The Tet Offensive underlined the fact that the United States had grossly underestimated the capabilities of the People’s Army of North Vietnam (PAVN) and the Viet Cong. Vietnam had primarily been a guerrilla war fought using fast attack and retreat tactics. During the Tet Offensive urban areas were targeted, with the PAVN seizing large sections of Khe Sanh and Hue as well as nearly taking the American Embassy. This was a major propaganda coup for the communists and highlighted a lack of intelligence on the American side. The reluctance of the American’s to bomb areas of historic significance saw the Tet campaign drag on. Tet highlighted the inefficiencies of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) and persuaded many senior advisers to Johnson that the war in Vietnam was potentially going to drag on. Tet therefore forced a major rethink of the policies employed by the United States of America (USA) in Vietnam.

            In America Tet saw a surge in the number of people opposing the war, which placed further pressure on the beleaguered Lyndon Johnson. The war was now being broadcast into the homes of Americans with regular bulletins showing American troops dying and the destruction of large areas of Vietnam. Around 20 million viewers witnessed the murder of a suspected Viet Cong soldier by the head of the National Police in South Vietnam. The pictures also laid bare the facts that a nation with meagre military and economic capabilities like North Vietnam was holding their own against the might of the United States, something which had previously not been reported. People protested vehemently and Gallup polls suggested that between February and March 1968, there was a swing of 20% between support and opposition to the war amongst the American public. Prominent aides in the Johnson administration now advocated diplomacy, fearing that to win the war would cost millions and be unlikely to receive the backing of Congress. Tet exacerbated an already difficult situation for President Johnson. He had misled the American public regarding the USA’s performance in Vietnam with inflated body counts of Viet Cong and now he had to face the wrath of the voters, becoming a prisoner in the White House. The Tet Offensive saw television highlight the problems America faced and provoked a backlash that Johnson could not survive.

            Tet led to President Johnson opting not to stand for another term. This was an idea Johnson had toyed with for several months and it seems that Tet had served to force the President’s hand. With failing health and a battle against depression Johnson realised he even stood a chance of losing the Democratic Party nomination with the charismatic and popular Robert Kennedy standing against him. It remains to be seen whether Johnson would have sought to battle it out against the younger Kennedy brother, but the Tet Offensive seemed to be key in his decision to stand down.

            One of Johnson’s final acts as President was to endeavour to open up peace negotiations with the North Vietnamese government. Although this proved to be largely fruitless it did set the scene for his successor Richard Nixon to commence negotiations almost immediately through his adviser Dr Henry Kissinger. This highlights a change in tactics brought about by the Tet Offensive, Johnson realised that he needed to withdraw the American troops but was faced with the possibility that this would be viewed as surrendering in the face of aggression by some. Furthermore he appreciated that he would have to gain peace on favourable terms, something which may prove difficult after the considerable effort it took to repel the ARVN during the Tet Offensive. Following the Tet Offensive the negotiations between America and the government of North Vietnam were a key aspect of the conflict up until the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973.

            Tet also could have marked the beginning of the end for the North Vietnamese but showed that America did not have the conviction or motivation to follow this up and pursue a victory. Having repelled the insurgents General Westmoreland requested additional troops to force home their advantage against a severely depleted PAVN. Essentially the Viet Cong had largely been obliterated during the offensive and a prolonged attack from the USA could bring the already desperate North Vietnamese to their knees. The request was rejected by the bulk of Johnson’s advisers who deemed this to be a risk and felt it would not be well received by the American public or Congress. Without the negative publicity generated during the Tet Offensive it is likely that a further advance by the Americans would have forced the North to either surrender or seek peace on America’s terms. Furthermore, it was still unclear what would constitute a victory, the rollback of communism from Vietnam entirely or a free South Vietnam with a necessity to significantly strengthen the ARVN or station troops there permanently. Therefore the Tet Offensive had made the chances of the USA holding South Vietnam and ensuring it did not turn communist highly unlikely and the North Vietnamese would be in a stronger position when negotiations commenced.

