[165]:196205 Large-scale offensives were rolled back in favour of small-unit and sapper attacks as well as targeting the pacification and Vietnamization strategy. Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969) was president of the United States between January 1953 to January 1961, a period of growing interest and involvement in Vietnam. [203] Between 1969 and 1971 the Viet Cong and some PAVN units had reverted to small unit tactics typical of 1967 and prior instead of nationwide grand offensives. [287], The Vietnam War was the first conflict where U.S. forces had secure voice communication equipment available at the tactical level. This effort to highlight the positive aspects of a nursing career reflected the feminism of the 1960s1970s in the United States. [37] However, the figures do not include deaths of South Vietnamese and allied soldiers. On 13 December 1974, North Vietnamese forces attacked Phc Long. The Air Force ran many missions of this kind to secure additional funding during budget negotiations, so the tonnage expended does not directly correlate with the resulting damage. The election was won by Republican party candidate Richard Nixon who claimed to have a secret plan to end the war. [163] Preparations were underway for the General Offensive, General Uprising, known as Tet Mau Than, or the Tet Offensive, with the intention of Vn Tin Dng for forces to launch "direct attacks on the American and puppet nerve centersSaigon, Hu, Danang, all the cities, towns and main bases"[164] Le Duan sought to placate critics of the ongoing stalemate by planning a decisive victory. This phase would end when the enemy had been worn down, thrown on the defensive, and driven back from major populated areas. "[315] U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger wrote in a secret memo to President Gerald Ford that "in terms of military tactics our armed forces are not suited to this kind of war. There had also been reports of Catholic paramilitaries demolishing Buddhist pagodas throughout Dim's rule. Learn why a country that had been barely known to most Americans came to define an era. Major allies, however, notably NATO nations Canada and the United Kingdom, declined Washington's troop requests.[157]. Following the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, Hanoi anticipated the arrival of US troops and began expanding the Viet Cong, as well as sending increasing numbers of North Vietnamese personnel southwards. [115]:26 About 500 of the "regroupees" of 1954 were sent south on the trail during its first year of operation. Regardless of political policies, U.S. commanders were institutionally and psychologically unsuited to a defensive mission. The B-52s literally dropped their payloads in the lake." These actions were part of a diversionary strategy meant to draw U.S. forces towards the Central Highlands. [111], In September 1960, COSVN, North Vietnam's southern headquarters, gave an order for a full scale coordinated uprising in South Vietnam against the government and 1/3 of the population was soon living in areas of communist control. There was an active strategy of recruitment and favorable treatment of Montagnard tribes for the Viet Cong, as they were pivotal for control of infiltration routes. The National Liberation Front had made great progress and was close to declaring provisional revolutionary governments in large areas.[126]. President Dim was overthrown and executed, along with his brother, on 2 November 1963. [98]:143[99][100]:569[101] However, declassified documents from the Vietnamese and Hungarian archives indicate that the number of executions was much lower than reported at the time, although likely greater than 13,500. Historian Luu Doan Huynh notes that "Dim represented narrow and extremist nationalism coupled with autocracy and nepotism. Some have argued that the policy of North Vietnam was not to topple other non-communist governments in South East Asia. [325] Vietnam veterans suffered from PTSD in unprecedented numbers, as many as 15.2% of Vietnam veterans, because the U.S. military had routinely provided heavy psychoactive drugs, including amphetamines, to American servicemen, which left them unable to process adequately their traumas at the time. [185][186], In September 1969, Ho Chi Minh died, aged seventy-nine. It was gradually replaced by the M16 rifle, designed by Eugene Stoner, between 1964 and 1970. President Eisenhower November 1, 1955 President Eisenhower deploys the Military Assistance Advisory Group to train the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. [94][95][40]:9697 The exodus was coordinated by a U.S.-funded $93million relocation program, which included the use of the Seventh Fleet to ferry refugees. [358]:376 Allen's analysis ties the position of potential missing or prisoner Americans into post-war politics and recent presidential elections, including the Swift boat controversy in US electoral politics. [134], President Kennedy was assassinated on 22 November 1963. This time, Tr could travel on a drivable highway with regular fueling stops, a vast change from the days when the Ho Chi Minh trail was a dangerous mountain trek. The Vietnam War had its origins in the broader Indochina wars of the 1940s and '50s, when nationalist groups such as Ho Chi Minh 's Viet Minh, inspired by Chinese and Soviet communism, fought the colonial rule first of Japan and then of France. China sent 320,000 troops and annual arms shipments worth $180million. [183][184] Nixon had also sought dtente with the Soviet Union and rapprochement with China, which decreased global tensions and led to nuclear arms reduction by both superpowers; however, the Soviets continued to supply the