Vietnam Notes:
1950-1975
Wanted to stop the spread of communism. the french connection- during world war 2 the french controlled indochina, france didn't give vietnam their independence after WWII, so war broke out between vietnam and france. vietnam won. powerful countries met at the geneva conference and decided the country would be split at the 17th parallel. communist north, non-communist south. didn't gain independence like they hoped. an election was supposed to be held to vote for a leader of the whole country, but both sides were not confident and the election never happened.
sides: US and south vietnamese against North vietnam and the vietcong
vietcong- guerilla warfare, communists in the south that fought against us. very difficult to find the enemy.
escalation- started with truman-johnson. the involvement in the vietnam war escalated through those presdients. truman- sent money to help the french fight the vietnamese. eisenhower also sent money and provided military advisors. kennedy- continued with money and advisors, also sent special operation forces (green berets). johnson- sent more and more combat forces.
gulf of tonkin resolution- a couple US ships were attacked by vietnam torpedoes. (questionable) was our declaration of war. congress gave johnson the power to "take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States." gave him the power to wage war in vietnam. only two people in congress voted against this.
tet offensive was a lunar new year in vietnam- important holiday- a major offensive by the n. viet and the vietcong. launched offensives in dozens of major cities. johnson had been sending more and more troops. the people believed that the US had been lying when they said the war was almost over. the war turned negative in 1968. up to this point the enemy had been using guerilla warfare, we liked the fact that they were using normal warfare tactics. they knew they had to use guerilla tactics to get rid of the US.
goes down in history as a loss for the united states but it is actually a very strong military win. this war was hard to get out of. "can't leave until the job is done"
nixon promised to end the war. said they were going to pull out of the war and let the vietnam people fight. (vietnamization). believed that we could leave honorably.
peace agreement didnt last. two years after we pulled out the north invaded the south. the south was not strong enough and was taken over. July 2, became one communist country. still communist today.
war powers act- presidents can not send troops somewhere for over 60 days without congress approval.
jimmy carter- grew up poor, joined the navy, fought in WWII, took over his fathers peanut farm, became successful and became very wealthy. was a governor of georgia and part of the senate. only president to receive a nobel peace prize after being president.
reagan- lots of military spending. ended the cold war. the soviet union had a really bad economy at the time. never really had a good economy. started the war on drugs. Nancy Reagan "Just Say No"
George H. W. Bush- went to Yale University. got a degree for economics. Reagan's VP. invaded panama to find a man for international drug trafficing. oil spill by alaska. soviet union fell apart. berlin wall came down. promised to lower taxes but raised them. 1988 election- wanted to continue on the path Reagan had set. didn't have many plans for big changes. won by a lot.
persian gulf war- started when iraq invaded kuwait. sedan hussien led this- became a bad guy when he gassed his own people. iraq thought kuwait was using oil across the border. invaded in aug. 1990. Operation desert shield- sent 1000s of US troops to saudi arabia. hoped it would prevent invasion by iraq. we became a shield. hoped that it would send a message to sudan hussien to get out of kuwait. bombed iraq and kuwait for days, then invaded kuwait, within a month we won. our goal was to free kuwait from iraqi control. negative outcome- destruction of infrastructure. after the war was over, iraq had to agree to a no fly zone to protect the people in iraq. everyday US troops would be flying over those areas. the IAEA sent weapon inspectors to iraq to make sure they weren't making weapons of mass destruction with nuclear power. believed they had WMDs but we never found any.
we never left saudi arabia. helped lead to the issues with iraq and iran.
bill clinton- 42nd president, 1993-2001. gov. of arkansas, 2nd president to be impeached by te house of representatives. election- 370 electoral votes, 43% of the popular vote (not great) close election. very split election.
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