Vietnam Unit Why did the Vietnam Indochina War

Vietnam Unit • Why did the Vietnam (Indochina) War happen? • How could it have been avoided? • What was its effect on U. S. government and social institutions? • How are we still seeing the effects of the war today?

Indochina and Vietnam Spans 5 presidents and 30+ years of history of involvement • Truman • Eisenhower • Kennedy • LBJ (Lyndon B. Johnson) • Nixon The Truman Doctrine Eisenhower Doctrine Containment Policy

Modern Day countries of Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam

Late 1800 s France began to takesover Indochina (gradually)

French wanted (surprise!) raw materials: rubber and rice

Vietnamese opium den--French wanted to raise tax money to pay for administering the colony

Justice could be harsh

Many Vietnamese and others served with the French in WWI

Literacy declines, landlessness grows under French rule • 5000 French administered a colony of 25 million. • Literacy before French rule was perhaps 80%. By 1925 only one school-age child in ten was receiving schooling. • Millions of peasants became landless, working for French plantations and mines • French priests convert many Vietnamese to Catholicism (This will be result in schisms within Vietnamese society later on. )

Ho Chi Minh, leader of the Viet Minh

Ho Chi Minh (Nguyễn Ái Quốc or Nguyễn Tất Thành) at Versailles He wants more autonomy for Annam At Communist Party meeting in 1920 (

WWII and its aftermath • Japanese occupied Indochina during WWII • Viet Minh established themselves as anti-Japanese guerrillas • After WWII, British (Indian) troops occupied the south; Chinese (nationalist forces) occupied the north • British returned control of the southern part of Vietnam to the

Ho Chi Minh with OSS Team in 1945

Growing crisis in Southeast Asia • US public mostly unaware • US foreign policy…DOMINATED by Indochina • After the French loss, Americans believe they can form and support a strong noncommunist govt. in the South. • Help place Ngo Dinh Diem in power "If Indochina goes, several things happen right away. The Malayan peninsula, the last little bit of the end hanging on down there, would be scarcely defensible … all of India would be outflanked. Burma would certainly, in its weakened condition, be no defense. “ –Dwight D. Eisenhower

Origins • French fought for control for the next 10 years • No money, no moral, no local support = defeat • At Dien Bin Phu, Vietnamese lay siege to French base for months • French suffer humiliating defeat at Dien Bien Phu

Domino Theory • The fear that if one country in Southeast Asia fell to communism, they would all fall like dominoes.

Three U. S. Presidents during the Vietnam era discussing the Domino Theory “If we withdrew from Vietnam the Communists would control Vietnam. Pretty soon, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia would go. ” President Kennedy, 1960 -63 “If this little nation goes down the drain and can’t maintain their independence, ask yourself what is going to happen to all the other little nations. ” Lyndon B. Johnson, 1963 -68 “If the U. S. now were to throw in the towel and go home, and the Communists took over South Vietnam, then all over Southeast Asia, all over the Pacific, in the Mid east, in Europe, in the world, the U. S. would suffer a blow. And peace, because we are the great peacekeeping nation in the world today because of our power, would suffer a blow from which it might not recover. ” President Nixon, 1968 -74

America gets involved in Vietnam • Truman Doctrine- We will aid countries resisting communism (1949) • Containment- Only allowing communism to exist where it currently existed (no spread) • Domino Theory- If Vietnam falls to communism other Asian countries would follow & possibly the world • In 1955, Eisenhower sends first advisors to Vietnam to train South Vietnam Soldiers • Kennedy- Supports containment • By 1963 there are 16, 000 advisors

Brief history of Vietnam’s Historical Struggle for Freedom • 1946 -1954 - French Indochina War- Ho Chi Minh leads a guerrilla war against the French. 75% of the war is funded by America to aid in the containment of communism. • Embarrassing defeat for the French @ Dien Bien Phu • Geneva Accords- • Peace treaty to end war • Split Vietnam @ 17 th Parallel • National unification election scheduled for 1956

Terms • National Liberation Front (NLF) aka “Vietcong” • Vietcong aka “VC” or simply “Charlie” • ARVN, Army of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) • Napalm—jellied gasoline

