The Vietnam War 1954 - 1975

1. The Vietnam War 1954 - 1975

2. We will deal with four questions in this lecture: • Why was America fighting in Vietnam? • What was the war all about? • Why did we lose and could we have won? • And finally, what were its long term consequences?

3. Background • Ho Chi Minh - a communist rebel leader fighting French colonialism in Indochina, but also a strong nationalist who believed in an independent Vietnam - had been asking for U.S. support of Vietnamese independence since the end of World War I.   • The U.S. rebuffed his requests for help in ousting the French, but kept close ties with him during World War II.  Ho's underground safely escorted many U.S. pilots shot down over Japanese occupied Indochina back to their bases.  Indeed, he was even given an official secret agent number by the Office of Strategic Services (the equivalent of today's CIA).

4. French Defeat • U.S. - eager to keep France in its European Cold War alliance – Truman publicly announced support for the French in the newly erupted French-Indochina War.  The French suffered a humiliating defeat against Ho's forces at Dien Bien Phu. 

5. 1954 Geneva Accords • a truce between French and Vietnamese fighting • a removal of all foreign military bases • a temporary partition at the 17th parallel to remove troops • national elections within two years for a unified Vietnam.  • Point Six of the Accords stated: "...the essential purpose of the agreement...is to settle military questions with a view to ending hostilities and that the military demarcation line is provisional and should not in any way be interpreted as constituting a political or territorial boundary."

6. Eisenhower • Eisenhower installed a puppet government under Ngo Dinh Diem in the South and provided him with $200 million a year in aid.  • alienated peasants through a land reform program that benefited the elite in society and uprooted them from their villages into strategic hamlets where they could be "protected" from communist rebels • National elections to unify the country were postponed indefinitely because it was clear that Ho Chi Minh would win 80% of the vote in a free election.

7. World Press Photo of the Year: 1963 Malcolm W. Browne, USA, The Associated Press. Saigon, South Vietnam, 11 June 1963. Buddhist monk sets himself ablaze in protest against alleged religious persecutio​n by the South Vietnamese government​. About the image Overwhelme​d with horror and the smell of burning flesh, Browne shot four rolls of the monk, who died silently. His photos prompted President Kennedy to withdraw support of the Ngo Dinh Diem government (overthrow​n four months later).

8. U.S. Military Involvement Begins • Kennedy elected 1960 • Increases military “advisors” to 16,000 • 1963: JFK supports a Vietnamese military coup d'état – Diem and his brother are murdered (Nov. 2) • Kennedy was assassinated just weeks later (Nov. 22)

9. National Liberation Front • known as the Viet Cong - was formed under North Vietnamese Communist guidance in an effort to liberate South Vietnam from "American imperialism."

10. Johnson’s War • Remembers Truman’s “loss” of China  Domino Theory revived (if Vietnam fell to communism so would the rest of South East Asia.) I’m not going to be the president who saw Southeast Asia go the way China went.

11. Gulf of Tonkin • Under the pretense of an "unprovoked attack" by North Vietnamese torpedo boats against American destroyer, USS Maddox • Gulf of Tonkin Resolution on August 7, 1964 – Gave Johnson a blank check • War escalates w/o oversight from Congress 

12. Johnson Sends Ground Forces • Any who disagreed with his policies, such as Vice President Hubert Humphrey or Undersecretary of State George Ball, both of whom opposed escalation of the war, were banished from administration councils for months • Defense Secretary Robert McNamara resigned in 1966 when he realized that continued escalation of the war would have little effect.

13. U.S. Troop Deployments

14. Ho Chi Minh: If we have to fight, we will fight. You will kill ten of our men and we will kill one of yours, and in the end it will be you who tires of it.

15. A Peasant Revolution • the population of South Vietnam consisted mostly of peasants. • if you are a poor peasant and you have nothing to lose and everything to gain from a revolution that promises land reform, education, a job, and health care - then communism doesn't sound so bad • Start fighting against U.S. military and economic domination of South Vietnam • the NLF's support was strongest in the countryside of South Vietnam where peasants could be farmers by day and guerrillas by night.  • U.S. needed to fight the people they were proclaiming to defend:  the peasants. The guerilla wins if he does not lose, the conventional army loses if it does not win. -- Mao Zedong

17. War Tactics

20. Operation Rolling Thunder • No US troops north of the 17th parallel – bombing raids in the North to limit military capability with search & destroy missions in the South.  • Peasants who supported the Democratic South were moved to “strategic hamlets” for their safety – they were more like concentration camps • Anyone outside the hamlets were considered Viet Cong or at least sympathetic to the communist cause.

22. Operation Rolling Thunder • Between 1965 and 1971, the U.S. dropped more than triple the amount of bombs the all enemy countries in WWII.  • In Indochina, six million tons of explosives had been dropped by 1971. • Ongoing bombing of Hanoi- nonstop for 3 years(!) Also targets on the Ho Chi Minh Trail. • Yet by 1967 a secret Defense Department study argued that all military and economic targets had been struck.  What was their left to destroy except villages and hospitals? Yet, they continued bombing.

