ANTALYA BİLİM UNIVERSITY

MODERN WORLD HISTORY/MESUT UYAR

THE WARS IN VIETNAM (1946-1979) AND THEIR IMPACTS ON
THE GLOBAL SYSTEM?
SAADET BERFİN ÖZACAR/190304011
DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY
 1

THE WARS IN VIETNAM AND THEIR IMPACTS ON GLOBAL

SYSTEM?
France applied the colonial system to Vietnam in 1887 and called it French

Indochina. Vietnamese nationalist Ho Chi Minh is trained in the Soviet Union as an

agent of the Communist International between 1923-1925 and then he formed the

Indochinese Communist Party at a meeting in Hong Kong in 1930. In 1940 Japanese

troops invade French Indochina and occupy Vietnam with little French resistance. Ho

Chi Minh and communist colleagues establish the League for the Independence of

Vietnam in 1941. This movement, known as Viet Minh, aimed to resist the

Vietnamese invasion of the French and Japanese. After the second world war in

1945, Ho Chi Minh declared the independence of Vietnam.It was obvious that France

had no intention of allowing full independence. Ho Chi Minh rejected limited self-

government which proposed by France and the Viet Minh began a guerrilla war

against France in 1946.

Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong declared the creation of the People’s

Republic of China in 1949. The People’s Republic of China and the Soviet Union

formally recognize the communist Democratic Republic of Vietnam. China and Soviet

Union began to provide economic and military aid to communist fighters within the

country. USA and Great Britain supported the French side. Vietnam was successful

in guerrilla tactics. The effects of the second world war continued in France. France

could not send enough troops to the region. So, the First Indochina War resulted in

victory of Vietnam communists in 1954. French forces had 75,581 dead and 64,127

injured.There were more than 300,000 dead and 500,000 injured from the communist

forces. More than 150,000 civilians were killed as a result of the First Indochina War.
 2

Although America provided military and economic assistance to France, it was not

sufficient. America was determined to replace France to prevent the spread of

communism throughout Southeast Asia. In a speech in 1954, USA President D.D.

Eisenhower said the fall of French Indochina to communists could create a domino

effect in Southeast Asia. This “domino theory” guides USA attitude on Vietnam for

the next decade.

A conference was held in Geneva, Switzerland, in July 1954 to solve problems in

Indochina. The Geneva Accords established North and South Vietnam with the 17th

parallel. South of the 17th parallel would be a non-communist state of Vietnam. North

of the 17th parallel would be a communist state under Ho Chi Minh. The agreement

also stipulates that elections are to be held within two years to unify Vietnam under a

single democratic government. Two million North Vietnamese civilians emigrated to

South Vietnam as a result of the partition. Viet Minh troops had to leave South

Vietnam. Some Viet Minh officers from the north secretly remained in the South. In

1955, catholic nationalist Ngo Dinh Diem was chosen as the leader of South Vietnam

with the support of the USA. Diem was a very strong anti-communist so his

relationship with the USA was good.

The South Vietnamese government under President Ngo Dinh Diem refused to

make preparations for the elections for the whole of Vietnam. The USA did not press

because USA was afraid of communist victory in the elections. USA President

Eisenhower seemed obsessed with the Domino theory, according to which, if a

country in a region became under the influence of communism, it quickly overthrow

all its neighbors. The goal of the USA was not to lose Southeast Asia. However,the

USA attitude was a violation of the Geneva Agreement.

 3

The Diem government lost popularity in a short time. He gained a reputation that

he did not deserve thanks to his corruption. Nationalists thought that he was under

too much American influence. In the early 1960s, Diem's government had evolved

into a family oligarchy that ruled through force and repression. In December 1960,

Diem’s many both communist and non-communist opponents within South Vietnam

formed the National Liberation Front (NLF) to organize resistance to the regime. NLF

was founded with the support of North Vietnam as the political side of the anti-

government riot in South Vietnam. The United States viewed the NLF as an arm of

North Vietnam and called them the Viet Cong.

Diem's security forces attacked Viet Cong with training and equipment from the

American army and CIA. Many of them were brutally tortured and executed. In 1961,

President John F. Kennedy sent helicopters and 400 Green Berets to South Vietnam

and organizes secret operations against the Viet Cong. On January 1962 in

Operation Ranch Hand, USA aircraft start spraying Agent Orange and other

herbicides over rural areas of South Vietnam to prevent meeting guerrilla forces’

nutritional needs. In 1962, Diem bombed the presidential palace in South Vietnam. In

January 1963, South Vietnamese troops are defeated by Viet Cong fighters. In the

case of the Buddhist crisis, the Ngo Dinh Diem government fired on the crowd of

Buddhist protesters in Hue city in the center of Vietnam. Eight people, including

children, were killed. USA confidence in Diem's leadership was reduced. The USA

supported the South Vietnam military coup and resulted in the killing of Diem and his

brother on November 1,1963. Then, the country was ruled by a succession of

generals. Three weeks later, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.