            Overall, the Tet Offensive did prove to be a pivotal moment in the Vietnam War. The PAVN and the Viet Cong had brought the problems America faced out into the open for the media to broadcast domestically forcing an already delicate issue to be widely debated. It changed the opinions of many within the White House, including Johnson, and forced his successor Richard Nixon to adopt a more conciliatory approach to the North Vietnamese and Communist World than he may have adopted previously. In reality the failure to attempt to follow up the successful placating of the Tet Offensive was America’s last opportunity to emerge victorious, but due to the poor reception Westmoreland’s request received and the half-hearted nature of his request it ensured that the Vietnam War would be settled at the negotiating table and not on the battlefield.     

            The policy of ‘Hearts and Minds’ introduced by Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ) early in his Presidency was largely unsuccessful and is symptomatic of poor policy choices the USA made during the Vietnam War. ‘Hearts and Minds’ involved the USA attempting to gain the support of the people of Vietnam, thus cutting of vital supplies of men and materials to the Viet Cong and People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN). This policy was doomed to failure by the heavy handed forced removal of Vietnamese people from their ancestral home and placing them in fortified villages under the ‘Strategic Hamlet’ policy initiated by John F Kennedy (JFK). This proved to be a massive error, where the policy had worked in Malaya for the British, the strong cultural bonds Vietnamese families have with their ancestors was severed causing anguish and resentment among the local populace. The failure to appreciate the prevalent Vietnamese culture in early American policies towards the Vietnamese was a key error and served to drastically undermine the policy of ‘Hearts and Minds’ before it had been conceived.

            Similarly, the decision by JFK to support Ngo Dinh Diem as the leader of South Vietnam highlights the bad policy choices the USA’s Government opted to pursue. Diem was a Catholic and managed to retain power in the predominantly Buddhist South Vietnam by a mixture of oppression and corruption. Protests against Diem’s anti-Buddhist policies, most notably the self-immolation of numerous Buddhist monks, was met with little sympathy or change in tact. The eventual removal of Diem came in November 1963, however for the remainder of the Vietnam War the forces of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the local police and successive leaders were seen as corrupt American lackeys who acted on harsh orders from the Americans. This merely served to heighten the gulf between the USA and the people of Vietnam and highlight further the poor choice of policy in Washington.

            Furthermore, the bombing campaigns employed by the USA in Vietnam could be deemed to be misguided as well as militarily and economically worthless. The use of defoliates and napalm on the jungle foliage could be considered to be a political own goal by the Americans. Images of children bearing horrific burns whilst fleeing the attacks of their liberators shocked people across the globe. This was coupled with the decision to launch extensive bombing campaigns along the Ho Chi Minh trail and North Vietnam. However the Ho Chi Minh Trail remained unbroken throughout the war and due to North Vietnam’s largely rural geography the bombs did little damage. The majority of Vietcong booby traps were made using the remains of unexploded American bombs. In reality America spent $9.60 to cause $1 worth of damage. This again shows the ineffective policies and methods that the USA chose to employ and continued to use.

            By implementing a draft system to ensure there were enough soldiers available to fight in Vietnam the USA could be seen to make a further key error which led to their poor performance in the Vietnam War. The draft largely picked out working-class youths, blacks or other minorities. In itself this is not ideal but not necessarily a problem, the fact that the average age of the soldiers serving in Vietnam was only nineteen it highlights the rawness of their recruits. This was exacerbated by the decision to only allow them to serve six month tours of duty, leading to soldiers being switched as they were becoming more used to their surroundings. This also led to poor decisions from naive leaders. This severely undermined the USA’s efforts and led to events like the My Lai Massacre which occurred due to poor leadership and tactics and made the gulf between the United States army and the Vietnamese people wider.

            The American soldiers found themselves fighting in an alien country for a cause they did not necessarily agree with or in some cases understand. This is further evidence of the USA opting to pursue the wrong policies. To draft soldiers into a war which placed them under considerable physical and mental strain led to severe problems, particularly during the ill advised Search and Destroy strategies. The fact inexperienced troops were attempting to fight a guerrilla war against a largely unseen enemy was a major factor in both the inability to win the Hearts and Minds of the Vietnamese people and furthermore the war itself. The decision to move away from Search and Destroy was a wise one but saw a complete failure to implement another plan. This led to instances of severe boredom leading to drug abuse, increased prostitution and also fragging – the murdering of senior soldiers. The USA inadvertently managed to completely change the landscape of South Vietnam from a rural, peaceful nation to one where corruption and vice were prevalent. This further served to force the South Vietnamese closer to the communist North and highlighted another area of policy from the Americans which was ill conceived.

