Why the war in VIETNAM?

Question

Forgive the ignorance... I've just never been informed why the war in Vietnam (obviously with the Americans) took place?

What caused it?

Answer 1

Put simply, to prevent the spread of communism. The same can be said about the Korean war.

Answer 2

Nice answer Mary Jo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It started just after WW2, when the Truman administration dropped the ball and failed to acknowledge Ho Chi Minh and the Vietnamese declaration of independance. They literally framed everything after ours and was anticipating US support. When US plans flee overhead during the public reading of their declaration this was construded by Ho Chi Minh to be an indication of our support...to which the crowd cheered. Truman dropped the ball. Vietnam could have been a Socialist country like France, but we failed to capitalize on the moment. More importantly, throughout the 50s the French were still fighting for control against Ho Chi Minh, as the economic fallout of WW2 left a lot of french colonies delcaring independence and they did not want to see Vietnam go that route...Vietnam had natural resources the French needed for rebuilding their country...like rubber.
So when the French left, the left South Vietnam and North Vietnam at an Armistice until an general election for the country to determine the course it was going to do. Eisenhower was in charge then, and the domino theory was coming into effect, especially after what happened in Korea. So when the general election favored the communists, the US renouced the elections and stood with the South against the North.

Answer 3

Simply put after the French pulled were forced out by the Viet Minh, the country was divided into the North (communist) and the South (not Communist). The survival of the North was protected by Russia and the Chinese and the South was protected under the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (Pacific version of NATO). When the communist and nationalist (most Viet Cong were actually nationalist and not communist, one reason the North Vietnamese communist arranged for their destruction during the war) started trying to over throw the government the U.S. and other countries put in advisers to help train the South Vietnamese Army, as things got worse the U,S, and other SEATO countries sent in combat troops and then the war got started after the Gulf of Tonkin incident which was used to pass the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution Congress which authorized military action/involvement against the North Vietnamese.

Answer 4

Warmongers, moneymongers and sheep...
Vietnam was a military proving ground for American military. We wanted to show the U.S.S.R. that we had what it takes to kick their butts, problem is we didn't expect the little "Charlie Cong" to fight back with the tenacity that he did.
Then when we had them whipped, Hanoi Jane had to open her big mouth and re-inspire them to keep up the fight.
Remember, it wasn't called the Vietnam War until after 1970, the title change from "Conflict" to war well after we'd been there for a while.

Answer 5

You have to go back a way, back to the mistreatment of plantation labor by the mighty Michelin Rubber Company, mistreatment that made them harken to communist ideology and the promise of just treatment for labor contained therein. As always, capitalist alliances shook in their boots at the prospect of human labor arising in the name of justice and so the war began. Treaties dragged the Americans into it. Oh but willingly they went. Several years of bombing and defoliation chemicals failed to demoralize the North Viets and you know the rest.

Answer 6

I concur with Pancake. I just did a research paper on Vietnam.

Answer 7

Well, u know, the US has to butt into everything, even if its not their business and use stupid excuses like keeping Communism from spreading. Even today, Bush used 9/11 as an excuse to attack Iraq to get more oil!!!!

Answer 8

It was alot of posturing and nonsense.

It first started with what Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy thought was an advancement of communism by the Soviet Union. They were paranoid that if the majority of Asia were to fall into communism, than it would eventually spread to Hawaii and make its way to the mainland. So they determined that it was very important to curb the USSR's influence. In Vietnam, though, the French had colonized it and were fighting an insurgency that wanted Vietnam to be unified and have open elections per the Geneva Conference. The French did not stand much of a chance and were driven out handly by the insurgents. Since the insurgents were lead by Ho Chi Minh, a well known communist, and the democratic world were afriad that he would come to power and create a communistic Vietnam, another agreement was made that would split the country into two parts, the south and the north. Minh got to control the North and a democratic government wasset up in the south. There were supporters on both sides, with many Catholics migrating south due to Minh's persecution of them in the north. There also talks of human rights violations by the north.

One of the worst things to come out of the second agreement was that some of Minh's people who fought in the insurgency in the south, were allowed to stay and "monitor" the situation for the upcoming election that was supposed to unite the country back into one. Also, the President that was set up in the south was seen as weak and a U.S. puppet. His elction was even looked down upon when it came out that his percentage of majority vote was over 90%, which everyone doubted considering his incompetence.

The U.S. was not trusting in the south's new leader either and wanted to ensure that the north would not advance on the south. But they did not want to seem as an occupational force either and be the primary military as they thought this would bring more instability to the new democratic government. So they had the idea of funneling large sums of money and sending top level advisors to South Vietnam to help with their defenses. This made the President of South Vietnam appear more weak.

As the Presidencies in America passed on, the doctines for handling Vietnam grew more hands on. Truman felt that Minh would be handled directly with South Vietnam's forces and through diplomacy while the U.S. supplied finances. Eisenhower had a similar approach, but introduced military personnel to act as a defensive deterrant to North Vietnam. Kennedy, faced with the Cuban missile crisis and the Bay of Pigs, took a more hard-lined approach and decided to help South Vietnam's military find Minh's operatives that were alloowed to stay in South Vietnam per the second agreement. By this time, Minh's operatives were called the Viet Cong. He also looked for ways for America to get out of Vietnam while still saving face because of South Vietnam's growing incompetence to handle its own problems. He also looked into getting rid of South Vietnam's President, who refused to have open elections per the first and second agreements. Then, just before Kennedy was assasinated, South Vietnam's President was killed. This threw South Vietnam into a tail-spin with several figures coming in and out of power.

After Kennedy died, Lyndon Johnson took over as President. He wa not a very good foreign relations diplomat and relied on his military and intelligence to find a solution. Their solution was an increased presence and more hands-on. They wanted to go on the offensive instead of being there for "support." Johnson agreed with that. He sent several naval ships to the seas off of Vietnam to patrol. North Vietnam saw this as a military build up and began conducting manuevers in the same area.

On e of those manuevers saw a Vietnam sub attack a U.S. ship in the Gulf of Tonkin. The North stated that first the U.S. ship was in their water conducting special forces missions in North Vietnam. Then they said that the attack simply did not happen. The U.S. denied those claims and said that the attack was an act of war. The Congress was reluctant to declare war due to uncertainty of the actual facts. Their solution was to warn North Vietnam that if any further attacks against U.S. forces were made, that action would be taken. Then a second attack was made against another U.S. ship in the area. Johnson submitted to Congress that North Vietnam had to be dealth with. Again, there were no actual facts and the ship's presence and position was hard to determine. The Congress granted Johnson the right to deploy military forces without officially declaring war. U.S. forces then took the lead on all military operations in South Vietnam to drive out the Viet Cong and make sure that the North insurgency did not de-stabilize South Vietnam. The U.S. had become the occupational force that it did not want to be.

Over the rest of Johnson's term as President, several tactical blunders were made, including the Tet offensive and trying to secure a diplomatic end to the war. Nixon presented what he called a fool proof plan for ending the war with American victory, althoug he never submitted publicly what that plan was. South Vietnam's continued incapability of securing its own borders and providing support to the U.S. military also made fighting North Vietnam and the Viet Cong difficult. When American forces would drive out the Viet Cong in an area, the South would lose their grip and the VC would occupy it again. Nixon also changed strategies several times to appease the American people and also not appear to be weak. The Chinese and Soviet Union also were helping North Vietnam, which made some in Congress wary about another world war.

Answer 9

to keep communism from spreading.

Answer 10

A brief rundown........