11.3: Vietnam Conflict- 1955-75

What Did the USA Fail in Vietnam but Succeed in Korea?

After World War II, the USA was by far the most powerful nation in the world and could not stamp out a communist uprising in Vietnam, a tiny, impoverished country. Why not? For the most part, the whole US strategy was premised upon the notion that the South Vietnamese government could become a viable nation like South Korea. The American government gave both countries billions of dollars in economic and military aid. However, this support did nothing to stem the tide of communism in South Vietnam. In contrast, South Korea was stable and had some popular support by the 1960s. What accounts for the failure of the USA in Vietnam but its success in Korea?

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Ho Chi Minh Trail as well as major battlegrounds in southern Vietnam, AH, is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA.

The French colonization of Vietnam did not provide a good foundation for a healthy economy and a stable democracy. Like most colonial powers, France sought to extract wealth from Vietnam and gave it very little in return. To promote the export of minerals, rice, and rubber, vast tracts of land were given to French companies and their local Vietnamese collaborators while millions were left landless. Vietnam had massive rubber plantations controlled by the French where workers were paid little and treated like slave laborers. For the most part, Vietnam remained an impoverished colony that produced low value primary products.  Railways and port facilities were built to serve the export economy rather than promote economic development. Additionally, the French provided few educational opportunities for the population. The French ran Vietnam like a police state with a secret police force. The Vietnamese had no civil liberties or political participation under French rule.

In the first decades of the 1900s a small western educated Vietnamese middle class had been created. Many went to France and were attracted to nationalist ideas. Initially, there were moderate democratic parties like the Indian National Congress.  However, through a campaign of repression, execution, and imprisonment the moderate nationalists were wiped out. Their rival was the Communist Party.  For the most part, radicalism emerged in Vietnam because the French refused to encourage the growth of moderate political parties and would not tolerate even peaceful mass agitation. By the 1930s, the Communist Party of Vietnam began to emphasize a peasant revolution. It attracted peasant support with its program of independence from French rule, land redistribution, higher wages for laborers, mass education, and health care. Their leader, Ho Chi Minh (1890-1969), was a capable leader with impeccable nationalist credentials. Consequently, it would be the Communists who led the country for national liberation. The Ho Chi Minh Trail, named after Ho Chi Minh, refers to a massive network of waterways, roads, and mountain paths used by the North Vietnamese guerrillas to move troops and supplies from North Vietnam to South Vietnam. Figure 11.3.1 is an outline map of the Indochinese peninsula. A long blue arrow in the map shows the Ho Chi Minh Trail that ran from North Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia to South Vietnam. The Ho Chi Minh Trail contributed to the success of the communists in the Vietnam War. 

For the most part, World War II created an opportunity for the nationalists in southeast Asia and the movement for Vietnamese independence took place within the context of decolonization that was occurring immediately after war ended. The Philippines was loyal to the US during World War II and launched guerilla movements against the Japanese. So, The US almost immediately granted independence to the Philippines. From 1945 until 1949, the Dutch fought a losing war against Indonesian nationalists who captured political power when the Japanese were defeated. After World War II, Ho repeatedly petitioned President Harry S. Truman to recognize Vietnam, but Truman never responded.  After being rejected, Ho declared independence and war with France followed until 1954. Almost all French leaders believed that their country could only recover its power and prestige by reclaiming its empire.

France sought US support by framing the conflict in Vietnam not as a colonial war but a war against communism. The US feared communism in Vietnam and France was an essential ally. For the most part, the US saw Ho as a tool of Moscow rather than a nationalist looking for independence from France. With US support the French had retaken all the major cities but could not control the countryside, because communists were very successful at gaining peasant support by instituting land redistribution. Overall, the French were just too unpopular in Vietnam to defeat the Communists who successfully used guerrilla tactics which brought the French to negotiate a ceasefire. By 1954, the French decided to abandon their colony of Indochina. Instead, they then sought to focus their efforts on maintaining their empire closer to home in Algeria. At the Geneva Conference of 1954, Vietnam was divided in two with popular elections within two years to elect a new government. The communists would control only the northern half of the country and a pro-Western government would control the southern half.

