This power point is an educational look at the causes of U.S. involvement in Vietnam through withdrawal.

1. The Vietnam War

2. Historical Background
• From the late 1800s until WWII, France ruled
most of Indochina

3. Historical Background
• The people of Indochina resisted French colonial rule
• The Indochinese Communist Party, founded in
1930, revolted against French rule under the
leadership of Ho Chi Minh

4. Historical Background
• Ho Chi Minh was sentenced to death but fled
Vietnam to the Soviet Union and then China

5. Historical Background
• The Japanese had begun creating their own empire in
Southeast Asia
• In 1940 Japan replaced French rule in Indochina

6. Historical Background
• Ho Chi Minh returns in
1941 and helps form the
Vietminh
– Vietminh –
an organization whose goal
is to win Vietnam‟s
independence from foreign
rule

7. Historical Background
• The United States forges an alliance with Ho
Chi Minh and supports him with aid to resist
the Japanese

8. Historical Background
• When Japan is defeated in 1945 Vietnam
assumes independence
• Ho Chi Minh based the Vietnamese
Declaration of Independence on the U.S.
Declaration of Independence

9. Historical Background
• France wanted to regain its profitable colony
of Vietnam
• The Vietnamese people weren‟t willing to
allow more colonial rule
– Resistance of French rule is passionate

10. Historical Background
• The French regain
the southern half of
Vietnam
• Ho Chi Minh and the
Vietnamese freedom
fighters maintain
control of the north

11. Historical Background
• Ho Chi Minh vows to fight for
independence, “If ever the tiger pauses, the
elephant will impale him on his mighty
tusks. But the tiger will not pause, and the
elephant will die of exhaustion and loss
of blood.”

12. U.S. Involvement
• In 1945 Lieutenant Colonel A. Peter Dewey is
sent to Indochina to gather intelligence on the
situation
• Dewey reported, “Cochinchina (southern
Vietnam) is burning, the French and British are
finished here, and we (the U.S.) ought to clear
out of Southeast Asia.”

13. U.S. Involvement
• On his way to the airport Dewey is shot and
killed, becoming the first American killed in
Vietnam

14. 1950s
• Despite Dewey‟s
warning the
United States
steps onto the
slippery slope that
is involvement in
Vietnam

15. 1950s
• In 1950 Truman sends $15 million in
economic aid to France to aid their fight in
Vietnam
• Over the next four years the U.S. provides $1
billion for France‟s efforts

16. Eisenhower and Vietnam
• Ike continues to supply the French after taking office
in 1953
• Domino Theory – Eisenhower believes that if one
nation becomes Communist then surrounding nations
would also become Communist

17. French Lose
• In 1954 the French
are defeated and
are forced out of
the nation

18. Geneva Accords
• 1954 – Representatives from France, Great
Britain, the Soviet Union, the United
States, China, Laos, and Cambodia meet with the
Vietminh and with South Vietnam‟s anticommunist
nationalists to create a peace agreement

19. Geneva Accords
• They decided to temporarily divide the nation
at the 17th parallel until elections could be held
in 1956

20. Election of 1956
• Ho Chi Minh‟s popularity
– Fought the French colonials and
the Japanese
– Broke up large estates and
redistributed land to peasants
• These things made him wildly
popular in Vietnam

21. Election of 1956
• South Vietnam‟s president, Ngo Dinh Diem
knew he couldn‟t win an election
• Ngo Dinh Diem refused to participate in the
elections

22. Election of 1956
• The United States
supported canceling the
election because they
also knew their guy
couldn‟t win
• The US instead offers
more money and military
support to Diem

23. Ngo Dinh Diem
• Diem, the U.S. supported president of South
Vietnam, was corrupt and brutal

24. Ngo Dinh Diem
• Diem also restricted Buddhist practices in a
nation with a majority Buddhist population
• Buddhist monks protested Diem‟s
restrictions

25. V.C.
• Vietcong – in 1957 a Communist opposition
group in the South began attacking Diem‟s
government
– Vietcong receive aid from Ho Chi Minh

26. Ho Chi Minh Trail
• The Vietcong were
supplied from Ho Chi
Minh’s North Vietnam
along an intricate
network of paths and
tunnels

27. Sink or Swim with Diem
• Diem‟s South Vietnam was growing more
unstable
• Eisenhower decided to Sink or Swim with
Diem

28. John Fitzgerald Kennedy
• 1961 – Kennedy takes office and continues to
support Diem and the South

29. Kennedy and Vietnam
• Along with more $$$ the U.S. sent thousands
of military advisors
• By 1963, 16,000 U.S. military personnel were
in South Vietnam

30. Ngo Dinh Diem‟s Downfall
• Diem‟s Hamlet Program, failure of land reform,
corruption and severe crackdown on Buddhism
caused his loss of support
– Buddhist Monks protested Diem‟s rule

31. Diem Has to Go
• On November 1, 1963, a U.S. –supported military
coup topples Diem‟s regime
• Diem is assassinated
• Saigon, South Vietnam‟s capital falls to chaos

32. The Decision Worth 60,000 American
Lives
• Before his death, Kennedy announced a plan to
withdraw
• Lyndon Baines Johnson, the new president of
the U.S. decides to stay and win

33. The Decision Worth 2,000,000
Vietnamese Lives
• With the U.S. maintaining financial and
military support it was only a matter of time
before Vietnam had its own version of…
– The Explosion of the USS Maine
– The Capture of the Zimmerman Telegram
– The Attack on Pearl Harbor

34. Justifying War

35. The Fighting Continues
• Before Lyndon
Johnson‟s election he
claimed he was “not
about to send American
boys 9 or 10,000 miles
away from home to do
what Asian boys ought
to be doing for
themselves.”

