The failure to spark a general uprising and the lack of defections among the ARVN units meant both war goals of Hanoi had fallen flat at enormous costs. The group was ultimately defeated in April following a battle in Saigon. The PAVN/VC responded with a new strategy hammered out in a series of meetings in Hanoi in March 1973, according to the memoirs of Trn Vn Tr. Most Asian countries were unwilling to accept these refugees, many of whom fled by boat and were known as boat people. The communist Tet Offensive throughout 1968 caused U.S. domestic support for the war to fade. [22]:76 Eisenhower, wary of involving the United States in a land war in Asia, decided against military intervention. [197] By 1970, Viet Cong forces were no longer southern-majority, as nearly 70% of units were northerners. [227]:545, China's support for North Vietnam when the U.S. started to intervene included both financial aid and the deployment of hundreds of thousands of military personnel in support roles. [298]:7 First Lieutenant Sharon Lane was the only female military nurse to be killed by enemy gunfire during the war, on 8 June 1969. 2144, Combat Area Casualty File, November 1993. [161] The first few days were considered a success but the momentum had slowed after fierce resistance. Minh's regime was overthrown in January 1964 by General Nguyn Khnh. [161]:196205 Large-scale offensives were rolled back in favour of small-unit and sapper attacks as well as targeting the pacification and Vietnamization strategy.

Group 559 was tasked with expanding the Ho Chi Minh trail, in light of the near constant bombardment by US warplanes.

[93]:23, President Ronald Reagan coined the term "Vietnam Syndrome" to describe the reluctance of the American public and politicians to support further military interventions abroad after Vietnam. "[173] Thus, the public was shocked and confused when Westmoreland's predictions were trumped by the Tet Offensive. In 1967, the Chinese government launched a secret military program named "Project 523". These advance warnings gave them time to move out of the way of the bombers, and, while the bombing runs caused extensive damage, because of the early warnings from 1968 to 1970 they did not kill a single military or civilian leader in the headquarters complexes. Ambassador Lodge informed Kennedy that "the prospects now are for a shorter war".

[375]:3767, On 25 May 2012, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation of the commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the Vietnam War. The PAVN's own official records of their losses across all three offensives was 45,267 killed and 111,179 total casualties. [285] Statistics for 19681972 suggest that "about 80 percent of the terrorist victims were ordinary civilians and only about 20 percent were government officials, policemen, members of the self-defence forces or pacification cadres. [140] The bombing campaign, which ultimately lasted three years, was intended to force North Vietnam to cease its support for the Viet Cong by threatening to destroy North Vietnamese air defenses and industrial infrastructure. [360] This resulted in a large federal budget deficit. [21] China claimed that its military and economic aid to North Vietnam and the Viet Cong totaled $20billion (approx. Johnson ordered the deployment of combat units for the first time and increased troop levels to 184,000. [252] State department reports furthermore state that ROK forces engaged in systemic, well-organised corruption in diverting US-equipment, and that actual security was often provided by South Vietnamese Regional Forces, which lacked organic firepower and heavy artillery but served as a buffer between Korean units and the PAVN/VC. Another French-speaking journalist, Catherine Leroy, was briefly captured and released by North Vietnamese forces during the Battle of Hu, capturing some famous photos from the battles that would appear on the cover of Life Magazine.

[120]:2016 During the battle the South Vietnamese had lost 83 soldiers and 5 US war helicopters serving to ferry ARVN troops that had been shot down by Vietcong forces, while the Vietcong forces had lost only 18 soldiers. U.S. and allied forces mount major offensive actions to seize the initiative to destroy guerrilla and organized enemy forces. [342], By 1975, the North Vietnamese had lost influence over the Khmer Rouge. These actions were part of a diversionary strategy meant to draw U.S. forces towards the Central Highlands. [99]:119 The United States countered with what became known as the "American Plan", with the support of South Vietnam and the United Kingdom. "This article", noted Peter Church, "proved to be the only one of the Paris Agreements which was fully carried out. [67] It lasted almost 20 years, with direct U.S. involvement ending in 1973. [15] It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam.

