In my last blog, I summarized the background leading up to American involvement in Vietnam despite serious warnings and reservations by the CIA and the military. In 1954, the South Vietnam political situation under the Diem government was best described as chaotic, lacking loyal and effective support. Commitment to the fight of communism was not at the forefront in their mindset. Not a driving force. It was more of a North vs the South conflict of ideas and government. A nationalist concept. In other words, a civil war in essence.
If you would like to see the previous posts in this series, here they are:
- Vietnam War Revisited – Part I
- Vietnam War Revisited – Part II – It Did Not Have To Be That Way
- Vietnam War Revisited – Part III – Misgovernment
- Vietnam War Revisited – Part IV – Was It Worth It?
- Vietnam War Revisited – Part V – What If’s
Tuchman, the author of The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam, makes the cogent point in her documentary. “Unless the Vietnamese themselves showed the will to resist Communism, no amount of external pressure and assistance can long delay complete Communist victory in South Vietnam.”
In hindsight, why did the American government ignore the sound advice of the military and CIA? Why did they struggle to stabilize the Diem government?
The assumption of American responsibility spawned covert operations in Laos and North Vietnam ten years before JFK committed military advisors in South Vietnam, a little- known fact.
One of the great unanswered historical questions regarding Cold War Communist threats was the lack of response to the Soviet takeover of Hungary in 1956 and Fidel Castro’s takeover of Cuba 90 miles off Florida in 1959. Yet Communists in distant Vietnam were perceived as a direct threat to American security? This seems to be a disconnect in deductive reasoning.
In 1960, Hanoi called for overthrow of the Diem regime and the end of “American imperialistic rule.” The conflict escalated with the formation of the National Liberation Front (NLF) of South Vietnam, better know as the Viet Cong (VC). Many were descendants of the Viet Minh, a formidable fighting force who defeated the French. Hanoi announced a ten-point Marxist social reform program cloaked in propaganda- “peace equality, democracy, and neutrality.”
Tuchman noted the irony- “Overt civil war was declared just as a new American President, John F. Kennedy, took office in the United States.”
The stakes were raised. JFK inherited a mess. There is no record of the policy deliberations, the degree of national interest involved, considerations of the contraindications and options. A long-range strategy was never defined. A White House official later admitted, “It was simply a given, assumed and unquestioned” we had to stop the advance of Communism wherever it appeared and Vietnam was the current place of confrontation.
Kennedy and his “Whiz Kids” advisors became married to the Cold War mindset and the domino metaphor. The JFK administration ignored piles of evidence and warnings compiled over the prior ten years contraindicating our involvement in South Vietnam. Convinced they would succeed where the French had failed, they waded into what would later become a quagmire.
If you like this historical storyline, continue to read my blogs at RLawsonAuthor.com/blog. If you are a history buff or just want to learn more about Vietnam, my novel, RECALL, will serve as a primer.
Comments are welcome if civil.
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