Download or read book The Escalation of American Involvement in the Vietnam War written by Christopher Chant and published by Vietnam War. This book was released on 2017 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The anti-Communist government of South Vietnam sought American aid, and this grew steadily from technical support, weapons, and equipment, to the initial limited involvement of US forces to protect American interests. This opened the floodgates, and by the mid-1960s ever-larger numbers of US troops poured into South Vietnam as US air power struck at North Vietnam. Each title in this series contains color photos throughout, and back matter including: an index, further reading lists for books and internet resources, and a timeline. Key Icons appear throughout the books in this series in an effort to encourage library readers to build knowledge, gain awareness, explore possibilities and expand their viewpoints through our content rich non-fiction books. Key Icons in this series are as follows: Words to Understand are shown at the front of each chapter with definitions. These words are set in boldfaced type in that chapter, so that readers are able to reference back to the definitions--building their vocabulary and enhancing their reading comprehension. Sidebars are highlighted graphics with content rich material within that allows readers to build knowledge and broaden their perspectives by weaving together additional information to provide realistic and holistic perspectives. Educational Videos are offered at the end of each book through the use of a QR code, that when scanned, takes the student to an online video showing a video relating to The Vietnam War. This gives the readers additional content to supplement the text. Text Dependent Questions are placed at the end of each chapter. They challenge the readers comprehension of the chapter they have just read, while sending the reader back to the text for more careful attention to the evidence presented there. Research Projects are

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 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 The Gulf of Tonkin written by Tal Tovy and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-04-22 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Gulf of Tonkin: The United States and the Escalation in the Vietnam War analyzes the events that led to the escalation of the conflict in Vietnam and increased American involvement. On August 4, 1964, the captains of two American destroyers, the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy, reported that their ships were being attacked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats. This report came on top of a previous report by the captain of the USS Maddox, indicating that he had been attacked by torpedo boats two nights earlier. The text introduces readers to the historiography of these incidents and how the perception of the events changed over time. The attacks, which were collectively called the Gulf of Tonkin incident, are presented in the context not only of the Vietnam War but also of the Cold War and U.S. government powers, enabling students to understand the events’ full ramifications. Using essential primary documents, Tal Tovy provides an accessible introduction to a vital turning point in U.S. and international affairs. This book will be useful to all students of the Vietnam War, American military history, and foreign policy history.

Download or read book Tonkin Gulf and the Escalation of the Vietnam War written by Edwin E. Moïse and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2000-11-09 with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Retracing the confused pattern of planning for escalation of the Vietnam War, Moise reconstructs the events of the night of August 4, 1964, when the U.S. Navy destroyers Maddox and Turner Joy reported that they were under attack by North Vietnamese torpedo boats in the Gulf of Tonkin. Using declassified records and interviews with the participants, Moise demonstrates that there was no North Vietnamese attack; the original report was a genuine mistake.

Download or read book Tonkin Gulf and the Escalation of the Vietnam War written by Edwin E. Moise and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author examines the events of one August night in 1964, when U.S. ships were allegedly attacked by the North Vietnamese, leading to an escalation of U.S. involvement in the war, and demonstrates that the attack never took place. UP.

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 290 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 The Limits of Intervention written by Townsend Hoopes and published by David McKay Company. This book was released on 1973 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Choosing War written by Fredrik Logevall and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2023-09-01 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In one of the most detailed and powerfully argued books published on American intervention in Vietnam, Fredrik Logevall examines the last great unanswered question on the war: Could the tragedy have been averted? His answer: a resounding yes. Challenging the prevailing myth that the outbreak of large-scale fighting in 1965 was essentially unavoidable, Choosing War argues that the Vietnam War was unnecessary, not merely in hindsight but in the context of its time. Why, then, did major war break out? Logevall shows it was partly because of the timidity of the key opponents of U.S. involvement, and partly because of the staunch opposition of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations to early negotiations. His superlative account shows that U.S. officials chose war over disengagement despite deep doubts about the war's prospects and about Vietnam's importance to U.S. security and over the opposition of important voices in the Congress, in the press, and in the world community. They did so because of concerns about credibility—not so much America's or the Democratic party's credibility, but their own personal credibility. Based on six years of painstaking research, this book is the first to place American policymaking on Vietnam in 1963-65 in its wider international context using multiarchival sources, many of them recently declassified. Here we see for the first time how the war played in the key world capitals—not merely in Washington, Saigon, and Hanoi, but also in Paris and London, in Tokyo and Ottawa, in Moscow and Beijing. Choosing War is a powerful and devastating account of fear, favor, and hypocrisy at the highest echelons of American government, a book that will change forever our understanding of the tragedy that was the Vietnam War.

