Vietnam Test 3

Nguyen Cao Ky

Nguyen Van Thieu (“Two”)

They hoped he would bring stability and effective leadership

No, but he wasn’t as bad as Ky

Because thousands of Viet Cong infiltrated South Vietnam wearing civilian clothes

“Some sort of litmus test”

Reprehensible, vulgar, and dishonorable

Chronic security leaks and fear of VC infiltration

Fear the ARVN officer corps was infiltrated by the Viet Cong

The more Americans fought, the less ARVN initiative there was

As new imperialist occupiers

200,000 additional U.S. troops

Search and destroy

Intensifying bombing around Hanoi and Haiphong

He could no longer write speeches claiming the U.S. was winning the war

He had long opposed escalation and believed the war strategy was failing

As early as summer 1965

An unconditional halt to the bombing

To jump-start peace talks and reduce anti-war criticism

A defensive strategy focused on protecting major urban areas

Rising U.S. casualties

November 1967

He rejected 200,000 and approved only about 55,000

No, he rejected halting the bombing and kept search and destroy

A CIA surveillance program targeting anti-war leaders

That it was much larger and more dangerous than it actually was

About 7,000

That anti-war leaders were communist-influenced or directed

Evidence of progress in Vietnam

Higher enemy body counts and retaken villages

To conduct a national PR tour

That the war’s end was “coming into view”

Phase Three

Strengthening ARVN, improving government, economy, infrastructure, and continuing pressure on the North

Stability, collapsing communist infrastructure, and U.S. troop withdrawals

“Light at the end of the tunnel”

Johnson’s trusted civilian advisers

That spying on Americans was wrong, search and destroy wasn’t working, and Westmoreland’s optimism was false

South Vietnam would collapse and LBJ would pay the political price

10,000–12,000 NVA troops near Dak To close to the Ho Chi Minh Trail

About 16,000

A massive search-and-destroy operation

Rugged, mountainous Central Highlands

Hill 875

Its elevation (875 meters)

Around 2,000

Perimeter trenches and deep tunnel complexes

Five days

They declared victory and withdrew

About 850 wounded, ~200 killed

Around 3,600

The NVA tested whether the U.S. would relocate massive forces into remote areas

Withdrew, allowing NVA units to return immediately

It focused on body count, not holding territory

The Tet Offensive

General Giap and Communist Party leader Le Duan

Early January 1968

They wore civilian clothes and blended with holiday travelers

A holiday ceasefire made U.S. and ARVN forces less alert

Sau Chmo (“Satchmo”), real name Dinh

Since 1950

2:45 a.m., January 31, 1968

19

A three-foot hole blown in the outer wall

All 19 attackers were dead; Satchmo was among them armed with a pistol, AK-47, and money

He was one of the embassy’s most trusted workers

To lure U.S. troops away, infiltrate cities, trigger uprisings, and collapse the South Vietnamese government

Kontum/Khe Sanh attacks and the Dak To fighting

Near the Laotian border, close to the Ho Chi Minh Trail

Rural indigenous South Vietnamese trained by U.S. Special Forces

Because they were agrarian, darker-skinned, and viewed as low status

He became obsessed with defending it “at any cost”

Expanding the airfield and sending thousands of troops

It diverted U.S. attention from the nationwide Tet buildup

It became the turning point of the Vietnam War

He needed to show progress in Vietnam before the November 1968 election.

He insisted the U.S. was making progress and moving into “phase three, phase four” toward victory.

It tested whether the U.S. would move large numbers of troops into isolated terrain, which they did with about 16,000 men.

Use diversionary attacks to pull U.S. troops from cities, trigger a mass uprising in South Vietnam, topple the Thieu government, and force U.S. negotiation.

The U.S. avoided heavy bombing inside South Vietnamese cities to prevent massive civilian casualties.

Con Thien protected the DMZ border, and Khe Sanh guarded the Ho Chi Minh Trail corridor near Laos.

He kept a physical model of the Khe Sanh area in the White House and ordered over 6,000 Marines to hold it at all costs.

The base sat below higher surrounding hills controlled by North Vietnamese forces who used them for heavy artillery and mortar attacks.

Five of the six largest cities and 36 of 44 provincial capitals were attacked, including Westmoreland’s headquarters and the U.S. Embassy.

A single weekend in which major U.S. cities like Boston, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and ~40 state capitals were attacked simultaneously.

Between 80,000 and 85,000 Viet Cong fighters.

Huế, the ancient capital of Vietnam.

In rural regions—western border areas, the Central Highlands, and the Mekong Delta.

The enemy lost every battle and failed to maintain control of any location.

Their forces were too widely dispersed to concentrate strength, making coordinated victory impossible.

A little over three weeks, until around February 24–25, 1968.