            The United States did not lose the Vietnam War because of their failure to win the Hearts and Minds of the South Vietnamese people. This was merely an example of their failure to develop a viable strategy that could see them attain a satisfactory outcome. The USA exhibited a near contempt for the people of South Vietnam and failed to see the links the people could draw between themselves and the old French overlords of Vietnam. They turned the Vietnam War into one of liberation where the Vietnamese did not see nor care about the political beliefs of the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese they merely saw them as liberators who were preferable to the Americans.

Tim O’Brien’s collection of short stories about the Vietnam War, The
Things They Carried, presents an intimate view into the lives of the
soldiers who fought that war. The novel combines personal stories with
vivid pictures of what war is really like for the young men trapped
thousands miles from home trying to survive in an alien environment.
The stories attempt to explain to the reader the dangers and fears
these young men experienced on a daily basis. Tim O’Brien tells the
story so that future generations can learn and perhaps think twice
about putting young people at risk again in a war. By describing the
physical burdens each of the men has to carry, Tim O’Brien reveals the
horrific truths about war and the emotional burdens men have to endure.

The war in Vietnam was the longest war the United States had ever been
involved in. It lasted 12 years, cost nearly 58,000 American lives, and
divided the country. The road to Vietnam began when the United States
government decided to help France defeat the nationalist movement in
Vietnam. The French were defeated and as a result the country of
Vietnam was divided into the communist controlled north and the French
backed government in the south. Under President Eisenhower, the United
States promised to support South Vietnam. The United States strongly
believed that if one country fell to communism, it would lead to the
fall of neighboring countries. In 1960, when President John Kennedy
came to power, there were 900 American military advisors in South
Vietnam. The North Vietnamese threatened to overthrow the government of
South Vietnam and Kennedy decided to increase the American military
presence in the country. By 1963, there were over 16,000 troops in
country. President Johnson escalated the war even further hoping to
quickly defeat North Vietnam with intense bombings and more troops. He
sent more then 180,000 more American troops. Even though the US had
superior weapons, the North Vietnamese could not be defeated. The
country became more and more divided over the cost of the war in
dollars and in lives. The war did not reach its final conclusion until
President Nixon was elected and began to slowly withdraw troops.
Finally in January 1973 the war came to an end with a cease fire
agreement signed in Paris. Two years later North Vietnam seeing that
the United States was leaving the country, attacked the South, and took
over the country. The price of the war was huge and the veterans who
returned did not come home to a hero’s welcome. The Vietnam War was
seen as the first defeat in America’s history. 

The soldiers who fight in war are burdened by many things. They not
only carry the tools of war, but also carry the memories of their past
lives before they were soldiers and the emotions brought about by their
dangerous circumstances. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is the leader of a
platoon of men, not much younger than he was. As the author states,
“The things they carried where largely determined by necessity” (2).
The soldiers were burdened by “P-38 can openers, pocket knives, heat
tabs, wristwatches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy,
cigarettes, salt tablets, pckets of Kool-Aid…”(2). Jimmy Cross, because
he was the leader, carried not only “a compass, maps, code books,
binoculars, and a 45-caliber pistol that weighed 2.9 pounds fully
loaded. He carried a strobe light and the responsibility for the lives
of his men.” (8). This burden was a heavy one for Jimmy, especially
when he had to see his men die. Jimmy also carried his love for Martha.
He carried not only her picture, but letters, and small gifts he had
sent him. One of these gifts was a pebble that Martha had found at the
Jersey shore. Lieutenant Cross saw this gift as a sign that Martha
loved him, but the truth was her love was in his imagination. The
pebble let him forget the day-to-day misery he was experiencing in
Vietnam. In his daydreams, he could pretend that he was somewhere else,
escaping into a place where fear and loneliness where put aside.
However, reality invades when the first soldier, Ted Lavender, is
killed. Cross now takes on the burden of guilt and shame for not doing
more to protect his men. After Lavender’s body was taken away, the
stone he carried as a memory of Martha now, “he would have to carry
like a stone in his stomach for the rest of the war” (16). It was then
that Lieutenant Cross realized that he would never be the same man
again and that Martha, “belonged to another world, which was not quite
real…and because he realized she did not love him and never would”
(17). Lieutenant Cross realizes that nothing will be able to remove his
memories of the war, and even years after the war when the author
visits Jimmy, “He’d never forgiven himself for Lavender’s death. It was
something that would never go away” (27). The burdens Jimmy carried
into war had now become a dead weight that would be with him until he
died. 

