The Vietnam Conflict

Some Facts…• Longest war in U.S. history, only

war we lost• Over 57, 000 Americans and 4

million Vietnamese were killed in war

French in Vietnam:• France controlled

Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos beginning in 1886

• Vietnamese resistance to French occupation grew during WWII

• Ho Chi Minh led resistance against French with his troops the Vietminh in 1945 and asserted Vietnam’s independence

War continues…– U.S. throws support to

French (U.S. worried about Soviet and Chinese influence in Vietnam) with $3 billion in aid

• Vietminh defeated French in 1954; Geneva Accords –– French agreed to leave

Vietnam– Vietnam divided into North

and South (fighting between N and S lasted through the 1950s)

U.S. Intervention:

• Domino Theory – basis of intervention

• U.S. supported South Vietnam and president Diem

• Kennedy sent 1,000 military advisors to South Vietnam in 1961

• By 1963 over 16,000 American military personnel sent over

Frustration with Diem’s Dictatorial and anti-Buddhist Regime…• South Vietnamese increasingly

unhappy with Diem – U.S. didn’t get in the way when he was overthrown and assassinated

Johnson took over after J.F.K. assassination

• Had doubts but didn’t want to be weak – sent more troops in 1964

Gulf of Tonkin• 1964, North Vietnam

purportedly hit a U.S. warship with machine gun fire

• Congress approved Tonkin Gulf Resolution giving the president authority to conduct military operations against North Vietnam and the Vietcong in South Vietnam without any official declaration of war

Escalating the War…• U.S. began

bombing North Vietnam on a regular basis starting in 1965

• By 1967, 500,000 troops

Tet Offensive– Truce on Vietnamese

new year, January 1968– 70,000 communist

soldiers launched a surprise offensive on South Vietnam, hundreds of cities and towns, urban areas, and U.S. embassy in Saigon attacked

– U.S. totally surprised

Mai Lai Massacre

• U.S. forces massacred villagers under direction of a Lieutenant, killed over 200 women, children, and old men in 1968

Hardship and Disillusionment• guerilla warfare –

jungle, floods, rain, ambushes, Viet Cong mines, booby traps, close combat forcing U.S. air strikes which kill own troops

• Hard to distinguish friends from enemies b/c of guerilla warfare and questionable alliances of South Vietnamese

• U.S. dropped approx. 3.2 million tons of explosives on Vietnamese countryside; 90% were napalm bombs – chemical bombs that burned whatever it touched…

• Fighting had devastating impact on Vietnamese civilians; in the North 80% killed were civilians

End of War:

• U.S. pulled troops out in 1973, after five years of negotiations

• Afterward, fighting between N and S began again; N ultimately won and country becomes communist

• In 1993, U.S. finally lifted embargoes against Vietnam, reestablished diplomatic ties