Intense house-to-house fighting with heavy bombing and artillery.

Retaking Huế required such heavy destruction that the city was devastated in the process.

As they retreated, enemy forces massacred an estimated up to 3,000 civilians and created mass graves.

Over 100,000 became refugees.

Around 70–80% of the 80–85,000 Viet Cong involved were killed or wounded.

He hoped capturing cities would trigger urban uprisings and collapse the Thieu government.

That the war was nowhere near ending, despite years of promises of imminent victory.

The growing difference between what U.S. leaders claimed and what the American public saw happening in Vietnam.

Most Tet attacks lasted a day or two, but the Khe Sanh siege continued until early June 1968.

North Vietnamese artillery destroyed the airstrip, forcing U.S. planes to slow-fly and push supplies out with parachutes.

The U.S. fought desperately to hold it but evacuated it within weeks of the battle ending.

About 90% of the three major networks’ broadcasts.

Around 60 million.

The execution photo of a handcuffed Viet Cong guerrilla shot by South Vietnam’s police chief Nguyễn Ngọc Loan.

Eddie Adams of the Associated Press.

It showed a public, non-trial killing by a South Vietnamese official, broadcast without censorship.

As the enemy’s “last gasp” that the U.S. had survived and defeated.

The U.S. moved from “search and destroy” operations to “population security,” focusing on defending cities.

Defensive strategy meant fewer casualties, which could reduce anti-war sentiment in the U.S.

They were expected to conduct most offensive operations.

Clark Clifford.

Westmoreland wanted escalation and more troops; Clifford wanted de-escalation and strategic withdrawal.

He traveled to Vietnam himself and produced a televised special concluding the war was a “stalemate” requiring negotiation.

“If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost Middle America.”

139 members sponsored a resolution demanding a full review of U.S. Vietnam policy.

It fell to 26%.

Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota.

He lost but received 42% of the vote, shocking Johnson.

Robert F. Kennedy.

His Treasury Secretary warned that major tax increases were required to fund both the Great Society and the war.

206,000 more troops.

Sending them would require even larger tax increases or cuts to domestic programs.

He refused to send the 206,000 additional troops.

He was reassigned (promoted) to Army Chief of Staff and replaced in Vietnam.

To explain the new direction of U.S. strategy and present a path toward peace negotiations.

“I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party for another term as your President.”

Partial bombing halt, transfer of more fighting to South Vietnam, and pursuit of negotiations with North Vietnam.

He announced a halt to the bombing of North Vietnam and expressed willingness to pursue peace negotiations.

Over 21,000 Americans had been killed in action by that date.

Over 58,000 names are on the Wall.

Three days after the speech, Hanoi said they were open to negotiations.

Formal talks began on May 13, 1968.

They believed Johnson, now a lame duck, would become desperate and offer more concessions if talks were delayed.

He halted bombing in North Vietnam but escalated bombing in South Vietnam, dropping over one million tons of bombs in 1968.

They felt excluded because negotiations were mainly between Washington and Hanoi, even though it was their land and future at stake.

Difficulty identifying the enemy, since Viet Cong looked indistinguishable from friendly South Vietnamese civilians.

They believed My Lai was infiltrated by Viet Cong sympathizers and ordered it to be “neutralized.”

Lieutenant William Calley commanded Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment.

They fired on anything in sight, killing civilians, livestock, women, and children.

Over 500 civilians were killed.

Some refused to fire on unarmed civilians because it violated their moral conscience.

Helicopter pilot Hugh Thompson landed between villagers and soldiers and threatened to fire on Charlie Company if they continued shooting civilians.

He reported 128 deaths instead of the actual ~500.

Only three rifles were recovered.

It was covered up for over a year and a half, until November 1969.

Seymour Hersh exposed the massacre and published interviews and articles.

Army photographer Ron Haeberle photographed the massacre, using his personal color camera to avoid Army control.

He was convicted of premeditated murder, sentenced to life, reduced to 20 years, and released after 10.

Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated April 4, 1968, and Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in June 1968.

Chicago saw mass protests involving antiwar, civil rights, women’s rights, and environmental activists.

He mobilized over 25,000 police and National Guard troops to maintain order.

Television coverage focused on violent clashes in the streets instead of events inside the convention hall.

They felt he was simply an extension of Johnson and lacked the fresh energy Robert Kennedy represented.

He claimed to have a “secret plan” to end the war but would not reveal it because “then it wouldn’t be a secret.”

She was a Republican liaison who communicated with South Vietnam’s President Thieu and urged him to sabotage late-stage peace efforts to help Nixon.

He announced an unconditional halt to all bombing in Vietnam, North and South.

Richard Nixon won with 301 electoral votes.

George Wallace, former Alabama governor who opposed civil rights reforms.

