CHAPTER 29

AMERICA DURING ITS LONGEST WAR, 1963-1975

STUDY GUIDE QUESTIONS

b.01

Important People

 

War Makers

 

Peace Makers

 

Protesters

 

Vietnamese

b.05

Vietnam & Japan

c.01

Port Huron Statement (1962)

d.01

The Vietnam Era and the US Economy

d.04

Gold Crisis, 1968

e.01

Foreign Policy and Withdrawal from Vietnam

[b.1]

THE WAR MAKERS

LYNDON BAINES JOHNSON, president 1963-1968

Johnson became US president after the assassination of JFK. LBJ dreamed of a "Great Society" in which all groups of people benefited from American prosperity. His connections in Congress brought about passage of sweeping legislation such as the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO), which was designed to jump start the poor. Unfortunately, LBJ also tried to fight the Vietnam War. One historian said that Vietnam ruined Johnson because he faced an "enemy he could not understand, a client he could not manage (meaning South Vietnam), and political forces he could not control" (the antiwar movement). During the war, LBJ was willing to:

  • Bomb selected targets in North Vietnam
  • Send US ground forces
  • Supply the Republic of South Vietnam with weapons and economic assistance.

Johnson was not willing to:

  • Bomb Hanoi or Haipong (feared China would enter the war).
  • Raise taxes
  • Call up reserves or National Guard.
  • Antagonize the American political right by unilateral withdrawal from Vietnam.

Like most his advisors, LBJ despised communists. Until 1968, LBJ escalated the war, hoping to achieve a military victory in Vietnam. He always said he did not want to be the first president to lose a war. In the end, however, Vietnam, as in the case of Richard Nixon, ruined the president. After the TET Offensive LBJ announced he would halt "ROLLING THUNDER," open negotiations with North Vietnam, and not seek reelection as president.

Johnson agonized over the war. Listen to him talk to students in 1965.

RICHARD MILHOUS NIXON (1913-1993)

President of the US, 1969-1974. Nixon campaigned in 1968 promising "peace and honor" in ending the war in Vietnam. After winning the election, he and Kissinger implemented their plan for a US withdrawal. The plan, know as the "Nixon Doctrine" or "Vietnamization", contained 6 important features:

 

  • Nguyen Thieu's government would remain in power.
  • American ground forces to be slowly withdrawn.
  • American withdrawal must not look like a defeat.
  • No coalition government with the Vietcong.
  • Exchange of all POW's.
  • All North Vietnamese troops must withdraw from SV before the US would terminate support of SV.

Nixon and Kissinger, aware of declining US economic strength and its inability to win in Vietnam, sought detente with the USSR. Nixon also visited China. Historians argue he was trying to weaken Chinese support for North Vietnam by offering China trade concessions. Equally plausible is the straightforward view that Cold War containment was becoming to costly, and that better relations with the USSR and PRC might reduce costly defense expenditures.

Vietnamization did not end the war. Of the 56,000 deaths in Vietnam, about 25,000 occurred after Nixon took office. In an attempt to bolster SV before the US got out, Nixon ordered attacks on Communist sanctuaries in Cambodia in 1970. Protest wracked the country as it appeared Nixon was turning the fighting from a Vietnam war into a general Indochina war. In 1972, Nixon ordered the infamous "Christmas Bombing" of Hanoi to make it look like his "Mad Man" approach had forced North Vietnam to accept Paris Accords. Nixon, paranoid of the antiwar movement, began employing illegal methods in an attempt to suppress his political enemies. He overstepped himself in the Watergate scandal and resigned from office 8 August 1974.

GENERAL WILLIAM C. WESTMORELAND

Westmoreland was the Commander of Military Assistance Command--Vietnam (MACV) from 1964-1968. Westmoreland authorized "search & destroy" missions in an effort to lure the VC and NVA into battle where US firepower could annihilate them. As late as December 1967, he insisted that the US was winning the war. The January 1968 TET offensive was Westmoreland's downfall. The ferocity of the Vietcong attacks shocked Americans who had been led to believe victory was just around the corner. General Creighton Abrahm replaced Westmoreland in July 1968. Westmoreland became Army Chief of Staff.