36. The Fighting Continues
• March 1965 – Lyndon Johnson dispatched tens
of thousands of U.S. soldiers to Vietnam

37. Sinking Morale
• “When we marched into the rice paddies… we
carried, along with our packs and rifles, the
implicit convictions that the Vietcong could be
quickly beaten. We kept our packs and rifles;
the convictions, we lost.”
– Lieutenant Philip Caputo

38. Sinking Morale
• Fighting an elusive enemy in jungle conditions
frustrated the Americans

39. Sinking Morale
• Many soldiers turned to drugs and alcohol to
cope with their situation
• Some superior officers were even killed by
their own soldiers

40. Home Sweet Home
• Early on, the American public mostly
supported the halting of Communism in
Southeast Asia

41. Home Sweet Home
• As the cost of war increased the American
economy suffered
• To pay for the war LBJ asked for a tax
increase

42. The Great Society
• Conservatives agreed to the tax increase for
the war in exchange for a $6 billion cut in
Great Society Programs

43. The Great Society
• LBJ‟s Great Society was a plan to improve the
lives of millions of Americans and end racial
injustice
– The war became more important

44. Almost There…
But, Not Really
• Meanwhile, General Westmoreland and
Defense Secretary Robert McNamara insist the
North is close to surrender

45. A Nation Divided
• By 1967, Americans were split over
supporting and opposing the war

46. The Draft…
of the working class
• Many soldiers sent to Vietnam were drafted

47. The Draft…
of the working class
• Draft Dodging
– Enroll in College
– Medical Reasons
– Conscientious Objector – religious or moral
reasons to not fight in war

48. The Draft…
of the working class
• 80% of American soldiers sent to Vietnam
were from lower economic levels
– The draft created a working-class war

49. Something‟s Amiss
• 20% of the combat deaths were African
Americans
• 10% of the American population was African
American

50. African Americans in „Nam
• “We were taking the young black men who had been
crippled by our society and sending them 8,000 miles
away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which
they had not found in Southwest Georgia and East
Harlem…We have been repeatedly faced with cruel
irony of wacthing Negro and white boys on TV
screens as they kill and die together for a nation that
has been unable to seat them together in the same
schools.”
– Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

51. Opposition Grows
• College Students become vocal against the war
• As the war grew so did opposition

52. Reasons for Opposition
• The belief the Vietnam War was a civil war
• The belief that the South Vietnam government
was no better than the North Vietnam
government

53. Reasons for Opposition
• The belief that the U.S. cannot police the entire
globe
• The belief that war is immoral

54. Reasons for Opposition
• 18 years old = eligible to fight
• 21 years old = eligible to vote
• “The Eastern World, it is explodin‟
Violence flaring, bullets loadin‟
You‟re old enough to kill, but not for votin‟
You don‟t believe in war, but what‟s that gun you‟re
totin‟?”
-Singer Barry McGuire

55. Opposition Rhetoric
• “Burn cards, not people!”
• “Hell, no, we won‟t go!”
• “Hey, Hey LBJ, How many kids did you kill
today!?”

56. Draft Resistance
• 200,000 accused of draft offenses
• 4,000 imprisoned for draft dodging
• 10,000 fled to Canada

57. Hawks
• A 1967 poll showed that 70% of Americans
believed war protests were “acts of disloyalty”

58. Hawks
• Americans also supported the government‟s
policy
– “Support our men in Vietnam”
– “America – love it or leave it”

59. Hawks
• “…you can‟t have freedom without defending
it.”
– Lyndon B. Johnson

60. Happy New Year!!!

61. 1968
• The Tet Offensive brought the war into
America‟s homes
• Before Tet 28% of Americans called
themselves Doves and 56% called themselves
Hawks

62. 1968
• After the Tet Offensive, both sides tallied 40%

63. 1968
• Famed and popular reporter Walter Cronkite
speaks out against the war

64. 1968
• Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara
resigns

65. 1968
• March 31, 1968 – Lyndon Baines Johnson
makes shocking announcements
– The U.S. would seek negotiations to end the war
– “I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the
nomination of my party for another term as your
president.”

66. 1968
• April 4, Martin Luther King Jr. is assassinated
• June 5, Robert Kennedy is assassinated

67. 1968
• At the Democratic National Convention riots
break out as news cameras caught the violence

68. 1968
• “There are people today who are afraid, in a
sense, to hope or to have hope again, because
of what happened in…1968. Something was
taken from us. The type of leadership that we
had in a sense invested in, that we had helped
to make and to nourish, was taken from us…
Something died in all of us with those
assassinations.”
– Georgia Congressman John Lewis

69. Richard Millhouse Nixon
• In 1969 Nixon enters the Whitehouse and says,
“We have to get rid of the nightmares we
inherited. One of the nightmares is war without
end.”

70. Richard Millhouse Nixon
• As many troops were pulled out of Vietnam,
the fighting and bombing continued for several
more years

71. My Lai, Vietnam
• In November 1969 a story breaks about a
massacre that had taken place on March 16,
1968

72. My Lai, Vietnam
• Under the command of Lieutenant William
Calley Jr., over 200 women, children and
elderly men were massacred

73. My Lai Massacre
• “We all huddled them up. I poured about four
clips into the group…The mothers hugging
their children…Well, we kept right on firing.”
– Private Paul Meadlo

74. My Lai Massacre
• When asked what his directive had been, one
solder answered, “Kill anything that breathed.”

75. The Easter Offensive and Calculated
Barbarism

76. Ghosts of Vietnam