Stalin died in March of 1953 opening a path to international settlement of war in Indochina at the Geneva conference in 1954. The new Russian premier, Malenkov, proposed “peaceful coexistence,” lessening Cold War tensions temporarily. But the Korean armistice freed Chinese troops to aid the Viet Minh in Vietnam, raising another serious concern to Eisenhower and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. One front closed, another opened. This is the background leading up to decisions to become involved in another war, this time in Southeast Asia.
After fighting a limited war in Korea, the military did not want to fight another conflict under such restrictions again. They reevaluated the cost/ benefit of engaging communist aggression in SE Asia and concluded the contest would cost more than any relative value gained by success. Was anyone listening?
A year later, 1954, the French loss their Indochina colony with a humiliating defeat at Dien Bien Phu despite massive American logistic aid. The U.S. underwrote 80% of the French expenditures at this juncture in what some considered a “colonial war.” This defeat presented Eisenhower with a dilemma – Should America become involved in Vietnam? Or, was Vietnam a flawed cause? He viewed Communism as a monolithic threat, the prevailing mindset at that time. But should America take a stand and fill the void left by the French?
This all happened back in 1954, seven years before JFK committed military advisors to South Vietnam, and ten years before our Marines landed in Danang. The crucial question of relative value was never answered for Vietnam during the Eisenhower/ Truman era unfortunately with unintended consequences.The Cold War went on and the anti-communist psyche persisted, some insisting we must defend SE Asia from a takeover, while other experienced observers warned against our involvement. The CIA cautioned that even if we defeated the Viet Minh, guerilla action could continue indefinitely precluding non-communist control of the region. The agency warned against an open-ended proposition with no definitive endpoint.
The Pentagon warned the North Vietnamese were only pawns, Communist China was the enemy. Once committing forces and U.S. prestige, disengagement would not be possible short of victory. Victory would require huge military and monetary investments. Prescience? Again, the recommendations went unheeded.
It was a tangle of “what-ifs” dumped into JFK’s lap in 1961 when the “Domino Theory” prevailed and influenced policy. MACV was born when JFK committed military advisors, deploying them to South Vietnam as “advisors” to train the South Vietnam Army (ARVN), a halfway commitment full of potential pitfalls as it turned out. Tuchman aptly characterized this, “…the United States was lodged in the trap of its own propaganda. The exaggerated rhetoric of the cold war had bewitched its formulators.”
Basically, rhetoric had become doctrine and JFK bought into it. Eight years of American effort in aiding the French in the fight against the “communist” Viet Minh had come to nothing. DC policy makers thought they could avoid the French mistakes. The indications for our disengagement from Indochina at this time were ignored. Truchman considered this a folly, “a tragedy deeper than a mistake.” Indochinese nationalism had become a Communist cause and there was no going back.
It is important to understand this pivotal history. In 1961, the JFK administration thought our involvement would be different from the French experience. We anticipated we’d be welcomed as helping South Vietnam become an independent, democratic government. We interpreted we were protecting them from a communist takeover, a concept of “nation building” worthy of promotion.
Did they not contemplate the South Vietnamese would not notice U.S. financial support for the French in the “colonial war”? Assumed it would escape their perception that our involvement represented another “White intrusion” in Asia. We overlooked their nationalist fervor, their passion for independence.
I devote several chapters in my fictional historical narrative to this particular subject. I invite you to read RECALL.
Leave a Reply