However, the vote would never take place. The United States began sending military advisers to South Vietnam almost as soon as the French withdrew. President Dwight Eisenhower, elected in 1952, invoked the “domino theory” to help the unpopular regime in South Vietnam prevent elections which would have made the extremely popular Ho Chi Minh leader of a unified nation. In 1954, the communists were in a strong position. They  communists had popular support, because they stood for opposition to the hated French rule and for independence. Overall, there was political stability and unity in the North. This new government received substantial aid from China and the USSR.  Additionally, in the south the communists controlled about half of the rural villages. The Communists also had strong support among the urban working classes in the south.

The South Vietnamese government was controlled by a pro-US anti-communist president named Ngo Ninh Diem. Diem was not the ideal person to serve as president. He was a member of the urban French-speaking Catholic elite who ruled over a population that was made up largely of Buddhist peasants. The US pressured the South Vietnamese government for land redistribution, but Diem refused. Therefore, a small elite continued to control much of the land in the south and rural poverty only strengthened Communist support there. The central problem was that the South Vietnamese government was unviable because it lacked popular support and legitimacy. There were no democratic elections to legitimize the government and the majority remained impoverished. Civil rights were not respected, and the government would arrest and torture anyone who criticized it.

Beginning in 1955, the USA began to advise, train, and equip the South Vietnamese Army (ARVN). However, US aid and assistance did not matter. Diem was seen more and more as a puppet of the USA and not a true nationalist like Ho Chi Minh. On December 20, 1960, various groups in South Vietnam who were hostile to Diem established the National Liberation Front or the Viet Cong. This coalition was dominated by the Communists but sought popular support by emphasizing nationalist goals and land redistribution rather than radical socialism. By 1963, Diem’s government was in crisis. Buddhist protests mounted because the government favored Catholics. This discrimination angered the top echelons of the military because many of the higher officers were Buddhist. Also, the government failed to stamp out the Viet Cong. By the end of 1963 the communist rebels had killed or kidnapped 13,000 government officials. The Communists controlled areas ruled over about half of the population of the south by 1963. Diem became so unpopular that the military assassinated him. Then, South Vietnam would be under a military dictatorship until 1975.

Nevertheless, the government of South Vietnam became even less stable after the assassination of Diem. It was basically controlled by a council of generals who were constantly in conflict with another. One general would serve as president but oftentimes he would be overthrown by another general in a coup. In an effort to bring all of Vietnam under Communist rule, the government of North Vietnam agreed to send troops into the south. By 1964, the Communists took over most of the countryside, and ARVN appeared completely unable to do anything about this. Sensing the threat of a united communist Vietnam, the US sought to prop up the South Vietnamese government through bombings of North Vietnam. During 1964–72, the US dropped a total of one million tons of bombs. As a result, many of the major northern cities were destroyed or damaged.  However, the North Vietnamese government simply relocated its factories to the countryside. In general, North Vietnamese morale appeared to have remained reasonably strong during the years of sustained American bombing. The South Vietnamese government became so weak that it was on the verge of collapse by the end of 1964. The USA had to either send troops in to fight the Communists or face a united Communist Vietnam. When North Vietnamese patrol boats clashed in the Tonkin Gulf with US warships, the US committed itself to major military commitments in Vietnam with full congressional support. Almost all Democrats and Republicans in Congress supported the Vietnam War.

When US military forces arrived in South Vietnam, the government only controlled the cities. American troop levels peaked at 543,000 in April 1969. Additionally, there were also 50,000 South Korean combat troops, 7,500 Australian troops, 11,000 Thai troops, and 2,000 Filipino soldiers. However, both the USSR and China provided even more assistance to the Communist government in the north because they competed for influence in Vietnam. US troops did very little to alter the ground game in South Vietnam. Rather than winning over the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese, the USA was seen more and more as an occupying army. The US occupation of Vietnam only strengthened the power of the communists while the South Vietnamese government remained unviable. Most South Vietnamese were either indifferent towards the government or supported the Communists.