MELVIN LAIRD (b.1922)

Melvin Laird was Nixon's first Secretary of Defense, 1969-1972. Nixon chose him because of his congressional contacts. Kissinger wanted to limit Laird' influence with Nixon because Laird immediately called for troop reductions in Vietnam. Kissinger, who prided himself on old-fashioned diplomacy, rejected rapid withdrawal because it would hurt his bargaining power at the Paris Peace talks. Laird, whose son John was an antiwar activist, understood the antiwar movement, noting that Americans no longer cared if the US won in Vietnam or not--it just wanted out. But Nixon did not end the war soon enough. Laird opposed these Nixon initiatives:

  • Cambodian incursion (1970).
  • mining of Haipong Harbor, North Vietnam.
  • B-52 strikes against the North.

Laird introduced the lottery draft, a system which limited a young-man's draftable status to 1 year. Under Laird's influence, Nixon began announcing troop withdrawals. Laird left Nixon's cabinet in 1972.

ROBERT McNAMARA

Robert McNamara was Secretary of Defense for JFK and LBJ from 1961-1968. McNamara was one of the most influential figures of the Vietnam War. He had undying faith in a technological solution to the war. "Systems Analysis" theory, as applied in Vietnam, proposed that if you kill x number of enemy troops and drop x number of bombs, it will all add up to victory. This thinking spawned one of the most repulsive aspects of the Vietnam War: the body count. In an effort to halt the flow of supplies down the Ho Chi Minh trail, McNamara even proposed building an electronic fence across the 17th parallel.

By 1966 McNamra became skeptical of the US war effort. He visited Vietnam 8 times. After seeing the ineffectiveness of bombing and the corruption of the SV government, McNamara began advocating a negotiated end to the war. When he realized his defense chief no longer had a stomach for the war, President Johnson released him and him president of the World Bank.

In 1993, McNamara wrote his personal memoir Reflections. He stunned America by saying US policy in Vietnam was misguided from the start.

DEAN RUSK (d.1994)

Dean Rusk was JFK's & LBJ's Secretary of State from 1960-1969. He died in 1992 as an unrepentant war hawk and Cold War warrior, believing to the end that the bombing and killing in Vietnam were in the interests of the US as long as it ended in a communist defeat. Ignoring the antiwar movement and the "Wise Men" he urged LBJ to continue the war. Rusk was disappointed when Johnson announced he would not seek reelection in 1968. When he left office, he sought a job as a university professor. No major university even considered him except the University of Georgia, where he remained until his death.

JOHN FOSTER DULLES (d.1959)

John Foster Dulles was Eisenhower's Secretary of State from 1953-1959. He was the classic Cold War warrior. He believed the US was locked in a moral struggle against the USSR & China. His use of words like "massive retaliation", "agonizing reappraisal", and "brinkmanship" alarmed critics.

When the North Vietnamese surrounded the French at Dien Ben Phu, Dulles and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Arthur Radford, advocated the use of American airpower to save the French army. Eisenhower rejected the advice. At the Geneva talks (1954), Dulles acted like a child. He grimaced his face, kept his arms folded tightly to his chest, and refused to shake hands with North Vietnamese or Chinese officials. Dulles agreed to a nation-wide election in Vietnam in 1956, but when it was obvious Ho would get 80-90% of the vote, he gladly went along with a National Security Council recommendation to renig.

Dulles formed SEATO in 1954, but this organization was unsuccessful in building a solid anti-communist block in southeast Asia. Dulles died of cancer in May 1959.

WILLIAM McBUNDY

Info added soon.

THE PEACE MAKERS

WILLIAM J. FULBRIGHT (b.1905)

Fulbright was a close friend of LBJ and headed the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee. In 1964, Fulbright was instrumental in passing the Tonkin Gulf Resolution. As the war progressed, however, Fulbright's views changed. Fulbright accused LBJ of confusing Vietnamese communism with Vietnamese nationalism. Fulbright's public hearing on the war gave critics a high-profile forum to express their views. Fulbright returned to his private law practice in 1974.

EUGENE McCARTHY (b.1916)

McCarthy, a Minnesota senator, ran against Hubert Humphrey for the Democratic nomination in 1968. McCarthy was not a forceful personality, but he campaigned on a platform of negotiated settlement in the Vietnam. The war, he contended, had drawn America away from its real problems: racism and poverty. Youthful "Kids for McCarthy" stumped enthusiastically for their man. His strong showing in the New Hampshire primary prompted JFK to enter the race. While police and students were battling each other in the streets of Chicago, the Democratic "machine" nominated Humphrey. Like Abraham Lincoln in 1860, Humphrey was elected "under armed guard." McCarthy left the senate in 1970.

DANIEL ELLSBERG (b.1931)

Ellsberg graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University. In 1964 he became one of the Washington "Whiz Kids", writing speeches and doing research in the McNamara defense establishment. As time passed, Ellsberg became a closet antiwar activist. In 1969 he began leaking copies of a classified Pentagon study to Fulbright and the New York Times. The study detailed how the administration had lied to the American people about Vietnam. With the help of a supreme court ruling, the papers were published as the Pentagon Papers in 1971. Nixon suspected Ellsburg and ordered his "plumbers" to break into the office of Ellsbergs psychiatrist to get evidence on him. It was a move that ultimately led to Watergate.

HENRY KISSINGER (b.1923)

Kissinger negotiated the Paris Peace Accord (1973) while acting first as Nixon's National Security Advisor, then as his Secretary of State. In the final agreement, Kissinger and Le Duc Tho agreed that :

  • South Vietnamese communists (NLF) would participate in South's government.
  • NVA troops could remain in positions in the South.
  • US twould halt bombing of North Vietnam.
  • Thieu government could remain in power for the time being.

Kissinger, like George Kennan, was a realist. His book Nuclear War and Foreign Policy (1957) articulated that nuclear weapons, used in a limited way, should be integrated in national strategy. Kissinger did not want to end the war in Vietnam for humanitarian or moral reasons. He wanted to build better relations with the USSR. In 1972 Kissinger negotiated the SALT I agreement, which limited nuclear weapons.

THE "WISEMEN"

The Wise Men were a group of elder statesmen convened by LBJ to advise him about the Vietnam War. Some of the Wise Men included:

  • George Kennan
  • Dean Acheson
  • Robert Lovett
  • Abe Fortas
  • Paul Nitze
  • Averell Harriman
  • Charles Bohlen
  • John McCloy

In a dramatic meeting 25 March 1968, the Wise Men told LBJ to quit the Vietnam War.

THE PROTESTERS

TOM HAYDEN (b. 1940)

In 1962, Tom Hayden, an articulate college student, drafted the Port Huron Statement, which launched the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS, or "New Left". Hayden and other like-minded students wanted to reform American society. The subsequent course of Hayden's life follows the fortunes of SDS. By 1968, Hayden was an avowed radical. He, Rennie Davis, Abbie Hoffman, and others leaders of the National Mobilization Committee stood trial as the "Chicago 7" for disturbances at the Democratic Convention. Their goal had been to draw America's attention to the undemocratic nature of US political system. Hayden married Jane Fonda. In 1980 California elected him as one of its US congressmen.

Read the first 3 paragraphs and the closing paragraph of the Port Huron Statement. Are you satisfied with the world the way it is?

ABBIE HOFFMAN (b. 1936-1989?)

