How Did Kennedy Dominate South Vietnam

as a way to flank South Vietnam. In 1962 a peace conference in Geneva declared Laos as neutral ground with a three-part coalition government divided between pro-American, pro-Communist and neutral factions. Congress decided that this would have to be good enough for Laos and turn their attention to South Vietnam. (jfklibrary) Like Eisenhower, Kennedy too doubted getting directly involved with Vietnam as well. (American Presidency, 355) “When South Vietnam’s weak but prodemocratic government and army seemed unable to stand up to Communist North Vietnam on its own, Kennedy dramatically increased the number of United States Military advisors in South Vietnam.”(Go.galegroup.com) Overtime Kennedy sent more than 16,000 military advisors to assist

(Kennedy’s Wars, 328-329) But in 1963 Kennedy saw major improvement by the South Vietnam Army, enough to start pulling American military advisors out of Vietnam, which was estimated to be a total of 1,000 advisors. (Kennedy’s Wars, 357) But as time went on the Viet Cong grew stronger and Diem was becoming uncooperative with Kennedy and Congress altogether. Washington saw him as beyond repair and wanted him out of the presidency. Congress couldn’t agree on whether or not the war between would be won with Diem. Kennedy assured Congress that time would tell. When South Vietnam’s President Diem was assassinated on November 2, 1963, America didn’t know what to do, and less than three weeks later President Kennedy was assassinated. (Kennedy’s Wars, 388-393) Lynden B. Johnson believed without the help of the American Military South Vietnam would surely lose in the civil war. Although America never declared official war on Vietnam, America didn’t start attacking with foot soldiers until March of 1965.

Kennedy only used television to spread important speeches to all of America, which he used only 9 times. (American Presidency, 354) Kennedy was also the president during the Space Race with the Soviet Union. Kennedy was the president when John Glenn Jr. became the first American to orbit the Earth. (jfklibrary) When in office, Kennedy face many issues and conflicts. Through all of them he still stayed firm in his peace first policy. “In 1963, the two superpowers signed a nuclear test ban treaty, which agreed to end the testing of atomic weapons in the atmosphere, under water, and in outer space.”(go.galegroup.com) This put a pause on the Cold War until Reagan order Mr. Gorbachev to tear down the “iron curtain” that separated East Germany from West