1. The Vietnam War: Analysis By: Jefferly Toussaint

3. What it was The Vietnam War started out as a conflict between Vietnam and France In July 1954, France was forced out of Vietnam Nationalist forces had beaten the French Allied troops

4. The Geneva Peace Accords The Geneva Peace Accords was signed by both the French and the Vietnamese –It stated the strains of the international Cold War The Geneva Peace Accords was drawn up in the shadows of the Korean War The Geneva Accords stated all the possible things that could go wrong in a war-torn Vietnam

5. The 17 th Parallel was made during the signing of the Geneva Peace Accords –The Vietnamese delegates that were present agreed to the temporary partition of their nation at the 17 th parallel to allow the French to save face although they were defeated The Communists were afraid that the peace treaty would attract the attention of the US and its western European allies and neither Moscow nor Peking wanted to risk another confrontation with the West after the Korean War

6. According to the Geneva Accords, Vietnam would hold national elections in 1956 to reunify the country –After, the division of the 17 th Parallel would vanish The United States disagreed –Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles believed that the Geneva Peace Accords granted Vietnam too much power He and President Dwight D. Eisenhower came up with a series of multilateral agreements that created the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization

8. South Vietnam Under Ngo Dinh Diem Using SEATO as a cover, the Eisenhower Administration created a new nation in Southern Vietnam With the aid of the US’s military, economic and political, the Government of the Republic of Vietnam

9. What happened after?? Almost immediately, the president of SV, Diem, reported that North Vietnam or the Democratic Republic of Vietnam wanted to take over them by force –In 1957, with military aid, Diem planned a counterattack He used the help of the American CIA to arrest thousands of Viet Cong

10. Diem’s harsh actions were immediately reprimanded by the Buddhist monks and nuns –They were joined by students, business people, intellectuals, and peasants They were in opposition to Ngo Dinh Diem The more these forces attacked Diem’s troops and secret police, he accused them of being Communist and trying to take control of SV by force

11. The Kennedy Administration The Kennedy Administration seemed split on how peaceful or “democratic” the Diem regime really was. –Some believed that Diem wasn’t “forceful” enough –Others argued that Diem is the best that they have

12. 1956-1960 The Communist Party of Vietnam desired to reunify the nation only through politics alone –Though unsuccessfully, the communist nation tried to cause Diem’s collapse by taking off TREMENDOUS internal political pressure on SV

13. When Diem was uncontrollably arresting supposed Communist, the southern Communists convinced the party to adopt more violent tactics to guarantee Diem’s downfall. At the 15 th Party Plenum in January of 1959, the Communist party finally approved the use of violent revolts to overthrow Diem and liberate Vietnam south of the 17 th Parallel

14. The Natl. Liberation Front The united front had brought together the Communists and non-Communists in umbrella organization that had limited but important goals. –On December 20, 1060, the Party’s new united front, the National Liberation Front (NLF) was born Anyone could join, so long as they opposed Diem and wanted to unify Vietnam

15. The Character of the NLF The character of the NLF and its relationship to the Communists in Hanoi has caused debate among scholars, anti- war activists, and policymakers. Washington D.C. claims that Hanoi directed the NLF’s violent attacks against Saigon’s regime

16. White paper **The White Papers: –Washington insiders denounced the NLF, and claimed that it was merely a puppet of Hanoi and that its non-communist elements were Communist dupes The NLF disagrees, saying that at was independent of the Communists in Hanoi and that it was made up mostly of non-Communists

17. December 1961 In 1961, President Kennedy sent a team to Vietnam to report on conditions in the south and to assess future American aid requirements. The report, the December 1961 White Paper, argued for and increase in military, technical, and economic aid –It was also the introduction of major American advisers to help stabilize the Diem regime

18. In typical “Kennedy” fashion, he chose to start from the middle –Instead of a major military build-up (the White Paper called for this), he sought a limited agreement with Diem The US would increase the level of its military involvement in SV –This arrangement was doomed from the beginning* –Washington and Saigon launched a determined and deadly military effort in rural areas

19. The Strategic Hamlet Project The new plan was to round up villages to move them to “safe hamlets” constructed by the GVN –Idea was to isolate the NLF from villages –This plan produced limited results and further alienated the peasants from the rule of Saigon The Strategic Hamlet Project spread GVN into the countryside

20. Military Coup By the summer of 1963, it was clear that the GVN was on the verge of Political collapse Diem’s brother had raided the Buddhist pagodas of SV –He claimed that they were the reason that Communists were creating the political instability The results were massive protests on the streets of Saigon that led Buddhist monks to self-immolation

