VIETNAM WAR

When was the vietnam war?

1955-1975

 What country was vietnam a colony of since 1884?

France

Who was the main opposition against french rule (he embraced communism)?

ho chi mihn

what made Truman support the french even though he supported anti-colonization?

Truman Doctrine

Why did the US respond to Vietnam by defending south Vietnam and its

anti-communist forces?

US is part of SEATO

What is the national liberation front: a group of communists in south Vietnam?

they wanted to destroy the Diem Government

Veitcong militants from the national liberation front

people that sign up to be in the army to destroy the south vietnamese government through violence

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

(when a ship blew up in the gulf of Tonkin) after the USS Maddox was destroyed in the gulf, escalating the US involvement in vietnam

General William Westmoreland

US army general

What was the domino theory?

the theory that if one country falls to communism, they all will eventually

 How did the us involvement in the vietnam war begin?

by defending the French forces in vietnam

Who was the leader of the vietminh?

ho chi minh

Why did Americans start to question the war effort?

reports during the nightly news showed the brutality of the war

 What military tactics did the vietcong use?

guerilla warfare

What us citizens were called "doves”?

people that were anti- war

The Tet Offensive

the largest push of the vietcong into south vietnam, the vietcong hit the khe sanh base in the northern part of south vietnam, days later a few us bases (saigon) were attacked, us and sv repelled the attacks-this offensive showed that the VC was a force to be reckoned with and that the VC was no longer using guerilla warfare

Using traps

vietcong war tactics

Credibility Gap

the difference between what the media says and what the president says

 Robert F Kennedy

was a democratic nominee for president and was assasinated- led to an easy win for nixon

Operation Rolling Thunder

it increased the us troop presence and continued airstrikes against vietcong

Napalm

US pilots dropped this gel and sprayed it into a jungle, then ignited it- this would make a massive fire

Agent Orange

a pesticide sprayed from US planes that was meant to kill plant life

 How did the vietcong fight?

they would travel light and they would only bring ride, they would hide in underground tunnels to ambush US patrols things they used booby traps with spikes at the bottom

What did Ho think would happen once the cost of the war became to great?

he

thought that the US troops would go home

What made the support sink in the war?:

the lack of progress in the war + the escalating number of casualties

Hawks

supported the war

Doves

broke with Johnson's policy of sending more troops as a moral issue and they believed the war was a civil war and we should not be involved

Students for a democratic society

established in 1960 at U of M; people were compaigning against the war - they said "We Won't Go!!"

The role of the media

created a credibility gap- and let Americans see what was happening during the war, this changed when the reporters would now broadcast from the battlefield

Eugene Mcarthy

an antiwar candidate and Robert Kennedy ran for president; RFK was assassinated and Nixon won election

Peace talks with the Vietnamese

Nixon started this when he went into the office because he wanted an end to the war

Peace with honor

what president Nixon wanted; this meant we would end the war, but not in a way that would make it look like we lost. he also said that we still had a lot of military options available

Vietnamization

gradually pulled out us troops out of vietnam while give south vietnam more military power (failed)

Why did vietnamization fail?

Nixon realized that 2/3 of americans supported an end to the war

 What was the peace agreement between the US and Vietminh?

they came to a peace agreement in Paris; and they said POWs (prisoners of war) would be exchanged but vietcong troops would remain in south Vietnam

What happened after the paris accords were signed?

the us troops left vietnam, and saigon (SV) fell to communism

North Vietnam

communist, vietminh and led by ho chi minh

 South Vietnam

democratic and south vietnam (they also had veitcong which were communists in south