THE VIETNAM WAR [1955-1975]

Fighting with Japanese.

-Vietnam or Indo-China [former name] was ruled by the French
before the Second World War. After the French lose to Japanese
in the Second World War, Japan conquered and ruled Vietnam
with a lot of hostility.
-In Vietnam there arose a strong anti-Japanese resistance
movement called Viet Minh led by a communist called Ho Chi
minh.
-He inspired the Vietnamese to resist the Japanese. After the end
of the war, Ho Chi minh entered the northern city of Hanoi and
declared Vietnam independent.
Fighting the French.
-In 1945 the French returned to Vietnam with the intention of
repossessing it. Ho Chi Minh offered a stiff resistance for a
period of 9 years. The Viet Minh controlled much of the North
of Vietnam while the French were in the South.
-1949-Ho Chi Minh got support from the communist China.
America on the other hand with their intention of fighting
communism financed France against the Viet Minh where they
gave out $500 million every year. Unfortunately the French
couldn’t subdue the Vietminh so the French left the country in
1954.
- A peace conference was held in Geneva which led to the
division of Vietnam into North and South Vietnam up to when
elections would be held to decide on the fate of Vietnam.
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Response by America.
-American president Eisenhower prevented the elections from
taking place in 1954 because he felt that China and USSR were
determined to spread communism in Asia and if Vietnam fell
into communism then the domino theory would apply whereby
Laos, Burma, Cambodia, Thailand and India would follow suit.
Financial support for Diem’s regime.
-The Americans helped Ngo Dinh Diem to form the Republic
of South Vietnam in 1955 because he was against communism.
Diem was not a darling to the Vietnamese due to the following
reasons;
1. He belonged to the landlord class that treated the peasants
unfairly.
2. He was a Christian who failed to recognize the Buddhists who
formed the bulk of the peasants.
3. His regime was very corrupt.
-America supported his regime with about $1.6 billion in the
1950s. Americans knew about his corrupt nature but that was the
best person they knew at that time. Diem was however
overthrown/murdered by his own army in 1963 but the regime
that succeeded him was equally corrupt (Duong Van Minh).
America however supported the new regime too.
The Vietcong.
-The actions of the anti-communist regimes made the citizens to
lose hope in them. They began supporting the communist led

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National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam formed in
1960. It was popularly called the Vietcong.
-Vietcong was operating in the South and had the support of
the South Vietnamese who were antigovernment, the
communist North Vietnamese under Ho Chi Minh.
-The Vietcong began attacks against the South Vietnamese
government using its guerilla fighters along the Ho Chi Minh
Trail. They attacked government installation, US air force and
supply bases, government forces
-The South Vietnamese government began a programme of
resettling the peasants from areas controlled by the Vietcong for
their safety but the peasants resented the idea leading to the
government pocketing the money that was meant for that
programme called the Strategic Hamlet Programme.
American involvement.
President Kennedy in 1962 sent military support/advisers to help
the South Vietnamese government against the Vietcong fighters
but was keen not to get America into the war. Unfortunately he
was assassinated in 1963 and his successor Lyndon Johnson was
ready to involve USA in a full scale war to avoid the spread of
communism.
The Tonkin Gulf Resolution.
-The North Vietnamese patrol boats opened fire on American
ships at the Gulf of Tonkin. That made the Congress to come up
with the Tonkin Gulf Resolution that gave the president powers
of taking any necessary measures of ensuring that there’s no

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more aggression. That meant that he could declare war anytime
against the Vietcong and N. Vietnamese.
-Feb 1965; Operation Rolling Thunder-bombing campaign
against the N. Vietnamese cities, factories, army bases and Ho
Chi minh Trail. It lasted for three years.
-March 1965-American troops arrived at Da Nang meaning
that America was now at war with Vietnam.
Reasons why America got involved in the war.
-To counter the spread of communism in Asia (containment).
-For fear of the domino theory.
-American military had a big budget which they spent on the
military in the purchase of weapons.
-American companies that manufactured weapons were in
business.
Vietcong’s tactics and troops.
-The Vietcong fighters in 1965 were about 170,000 and they
were outnumbered and outgunned by the American and South
Vietnamese soldiers.
Guerilla warfare-refers to little war. It is translated from
Spanish and it involves hitting and hiding.
-The fighters couldn’t be easily identified because they didn’t
wear uniforms.

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- They did not have operational bases or headquarters. They
worked in small groups. They could attack then hide in jungles,
tunnels or in the villages.
- They could set traps through digging pit holes and setting
sharpened bamboo sticks (booby traps). They could also ambush
the American troops or apply hand to hand combats.
Civilians-Vietcong fighters cooperated with the civilians and
even helped them on their fields. However, they killed any
civilian who was against them or spread terror to the
professionals who were allied to the South Vietnamese
government. About 27,000 civilians were killed between 1961 -
1971 by the Vietcong.
Supplies-the supplies from North Vietnam came along the Ho
Chi Minh trail. It was a series of roads and pathways that
connected north to South Vietnam. The trail was constantly
being bombed by the American and South Vietnamese forces
but it was still being used by the Vietcong forces.
Commitment-despite the fact that North Vietnam and Vietcong
had a high casualty rate of over 1 million, Ho Chi Minh still
pushed on and never gave up. He replaced the fallen soldiers
constantly.
-Vietcong fighters built long underground tunnels to hide from
the US bombings. The tunnels were self-contained with
hospitals, sleeping quarters, kitchen, traps etc. They were 240km
of them.