"[124] The numbers for U.S. troops deployed to Vietnam during the same period were much lower: 2,000 in 1961, rising rapidly to 16,500 in 1964. The United States had previously cancelled its planned air intervention at the end of the First Indochina War because of doubts from British Prime Ministers Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden. [83]:48. See: Due to the early presence of U.S. troops in Vietnam, the start date of the Vietnam War is a matter of debate. [283]:251 A report by Newsweek magazine suggested that at least 5,000 civilians may have been killed during six months of the operation, and there were approximately 748 recovered weapons and an official US military body count of 10,889 enemy combatants killed. [147] The Marines' initial assignment was the defense of Da Nang Air Base. [39]:6934, On 20 March, Thieu reversed himself and ordered Hu, Vietnam's third-largest city, be held at all costs, and then changed his policy several times. [213][214], By the end of April, the ARVN had collapsed on all fronts except in the Mekong Delta. The circumstances of the attacks were murky. China sent 320,000 troops and annual arms shipments worth $180million. The conflict between Hmong rebels and the Pathet Lao continued in isolated pockets. He was against the deployment of American combat troops and observed that "to introduce U.S. forces in large numbers there today, while it might have an initially favorable military impact, would almost certainly lead to adverse political and, in the long run, adverse military consequences. Increasingly, each new regime was viewed by the communists as a puppet of the Americans; whatever the failings of Dim, his credentials as a nationalist (as Robert McNamara later reflected) had been impeccable. and vol. [259] In the end, though, a desire to prove their commitment to the ANZUS alliance and discourage an American withdrawal from Southeast Asia necessitated a military commitment. [373] And behind the scenes Secretary of Defense McNamara wrote in a memo to President Johnson his doubts about the war: "The picture of the world's greatest superpower killing or seriously injuring 1,000 noncombatants a week, while trying to pound a tiny backward nation into submission on an issue whose merits are hotly disputed, is not a pretty one. [205] In AprilMay 1970, North Vietnam invaded Cambodia at the request of the Khmer Rouge following negotiations with deputy leader Nuon Chea. American helicopters began evacuating South Vietnamese, U.S. and foreign nationals from various parts of the city and from the U.S. embassy compound. [39]:714 After having appealed unsuccessfully to Congress for $722 million in emergency aid for South Vietnam, President Ford had given a televised speech on 23 April, declaring an end to the Vietnam War and all U.S. [270] At the same time, approximately 20,000 Canadians crossed the U.S.-Canada border to illegally enlist in the U.S. Armed Forces for service in Vietnam, of which 134 died. If the enemy persisted, a period of twelve to eighteen months following Phase 2 would be required for the final destruction of enemy forces remaining in remote base areas. "[93]:326 Kennedy had not anticipated Dim's murder. [94]:143[95][96]:569[97] However, declassified documents from the Vietnamese and Hungarian archives indicate that the number of executions was much lower than reported at the time, although likely greater than 13,500.

The Western Political Quarterly. The identities of the leaders of the organization often were kept secret.

[108]:73, In March 1956, southern communist leader L Dun presented a plan to revive the insurgency entitled "The Road to the South" to the other members of the Politburo in Hanoi; however, as both China and the Soviets opposed confrontation at this time, L Dun's plan was rejected. [157], Engagement A Virtual Surprise To US Commanders, In late 1967, the PAVN lured American forces into the hinterlands at k T and at the Marine Khe Sanh combat base in Qung Tr Province, where the U.S. fought a series of battles known as The Hill Fights. Other figures point to $138.9billion from 1965 to 1974 (not inflation-adjusted), 10 times all education spending in the US and 50 times more than housing and community development spending within that time period. Officials expected a foreign intervention to fail, were concerned that they would be supporting a corrupt regime, and did not want to further stretch their country's small military (which was already deployed to Malaysia). [157] The PAVN/Viet Cong had furthermore developed strategies capable of countering U.S. military doctrines and tactics (see NLF and PAVN battle tactics). [68][A 9] After the French military withdrawal from Indochina in 1954, the U.S. assumed financial and military support for the South Vietnamese state. Following Vietnamization many Montagnard groups and fighters were incorporated into the Vietnamese Rangers as border sentries. [73]:89, In October 1956, Dim launched a land reform program limiting the size of rice farms per owner. [289]:78 Torture was conducted by the South Vietnamese government in collusion with the CIA.[290][291]. [198], In 1970, Nixon announced the withdrawal of an additional 150,000 American troops, reducing the number of Americans to 265,500. [70] The People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), also known as the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) engaged in more conventional warfare with U.S. and South Vietnamese forces (Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN)). Chief among the proposed changes was the removal of Dim's younger brother Nhu, who controlled the secret police and special forces, and was seen as the man behind the Buddhist repression and more generally the architect of the Ng family's rule. [101], From April to June 1955, Dim eliminated any political opposition in the south by launching military operations against two religious groups: the Cao i and Ha Ho of Ba Ct.

