TPTW+Sophie  

The Path to War By Sophie

After the Vietnamese victory at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the French decided to admit defeat. That battle was the last of a war that started over the Vietnam Deceleration of Independence. The fighting is now over and an international peace conference was being held. The Geneva conference made the decision to make a temporary line across Vietnam. The northern half would be ruled by the communist leader, Ho Chi Minh. The southern part would be led by the democratic ruler, Ngo Dinh Diem. The conference also came up with the idea that they would have a free election for everyone in Vietnam to decide their new government. Ngo Dinh Diem was afraid that the communist leader would win because of his and the Viet Minh’s popularity. So he refused to let the scheduled voting start. The election was canceled and the accord peace treaty was broken. Ho Chi Minh decided to go back to war to reunite the country. Ngo Diem asked President Eisenhower to send military support and advisors. Eisenhower did. Diem’s government and his army were unpopular with the citizens. The National front of Liberation of Vietnam and Viet Cong guerrilla fighters came from both sides of the 17th parallel. They saw themselves as patriots fighting to reunite their country and throw out a fraudulent leader who was refusing to hold a democratic election. The U.S. on the other hand saw them as very dangerous communists. Some of the U.S. advisors knew of a plot to assassinate Diem and they did nothing to stop or prevent it. A highly successful move resulting in Diem’s death, and it left the southern government just as unstable as it was before he died. The Viet Cong were growing stronger and they were getting more soldiers from the north and gaining more soldiers as they moved south. Even though the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) was much larger by almost 10 ARVN to one guerrilla, and yet the guerrillas were unstoppable. The U.S. government officials were in fear that Vietnam would soon be under the rule of communism. They thought that if Vietnam went to communism the other countries surrounding it would soon fall as well. Sort of like if one domino falls the others are going to fall also. A lot of people in the U.S. disagreed on Vietnam. Some were pacifists; they thought that war was bad in any form and that we shouldn’t get involved. Others believed that the United States had no business getting involved in a war so far away. Still others disagreed to the U.S. supporting a distorted, dictatorial South Vietnamese government. The US ship the Maddox was attacked by a Northern Vietnam ship. Then two days later another US ship was attacked by Northen Vietnam. There is no proof that the second attack ever happened, but it is what got the US foot soldiers into Vietnam.