Download or read book American Military Escalation in the Vietnam War The Decision Making Process written by Munindra Khaund and published by . This book was released on 1993 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Vietnam War written by Michael P. Sullivan and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2021-09-15 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The war in Vietnam achieved almost none of the goals the American decision-makers formulated, and it cost more than 56,000 American lives. Yet, until recently, Americans have preferred to ignore the causes and consequences of this disaster by treating the war as an aberration in United States foreign policy, an unfortunate but unique mistake. What are the "lessons" of Vietnam? Many previous discussions have focused on narrow or misleading questions, rehashing military decisions, for example, or offering blow-by-blow accounts of Washington infighting, or castigating foreign-policy decision-makers. Michael Sullivan undertakes instead a broad and systematic treatment of the American experience in Vietnam, using a variety of theoretical perspectives to study several aspects of that experience, including the decision-making process and decision-makers' perceptions of the war; public opinion and "mood" before, during, and after the war; and the Vietnam War in relation to the Cold War and to power structures and patterns of violence in the international system. The major goal of The Vietnam War: A Study in the Making of American Policy is to show that the American experience, not only in Vietnam but elsewhere in the world, must be understood as an integral part of the processes of both American foreign policy and international politics. Sullivan demonstrates the importance of using a variety of empirical and quantitative evidence to study foreign policy and of relating a specific historical situation like the Vietnam War to broader theories of international relations.
Download or read book Escalation of the Vietnam War Analysis of reasons written by Sophia Freund and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2006-01-18 with total page 17 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminar paper from the year 2005 in the subject History of Europe - Newer History, European Unification, grade: 1,7, University Pierre-Mendès-France (Institut des Etudes Politiques), course: Cours spécialisé, language: English, abstract: Since the beginning of the escalation of the Vietnam War politicians and scientists are discussing the reasons for this intensification of military action. One can find as much theories as theorists. In the following I will present the most important and disseminated concepts. To create a foundation for my presentation I will shortly describe the chronology of the events which frame the escalation and the escalation itself. After that I will at first present the official, government explanation for the escalation, which is based on the containment of Communist aggression. Subsequent to that I will portray the two most important theories: the 'Quagmire Theory' and the 'Stalemate Theory'. Furthermore some analysts saw the dilemma in the personality and the authority of the American Presidents. At least there is the idea that the escalation was a result of political and economical interests of the USA. Finally I will finish my work with my own conclusion about the intervention in the Vietnam War and its escalation.
Download or read book Choosing War written by Fredrik Logevall and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text examines the great unanswered question on the Vietnam War: could the tragedy have been averted? It challenges prevailing myth that the outbreak of large-scale fighting in 1965 was unavoidable and argues that the war was unnecessary.
Download or read book The Limits of Intervention written by Townsend Hoopes and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 1987 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Far and away the most illuminating account we have of the people and policies that led the United States into the Vietnam catastrophe. . . .A significant contribution to the history of our times." --Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.
Download or read book Eve of Destruction written by Shannon L. Smith and published by . This book was released on 1988 with total page 88 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book American Leadership and Decision Making Failures in the Tet Offensive Vietnam War Milestone Deception and Warnings Missed Opportunity Intelligence Structure Solutions Communist Activities written by U. S. Military and published by . This book was released on 2017-08-29 with total page 93 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Officers in today's United States military can learn from the policy and military decision-making failures and successes in American history. The hope is that in future military operations, they will not repeat the mistakes of the past. This thesis will address the question of how the American leadership failed to correctly assess the indications of an impending offensive in the months preceding the 1968 Tet Offensive in Vietnam. The thesis will analyze and investigate the following weaknesses that contributed to the failure to foresee the Tet Offensive: North Vietnamese and Viet Cong deceptive actions, American inability to analyze those actions, measures the United States had in place to detect and to counter North Vietnamese preparations for the offensive, and the incomplete organization of the American intelligence organization in theater. The Tet Offensive serves as a cautionary parable for modern-day and future military leadership. CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION * CHAPTER 2 - DECEPTION AND WARNINGS * CHAPTER 3 - MISSED OPPORTUNITY * CHAPTER 4 - INTELLIGENCE STRUCTURE * CHAPTER 5 - SOLUTIONS The 1968 Tet Offensive demonstrates how a leadership inability to properly analyze the battlefield can reshape a war and influence the domestic political landscape. Due to flaws in this analytical process, the Tet Offensive ultimately became a major negative turning point in the United States' involvement in the Vietnam War. Tet accelerated a change in how the American public viewed the progress of the conflict. Despite the tactical defeat of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA, also known as the People's Army of Vietnam [PAVN]) and People's Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF, or more commonly known as the Viet Cong), many Americans now viewed Vietnam negatively and the Johnson administration with distrust. Increasingly, more and more people began to question the legitimacy of US involvement in Vietnam. Did the American military leadership fail to correctly assess the indications of an impending offensive in the months preceding the Tet Offensive? In 1967, did the leadership ignore or misinterpret critical intelligence on the offensive including the movement of NVA and Viet Cong troops and supplies? Did Communist activities cause the American military and government to misread preparations being made for a larger operation? Based on information available at the time, what measures could the US have taken to correctly interpret NVA and National Liberation Front (NLF) preparations for the Tet Offensive? Was the American intelligence structure and decision-making process optimized, in terms of organization, to analyze the intelligence it possessed?
