In March 1965, Johnson made the decision—with solid support from the American public—to send U.S. combat forces into battle in Vietnam. The U.S. involvement in South Vietnam stemmed from a combination of factors: France's long colonial history in French Indochina, the US War with Japan in the Pacific, and both Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong's pledge in 1950 to support Ho Chi … These five presidents were Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. In December 1960, Diem’s many opponents within South Vietnam—both communist and non-communist—formed the National Liberation Front (NLF) to organize resistance to the regime. South Korea was the main U.S. and South Vietnamese partner, providing over 300,000 troops and suffering some 5,000 deaths. Though Vietnamese communists allied with the Khmer Rouge during the Vietnam War, they eventually deposed the regime in 1979. Yet, as Moise points out, they both learned one important lesson: “It’s dangerous to get in a fight when the other side cares about winning more than you do.”. After a while, “no one thinks they’re going to win,” says James McAllister, a political science professor at Williams College, “but they’re damn sure a loss is not going to take place under their watch.”, READ MORE: How the Vietnam War Ratcheted Up Under 5 US Presidents. “Their function is as a tripwire,” Moise says, “a warning to the Americans: ‘Don’t go too far… or you’ll be fighting us.’”. Besides the troops from South Vietnam, the main participant in the battles (on the ground and in the air) – was the army of the United States.The US losses were at least 58 000 people. The global context is also important because Cold War tensions between the U.S., the Soviet Union, and China also shaped events related to the Vietnam War. Kennedy wished to overthrow Prime Minister Ngo Sinh Diem, the leader of Vietnam, but was assassinated before he could do so. At first, the U.S. operated behind the scenes, but after 1964, sent combat troops and became more deeply mired in the war. What he needed to do was to remove the remaining American soldiers in Vietnam. Determined to prevent South Vietnam from falling into communist hands, the United States propped up Diem with billions of dollars in aid, as well as increasing numbers of military advisers. Vietnam is a country in south-east Asia. Though relatively little official data exists about female Vietnam War veterans, the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Foundation estimates that approximately 11,000 military women were ...read more, The Vietnam War (1955-1975) was fought between communist North Vietnam, backed by the Soviet Union and China, and South Vietnam, supported by the United States. Saigon is the city located in South Vietnam that resides next to Ho Chi Ming City. In May 1968, Johnson announced formal peace talks would soon begin in Paris. After the My Lai Masscre, anti-war protests continued to build as the conflict wore on. China and the Soviet Union didn’t have to do as much as the Americans, Moise explains, because they were buttressing the stronger side. The United States responded with a secret bombing campaign that Nixon drastically ramped up in 1969. The war had pierced the myth of American invincibility and had bitterly divided the nation. Instead, a communist insurgency broke out, pitting the so-called Viet Cong, who were sponsored by North Vietnam, against Diem’s forces. Answering press questions after addressing a Howard University audience on 2 March 1965, King asserted that the war in Vietnam was “accomplishing nothing” and called for a negotiated settlement (Schuette, “King Preaches on Non-Violence”). ! The young Navy pilot John McCain, son of a ...read more, Vietnamization was a strategy that aimed to reduce American involvement in the Vietnam War by transferring all military responsibilities to South Vietnam. That insurgency drew heavy U.S. bombing. America and South Korea were the biggest supporters of Saigon. Key Takeaways: U.S. Involvement in Vietnam 320,000 military personnel, more than 4,000. The South Vietnamese then led their own invasion of Laos, which was pushed back by North Vietnam. Nonetheless, “if there had been no Chinese or Soviet support, the North Vietnamese could not have won,” he says, pointing out that the U.S. military budget was roughly 30 times greater than the entire gross national product of North Vietnam. There were a couple reasons why Pro-Saigon supporters lost the Vietnam war. The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chiến tranh Việt Nam), also known as the Second Indochina War, and in Vietnam as the Resistance War Against America (Vietnamese: Kháng chiến chống Mỹ) or simply the American War, was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. Before World War II the French controlled most of Indochina, today’s Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. Opponents of the war argued that civilians, not enemy combatants, were the primary victims and that the United States was supporting a corrupt dictatorship in Saigon. (National Archives Identifier 66956688) In contrast, the pro-war supporters regarded anti-war … United States and South Vietnamese forces relied heavily on their superior air power, including B-52 bombers and other aircraft that dropped ...read more, Women in the Vietnam War served as soldiers, health workers, and in news-gathering capacities. WHAT COUNTRIES WERE INVOLVED IN THE VIETNAM WAR? Following its 1945 defeat in World War II, Japan withdrew its forces from Vietnam, leaving the French-educated Emperor Bao Dai in control. It also cost the lives of over two million civilians.. Background. At another protest 10 days later, two students at Jackson State University in Mississippi were killed by police. The ensuing political instability in South Vietnam persuaded Kennedy’s successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara to further increase U.S. military and economic support. The U.S. entered the Vietnam War in an attempt to prevent the spread of communism, but foreign policy, economic interests, national fears, and geopolitical strategies also played major roles. The Vietnam War was ostensibly a civil war between the communist North and pro-Western South. In 1970, a joint U.S-South Vietnamese operation invaded Cambodia, hoping to wipe out DRV supply bases there. On 2 July 1976, North and South Vietnam were merged to form the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Yet the Vietnamese didn’t do all the fighting. Prince Norodom Sihanouk “basically felt that he was surrounded by dangerous enemies, and he had to make nice with some of them,” Moise says, adding that “he could not afford to offend” the North Vietnamese despite being “anti-communist in Cambodian politics.”