[83]:19 John F. Kennedy, then a U.S. senator, said in a speech to the American Friends of Vietnam: "Burma, Thailand, India, Japan, the Philippines and obviously Laos and Cambodia are among those whose security would be threatened if the Red Tide of Communism overflowed into Vietnam."[102]. As he remarked, "I still doubt that the North Vietnamese would have relented.

The frequency of guerrilla attacks rose as the insurgency gathered steam. General William C. Westmoreland assumed command of the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), as well as of the U.S. Army, Vietnam (USARV), formed in 1964. South Korean forces were also accused of war crimes. The target was Bun Ma Thut, in k Lk Province. [44], U.S. forces established numerous free-fire zones as a tactic to prevent Viet Cong fighters from sheltering in South Vietnamese villages. [156]:1536 Despite the continual conductance of major operations, which the Viet Cong and PAVN would typically evade, the war was characterised by smaller-unit contacts or engagements. [22], President Thiu, a former general, was fearful that his forces would be cut off in the north by the attacking communists; Thieu ordered a retreat, which soon turned into a bloody rout. In 1971, the Pentagon Papers were leaked to The New York Times. Diem brought the landlords back to the villages. Ho Chi Minh took power in North Vietnam and one million refugees fled south. 32(1). A counter-offensive in 1971 as part of Operation Chenla II by the PAVN would recapture most of the border areas and decimate most of Lon Nol's forces.

[211] The fall of Phuoc Binh and the lack of an American response left the South Vietnamese elite demoralized. Although Dim was publicly praised, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles privately conceded that Dim had to be backed because they could find no better alternative. Phase 2. Group 559 was headquartered in Na Kai, Houaphan province in northeast Laos close to the border.

[128], Paramilitary officers from the CIA's Special Activities Division trained and led Hmong tribesmen in Laos and into Vietnam. [306] They also fought in the Battle of Hue. Within the U.S., the war gave rise to what was referred to as Vietnam Syndrome, a public aversion to American overseas military involvements,[74] which together with the Watergate scandal contributed to the crisis of confidence that affected America throughout the 1970s.

By 1960, the land reform process had stalled because many of Diem's biggest supporters were large land owners. There was a sixty-day period for the total withdrawal of U.S. forces. [172] In a speech before the National Press Club he said a point in the war had been reached "where the end comes into view. [297] According to Rummel, PAVN and Viet Cong troops killed 164,000 civilians in democide between 1954 and 1975 in South Vietnam, from a range of between 106,000 and 227,000 (50,000 of which were reportedly killed by shelling and mortar on ARVN forces during the retreat to Tuy Hoa). [218], During the course of the Vietnam War a large segment of the American population came to be opposed to U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. During the war more than one million rural people migrated or fled the fighting in the South Vietnamese countryside to the cities, especially Saigon. [39]:71820, On 30 April 1975, PAVN troops entered the city of Saigon and quickly overcame all resistance, capturing key buildings and installations.

The B-52s literally dropped their payloads in the lake." [144] Nonetheless, it is possible to specify certain groups who led the anti-war movement at its peak in the late 1960s and the reasons why. [191] ROTC enrollment decreased from 191,749 in 1966 to 72,459 by 1971,[192] and reached an all-time low of 33,220 in 1974,[193] depriving U.S. forces of much-needed military leadership.

At the Geneva Conference, the French negotiated a ceasefire agreement with the Viet Minh, and independence was granted to Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.

