The USA鈥檚 involvement in the Vietnam War, 1954-1961
During World War Two, the French colony of Indochina (later Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos) was occupied by the Japanese. During the war, Ho Chi Minh was a Vietnamese leader who led various revolts against the Japanese, French colonial powers and the US-backed South Vietnamese between 1941 and the mid-1960s. led a group of Vietnamese A supporter of a classless society where all property is publicly owned. A type of warfare that involves frequent attacks on larger enemy forces. fighters, called the Viet Minh, in resistance to the Japanese.
When the Japanese left at the end of the war the Viet Minh took control and set up the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Following this:
- France was determined to take back control of the area and started a military campaign in the DRV
- the USA gave military aid to the French because it did not approve of Ho Chi Min's communist beliefs
- French forces struggled in combat against the Viet Minh and experienced a significant defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954
The French withdrawal
In 1955, after their defeat, the French decided to withdraw. A peace agreement called the Geneva Accords was drawn up. It was agreed that:
- Vietnam would temporarily be split in two.
- In 1956, there would be elections to unite the country.
- Cambodia and Laos would become independent.
The USA wanted to prevent a communist takeover of Vietnam. This led to peace talks between the US-backed government of Ngo Dinh Diem in the South, and the Soviet- and Chinese-backed government of Ho Chi Minh in the North.
US involvement
The USA was very concerned about the events in Vietnam. After World War Two, a The political tension and competition for power that existed between the communist East and the democratic West after World War Two. The two sides did not ever go to war. had begun between the USA (with its allies in the West) and the The group of 15 communist republics formed from the Russian Empire after the revolution of 1917. (with its allies in the East). One of the issues that divided them was how the government, society and the economy should be organised:
- The USA had a capitalist system, which involved private ownership of property and people making profit for themselves.
- The Soviet Union had a communist system, in which the state owned property and profits were used to fund the government in order to provide services for its people.
After the signing of the Geneva Accords, Ho Chi Minh took control of the northern part of Vietnam. He was a communist and had the support of the leading communist powers: the Soviet Union and China.
The USA was afraid that, if nothing was done, communism would spread from the North into southern Vietnam and then throughout Southeast Asia. This was called the An American idea that if one country fell to communism, others would follow - like a row of dominoes.. US officials worried that an increase in communist countries would strengthen its opponent, the Soviet Union, in the Cold War. The USA was already spending billions of dollars in Europe to stop the spread of communism and had supplied forces to support South Korea in a war against communist North Korea.
Therefore, after the French withdrawal in 1955, the USA intervened and supported the newly created Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam). The head of the government in South Vietnam was President Ngo Dinh Diem, a Catholic who had been educated in the USA.
The USA provided South Vietnam with aid and helped to create the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) to defend the country against communists. By 1960, there were almost 1,000 Americans in South Vietnam acting as military advisers.