The soldiers of Vietnam were very young men who lived with constant
fear, loneliness, and rage at the world for putting them in this
horrible situation. One of the soldiers was a Native American from
Oklahoma named Kiowa. He is a quiet man who gets along with everyone
and tries to make sense of the war. He carries all the same equipment
as the other soldiers in the platoon, but being, “a devout Baptist,
carried an illustrated New Testament that had been presented to him by
his father…” (3). He also carried his superstitions, and resentment
against white people. “As a hedge against bad times, however, Kiowa
also carried his grandmother’s distrust of the white man, his
grandfather’s old hunting hatchet…” (3). All though he did not trust
many of the other people in his platoon, he still made it appoint to
talk to them and become their friend. All of the other soldiers liked
him and his presence in the platoon made them feel better about the
dangers they faced. They would watch Kiowa who always carried certain
items with him whenever they were going on night missions. “Kiowa
always took along his New Testament and a pair of moccasins for
silence.” (9). After Ted Lavender was killed, Kiowa wanted to feel a
sense of loss, but somehow he could not. He only felt relief that he
was alive. However, when night came, “he opened his New Testament and
arranged it beneath his head as a pillow. The fog made things seem
hallow and unattached.” (18). Kiowa’s religion gave him a sense of
peace over what was happening. It gives him a way to distance himself
from the emotions of war. In the end Kiowa dies a senseless death in a
field of mud. Each of the men blames themselves for his death. Jimmy
Cross blames himself because he chose the field they were camped in. He
plans to write a letter to Kiowa’s father but somehow never gets around
to it. One of the other soldiers blames himself because he had used a
flashlight to show Kiowa a picture of his girlfriend. In the end, it
does not matter because dead is dead. They find Kiowa’s body and dig it
out of the muck. They clean him off, go through his pockets, and “place
his personal effects in a plastic bag, tape the bag to Kiowa’s wrist,
then used the radio to call in a dustoff” (175). Even in death the
soldiers have a burden to carry. Nothing could save Kiowa, not his
weapon, not his God, not his friends, and not his courage. 

The legacy of the Vietnam War is a legacy of lost lives and grief. The
war took young men and put them into a situation where they were
weighted down by both the physical and psychological burdens they had
to carry. This legacy lives on today, and Tim O’Brien’s stories are a
way of making new generations understand the hell of war. The
experiences of men like Lieutenant Cross and Kiowa, one a leader and
the other a foot soldier, one who lives and who dies, clearly
illustrates that the people who experience war never get over the pain.

Bibliography 

Cayton, Andrew, Elizabeth Perry, Allan Winkler. American: Pathways to
the Present. Neeham:Prentice Hall, 1998. 

O’Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried. First Broadway Books: New York,

1. Ho Chi minh took control of north Vietnam after the defeat of the Japanese in WWII
2. The French took control of south Vietnam.
3. The French were defeated by Ho Chi minh.
4. Vietnam was officially divided into two nations (north and south)
5. To 1964- American military advisers were sent to south Vietnam to support the south Vietnamese armed forces against the Viet cong  and the north Vietnamese army.
6. Australian advisors joined the Americans in Vietnam.
7. Sir Robert Menzies (PM) announced the reintroduction of national service (conscription) for 20 year old men.
8. Australian combat troops were sent to south Vietnam.
9. Anti-war protests increased in Australia.
10. The battle of Long Tan took place seventeen Australians killed.
11. American president Lyndon B Johnson visited Sydney and was given an enthusiastic welcome.
12. Support for Australian involvement in Vietnam declined dramatically.
13. Large moratorium marches took place.
14. To 1972- Australian combat troops withdrew from south Vietnam.
15. American troops began to withdraw from Vietnam.
16. The last American troops withdrew.
17. Following the departure of U.S troops, south Vietnam fell to the Viet cong and north Vietnamese forces. The Vietnam war was over.
18. North Vietnam and South Vietnam were united as the Republic of Vietnam.

