The Vietnam War - CCEA

Vietnam had been a French colony before it was occupied by the Japanese during World War Two.

After World War Two, it was returned to French control, but many Vietnamese people wanted independence.

As a result, in the 1950s, the French found themselves fighting a war against the Viet Minh, an organisation dedicated to getting rid of foreign powers from Vietnam.

Worried about the spread of communism in South East Asia, the USA began to financially support the French war effort in Vietnam.

In 1954, the French were finally defeated by the Viet Minh at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu.

The Geneva Agreement then divided Vietnam along the 17th Parallel into two zones - in North Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh set up a communist dictatorship and in South Vietnam the USA backed Ngo Dinh Diem.

Ho Chi Minh wanted to unite all of Vietnam under his rule.

Ngo Dinh Diem, an unpopular leader, was out of touch with the South Vietnamese people.

• The policy of containment led the US to support the South Vietnamese government. They believed in the domino theory and feared if Vietnam fell to communism, other countries in South East Asia would follow.
• South Vietnam was a useful satellite state because it was rich in tungsten, tin and rubber.
• North Vietnamese gunboats fired upon the Maddox, a US destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin. The USA Congress then gave the President the right to use “all necessary measures” in the war, without having to consult Congress.
• Like Kennedy, President Johnson was convinced that America’s vast wealth and power would ensure victory in any war.
• The US believed that China and the USSR were behind North Vietnam’s attacks upon the south.

Ngo Dinh Diem’s government was unpopular with ordinary people in South Vietnam who began to give their support to the Vietcong - a group set up to reunite the country.

They were particularly popular with Vietnamese peasant farmers.

The Vietcong were also aided and supplied by communist North Vietnam.

In 1959, Ho Chi Minh declared a war to overthrow the South Vietnamese government and unite Vietnam under communist rule with the support of the Vietcong.

The non-communist government of South Vietnam looked in danger of being overthrown by the communist-backed Vietcong guerrillas.

The USA was operating a policy of containment and they feared the domino effect; in this instance, they viewed Vietnam as a wobbly domino.

The USA had given millions of dollars to support Ngo Dinh Diem’s government but this was unsuccessful.

They began to realise that force was needed and this meant American soldiers in Vietnam.

Ngo Dinh Diem was assassinated in November 1963 and this opened the door for the USA to get involved in order to ensure ‘stability’ and beat back the communist threat.

In August 1964, the destroyer USS Maddox, an American naval vessel, was attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin, just off the coast of North Vietnam, by North Vietnamese torpedo boats.

This provoked President Johnson into retaliating with military attacks in North Vietnam.

The Tonkin Resolution passed by Congress allowed him to take whatever action was necessary to deal with the crisis.

In March 1965, the first ground troops were sent to Vietnam.

On 16 March 1968, US troops led by Lieutenant William Calley targeted My Lai, a village of around 700 people in South Vietnam.

Their aim was to find members of the Vietcong.

In the massacre that followed, over 300 civilians died.

The army tried to cover the incident up to avoid bad publicity.

However, the story leaked out to a national newspaper, The New York Times.

The newspaper published the details in November 1969.

This, along with colour pictures of the massacre in a magazine, shocked the public and forced the army to act.

In 1971, Calley was placed on trial and convicted of war crimes.

His sentence was life imprisonment, but this was not carried out.

The My Lai Massacre is an example of the failure of America’s search and destroy tactic.

It also demonstrated the US people’s changing feelings about the Vietnam War.

By 1969, Johnson was hugely unpopular (there were lots of anti-war protests) and Richard Nixon had won the recent Presidential election in America.

Nixon was determined to remove the US from the Vietnam War.

He made a number of decisions:

1. Increased bombing against North Vietnam.
2. Secret bombings of neighbouring countries that were being used to supply the Vietcong.
3. Vietnamisation: Dependence on the USA would end and South Vietnam would stand on its own two feet.

The Vietcong used the cover of the jungle to their advantage, as well as developing a vast network of underground tunnels which they used to evade capture.

They fought a hit-and-run guerrilla war against inexperienced American soldiers, many of whom were young conscripts.

The threat of an invisible enemy and hidden traps had a demoralising psychological impact on US troops.

Another advantage the Vietcong had was the use of the Ho Chi Minh trail.

They were kept well supplied by a constant stream of food and weapons from North Vietnam using this jungle trail which wound through the neighbouring countries of Laos and Cambodia.

In 1968, the Vietcong used the cover of the Vietnamese New Year (known as Tet) celebrations to change tactics and launch a massive attack on US-held areas across South Vietnam.

The attack was a success for the Vietcong, although ultimately they were driven back by the US Army.

However, it showed the Americans that despite all the soldiers, bombs and money spent in Vietnam, they were not making progress against the Vietcong or communism.

Many historians see the Tet Offensive as a turning point in America’s mission in Vietnam.

By 1973, a peace treaty was signed in Paris.

The terms of the treaty allowed for US withdrawal and the Vietcong to remain in the South.

It also put off a decision about the country’s political future until a later date.

In 1974, the fighting between North and South restarted but no help came from the USA and in 1975 North Vietnam attacked the South.

By the end of April 1975, Vietnam was unified under communist leadership.

As the United States poured men and money into South Vietnam, Chinese and Soviet involvement in Vietnam also increased.

However, neither the USSR nor China was open about the nature of their support.

• Initially sent soldiers and military equipment.
• Helped repair road, rail and airstrip networks.

• Major supplier of military aid (trained pilots, gave planes, tanks etc).
• Became North Vietnam’s main supplier in 1965 with financial aid, military equipment and advisors.
• Supplied deliveries of food, petroleum, transportation equipment, iron and steel, other metals, fertilisers, arms, munitions and other commodities.

• 1954: French defeated by the Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu. Vietnam is split along the 17th Parallel.
• 1960: Vietcong set-up (National Liberation Front). Aim: to remove Diem and unite Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh.
• 1963: Diem assassinated by Vietcong. JFK assassinated - Johnson becomes President.
• 1964: Gulf of Tonkin Incident - Tonkin Resolution passed. Johnson orders increase in US tactics.
• 1965: Operation Rolling Thunder bombings. Increase in: troops; chemical weapons; search and destroy.
• 1968: Tet Offensive turning point. Nixon becomes President.
• 1970: Vietnamisation begins: withdrawal of US troops. Bombing of North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Peace talks begin.
• 1973: The Paris Peace treaty is signed.
• 1975: South Vietnam falls to communism.

The bombing campaign failed because the bombs often fell into an empty jungle, missing their targets.

The brutal tactics used by US troops often drove more Vietnamese civilians to support the Vietcong.

The North Vietnamese guerrillas knew the jungle and made use of guerrilla tactics as well as elaborate underground bases and tunnels to shelter from US bombs.

Despite the USA’s superior military strength, it could not stop the spread of communism.

The policy of containment had failed.

Having presented the war in Vietnam as a moral crusade against communism, the atrocities committed by the US military in Vietnam in terms of the number of civilian deaths and the use of chemical weapons had tarnished America’s image at home and abroad.

Anti-war protests gathered momentum in America, with many opposing the draft.

Events like the My Lai Massacre were reported in the US press as well as film footage of US soldiers burning homes and of the effects of napalm, all of which turned public opinion against the war.

China, the USSR and USA entered into a period of greater understanding of each other’s system of government.

USA

• The USA was humiliated internationally.
• Containment had failed but not all of Indochina fell to communism.

USSR

• Soviet power did not increase - relations were often strained with Vietnam.