Did the Tet offensive in 1968 teach Americans a lesson...?

Question

...history indeed tells us what the Western offensive should do in Iraq - but who's big enough to withdraw. The refusal of Bush and Blair has made them a laughing stock in both the countries they are head of. Toppling Saddam was one thing, but that was only half the job done. Will we end up leaving Iraq with heads held high, or defeated solodiers who, just like the early seventies return to their mother country with scorn and hate?

Walter Cronkite knew what he was saying, David B...so did Lyndon Johnson, as he dropped out of the 1968 race.

Come on, Michael H...no one 'won' - but it was the Americans who suffered the worst, with political defeat of U.S.
North Vietnam outran the South Vietnamese forces two years after the 1973 peace treaty.

Answer 1

Tet was a complete failure for the other side militarily. Before it the VC in the south were a major part of the war. After it was mostly NVA. Too many of the southern VC were killed. The NVA themselves were mauled. The spring and summer of '68 after, our forces were killing teenage kids in NVA uniforms. There was never a better chance to win a military victory. But the media presented it in such a way that it looked like the other side had won. The political rules for fighting the war were still in place. Then LBJ decided against a second run. To the public it looked like a loss, and many lost support for the war. Prior to Tet the majority of Americans supported it. After that began to change. The major lesson should be don't let the media get out of hand in war time.

Answer 2

I learned a lesson from it but it wasn't till over 20 years after the fact. I watched Walter Cronkite to see how the war was going. I figured I was headed over there as soon as I graduated.

From watching the news reports at the time it looked like the Viet-Cong had taken over the south. Marines at Khe Shan were surrounded like the French. It wasn't till the discovery channel started running stuff on the Vietnam war that I learned that the Viet-Cong had themselves been wiped out during the Tet Offensive and that it was not a military victory but had been a crushing defeat for the communist.

I also learned that the siege at Khe Shan also resulted in the virtual annilhilation of an entire North Vietnamese army. That the brilliant military mind of General Gap had used WWI tatics and tried a massed attack against Khe Shan which was shredded by an american artillery barrage which crushed the attack and virtually wiped out the attackers to the last man. All we got from the news reports was they had breached the outer defenses.

What I have learned is you can't trust the National Media to give you the straight story. They have an agenda and its not only the story they tell but what they don't tell you.

Answer 3

The NVA's Tet Offensive was a Military failure for the North Vietnamese. American forces quickly defeated the North Vietnamese forces. Walter Cronkite's response to the Tet Offensive was premature. The Tet Offensive is a great example of how the media can inappropriately influence the conduct of war.

Answer 4

Tet showed to never underestimate your enemy, just because he has less armour/weopens technology he is no less a formidable foe. It took a while for those intricate tunnel systems to be found, so simple yet ingenious. The bluff for Tet worked but as many have already covered the Vietnamese suffered high casualties.

Rolling this forward again mistakes are made because the enemy has not been understood.

Iraq
-)There are multiple internal factions fighting for Iraq's soul - US did not realise this.
-)There are external factions involved in the war, moving within the conflict, such as Iranian and AL-queda sponsored units.
-)They realise they will not win in a straight up fight against co-alition so fighting "intelligently" using Improvised Explosive devices (IEDS) against soft skinned/unarmoured vehicles.

Afghanistan
-)Fighters are hardened from fighting the Russians
-)Many key Al-Queda personnel were trained, funded and supplied with technology, (e.g. stingers) and tactics by western agencies such as CIA and MI5. I remember an interesting program where they interviewed an ex CIA guy and raised those fears highlighted of "our" knowledge and equipment being used against US.

Just makes you wonder when helicopters etc get shot down what really happened. Will have to wait 50 years to get the docs.

Answer 5

The Tet offensive was indeed a miltary failure. However the US were unnerved by it and never recovered the confidence that they could win in Vietnam (This story is in today's Times).

However whilst Vietnam taught the USA many lessons, they foolishly did not foresee that Iraq would be worse than Vietnam?

Answer 6

It taught us how the ENDURANCE of the Vietnamese help them win. Imagine fighting from like the 50's to the mid 70's. Thats crazy in today's standards. Also it just teaches us particular strenghts in armies. China--> Manpower
Vietnam--> Endurance
Pre Cold War Germany --> Tactics
and good ol' USA has logistics. Thats swell

Answer 7

Go to The Independent (Newspaper) website as they had a very good article in there on Friday 21/10 or by a copy of IOS today 22/10 if there's a shop still open (garages are good)

Answer 8

One does not need to be BIG to cut & run, only have a lack of commitment or WORSE, a coward. We will end up leaving Iraq with heads held high or in total defeat as long as GW is our president. We will not retreat when we are on the verge of winning, as we did in Vietnam.

Answer 9

No, I don't suppose they did, but this argument shouldn't be used to belittle the memory of those who served and died overseas, for whatever reason, as an ex-squaddie I have to say that the poor bloody infantry aren't the ones who make the decision, but they have to face the consequences.

Answer 10

You would have thought so, but then in learning lessons, we becoe that little bit more clever, and as this refers to Americans, learning to be clever is their big problem.

However, and for our amusement, as they do not learn, we continue to see America get kicked up the ar se and out of another Country.