Gualandre Funeral home is handling the arrangements, while be preregistered with her birth name, Tran She was also known for her fiery talkLe Xuan.

She lived in a former presidential palace with her husband who was the head of the secret police in Saigon which was south Vietnam’s capital. She lived there also with her brother-in-law who was a bachelor president Ngo Dinh Diem. He was president fro 1955-1963. She sort of drifted into the roll of first lady because the President was related to her and a bachelor.

She was known for photographs of her in her bouffant and beautiful clothes. She also wore a tight traditional silk tunic. Those were meant to be worn loosely. These pictures are from the early 1960’s.

She was especially harsh about Buddhists monks who were protesting Diem;s crackdown by setting themselves on fire. She once made a statement about the Buddhist monks that she would “clap hands at seeing another monk barbeque show, for one cannot be responsible for the madness of others.

She had a Buddhist father named Tran Van Chuong who was an ambassador resigned in protestand her mother Nam Tran Choung who was permanetly South Vietnam’s observer to the United States.

Her husband was killed in the U.S. on Nov 1 1963 by a US back coupe to get rid of his dictatorship, they were in the U.S. on a speaking tour.

After her husand was killed she chose to go into exile in Italy and the only time she left her home was to go to Mass.

One of the most horrific memories (among many) for Americans old enough to remember the Vietnam War is the constant Pentagon emphasis placed on “body counts.” The story of how many enemies were killed each day by our brave boys in uniform was used to justify our continued presence in South Vietnam. At the same time, it was a grim joke for the soldiers asked to turn in numbers that frequently had no meaning. Anyone dead in the general area of combat magically became an enemy combatant, regardless of sex or age, whether or not they were found with weapons or any other common sense definition of enemy combatant. Many have speculated that this focus on numbers led to some of the more egregious killing of civilians and non-combatants which ended up turning many South Vietnamese against the American forces and into the hands of the North Vietnamese.

Image via Wikipedia

General Petaeus is now emphasizing the number of enemy killed at the same time that drone attacks and encounters are ramping up. The temptation is obvious, just as in Vietnam there are no metrics like amount of land “liberated”, villages occupied or anything else a soldier can lay his hands on to make sense of things. Civilian death tolls have risen accordingly with the recent death of civilians calling for apologies by administration officials. Nine boys were killed by mistake. Things really start to heat up when children are killed because of mistakes during combat operations, driving more locals to take a stand.

Image via Wikipedia

It has been acknowledged for some time now that the real metrics of success in counter-insurgency are not as satisfying to military men as body counts. Talking about how many wells were dug and schools built are ok, but do not carry the same cachet or weight as numbers killed. It is what was done to make people’s lives better that really make a counter-insurgency successful.

For more of my Stories: Mike’s View

The first reason for why the United States chose to become more involved in Vietnam was to contain communism, a policy known as containment. The North Vietnamese government, led by Ho Chi Minh was communist, and in South Vietnam their approval was high. Fearful that the south too would fall to communism, the US placed a capitalist leader in the south. However, his approval was very low, and in 1959 the North Vietnamese government, the Vietminh felt the time was right to unite the country of Vietnam by armed force, thus creating a National Liberation Front known as the Vietcong. The Vietcong used guerrilla tactics against the South Vietnamese forces, who despite being supported by US military advisors were losing the struggle.