25. Chemical Defoliation • Napalm, jellied gasoline, was used to burn jungles to uncover the enemy, and crops were destroyed to deprive them of food.  • Nineteen million gallons of poisonous chemicals such as Agent Orange were sprayed on South Vietnam alone, killing livestock, fish, and causing blindness, birth defects, and death throughout peasant villages.  • In the end this suffering only intensified the will of the peasants to drive out the U.S

26. The Air War:A Napalm Attack

27. My Lai Massacre • March 16, 1968 • A battalion of U.S. soldiers ambushed earlier in the day took their revenge out on the village of My Lai by killing livestock, committing sodomy and rape, maiming civilians, and executing between 400-455 innocent people. • The incident was revealed six years later in 1974 and called an isolated case by the military until veterans came forward with other horror stories of village massacres.  • For many soldiers, the war had degenerated to a level where all Vietnamese were the enemy.

29. The Ground War 1965-1968 • General Westmoreland, late 1967: He was instrumental in raising the level of US forces deployed in Vietnam and in developing the strategies implemented in the region. We can see the“light at the end of the tunnel.”

30. V.C. solider executed during Tet Offensive

31. The Tet Offensive, January 1968 • a coordinated V.C. attack throughout South Vietnam in which guerillas were able to breach the American Embassy compound • Even though the offensive was a military failure for the North Vietnamese, it was a political and psychological victory for them because it dramatically contradicted optimistic claims by the U.S. government that the war was all but over.

33. Battle of Khe Sahn, distraction from the Tet Offensive

34. Impact of the Tet Offensive • Domestic U.S. Reaction: Disbelief, Anger, Distrust of Johnson Administration • Johnson’s popularity dropped in 1968 from 48% to 36%. • Sparing himself a humiliating re-election defeat, Johnson pulled himself out of the Presidential race, bitter and disillusioned that the kids he helped send to college on Great Society programs were now outside the White House chanting - Hey, Hey LBJ! How many kids did you kill today?

35. Impact of the Vietnam War …I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President. Johnson announces (March, 1968):

36. American Morale Begins to Dip • Disproportionate representation of poor people and minorities (96% were exempted for educational reasons • Severe racial problems. • Major drug problems • “fragging” –soldiers murdering their officers (fragmentation grenade)

37. “Peace with Honor” • Republican Richard Nixon entered office implying he had a secret plan to resolve the conflict.  • His plan?  EXPAND THE WAR!  • To secure public support in the U.S., Nixon also began his program of Vietnamization - a gradual withdrawal of American troops and training and arming of South Vietnamese military forces.

38. Nixon’s “Secret War” Plan • Nixon invaded neutral Cambodia & Laos to root out North Vietnamese supply depots (along the Ho Chi Minh Trail) and contributed to the instability of the government there (which would eventually collapse in its own savage communist revolution). 

40. “Pentagon Papers,” 1971 • Former defense analyst Daniel Ellsbergleaked govt. docs. regarding war efforts during Johnson’s administration to the NY Times. • Showed that LBJ had planned to go to war when he was still telling the public he wouldn’t; also showed that there were no plans to end the war ever. • New York Times v. United States (1971) • 1st Amendment did protect the New York Times' right to print classified materials.

41. By 1972, South Vietnamese forces were in disarray, and Nixon - having no desire to lose Vietnam just before the election – declared • Nixon unleashed a diplomacy of terror - mining Haiphong Harbor and dropping an additional 112,000 tons of bombs over North Vietnam over Christmas (this is in addition to the 6 million tons already dropped by 1971!) "The bastards have never been bombed like they are going to be bombed this time."

42. The End is Near • Over the Christmas week, Nixon launched the most massive bombing yet of North Vietnam - laying waste to factories, hospitals, residential districts, airports, and bus and train stations.  The terror worked - to a point.  • The North Vietnamese were brought to the negotiating table and Nixon declared victory just before the election.  He then quickly pulled out the remaining U.S. forces.

43. Paris Peace Accords • Provisions: • the withdrawal of US troops • end to direct US military involvement • democratic elections were to be held in South Vietnam, • in order to end the rivalry between the official government of South Vietnam, and the Communist PRG.

44. U.S. Withdrawal • After the withdrawal of military forces in 1973, the fighting did not stop in South Vietnam.  It simply continued without U.S. forces (Nguyen Van Thieu rejected the treaty, with US assistance continued to defy the Vietcong) • The turning point came in January 1975 when South Vietnamese forces began to retreat to more defensible lines and never stopped retreating.  • South Vietnamese soldiers shot civilians fleeing from the fighting in order to steal their transportation, officers left their troops by escaping the country on aircraft, and the government fell before it could issue a surrender.

46. Remaining U.S. personnel had to be evacuated by helicopter from the rooftop of the American embassy while holding back the thousands of Vietnamese who sought to flee the country.  • The American tragedy in Vietnam came to an end in April 1975 when Saigon, the former capital of South Vietnam, was renamed Ho Chi Minh City.

48. The Impact • 26th Amendment: 18-year-olds vote • Nixon abolished the draftall-volunteer army • War Powers Act, 1973 ٭ • President must notify Congress within 48 hours of deploying military force • President must withdraw forces unless he gains Congressional approval within 90 days • Disregard for Veterans  seen as “baby killers” • POW/MIA issue lingered

49. Khmer Rouge (Cambodia) • Communism spreads quickly through Cambodia & Laos • 1975 to 1979 was known as the Democratic Kampuchea • policy of social engineering, which resulted in genocide. • agricultural reform led to widespread famine, insisting on absolute self-sufficiency, even in the supply of medicine • led to the deaths of thousands from treatable diseases (such as malaria). • Brutal and arbitrary executions and torture carried out by its military units against perceived opposition

50. Some American POWs Returned from the “Hanoi Hilton” Senator John McCain(R-AZ)