Download Notes - Vietnam

Notes - Vietnam
French Indochina
1. Vietnam
2. Laos
3. Cambodia
In 1954 the Vietnamese defeated the French at Dien
Bien Phu. The French decided to pull out of
Vietnam and the Geneva Convention divided
Vietnam at the 17th Parallel.
North Vietnam became a communist nation under
the leadership of Ho Chi Minh. South Vietnam,
under the leadership of Ngo Dinh Diem, had U.S.
support.
The Government of North Vietnam and Ho Chi
Minh had the goal of united all of Vietnam under
Communism. The National Liberation Front, or
Vietcong, were communists in South Vietnam who
used guerrilla style warfare to try to overthrow the
government of South Vietnam.
The United States had the policy of containment and
also believed in the domino theory which stated if
one country in Southeast Asia fell to communism, all
of Southeast Asia would fall to commumism.
To aid South Vietnam the U.S. began limited
bombing of North Vietnam. In August 1964 a U.S.
ship was attacked off the Gulf of Tonkin. President
Lyndon B. Johnson asked Congress to pass the Gulf
of Tonkin Resolution which gave the President the
power to wage war in Vietnam.
General William Westmoreland was the
commander of U.S. troops in Vietnam.
What made Vietnam difficult and unpopular?
1. Hard to tell who the enemy was.
2. Low morale of the soldiers
3. Spending for the war took money away from
domestic programs
4. First televised war
5. No end in sight to the war
“You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of
yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will
win.” - Ho Chi Minh
American leaders kept telling the American people
that an end to the war was close. In January 1968 the
Vietcong launch the Tet Offensive. This was a
turning point for the war in Vietnam because public
opinion turned against the war and Lyndon Johnson.
1968 was an important year for numerous reasons.
1. Lyndon Johnson announced he would not run for
another term as President
2. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were
assassinated
3. Richard Nixon was elected President of the United
States
Richard Nixon announced the policy of
Vietnamization, which would turn the war over to
Vietnam and the United States would gradually pull
out.
Meanwhile, protests occurred at home because of the
news of the killings of women and children at My
Lai in 1968. Protests became violent on college
campuses around the country.
At Kent State University 4 students were killed
when the Ohio National Guard was called in to stop
an antiwar rally.
The United States finally left Vietnam in 1973 in
what was the longest war the United States ever
fought in. 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam. All of
Vietnam fell to communism in 1975.
Because of the hard feelings caused by Vietnam
Congress passed the War Powers Act which limited
the President’s power to commit troops to combat
without first getting the approval of Congress.