Booming as Memories of Vietnam Fade", "General Won't Punish G.I. L c Th and Henry Kissinger, along with the PRG Foreign Minister Nguyn Th Bnh and a reluctant President Thiu, signed the Paris Peace Accords on 27 January 1973. In August 1966, after the arrival of the 9th Division, the Koreans established a corps command, the Republic of Korea Forces Vietnam Field Command, near I Field Force at Nha Trang. [247] East Germany had also provided a substantial amount of aid to help North Vietnam duplicate "Green Dragon" identity cards, which were created by Saigon in order to identify North Vietnamese combatants and were difficult to duplicate. When the Japanese invaded during World War II, the Viet Minh, a Communist-led common front under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh, [A 12]. As South Vietnam was formally part of a military alliance with the US, Australia, New Zealand, France, the UK, Pakistan, Thailand and the Philippines, the alliance was invoked during the war. [263], Some 10,450 Philippine Armed Forces troops were dispatched to South Vietnam and primarily supported medical and other civilian pacification projects.

[22] Many songwriters and musicians supported the anti-war movement, including Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Peggy Seeger, Ewan MacColl, Barbara Dane, The Critics Group, Phil Ochs, John Lennon, John Fogerty, Nina Simone, Neil Young, Tom Paxton, Jimmy Cliff and Arlo Guthrie. [327], The Vietnam War was the first conflict where U.S. forces had secure voice communication equipment available at the tactical level. [302] American women serving in Vietnam were subject to societal stereotypes.

[39]:99100. One of the first major films based on the Vietnam War was John Wayne's pro-war The Green Berets (1968). These chemicals continue to change the landscape, cause diseases and birth defects, and poison the food chain. [69]:58 Despite this, the North Vietnamese leadership approved tentative measures to revive the southern insurgency in December 1956. Secondly, we didn't know our South Vietnamese allies And we knew less about North Vietnam. [338] Between 1975 and 1980, more than 1 million northerners migrated south to regions formerly in the Republic of Vietnam, while, as part of the New Economic Zones program, around 750,000 to over 1 million southerners were moved mostly to uninhabited mountainous forested areas.[339][340]. The top-secret history of U.S. involvement in Vietnam, commissioned by the Department of Defense, detailed a long series of public deceptions on the part of the U.S. government. South Korea would later ask to join the Many Flags program in return for economic compensation. aid. Thiu had halted the general advance, leaving armoured divisions able to surround them. [161]:110 The effects of U.S. bombing campaigns had mobilised the people throughout North Vietnam and mobilised international support for North Vietnam due to the perception of a super-power attempting to bomb a significantly smaller, agrarian society into submission. Chloro-dioxins, which are inevitably formed as a byproduct of Agent Orange synthesis, are highly teratogenic, and there is substantial evidence that the birth defects carry on for three generations or more. [294] Benjamin Valentino attributes 45,00080,000 "terrorist mass killings" to the Viet Cong during the war. Although female military nurses lived in a heavily male environment, very few cases of sexual harassment were ever reported. [234], The KGB had also helped develop the signals intelligence (SIGINT) capabilities of the North Vietnamese, through an operation known as Vostok (also known as Phng ng, meaning "Orient" and named after the Vostok 1). In response, the U.S. Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and gave President Lyndon B. Johnson broad authority to increase the U.S. military presence in Vietnam, without a formal declaration of war. The U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam, Henry Cabot Lodge, invited the coup leaders to the embassy and congratulated them.

Nevertheless, domestic U.S. opposition to the war continued as 500,000 protesters marched in Washington on April 4, 1970. Kennedy advisors Maxwell Taylor and Walt Rostow recommended that U.S. troops be sent to South Vietnam disguised as flood relief workers.