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 America the Vietnam War and the World written by Andreas W. Daum and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2003-07-14 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Publisher's description: "This book presents new perspectives on the Vietnam War, its global repercussions, and the role of this war in modern history. The volume reveals 'America's War' as an international event that reverberated all over the world: in domestic settings of numerous nation-states, combatants and non-combatants alike, as well as in transnational relations and alliance systems. The volume thereby covers a wide geographical range-from Berkeley and Berlin to Cambodia and Canberra. The essays address political, military, and diplomatic issues no less than cultural and intellectual consequences of 'Vietnam'. The authors also set the Vietnam War in comparison to other major conflicts in world history; they cover over three centuries, and develop general insights into the tragedies and trajectories of military conflicts as phenomena of modern societies in general. For the first time, 'America's War' is thus depicted as a truly global event whose origins and characteristics deserve an interdisciplinary treatment."

Download or read book The Vietnam War Why Escalate written by and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 22 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States involvement in Vietnam began in 1950 when President Truman provided aid to the French military in Indochina and deployed 35 American advisors. By 1969 the United States had 543,000 troops in Vietnam engaged in a war to thwart communist expansion in the region and stabilize the fledgling South Vietnamese Government. The most dramatic increases occurred between 1965 and 1968 following the initial deployment of U.S. ground combat troops. The chain of events that forced President Johnson and his advisors to choose this course of action have been the topic of debate for 35 years, with conclusions ranging from benign criticism to charges of criminal misconduct. This paper will document the incremental increases of U.S. involvement in the war effort and explore the rational for each specific escalation decision. The escalation of the War in Vietnam was a direct result of the inability of the U.S. to make a firm commitment during the early stages of the conflict. Had we had a better understanding of the situation early in the game, we may have known that an early and strong commitment of U.S. forces could have forced Hanoi to accept the South Vietnamese Government and the partitioning of the country.

Download or read book The Vietnam War written by Mitch Yamasaki and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through a collection of original source documents and the words of those who lived through it, The Vietnam War gives insight into the historic background and events leading to American involvement and escalation of the war. Professor Mitch Yamasaki examines the major interpretations of how and why the U.S. became involved, what it hoped to accomplish, and how a poorly armed guerilla army thwarted U.S. efforts. Carefully selected materials highlight the forces that led to President Johnson's dilemma, the country's deep divisions over the war, and the ongoing reexamination of the Vietnam War.

Download or read book To Reason Why written by Jeffrey P. Kimball and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2005-08-11 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is about the past and continuing debate over the causes of United States involvement in the Vietnam War. It brings together readings that best exemplify the widely varying answers that historians, political scientists, social scientists, policymakers, journalists, and novelists have given to the essential question of American involvement: why did the U.S. intervene diplomatically and militarily in Vietnam between 1945 and 1975?Ó --from the Preface To Reason Why breaks new ground in covering and analyzing this issue. Kimball has gathered together thirty-eight readings -- including speeches, interviews, and articles -- that best exemplify the conflicting ideas and theories about the U.S. intervention in Vietnam. Among these thirty-eight readings are excerpts from David Halberstam, Daniel Ellsberg, Frances FitzGerald, Henry Kissinger, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon.