The US thought that Russia and China, both communist countries, were trying to spread communism throughout south-east Asia, and so the US felt concerned about the domino theory, which stated that if one country fell to communism, then the others around it would also fall. Afraid that Vietnam and neighboring Cambodia and Laos would become communist, the US, led by JK Kennedy therefore increased military aid to South Vietnam by sending over 10,000 advisors to South Vietnam

From 1961 to 1963, following the assassination of JF Kennedy, Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson carried on with Kennedy’s commitments to the war. However, in 1964 when he faced re-election, his anti-communist Republican opponent accused his of being soft on communism. Desperate to prove him wrong and win the election, Johnson began taking a very active stance against communism and increased military involvement in Vietnam. There was also a matter of pride; Johnson did not want to be the first US president to lose a war. He therefore used such events as the Gulf of Tonkin incident to show that he was strong against communism and to win the votes of the American public.

The Gulf of Tonkin incident was the most important reason for the US involvement in Vietnam. Between August 2nd and August 4th 1964 the US sent two US destroyers to monitor South Vietnamese attacks on the coast of North Vietnam, and it was alleged that the two US destroyers were attacked unprovoked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats over international waters; while this wasn’t quite true (the US were aiding South Vietnamese attacks and North Vietnam therefore saw the US also as being the enemy), President Johnson received US Congress support to send military forces to Vietnam. Despite doubts over whether the Gulf of Tonkin incident actually occurred, this was the turning point in US involvement in Vietnam as both the senate and the general public of America began to view North Vietnam and the Vietminh as a very real enemy following its alleged attack on US boats.

To conclude, the most important reasons as to why the United States became increasingly involved in Vietnam were to contain communism and stop the domino theory, as part of LB Johnsons campaign to win the election by taking an active stance against communism and as a response to the Gulf of Tonkin incident.

            The first issue President Johnson dealt with was the Great Society, which is a domestic issue. The Great Society was Johnson’s ambitious domestic agenda. The biggest parts of this plan include bringing aid to underprivileged Americans, regulating natural resources, and protecting American consumers. Other parts of the program include environmental protection laws, landmark land conservation measures, the Immigration Act, bills establishing a New Endowment for the Arts and the New Endowment for the Humanities, a Highway Safety Act, the Public Broadcasting Act, and a bill to provide consumers with some protection against shoddy goods and dangerous products. The Great Society also included an effort to fight poverty, which was made a national concern by declaring a “War on Poverty”. Lyndon signed a series of bills and acts in order to start programs such as Head Start, food stamps, work study, Medicare, and Medicaide. In creating these porgrams, poverty rates dropped from 20% to 12% and stayed there. Public health made a turn for the better under Johnson, poverty levels were reduced, and living standards were better as a result of the Great Society. The country as  a whole improved during The Great Society, which makes Presiden Johnson an excellent president.

            A second issue President Johnson delt with was Civil Rights/Race Relations, which was a domestic issue. The Civil Rights problem was when there was segregation between races. African Americans and Whites could not utilize the same areas. President Johnson took action by convincing key to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which ended the segregation of public facilities. The African Americans in the country at the time were also discriminated against and many were iliterate. To help out these people, President Johnson passed the Voting Rights Acto of 1965, which suspended literacy tests in areas where voting rates were under a certain percentage. These two acts passed by President Johnson ended discrimination in the South and gave African Americans the right to vote. The way President Johnson handled this event made him a poor president. He concentrated so much on helping an underprivilaged minority that he didn’t think of how the rest of the country would react. The rest of the country was the split on the issue. Some people didn’t want to see their tax money go to people who are too lazy to get an education and a job. Others thought that this would help stimulate the economy and help raise the value of the US dollar.

            A third issue that happened under President Johnson was the Vietnam War, which is a foreign issue. The war was fought between 1964 and 1975 in North and South Vietnam. The situation in Vietnam was that North Vietnam (Communist) was trying to take over South Vietnam (Republic) and the Soviets along with the Chinese were giving military aid to North Vietnam while the United States helped South Vietnam. President Johnson started of by sending about 75,000 troops to Vietnam, but as time went on, he saw that keeping South Vietnam away from Communism was a necessity; he therefore kept on sending more and more American soldiers into Vietnam and when the war was at its height, more than 200,000 American troops were in Vietnam. Since President Johnson believed that he had to do whatever is needed to defeat North Vietnam, he would disregard what the public believed. Even though at one point only 25% of the public believed that Johnson was doing good for the country, he continued to fight the war. Because Johnson kept fighting the war against the public’s will, there were demonstrations being held in Washington. The war became so unpopular that 9,118 draftees refused to fight in the war; but to make matters worse, all of the draftees were prosecuted. The war made the people of the US angry. The war made President Johnson a poor president due to the fact that he disregarded the public opinion on the war.

