Essay About First War And Vietnam Retaliation

Vietnam Retaliation in the U.S
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”Vietnam was the first war ever fought without any censorship. Without censorship, things
can get terribly confused in the public mind.” – Gen William C Westmoreland, US Army
It is said that a war cannot be fought without the support of the people. Much so was this
related to the Vietnam conflict. I say the “Vietnam Conflict” in that the United States never
actually declared war on North Vietnam after its communist split-up in 1960. The conflict was
based on the principles of containment stated in the Truman and Eisenhower Doctrines. These
documents stated that military aid would be given to any nation willing to fight communism.
This idea of “keeping communism in its place” without it spreading to new nations was called
containment, a name given by President Harry Truman.
In May of 1955, Vietnam, which was a French colony, was broken up by rebels led by Ho
Chi Minh. Under the accords of the Geneva Convention, the French colony was broken into
Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. North Vietnam was supported by the Communist China and
Soviet Union while South Vietnam fought off communism with aid from the United States.
These series of events added to the tensions felt in the Cold War, which lasted between the
United States and the Soviet Union until 1989.
The year 1964 brought the United States into the conflict even more with President
Johnsons Operation “Rolling Thunder”, which bombed railroads, troop camps and other North
Vietnamese targets. This also brought two battalions of 3,500 marines and opened the door to
lead 540,000 men in Vietnam by 1967. This drastic call for troops to be deployed to Vietnam
called on the Selective Service Act, which drafted men into the military who fit certain
requirements. This combined with anti-war sentiments felt at home led to the opposition to the
war I am to speak about.
The Conflict in Vietnam did not go unnoticed at home as well. Some Americans were
eager to fight Communism in Vietnam. But, unlike most wars of American time, the action in
Vietnam had a very split approval amongst Americans. Many believed that the conflict was the
responsibility of South Vietnam, and not that of the United States. By the conflicts escalation,
however, the approval of the practice of containment in Vietnam dropped drastically as more
Americans lost their lives to Viet-Cong guerillas. But some were optimistic, said here: “Writer
James Reston commented that the anti-war demonstrations were not helping to bring peace to
Vietnam. He said they were postponing it. He believed the demonstrations would make Ho Chi
Minh think America did not support its troops. And that, he said, would make President Ho
continue the war (
The War Draft was feared by many young Americans, as they were the ones being called
into commission. A common practice amongst men aged 18 to 26 was burning draft cards to
display war opposition. Some totally fled the country, moving to Canada or other countries.
Many got married, plead disabilities or homosexuality or even joined the National Guard. Many
of the protesters were collage aged people, who looked at the war at a different standpoint. The
Baby Boom generation seemed to have a different attitude towards war than their parents. Rather
than blindly fighting for the American cause, the students asked why and challenged the system
of the military draft. No other war in American history had so much opposition, and to this day,
people still believe it was a pointless and vain attempt by the United States to show off their
military strength to the Superpowers, being the Soviet Union and China.
The media had a large impact of the American opinion of the Vietnam Conflict. The first
pictures of the war Americans seen of the war were in 1963, with the burning suicides of
Buddhist monks who were attacked by the Communist government. The monks, rather than
giving up their religion, immolated themselves publicly
to show their spiritual strength. This
scene shocked Americans as to what was going on to great extremes. As the search-and-destroy
mission went on, Americans were subjected to more pictures and reports from Vietnam, adding
to their discontent, especially those families of those who were fighting. American soldiers were
apprehensive of any civilian. The Viet-Cong, who were the guerillas in South Vietnam working
to spread communism, never wore uniforms and were impossible to detect amongst civilians.
Pictures of Americans killing Vietnamese, Vietnamese killing Americans, and scenes of war
filled the homes of Americans from the televised news and newspapers from 1963 to 1973.
Many people at home because of this began to ask themselves “why?”. In the book The Vietnam
War,