Why Did Usa Send Their Troops To Vietnam?

After WW2, in South East Asia there was a high risk of spread of communism. In America's opinion, South East Asia countries were like dominoes: if one of them turned communism, others would follow its example. This is why in 1954 President Eisenhower decided to support South Vietnam in order to stop the spread of communism. By 1963 there were 17000 US advisors in South Vietnam. At that time the president of Vietnam was Diem, disliked by the most of the population, especially Buddhists which were persecuted because of their religion (Diem was catholic). In protest, Buddhist monks marched the streets and set themselves on fire. The same year the coup against Diem was planned and it was supported by the US government.

In one year's time, President Johnson had gained the support of the congress to send troops to Vietnam. He claimed that those troops were meant to stop the spread of communism. By the year 1965 more than 200000 US troops were in Vietnam.

This essay will look at why three US presidents decided that the only way to stop communism from spreading was to send in the troops.

In May 1954 the heads of strongest countries USSR, Britain, China, USA, Vietnam and France held a meeting in Geneva, on the same day Dien Bien Phu fell. They argued about elections in Vietnam. Finally they agreed on the following parts:

* Vietnam would be divided temporarily in two along the 17th parallel - the North under Ho Chi Minh and South under Ngo Dinh Diem

* The Vietminh forces would withdraw from the South and the French would pull out of the North

* A date for the elections was fixed: July 1956

Later this meeting was referred to as the Geneva Agreement.

The president Diem was not the ideal person to be in charge of South Vietnam. He was, as one American official said, "a puppet who pulled his own strings - and ours (American) as well." He put people in prison camps, he was harsh on peasants, he refused to allow an election in the South, and he persecuted Buddhists and eliminated Vietminh supporters in the South. Though the US government supported him because he had prevented communist victory in the South.

By the time Kennedy became the president of the USA, Diem became extremely unpopular mainly for the reasons I have mentioned above in my essay. Diem even came up with a policy called the "strategic hamlet". The policy was about taking peasants away from the areas where the popularity of VC was strong. The population of whole villages had to be re-housed. Of course the policy was supported by Kennedy and the US government. In total two thirds of the population was moved.

In 1963, President Kennedy even sent military advisors to help Diem. In the same year there was a coup organised against Diem and Kennedy had supported it. As the result of that coup, Diem and his brother Nhu were shot dead. Diem was replaced with the leadership of the South Vietnamese army.

The spread of communism in South East Asia was inevitable, and one of the main reasons was Communist China. The victory of Mao Zedong' communist forces in the war in China in 1949 were a great boost to the Vietminh. Mao supplied his fellow communists in the North Vietnam with essential military supplies, such as artillery.

The leader of Vietminh was Ho Chi Minh. He was born in 1890 as son of a peasant. For a number of years, he lived in Europe. Soon he became

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