. The conflict was intensified by the ongoing Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. There is no question that few conflicts have been as violent, long lasting and complex as the Vietnam War. Most Vietnamese, however, opposed colonial rule, and a rebellion broke out led by communist and pro-independence leader Ho Chi Minh. Warfare had demolished the country’s infrastructure and economy, and reconstruction proceeded slowly. In addition to the United States, South Korea, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand also committed troops to fight in South Vietnam (albeit on a much smaller scale). THE WAR IN VIETNAM was one of the 20 th Century’s most intractable conflicts. First of all, the United States could not expand the war. The invasion of these countries, in violation of international law, sparked a new wave of protests on college campuses across America. From 1965 to 1969, the U.S. was involved in a limited war in Vietnam. During the Cold War period, the biggest enemy of the United States was the Soviet Union. When the Second Indochina War, or Vietnam War, as it’s known in the United States, began soon after, France stayed well away. In 1955, however, the strongly anti-communist politician Ngo Dinh Diem pushed Emperor Bao aside to become president of the Government of the Republic of Vietnam (GVN), often referred to during that era as South Vietnam. The main participating countries. The increasingly unpopular war had created deep rifts in American society. That is what had happened in Eastern and Central Europe after World War II, and the West was worried that with communist governments already in place in North Korea and North Vietnam, a failure to come to the aid of South Vietnam would mean the collapse of that country as well as all its neighbors—Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, perhaps even Japan. Oct. 15, 1969: The first Moratorium to End the War in Vietnam, a … President Nixon believed his Vietnamization ...read more, The Vietnam War was ostensibly a civil war between the communist North and pro-Western South. Canadian corporations sold war material to the Americans. Anti-war marches and other protests, such as the ones organized by ...read more, Of the nearly 1 million Americans who served on active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces during the Vietnam War era (1964-75), many were or went on to become famous in diverse fields such as politics, entertainment, sports and journalism. The French and American experiences in Vietnam differed in many respects. Financial aid, along with a desire to curry favor with the United States, drew in additional countries as well. South Vietnam : was backed by anti-communist countries and members of the South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) which included the United States, South Korea, Australia, the Philippines, New Zealand, Thailand, Khmer Republic (later overthrown by Khmer Rouge), Kingdom of Laos and Republic of China (Taiwan). The South Korean government, under the administration of Park Chung-hee, took an active role in the Vietnam War.From September 1964 to March 1973, South Korea sent some 350,000 troops to South Vietnam.The South Korean Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Air Force all participated as an ally of the United States. The Vietnam conflict is often referred to as the “first television war.” Film from Vietnam was flown to Tokyo for quick developing and editing and then flown on to the United States. Twice a week we compile our most fascinating features and deliver them straight to you. The U.S. started to begin air raids on North Vietnam and then they started to do other communist areas in the South. The Soviets wanted to “make life difficult for the United States,” McAllister says, “but they didn’t want to do it in a way that got them in a conflict with the United States.”, Soviet involvement in the war increased in the late 1960s, just as China’s influence was lessening. The bloody conflict had its roots in French colonial rule and an independence movement driven by communist leader Ho ...read more, The Korean war began on June 25, 1950, when some 75,000 soldiers from the North Korean People’s Army poured across the 38th parallel, the boundary between the Soviet-backed Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the north and the pro-Western Republic of Korea to the south. The Vietnam War (also known as Second Indochina War or American War in Vietnam) lasted from 1 November 1955–30 April 1975, (19 years, 5 months, 4 weeks and 1 day). So, too, did a legitimate fear of Communism, Moise says. Meanwhile, President Richard Nixon authorized a cross-border invasion of Laos in 1971. Following France’s defeat in the First Indochina War, an international agreement divided Vietnam in two. The Vietnam war was a conflict between North Vietnam (backed by the communist countries) and South Vietnam (backed by the capitalist forces). How did the Vietnam War shape or affect the relationship between the United