President Nixon's Secret Bombing of Cambodia Essay

The Vietnam War was costly not only to our armed forces but to our American economy and American morale. We entered the war in an attempt to end the communist regime of North Vietnam and their southern allies, the Vietcong, from taking over South Vietnam. South Vietnam was an ally of the United States and due to this political relationship; the United States was entitled to help defend their ally. More than 58,000 Americans were killed in the Vietnam War. By 1969 it was the peak of American involvement in the war and more than 500,000 U.S. military personnel were involved in the Vietnam conflict. Throughout the war growing opposition towards participation of military forces threatened the support of the war. American citizens began to

George Herring 's article " The legacy of Vietnam" talks about the military clash between the communist North Vietnam, backed by its allies and the government of South Vietnam, backed by the United States and other countries that are anti-communist that happened in Vietnam during Richard Nixon 's presidency. The Vietnam War was a terrible war, especially for Vietnamese because a millions of them died during the war. The author not just describes the war itself; he also analyzes the killing and the attack that occurred during the war. In general the Vietnam War was the most costly war contrast to other wars and it was the most shocking eras in American history. The Vietnam War had an impact in American history. It brought fear from the war

In 1960s, the US was faced with another crisis of communist expansion in the war between North and South Vietnam. The Kennedy Administration decided to further pursue their containment strategy out of fear being seen by the international community as weak towards communism. During the Johnson Administration, an attack against American vessels that happened in the Gulf of Tonkin led to President Johnson being granted the ability to conduct broad military operations without congressional approval. The American public began to largely oppose American intervention in Vietnam because the optimistic statements made by the government ran contradictory to the reports of the violent fighting by American news outlets. During the Nixon administration, the US switched to a policy, later known as Vietnamization, where the main goal was to strengthen the South Vietnamese forces and provide them with better armaments so they can better defend themselves. Vietnamization proved to be ineffective as the South Vietnamese forces were unable to hold their own against the North without US air support as proven during Operation Lam Son 719 and the Easter Offensive. The signing of the Paris Peace Accords officially ended US involvement in the Vietnam War. The US followed containment policies during beginning of the war due to the underlying fear of the spread of communism and since the policies were inherited from previous

The 1960’s and 70’s were filled with turbulent changes. The US was still reeling from containment and its domino policy, leading it to believe that it had the right to exercise influence in foreign affair. One foreign affair was known as Vietnam. The Vietnam War was the longest war in the nation’s history. This war, from both abroad and at home, drastically changed the society of America, socially, economically, and politically. It caused for much anti-war sentiment and fueled the counter culture movement, it caused inflation and contributed to the stagflation, and brought down Johnson’s reputation and caused for several changes in legislation.

Throughout America’s history, few things have left the nation in such controversial turmoil as the Vietnam War. With an American death toll of almost 60,000 troops, the Vietnam War has gone down in infamy as one of the most tremendous struggles Americans have faced both overseas and on the home front. Because of the tumultuous controversies caused by the war, Americans split into two social factions – those against the war and those who supported it. During the years of 1961-1975 - the era in which the war had its greatest effect on Americans - the population of citizens from 18-35 years old and the Presidency were both affected irreversibly.

President Richard M. Nixon’s administration had to face many international and domestic challenges in the United States between 1968 and 1974, some positive and some negative. His achievements in expanding peaceful relationships with both China and the Soviet Union are contrastingly different with his continuation of the Vietnam War. In the end, Nixon’s scandals and abuse of presidential power caught up to him, and his administration did much to corrode America’s faith in the government.

When President Nixon took office in 1969, the U.S. was currently sending american troops to fight in the Vietnam war.Shortly after taking office in 1969, President Nixon introduced a policy called Vietnamization that was intended to end american military involvement in Vietnam war by encouraging all south vietnamese to take more responsibility for fighting the war on their own.

Sworn to office as the thirty-seventh President of the United States, Richard Nixon took on the challenge of leading America during hard times. War overseas in sued and a divided nation was left back home. However, taking the issues at hand Nixon was able to stop wars in Viet Nam, improve relations with China, but was left forever stained with the great “Watergate Scandal.”