North Vietnamese with aid. [200]:357 William Westmoreland, no longer in command but tasked with investigation of the failure, cited a clear dereliction of duty, lax defensive postures and lack of officers in charge as its cause. [328]:4447 An estimated 125,000 Americans left for Canada to avoid the Vietnam draft,[329] and approximately 50,000 American servicemen deserted. [40]:8890 Around one million northerners, mainly minority Catholics, fled south, fearing persecution by the Communists. Poor leadership, corruption, and political promotions all played a part in weakening the ARVN. His presidency was short but it spanned a critical period, both in Vietnam and the formulation of US policy. Although female military nurses lived in a heavily male environment, very few cases of sexual harassment were ever reported. [23], The PRC also began financing the Khmer Rouge as a counterweight to North Vietnam at this time. The ARVN forces were led by Dim's most trusted general, Hunh Vn Cao, commander of the IV Corps. Dim refused to make concessions to the Buddhist majority or take responsibility for the deaths. [228] The fatal shooting of four students at Kent State University in 1970 led to nationwide university protests. [107] According to Gabriel Kolko, 40,000 political prisoners had been jailed by the end of 1958. In 1968, the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group (VWCWG) was established by the Pentagon task force set up in the wake of the My Lai Massacre, to attempt to ascertain the veracity of emerging claims of war crimes by U.S. armed forces in Vietnam, during the Vietnam War period. War crimes were committed by both sides during the conflict and included rape, massacres of civilians, bombings of civilian targets, terrorism, the widespread use of torture, and the murder of prisoners of war. The conflict between Hmong rebels and the Pathet Lao continued in isolated pockets. 5, pp. China said that its military and economic aid to North Vietnam and the Viet Cong totaled $20billion (approx. [290], On 2 July 1976, North and South Vietnam were merged to form the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. [citation needed] However, heightened oil prices meant that many of these assets could not be adequately leveraged. The anti-war movement was gaining strength in the United States. Brandishing a captured Chinese machine gun, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara appeared at a televised news conference in the spring of 1965. He instituted the death penalty against any activity deemed communist in August 1956. "[177] Thus, the public was shocked and confused when Westmoreland's predictions were trumped by the Tet Offensive. [102] In 1956, leaders in Hanoi admitted to "excesses" in implementing this program and restored a large amount of the land to the original owners. He argued that with two months of good weather remaining until the onset of the monsoon, it would be irresponsible to not take advantage of the situation. [85]:328, U.S. military advisors were embedded at every level of the South Vietnamese armed forces. Vietnam Democide: Estimates, Sources, and Calculations", "2021 NAME ADDITIONS AND STATUS CHANGES ON THE VIETNAM VETERANS MEMORIAL", "Vietnam War U.S. Military Fatal Casualty Statistics: HOSTILE OR NON-HOSTILE DEATH INDICATOR. [358]:374, Michael Allen in Until The Last Man Comes Home also accuses Nixon of myth making, by exploiting the plight of the League of Wives of American Prisoners in Vietnam and the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia to allow the government to appear caring as the war was increasingly considered lost. The ethnic minority peoples of South Vietnam, like the Montagnards (Degar) in the Central Highlands, the Hindu and Muslim Cham, and the Buddhist Khmer Krom, were actively recruited in the war. The U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam, Henry Cabot Lodge, invited the coup leaders to the embassy and congratulated them. Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and the Philippines[97]:556 all agreed to send troops. Chapter 17 index: "Communists provided further corroboration of the proximity of their casualty figures to American figures in a postwar disclosure of total losses from 1960 to 1975. Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon oversaw the conflict, which ratcheted up in intensity as the years passed by. [97]:224 Three days later, he declared South Vietnam to be an independent state under the name Republic of Vietnam (ROV), with himself as president. Westmoreland predicted victory by the end of 1967. [103]:570571 In April 1962, John Kenneth Galbraith warned Kennedy of the "danger we shall replace the French as a colonial force in the area and bleed as the French did. At World War II's end, Viet Minh forces seized the northern. [46] North Vietnam was also known for its abusive treatment of American POWs, most notably in Ha L Prison (aka the Hanoi Hilton), where torture was employed to extract confessions. Booming as Memories of Vietnam Fade", "General Won't Punish G.I. However, limitations of the units, including poor voice quality, reduced range, annoying time delays and logistical support issues, led to only one unit in ten being used. [40]:221 In the same month, Johnson pledged that he was not "committing American boys to fighting a war that I think ought to be fought by the boys of Asia to help protect their own land". [36], US reports of "enemy KIA", referred to as body count were thought to have been subject to "falsification and glorification", and a true estimate of PAVN/VC combat deaths may be difficult to assess, as US victories were assessed by having a "greater kill ratio". In the countryside