The USA Conflict Home and Abroad: 4.4

Question 1

Describe the key cultural and geographical strengths of North Vietnam in the Vietnam War

Answer 1

• understood the physical geography of South Vietnam, due to many of the North Vietnamese having lived in South Vietnam before moving north after the Geneva Accords (many had southern contacts as well because of this)
• North Vietnamese spoke the same language as the South Vietnamese, leading to greater organisation, camaraderie and trust amongst North and South Vietnamese communist forces; no division unlike ARVN and US
• former Vietminh knew the locations of existing tunnel systems, as well as how to build upon and expand them into more useful tunnel systems
• WERE USED TO FIGHTING IN THE VIETNAMESE TROPICAL CLIMATE, SO HAD MORE ENDURANCE ETC. THAN US TROOPS

Question 2

Describe the key political/economic strengths of North Vietnam in the Vietnam War

Answer 2

• very little/no political opposition to the communist regime in North Vietnam during the war
  [] BECAUSE THE PEOPLE WERE COMMITTED TO REUNITING VIETNAM UNDER COMMUNISM
  [] also due to communist re-education camps etc.
• VC already established and strong in South Vietnam before North Vietnamese aid, so they were a bonus rather than a burden, like the ARVN was in some respects
• North Vietnam had significant financial and military aid in terms of equipment and some troops from China and the USSR due to needing communist ally countries in the Cold War, as well as a North Vietnamese victory meaning the spread of communism and thus the spread of the USSR’s political power over communist nations
• Laos (communist tendencies) and Cambodia (neutral and later communist (though not until after the end of the War)) allowed the North Vietnamese to use the Ho Chi Minh Trail to supply the VC in South Vietnam
  [] CRUCIAL TO THEIR VICTORY !!!!!! GAVE EASY ACCESS TO SOUTH VIETNAM AND ALLOWED THEM TO MOVE TROOPS AND EQUIPMENT WITHOUT OPPOSITION OR DAMAGE EXTRANEOUS TO THE US’ ATTACKS !!!!!!!

Question 3

Describe the key military strengths of North Vietnam in the Vietnam War

Answer 3

• communist forces in Vietnam were very much used to the tropical climate and thus had more ease in fighting than the US troops
• communist forces were also smaller than US forces and could use the tunnels with ease
• guerrilla tactics + small skirmishes
  [] inflicted high amounts of damage to US troops, US property, communications networks, bridges, infrastructure and US publicity through the use of very small amounts of resources and troops in comparison to the US’ overwhelming firepower
  [] were well organised and managed to gain the support of the people and KEEP IT THROUGHOUT THE WAR, meaning it was extremely hard for the US or South Vietnamese to even start to do this later in the war
  [] had the newest weapons and supplies from the USSR and China (though this made them weak towards the end of the war when there was fear of abandonment)
• battles
  [] were fought rarely, surprising the enemy and doing a LOT of damage
  [] eventually won the war by using battles, not guerrilla attacks

Question 4

Describe the key cultural and geographical weaknesses of the USA in the Vietnam War

Answer 4

• USA was geographically far from Vietnam
  [] a lot of xenophobia from the Vietnamese villagers, leading to support for the VC who were familiar to them unlike the foreign troops
• some US troops were (extremely) racist towards the Vietnamese
  [] decreased trust on either side
  [] decreased consideration of US troops for the health and safety of the Vietnamese, which reflected in their attitudes to massacre, properly warning of free-fire zones etc.
• US troops had very little understanding of the culture in Vietnam and didn’t make efforts to understand
  [] hurt US efforts to “win the hearts and minds” of the villagers under Kennedy
  [] led to apathy from US troops, which reflected badly in the media
  [] made villagers resent the US troops when forced to move away from culturally significant agricultural and ancestral lands during the Strategic Hamlet Program
  [] didn’t know that many villagers were illiterate, so their warning pamphlets etc. were pointless, frustrating and made the US seem apathetic and cruel to the villagers in the media
• US troops used interpreters as couldn’t speak the language
  [] some troops made efforts to learn initially, especially the Green Berets (not technically troops), but these were minimal and lacked commitment
  [] led to distrust of the US troops and officials from the Vietnamese villagers (due to general xenophobia, unfamiliarity and feeling as if there was no true effort to connect on a personal level with the people they were trying to gain support from)

Question 5

Describe the key political/economic weaknesses of the USA in the Vietnam War

Answer 5

• many Vietnamese viewed the USA as using the South Vietnamese government as its puppet
  [] hailed back to the feeling of being under French colonial rule, which was deeply unpopular with the Vietnamese
  [] made the US unpopular and oppressive in the eyes of the South Vietnamese (villagers)
• the South Vietnamese government that the USA backed was inherently corrupt regardless of leader, and many important political figures within it had worked for the French, meaning they were already unpopular with locals from the start
  [] demonstration of yet another failure of the US to understand the culture and political climate of Vietnam, which damaged their popularity amongst the South Vietnamese and gave the VC propaganda against them to increase their own strength
  [] demonstrates that the government was, on many levels, destined to fail without the US propping it up
• significant political opposition to the war in Congress towards its end (1968 onwards)
  [] politicians called for faster troop withdrawals, less funding of the war etc.
  [] from 1971, set restrictions on funding to the ARVN and military, undercutting previous promises made by Nixon to Thieu in terms of support
  [] restrictions meant that even US troops were under-equipped and could thus fight less efficiently than the frequently supplied North Vietnamese and VC

Question 6

Describe the key military weaknesses of the USA in the Vietnam War

Answer 6

• US military fixated on escalation of the war, and use of more firepower instead of fighting a limited war
  [] meant more US losses in total
  [] was very unpopular in Vietnam and damaged trust between the Vietnamese and the US troops, leading to higher support for the VC
  [] led to poor publicity and condemnation of the US worldwide (Cold War propaganda and thus pressure put on the US to stop or scale down the war, which they didn’t do, backfiring even more in terms of politics)
• counter-insurgency and pacification tactics were brought in too late (Kennedy’s administration; the VC were already strong and growing stronger by this time) and were not done consistently enough to be effective or convey any amount of sincerity of care that the US troops were supposed to have for the South Vietnamese villagers
• draft meant that ground troops were young and inexperienced, and also that troops were not fighting because they wanted to but because they had to
  [] increased lack of discipline amongst the army as time went on, including high drug usage, fragging and avoiding battle towards the end of the war
  [] also led to demoralisation of the US troops, leading to EVEN LESS commitment to fighting and weakening the US efforts significantly
• measured success in terms of traditional battle (death toll, enemy bases destroyed/cleared etc.) and not in terms of what actually counted towards success in the war
  [] made the army seem more successful than they were, which could explain the overconfidence of the US military that victory seemed near with enough troops and firepower
  [] ignored the fact that the ARVN still had little control of southern areas of Vietnam, as well as the fact that the VC would simply repair any damage done by the US and ARVN then move back into the areas “cleared”
  [] ignored that the brutal and militant tactics of the military caused growing resentment towards the US from the villagers, leading to growth in the strength of communist forces

Question 7

Describe the key weaknesses of the USA in the Vietnam War in terms of home-based opposition to the war

Answer 7

• US was democracy and needed support of people for politicians to be elected
• if too much opposition, would lose support from general public
• was the first time that a significant amount of Americans didn’t accept the government’s reasons for war, as well as the first time they noted that the government was not doing what they wanted, making them feel unheard, ashamed and distrustful of the government and other authorities
• the discordance between the general public’s opinions and the government’s drive for war reflected badly on American political leaders in media worldwide, and gave Cold War propaganda to the USSR