They believed his legacy depended on restarting negotiations and possibly beginning U.S. troop withdrawals.

A prolonged debate over the shape of the negotiating table—rectangular, square, round, or combined.

One round table in the center with two square tables on either side for the delegations.

Over 14,500 Americans were killed in 1968.

Over 30,000 Americans had been killed in action by the end of the year.

“We will not make the same old mistakes in Vietnam. We will make our own.”

He said he believed the war could be ended in six months.

He sought an independent, non-communist South Vietnam while reducing U.S. troop presence.

Over 540,000 U.S. troops were deployed in South Vietnam.

Drawing down U.S. troops while shifting combat responsibility to the ARVN.

Enemy infiltration from the Ho Chi Minh Trail had to be stopped to prevent resupply of North Vietnamese troops.

A 1969 operation targeting the A Shau Valley to cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

Hill 937, later known as Hamburger Hill.

About 400 members of the 101st Airborne Division.

North Vietnamese forces were deeply entrenched with fortified bunkers across the hillside.

Ten separate assaults over ten days.

About 450 casualties, including nearly 100 killed.

Over 250 airstrikes and more than 500 tons of bombs were dropped on the hill.

U.S. forces abandoned it, and the NVA reoccupied it without resistance.

They were outraged and confused, seeing it as senseless loss of life for no meaningful gain.

Life magazine published photos of 242 Americans killed in one week of fighting.

Support for the war fell below 40% for the first time.

He escalated bombing against North Vietnam, including strikes in Hanoi and Haiphong.

Cambodia and Laos were bombed to hit North Vietnamese sanctuaries.

A New York Times reporter revealed the secret bombings.

He ordered wiretaps on government employees suspected of leaking information.

The “plumbers,” whose creation later tied into Watergate.

A covert strategy to deliver massive blows against North Vietnam—potentially even nuclear weapons.

Richard Nixon told Henry Kissinger to convene it.

To plan a savage, punishing blow against North Vietnam.

The Ho Chi Minh Trail in Cambodia and major North Vietnamese cities like Hanoi and Haiphong.

The potential use of tactical nuclear weapons.

News arrived that Ho Chi Minh had died on September 2, 1969.

Lê Duẩn was running the government while Ho Chi Minh was a symbolic leader.

A mass grassroots protest movement demanding an end to the war.

The Moratorium to End the War.

Over a quarter of a million protesters.

Coretta Scott King.

He called them anarchists and communist sympathizers.

His Vietnamization speech.

A “credibility gap” between government statements and actual facts.

He emphasized casualties, troop numbers, stalled negotiations, and blamed LBJ for the crisis.

He argued it would betray allies and damage America’s global credibility.

Vietnamization.

Primary responsibility for ground fighting (manpower).

Air support, economic assistance, and military aid.

That the U.S. intended a complete withdrawal of combat forces in the future.

He said the enemy would simply wait them out.

The “great silent majority.”

He announced that 60,000 troops would be withdrawn by the end of the year.

Pro-Nixon patriotic rallies began to replace anti-war protest coverage.

That the campus was patriotic and free of anti-war protests.

General Creighton Abrams.

Shifted from search-and-destroy to targeting enemy logistics and the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

Because the Ho Chi Minh Trail continued sending men and supplies into South Vietnam.

He was overthrown in a CIA-involved coup and replaced by Lon Nol.

He would not fiercely object to U.S. operations against the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

The Parrot’s Beak and the Fishhook.

ARVN forces, with U.S. air support.

About thirty miles.

April 30, 1970.

The attacks were beginning only about an hour and a half after the speech.

He said it was needed to protect U.S. troops and ensure Vietnamization succeeded.

“Incursion.”

Withdraw and not occupy the territory.

A massive reignition of the anti-war movement.

Over 450 campuses.

Kent State University in Ohio.

Administrators feared unrest and asked the governor for support.

With live ammunition and little crowd-control training.

Guardsmen fired ~70 rounds in 15 seconds, killing four students and wounding others.

Two students were simply walking to class.

University at Buffalo and Jackson State University.

Shut down campus and ordered all students off campus within 24 hours.

The Senate voted to terminate the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

A plan calling for complete U.S. withdrawal by the end of 1971.

With disdain and the creation of the Houston Plan.

To authorize CIA, FBI, and NSA surveillance, mail-opening, and burglaries against suspected “enemies.”

Congressmen seeking oversight, the media, and anti-war protestors.

About 27 miles—three miles short of their target.

It resembled earlier political decisions where gains were abandoned.

20,000 weapons, 2,000 tons of ammunition, and 700 tons of rice.

About 1,100 U.S./ARVN troops killed and roughly 14,000 enemy killed.

Deeper national division and rising fear that Nixon might be a one-term president.

