Vietnam War

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I havn't seen any recent Vietnam discussion topics, so I thought I would pose the question that has been asked since the US pulled out of South Vietnam:

Could the war have been won? And if so, how?

Also, a question of mine: Why wasn't North Vietnam invaded(by ground troops)? Was it feared the Communist Block would interfere if North Vietnam was inavded?

 

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The second question is easily answered: yes, there was the fear of escalation into a World War, same reason why the UN (or US) didn't cross the Yalu river during the Korean War.

The first one is more difficult to answer. In my opinion the answer is no, because it was a conflict that should have been approached with a more sophisticated political attitude on the US part. But it was seen as a purely military affair. When political approaches were tried, they usually backfired, like the "strategic hamlets" and "Operation Phoenix".

 

[Aetius]

I don't think the US could have won it for the same reason they lost in China. They were supporting a corrupt regime against non-corrupt nationalists, e.g. the South Vietnam army officers sold the supplies meant for their troops. How is an army like that going to win?

 

[TeutonicKnight]

Could the war have been won? And if so, how?

As it was, No. Thats like saying, could Russia have beaten Germany if they stopped at pre-Barbarossa borders. A lot of Anti-Americans use Vietnam to show that America can be defeated. Sure, the whole world could have been defeated by North Vietnam if they never had fear of invasion. There were more rules to the Vietnam war than in a Highschool chess match, it was ludicrious to have even attempted to fight under such duress.

People often compare Russias falter in Afghanistan as "Russia's Vietnam" you can't even begin to compare the two. Russia could invade and did, could conduct war in a mode in which they saw fit and just, as they had no restrictions such as America in Vietnam.

So much has been said of the Viet-Cong that one who has minimal knowledge of the subject would think they single handely whipped the American imperialists. The cold hard fact was that after the large lossess after Tet, the Viet-Cong were a spent force. The NVA, while not as bad off as the VC, were still considered a viable opponent.

The single biggest opponent in America's fight in Vietnam was America. Propaganda was the best weapon North Vietnam possessed, outside of jane fonda(notice no caps, as she desrves none).

I remember watching a special on A&E about Vietnam and a fighter-bomber pilot said "he couldn't believe the stupidity that was involved in conducting that war" he was telling the interviewer about bombing a railway junction in Hanoi, but he couldn't bomb the SAM's that were sitting adjacent to an area deemed off limites. He said it was hard knowing just a quick burst of MG fire would destroy the SAM's, but they were left alone and were probably the same ones that shot him down a few weeks later.

 

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Originally posted by TeutonicKnight


As it was, No. Thats like saying, could Russia have beaten Germany if they stopped at pre-Barbarossa borders. A lot of Anti-Americans use Vietnam to show that America can be defeated. Sure, the whole world could have been defeated by North Vietnam if they never had fear of invasion. There were more rules to the Vietnam war than in a Highschool chess match, it was ludicrious to have even attempted to fight under such duress.

People often compare Russias falter in Afghanistan as "Russia's Vietnam" you can't even begin to compare the two. Russia could invade and did, could conduct war in a mode in which they saw fit and just, as they had no restrictions such as America in Vietnam.

So much has been said of the Viet-Cong that one who has minimal knowledge of the subject would think they single handely whipped the American imperialists. The cold hard fact was that after the large lossess after Tet, the Viet-Cong were a spent force. The NVA, while not as bad off as the VC, were still considered a viable opponent.

The single biggest opponent in America's fight in Vietnam was America. Propaganda was the best weapon North Vietnam possessed, outside of jane fonda(notice no caps, as she desrves none).

I remember watching a special on A&E about Vietnam and a fighter-bomber pilot said "he couldn't believe the stupidity that was involved in conducting that war" he was telling the interviewer about bombing a railway junction in Hanoi, but he couldn't bomb the SAM's that were sitting adjacent to an area deemed off limites. He said it was hard knowing just a quick burst of MG fire would destroy the SAM's, but they were left alone and were probably the same ones that shot him down a few weeks later.

As a Marxist, I can tell you that no one who knows anything about Vietnam thinks that the VC and the NVA defeated the US. It is obvious that it was won by the domestic opposition to the war, to the mobillization of students, the feeling of working-class and the poor, of Blacks and Hispanics that the war had no honorable objective but propping up a puppet, corrupt regime and that they were the cannon-fodder. That's why there were some 200 clandestine publications against the war published by members of the American armed forces in Vietnam.

Truly, without the solidarity of the American people, the Vietnamese would have been defeated.

 

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I can tell you from first hand experience that the loss of the war in Vietnam was absolutely NOT solely because of domestic factors.