Download or read book American Tragedy written by David E. Kaiser and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 612 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A re-creation of the deliberations, actions, and deceptions that brought two decades of post-World War II confidence to an end, this book offers an insight into the Vietnam War at home and abroad - and into American foreign policy in the 1960s.

Download or read book Hanoi s Road to the Vietnam War 1954 1965 written by Pierre Asselin and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2015-08-18 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Using new and largely inaccessible Vietnamese sources as well as French, British, Canadian and American archives, Pierre Asselin sheds valuable light on Hanoi's path to war. Step by step the narrative makes Hanoi's revolutionary strategy from the end of the French Indochina War to the start of the Anti-American Resistance Struggle for Reunification and National Salvation (the Vietnam War) transparent. The book reveals how North Vietnamese leaders moved from a cautious policy emphasizing nonviolent political and diplomatic struggle to a far riskier pursuit of military victory"--

Download or read book The Gulf of Tonkin Incident written by Charles River and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2021-05-07 with total page 94 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Includes pictures *Includes a bibliography for further reading "The last thing I wanted to do was to be a wartime President." - Lyndon B. Johnson The Vietnam War could have been called a comedy of errors if the consequences weren't so deadly and tragic. In 1951, while war was raging in Korea, the United States began signing defense pacts with nations in the Pacific, intending to create alliances that would contain the spread of Communism. As the Korean War was winding down, America joined the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, pledging to defend several nations in the region from Communist aggression. One of those nations was South Vietnam. Before the Vietnam War, most Americans would have been hard pressed to locate Vietnam on a map. South Vietnamese President Diệm's regime was extremely unpopular, and war broke out between Communist North Vietnam and South Vietnam around the end of the 1950s. Kennedy's administration tried to prop up the South Vietnamese with training and assistance, but the South Vietnamese military was feeble. A month before his death, Kennedy signed a presidential directive withdrawing 1,000 American personnel, and shortly after Kennedy's assassination, new President Lyndon B. Johnson reversed course, instead opting to expand American assistance to South Vietnam. In 1964, the USS Maddox was an intelligence-gathering naval ship stationed off the coast of North Vietnam for the purpose of gathering information about the ongoing conflict between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. The borders between the two sides were in dispute, and the United States was less up to date on changes in these borders than the two belligerents. In the process, the USS Maddox accidentally crossed over into North Vietnamese shores, and when the ship was sighted by North Vietnamese naval units, they attacked the Maddox on August 2, 1964. Though no Americans were hurt, naval crews were on heightened alert as the Maddox retreated to South Vietnam, where it was met by the USS Turner Joy. Two days later, the Maddox and Turner Joy, both with crews already on edge as a result of the events of August 2, were certain they were being followed by hostile North Vietnamese boats, and both fired at targets popping up on their radar. The fighting on August 2, can be verified through a variety of sources and an accounting of materials expended. However, the mystery of the Gulf of Tonkin begins with what the Maddox's Captain John J. Herrick believed was a second attack that spanned August 4 and into the following morning. He reported to officials that there was such an attack despite lack of visual confirmation. The Ticonderoga passed along the report of an August 4 attack, with some visual evidence gathered by sailors and officers. After this second encounter, Johnson gave a speech over radio to the American people shortly before midnight on August 4th. He told of attacks on the high seas, suggesting the events occurred in international waters, and he vowed the nation would be prepared for its own defense and the defense of the South Vietnamese. On the strength of Herrick's report, on August 5, as part of the retaliatory action, Johnson ordered aerial attacks against the coastline's patrol bases and oil storage facilities. These represented the first purely American attacks against North Vietnam, named Operation Pierce Arrow. Lieutenant Everett Alvarez, an American pilot from the USS Constellation, was shot down and became the first American aviator to be captured. Fellow pilot Richard Sather received the unfortunate distinction of becoming the first American aviator to be killed in Vietnam. It would be years before the government revealed that the second encounter was no encounter at all. The government never figured out what the Maddox and Turner Joy were firing at the night of August 4, but there was no indication that it involved the North Vietnamese.