[A 8], Following the end of the war, the Sino-Soviet split re-emerged and the Third Indochina War began. [184]:64950[396][397], Between 275,000[63] and 310,000[64] Cambodians were estimated to have died during the war including between 50,000 and 150,000 combatants and civilians from US bombings. [224] The fatal shooting of four students at Kent State University in 1970 led to nationwide university protests. [240] Czechoslovak instructors and trainers instructed the Vietnam People's Air Force (VPAF) in China and helped them develop a modernised air force, with the Czech-built Aero Ae-45 and Aero L-29 Delfn alongside Zln Z 26 aircraft utilised significantly for training, and regarded as preferential to Soviet-built Yakovlev Yak-3 as training aircraft. Included among their ranks were "about 90 percent" of Laos's "intellectuals, technicians, and officials. With the fall of the city, the defense of the Central Highlands and Northern provinces came to an end. [375]:374, Michael Allen in Until The Last Man Comes Home also accuses Nixon of myth making, by exploiting the plight of the League of Wives of American Prisoners in Vietnam and the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia to allow the government to appear caring as the war was increasingly considered lost. In Vietnamese, the war is generally known as the Khng chin chng M ("Resistance war against the United States"). [39]:686, The success of the 19731974 dry season offensive inspired Tr to return to Hanoi in October 1974 and plead for a larger offensive the next dry season.

Previously, the VC had utilised hit-and-run guerrilla tactics. Building up on the success of ARVN units in Cambodia, and further testing the Vietnamization program, the ARVN were tasked to launch Operation Lam Son 719 in February 1971, the first major ground operation aimed directly at attacking the Ho Chi Minh trail by attacking the major crossroad of Tchepone.

[142], The objective of stopping North Vietnam and the Viet Cong was never reached. [264][265] Subic Bay and Clark Air Base achieved maximum functionality during the war, as well as supporting an estimated 80,000 locals in allied tertiary businesses that ranged from shoe making to prostitution. The first group of medical soldiers, including four doctors, seven nurses and one officer in charge of military supplies, arrived in Vietnam in 1966 and worked at Truong Cong Dinh hospital in the G Cng district. [199] Between 1969 and 1971 the Viet Cong and some PAVN units had reverted to small unit tactics typical of 1967 and prior instead of nationwide grand offensives. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in VietnamWashington, November 6, 19637:50 p.m.", "Counterinsurgency in Vietnam: Lessons for Today", "Vietnam Study, Casting Doubts, Remains Secret", "Making More Enemies than We Kill?

A devout Roman Catholic, Dim was fervently anti-communist, nationalist, and socially conservative. A group of American doctors inspecting the prison in the same year found many inmates suffering symptoms resulting from forced immobility and torture. [315] A number of prominent Western journalists were also involved in covering the war, with Dickey Chapelle being among the first as well as the first American female reporter killed in a war. "[93]:546 The American public and media began to turn against Johnson as the three offensives contradicted claims of progress made by the Johnson administration and the military. "[376] The morale and discipline problems and resistance to conscription were important factors leading to the creation of an all-volunteer military force by the United States and the termination of conscription. The ARVN proved incapable of resisting the onslaught, and its forces collapsed on 11 March. In Vietnam the diary has often been compared to The Diary of Anne Frank and both are used in literary education. When first deployed, the M16 also suffered from a propensity to jam in combat, leaving the soldier defenseless and potentially killing him. [263] This brought Australian commanders into conflict with Westmoreland's conventional attrition warfare approach, since Australian ground forces were required to follow US doctrine. On 2 August 1964, USSMaddox, on an intelligence mission along North Vietnam's coast, allegedly fired upon and damaged several torpedo boats that had been stalking it in the Gulf of Tonkin. [141] Between March 1965 and November 1968, Rolling Thunder deluged the north with a million tons of missiles, rockets and bombs. [191], Between 1969 and 1971 the U.S. Army recorded more than 900 attacks by troops on their own officers and NCOs with 99 killed. The grunts [infantrymen] were determined to survive they insisted of having something to say about the making of decisions that determined whether they might live or die. Commitment of U.S. (and other free world) forces necessary to halt the losing trend by the end of 1965. South Vietnam was inundated with manufactured goods. By 1973, approximately 7,500 women had served in Vietnam in the Southeast Asian theater. [316] Webb would be the first Western journalist to be captured and released, as well as cover the perspective of the Viet Cong in her memoir On The Other Side. Cao was a Catholic who had been promoted due to religion and fidelity rather than skill, and his main job was to preserve his forces to stave off coup attempts; he had earlier vomited during a communist attack. In 1967, Thieu became president with Ky as his deputy, after rigged elections. [184] In the two-year period following Tet, the PAVN had begun its transformation from a fine light-infantry, limited mobility force into a high-mobile and mechanised combined arms force. [105] Seventeen people were killed in an attack at a bar in Chu c in July, and in September a district chief was killed with his family on a highway. leadership.

