How Important Was America's Involvement In The Vietnam War

The Vietnam war was an armed conflict, lasting from 1963 to 1973, during which America and the Capitalist South Vietnamese Army fought against the communist resistance group, the Vietcong. Although America was far wealthier and technologically superior at this point, all their military might could not defeat the nation of Vietnamese peasants which formed the Vietcong.

Part of the reason for the Vietcong's success is due to each party's reason for their involvement. America fought to prevent The Domino Theory from occurring which was the belief that if North Vietnam influenced South Vietnam to become Communist, the ideology would surely spread to other countries and ultimately the entire world. On the other hand, the Vietcong fought simply to unite North and South Vietnam under communist rule. Majority of the Vietnamese people shared this vision for their country which strengthened the Vietcong's cause. Thus America's chances of defeating the nation of peasants were already low.

Another factor contributing to the Vietcong's success was how each side gathered soldiers for the physical fight. Initially, under John F Kennedy, USA had only sent military advisors into Vietnam to train the South Vietnamese army, however, after Lyndon B Johnson became president in 1963, he intended on fully involving the US troops in the actual
They also set off on Search and Destroy missions to find and kill the Vietcong. The missions involved using a highly flammable gel called Napalm to set massive fires in Vietnamese villages. Neither of these operations succeeded, however, they did cause mass destruction and killed many innocent people. This angered the Vietcong and encouraged them to fight even harder and with such force that all the military might of America could not defeat