21. By Late September… The Buddhist protests were creating such a disturbance, the Kennedy administration supported a coup –In 1963, some of Diem’s generals went to the American Assembly in Saigon with plans to overthrow Diem On November 1, 1963, Diem and his brother were captured and later killed –3wks later, president JFK was assassinated

22. During this time… At the time of these assassinations, there were already 16,000 military advisers in Vietnam The Kennedy administration had managed to run the war from Washington without the major intervention of American troops –The continuation of problems in Saigon convinced the new president, Lyndon B. Johnson, that America needed to be more aggressive

23. Gulf of Tonkin Resolution On August of 1964, the DRV launched a locally controlled attack against two American ships, – the C. Turner Joy –The U.S.S. Maddox The first occurred on August 2, 1964 –Though a second one was due to happen on August 4, 1964, it never happened

25. Strategy There was a split in the strategy of controlling Vietnam –The Joint Chiefs of Staff wanted to expand the air war over the DRV quickly to stabilize the new regime of Saigon –The civilians in the Pentagon wanted to apply gradual pressure to the Communist party with limited and selective bombings

26. Final Choice The NLF attacked two US Army installations in SV –Result: Johnson ordered the idea of the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s idea

27. Operation Rolling Thunder From 1960-1964, the Communist Party believed that it was getting through to America –They believed that they could win a military victory In March if 1965, Johnson sent the first combat troops to Vietnam –The party moved to an extended war strategy

29. -Idea The main idea was to get the US bogged down in a war that it could not win and then barricade America with unfavorable conditions for a political victory The CPV believed that the country would eventually tire of the war and demand a negotiated settlement

30. The War in America The Johnson administration did whatever they could so that the United States would not be affected by the war. He wanted to fight the war in “cold blood” which means that America would fight the war in Vietnam but they would leave little noticeable impact and little resources

31. You can’t always get what you want But these goals were never met. –Eventually, there were just not enough volunteers to go into war They had to issue a draft to get the men to go fight

32. Protests –Protests erupted on: –College campuses –Major cities –By 1968, every corner of the country seemed to have felt the war’s impact

33. The Tet Offensive In 1968, things had gone from bad to worse –In late January, the DRV and the NLF launched the same attacks against the major southern cities The Tet offensive –Was a military and also a psychological defeat

35. The Bargaining Table The Communist Party correctly believed that the American people were growing tired of the war. Its successes in the countryside had made a bit of a difference in who was on America’s side President Johnson, in March of 1968, said that he would not run for re-election, but would go on the bargaining table to help end the war

36. The Nixon Years In the spring of 1968, in Paris, it was made public that the Americans and the Vietnamese were meeting to discuss an end to the long and costly war Nixon’s secret plan was to borrow a strategic move from Lyndon Johnson’s last year in office –Vietnamization

37. Vietnamization An awful term that implied that the Vietnamese were not fighting and dying in the jungles of Southeast Asia. Although this strategy brought American troops home, it also increased the air war over the DRV and relied more on the AMVN for ground attacks

38. War Expansion The Nixon Years also witnessed the expansion of the war into Laos and Cambodia –That violated the international rights of these countries in secret campaigns

39. Bombing Campaigns Cause a Riot Late April 1970 –At Kent State, in Ohio, four students were killed be the National Gaurds men who were called out to preserve order

40. Expanded Air War The expanded air war did not faze the Communist Party. –It continued to make hard demands in Paris Nixon’s Vietnamization plan only quieted domestic critics, but his air attacks only proved to be a cover for and American retreat

41. Early Fall 1972 U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and DRV reps. Xuan Thuy and Le Duc Tho had hammered out a introduction of a peace draft.

42. They believed that its Southern allies would just accept the treaty, and have nothing to say about it. –The leaders in Saigon rejected the Kissinger- Tho peace draft and demanded that no special consideration be made

43. December 1972 The Nixon administration unleashed a series of deadly attacks that the named the Christmas Bombings –They attacked Hanoi and Haiphong The Christmas bombings brought immediate blame from the international committee and forced Nixon’s administration to reconsider its strategy

44. The Paris Peace Agreement January of 1973 –The Nixon White House convinced the Thieu- Ky regime in Saigon that the US would not abandon the GVN if they signed this peace accord On January 23, the final draft was sent, ending open warfare between the US and the DRV

46. The Fall of Saigon Although the PPA was signed, fighting continued until 1975. –On the morning of April 30, 1975, the Communist forces captured the presidential palace in Saigon, ending the Second Indochina War