Bulgarian military aid had already been provided to the latter since 1967. The first Americans were killed in 1959. [39]:2467 This marked the beginning of the American ground war. [247] In addition, East Germany had also vigorously denounced the US war effort, and had reaped significant international and diplomatic standing as a result of its anti-war campaigns. [326], The AC-130 "Spectre" Gunship and the UH-1 "Huey" gunship were used frequently by the U.S. during the war. [93]:655, American women served on active duty performing a variety of jobs. By ignoring ARVN units, the U.S. commitment became open-ended. Hanoi took advantage of the situation and increased its support for the guerrillas. The Vietnam War has been featured extensively in television, film, video games, music and literature in the participant countries.

[39]:104 The last French soldiers left South Vietnam in April 1956.

11719.

U.S. public opinion overwhelmingly supported the deployment. Regardless of political policies, U.S. commanders were institutionally and psychologically unsuited to a defensive mission. In 1957, independent observers from India, Poland, and Canada representing the International Control Commission (ICC) stated that fair, unbiased elections were not possible, with the ICC reporting that neither South nor North Vietnam had honored the armistice agreement. This figure includes battle deaths of Vietnamese soldiers in the Laotian and Cambodian Civil Wars, in which the PAVN was a major participant. When Kennedy was informed, Maxwell Taylor remembered that he "rushed from the room with a look of shock and dismay on his face. This freed North Vietnamese army units for combat in the South. [83]:3635 U.S. and South Vietnamese forces were initially shocked by the scale, intensity and deliberative planning of the urban offensive, as infiltration of personnel and weapons into the cities was accomplished covertly;[160] the offensive constituted an intelligence failure on the scale of Pearl Harbor. [210][39]:683 Gerald Ford took over as U.S. president on 9 August 1974 after the resignation of President Nixon, and Congress cut financial aid to South Vietnam from $1billion a year to $700million. Half of the ARVN troops involved were either captured or killed, half of the ARVN/US support helicopters were downed by anti-aircraft fire and the operation was considered a fiasco, demonstrating operational deficiencies still present within the ARVN. In the summer of 1962, Mao Zedong agreed to supply Hanoi with 90,000 rifles and guns free of charge. [375]:172 Although acknowledging serious problems, he questions the alleged "near mutinous" conduct of junior officers and enlisted men in combat. [34]:4503, According to figures released by the Vietnamese government there were 849,018 military deaths on the PAVN/VC side during the war. [39]:7024, On 7 April, three PAVN divisions attacked Xun Lc, 40 miles (64km) east of Saigon. As a result, Chinese scientist Tu Youyou and her collaborators discovered artemisinin. Contemporarily, the Eastern Bloc country was also known for its role in the mediation activities in the mid-1960s, resulting in what became known as the "Trinh Signal" in January 1967, in which Hanoi accepted the possibility of negotiation with Washington. Unlike the American women who went to Vietnam, both South and North Vietnamese women were enlisted and served in combat zones.

Drug use, racial tensions, and the growing incidence of fraggingattempting to kill unpopular officers and non-commissioned officers with grenades or other weaponscreated severe problems for the U.S. military and impacted its capability of undertaking combat operations. [198] In the post-Tet environment, membership in the South Vietnamese Regional Force and Popular Force militias grew, and they were now more capable of providing village security, which the Americans had not accomplished under Westmoreland. They were however criticized for ignoring the political nature of the insurgency. US casualties in 1970 were less than half of 1969 casualties after being relegated to less active combat.

[247] In official Vietnamese language histories on the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security, the assistance provided by the Soviet and East German intelligence services to Vietnam is usually rated as the most important within the socialist bloc. In South Vietnam, many women voluntarily served in the ARVN's Women's Armed Force Corps (WAFC) and various other Women's corps in the military.