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American tactics and troops.
Bombing-(1965-72) the targets were military, industrial and
civilian targets in N. Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh trail, Laos and
Cambodia because they supported the Vietcong. Civilian
casualties made the Americans to be even more un-popular
amongst the Vietnamese. Most bombing happened in North
Vietnam.
Search and destroy-heavily defended US bases were set up in
South Vietnam near the coast. From there helicopters would be
dispatched with troops into villages to search and destroy any
Vietcong hideout. The agenda was to kill the Vietcong and
counter the guerilla warfare. It worked out but had some
challenges namely;
-American soldiers did not get adequate information to conduct
raids.
-The strategy made the civilians to hate the Americans even
more and draw closer to the Vietcong.
-Many innocent people were mistakenly killed. For every
weapon captured the body count was 6 i.e. six peasants killed by
the Americans.
-Inexperienced American soldiers fell into the booby traps.
Chemical weapons-Agent Orange weed killer was sprayed in
the forests where the Vietcong hid. It was meant to destroy the
vegetation. Thousands of square kilometres were sprayed from
airplanes (approximately 82 million litres were used).

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Napalm was sprayed to clear the jungle. It also burned the skin
to the bone.
Conscription and morale-America introduced
draft/conscription after 1967. After young men finished college,
they could be called to join the US army.
-Many of them were young and inexperienced, around 19 years.
-Many of the soldiers were not committed, they just wanted to
be alive as opposed to the Vietcong who were fighting for a
course to defend their country with determination.
-Little morale amongst the new soldiers. That made them to be
given a one year term of service which meant that once they got
the experience, time to return home had reached.
Tet Offensive.
-American and South Vietnamese soldiers felt that the war
between 1965-1967 was going on well and that they would win
the war. They felt that they were killing many Vietcong fighters
despite the struggle with their guerilla tactics.
-During the New Year celebrations of 1968, the Vietcong troops
attacked over 100 cities and military targets and even tried to
capture the American embassy at Saigon. Americans fought had
to regain the embassy for two days.
-Vietcong soldiers thought that the South Vietnamese would join
them but that wasn’t the case. They lost about 10,000 fighters.

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-The Tet Offensive was a turning point for the war and it raised
many questions i.e;
1. American troops were around 500,000 and America was
spending $20 billion per year so how could the communists take
them by surprise?
2. American and South Vietnamese were able to recapture the
cities using heavy artillery and air force leading to the death of
many civilians, city of Hue being destroyed. People felt that it
wasn’t worth that cost.
The Peace Movement in America.
-American citizens did not support the war due to the following
1. High death tolls of young American soldiers.
2. America was spending a lot of money that could be put to
better use and yet they didn’t seem to be winning the war.
3. Draft inequality whereby more African Americans were
being conscripted into the army than White Americans i.e. 30%
vs. 19%. Former world heavyweight boxing champion,
Mohamed Ali, refused to join the war due to his religious faith
and that made him to be stripped off his title and his passport
removed. His argument was that he couldn’t fight for a country
that discriminated them at home and that the Vietcong never
called them ‘niggas.’
3. Many Americans hated what was happening in Vietnam.

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Protests.
They were led by students and civil campaigners.
1. There were about 100 demonstrations against the war
involving 40,000 students by the first half of 1968. The
students would burn the American flag and insult their
president, Lyndon B. Johnson.
2. About 700,000 anti-war protesters demonstrated in
Washington D.C in Nov.1979. It was the largest political
protest in American history.

My Lai Massacre-March 1968.

-The Charlie Company (unit of young American soldiers)
began a search and destroy mission in My Lai where they
were told that it was a Vietcong headquarter and about 200
of them were hiding there. They were to destroy all the
livestock, dwellings (scorched earth policy) because the
villagers would have gone to the market because it was on
a Saturday. Others thought that they were under
instructions to kill everyone they found.
-16th March the soldiers gunned down around 400
Vietnamese most of them being women, children and the
old people. Others were killed while working in the farms.
No Vietcong soldier was found, only three weapons.

Ending of the war.

-After the Tet offensive, president Lyndon B. Johnson of
America concluded that the war could not be won
militarily. He therefore reduced the bombing of North
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Vietnam and advised his officials to seek negotiation with
the communists.
-He also said that he would not run for presidency in the
future elections because he knew that he would lose due to
America’s participation in Vietnam.

President Richard Nixon.

-He was elected president in Nov.1968.
-He together with his National Security Adviser, Henry
Kissinger, worked to end American involvement in the war
between 1969-73. However it was an uphill task for them
because America also had an agenda of containment. They
could not just let communism to spread to Vietnam so they
strategized in the following ways:
1. Improved relations with USSR and China.
-These two countries fell out and as a result each of them
tried to improve their relations with America because they
felt that there could be war between them.
2. Vietnamisation of the war effort.
-Nixon began withdrawing the American forces from
Vietnam and handed over the war responsibility to the
South Vietnamese government. About 400,000 troops left
Vietnam between 1969-71.
3. Peace negotiations with North Vietnam.
- Kissinger had several peace negotiations with chief
Vietnamese peace negotiator called Le Duc Tho from 1969.

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4. Increased bombing.
- To prove that America was not weak, Nixon increased
bombing in North Vietnam and the Vietcong bases in
Cambodia.

Peace and honour.

-in Jan 1973 all the parties signed the peace agreement in
Paris. Nixon called it ‘peace with honour’.
-Last American troops left Vietnam in Mar.1973.
-It took another two years for South Vietnam to fall into
communism because America withdrew her support.
Communists had hence won the war.

Effects of the war.

-America lost in her attempts to stop the spread of
communism (containment).
1. It proved that the military supremacy of America could
not make her win the war.
2. The American bombing of Laos, Cambodia made them
to fall into communism.
3. Led to propaganda against America from their
ruthlessness in the war eg use of chemical weapons and
massacre, bombing.

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