Us Victory in Vietnam?

Originally posted by Kevin In my opinion the US obviously won militarly in Vietnam, however American society didn't have the politcal will at home to fight a sustained an drawn out war far from home. In addition the impact of body bags coming home and heavy losses to an enemy US forces couldn't see had it's effects over time like mentioned in this thread. We also faced an uphill battle anyways since large elements of the South Vietnamese population was sympathtic towards the communists but more so towards Ho Chi Minh. All of this helped contribute to the fall of South Vietnam, in my opinion though especially the aspect of politcal and social opposition in the United States. Other then that had the US somehow fought it out against the North even though it would have been brutal and potentially further damaging to the American world image at the time, the US could have achieved an end similar to that of Korea or today's Iraq.

Kevin,

This is a dangerous mythology, mainly promoted by conservatives who never actually fought in Vietnam, such as Rush and Cheney.

The U.S. didn't have any good reason to fighting in Vietnam in the first place. That was the demoralizing aspect of the war to Americans: there was no clear political objective.

The Vietnam war for the U.S. was a long, costly, and deadly exercise in not losing face. Trying to avoid losing face at the cost of the lives of 60 thousand children of mothers and fathers.

Are body bags a downer? You bet they are. They should be, especially when the country where you are fighting has no chance of attacking the U.S. in its continental territory.

If the American public showed anything during Vietnam was that at some point they were not willing to keep slaughtering their children for a pointless war. It was a statement of strength of the American people to reject the total nonsense that the warmongers chanted at them about the danger of Vietnam and the pro-war propaganda that was pushed at them.

Again, keep in mind that those who spread the mythological loss in the home front were a bunch of pro-war draft dodging cowards who didn't believe that the cause was worthy enough for them to fight for. And I am talking about Rush, Cheney, and the other conservatives that took the U.S. to war in Iraq.

Kevin, You didn't simply fight communist you, we, fought Vietnamese nationalist that saw themselves as freedom fighters.

this wasn't an effective chess move against Moscow rather a mind game with a make believe ideological bogyman. To the Vietnamese this was a continuation of french aka western- imperialism that must be resisted.

There is nothing just in the US aggressions, just misguided beliefs/actions with many innocents killed for Washington's paranoia. The war killed the US economically before it bailed out, so don't think winning it with more paper money and blood was going to make things good for anyone. Yes it is possible that the US can lose wars and be beaten, esp when its not fighting on its terms.


Edited by Leonidas - 13-May-2009 at 14:25

Originally posted by Temujin but what you say makes no sense. if the US was afraid of a Nuclear War, why did they personally invovled in this war in the first place? a direct US involvement in any of the proxy wars could have meant slugging it out with the USSR, if those other countries were to fall into Communist sphere fo influence anyways what was the point? if those countries would have been so insignfiicant, why get involved at all?

Originally posted by DukeC   The concept of containment meant opposing the Soviets and their allies wherever they tried to expand their influence and power.

 

..Hi...

 

..Just popping in to what has been a very, very interesting thread to read and to add a point, which although i have used Duke's quote, is not a direct response to Duke's overall comments….

 

...I thought it might be worth considering that ‘containment’ was a very fluid concept, and the phrase 'containment' really only acted as an umbrella term for a number of differering post-WWII US strategies to minimise the perceived encroachment of the Communist threat around the rest of the world......in this sense, nuclear strike options were a valid response at different times under different Washington Administrations….nuclear war was not always something that might be avoided at all costs….NSC-68 was a direct militaristic and economic response, if not retaliation, toward the perceived build up of the Soviet military arsenal…..this was not just to act as a ‘balance’ but to deal with the very real possibility that if the United States had to respond with atomic weaponry, and it was an option, the United States would survive more intact than the Soviet Union…a defining Cold war logic if there ever was one…

 

…under Eisenhower the ‘New Look’ version of containment held sway, in a way, an attempt to ‘look’ at all the options available, a slight shift away from total reliance on nuclear bombs, and then respond,….but even so,  military action was still there, but now it was a calculated choice… then there was the idea of flexible response or asymmetrical retaliation, military or other wise…once it was ‘you attack Washington (or Berlin, London etc) and we will attack Moscow’…FR basically said that if the Soviets pushed in one part of the world, it did not necessarily mean that the United States would respond in kind, but perhaps instead threaten Moscow’s interests elsewhere…it was very much flexible response that was on show with the arrival of the American war in Vietnam…Russia was seen as more aggressive and successful in the European theatre and alongwith the Sino-Soviet alliance, the United States felt the need to prevent further communist expansion…thus Vietnam, a conflict by proxy…it is worth noting that for a time, the United States did not see Vietnam as a theatre of war, they did not intend to ‘fight’ as such, it was ..er…containment by other means…however, misjudgment, miscalculation and a number of difficult, but ultimately wrong decisions by the Kennedy and Johnson governments led to an escalation of the military presence, and thus, the road to outright war….the end calculation was never really how to win a war, but how to leave the mess and navigate an ‘exit with honour’ strategy…

 

..then of course there was the Nixon, Ford and Carter era of détente (a diplomatic policy), and the SALT negotiations which although proposed a decrease in the military threat, was in fact another facet of containment, especially when you consider (in detail) the nature of the triangular diplomacy that occurred between the Soviet Union, the United States, and the People's Republic of China…historians still debate the nature of détente but in basic terms, the United States sought this form of policy to contain the Soviet Union by other means, and the People's Republic of China, although not a believer in the détente concept, (they thought it was ‘appeasement’), employed Soviet-American talks as a shield from perceived Soviet aggression against China, and used the opportunity to strengthen Sino-American diplomatic relations…. and the Soviet Union, well, its possible that Moscow, in a weakened state, looked for an alliance with the United States in an effort to counter an increasing Chinese influence in the world..(apparently, Brezhnev proposed a Soviet-American treaty that would demand the help of the other country if either was attacked by a third party)…either way, the Soviets sought to re-establish themselves in light of the normalisation of diplomatic relations between China and the United States and the feeling that Russia was increasingly isolated and now threatened by a combination of the two other world powers, in that sense, the pusuit of détente failed and ironically led to military conflict….

 

 

..if anybody wants to look into more detail about containment, may I suggest the new revised editon  of ‘Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy’ by John Lewis Gaddis, it really is a superb, well informed book and pretty much at the tip of distinguished scholarship…

 

..anyway, that’s it (did I say just a note?) all the best….i am enjoying what has got to be one of the best threads that has ever been on AE….

 

AoO…

 

Originally posted by Temujin i just don't see that. since the US lost there anyways the US could have saved 60.000 soldiers, money, face and other things. if it wasn't the US goal to cotnain Communism there, why go there and involve so heavily? the world could not be saved by involving in Vietnam, do you think it could have spread further than it already did? no it couldn't, because yous aid it was unimportant, you're contradictign yourself in your own post and evade a clear conclusion.

Edited by DukeC - 15-May-2009 at 19:49

The US didn't win the Viet Nam war, politically or militarily. The involvement of US forces in the north versus south Viet Nam war was predicated on the "Domino Principle", that is, if South Viet Nam fell to a Communist regime it would pave the way for communist expansion throughout South East Asia. The US badly under-rated the determination of the Vietnamese people to re-unite the two states, and the political will of the North Vietnamese to fight until their goal was achieved. The US, as always, relied on firepower, but this proved largely ineffective against guerrilla warfare on the part of the Vietnamese. General Westmoreland lulled the US government into believing that victory was achievable by providing false "body count" figures, a ridiculously naïve indicator of success.