Because they demanded that the U.S. fully withdraw from Cambodia before any talks resumed and used U.S. domestic backlash to pressure Nixon.

Turning the ground war over to ARVN while the U.S. shifted to mainly air support.

More missions meant more pilots were being shot down and captured as POWs.

Rescue 50–55 American POWs believed to be held at the Sơn Tây camp.

Because the POWs had been moved before the raid.

It forced North Vietnam to consolidate POWs into central prisons, boosting POW morale and limiting vulnerability to future raids.

As major bargaining chips, knowing the U.S. could not secure peace without recovering them.

They were temporarily given clean clothes and food for staged photos, which were reclaimed immediately afterward.

His reelection campaign was approaching, and he needed visible progress in the war.

To invade Laos and disrupt the northern section of the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

To use its airstrip as a base for supporting ARVN’s advance along Highway 9.

It was the only major road wide enough for military equipment and led directly to Tchepone.

They were stopped by 20,000–40,000 NVA troops massed at the Laotian border.

Hueys took heavy fire, seven were shot down, rescue circling exposed more aircraft, and some helicopters never deployed their ARVN troops.

Intense U.S. bombing runs that cleared Highway 9.

The NVA had removed all supplies before withdrawing, leaving the town empty.

They launched constant daily attacks, turning the withdrawal into a near-rout.

Because ARVN inflicted roughly three times as many casualties as they suffered, despite needing U.S. air support.

Despite troop withdrawals, the public viewed the war as a continuing failure and grew war-weary.

Their participation—combat veterans protesting in uniform—gave the antiwar movement new credibility.

That the U.S. had no direct interest in South Vietnam, the war was corrupt and immoral, statistics were falsified, and men were dying for a “mistake.”

The full extent of the My Lai massacre and its cover-up.

Top secret documents leaked by Daniel Ellsberg showing JFK and LBJ had misled the public about the Vietnam War.

He feared leaks would expose his own covert abuses and political secrets.

A 6–3 decision allowing publication because the government failed to show grave, irreparable harm.

To “plug leaks” by discrediting critics and preventing further exposure of administration secrets.

Nixon’s paranoia about leaks escalated covert operations, eventually resulting in the Watergate break-in.

71% believed entering Vietnam was a mistake, 58% called the war immoral, and Nixon’s approval fell to 31%.

He needed a diplomatic breakthrough to be reelected in 1972.

Release of all POWs in exchange for full U.S. troop withdrawal within seven months—but without requiring NVA withdrawal from South Vietnam.

It allowed North Vietnamese troops to remain in South Vietnam, leaving ARVN vulnerable once the U.S. withdrew.

POWs would be released only after all U.S. forces withdrew and all U.S. aid to the Thieu government ended.

It abandoned South Vietnam and guaranteed rapid collapse, violating Nixon’s demand for “peace with honor.”

He told Kissinger the U.S. could “solve its problems” by assassinating President Thieu.

They believed domestic U.S. political pressure would prevent Nixon from deploying more American troops.

Across the DMZ near Dong Ha, in the Central Highlands (Kontum/Pleiku), and west of Saigon.

It focused on three concentrated fronts and relied on regular NVA forces, not Viet Cong.

Massive B-52 strikes, attacks on the DMZ, and strikes around Hanoi and Haiphong.

Immediate withdrawal, continued negotiations, or decisive military action.

He argued it would abandon South Vietnam and encourage global communist aggression.

Mining North Vietnamese ports, cutting rail links from China, and continuing air and naval strikes.

Return of all American POWs and a ceasefire.

He claimed he was not expanding but ending the war, and that North Vietnam had escalated every time the U.S. proposed peace.

The North Vietnamese Army (NVA), whose numbers were in the thousands rather than tens of thousands by that point.

Across the DMZ including Dong Ha, into the Central Highlands including Kontum, and down through the Parrot’s Beak into the Mekong Delta.

They were surprised by the speed and magnitude of the invasion.

He approved B-52 strikes along the DMZ and expanded bombing to fuel depots near Hanoi and Haiphong.

Fuel depots around Hanoi and Haiphong, the railroad links from China to North Vietnam, and the mining of Haiphong Harbor.

He said the U.S. would completely withdraw from Vietnam within four months once POWs were released and a cease-fire began.

Seven months.

“We must go for broke… punish the enemy and stop at nothing to bring him to his knees.”

He said he would approve bombing important targets “even if it risks civilian casualties,” though he denied targeting civilians indiscriminately.

Both urged restraint, not wanting the war to escalate into a nuclear conflict.

They viewed bombing as more acceptable than sending more ground troops because it meant fewer U.S. casualties.

His Easter Offensive response appeared forceful, and Democrats nominated the very liberal, antiwar Senator George McGovern.

Operation Linebacker.

112,000 tons in that single month.