Us Involvement In The Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a War that America lost against all odds. After dropping 4.6 million tons of bombs, spending more than one trillion dollars (today’s money) over twenty years, killing over 3 million North Vietnamese, sending 2.7 million troops across the world and losing 58,000 soldiers, America could not defeat the nationalist drive of the North Vietnamese. America lost because of the effectiveness of Vietnamese guerilla tactics, the portrayal of the War in American media, poor communication and misinformation by the American Government, the American support of a corrupt regime in South Vietnam, limited support from the American people, inadequate motivation from the American soldiers and America’s misguided strategy during the war.

After years of fighting the French and Vietnamese could not reach a resolution. The United States involvement in the Vietnam War would start soon after Truman’s Doctrine. Truman’s Doctrine in 1947 established that the United States would protect any democratic country under threat from an authoritarian force. After major losses in 1954, the French felt that the war could not be won and they signed the Geneva Accords that aimed to divide Vietnam at the seventeenth parallel until elections could be held in 1956 to reunite the country. The United States should have taken this as a sign. The North Vietnamese were willing to do anything to win their war, because for them it was not a war of government and leadership, it was a nationalist War. Despite Ho Chi Minh’s allegation as a, “dedicated communist” by (Time Magazine, 1955) due to the influence from China and Russia who were aiding Minh through munitions and funding, Minh was fighting a war to unite North and South Vietnam and get foreigners to leave his country. President Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson both honoured Truman’s Doctrine and intended to protect South Vietnam from what they believed to be an authoritarian force. After Kennedy was killed in 1963, Johnson continued to increase American

The Viet Cong had a very advanced military strategy which shocked America and the South Vietnamese. The North Vietnamese had main force Viet Cong units who were uniformed full-time soldiers and were used to launch large scale offensives over a wide area. They also had regional forces who would only fight when necessary to their region, however they were still full time soldiers. This made it so every area had some form of defense at all times. In addition to this small regional units would join the main force units for large offensives and attack in great force. This created a war of attrition. America was not willing to lose many men in this war and the American people did not have a stomach for even a few thousand losses, whereas the Vietnamese were losing millions of men over a short period of time. Despite having the more advanced army, the majority of American soldiers were conscripted and lacked the motivation of the Vietnamese. The main force Viet Cong considered themselves professional soldiers who had been fighting for over a decade since the French conflict. In contrast, the regional soldiers were for the most part young teenagers. This made it especially hard for America to differentiate between South Vietnamese citizens and the Viet Cong soldiers. Ho Chi Minh knew this and took advantage of it. After a year of full on conflict, in December 1965 Ho Chi Minh