even the best ARVN units seemed incapable . In the final weeks of his life, Kennedy wrestled with the need to decide the future of the United States' commitment in Vietnam. One documented event was the Phong Nh and Phong Nht massacre where the 2nd Marine Brigade reportedly killed between 69 and 79 civilians on 12 February 1968 in Phong Nh and Phong Nht village, in Bn District, Qung Nam Province. The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955[A 2] to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. After the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, President Lyndon B. Johnson and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara slowly increased military pressure on the coast of North Vietnam, aiding the South in offensive strikes and intelligence-gathering.. [87]:18 By 1954, the United States had spent $1billion in support of the French military effort, shouldering 80 percent of the cost of the war. [98]:193194,202203,215217, The domino theory, which argued that if one country fell to communism, then all of the surrounding countries would follow, was first proposed as policy by the Eisenhower administration. "[316], Hanoi had persistently sought unification of the country since the Geneva Accords, and the effects of U.S. bombings had negligible impact on the goals of the North Vietnamese government. [200]:357. [97]:468. United States Vietnam Relations, 19451967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense, vol. "Vietnam War" is the most commonly used name in English. On November 1, 1963, the South Vietnamese government was overthrown. In 1998, after a high level review by the. After two clashes that left 55 ARVN soldiers dead, President Thieu announced on 4 January 1974, that the war had restarted and that the Paris Peace Accords were no longer in effect. Guenter Lewy asserts that one-third of the reported "enemy" killed may have been civilians, concluding that the actual number of deaths of PAVN/VC military forces was probably closer to 444,000. His plan to build up the ARVN so that it could take over the defense of South Vietnam became known as "Vietnamization". France and the United States also discussed the use of three tactical nuclear weapons, although reports of how seriously this was considered and by whom are vague and contradictory. President Richard M. Nixon assumed responsibility for the Vietnam War as he swore the oath of office on January 20, 1969. By the time South Vietnam joined the talks, Richard M. Nixon had been elected president. [249]:78 Torture was conducted by the South Vietnamese government in collusion with the CIA.[250][251]. The circumstances of the attacks were murky. [132], Paramilitary officers from the CIA's Special Activities Division trained and led Hmong tribesmen in Laos and into Vietnam. [208] Lon Nol began rounding up Vietnamese civilians in Cambodia into internment camps and massacring them, provoking harsh reactions from both the North Vietnamese and South Vietnamese governments. [239] The substantiated cases included 7 massacres between 1967 and 1971 in which at least 137 civilians were killed; seventy eight further attacks targeting non-combatants resulting in at least 57 deaths, 56 wounded and 15 sexually assaulted; and 141 cases of U.S. soldiers torturing civilian detainees or prisoners of war with fists, sticks, bats, water or electric shock. In 1967, all Viet Cong battalions were reequipped with arms of Soviet design such as the AK-47 assault rifle, carbines and the RPG-2 anti-tank weapon. Beginning in the summer of 1955, Dim launched the "Denounce the Communists" campaign, during which suspected communists and other anti-government elements were arrested, imprisoned, tortured, or executed. U.S. troop withdrawals continued, but American airpower responded, beginning Operation Linebacker, and the offensive was halted. The costs of the war loom large in American popular consciousness; a 1990 poll showed that the public incorrectly believed that more Americans died in Vietnam than in World War II. Phase 1. [24]:1070. [17] It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. [160]:407411 Drug usage increased rapidly among U.S. forces during this period, as 30% of U.S. troops regularly used marijuana,[160]:407 while a House subcommittee found 1015% of U.S. troops in Vietnam regularly used high-grade heroin. [263][264] Some women also served for the PAVN and Viet Cong intelligence services. Ami Pedahzur has written that "the overall volume and lethality of Viet Cong terrorism rivals or exceeds all but a handful of terrorist campaigns waged over the last third of the twentieth century", based on the definition of terrorists as a non-state actor, and examining targeted killings and civilian deaths which are estimated at over 18,000 from 1966 to 1969. In February 1955, President Eisenhower sent the first American military advisors to Vietnam to help build up Diem's army. In South Vietnam, many women voluntarily served in the ARVN's Women's Armed Force Corps (WAFC) and various other Women's corps in the military. With respect to the question of reunification, the non-communist Vietnamese delegation objected strenuously to any division of Vietnam, but lost out when the French accepted the proposal of Viet Minh delegate Phm Vn ng,[103]:134 who proposed that Vietnam eventually be united by elections under the supervision of "local commissions". [87]:103 The CIA was less optimistic, however, warning that "the Viet Cong by and large retain de facto control of much of the countryside and have steadily increased the overall intensity of the effort". With the US losing around 300 soldiers a week in Vietnam, and the enemy showing no signs of weakening, Nixon