The Vietnam War was fought in the countries of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, from 1 November 1955 to 30 April 1975. The main countries involved in the Vietnam War were North and South Vietnam. South Vietnam was backed by anti-communist countries and members of the South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) which included the United States, South Korea, Australia, the Philippines, New Zealand, Thailand, Khmer Republic (later overthrown by Khmer Rouge), Kingdom of Laos and Republic of China (Taiwan). North Vietnam was backed by the communist allies which included People’s Republic of China, Soviet Union, Pathet Lao (Laotian Communist insurgents), Khmer Rouge (Cambodian Communist insurgents) and North Korea.
In short, the Vietnam War started as a result of the U.S.’s strategy of containment during the Cold War, which aimed to prevent the spread of communism throughout the world.It is considered that the US lost the Vietnam War.
The person serving as US President when the first troops were sent to attack North Vietnam was President Lyndon B. Johnson. However, it is believed that there were 5 Presidents involved in the Vietnam War. President Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961), President John F. Kennedy (1961-1963), President Lyndon B. Johnson (1963 – 1969), President Richard Nixon (1969 -1974), and President Gerald R. Ford (1974 – 1977).
President Dwight Eisenhower, following the French defeat in the first Indochina War and the division between North and South Vietnam, decided to support anti-communist leader Ngo Dinh Diem in South Vietnam. He created the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in an attempt to block communist spread to Southeast Asia, sent the first American military advisors to Vietnam to help build up Diem’s army in 1955.
President John F Kennedy was known for being a firm believer in the Communist “Domino Theory”, and supported Diem’s Army even further. However, he was conscious of Diem’s oppression and discrimination towards Buddhists and other religious minorities, and eventually decided that he could never unite South Vietnam to fight against the Viet Cong. Only 3 weeks before his death, President Kennedy approved a coup to overthrow Diem’s government.
In was during President Lyndon B. Johnson’s term that the Gulf of Tonkin incident occurred, which involved two separate confrontations involving North Vietnam and the United States in the waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. Even though this incident remains controversial nowadays and is considered false for varied reasons, at the time Congress, in response, passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, allowing the President to take all necessary measures against North Vietnam.
President Johnson, after winning the presidential election, ordered a sustained bombing of North Vietnam shortly after, which lasted 3 years. He then sent the first combat troops to South Vietnam, in response to a Viet Cong’s attack on U.S. air base in Pleiku. After this, the number of troops deployed in Vietnam only increased. During his last period however, President Johnson became more and more unpopular, given that the end of the Vietnam War was nowhere near, from either winning or reaching a peace agreement.
Richard Nixon was elected, by the promise that he would bring “peace with honor” to the Vietnam War, which was growing more and more unpopular. However, President Nixon secretly intensified the war by involving Cambodia and Laos, in an attempt to destroy North Vietnamese supply through the Ho Chi Minh Trail to South Vietnam. There were side effects from his actions, which caused massive protests throughout the US. However, President Nixon made a historic visit to China, as well as a strategic Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with the Soviets, which secured his second elections victory. The same year of his re-election, Nixon ordered a bombing usually referred to as the “Christmas Bombing”, which’s purpose was to keep North Vietnam at the negotiating table as well as to convince South Vietnam to sign a peace treaty. The Paris Treaty was eventually signed that year, ending the American direct involvement in Vietnam. President Nixon then resigned, being the first to do so after a grand political scandal against his party called the “Watergate Scandal”.
During President Gerald R. Ford’s period, Congress considerably cut down the amount of military aid given to South Vietnam. Congress also internally forbade any direct involvement from the US in the Vietnam War. As South Vietnam was about to fall, President Ford made a final appeal to Congress asking for $722 million in military aid to essentially save the country. This appeal was rejected. On April 23, 1975, President Ford declared the Vietnam War ended “as far as America is concerned”, and only seven days later, South Vietnam’s capital was captured and fell to the communists.
It seems to me that one of the main things to have in mind when deciding whether this war was justified or not, is the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. As I previously said, President Lyndon B. Johnson proposed this policy after the Gulf of Tonkin incident, in which he claimed that U.S. ships in the Gulf of Tonkin had been attacked by the North Vietnamese. It was intended to allow the President to take any necessary measures against North Vietnam.
The application of this resolution seems wrong and illegal to me, given that what President Johnson did was declare war without doing so officially. It also seems to me as if this resolution brought a great deal of negative consequences and effects to the US, which were of course, the war itself, with its staggering death toll of an estimated 2 million Vietnamese civilians, 1.1 million North Vietnamese troops, 200,000 South Vietnamese troops, and 58,000 U.S. troops (not counting the wounded in combat who lived).
But I’d think, another consequence that is often obscured is the fact that the Vietnam War, along with the Korean War paved the road for future presidents to bypass the War Powers Clause (Article I, Section 8, Clause 11) and declare war without declaring it, as is the case with the War in Afghanistan and the Military intervention against ISIL. President Eisenhower in his final speech as president warned us of the military industrial complex, saying that “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist.”. I believe that those words were very important, because he warned us of eternal war, and of war being the heart of the economy of our country, which are both things we are living through right now as a nation. He explained this concept more deeply in the same speech when he said that “Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of ploughshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions."
One of the things that disturb me most about this war is of how the US fought the war, but at the same time never invaded the North. It seems to me that the reason behind this is because the US was careful for this war not to become into a full world war against the communist countries, fighting yet not hard enough. I was able to interview my uncle, a Vietnam Veteran, and ask him about this matter. He shared with me about how much more suffering it brought to fight a war were you weren’t supposed to completely beat the enemy, but rather hit political blows every now and then. It is also known that the Vietnam War was one of the most expensive wars the US has ever fought, referring to both the amount of money used and the amount of casualties. To summarize my ideas, I believe the Vietnam War was a war that brought more cons than pros to the country, and therefore was an unjustified war.
Works Cited:
- ”Vietnam War”, Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War
- “What countries involved in the Vietnam War?”, Vietnam War. http://thevietnamwar.info/what-countries-involved-in-the-vietnam-war/
- ”Tonkin Gulf Resolution (1964).”, https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=98
- "Ike's Warning Of Military Expansion, 50 Years Later", NPR. http://www.npr.org/2011/01/17/132942244/ikes-warning-of-military-expansion-50-years-later