Lyndon B. Johnson became president.

 4

Allegedly, USS Maddox was attacked by North Vietnamese patrol torpedo boats in

Gulf of Tonkin. Two USA planes were dropped and one USA pilot captured by North

Vietnam in 1964. On 10 August 1964, the attacks in Gulf of Tonkin encouraged the

president to take the Tonkin Gulf Resolution. This decision empowered Johnson to

oppose “communist aggression” in Southeast Asia. USA planes began regular

bombing raids, Operation Rolling Thunder, the following year. The South Vietnamese

war effort in was fought largely under the command of General W. Westmoreland.

Westmoreland followed an attrition policy aimed at killing as many enemy troops as

possible. North Vietnam strengthened the air defense thanks to help of China and the

Soviet Union,

On June 1965, General Nguen Van Thieu of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam

Governmental Military (ARVN), becomes president of South Vietnam. The number of

US troops deployed in Vietnam rose to 500,000 by 1967. Bombings to North Vietnam

cities, ports and airports continued. Huge Vietnam War protests occur in Washington,

D.C., New York City and San Francisco on April 1967. Nguyen Van Thieu won the

presidential election of South Vietnam with a new constitution in September 1967. In

the Battle of Dak To,USA forces lost about 1,800 people on November 1967. In the

later years of the war, physical and psychological breakdown increased, such as

drug use and post-traumatic stress disorder, riots and military attacks on officers

among American soldiers.

On January 1968, The Tet Offensive begins with the combined attacks of the Viet

Minh and North Vietnamese armies. More than 100 cities and police stations are

attacked in South Vietnam. Also,the USA Embassy is invaded. The USA gradually

started to withdraw from the region. Battles at Hue and Saigon ended with victory of

American forces and Army of the Republic of Vietnam Governmental Military (ARVN).
 5

Richard M. Nixon won the presidency. In an attempt to limit the volume of

American casualties, Nixon announced a program called Vietnamization. Nixon held

public peace talks in Paris. North Vietnamese wanted the US to withdraw completely

and unconditionally as a peace condition. As a result the peace talks stopped. On

September 1969, Ho Chi Minh died of a heart attack in Hanoi. Nixon gradually

reduced the number of USA forces in South Vietnam. The USA and South Vietnam

forces attacked communist bases on the Cambodian border in 1970. ARVN invade

Laos with support of USA to cut off the Ho Chi Minh Trail in 1971. The Vietnamese

People's Army launched the Easter Offensive against ARVN and USA forces in 1972.

Nixon ordered the start of the war's most intense air strike in Operation Linebacker

and about 20,000 tons of bombs were thrown.

In January 1973, the USA and North Vietnam signed the Paris Peace that ended

hostilities and USA involvement in the Second Indochina War. The North Vietnamese

accept a cease fire. The war between North and South Vietnam continued. Nixon

resigns after Watergate Scandal is exposed. Gerald R. Ford becomes president.

President Ford rules out any further USA military involvement in Vietnam in 1975.

Communist forces captured the capital of South Vietnam. North and South Vietnam

are formally unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam under communist regime in

1976. It means that “the American policy of preventing the spread of communism in

South-east Asia had ended in complete failure”(Lowe,p.154.,2013)

Approximately 2 million Vietnamese civilians, 1.1 million North Vietnamese troops,

200,000 South Vietnamese troops, and 58,000 USA troops died during the war.

Around 18 million civilians were left homeless. The Vietnam War cost $168 billion or

$1 trillion in dollars of today. Also,since the 1970s, war compensation has been paid

to Vietnam veterans and their families. Compensation benefits for Vietnam veterans
 6

and their families still cost $ 22 billion a year. Vietnam veteran costs are higher than

other wars.Because firstly, they are the first veterans who were diagnosed with Post

Traumatic Stress Disorder after war. Another disease was caused by the effects of

Agent Orange. The chemical dioxin caused cancer, diabetes, and birth defects. More

than 2.5 million USA soldiers were exposed to Agent Orange. Many years later,

Settlement Fund federal officials confirmed that diabetes is a disease with the right to

cash compensation. Vietnam medical problems include heart disease. Compensation

costs increased further in the coming years because the heart disease is the

country's leading cause of death. Over 100,000 USA troops lost limbs in the war and

required treatment. Healthcare costs increased.