States, the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China? Hanoi is the capital of Vietnam that is located in the north of the country. Vietnam, The Necessary War: A Reinterpretation of America’s Most Disastrous Military Conflict. By 1972, the idea that Vietnam posed a threat to Cold War America was so discredited, it sometimes sounded as if America’s only remaining war aim was to … The Vietnam War was described as a civil war within South Vietnam, although it became a proxy war between Cold War powers. Though it originally took little interest in the Vietnam War, the Soviet Union secretly ramped up its aid to North Vietnam following Nikita Khrushchev’s fall from power. At first the United States only aided France with military aid and advisors, but after the French suffered a major defeat at Dien Bien Phu in the north-western hills, the French pulled out and the United States took over the burden of the war. The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The majority of the war was caused by the actions of the most powerful politicians, on both sides of the fighting. Reports of the Tet Offensive stunned the U.S. public, however, especially after news broke that Westmoreland had requested an additional 200,000 troops, despite repeated assurances that victory in the Vietnam War was imminent. At first, the United States largely operated behind the scenes. Other Countries Involved: 1. Among other weapons, the USSR provided surface-to-air missiles that the Chinese weren’t yet technologically capable of producing. Unsurprisingly, the North Vietnamese likewise moved troops and supplies through neighboring Cambodia, which, though officially neutral, tolerated the communist intrusions. “The French had controlled Vietnam for a couple of generations,” explains Ed Moise, a professor of history at Clemson University and author of Tonkin Gulf and the Escalation of the Vietnam War. “They were determined to go on holding it, both as a matter of national pride and because if they let one colony go loose, then the others might get ideas.”. Poster entitled "Support Vietnam People," circa 1969, showing China's support of the Communist cause in Vietnam. The United States’ presence and involvement in the Vietnam War were something that many people felt very strongly about, whether they be American citizens, Vietnamese citizens, or global citizens. For the most part, the Chinese stayed in the background, rebuilding areas destroyed by U.S. bombs and manning anti-aircraft batteries. North Vietnam immediately broke the accord, however, moving troops and supplies through Laos rather than traversing the heavily guarded demilitarized zone that separated it from South Vietnam. Before long, however, Americans grew dissatisfied with America’s continued presence in Southeast Asia. By 1957, the Viet Cong and other opponents of Diem’s repressive regime began fighting back with attacks on government officials and other targets, and by 1959 they had begun engaging the South Vietnamese army in firefights. According to a survey by the Veterans Administration, some 500,000 of the 3 million troops who served in Vietnam suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, and rates of divorce, suicide, alcoholism and drug addiction were markedly higher among veterans. Nixon then sent troops across the border in 1970, taking advantage of a coup that ousted Sihanouk in favor of a pro-American general. Ho led the North, whereas the U.S.-backed Ngo Dinh Diem took charge of the South. Ford was ready to end US involvement in the Vietnam War once and for all. As the Pentagon Papers later revealed, “the Diem regime certainly, and an independent South Vietnam almost as certainly, could not have survived” without U.S. help. U.S. bombs killed tens of thousands of Cambodians, which, some historians contend, may have increased popular support for the Khmer Rouge, a communist insurgency group that initiated a brutal genocide upon taking power in 1975. The Vietnam War. READ MORE: Why Were Vietnam War Vets Treated Poorly When They Returned? Vietnam War. The Vietnam War was an international conflict. Miller, Edward. The Vietnam War was the longest lasting war in the United States history before the Afghanistan War. As the first U.S. troops were withdrawn, those who remained became increasingly angry and frustrated, exacerbating problems with morale and leadership. There are two main reasons why Australia got involved in the Vietnam War. Vietnam, a nation in Southeast Asia on the eastern edge of the Indochinese peninsula, had been under French colonial rule since the 19th century. Other Countries Involved: 1. Why Were Vietnam War Vets Treated Poorly When They Returned? America's fight involved not only 'search and destroy' strategies and aerial bombardment, but also a battle for the hearts and minds of the local population, not to mention those watching events unfold back home. U.S. officials eventually soured on Diem, tacitly approving a 1963 coup that resulted in his death. France had been a long-time occupier of Vietnam before 1954. It was also an important city that China, the Soviet Union, and other countries supported. Once … Against the background of the Cold War, the Vietnam War embroiled the United States, South Vietnam, and regional allies in a long and costly conflict against the regular forces of North Vietnam and the Communist Viet Cong guerillas. Communist forces ended the war by seizing control of South Vietnam in 1975, and the country was unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam the following year. The United States got involved in the Vietnam conflict to keep communism from spreading throughout Southeast Asia. More than 3 million people (including over 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half of the dead were Vietnamese civilians. The Vietnam war was a conflict between North Vietnam (backed by the communist countries) and South Vietnam (backed by the capitalist forces). New York: Free Press, 2002. The U.S. bombings made Laos the most heavily bombed country per capita in the world. By the end of his second term as president, his approval rates plunged to an all-time low as the end of the Vietnam War was nowhere in sight after the Viet Cong’s Tet Offensive. How eight countries got bogged down in the Vietnam War's Cold War proxy battle. READ MORE: Why Were Vietnam War Vets Treated Poorly When They Returned Home. Vietnam War The Vietnam War pitted communist North Vietnam and the Viet Cong against South Vietnam and the United States. In March of 1975, he ordered for there to be an airlift in Da Nang for 237,000 anti communist Vietnamese refugees, most were brought to the US. The CIA-sponsored "Secret Army" of Major Gen. Vang Pao at Long Cheng, where the U. S. and Laotian governments permitted newsmen a rare glimpse of the base in 1972. With training and equipment from American military and the CIA, Diem’s security forces cracked down on Viet Minh sympathizers in the south, whom he derisively called Viet Cong (or Vietnamese Communist), arresting some 100,000 people, many of whom were brutally tortured and executed. ...read more. The official position of the United States government on their involvement in the Vietnam War was that they were there at the request of South Vietnam to repel communist forces that were growing during the Cold War(Reaction to the War In the United States). The Vietnam War: Primary Sources and Activities Supported by the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources program The Vietnam War was a conflict that spanned almost two decades, and was ultimately a failure for the United States. After Ho’s communist forces took power in the north, armed conflict between northern and southern armies continued until a decisive the northern Viet Minh’s decisive victory in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954. Tens of thousands of soldiers received dishonorable discharges for desertion, and about 500,000 American men from 1965-73 became “draft dodgers,” with many fleeing to Canada to evade conscription. Introduction Map of Vietnam. Despite speculation that the victorious North Vietnamese would, in President Nixon's words, "massacre the civilians there [South Vietnam] by the millions," there is a widespread consensus that no mass executions took place. FACT CHECK: We strive for accuracy and fairness. Congress soon passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave Johnson broad war-making powers, and U.S. planes began regular bombing raids, codenamed Operation Rolling Thunder, the following year. The main countries involved in the Vietnam War were North and South Vietnam. Cambodia, while officially neutral, tolerated communist intrusions—and was bombed by the United States for those intrusions. © 2020 A&E Television Networks, LLC. Working under the “domino theory,” which held that if one Southeast Asian country fell to communism, many other countries would follow, Kennedy increased U.S. aid, though he stopped short of committing to a large-scale military intervention. However, in the years following the war, a vast number of South Vietnamese were sent to re-education campswhere many endured torture, starvation, and disease while being forced to p… Johnson’s new tack, laid out in a March 1968 speech, met with a positive response from Hanoi, and peace talks between the U.S. and North Vietnam opened in Paris that May. America began sending aid to the French fighting … Both sides wanted the same thing: a unified Vietnam. Yet their support for South Vietnam never wavered, no matter who occupied the White House. The Vietnam War The USA became involved in Vietnam because it feared the spread of communism. Not only were the Americans engaged in large-scale military operations in a land far away from their own, but the two major Communist powers, China and the Soviet Union, were also deeply involved. In the end, almost 60,000 Australians served (521 of whom died), about 40,000 Thais served (321 of whom died), and over 3,000 New Zealanders served (37 of whom died). It began in 1954, after the country of Vietnam was split into two parts, North Vietnam and South Vietnam. A coup by some of his own generals succeeded in toppling and killing Diem and his brother, Ngo Dinh Nhu, in November 1963, three weeks before Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. In 1954, Ho’s forces won a decisive victory at Dien Bien Phu and succeeded in evicting the French once and for all. Who Was Involved in the Vietnam War on the Side of South Vietnam. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. However, it contributed to peacekeeping forces in 1973 to help enforce the Paris Peace Accords.. With the Cold War intensifying worldwide, the United States hardened its policies against any allies of the Soviet Union, and by 1955 President Dwight D. Eisenhower had pledged his firm support to Diem and South Vietnam. The Vietnam era was marked by protests, not just about war, but also for social change. It started after World War II and ended in 1975. This is the currently selected item. Vietnam War: United States and South Vietnam vs. North Vietnam: 1961: Bay of Pigs Invasion: United States vs. Cuba: 1983: Grenada: United States intervention: 1989: U.S. More than 58,000 Americans and hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese died in the war. There were a number of long-term and short-term reasons to explain why the USA became involved in Vietnam in the late 1950s. War between North and South Vietnam continued, however, until April 30, 1975, when DRV forces captured Saigon, renaming it Ho Chi Minh City (Ho himself died in 1969). The Philippines, Taiwan and Spain likewise aided the U.S. war effort, whereas on the communist side North Korea and Cuba purportedly sent token support. 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