vietnam

Vietnam

Mr. G ies lerAmer ican H istory

Do Now –

Describe the term containment

Letter to President Harry Truman, February 16, 1945

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:

“Our VIETNAM people, as early as 1941, stood by the Allies' side and fought against the Japanese and

their associates, the French colonialists. From 1941 to 1945 we fought bitterly, sustained by the patriotism,

of our fellow-countrymen and by the promises made by the Allies at YALTA, SAN FRANCISCO and

POTSDAM…..But the French Colonialists…have come back, and are waging on us a murderous and

pitiless war in order reestablish their domination….. This aggression is contrary to all principles of

international law and the pledge made by the Allies during World War II…..It violently contrasts with the

firm stand you have taken in your twelve point declaration…..The French aggression on a peace-loving

people is a direct menace to world security….It is with this firm conviction that we request of the United

Sates as guardians and champions of World Justice to take a decisive step in support of our

independence….What we ask has been graciously granted to the Philippines. Like the Philippines our goal

is full independence and full cooperation with the UNITED STATES. We will do our best to make this

independence and cooperation profitable to the whole world.”

Respectfully Yours,

Ho Chi Minh

What To Expect During This Unit

Listen to a few tracks enjoyed by the “Grunts”

Dissect Plenty of Primary Sources

A lot of video and audio sources

Examine the Evolution of American Culture

Examine the Vietnam Experience

Plenty of Group Work

What I Know About Vietnam

What I Want to Learn About Vietnam

What I Learned About Vietnam

K-W-LTTYN

Refer to notes packet

The Origins of the Vietnam War

T T Y N : Why Vietnam?

The expulsion of the Japanese in 1945 led not to

independence but a revival of French colonialism

Anticommunism rhetoric

A logical extension of Cold War policies and

assumption

The Origins of the Vietnam War

U.S. funneled billions of dollars in aid to bolster French

efforts

1954, the U.S., refusing to send in troops and/or use a

nuclear bomb in an effort to help the French, France was

left with no alternative but to agree to Vietnamese

Independence

The Origins of the Vietnam War

Victory for Ho Chi Minh’s nationalist forces

Geneva Peace Conference divides Vietnam into two

districts, with elections in 1956 to unify the country

Ngo Dinh Diem – American puppet government

The Origins of the Vietnam War

1960s, the U.S. was committed to the corrupt regime

of Diem and the South Vietnamese

1963, U.S. approves a military coup that led to Diem’s

death

1963, 17K American Advisors in S. Vietnam

The Key Personalities of the Vietnam Conflict

Lyndon Baines Johnson, President of the United States, November 22,

1963 – January 20, 1969

John F. Kennedy, President of the United States January 20, 1961 –

November 22, 1963

Robert McNamara, Secretary of Defense of the United States January 21, 1961 –

February 29, 1968

Ho Chi Minh, President of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) 19

February 1951 – 2 September 1969

The Key Personalities of the Vietnam Conflict

William Westmoreland, American Army General and commander of the US forces deployed in Vietnam

between 1964 to 1968

Walter Cronkite. anchorman for the CBS Evening News for 19 years (1962–81). 

“The Most Trusted Man in America”

You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win.--Ho Chi Minh to the French, late 1940s

This is not a jungle war, but a struggle for freedom on every front of human activity.--Lyndon B. Johnson, 1964

We are not about to send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.--Lyndon Johnson, Oct. 1964

I must question the wisdom of involvement in Vietnam--JFK, 1963

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident

August1964, N. Vietnamese vessels perhaps fired upon an

American spy ship off its coast

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution passed

Authorizing the president to take “all necessary measures

to repel armed attack”

Passed without any discussion of American goals and

strategy in Vietnam

“I am not going to be the president who saw

Southeast Asia go the way China went.” –

LBJ

American Escalation

1964 reelection campaign, Johnson insisted he had no

intention of sending American troops into Vietnam

After reelection, U.S. begins airstrikes and introduce

American troops in the south

1966 – 380K troops

1967 – 485K

End of 1968 – 540K (peak deployment)

American Escalation

America remains quiet

Prior to 1968;

Support 56%

Opposition 28%

“Hearts and Minds”

American Escalation

“Search and Destroy” missions

“Operation Rolling Thunder” 1965-1968

Bombs, bombs, and more bombs – American planes

dropped more tons of bombs on the small country of

North and South Vietnam that both sides used in all of

WWII

Spread chemicals

Napalm

American Escalation

TTYN: What does the following quote tell you about the

resolve of the North Vietnamese?

“You can kill ten of my men for every one I kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will lose and I will win.” --Ho Chi Minh to the French, late 1940s

The Vietcong: The Other Enemy

The People's Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF)

Created by the North Vietnamese communists to

escalate the armed struggle in South Vietnam.

The VC were guerrillas,

They wore no uniforms, dressed in the same type of

clothing as the local peasants, and blended into the

landscape when their mission was complete. 

The Vietcong: The Other Enemy

The Viet Cong were supported and trained by the

government of communist North Vietnam.

The Viet Cong tried to create a popular uprising in

South Vietnam during the Vietnam War with their 1968 Tet

Offensive, but were able to seize control of just a few

small districts in the Mekong Delta region

What I Know About Vietnam

What I Want to Learn About Vietnam

What I Have Learned So Far About Vietnam

K-W-LTTYN

Refer to notes packet

The Tet Offensive

Refer to your notes packet

The Tet Offensive Refer to your notes packet

Summarizing the Tet

This military action was a major turning point in the

way many Americans perceived the war.

