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1998-07-25
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Vietnam: Understanding the War
Outline
I. Introduction
II. Common questions asked regarding the Vietnam War.
III. Answers to Questions.
IV. Additives and Information regarding the War.
V. Elaborations by politicians and journalists regarding the War.
VI. Conclusion
Imagine this, a young boy about 10 years old comes home from school and asks,"Daddy, what
was the Vietnam War?" The father is at a loss of words to explain to his son the basics of
the Vietnam War. Not because of his lack of knowledge about the War itself, but moreover
because of his inability to express his thoughts into words. What should he do? Should he
take the time and attempt to give his son a rhetorical answer that both evades the question
while at the same time satisfies his query? Or, should he just take a trip down to the
nearest Blockbuster Video and rent a movie such as Platoon, or Full Metal Jacket. Well,
what do parents and teachers in general tell the young people of our society about Vietnam,
the ones who weren't born until after the U.S. withdrawal? Yes, this is a tricky question
that must be handled with ca Well, what are some of the questions that the young people
want to know? Some of these Questions include: What was the cause? When was the war?
How many Americans were killed? What countries fought in the war? and, Who won?1 These
questions express a simple, straightforward interest into the basic make-up of the War. It
may also be surprising that this strain of questions may be answered very effectively by a
small spectrum of facts regarding the Vietnam War by well-informed people who took part
i The first thing that young people of the present generation should know is that the
United States never fielded better armies than those that participated in Vietnam.2 The
trouble was political in a sense and in another sense came from the upsurge of radicalism
that swept the country and caused a lot of people to try to disrupt the war effort.3 We
were in Vietnam for the same reason we had been in Korea: to stop the spread of Communism,
particularly in areas of vital interest to the United States. Thel use of the area in case
of a widespread international confrontation.5 Secondly, what about the role of the news
media in the War? What about it? For example, people often remark that television
affected the outcome of the War by making the home audience so conscious of the horrors of
war that large segments of the population marched in the streets to protest it. It's true
that many people protested the war on the home front, for many diverse reasons, some based
on a concern for war or for Vietnam, others for more personal or self-serving reasons.6
But, television almosthowed us war (though not its horrors) and turned the audience against
it. To some extent, in the safe banality of its coverage (especially in the early years),
television banalized war and made it seem okay, manageable, winnable." What was a downfall
of the U.S. cause? Well, first the U.S. government was unwilling or unable to articulate
effectively goals and objectives for our involvement in Vietnam, thus failing to mobilize
public support for this sacrifice. Second, the government failed to realize that Dau
Tranh8 had both military and political applications and that the Vietnamese Communists gave
equal weight to both sides of this situation. Third, once committed to sacrifice, we did
not fight to win because of political conschina conflict is that the nations that won the
war have lost the peace.10 Geography was a decisive factor in the War. Geography and
political constraints made an allied victory impossible under the ground rules that were in
effect between 1965 and 1973. Hanoi was able to use Laos and Cambodia freely to reinforce
the southern battlefield, always protected by U.S. self-constraints. It was in actuality
an Indochina war, as seen from Hanoi, if not seen from Washington. United States forces
were not allowed to block the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos and Cambodia. Consequently, as
l Why did the U.S. get involved in the war? Well, our original motives were good: to help
the South Vietnamese preserve their independence and freedom from Communist aggression.
But our strategy was flawed, our Saigon ally corrupt and incompetent.12 "America's motives
in Vietnam were entirely honorable: to help defend a society under attack. We were not
there as imperialists or colonialists. We simply wanted to prevent an admittedly imperfect
system and society from being changed by force into a tota So, What lessons were learned
from the Vietnam experience? The United States learned in Vietnam that there are limits to
its power and that to exceed those limits invites tragic consequences. Another principal
lesson of the Vietnam War is that the United States should not intervene in other countries
with military forces unless that country is a serious threat to our own security. We
should not use military force to dictate the political system of another country-especially
small countries that wish to In Conclusion, what have we now to tell the young people of
the country when they ask these hard-to-answer questions about the War that has longed to
be forgotten by the American people? We have these answers to give them; answers that are
neither out- of-the-blue statements to stop the person from asking, nor are they concocted
from a Vietnam War movie. They are real facts, straight from the mouth of the
most-involved persons from that era. However, are we, the elders and the parents, just the
hypothe 1Bill McCloud, "What Should We Tell Our Children About Vietnam?" American
Heritage, IXL (May/June, 1988),56.
2Ibid.,p.57
3John Franks, Vietnam: Causes and Resolutions (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University,
1975), 3. 4John Kaplan and Jon R. Waltz, The Reason: A View On the Vietnam War (New
York: Macmillan, 1983), p.27. 5McCloud, p.57. 6Ibid. 7Ibid., p.58. 8Vietnamese for
"struggle" 9Kaplan and Waltz, p.33. 10McCloud, p.58. 11Martin Deutsh, A Small Geographic
Explanation of the Vietnam War (New York: H.W. Wilson, 1976), p.4. 12Kaplan and Waltz,
p.29 13McCloud, p.68. Quote by Peter R. Kann, Reporter for The Wall Street Journal in
Vietnam, 1967-68. 14McCloud, p.64.
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