Vietnam War

Vietnam War

1. Reasons for Involvement

   • Poor Leadership of Diem
     • Nepotistic
     • He prosecuted Buddhists (80% of population)
       • Loses support of the South Vietnamese (these people weren't yet communist)
         • They start to support the Vietcong
   • Domino Theory
     • If Vietnam falls, so will Laos and Cambodia
     • Containment
   • Military Industrial Alliance
     • US Industry and army knew war would generate wealth for US
       • they put pressure on the government to get involved
   • Gulf of Tonkin 1964
     • US Maddox (ship) reports it has been attacked by N. Vietnam whilst in the Gulf of Tonkin
       • Johnson asks Congress for permission to send combat troops
         • Congress agrees

2. Reasons for failure

   • Poor US tactics
     • Tactics ineffective
       • Causing S. Vietnamese peasants to support VC
       • Poorly equipped
         • Guns didn't work in the climate
         • Backpacks too heavy
         • Boots rotted away due to the water
       • Named missions
         • Strategic Hamlet
           • Upset peasants because it moved them away from their homes and ancestors
         • Search and Destroy
           • My Lai massacre
           • US soldiers vulnerable to ambush
           • Didn't know their enemy
         • Rolling Thunder
           • Horrific damage to land and people
   • Effective VC tactics
     • Guerilla Warfare
       • Knew the jungle
       • Booby traps e.g. punji sticks
     • No uniform - unidentifiable
     • Used tunnels and Ho Chi Minh Trail
   • Media
     • Made US people against the war
       • Live coverage of the execution of an unarmed V.C. suspect in Saigon
         • Shocked America
       • Photo of Kim Phuc after the Trang Bang bombings
         • Front of a magazine
       • Walter Cronkite (celebrity) said that the war was unwinnable live on TV
     • Government realised it had lost the support of the US public, so couldn't maintain war effort
   • Protest Movement
     • Pressurises government to take America out of the war
       • Convinces Johnson that US needs to withdraw
         • He doesn't stand for re-election in 1968
   • Cost
     • HUGE COST
       • Needed to help tackle poverty in US at the time
       • Civil Rights movement happens
       • Americans refuse to pay taxes, as a protest, because these pay for the war
   • Tet Offensive 1968
     • US thinks its winning war as VC had suffered great loses
       • Believed that open combat would ensure a win
         • VC attack US bases and S.V cities as a SURPRISE
           • Initial VC success - make it to Saigon
             • Shown on live TV
       • Failure to US because army realise they can't won because VC have an 'inexhaustible' supply of troops
         • Army generals tell Johnson they won't win

3. How they withdrew (1968-73)

   • Nixon's policy
     • Steps up Rolling Thunder in North Vietnam
       • Wants to intimidate
       • Includes Ho Chi Minh trail
         • Heavily criticised by other countries for bombing Laos and Cambodia
     • Trained and equipped South Vietnamese troops
       • They could then continue to fight
       • Gradually reduce no. of US troops
         • Last troops withdrawn in 1973
       • FAILS - Saigon falls in 1975