Spending on the Vietnam War played a role in causing the Great Inflation that

began in 1965.The Vietnam War accelerated the mechanization of the agricultural

industry. In 1970, a quarter of the USA population lived in farms or rural communities

and most of them went to fight in Vietnam. Farms bought larger machines and

concentrated on a main crop. The Vietnamese economy was chaotic too and it would

take decades to rebuild. Most of the population was unemployed and poor. Vietnam

did not have an industrialized base and high-gain minerals or agricultural products.

Vietnam has found an urgent solution by exporting over $ 1 billion in unused

American military equipment and scrap metal. With the new regime, rice and other

essential products have been sold below market values for a decade. However, a war

in Cambodia that started in December 1978 forced the economy. Economic reforms

improved conditions in Vietnam beginning in the middle of 1980s. Vietnam continued

privatization reforms, known as dau man hade, that transformed into the third largest

rice producer in the world.

 7

The Vietnamese economy was revived in the early 1990s as political relations

with the USA began to resolve. In February 1994, USA lifted the twenty year old

Vietnam embargo. American companies began trading with the communist nation.

However, the policies of the Vietnamese government slowed foreign investment until

1997. Some analysts are mindful about Vietnam's economic return to the West.

Foreign investments decreased from $ 2.8 billion to $ 500 million by 1999. However,

tourism continued to increase thanks to the student and cultural exchange programs

in Vietnam.

More than half of the dead American soldiers during the Vietnam War was 18 to

20 years old. Preparation of 18 years old men for war was a controversial issue

because they could not vote. 18 years old youngs went to fight but could not choose

their presidents. Everyone who was old enough to take up arms for his country was

old enough to vote. Firstly, in 1971 the voting age was lowered from 21 to 18. The

voting age in the USA is 18 years since the Vietnam War. In 1973, Department of

Defense began to rely on forces based on volunteerism. It would take a generation

for all-volunteer force to become the modern,highly capable military that it is today.

All wars in world history have more or less decisive on the future of humanity. One

of the biggest examples of this is the Vietnam War. The USA left this war defeated,

and its prestige was shaken. We can see its effects even in Hollywood movies.

Rambo is an example. The USA learned important lessons from this defeat. Firstly,

USA will not be entered into open-ended battles.Secondly, unless wars are required,

USA soldiers will not be sent directly. These decisions of the USA are still effective

today. The USA tries to invade the countries by using terrorist organizations instead

of its own army.

 8

Drugs and alcohol greatly affected American troops in Vietnam war. The USA

learned that American soldiers were using drugs and took immediate action to

suppress drugs, especially marijuana. After cannabis was banned, many soldiers

turned to heroin to get higher. The soldiers used them to reduce their stress and

sometimes forget what they saw on the battlefield. Cannabis, heroin and alcohol were

easily accessible and very cheap in Vietnam. When they returned to USA, it was not

that easy to get the drugs. Returning men between the ages of 19 and 23 were much

more difficult to adapt to society. Employers were considering this drug addiction and

could not accept them. Some of the soldiers continued to use alcohol and drugs to

deal with the frustration and pain of not being accepted into society. Unfortunately,

the soldiers came back from the war individually and isolated. After returning home,

most of the soldiers were rejected and criticized by the society. Whereas the soldiers

needed social support, love and a positive welcome from the society. The soldiers

could not share their war experiences with their family and friends because they

thought that nobody could understand them. This situation caused loneliness,

estrangement and sometimes hate in the soldiers. On the other hand, the trust in

American military abilities decreased because the great superpower, the USA, was

defeated in a much smaller and less powerful country. They were the first soldiers to

be not proudly remembered in an American war. Many of the soldiers who returned

from the war committed suicide and ended their lives.

The Vietnam War had turned into a genocide and the states acted brutally with

each other. Mass tortures were carried out, such as the burning of people alive.

Biological and chemical weapons caused great harm to both people and the

environment. Raids and looting became ordinary. Napalm and Agent Orange had

huge effects,too. Napalm is a mixture of plastic polystyrene, hydrocarbon benzene,

 9

and gasoline.When it is ignited, sticks to practically everything and burns up to ten

minutes. The effects of napalm on the human body are monstrous painful and

generally cause death. Many animal species and vegetation have drastically

decreased and in some cases are extinct. In this case, little can be done to cover the

damage caused by the war on the Vietnam ecology. All these horrible events were

learned from the media by the USA public opinion. Images of soldiers who died,

injured and suffered, the funerals and suffering of the Vietnamese people cooled the

American people from the war. Also, support of USA public for war decreased and

they began to resist. By the 1970s, the majority of the population became anti-war.

