Vietnam+The+Path+to+War




 * A BRIEF HISTORY OF VIETNAM [[image:turningpoints/vietnamsill.gif align="right" caption="vietnamsill.gif"]]**

Pre 1800s – **Vietnam has Dynastic rulers (ruled itself), influenced by China.**

LATE 1800s – **Vietnam is a French colony called French Indochina.**

1930s – **communist revolts led by Ho Chi Minh – Ho Chi Minh flees to China and USSR**

1940s – **Ho Chi Minh forms Vietminh party in order to liberate Vietnam – declare independence in 1945**

1954 – **Vietminh successfully defeats French in north Vietnam and establish communist government in north**

1954 – **Vietnam is split temporarily by the Geneva Accords, with free elections to be held in 1956 to unite the nation**

LATE 1950s – **Civil War in Vietnam between Communist North and American-supported South**


 * PRESIDENTIAL INVOLVEMENT **
 * [[image:turningpoints/hst.gif align="left" caption="hst.gif"]] || [[image:turningpoints/dde.gif align="left" caption="dde.gif"]] || [[image:turningpoints/lfk.gif align="left" caption="lfk.gif"]] || [[image:turningpoints/lbj.gif align="left" caption="lbj.gif"]] ||
 * **TRUMAN**
 * sent economic and military aid to France to help keep their colonies in Indochina** || **EISENHOWER**
 * Domino Theory, if one falls then others will fall too to Communism, set up a puppet state in South Vietnam**
 * Ngo Dinh Diem leads South, won't hold free elections, Buddhists self-immolation** || **KENNEDY**
 * U.S. supports and overrthrow of Ngo Dinh Diem in 1963, send military advisors and doesn't want to be soft on Communism, 16,000 advisors not military troops** || **JOHNSON**
 * Commits US more fully to war in Vietnam, we are not sending Americans troops to do what Asians should** ||


 * =** The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution **=

Maddox is attacked by Vietnam, and then the Turner Joy was supposedly attacked also. Lyndon B. Johnson asks congress for a blank check to prevent further aggression. Was unanimous in house, and 2 people opposed it in the senate. ||  ||  ||
 * Sec. of Defense Robert McNamera ||  ||


 * [[image:http://cdn.dipity.com/uploads/events/0bbab3dff8455159bcacb94c240ceb82_1M.png caption="external image 0bbab3dff8455159bcacb94c240ceb82_1M.png"]] || =** Operation Rolling Thunder **=

US repeatedly bombed Vietnam. ||

= =
 * = American ground troops enter Vietnam =

notes || ||

My questions about the Vietnam War: