Some questions to keep in mind:

1. Why was the "Domino Theory" an effective means of gaining political and popular support for American active involvement in foreign affairs?
2. Compare and contrast JFK and LBJ's specific reasons for increasing America's involvement in the Vietnam conflict.
3. How is the "Gulf of Tonkin" comnparable to today's "Weapons of Mass Destruction" argument?

The Wise Men: McGeorge Bundy and
John McCloy with President Lyndon B. Johnson, 09/21/1965,
National Archives and Records Administration

Costs of the Vietnam War to the United States

Economic Costs:

LBJ believed that the United States could simultaneously wage war and fulfill the goals of the Great Society. As it turned out, however, the United States, could not afford to invest in both "guns" and "butter." The war cost the United States more than $140 billion. Vietnam drained American coffers, took money away from Johnson's ambitious domestic programs, and undermined his ambitious Great Society.

Human Costs:

The war left 58,000 American soldiers dead and more than 300,000 wounded. Numerous American soldiers also returned home with crippling and long-lasting psychological wounds.

Consensus Costs:

The war also fractured American opinion about the role of the nation in world affairs. Before Vietnam, most Americans believed that the United States was a beacon of freedom the world-wide struggle against Communism. The results of the Vietnam War, however, exposed the foolishness of the argument that the United States could defend freedom around the globe. Vietnam shattered the long-held belief that American money and American technology could accomplish just about anything.

Moods: President Lyndon B. Johnson, Secretary of State Dean Rusk,
McGeorge Bundy in the Oval Office, 12/08/1964,
National Archives and Records Administration

How Did American Involvement in Southeast Asia Escalate?

1941: The Allies sign the Atlantic Charter, which states their post-war goals. The United States rejects colonialism and supports, at least in theory, the political self-determination of former colonies around the world. After WWII, however, some nations reestablish colonial power despite United States opposition.

1945: Vietnam declares its independence after 100 years of occupation by the Chinese, Japanese, and French. On September 2, 1945, Ho Chi Minh proclaims Vietnamese independence with a speech reminiscent of Thomas Jefferson's "Declaration of Independence."

1949: China, one of the major trading partners of the United States, becomes a Communist state. Many American anti-Communists refer to this event as the "fall" or "loss" of China.

1950: Dean Acheson states that the United States will concentrate on protecting a "Pacific Rim," extending from Japan to the Philippines, from Communist expansion. The Korean War begins on June 25, 1950. The United States never formally declares war. Although the war is officially declared a United Nations police action, nine out of every 10 policemen are Americans.

1953: The parties in the Korean conflict agree to a truce that reinstates the 38th parallel as the dividing line between North and South Korea. Other problems in Asia develop. Internal civil wars escalate in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam as these nations fight French colonialism.

1954: France continues to wage war to protect its colonial empire in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. For the first time, the United States begins to provide the French with economic and military aid. By 1954, the United States funds 75% of all the costs of a war the French had no realistic hope of ever winning. French generals make one last stand at Dien Bien Phu, a valley surrounded by Vietnamese artillery. The United States guarantees American air support, but domestic political concerns prevent Eisenhower from fulfilling this promise. After the fall of Dien Bien Phu, the Geneva Conference of 1954 agrees to resolve the problems of Southeast Asia in the following ways:

1. Make Laos and Cambodia independent countries.
2. Temporarily divide Vietnam at the 17th parallel.
3. Guarantee that North and South Vietnam would hold free elections in 1956 to reunite both countries under a single government.

1956: The United States prevents free elections from taking place in Vietnam. American leaders understand that free elections could only lead to Vietnam's reunification under Ho Chi Minh, a wildly popular Vietnamese political leader who had fought for national independence since before World War II. Ho Chi Minh was also a Communist who had spent time in Moscow. Although the United States have no direct evidence that he was a Kremlin puppet, American leaders treat him as such.

The Domino Theory: A theory which described the spread of Communism in terms of a row of dominos waiting to fall. The premise was that if Vietnam fell to communism, Laos and Cambodia would be next. Eventually Communism would reach the Philippines, and ultimately arrive on the shores of California.

1960: When John F. Kennedy enters the White House, just 780 American military advisors are in South Vietnam. Kennedy sends more advisors and, by the time of his assassination, the United States has more than 17,000 advisors in Vietnam to support the fragile regime of Ngo Dinh Diem.