Download or read book Success and Failure in Limited War written by Spencer D. Bakich and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2014-03-20 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Common and destructive, limited wars are significant international events that pose a number of challenges to the states involved beyond simple victory or defeat. Chief among these challenges is the risk of escalation—be it in the scale, scope, cost, or duration of the conflict. In this book, Spencer D. Bakich investigates a crucial and heretofore ignored factor in determining the nature and direction of limited war: information institutions. Traditional assessments of wartime strategy focus on the relationship between the military and civilians, but Bakich argues that we must take into account the information flow patterns among top policy makers and all national security organizations. By examining the fate of American military and diplomatic strategy in four limited wars, Bakich demonstrates how not only the availability and quality of information, but also the ways in which information is gathered, managed, analyzed, and used, shape a state’s ability to wield power effectively in dynamic and complex international systems. Utilizing a range of primary and secondary source materials, Success and Failure in Limited War makes a timely case for the power of information in war, with crucial implications for international relations theory and statecraft.
Download or read book Into the Quagmire written by Brian VanDeMark and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1995-05-18 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In November of 1964, as Lyndon Johnson celebrated his landslide victory over Barry Goldwater, the government of South Vietnam lay in a shambles. Ambassador Maxwell Taylor described it as a country beset by "chronic factionalism, civilian-military suspicion and distrust, absence of national spirit and motivation, lack of cohesion in the social structure, lack of experience in the conduct of government." Virtually no one in the Johnson Administration believed that Saigon could defeat the communist insurgency--and yet by July of 1965, a mere nine months later, they would lock the United States on a path toward massive military intervention which would ultimately destroy Johnson's presidency and polarize the American people. Into the Quagmire presents a closely rendered, almost day-by-day account of America's deepening involvement in Vietnam during those crucial nine months. Mining a wealth of recently opened material at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and elsewhere, Brian VanDeMark vividly depicts the painful unfolding of a national tragedy. We meet an LBJ forever fearful of a conservative backlash, which he felt would doom his Great Society, an unsure and troubled leader grappling with the unwanted burden of Vietnam; George Ball, a maverick on Vietnam, whose carefully reasoned (and, in retrospect, strikingly prescient) stand against escalation was discounted by Rusk, McNamara, and Bundy; and Clark Clifford, whose last-minute effort at a pivotal meeting at Camp David failed to dissuade Johnson from doubling the number of ground troops in Vietnam. What comes across strongly throughout the book is the deep pessimism of all the major participants as things grew worse--neither LBJ, nor Bundy, nor McNamara, nor Rusk felt confident that things would improve in South Vietnam, that there was any reasonable chance for victory, or that the South had the will or the ability to prevail against the North. And yet deeper into the quagmire they went. Whether describing a tense confrontation between George Ball and Dean Acheson ("You goddamned old bastards," Ball said to Acheson, "you remind me of nothing so much as a bunch of buzzards sitting on a fence and letting the young men die") or corrupt politicians in Saigon, VanDeMark provides readers with the full flavor of national policy in the making. More important, he sheds greater light on why America became entangled in the morass of Vietnam.
Download or read book Unwilling to Quit written by David L. Prentice and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2023-08-22 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although US involvement in the Vietnam conflict began long before 1965, Lyndon Johnson's substantial large commitment of combat troops that year marked the official beginning of America's longest twentieth-century war. By 1969, after years of intense fighting and thousands of casualties, an increasing number of Americans wanted the United States out of Vietnam. Richard Nixon looked for a way to pull out while preserving the dignity of the United States at home and abroad, and at the same time, to support the anticommunist Republic of Vietnam. Ultimately, he settled on the strategy of Vietnamization—the gradual replacement of US soldiers with South Vietnamese forces. Drawing on newly declassified documents and international archives, Unwilling to Quit dissects the domestic and foreign contexts of America's withdrawal from the Vietnam War. David L. Prentice demonstrates how congressional and presidential politics were a critical factor in Nixon's decision to abandon his hawkish sensibilities in favor of de-escalation. Prentice reframes Nixon's choices, emphasizes Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird's outsized yet subtle role in the decision-making process, and considers how South Vietnam's Nguyen Van Thieu and North Vietnam's Le Duan decisively shaped the American exit. Prentice brings Vietnamese voices into the discussion and underscores the unprecedented influence of American civilians on US foreign policy during the Vietnamization era.
Download or read book The Irony of Vietnam written by Leslie H. Gelb and published by Brookings Institution Press. This book was released on 2016-05-31 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "If a historian were allowed but one book on the American involvement in Vietnam, this would be it." — Foreign Affairs When first published in 1979, four years after the end of one of the most divisive conflicts in the United States, The Irony of Vietnam raised eyebrows. Most students of the war argued that the United States had "stumbled into a quagmire in Vietnam through hubris and miscalculation," as the New York Times's Fox Butterfield put it. But the perspective of time and the opening of documentary sources, including the Pentagon Papers, had allowed Gelb and Betts to probe deep into the decisionmaking leading to escalation of military action in Vietnam. The failure of Vietnam could be laid at the door of American foreign policy, they said, but the decisions that led to the failure were made by presidents aware of the risks, clear about their aims, knowledgeable about the weaknesses of their allies, and under no illusion about the outcome. The book offers a picture of a steely resolve in government circles that, while useful in creating consensus, did not allow for alternative perspectives. In the years since its publication, The Irony of Vietnam has come to be considered the seminal work on the Vietnam War.
Download or read book The U S Government and the Vietnam War Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships Part IV written by William Conrad Gibbons and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-07-14 with total page 986 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fourth volume of a five-part policy history of the U.S. government and the Vietnam War covers the core period of U.S. involvement, from July 1965, when the decision was made to send large-scale U.S. forces, to the beginning of 1968, just before the Tet offensive and the decision to seek a negotiated settlement. Using a wide variety of archival sources and interviews, the book examines in detail the decisions of the president, relations between the president and Congress, and the growth of public and congressional opposition to the war. Differences between U.S. military leaders on how the war should be fought are also included, as well as military planning and operations. Among many other important subjects, the financial effects of the war and of raising taxes are considered, as well as the impact of a tax increase on congressional and public support for the war. Another major interest is the effort by Congress to influence the conduct of the war and to place various controls on U.S. goals and operations. The emphasis throughout this richly textured narrative is on providing a better understanding of the choices facing the United States and the way in which U.S. policymakers tried to find an effective politico-military strategy, while also probing for a diplomatic settlement. Originally published in 1995. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Download or read book Shame and Humiliation written by Blema S. Steinberg and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 1996-04-16 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Steinberg focuses on the narcissistic personality, identifying it as intensely self-involved and preoccupied with success and recognition as a substitute for parental love. She asserts that narcissistic leaders are most likely to use force when they fear being humiliated for failing to act and when they need to restore their diminished sense of self-worth. Providing case studies of Johnson, Nixon, and Eisenhower, Steinberg describes the childhood, maturation, and career of each president, documenting key personality attributes, and then discusses each one's Vietnam policy in light of these traits. She contends that Johnson authorized the bombing of Vietnam in part because he feared the humiliation that would come from inaction, and that Nixon escalated U.S. intervention in Cambodia in part because of his low sense of self-esteem. Steinberg contrasts these two presidents with Eisenhower, who was psychologically secure and was, therefore, able to carry out a careful and thoughtful analysis of the problem he faced in Indochina. Shame and Humiliation reveals how personality traits affect our perception of reality and offers a powerful demonstration of the impact of psychodynamics on presidential decision making.