January 1969, Richard Nixon entered the executive office picking up the pieces Lyndon Johnson who had left while the Vietnam War was still in effect. Many Americans had the expectation that Nixon would be the “peaceful president”, visualizing he would put an end to this war in Southeast Asian and bring back home our troops. A policy Nixon redefined was the American role in the world by suggesting to limit the U.S resources and commitments. Therefore, Nixon’s set his efforts to end the war since the withdrawal from Vietnam was not an immediate option. Also, Nixon had his radar on Moscow and China because according to George C. Herring, they felt that they must release the United States from the war in a way that would uphold United States credibility with their friends and foes alike. During Nixon’s term in office, he tries a number of different strategies in his effort to end the war, but to this day, one can see that Nixon only prolonged the war when it could have ended earlier.

Nixon used his power of executive agreements manipulatively in a strategy that he called, linkage politics; this is a term for strategically organizing the United States relationships with communist powers (Small 1999, 63). Nixon knew that he must settle the Vietnam War with honor because it was a stake in Southeast Asia. Using his theory of linkage politics he saw that the end of the Vietnam War would affect negotiations with China and Russia (Small, 1999 65). He first tried to make an executive agreement with Russia, by explaining to them his idea of “strategic parity. This was an idea that because both nations had enough weapons to completely demolishes the other, neither should start war, and peace would continue. Like Eisenhower’s attempts, Nixon was unable to make an agreement with the USSR and talks continued to be slow (PBS Nixon 2002, 2).

The politics of the ultratight resonated deeply with Richard Nixon. Nixon had cut his political teeth as a young Red-hunting member of the House Un-American Activities Committee in the 1950s. His home district in Orange Country, California, was widely known as a Birch Society stronghold. The Los Angeles-area Birch Society claimed the membership of several political and economic elites, including members of the Chandler family, which owned and published the Los Angeles Times. According to the writer David Halberstam (1979, 118) the Times, which was once described as “the most rabid Labor-bating, Red-hating paper in the United States,” virtually created Richard Nixon.

President Richard Nixon advocated Vietnamization withdrawing American troops and giving South Vietnam greater responsibility for fighting the war. But In 1970, Richard Nixon attempted to slow the flow of North Vietnamese soldiers and supplies for South Vietnam by sending Americans, forces to destroy the Communist supply bases in Cambodia. The Vietnam War cost the United States about 58,000 lives and 350,000 casualties. Which also resulted between one and two million Vietnamese death.

In a nation divided by war in 1969, Richard Nixon delivered a speech with the hope that it would bring Americans together. At this time the American people stood divided on their views on the war. Many people wanted to withdraw from the war and many people supported the war in the quest for peace. The Vietnam War had already been going on for quite some time when Nixon came into office. Nixon was the second youngest president; he came to office in 1969 as the 37th president of the United States. (Sheppard) The goal of his speech was to unite the nation as he pursued the war and to try to win peace. Americans were divided among going to war and ending the war for peace. The tone

The investigation assesses the level of success President Richard Nixon’s Vietnamization policy attained during the Vietnam War to end U.S. involvement in the war. In the strive to evaluate the level of success this policy demonstrated, the investigation evaluates the ability of the policy to equip, expand, and train Southern Vietnamese forces and allocate them to a substantial combat position, all while simultaneously reducing the quantity of U.S. combat troops in a steady manner. The Vietnamization policy is investigated and analyzed by both its causes and effects. The motivation that led to Nixon’s creation of this

In 1958, Communist-led guerrillas, eventually known as the Viet Cong, began to battle the government of the South Vietnamese. The United States then sent 2,000 military advisors t support South Vietnam’s government. This number grew to 16,3000 by 1963. The military force slowly deteriorated. By 1963 the fertile Mekong Delta was lost to the overpowering Viet Cong. The war rose in 1965, when President Johnson issued commencing air strikes on North Vietnam and ground forces, which had risen to 536,000 by 1968. The Tet Offensive by North Vietnam turned many Americans against the waging war. President Nixon, following Johnson, promoted Vietnamization, the withdrawing of American troops and handing over the great responsibility of the war to South Vietnam. Protesting of the war dramatically increased, especially after Nixon’s attempt to slow North Vietnam forces and supplies into the South by sending American forces to destroy supply bases in Cambodia in 1970, which violated Cambodian neutrality. This provoked antiwar protests on many of the United Stats’ college campuses. In 1968 through 1973 attempts were made to end the ongoing conflict through diplomacy. Then in January 1973, an agreement was reached. U.S. forces withdrew from Vietnam and the U.S. POWs were released. In April 1975, South Vietnam surrendered to the North and Vietnam was once again united. The Vietnam War ended, but it took the lives of 58,000