            The fourth affair that President Johnson dealt with was the relationship between the US and South American countries; this was a foreign issue. During Lyndon’s presidency, there was a series of crises in Latin America; and due to the Monroe Doctrine, Johnson was obligated to settle the problem(s) in these countries. When Cuba demanded that the US return the Guatanamo Naval base and shut of the water installation, the US navy created their own water supply, causing the Cubans to back down. When the Panamanians rioted against American control of the Panama canal, President Johnson dealt with the Panamanians firmly with violence, but eventually President Johnson agreed to return the canal by 1999. President Johnson’s decision to deal with Latin American affairs gave the people of the United States a sense of nationalism. This made President Johnson an average president because the American public responded to the event with approval.

President Johnson wasn’t a poor president because he did enough things to benefit the American public that people didn’t weigh the bad things he did as heavily. He wasn’t an excellent president because his actions proved that he supported things that were wrong and unjust, which makes him in no way an excellent president.

The Vietnam War was a military conflict that took place between the years of 1965 and 1973 in the Indo-China Peninsula, more commonly known as the countries of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. The war concerned the communists of North Vietnam, China, North Korea and the USSR, and the Nationalists/Capitalists of South Vietnam and the United States.

Vietnam originally had been a part of China, until it broke away from them in 938AD and became an independent country. It then was taken control of by the French army in the late 19th century, and remained the same for the better half of the next century or so. The Japanese was able to obtain temporary control over Vietnam in the early months of 1945, but had to hand Vietnam back to the French after their loss in the Second World War. But both the nationalists and the communists wanted independence, and fought alongside each other against the French, until they decided to pull out of Vietnam in 1954. Vietnam was then divided into two separate states not unlike North and South Korea, with the communist party, controlled by Ho Chi Minh, in the North and the nationalists, controlled by Diem, in the South.

The USA decided to partake in the Vietnam War. This was mainly because of the Truman Doctrine. Though the only immediate and explicit effect of this doctrine was the aid from the USA to Turkey and Greece, it showed that the US were on a stage of ‘containment’ and wished to aid anyone and everyone who wanted to fight communism, with the exception of already communist countries. The other reason for their participation in the war is because of the ‘domino’ theory. The Southern Asian countries were all shifting to communism, and the Americans (wrongly) believed that as soon as one country is liberated from communism the other countries would be soon to follow without any influence from the United States. The Americans stated that their aim in the Vietnam War was to ‘defend South Vietnam’.

Another reason, or rather excuse, for the Americans to get involved in the Vietnam War was the Gulf of Tonkin Incident(s) where there were naval clashes between the US and North Vietnam. There was little damage in the first incident, where the American Aircraft and destroyer received light damage as well as three Vietnamese Torpedo boats. There were no casualties on the American side, though around 10 sailors from North Vietnam were reported to be wounded or killed. The second incident resulted in the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which allowed the US to help any South-Eastern Asian country aid, if they wanted it, against communist aggression.

In 1965 the US president was President Johnson. At the start of this year, there were regular air raids on the North Vietnamese territory from the US air-force, but Johnson did not think that this would be enough to aid the government of Diem enough to hold up against the army of Ho Chi Minh, even though it was calculated that more bombs were dropped on Vietnam than on Berlin in the course of the whole second world war. He then decided to send in huge American forces into Vietnam, around one hundred and eighty thousand soldiers at first, and gradually increased to five hundred thousand soldiers in the next three years. At this point it seemed as if the Americans were not merely ‘aiding’ the South Vietnamese army, but was actually fighting the war for them.

The Americans also encouraged a few nationalist generals to overthrow Diem, who seemed obviously at the point a very unpopular and very weak ruler of nationalist Vietnam. General Thieu became the new leader of South Vietnam, and had a very strong position due to American aid and help in Vietnam.