Hoffman was the founder of the Youth International Party ("Yippies"). Educated at Brandies University, Hoffman got started in activism by opposing capital punishment in 1960. In 1964 he joined SNCC and participated in voter registration campaigns. He later joined the counterculture movement. His intention was to expose the hypocrisy of mainstream American values and to have fun while doing it. He once threw dollar bills down on the floor of the Stock Exchange and laughed while brokers scrambled for them. As a radical antiwar protester, he was one of the "Chicago 7" in 1968.

In 1973 Hoffman was arrested for selling cocaine. In 1986 he was working for Radio Free America.

DAVID DELLINGER (b. 1915)

Dellinger has been an activist his entire life. In 1942 he was jailed for refusing induction under the Selective Service and Training Act. In 1965, Dellinger coordinated the 5th Avenue Parade in NYC, the first major demonstration against the growing war in Vietnam. As chairman of the National Mobilization Committee to End the War In Vietnam, Dellinger organized the famous Pentagon demonstration in October 1967. He contacted North Vietnamese officials and gained the release of 6 US POW's. He stood trial as one of the "Chicago 7", though he did not advocate the type of rabble rousing Hayden, Hoffman, and Davis did. To this day, Dellinger has not give up the struggle against war and remains as idealistic as ever.

CORA WEISS

Wiess headed a national organization of middle class housewives called WOMEN'S STRIKE FOR PEACE (WSP). Their purpose was to protest the Vietnam War. The following is a list of some of their activities:

  • protested the sale of war toys.
  • arranged guest speakers, including antiwar senators Gruenig and Morse.
  • An 82-year old WSP activist burned herself to death in protest of the war.
  • passed out leaflets and went door-to-door.
  • Call-in campaigns to the president.
  • 10 WSP activists visited mothers in Hanoi in bond of friendship and concern.

Most WSP activists did not consider themselves feminists.

THE VIETNAMESE

HO CHI MINH (1890-1969)

Leader of North Vietnam and guiding light in Vietam's struggle for independence and unification. More of a nationalist than a communist, Ho successful expelled 3 successive foreigners occupying his country: Japan, France, and the US. He once predicted that the Vietnamese would lose many more men in the struggle, but that in the end it would make no difference: Vietnam would be free. He died before the war ended.

NGO DINH DIEM (1901-1963)

The mandarin ruler of SV from 1957-1963. Diem was catholic, a nationalist, and anticommunist. Diem was hated in his country and is best described as a "brilliant incompetent." That he lasted as long as he did was amazing. Forcing peasants off their land and into protected "Strategic Hamlets", alienation of the Buddhists, and government corruption caused his downfall. The US looked the other way when Diem's generals murdered him in an armored car, in November 1963.

NGUYEN THIEU (1923- )

Leader of South Vietnam, 1965-75. As an infantry commander, Thieu fought in the French army against the Vietminh. The Thieu-Ky combination was far from ideal, but the US reluctantly supported them. Like all other regimes in South Vietnam during the massive 25-year nation building effort, corruption and incompetence marred the Thieu government. His relative success depended on 2 factors: he prevented the military from mounting a coup, and maintained the confidence of the US, upon whose dollars Thieu ultimately depended. Thieu opposed the 1972 peace accord, claiming the US had abandoned Vietnam.

VO GIAP (1912- )

Giap was the military leader of the Viet Minh (who fought against the French), and later of the North Vietnamese communists. His spectacular victory against the French at Dien Bien Phu (1954) shocked the world and won independence for North Vietnam. Although Giap's Tet Offensive (1968) virtually destroyed the Vietcong, The North won a dramatic political victory by waking America up to the fact that the war was far from over. When Giap's 1972 invasion of SV failed he was replaced by Van Tien Dung. In 1980 Giap retired as the minister of defense of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

[b.5]

VIETNAM & JAPAN

World systems theorists argue the US entered Vietnam to safeguard on of Japan's historica markets. The Japanese, hard-pressed to earn dollars during the 1950's, need to earn money in the non-dollar area. If Japan could obtain raw materials and sell its manufactured products in its own backyard (western Pacific), then it could convert this money to US dollars and buy our goods. Everyone would benefit.