Download or read book American Decision making in the Escalation of the War in Vietnam written by Kenneth W. Hedman and published by . This book was released on 1977 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Greene Papers written by Wallace Martin Greene (Jr.) and published by Government Printing Office. This book was released on 2016-03-24 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: General Wallace M. Greene Jr. was the 23d Commandant of the Marine Corps, serving from 1964 to 1967, a period in which American involvement in Vietnam increased dramatically. The Greene Papers: General Wallace M. Greene Jr. and the Escalation of the Vietnam War, January 1964-March 1965 contains more than 100 documents from the personal papers of General Greene and is the first edited volume of personal papers to be published by the Marine Corps History Division as a monograph. Produced by a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Greene's notes provide readers with a firsthand account from one of the main participants in the decision-making process that led to the commitment of a large-scale American expeditionary force in Southeast Asia. Because of President Lyndon B. Johnson's reticence to regularly consult the Joint Chiefs on military matters, however, the notes also give readers a second point of view: that of a frustrated advisor kept on the outside and forced to look in, observe, and reflect on major military decisions often made without his input or support. Also apparent are the tensions between Greene and President Johnson's aggressive and domineering Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara. This volume begins in January 1964 and ends just before the landing of the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade at Da Nang on 8 March 1965, a pivotal moment that marked the official transition from the United States' advisory mission to a more active combat mission. In doing so, it traces Greene's growing frustration with McNamara's and Johnson's equivocation and uncertainty about Southeast Asia. Along with a series of commemorative pamphlets, this book is part of the Marine Corps History Division's effort to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Vietnam War. Other publications avaialble from the United States Marine Corps can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/agency/922 Other publications about the Vietnam War can be found here: https://bookstore.gpo.gov/catalog/us-military-history/battles-wars/vietnam-war
Download or read book Operation Rolling Thunder written by U.s. Naval Academy and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2014-04-19 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The assassination of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem on November 1, 1963, left a leadership void in Saigon that was never filled. Heads of state went through Saigon like a revolving door, yet none of them were able to successfully lead and govern the people of South Vietnam. On the other side of the globe, President of the United States John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963. While the U.S. had a line of succession, President Johnson was relatively new to the Vietnam situation. Even though Johnson was new, he still had Kennedy's cabinet and advisers to aid his decisions. Despite this, by early 1964 two new leaders, Nguyen Khanh and Lyndon Johnson sought a solution to the decades long struggle in Vietnam. President Johnson inherited a three-front war in Vietnam. One front was North Vietnamese support of the Viet Cong (VC) insurgency in South Vietnam, and Johnson had to stop this support in order to defeat the VC. The insurgency itself constituted another front that had to be defeated in order to maintain a free and independent South Vietnam. The third overarching front was the creation of a stable and legitimate government in Saigon capable of governing the people of South Vietnam. The question for his administration was on which of these aspects to focus. Before Johnson could make that decision, he first had to decide if the U.S. should continue to aid Saigon; therefore, he had three options: leave Vietnam, continue in an advisory role, or escalate U.S. involvement. The political and military situations in Vietnam deteriorated to such a point through 1964-1965 that by February 1965 there were no good choices left from which President Johnson could choose. Johnson desired for there to be a stable South Vietnamese government before he committed U.S. forces to its defense; however, no such government emerged. The administration was unwilling to risk U.S. prestige, resources, and lives unless they were confident South Vietnam could succeed without U.S. support. Because of the instability in South Vietnam as well as the perceived risk of communist aggression, President Johnson decided that escalatory military actions would be limited and gradual. Therefore, President Johnson made the least bad decision he could in February 1965 by initiating Operation ROLLING THUNDER and committing the United States to the Vietnam War.
Download or read book The Rhetoric of War written by Harvey A. Averch and published by University Press of America. This book was released on 2002 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Rhetoric of War, Harvey Averch explores the relationship between the a priori policy models that decision makers use in war (or peace) and policy analysis, and provides cost-effective alternatives for decision makers in war or peace. The Vietnam War serves as a case study of the effectiveness of many models proposed by political scientists, historians, and policy analysts as capable of improving decision making if only decision makers were persuaded to adopt them. Averch demonstrates that whatever the method, willingness to be personally and organizationally self-critical is a necessary condition for using any policy analysis method in a serious way.