Unfortunately, the USA did not care about this situation and continued.

Since 1995, the relations of the two countries began to normalize. USA-Vietnam

relations became collaborative and comprehensive. It even turned into a partnership

that covers political, economic, security and human relations. The development of

relations between the two countries is based on cooperation in trying to find USA

soldiers who lost their lives in the war but could not be found. Today, both Vietnam

and the USA are getting closer as they hope to control Beijing's expansion in the

South China Sea. However, Vietnam's communist political system and the search for

a multi-country foreign policy will prevent intimacy between Vietnam and USA.

In 1975, Vietnam united under the communism after the fall of Saigon.

Unfortunately, when Vietnam rebuilds itself, tensions have increased with its

neighbor Cambodia. Cambodia-Vietnam relations broke down for various reasons.

The relations between the two governments were friendly in the beginning.After

Saigon's fall, some events along the long Vietnam-Cambodian border increased

tensions. A day after Saigon's fall in 1975, Cambodian troops captured a small island

of Vietnam. The Vietnamese quickly recaptured the island, but hundreds of

 10

Vietnamese citizens were killed by the Cambodian army during the invasion of island.

This incident showed Cambodia's negative policy towards the Vietnamese.

Vietnamese were persecuted by Cambodian authorities. Vietnam saw presence of

Cambodia as a threat to domination of Vietnam. The Vietnamese and Cambodian

governments were insecure to each other. Vietnam saw Cambodia as the pawn of

China. The Cambodian government opposed this attitude.Cambodian forces began

cross-border raids. Relations between these two countries suffered greatly.

On January 1979, Vietnam captured Cambodia as a result of its expansion

strategy. Vietnam ended the Chinese influence in the region, it caused a powerful

attack from China. The Third Indochina War, or the Sino-Vietnam War, is a short but

bloody border war between China and Vietnam in 1979. Chinese forces entered

North Vietnam and captured several cities near the border. During the war, 1.5 million

Chinese soldiers were kept ready along the China-Soviet border against a possible

Soviet attack. Vietnam's border troops put up a very good defense. They caused

major casualties to the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA). China declared that

the aim of the war was to give Vietnam a punitive lesson. On March 6, 1979, China

declared that they fulfilled their duties and aim. As a result, Chinese troops withdrew

from Vietnam. The war took place between February 17 and March 16, 1979, so it

lasted for 1 month. After the Third Indochina War, Vietnam continued to occupy

Cambodia until 1989. Border conflicts between China and Vietnam continued until

1990. Both sides claimed victory after war. Both sides lost close to 50.000 people.

The war began at the peak of the China-Soviet split. The war showed that the Soviet

Union could not protect its ally, Vietnam.

The effects of Indochina Wars, which started as a civil war between the north and

south of Vietnam, were not limited to Vietnam. The impacts of the Indochina Wars
 11

were global. France, America, China, the Soviet Union and many other countries

were directly or indirectly affected by this war. These wars not only affected political

and military relations between countries, but also affected many countries and people

in economic, social, psychological, ecological and many more. The effects of

Indochina Wars continue to be felt since the first war began. Most of the laws and

decisions taken years after the wars were directly or indirectly affected by these wars.

Wars are always an important factor in determining the attitudes of countries towards

each other. It would not be wrong to say that the Indochina Wars, which were carried

out bloody and mercilessly, affected humanity.

 12

REFERENCES

The Psychological Effects of the Vietnam War, (Josh Hochgesang et.al,1999)

https://web.stanford.edu/class/e297c/war_peace/media/hpsych.html

The Vietnam War, BBC

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zv7bkqt/revision/1

Vietnam War,( February 28, 2020)

https://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/vietnam-war-history

Vietnam War and its impacts,(Berman,2020)

https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-

and-maps/vietnam-war-and-its-impact

Norman Lowe - Mastering Modern World History-Palgrave Macmillan (2013)

The Right to Vote after Vietnam War in USA

http://www.usemb-ankara.org.tr/ABDAnaHatlar/Hukumet.htm

Vietnam War Facts, Costs and Timeline, Kimberly Amadeo, (February 19, 2020)

https://www.thebalance.com/vietnam-war-facts-definition-costs-and-timeline-4154921

The First Indochina War(2020)

https://www.historyguy.com/indochina_war_first.htm

The Third Indochina War, Alfred Howard Miller, (May,2016)

 13

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/

301542537_An_investigation_into_the_causes_of_the_Third_Indochina_War_AKA_t

he_Sino-Vietnamese_War