By 1967, public opinion globally and in the USA was turning against US involvement in South Vietnam (see Figure 11.3.2). From Sweden to India to Japan, large chunks of public opinion lauded North Vietnam as a heroic nation fighting for its independence. The North sought to overrun the South in early 1968 with the Tet Offensive. Although this attack failed, it was a major public relations nightmare for the US government. The communists overran the US embassy in Saigon and most Americans doubted that victory was possible in Vietnam. Most Americans viewed the South Vietnamese government as a puppet of US imperialism. Figure 11.3.2 captures this popular sentiment in a photo of two male protesters in Wichita, Kansas, taken in 1967. One man is wearing a sign that reads "Saigon Puppet" and another man is wearing a sign that reads "US Imperialism." The "Saigon Puppet's" hands are stretched out and the strings tied to his hands are controlled by by US imperialists. The Democrats lost the presidential election in 1968, but the new Republican government under Richard Nixon ran into the same problems. Communist morale was high, and the South Vietnamese government remained unpopular. The American public and Congress wanted to end the conflict. Consequently, the US government started to shift more of the combat responsibilities to the ARVN in a policy known as Vietnamization. The Nixon administration provided more than a million M-16 rifles as well as vehicles, planes, and helicopters. American aid also enabled South Vietnam to increase the ARVN from eight hundred fifty thousand soldiers to more than one million by 1971.

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): Vietnam War protesters in Wichita, Kansas, National Archives, in the Public Domain.

Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\): Why would US President Nixon support a dictatorship in South Vietnam? National Archives, in the Public Domain.

Nixon finally signed a peace accord in early 1973 which preserved the independence of South Vietnam. Figure 11.3.3 shows President Nixon and South Vietnamese dictator Nguyễn Văn Thiệu making a joint statement in June 1969,at Midway Island, about the withdrawal of US troops from Vietnam. They are dressed in formal suits and standing outdoors in front of a microphone stand. Both presidents emphasized that Vietnamese troops would replace US troops, and this process became known as "Vietnamization." US combat troops were out of Vietnam shortly afterwards. However, Nixon did not demand that the one hundred fifty thousand North Vietnamese troops in South Vietnam withdraw. The US president knew that Vietnam would probably be unified under Communist rule, but he wanted time lag between the removal of U.S. troops and a communist takeover until he was out of office. Nixon did not want to go down in history as the president who lost Vietnam. Within less than a month after the ceasefire went into effect, conflict erupted throughout South Vietnam. Communists maintained and expanded their hold in the south as the ARVN continued to suffer from corruption, desertion, and poor leadership.   

Overall, ARVN soldiers either surrendered or defected. The South Vietnamese faltered once the USA pulled out of Vietnam. Its economy had been on life support during the 1950s and 1960s. It had no real industrial base, poor infrastructure, and urban as well as rural poverty. The US kept the economy afloat with massive aid and the consumer spending of US military forces stationed in Vietnam. Hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese worked directly or indirectly for the US military. As a result, unemployment and inflation soared when the US withdrew its forces.

Meanwhile, the US Congress began to cut funding for South Vietnam. It approved just $750 million in military and economic assistance. However, this amount was only half of the $1.5 billion which the president wanted and less than a third of the $2.3 billion Washington had spent on military aid alone in 1973. In 1975 the north took control of Saigon. Upon taking over, some historians have estimated that the communists executed as many as sixty-five thousand Southerners. The communists also sent at least two hundred thousand more to reeducation camps. 

Primary Source: The Pentagon Papers, 1971

The Report of the Office of the Secretary of Defense Vietnam Task Force, popularly known. As the Pentagon Papers, was released by Daniel Ellsberg who had worked on the report. This report documents US involvement in Vietnam, from 1945 to 1968. The Pentagon Papers revealed the secret working of the US government. It showed that the US government had consistently lied to the American people. Daniel Ellsberg was initially charged with conspiracy, espionage, and theft of government property for disclosing historical secrets. The charges were later dismissed. June 13, 2021, marks the 50th anniversary of the publication of this report in the New York Times.

Discussion Questions:

• Who was Daniel Ellsberg?
• What was the impact of the Pentagon Papers on public opinion?
• What was so shocking about the content in the Pentagon Papers? What did the documents reveal?
• What is the historical significance of the Pentagon Papers?

Review Questions

• What factors account for the popular support for the Communists in Vietnam?
• How was the South Vietnamese government unviable? 
• Why did the US seek to prop up the government the government of South Vietnam?