US Involvement In The Vietnam War

Throughout the course of history, wars and battles have raged between humans. One of these historic wars was the Vietnam War, a war fought between the North and South Vietnamese. About 58,220 Americans died in the Vietnam War. As a matter of fact, many Americans questioned the United State’s involvement in the war. Because of this, America became increasingly divided on whether troops should be continually sent to Vietnam. Some Americans were opposed to the draft because of the use of a draft, America was losing sight of its goal, people did not even want to fight in this war, and the war was seemingly unwinnable.

First off, the draft was a main reason that opponents of the war fought against. About two-third of American troops volunteered
After continually sending troops, America signed a treaty to stop participating in the war. The U.S. did not abide by this, and continued to fight. President Nixon is a prime example of this betrayal. When Nixon made his campaign to stop the war in Vietnam, he secretly wanted to continue it. He continually bypassed his government advisors and officials to take control of the army and government. According to http://www.vvaw.org/about/warhistory.php, “The U.S. tried everything to win. We dropped more than three times the total tonnage of bombs dropped by both sides in World War II. We conducted "Operation Phoenix" during which the CIA and the Saigon government killed up to 40,000 suspected members of the Viet Cong. We defoliated 10% of the land, much of it permanently. We bombed, bribed, shot, killed and burned for more than 10 years at a cost of $170 billion. Despite all this, we still lost.” This quote shows how desperate the U.S. was in order to win the war, and they tried everything to win. According to http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1969.html#def, America did not keep their promises to show “severe retaliation” against the Viet Cong when the Viet Cong broke the treaty. This was a treaty that was signed by President Nixon with South Vietnamese President Thieu. “Thieu reads from the letter sent by Nixon in 1972 pledging "severe retaliatory action" if South
It is because we have misconceived the nature of the war: It is because we have sought to resolve by military might a conflict whose issue depends upon the will and conviction of the South Vietnamese people. It is like sending a lion to halt an epidemic of jungle rot.”” This shows how the former President John F. Kennedy stated that the war in Vietnam could not be stopped by American forces alone, which was a key point that President Nixon and Johnson both failed to see. As they continually sent more troops to Vietnam to aid the half-living GIs still there, the American fighting force became filled with underage teenagers struggling to keep up with the face-paced combat. ““This misconception rests on a second illusion—the illusion that we can win a war which the South Vietnamese cannot win for themselves.”” The people supporting the fighting in Vietnam believed that we should intrude on the South Vietnamese civil war because if we did not, then Communist powers might reach the South Pacific. Their mindset was, “better to fight now with the South Vietnamese than later, alone. Opponents of the war state that the North Vietnamese could have been stopped had America not interfered by sending more and more troops. This is because in the beginning of the war, America had not interfered as