Vietnam

Vietnam Shares a Border with China

• China is on the North side of Vietnam.

• Today Vietnam honors the Trung Sisters who led an army on elephants to defeat the Chinese army and drive them out of Vietnam in 43 BC.

Vietnam and W W II • During W W II Japan invaded China, the

Philippines and Vietnam in an effort to enlarge their empire.

• The USA sent Ho Chi Minh, the President of Vietnam, lots of help.

• The OSS (Office of Strategic Services- later named the CIA) parachuted men, supplies and equipment to help Vietnam. The USA worked WITH Vietnam to fight Japan.

Ho Chi Minh

USA sees Vietnam as Enemy

• The ongoing Cold War between USA and the Soviet Union made Vietnam an enemy when they turned to the Soviets for help.

• WWII armistice split Vietnam in half.• The USA controlled south Vietnam and China

controlled north Vietnam. The Chinese treated the North Vietnamese very badly. In 1946 China left Vietnam and the USA gave Vietnam back to the French who had been

controlling Indochina for the last 100 years. The end of French control came at

Diem Bien Phu in 1954.

Dien Bien Phu

• This was a major victory for Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Minh. Dien Bien Phu was a wide valley surrounded by hills made of dense jungle. The only way in or out was a road that was guarded by the French military.

• Ho Chi Minh told his troops to dismantle all their tanks, trucks and big weapons and carry them over the hills in pieces in the pitch dark of night and to silently reassemble everything.

• When the French woke the next morning they were surrounded by the Minh army and its weaponry. The French surrendered.

After Dien Bien Phu• Ho Chi Minh took control of North Vietnam

• President Diem was propped up as being in control of South Vietnam.

• The CIA sold heroin in Asia to buy off Diem’s political competition.

• Diem was as bad as the French because he treated the South Vietnamese people very cruelly. He refused to hold elections and committed human rights abuses.

The Domino Theory• The USA feared that the majority of

Vietnamese would vote for Ho Chi Minh.• Ho Chi Minh was a nationalist and a

pragmatist.. • Fear in the USA said that if Vietnam fell to Ho

Chi Minh all other Asian countries would become communist and it would spread to Hawaii and then mainland USA.

• U.S. believed would be better to fight communism in Asia than at home in the USA.

Diem’s Abuses• Diem was anti French and anti communist but

he “…acy and nepotism." represented narrow and extremist nationalism coupled with autocr

• Autocracy is when one person has uncontrolled power and nepotism is when one favors ones relatives for promotion.

• military to attack religious groups including Buddhism and arrested anyone suspected of being communist tortured & killed each

• 52,000 Vietnamese moved to North Vietnam.

Diem was Catholic• Diem celebrated the arrival of his

brother who was a priest • Denied Buddhists right to celebrate

their annual remembrance of Buddha.• 10,000 people started a hunger strike

in Saigon and Diem agitators destroyed or burned down Buddhist pagodas and temples.

• troops fired on the peaceful demonstrators and 9 monks were killed. Diem blamed the killing on communists.

Buddhist Monk Protests

• Superior Thick Quant Duc,." Then he calmly sat down in a main street of Saigon, poured gasoline on himself and burned himself to death. It was June 2, 1963.

• The self-immolation caused enormous reaction within and outside South Vietnam.

• Other Buddhist monks followed Thich Quang Duc's example. Within a brief period, 6 more burned themselves to death as a protest. Finally a Buddhist Nun committed self- immolation and set herself on fire. Diem’s wife joked about the Buddhist Barbeque’s.

Buddhist Nun On Fire• The monks and nun who set themselves

on fire were striving to bring attention to the atrocities that Diem was instigating.

Diem has a change of Heart• He makes a call to Ho Chi Minh to set

up plans for a full country election.

• That night Diem and his brother are found dead in the trunk of his car.

• Diem was murdered one week before President Kennedy was assassinated in Texas. Type Diem’s name into Google and you will get 20 Kennedy selections.