Andrew Rotter, a historian, argues that before the French defeat at Dien Ben Phu (1954), the US upheld French colonialism in Vietnam to make sure France had a market. It violated the principle of decolonization, which was one of FDR's war aims, but the US felt French reconstruction was more important.

ome historians argue that the US entered Vietnam to protect the world system of international trade, finance, and manufacturing. World system theorists divide the world into 3 zones:

  • core
  • 2nd world
  • periphery (or 3d world)

Crucial to the maintenance of this system is a hegemon. The US occupied that role from 1945-1973. A hegmon possesses enough military and economic strength to ensure the stability of the system. No part of the system can be written off without a fight. Credibility and market access for sister core nations force the hegemon to fight against revolutionary nationalism or communism to ensure the integrity of the system.

[d.1]

THE US ECONOMY AND THE VIETNAM ERA

The Twin money suckers of the Vietnam War and Johnson's Great Society were too much for the American economy to bear. Of the two, the Vietnam War consumed a greater portion of the annual Federal budget (about $25 billion vs. $2 billion). Paul Kennedy, in his best selling book, The Rise and Fall of Great Powers (1987), shows that American hegemony had come to an end around 1970: Signs of ebbing US hegemony are listed below:

  • Japan achieved a favorable balance of trade with the US, which means Japan exported more to us than we exported to them.
  • Inflation and the accompanying Gold Crisis ruined the dollar as a stable unit of international exchange. See "Gold Crisis" diagram below.
  • In 1973, the OPEC oil embargo struck, paralyzing the nation and revealing our slavish dependence on Middle East oil.

The rapid growth that marked the US economy beginning in 1950 began to slow down around 1965. In 1979 growth stopped all together. The US has experienced short recoveries since 1980 but has never regained the momentum lost during the 1960's and early '70's. The huge debt created during the 1980's has added to the economic challenge facing the United States today.

[d.4]

GOLD CRISIS

The Gold Crisis of 1968 was a major factor in the US withdrawal from Vietnam. The diagram below shows how gold left the US in amounts that caused alarm in the US goverment.

The Gold Crisis of '68 marked a major shift in global finanacial arrangements. In 1971, Nixon suspended gold payments to foreign nations redeeming in gold. In 1976, the US removed itself from the gold standard, ending the 30 year old Bretton Woods Agreement. Today, currencies are valued according to market forces, not by political agreement on the price of gold.

[e.1]

FOREIGN POLICY AND WITHDRAWAL FROM VIETNAM

The US withdrawal from Vietnam was forced by a variety if factors. The list below outlines the major developments.

  • The Nixon Doctrine called for Vietnamization. This meant the US would continue to supply air and naval support but the South Vietnamese Army would assume complete responsibility for the ground fighting.

     

  • Nixon and Kissinger wanted better relations with the USSR. By 1970, the Russia had acheived nuclear parity. The 1972 SALT I agreement put caps on the amount of nuclear warheads the US and USSR would build and deploy.

     

  • The US was concerned about Soviet influence in the Middle East. Ditching Vietnam was a way to make the Soviets show less interest in the oil rich region of the Middle East.

     

  • Nixon and Kissinger wanted better relations with China. If the US would get out of Vietnam, it was reasoned, may Peking would reduce its military support of Hanoi. That way South Vietnam would survive. Toward this end, Nixon visited China in 1972. Vietnam fell anyway in 1975, and in 1976 the US extended diplomatic recognition of the Peoples Republic of China.

     

  • The Gold Crisis and inflation caused the US to lose exports and gold.

     

  • Low morale, drugs, racial tension, and combat refusals were ruining military efficiency. The US pull-out of Vietnam was the first step in restoring the insitutional health of the armed forces.

     

  • Increasing numbers of Americans were buying into the arguments of the antiwar movement. From Congressmen to housewives, Americans accepted the fact that a communist victory in Indochina was an acceptable price to pay for a US pull-out.

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