concluded that the war could not be won. [279], During the early stages of the war, the Viet Cong mainly sustained itself with captured arms; these were often of American manufacture or were crude, makeshift weapons used alongside shotguns made of galvanized pipes. This provoked a backlash from the Montagnards, some joining the Viet Cong as a result. [88] Nixon, a so-called "hawk" on Vietnam, suggested that the United States might have to "put American boys in". [320] It was stated that war-spending could have paid off every mortgage in the US at that time, with money leftover. This ended a series of coups that had happened more than once a year. [252] South Korean forces are also accused of perpetrating other massacres, namely: Bnh Ha massacre, Binh Tai Massacre and H My massacre. Which president started sending troops into Vietnam? Group 559 was headquartered in Na Kai, Houaphan province in northeast Laos close to the border. In January 1950, the communist states of China and the Soviet Union recognized the Viet Minh's Democratic Republic of Vietnam, based in Hanoi, as the legitimate government of Vietnam. [85]:353354 The idea that the government of South Vietnam could manage its own affairs was shelved. [229] Anti-war protests declined after the signing of the Paris Peace Accords and the end of the draft in January 1973, and the withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam in the months following. Furthermore, throughout the war there was found to be considerable flaws and dishonesty by officers and commanders due to promotions being tied to the body count system touted by Westmoreland and McNamara. [281] In the period up to the conventional phase in 1970, the Viet Cong and PAVN were primarily limited to 81mm mortars, recoilless rifles, and small arms and had significantly lighter equipment and firepower in comparison with the US arsenal. The Foreign Minister for the Viet Cong and later the PRG was also a woman, Nguyn Th Bnh. The U.S. war in Vietnam officially began in 1964 under President Lyndon B. Johnson. When first deployed, the M16 also suffered from a propensity to jam in combat, leaving the soldier defenseless and potentially killing him. Communist forces were under a single command structure set up in 1958. [312] Of all the countries of Indochina, Laos experienced the largest refugee flight in proportional terms, as 300,000 people out of a total population of 3million crossed the border into Thailand. Of the war crimes reported to military authorities, sworn statements by witnesses and status reports indicated that 320 incidents had a factual basis. Why did America go to war with Vietnam? [148] During this phase, the use of captured equipment decreased, while greater numbers of ammunition and supplies were required to maintain regular units. [92][40]:8788 Under the terms of the Geneva Accords, civilians were allowed to move freely between the two provisional states for a 300-day period. Ambassador Graham Martin's belief that Saigon could be held and that a political settlement could be reached. "[85]:367, Vietnam was a major political issue during the United States presidential election in 1968. [292][A 13] However, in the years following the war, a vast number of South Vietnamese were sent to re-education camps where many endured torture, starvation, and disease while being forced to perform hard labor. Much like the general historiography of the war, discussion of myth has focused on U.S. experiences, but changing myths of war have also played a role in Vietnamese and Australian historiography. By ignoring ARVN units, the U.S. commitment became open-ended. Some observers in the United States questioned the administration's policy. The two countries fought a brief border war, known as the Sino-Vietnamese War. This proposal was conveyed to the U.S. embassy in Saigon in Cable 243. Only five high-ranking congressional officials were informed of Operation Menu. [167]:245, The experience of American military personnel of African ancestry during the Vietnam War had received significant attention. [258]:71. [34]:450453[44] Extrapolating from a 1969 US intelligence report, Guenter Lewy estimated 65,000 North Vietnamese civilians died in the war. Thiu had halted the general advance, leaving armoured divisions able to surround them. [24], In a referendum on the future of the State of Vietnam on 23 October 1955, Dim rigged the poll supervised by his brother Ng nh Nhu and was credited with 98.2 percent of the vote, including 133% in Saigon. Eisenhower was born in Texas, raised in Kansas then educated at the West Point military academy, graduating in 1915. Gabriel Garca Mrquez, a Nobel Prize winning writer, described South Vietnam as a "False paradise" after the war, when he visited in 1980: The cost of this delirium was stupefying: 360,000 people mutilated, a million widows, 500,000 prostitutes, 500,000 drug addicts, a million tuberculous and more than a million soldiers of the old regime, impossible to rehabilitate into a new society. The United States enters the war. May 12, 1975, "Chapter I, Background to the Crisis, 1940-50", "Stabbed in the back! "[100]:575 An estimated 200,000 to 400,000 Vietnamese boat people died at sea, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The ARVN proved incapable of resisting the onslaught, and its forces collapsed on 11 March. A counter-offensive in 1971 as part of Operation Chenla II by the PAVN would recapture most of the border areas and decimate most of Lon Nol's forces. It was formed in Memot, Cambodia, and directed through COSVN. [313], Failure of U.S. goals in the war is often placed at different institutions and levels.
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