On the morning of January 30, 1968, Communist

forces in North Vietnam and Vietcong squads in the

South took advantage of a truce during Tet (the

Vietnamese new year holiday) to launch a massive

offensive.

The Tet Offensive – Turning Point??

Summarizing the Tet

Major cities and provinces were captured, and heavy

fighting ensued.

Although turned back by U.S. and South Vietnamese forces

in a matter of days, the Communists nonetheless claimed a

major political and psychological victory.

U.S. observers were stunned by the size and coordination

of the Communist forces.

Declared over April 1, 1968

The Tet Offensive – Turning Point??

The Tet Offensive – Turning Point??

Public opinion after the Tet Offensive

Support 41%

Opposition 42%

TTYN: Why did public support for Vietnam shift so

dramatically?

Photo Journalism

Eddie Adams's Pulitzer Prize-winning photo taken on the streets of Saigon during the Tet Offensive sent shock waves through America

Photo Journalism

Photo Journalism

1972 file photo, 9-year-old Kim Phuc, center, runs down Route 1 near Trang Bang, Vietnam after an aerial napalm attack.

Photo JournalismTTYN – How did the images below cause a seismic shift in the way Americans interpreted the war?

Cronkite Reports on Vietnam

Refer to your notes packet

The Mai Lai Massacre

On March 16, 1968 the angry and frustrated men of

Charlie Company entered the Vietnamese village of My

Lai

“This is what you've been waiting for -- search and

destroy -- and you've got it," said their superior officers.

The Mai Lai Massacre

As the "search and destroy" mission unfolded, it soon

degenerated into the massacre of over 300 apparently

unarmed civilians including women, children, and the

elderly.

Men were ordered to enter the village firing, though

there had been no report of opposing fire.

The Mai Lai Massacre

According to eyewitness reports offered after the

event, several old men were bayoneted, praying women

and children were shot in the back of the head, and at

least one girl was raped and then killed.

According to reports, a group of the villagers, ordered

them into a ditch, and mowed them down in a fury of

machine gun fire.

McNamara Reflection

Refer to your notes packet

The Counter Culture

The Antiwar Movement

Casualties mount

Americans bombs rain down on Vietnam

Images and stories hit the front pages and the front porches

SNCC and SDS tip the scales (Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee and Students for a Democratic Society)

MLK condemns the war and the Johnson Administration

By 1967, men were burning their draft cards or fleeing to Canada

The Counter Culture

Refer to your notes packet

1967, Antiwar demonstrator outside the Pentagon

The Counter Culture

October of 1967, 100K protestors assemble at Lincoln

Memorial

By the late 1960s, millions of young people openly rejected

the values and behaviors of their elders

For the first time in American history, flamboyant rejection

of respectable norms in clothing, language, sexual behavior,

and drug use became the basis for a mass movement

Rallying cry was “Liberation”

The Counter Culture

What they were after

Emphasized the ideal of community

Independence from authority

The Free individual

1967, The Summer of Love

“Give peace a chance”

The Weather Underground: The Weatherman

Splinter group of SNCC

the Weathermen were widely criticized for their use of

violence as a means of social and political change.

Many accused the group of terrorism, while others

accused it of giving all activists, both militant and more

mainstream, a bad name.

“ When you feel you have right on your side, you can do some pretty horrific things.” - Brian Flanagan, former Weatherman

The Weatherman

Refer to your notes packet

The Weatherman

The Weatherman believed that violent action was a

necessary evil in a time of crisis, a last-ditch effort to grab the

country’s attention.

The Results - a widespread revolt against the status

quo: against previously upheld structures of racism,

sexism and classism, against the violence of the

Vietnam War and America’s interventions abroad.

Kent State

The Vietnam war heightened awareness and protest,

which spread to college campuses

In May 1970, Kent State students protesting the

bombing of Cambodia by United States military forces

Kent State

Clashed with Ohio National Guardsmen on the Kent

State University campus.

Guardsmen shot and killed four students on May 4

The Kent State Shootings became the focal point of a

nation deeply divided by the Vietnam War.

Kent State

Refer to your notes packet

Kent State

TTYN: You Predict. What effect, if any, do you believe that the Kent St. shooting would have on America?

The shootings helped convince Americans that the anti-war

protestors were not just hippies, drug addicts, or promoters of free

Rather than causing a decline in protests, the Kent State

Shootings actually escalated protests.

Many colleges and universities across the United States

cancelled classes and actually closed their doors for the remainder

of the academic year in fear of violent protests erupting on their

campuses.

Woodstock

500,000 people from all over the U.S. traveled to

Woodstock

Woodstock signaled the merger and ambivalence of the

counterculture and protest.

The festival was billed as "three days of peace and love,"

in contrast to the war and hatred in Vietnam.

Woodstock

Refer to your notes packet

Problem -- Spread of Communism: The Vietnam War

Result

Solution

Sm

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up

Ac

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What I Know About Vietnam

What I Want to Learn About Vietnam

What I Have Learned About Vietnam

K-W-LTTYN

Refer to notes packet

In this April 29, 1975 file photo, U.S. Navy personnel aboard the USS Blue Ridge push a helicopter into the sea off the coast of Vietnam in order to

make room for more evacuation flights from Saigon.

Evacuation of Americans during Operation Frequent Wind, 29th April 1975.

Assessment