When Lt. Colonel MacKenzie and his unit didn’t show up at the reported time at the museum, the North Vietnamese army found out the men already took the paintings under their very noses without being seen or heard. But they made it work to their advantage by sending out a propaganda statement naming the men involved in the burglary and complaining to the State Department about the US Army’s gang of war criminals lead by Lt. Colonel Jackson J. MacKenzie, even including the name of Major Harrison Russell. They weren’t told Major Russell was injured in a mortar attack two days before the mission and was recovering from surgery to remove his
The United States of America used a giant lie of freedom, democracy, and a communism scare to invade Vietnam. According to A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn, the U.S. is only interested in “rice, rubber, teak, corn, tin, spices, oil, and many others” that the country has to offer (Zinn 475). Vietnam has been a quiet country until the war started. Many problems occurred when the United States used a man name Diem to control Vietnam. Many tragic things had happened during this incident like murders and burning down villages. Many people would rather go to jail than kill innocents lives. The war was simply taking advantage of this country resource that it could be compel into giving the United States.
President Kennedy sent 500 Special Forces troops and military advisors to assist South Vietnam in May 1961.
The My Lai massacre took place in South Vietnam on March 16, 1968. To some, the occasion is considered the worst event in American military history. A group of American soldiers attacked and killed between 300 and 500 Vietnamese men, women, and children. About a year later people learned of the violent attacks made on these innocent people by newspapers and newscasts. When people heard of the attacks, it increased the animosity against war and gave the public another reason to resent the Vietnam veterans. Hugh Thompson is a soldier that felt the story of My Lai should be known. He stopped multiple violent attacks against the Vietnamese by intervening and risking his own life, by putting himself between the Vietnamese and American soldiers with
The decision that was made to enter war changed America, the nation had a split, consisting those who believed that communism should be stopped and the ones that believe violence is not the answer. President Johnson believed that establishing a brute force to repel communism in Vietnam would be beneficial to the future of the United States. The decision, however came with tragedies, such as the amount of U.S. soldiers that lost their lives. The danger of communism opened the eyes of all Americans. Ever since WW2, Soviet Union exemplifies communism and encouraged all the other nations in the east to participate. With all of the corporation dealing to the communist Soviet Union, America became on high alert as it was during the Cold War. The meaning behind prevention is to stop.
There are many debates regarding the Vietnam War, but regardless of which side of the fence you sit on, none can argue that one of the most horrific massacres happened during this time. Most mothers and fathers would find it hard to believe that their sons would return home to them cold blooded murders. As one mother put it in an article while being interviewed by Mr. Hersh of the New York Times, “I gave them a good boy and they sent me back a murderer”.
In many ways, I enjoyed the layout of your short essay. Foremost, this article is to the point. However, I believed that the war in Vietnam was not justifiable. More than 50,000 lives were lost that affected the Vietnamese society and America’s soldiers. Moreover, the Agent Orange compounded many health problems. On the other hand, it appeared that America involved themselves in a situation that they were not sufficiently repaired to address.
One of the most important issues that happened to everyone in the past called the Vietnam War. The Vietnam War is a war that between the Southern and Northern zones of Vietnam. In the early 1960’s, the United States was very worried about the situation in the South Vietnam. Therefore, the president Lyndon B. Johnson were starting to draft so many young people in the country to combat issues in the war with Vietnam. However, the Vietnam War were proved to be a common topic were to fight against the war, combat the issue of drafting about freedom and peace in countries to stand against the U.S. intervention in other countries. Moreover, the United States has believed there were over 20,000 Viet Cong guerrillas in the south and about another 100,000 of the population were on the Viet Cong side to defeat with other countries. Also, Vietnam War is one the longest war in the history has fought with the United States on the bridge of Cau Tan Cang which never going to win the war in Vietnam. Besides that, the Australians have fought a battle in a rubber plantation near the Long Tan. They won this battle with the Viet Cong and was lost with 18 men and has 21 wounded during that battle. Also, The Viet Cong had about 500 people wounded and lost 245. Therefore, the Vietnamese traditional culture may be still a mysterious and unknown to most of the people outside the countries of Vietnam, especially the white people. Nowadays, many white people, Philippines, and other neighbor countries
Blood, gore, intense combat, little sleep, death. These are some words that describe the Vietnam War. The Vietnam War had 240 days of combat in one year. World War II had forty days of combat in four years(Interesting Facts). That statistic shows how rough the Vietnam War was. The fighting was constant between the two sides. This war was fought over politics and had many gruesome battles.
One of the main causes of the Vietnam War revolved around the simple idea held by the Americans that communism was threatening to expand all over Asia. This idea that one Asian country becoming a communist nation would lead to a chain reaction that the rest of the Asian countries would follow suit and become communist countries as well. This is an example of the domino theory under United States foreign policy. The Americans used this idea to explain why they needed to station troops in South Vietnam and that was to contain the spread of communism. This ultimately led to the Second Indochina War in 1954.
The two messages the authors were trying to display were that when Saigon fell, it was a very difficult time, trying to help everyone escape. One reason it was difficult is because of the quote, “As he was loading his helicopter… his family was machine gunned” (Shapiro). It was dangerous for the helicopter pilots to load all of the people, and it might have been scary too. The author used word choice like “They were all lying dead.” This displays some of the dismay and sadness that happened in this scene. Another quote that supports this message is, “...thousands of desperate Vietnamese refugees” (Shapiro). The way the author said, “thousands of desperate,” helps me imagine a ton of terrified, screaming people. Finally, the quote, “...Communists
The Vietnam War began November 1st, 1955 and ended April 30th, 1975. It was a long costly war that involved North Vietnam and their Southern allies, known as Viet Cong, against South Vietnam and its main ally the United States. This war was very unpopular at home and would end with the withdrawal of the United States and the unification of Vietnam under communist control. Many think of war as something that just men are involved in but very rarely do people think of the role of women in the war. “Like many of the men going over to Vietnam to serve their country, young women from all over the nation volunteered to serve as nurses in the hospitals and medical facilities in South Vietnam. These women volunteered for a variety of reasons: to serve their country, to help the service men who were wounded, to receive training and an education, to further their military careers, to prove themselves or just to have an adventure” (Texas Tech University).
Matthew Lippman provides that the Lai Massacre violated the international humanitarian law of war. The Lai Massacre and the Vietnam War raises critical questions about how America conduct war and its military leadership in Vietnam. The massacre of innocent unarmed civilians illustrates the horrendous war crime committed by American soldiers. Lippman discusses how the United States tried to keep the events of My Lai Massacre from the public. The My Lai Massacre makes me wonder if this was only one of the many massacres in Vietnam War and if the higher US officials managed to cover-up the other massacres. The trials for the crimes committed in My Lai were held separately from the Nuremberg trails because officials wanted to avoid creating parallels between the two events. However, parallels can be drawn with American conduct in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Troops who were in violation of international law and committed war crimes in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay were not held accountable for their action to their full extent. In fact, those who were convicted were not necessarily charged with war crimes. This leads us to question whether the events of my Lai and Nuremberg could ever be reconciled. Allan Ryan makes the argument that the Nuremberg Tribunals was the most significant development of international human rights law. I agree with Ryan as many tribunals following the events of World War II have been modeled after the Nuremberg Tribunals. For instance, this is true in
The Vietnam War is one of the most important conflicts of the twentieth century. It is the second most traumatic, contentious, and problematic event in U.S. history—the first being the Civil War. Yet the Vietnam War, means that “the dispute zone”. it was also called "Second Indochina War" and the "American War".
What actually happened vietnam? How did the Vietnam war start? What happen before Vietnam war? Was Vietnam a stabilize country before Vietnam war? And how did we rebuild?. All these question I’ve been wondering about my own country. Did you know that Vietnam actually had a More than 30 year of war ? Vietnam was like a warzone with an environment that smell like blood, gunpowder. It all started out as the France making Vietnam one of their colony. Than Japan come in trying to compete Vietnam over France. Than Vietnam split in half, and Vietnam war start. Vietnam fought so hard against France than japan than the US to maintain their independence. It was all lead by a communist leader, Ho Chi Minh. It started in 1848.
Racism, resentment, politics, political agendas, suffering, war, hate from people in the United States, hate from people in Vietnam, overall anger, and a lot of weapons. These are all factors that played into the United States being involved in one of the most horrific acts in our history. The My Lai Massacre was a massacre by United States Soldiers that created controversy and anger throughout the world. It leads us to the question, was this avoidable? Was one of the worst massacres in Untied States history doomed to happen? Looking at the contents of this war, reviewing accounts from soldiers that have fought in the war, that were there on that day, there is a strong testimony that this massacre was indeed doomed to happen.