The Vietminh and The Vietcong • Vietminh rebels who defeated the French begin fighting against South Vietnamese and Diem. • The National Liberation Front is formed, becomes The Vietcong (Vietnamese Communist) goal of over throwing Diem and expelling US. • Both groups consisted of nonprofessional fighters, men, women, old and young. • Ho Chi Minh saw many similarities between Vietnam and American’s Revolution. (both were for freedom)

Suggested Discussion Topics: Vietnam, the early years • Was the U. S. involvement in Vietnam inevitable? • At what points could the U. S. have changed the course of the wars? What was its best chance? • Why was the U. S. so fixated on the “Domino Theory? ” • How did the U. S. misread or not understand what was going on in Vietnam? • What as driving Kennedy to become more involved in Vietnam. Was it personal or political? • How would you characterize Kennedy’s role in Vietnam? • How would you characterize his conflict over Vietnam?

Diem and the Buddhists • Ho Chi Minh looked like he was going to win the Geneva elections, so Diem with US approval, blocked the elections • US supports Ngo Dinh Diem, the non-communist leader in South Vietnam • Diem is seen as corrupt • He is a Catholic in a Buddhist majority country • Doesn’t make good on promised social & economic reforms • Repressive tactics against enemies • Civil Turmoil- Verge of Vietnamese Civil War • Buddhists, knowing Americans are watching began protesting Diem’s government and unite the country against him (and the US).

Overthrow of the Diem government • Kennedy OKs a coup against Diem’s government • Nov, 1963, group of generals carries out the coup. Diem and Nhu are killed • Kennedy regrets that they are assassinated and in such a brutal way • Three weeks later 11/22/63) Kennedy is assassinated in Dallas. Lyndon Johnson becomes president

LBJ-ultimately a tragic figure • “I knew from the start if I left the woman I really loved – the Great Society – in order to fight this bitch of a war (Vietnam) on the other side of the world, then I would lose everything at home. All my programs. All my hopes…All my dreams. ”

Gulf of Tonkin Incident and Resolution • Gulf of Tonkin Incident- US ship is said to have been attacked • Gulf of Tonkin Resolution- Allowed LBJ to take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the US. • Enables the escalation of the War- • • • Send more troops and bombs to Vietnam Bomb North Vietnam Americanizing the War- March 8, 1965 first US combat troops enter Vietnam

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution August 1964 • No votes against it in the House of Reps. • Senate votes 88 -2 for it. (Morse and Gruening vote no) • Johnson’s popularity soars

Battle of Ia Drang Valley: Nov 1965 Use of helicopters to insert U. S. troops and kill the enemy. “Kill ratio” of ~10 -1

U. S. strategy: “Body Count”

• American Strategies in Vietnam Rolling Thunder- Relentless bombing of North Vietnam. Sought to stop support flowing into South Vietnam. More bombs dropped on N. Vietnam than in Europe (WW 2) • Search and Destroy- American strategy of finding and killing NVA and VC • Agent Orange- Chemical sprayed on the dense jungles of Vietnam. Meant to kill the jungle and push peasants into the cities/strategic hamlets.

Tet Offensive Jan-Feb 1968: Turning point in the war • The war turned against the US in 1968, when the NVA began the Tet Offensive, a surprise offensive on a major Vietnamese holiday that saw attacks all over the country, including in Saigon itself • Attack by ~ 70, 000 NVA and VC troops. Saigon and 75% of provincial capitals assaulted • VC Commandos reach the U. S. embassy in Saigon • Major attack on Khe Sanh base was a diversion • Largest battle was in the city of Hue

Largest battle was in Hue Major fighting in Saigon, Tan Son Nhut airbase, U. S. embassy hit, widespread destruction

Iconic Tet Photo: Execution of a suspected Viet Cong by the Chief of Police of Saigon 2/1/68.

Tet: both sides “won” and “lost” • • • United States North Vietnam + Viet Cong Gen. Westmoreland’s • Suffered huge casualties assurances that the war was • There was not a general going well proved untrue uprising of the South U. S. public turns against the Vietnamese people war Contributes to LBJ withdrawing from the presidential race two months later U. S. inflicts huge casualties on NVA and VC ARVN troops fought well

Cronkite I Mr. CRONKITE: (Reading) Tonight, back in more familiar surroundings in New York, we'd like to sum up our findings in Vietnam, an analysis that must be speculative, personal, subjective. Who won and who lost in the great Tet Offensive against the cities? I'm not sure. The Vietcong did not win by a knockout but neither did we. Then, with as much restraint as I could, I turned to our own leaders whose idea of negotiation seemed frozen in memories of General Mc. Arthur's encounter with the Japanese aboard the Battleship Missouri. We've been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders. . .