A lot of guys felt at the time, and still feel, that the war over there was lost because the United States did not bother to try. This was obvious at the time, regardless of the reasons why, and this killed morale.

Add this to the fact that our own guys were constantly trying to deal us drugs, prostitutes, gambling, and shady shit in general and it became fairly obvious to the grunt in a hurry that the whole war had nothing to do with winning.

I was in Da Nang on a stop over during the Tet offensive in 68, and I can tell you that despite the fact that the NVA "lost" that battle, the morale of everyone around me was absolutely devastated -- especially in light of the so-called democratic regime we were defending in Saigon.

 

[Aetius]

I think that the initial question needs some qualification, the war was between North and South Vietnam. The sides were supported by repective cold war block. The fact that the US was forced to basically run the war instead of the South Vietnamese speaks volumes about the weakness of the South Vietnamese government.
I would think the difference between the South Vietnamese army's attitude and the NVA would be the big difference in the conflict. The US was in the war to help South Vietnam and the South Vietnamese Army against insurgents from the north.
If SVA were as well motivated and led as the NVA, they should have been able to beat them, but they were not. The South Vietnamese government was not particularly successful with dealing with the factors that helped the VC recruit either.

 

[unmerged(4783)]

Originally posted by Aetius
I think that the initial question needs some qualification, the war was between North and South Vietnam. The sides were supported by repective cold war block. The fact that the US was forced to basically run the war instead of the South Vietnamese speaks volumes about the weakness of the South Vietnamese government.
I would think the difference between the South Vietnamese army's attitude and the NVA would be the big difference in the conflict. The US was in the war to help South Vietnam and the South Vietnamese Army against insurgents from the north.
If SVA were as well motivated and led as the NVA, they should have been able to beat them, but they were not. The South Vietnamese government was not particularly successful with dealing with the factors that helped the VC recruit either.

You point out an important element, but you leave out the fact that without superpower intervention (US/SU), Ho Chi Minh would have ruled that country from 1945 on. It was only the ambivalent American position after Roosevelt's death which allowed the French to return and fail. By the end of the French presence on Vietnam, the US was footing the entire bill of the war for the French government.

 

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My Uncle did a swing in 'Nam in '66. He said the worst thing he ever saw, and he always scrathced his head over it, was the fact that on at least two occasions, on a search and destroy, they had Vietnamese surrounded, and when they radioed back for orders, they were told to open their ranks and allow the Vietnamese to escape. My Uncle never understood why this happenned, but became convinced that the government didn't want to win, just keep the military budget high.

 

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It is well-known that Americans won absolutely all the major engagements against the VC and the NVA, heck, American dead were 58,000 versus at least 2 million Vietnamese. That's better than a 34:1 ratio.

In a war the problem is not, as Patton famously said, to kill the other bastard, but to win. The Vietnamese were willing to win if it took them 50 years, the Americans obviously weren't.

 

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ah, I thought the Vietnam War was a US military victory, but a political defeat....

The points raised before are valid. you cannot win against the will of poeple... both at home and in the front....

 

[unmerged(469)]

Originally posted by Pirate Scum


You point out an important element, but you leave out the fact that without superpower intervention (US/SU), Ho Chi Minh would have ruled that country from 1945 on. It was only the ambivalent American position after Roosevelt's death which allowed the French to return and fail. By the end of the French presence on Vietnam, the US was footing the entire bill of the war for the French government.

An old wives tale of modern history I've picked up is that the French basically used their Marshall Plan money in Nam. Know anything about this?

 

[Dark Knight]

Originally posted by Admiral Yi

An old wives tale of modern history I've picked up is that the French basically used their Marshall Plan money in Nam. Know anything about this?

That's a bit of misnomer. The French didn't have to use their Marshall Plan money in Vietnam because they were given huge amounts of money by the US directly for their war effort. In 1950, this was only 15% of their spending on the war, but by 1954 it had reached 82%.

 

[Duque de Bragança]

Originally posted by Dark Knight

That's a bit of misnomer. The French didn't have to use their Marshall Plan money in Vietnam because they were given huge amounts of money by the US directly for their war effort. In 1950, this was only 15% of their spending on the war, but by 1954 it had reached 82%.

True, but the requested help by B-29s didn't came for Dien-Bien-Phu.
I think we had this conversation on this forum before

 

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Originally posted by BRYCON316
convinced that the government didn't want to win, just keep the military budget high.

interesting poitn of view. same as one of my fav. writers Joe Haldeman's experience in Nam... take that hill, defend that hill, then leave that hill, then retake it again, then defend it again, then leave it again, and then let ib be leveled by B-52...