down and arrested thousands. In 15, Diem passed a series of acts known as Law 10/5 that made it legal to hold someone in jail if they were a suspected Communist without bringing formal charges.

From the moment he took power, Diem faced enormous difficulties. Students, intellectuals, Buddhists and others joined the Communists in opposition to Diems rule. The more these forces attacked Diems troops and secret police, the more he tried to control their protests. The president maintained that South Vietnam was a peace-loving democracy and that the Communists were out to destroy his new country. The Kennedy administration seemed split on how peaceful or democratic the Diem regime really was. Some Kennedy advisers believed Diem had not instituted enough social and economic reforms to remain a viable leader in South Vietnam. Others argued that Diem was the best of a bad lot. As the White House met to decide the future of its Vietnam policy, a change in strategy took place at the highest levels of the Communist Party. From 156-160, the Communist Party of Vietnam desired to reunify the country through political means alone. Accepting the Soviet Unions model of political struggle, the Communist Party tried unsuccessfully to cause Diems collapse by exerting tremendous internal political pressure. After Diems success against Communist cells in the South, however, southern Communistsconvinced the Party to adopt more violent tactics to guarantee Diems downfall. At the Fifteenth Party Plenum in January 15, the Communist Party finally approved the use of revolutionary violence to overthrow Ngo Dinh Diems government. In May 15, and again in September 160, the Party confirmed its use of revolutionary violence and the combination of the political and armed struggle movements. The result was the creation of a broad-based united front to help mobilize southerners in opposition to the Saigon government.

The united front had long and historic roots in Vietnam. Used earlier in the century by the Communists to mobilize anti-French forces, the united front brought together Communists and non-Communists in an umbrella organization that had limited, but important goals. On December 0, 160, the Party s new united front, the National Liberation Front (NLF), was born. Anyone could join this front as long as they opposed Ngo Dinh Diem. Many non-Communists who did join the Front may not have realized that the Party would ultimately dissolve the NLF and limit non-Communist representation in a unified government.

The character of the NLF and its relationship to the Communists in Hanoi has caused considerable debate among scholars, anti-war activists, and policy makers. From the birth of the NLF in 160, government officials in Washington claimed that Hanoi directed the NLFs violent attacks against the Saigon government. In a series of government white papers, Washington insiders denounced the NLF, claiming that it was merely a puppet of Hanoi. The NLF, in contrast, argued that it was autonomous and independent of the Communists in Hanoi and that it was made up mostly of non-Communists. Many anti-war activists supported the NLFs claims. Washington continued to discredit the NLF, however, calling it the Viet Cong, a derogatory and slang term meaning Vietnamese Communist.

In 161, President Kennedy sent a team to Vietnam to report on conditions in South Vietnam and to assess future American aid requirements. The report, now known as the December 161 White Paper, argued for an increase in military, technical, and economic aid, and the introduction of large-scale American advisers to help stabilize Diems government and crush the NLF. As Kennedy weighed the merits of these recommendations, some of his other advisers urged the president to withdraw from Vietnam altogether, claiming that it was a dead-end alley.

In early January 17, the Nixon White House convinced the Thieu-Ky regime in Saigon that they would not abandon South Vietnam if they signed onto the peace accord. Likewise, Hanoi convinced leaders of the NLF that all southern political prisoners would be released shortly after the peace accord was signed. On January , therefore, the final draft was initialed, ending open hostilities between the United States and the DRV. The The Paris Peace Agreement did not end the conflict in Vietnam, however, as the Thieu-Ky regime continued to battle Communist forces. From March 17 until the fall of Saigon on April 0, 175, ARVN forces tried desperately to save South Vietnam from political and military collapse. The end finally came, however, as DRV tanks rolled south along National Highway One. On the morning of April 0, Communist forces captured the presidential palace in Saigon, ending the Second Indochina War.

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