Cronkite 2 (Reading) Both in Vietnam and Washington to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds. For it seems now more certain than ever, that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate. To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, if unsatisfactory conclusion. On the off chance that military and political analysts are right, in the next few months we must test the enemy's intentions, in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.

Ho Chi Minh Trail • Path through Cambodia and Laos used by North Vietnam to bring supplies to Viet Cong in South Vietnam. • Although mostly in Laos and Cambodia the US • Bombed and attacked the supply route

Meanwhile a Secret War in Laos • Turned out the U. S. had been bombing heavily for years to stop supplies from reaching the Vietcong and NVA. • In fact, Laos is the most heavily bombed nation per capita in the history of the world! The U. S dropped as many as 4 times the amount of explosives in Indochina as in all of World War II

Laos: The bombing http: //www. motherjones. com/po litics/2014/03/laos-vietnam-warus-bombing-uxo The U. S. made nearly 600, 000 bombing runs over Laos 19641973 and dropped 2. 5 million tons of explosives—more than the U. S. dropped on Germany and Japan in WWII. About a ton for every man, woman and child in Laos

The Sorrow of War Bao Ninh served in the Glorious 27 th Youth Brigade – of the 500 who set out in 1967, he was one of only ten survivors. He wrote The Sorrow of War, an extremely moving—and controversial---account of the Indochina War from the point of view of a North Vietnamese soldier. Bao Ninh was one of the soldiers who attacked Tan Son Nhut airport in Saigon on the day the former capital of South Vietnam fell.

The Irony of “Search and Destroy” U. S. Captain after artillery and bombing had killed perhaps 1, 000 people

• More than 2 million Vietnamese civilians killed

Eve of Destruction (performed by Barry Mc. Guire) • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=I 98 Ke. KV _F 9 g

Anti-War Teach-ins

Demonstrations

Norman Morrison, a Quaker, burns himself to death outside the Pentagon in November 1965

Street named after Morrison in Hanoi

Roger La. Porte burned himself to death outside the United Nations in November 1965. When asked why he had burned himself, La. Porte calmly replied, "I'm a Catholic Worker. I'm against war, all wars. I did this as a religious action. . . " Alice Herz, who burned herself to death in Detroit in March 1965, said in her good-bye letter that LBJ was using his military power "to wipe out whole countries of his choosing".

Some people were not really supportive

Many of the early protests were aimed at Dow Chemical, maker of napalm and Saran Wrap (among other products)

Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) SDS was founded in 1959. Largest student anti-war organization, eventually reaching 100, 000 members. It split apart into different factions in 1969

1962 Port Huron Statement • Called for participatory democracy, saying that large corporations and big government had taken over the country • Becomes major force against Vietnam War

US build up & the draft • To help win the war the US begins drafting young men to train and fight in Vietnam. More than 2 million drafted. Eventually about 25% of the soldiers in combat zones were draftees. • Overwhelming numbers of draftees were working class. College kids could get deferments and not have to go to war. • By 1968, there are more than 500, 000 American troops in Vietnam.

Resistance to the draft Bruce Dancis: spent 19 months in prison in Kentucky Burn your draft card or don’t register, possible penalty included jail terms Go to a “friendly” nation such as Canada or Sweden. But then you can’t return…

GI Resistance Jeff Sharlet Distributed to GIs in U. S. and Vietnam– circulation of 30, 000

October 15, 1969 Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam

2 million participated—the largest demonstrations in US history

Posters and Art

Johnson decides not to run for reelection • Increasingly the American people came to have a “Credibility Gap”, i. e. they no longer believed that LBJ was telling them the truth about the war § In March 1968, LBJ withdrew from the presidential race after barely winning the New Hampshire presidential primary over peace candidate Sen Eugene Mc. Carthy of Minnesota.