Poll Question: "In view of developments since we entered the fighting in Vietnam, do you think the U.S. made a mistake sending troops to fight in Vietnam?"
DATE	PERCENT WHO SAID NO
August 1965	61
March 1966	59
May 1966	49
September 1966	48
November 1966	51
February 1967	52
May 1967	50
July 1967	48
October 1967	44
December 1967	46
February 1968	42
March 1968	41
April 1968	40
August 1968	35
October 1968	37
February 1969	39
October 1969	32
January 1970	33
April 1970	34
May 1970	36
January 1971	31
May 1971	28
Gallup polling on the Vietnam War 1965 - 1971		President Lyndon B. Johnson listens to tape sent by Captain Charles Robb, his son in-law, from Vietnam, 07/31/1968.

Why did JFK support the Vietnam War?

1. He wanted to reassert American military might following the Bay of Pigs Invasion, the Berlin Crisis, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

2. JFK was an ardent "Cold Warrior" who drew on the lessons of Britain's failed appeasement of Hitler at Munich in 1938 and who supported containment. He viewed North Vietnam as a communist aggressor and a Soviet pawn. In Kennedy's mind, containment depended on American support of South Vietnam against Northern aggression.

3. He supported "limited brushfire wars" in the age of a nuclear threat. Kennedy believed governments would have to develop mobile forces to deal with small international problems before they developed into global nuclear war. For this reason, he created the Special Forces, otherwise known as the Green Berets. Kennedy used Vietnam as a testing ground for his "new toys." On the morning of November 22, 1963, he spoke to his aides about his desire to experiment with new troops and weapons in South Vietnam.

1963: When Johnson becomes president after Kennedy's assassination, he stresses the importance of continuing JFK's foreign policies. On a 1962 fact-finding tour of Southeast Asia, Johnson visited Vietnam and felt that South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem was the "George Washington of Asia." For this reason, he supports the South Vietnamese. He wants to improve medical care, build schools, and create an Rural Electrification Administration, a sort of Tennessee Valley Authority, in Vietnam. Johnson said,

"I want to leave the footprints of America in Vietnam. We're going to turn Mekong Delta into the Tennessee Valley."

1964: Congress begins to debate United States involvement in Vietnam after North Vietnamese ships allegedly fire on American destroyers patrolling the Gulf of Tonkin. President Johnson calls these unconfirmed attacks "as devious as Pearl Harbor," goes to Congress, and claims that North Vietnamese vessels had fired at United States vessels in international waters. Congress empowers Johnson to "take all necessary measures to repel any attack against the forces of the U. S. and prevent further aggression." In reality, the American ships had violated North Vietnamese waters to support South Vietnamese commandos. Read the facts.

1965: Through the fall of 1964, Johnson remains unsure about how to justify the aerial assault of North Vietnam. On February 3, 1965, however, the North Vietnamese attack the American air base at Pleiku, kill 8 military advisors, and wound 100. This incident gives Johnson a rationalization for aerial bombardment, which he orders on March 2, 1964. The direct involvement of American ground troops begins less than two weeks later when United States marines secure military bases and airfields. At first, Eisenhower orders the troops to act only on the defensive. Military officers, however, claim that this policy makes them sitting ducks and they formulate a new strategy: "search and destroy" missions. These missions begin in June 1965, and the United States commits itself to an all-out land war.

1966-67: Television news depicts a sanitized view of the war. Broadcasts announce body counts without images and shoot footage well in advance of the events that those pictures supposedly document.

1968: The North Vietnamese launch the Tet Offensive, a massive military strike against American bases in thirty-nine Southern Vietnamese cities. Although the Tet Offensive demonstrates that North Vietnam is better equipped, better trained, and more determined to win the war than the American public had believed, the United States steps up involvement in Vietnam.

The Tet Offensive marked the beginning of more immediate and accurate media coverage of the war. For the first time, Americans could see on television all of the horrors of war. In February 1968, NBC broadcast shocking images of a South Vietnamese officer shooting a defenseless prisoner in the head. Because of the nation's unsuccessful struggle to win the war, Johnson decided to withdraw from the 1968 presidential race. In 1964, when he was elected president, he received 61% of the popular vote. When he left office four years later, however, he was one of the most unpopular presidents in American history.

America's involvement in Vietnam had progressed from a small cadre of "military advisors" to a full-fledged land force within ten years. The war forced Lyndon Baines Johnson to withdraw his name from consideration for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968. After the election, a new name, one not unfamiliar to Americans who had lived through the Second Red Scare and who remembered the "touching" story of Checkers the dog, would soon adorn the mailbox at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

John Kerry, future U.S. Senator and presidential candidate,
testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 22, 1971

The story of Richard Milhous Nixon's presidency and the role he tried to play as the leader of a new Republican party is, of course, a fascinating and important part of our story. So important, in fact, that we'll take it up in Online Lecture 3: May 2007: The Nixon Years.