Ho Chi Minh and his generals knew very well that the USA was very skilled and hard-to-beat in open warfare. So, they avoided the traditional warfare the Americans were so used to completely, which proved a very big problem for the US army. Ho Chi Minh preferred to use Vietcong Fighters, which were communist forces in South Vietnam, who, along with the North Vietnamese army, were very skilled with guerrilla warfare. They sabotaged US supplies and organised sudden ambushes that the US were very bad at uncovering. They had almost no way to respond to this kind of attack. Another important reason why the Americans were unable to fight at their fullest potential was that though they were really skilled in offensive tactics, their stay in Vietnam initially was ordered to be purely defensive. The US marines, to put it bluntly, lacked the flexibility and psychological means that is essential to defensive mission. Because of this, US had to employ extreme (not THAT extreme) methods in order to cope with the guerrilla attacks made by the Vietcong fighters.

The US responded with two ways to cope with the guerrilla tactics employed by the Vietcong Fighters. The first of which was to drop massive loads of bombs to destroy possible supply lines for the Vietcong fighters, so as to tire them out. The second was to used chemical warfare and destroy areas of the countryside where the US army suspected of hiding communists. The second method was extremely cruel and hated by many people. It usually involved napalm, which was a chemical that burns sticks to the skin and burns it away slowly. What was worse about this chemical was that you could not even water it down or even wash it in any way. The more water you pour on it the more fiercely it burns the skin. The US response to the guerrilla tactics proved not only ineffective but on the contrary angered ordinary Vietnamese people, and made it even easier for Ho Chi Minh to rally their support during the years of the Vietnam War. Countless civilians were killed by the US army, when they tried to stop the guerrilla warfare.

Another difficulty faced by the Americans during the Vietnam War was the public protests against the Vietnam War. There has never been any real massive protests in public areas against the various wars the USA had to fight, but the introduction of one weapon made this inevitable; television. In the previous wars that the United States fought, war was seen as an almost romantic thing – people were to sail or fly away to far, foreign places, frightening the souls of fearful adversaries, and then to die helping their countries cause. But now, people are able to physically see the horrific nature of Modern Warfare 2.

Another reason for the protests against the Vietnam War was the resulted of the Tet offensive. The Tet offensive was an all out attack on South Vietnam, especially around the areas of Saigon, their Capital. Though the offensive was a short-term failure for the Vietcong fighters, as the US army managed to re-capture the areas taken within a few days and over fifty thousand Vietcong fighters were killed, the long term negative effect on the US was undeniably strong. The Tet offensive is widely seen as a turning point in the Vietnam War. Back in the USA, people saw the dying/dead/about to die/unconscious Vietcong fighters outside the American Embassy building well within American grounds saw that many people became disillusioned about the war. Up until this point most people believed that they were close to victory in Vietnam, but seeing foreign forces infiltrate the place that was by all means supposed to be a safe Haven and un-breakable territory ridiculed that notion.  The anti-war movements in the United States grew in strength and many politicians (correctly) saw that there was simply no way that America can win the Vietnam War. As quoted from this random American politician called Dean Acheson (open quote) The issue is can we by military means keep the North Vietnamese off the South Vietnamese? I do not think we can. (Close quote).

The Americans decided to pull out of South Vietnam after a number of peace talks with both the North Vietnamese and the nations supporting it. Nixon arranged a cease fire in 1973 and straight afterwards withdrew his forces from Vietnam. The results from Vietnam were disastrous for the Vietnamese. More than fifty five thousand soldiers were killed and countless more wounded. The Americans also suffered a grievous blow to their pride and confidence. After the War the USA started to get friendlier with the communist countries and started an era know as détente, which basically means peace with the communist world.

Nixon decided and announced in 1971 that he would visit China, and this visit took place in 1972. Since the communist party of China triumphed and emerged with a Communist China the USA had not even recognised this state.

Nixon then lessened the arms race with the Soviet Union, in talks known as the SALT talks.

Most importantly, as soon the Americans withdrew from South Vietnam, the communist forces forced their way into the South, and within one or two years, had complete control over the whole of Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh emerged as triumphant. Also, the neighbouring countries of Cambodia and Laos was converted in this period as well, inspired by the wars in Vietnam.