Who can give me a brief history or the vietnam war, what was it?

Question

Who can give me a brief history or the vietnam war, what was it? How did it start? What happened? Best answer gets the 10 points. Please limit answers to 20 sentences or less. If you must write a little more, go ahead. And no Wikipedia. Thank you!

Answer 1

I've been studying Vietnam and the Vietnam War for a long time, and there's NO WAY you can describe what happened in less than 20 sentences. I'll give you a history lesson nonetheless.

1800 - !802: Gia Long defeats rival clans, unites Vietnam, becomes the first Nguyen Emperor and starts the last dynasty in Vietnam. Gia Long asked assistance from France during the fighting. France sends mercenaries arriving almost at the end of the fighting. France claims to have been the force that united Vietnam and decides to start occupying Vietnam and neighboring countries. .

1800's: The French eventually colonize Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia as Indochina. The government of these countries becomes heavily influenced by French rule.

WWII: Japanese occupy Vietnam during WW II. France supports resistant Viet forces lead by Ho Chi Minh against the Japanese with a promise of independence for Vietnam after the war.

1946 - 1954: France reneges on their promise of independence and reoccupies Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh, Nguyen Giap and others organize the Viet Minh resistance force to fight and finally defeat the French.

1954 - Geneva agreement splits Vietnam in half with communism in the North and democracy in the South. A national vote deciding which government would control Vietnam was to occur in 1956, but never happens due to being rejected by President Diem and the U.S.

1956 – The French leave Vietnam and U.S. begins training South Vietnamese forces. North Vietnam starts sending infiltration groups into South Vietnam. This will eventually become the Viet Cong in 1961.

1956 – 1963: South Vietnamese forces with substantial military aid from the U.S. maintain control over the Viet Cong. U.S. officially does not have combat troops in Vietnam at this time. President Diem is as strong proponent for democracy as Ho Chi Minh is for communism. However, Diem undermines his support that will lead to his overthrow and assassination.

1963 – President Kennedy is assassinated. Johnson becomes president. President Diem is assassinated. Several coups over the next few years to replace President Diem completely destabilized the South Vietnamese government.

1964 – Gulf of Tonikan incident is arguably the reason why the U.S. starts sending combat soldiers to Vietnam. It was later found that the incidents didn’t occur as initially indicated.

1965 – 1968: The U.S. has taken over the fighting from the South Vietnamese forces. Troop levels raise to over 500,000 U.S. Although NVA and Viet Cong forces never win a major confrontation and loose many times more combat soldiers, they are never defeated. My personal opinion, and that of many others, is due to the constraints put on the U.S. military in how they can engage the enemy.

1968: Tet Offense. NVA General Nguyen Giap launches a major offensive striking every major military and population center in South Vietnam. The offensive was a huge military failure for the Viet Cong and NVA, leaving the Viet Cong all but destroyed and the NVA rendered ineffective for months afterwards. However, it was a major political victory for the Communist North by fueling public resentment and negative opinions about the war in the United States, which would eventually lead to the end of U.S. involvement in the war.

1968 – 1973: Johnson declines re-election campaign. Nixon takes office and takes the war in a different direction. There were secret bombing of Laos and Cambodia, secret meetings between Henry Kissinger and North Viet leaders and secret meetings with Kissinger and China leaders. Very few people know this, but a deal struck with the Chinese gave Nixon reason to pull U.S. combat forces out of South Vietnam and eventually abandon them.

1973: Ceasefire agreement and the last U.S. combat troops leave South Vietnam.

1974 - 1975: South Vietnamese President Thieu renews the war against North Vietnam. Communist forces switch from guerilla to conventional war tactics and take over South Vietnam within months. Without U.S. support, the South Vietnamese army collapses.

April 30, 1975 – South Vietnamese President Minh surrenders to NVA forces that had captured Saigon.

The reason why I’ve posted all this information is to indicate that war was inevitable in Vietnam. The Vietnamese were going to kick the French out of their country sooner or later. However, the U.S. didn’t have to get involved and politicians should not have limited the military in what they could do.

From 1964 till 1973, The U.S. had more then enough military resources in South Vietnam to end the war within weeks if the military was allowed to do so. Instead, tens of thousands of American soldiers and literally millions of Vietnamese died over the years and decades that that country had been at war.

One last thing.. I honor each and every Vietnam Veteran because I would not be here right now if it wasn’t for their bravery. God bless you…

MD

Answer 2

Simple, communism is the reason behind the war. The political air at the time was tense between the US and Russia, this was the build up to the coldwar. Russia's influence over North Vietnam showed us communism was catchin on in other places and it scared our country. While South Vietnam wanted to secede and have a different form of government, a democracy, we took it as the opportunity to fight communism because in our politicians minds it was better to fight communism abroad rather than in our own backyard. They were afraid of communism reaching here. We didn't exactly like the idea of A communist North Vietnam trying to force communism on South Vietnam for fear it would spread by sheer force across the globe and reach our shores.

Answer 3

i've seen the documentary of what people did to prisoners during the vietnam war. also i've seen what the people who have done such damage to the prisoners has to say about why they did, what they did too. some people believe admit they're criminals but some say they did what they did coz they were ordered by their higher authority.

the real reason behind the war is the same as all whats happening around now too; power and feel the want to shed blood and to find themselves among all what's going on...

Answer 4

re cmon everybody should know about the vietnam war it's like knowing ww2 i mean vietnam cmon vietmh vietnemeese resistance kicks out some frenchies and in the 60s upper vietnam and south vietnamese commie insurgents threatened to unify all vietnam usa comes in their tries to deturr the communist but failed in and now vietnam is communist u should know this by now

Answer 5

That is such a bad subject for those of us who went through that period. We lost family members and friends. Our men came home and were and are not the same mentally. Pot became a new way of life. A lump appears in my throat each time that the war is brought up. Our men went through hell as in any war. We love all of our service men. It is something many of us do not want to discuss.

Answer 6

The French thought they could stop the Chinese communistic influence from growing, but they couldn't, so they got out. The US thought they could do better than the French. Obviously they couldn't.

However, my brother thinks that Linden B Johnson, having stock in Bell Helicopter, wanted to go to war to increase his income through selling helicopters for the war effort.

Answer 7

the vietnam war resulted in the cold war era... where nations were fighting to see who had the bigger bombs and missiles... which also includes "cuban missile crisis".... vietnam was a civil war betwen north and south... one for democracy and the other for communistic beliefs... thats all i remember...

Answer 8

check out www.history.com.