Vietnam Protestors At Home

• In addition to Rev Dr. Martin Luther King’s protest at Riverside Church, there were protests at US colleges too.

• Kent State University conducted a peaceful protest that turned violent. The army fired on the peaceful crowd killing at least 4 students and injuring others.

1964 – The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

• The USA was at war with Vietnam for 12 years without legally declaring war.

• LBJ escalated military presence and started bombing Hanoi because two USA vessels reported being fired upon in the Gulf of Tonkin in North Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh insisted he did not fire on the USA.

• It was probably the CIA who fired on their own ships to start trouble. No major damage

occurred to either ship in the so called Tonkin Incident.

TONKIN GULF

Video LBJ on Policing the World Combatting Communism Watch American Experience Online PBS Video.mht

Hanoi Hilton• American pilots who were shot down during the bombing

of Hanoi were kept in the Hanoi Hilton which was a prisoner of war camp. Prisoners were kept isolated

• . They all prayed for their captors and the treatment of all of them improved as did the food.

The Viet Cong• The Viet Cong were the undercover Viet

Minh who were in South Vietnam subverting USA operations.

• Vietnamese who were accused of being Viet Cong were usually killed

Napalm

• The USA began using violent chemicals to defoliate the jungle. Innocent people were severely burned by Napalm.

• Napalm was a mixture of petrol and a chemical thickener which produces a tough sticky gel that attaches itself to the skin. The pain caused by the burning is so traumatic that it often causes death.

The My Lai Massacre

• Sergeant Calley ordered the massacre of all the people in My Lai because he suspected cooperation with the Viet Cong.

• Babies, women and old people were massacred.

The Tet Offensive - 1968 High holiday Tet offensive was countrywide in scope and

well coordinated, with more than 80,000 Vietcong troops striking more than 100 towns and cities, including 36 of 44 provincial capitals, 72 of 245 district towns, and the national capital.

• The initial Vietcong attacks stunned NATO forces and took them by surprise.

• offensive was a military disaster for Vietcong forces, it had a profound effect on the American administration and shocked the American public, that the communists were, due to previous defeats, incapable of launching such a massive effort.

• US military chased the Viet Cong into Cambodia and bombed the capital city Phnom Penh.

• 1970 – the Khmer Rouge, under the leadership of Pol Pot, Pol Pot

• Sep 3rd – 1969 Ho Chi Minh dies.

HOME FRONT- PENTAGON PAPERS 7,000 PAGE DOCUMENT WRITTEN BY DEFENSE SECRETARY R. MCNAMARA 67-68 – REVEALED US NEVER HAD PLAN TO END WAR AS LONG AS NV CONTINUED ITS ATTACK ON SV

VEITNAMIZATION @ 1969 DURING Nixon’s PresidencyGradual withdrawal of US troops by 1972 there were less than 25,000 troops remained in Vietnam = “peace with honor” = covertly (secretly) ordered bombings in Laos& Cambodia• DECEMBER 31,1970 CONGRESS REPEALED THE TONKING GULF RESOLUTION •WAR POWERS ACT = MUST INFORM CONGRESS WITHIN 48 HRS OF SENDING FORCES INTO HOSTILE AREAS W/O DECLARATION OF WAR TROOPS ONLY CAN REMAIN FOR 90 DAYS UNLESS CONGRESS APPROVES PRESIDENTS ACTIONS OR CONGRESS DECLARES WAR.

LEGACEY OF THE VIETNAM WAR

The Boat People

• Refugees who feared communism and mixed American and Vietnamese children fled Vietnam in all types of boats.

• Some sank, some were taken by pirates and some made it to safety.

1990

• Before the fall of the Soviet Union Vietnam introduced a program called Doi Moi. It means renewal and "renovation“. It is the name given to the economic reforms initiated by in Vietnam.

• TOURISM, MANUFACTURING OF CLOTHING. • The free market is alive and doing well in Hanoi.• Vietnam is the size of California with the temperature

a bit warmer than Hawaii and tigers and snakes and elephants.