1968 --Democratic Party is torn apart June 1968: Robert Kennedy was a leading presidential contender when he was killed August 1968, antiwar protests erupt into violence, with running clashes between demonstrators and the police in the streets of Chicago

The Weather Underground (Weathermen) • Founded in 1969 at University of Michigan, radicals who demanded direct, often violent action against the U. S. government and U. S. corporate interests. Carried out a series of bombings in the early 1970 s. Took their name from “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. ” from Bob Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=Y 8 An. F 2 Rk. MV 8 • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=Tf d. J 3 Fi. Sva 4 •

November 1968, Republican Richard Nixon defeats VP Hubert Humphrey • Nixon was elected on a platform of “Peace with Honor”

My Lai

Lt. William Calley

Operation Phoenix • 1967 -1972 Widespread assassination, torture, and interrogation program developed by the CIA, using US and South Vietnamese special forces, paramilitaries. Purpose: wipe out the Viet Cong political structure • Torture and execution was widely used • Brutal but effective, as many as 80, 000 VC operatives “eliminated”:

Nixon appealed to the “Great Silent Majority” to counter the growing antiwar movement

• Nixon wanted the South Vietnamese to play a greater role in the war, a policy he labeled Vietnamization • But he continued carpet bombing Hanoi & ordered an invasion of neighboring Cambodia and Laos • He relied on the diplomacy of Henry Kissinger to achieve peace and/or an American withdrawal • Kissinger-”A Decent Interval” https: //millercenter. org/thepresidency/educationalresources/nixon-kissinger-andthe-decent-interval • The US does manage to extricate itself by Jan. 27, 1973, signing the Paris Peace Accords with North Vietnam

But not before the war expanded • US invades Cambodia in 1970, sparking a major civil war between Cambodian Gov’t and communists guerrillas in Cambodia, called the Khmer Rouge

• Anti-war protests against the Cambodian invasion became widespread… Kent State, May 1970 – National Guardsmen opened fire on students in Ohio protesting the spread of the war to Cambodia, killing four.

PHASE 3 – VIETNAMESE CIVIL WAR, 1973 -75 • The NVA easily defeated the South in 1975; the South had appealed to Nixon for aid, Nixon was embroiled in the domestic Watergate Crisis, and he was in essence a “lame duck” • 1975 – the US abandoned its embassy in Saigon, which was renamed Ho Chi Minh City in the newly unified and communist Vietnam

Legacies of the 10, 000 Day War French Phase 1946 -1954 • Dead 600, 000 -800, 000, including 75, 000 French soldiers

Legacies of the 10, 000 Day War • As many as 4 million Vietnamese: 2+ million civilians + 1. 1 million Viet Cong and NVA killed

Legacies of 10, 000 Day War • 11 million Vietnamese became refugees

Legacies of the 10, 000 Day War American Phase • 200, 000 -250, 000 South Vietnamese military dead • 58, 000 Americans dead • More than 5, 000 South Koreans, Australians, New Zealanders and others dead

Legacies of the 10, 000 Day War “Operation Ranch Hand” • Between 1962 and 1971, the U. S. sprayed more than 19 million gallons of herbicides over 4. 5 million acres in Vietnam, devastating the environment, killing or maiming hundreds of thousands and causing large numbers of birth defects. • 4. 5 million Vietnamese exposed to defoliants

Agent Orange, manufactured by Dow Chemical and Monsanto

Death, disease and deformities Vietnamese Red Cross estimates 1 million Vietnamese affected, including 150 -500, 000 children born with birth defects

2. 6 million U. S. personnel exposed

Bombing • Bomb craters filled with water = mosquito breeding ground = malaria and other diseases • 800 million unexploded bombs in Laos alone

Legacies of the 10, 000 Day War Cambodia • 300, 000 dead 19701975 • In April 1975 the Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot take control of Cambodia, leading to a genocide that resulted in the deaths of up to an estimated 2 million Cambodians from 1975 to 1979

Vietnam Vets and GI Resistance • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=iydq 2 QS 35 i. Q • Operation Dewey Canyon III, April 1971 https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=4 P 1 z. Xc. Q 3 ZGw

Gimme Shelter (Vietnam). • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=SOVG 2 ZJ 4 lg. Q