Anybody here old enough to remeber the beginnigs of US involvement in Viet Nam?

[3_Limes]

The reason I'm asking is: JD Vance assures us that there's no chance of a protracted conflict in Iran. So, how long did it take for VN to go from "no chance of protracted conflict " to quagmire? Just to get an idea of what to expect going forward.

[dalton99a]

1. The trick is to wage war without declaring war

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War

Following the Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964, the US Congress passed a resolution that gave President Lyndon B. Johnson authority to increase military presence without declaring war. Johnson launched a bombing campaign of the north and sent combat troops, dramatically increasing deployment to 184,000 by 1966, and 536,000 by 1969. US forces relied on air supremacy and overwhelming firepower to conduct search and destroy operations in rural areas. In 1968, North Vietnam launched the Tet Offensive, which was a tactical defeat but convinced many Americans the war could not be won. Johnson's successor, Richard Nixon, began "Vietnamization" from 1969, which saw the conflict fought by an expanded ARVN while US forces withdrew. The 1970 Cambodian coup d'état resulted in a PAVN invasion and US–ARVN counter-invasion, escalating its civil war. US troops had mostly withdrawn from Vietnam by 1972, and the 1973 Paris Peace Accords saw the rest leave. The accords were subsequently violated by North Vietnam, and fighting continued until the 1975 spring offensive and fall of Saigon to the PAVN, marking the war's end. North and South Vietnam were reunified in 1976.

[surfered]

12. Resulting in 58,000 US soldiers killed, 300,000 wounded.

And today, Vietnam has favored nation status in trade.

[dalton99a]

18. +1. Saigon is now a huge modern metropolis

[MarineCombatEngineer]

53. That picture is beautiful

that's sure not the Saigon I remember from my tours in the SE Asia games.

[SWBTATTReg]

73. Wow!

This is a far cry from what I imagined it to be!!! Night and day!!

I just remember the dismal memories of reading the newspapers on how many US soldiers died that day/period of time. A steady, horrible, daily drumbeat of death.

Had friends go to Vietnam. We would all sit and watch the lottery draw out numbers for who was 'so lucky' to get to serve / in Vietnam. It wasn't a fun thing for my high school /ROTC friends.

[surfered]

105. Ho Chi Minh City

[popsdenver]

25. My mind is old

but it seems that at the time, it wasn't declared a "war", but a "Police Action" or some such crap.
Do you remember anything about that???????????

I talk to all kinds of people, who don't recall, in the run up to the TET offensive, McNamara telling Johnson he needed an additional 250K? soldiers right away, and lowered IQ standards, and rushed training to achieve that goal. They called them
"McNamara's Morons"............
Do you remember anything about that?

[dalton99a]

30. Even the Korean War was described as a police action

The President's News Conference of June 29, 1950

Harry S. Truman
June 29, 1950

...

Q. Mr. President, another question that is being asked is, are we going to use ground troops in Korea?

THE PRESIDENT. No comment on that.

Q. Mr. President, could you elaborate on this statement that - I believe the direct quote was, "We are not at war." And could we use that quote in quotes?

THE PRESIDENT. Yes, I will allow you to use that. We are not at war.

Q. Mr. President, would it be correct, against your explanation, to call this a police action under the United Nations?

THE PRESIDENT. Yes. That is exactly what it amounts to.

...

https://web.archive.org/web/20101226063925/http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=594

[mommymarine2003]

34. My father served in Vietnam in 1966-67. He never forgave Johnson and McNamara.

My father was a career Marine officer. Vietnam was his third war in which he served. He was a Democrat until the Gulf of Tonkin. I think a lot of the military never forgave Johnson. I saw McNamara as a teenager when we lived in the DC area when my father was stationed at Headquarters Marine Corps. He was walking out the door of the Smithsonian when we were walking in. I just remember that he looked like the cover of Time Magazine that I had seen before.

[popsdenver]

40. In December, just before the Tet occurred

McNamara and his son came into a store that I was working in, and I nearly got fired for refusing to wait on him......

BTW: Johnson came into the Presidency not worth anything, and later left the White House worth a reported 20 Million.....

[Chemical Bill]

104. If only your father could have known about...

Henry Cabot Lodge and Allen Dulles. Too bad the book The Devil's Chessboard didn't come out for decades.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

56. Yeah, at the time, it wasn't a declared war, it was a so called police action,

but the funny this is, well not funny at all, during my tours, I sure as hell didn't see any police depts. fighting, except maybe the military police.

[GCG]

2. It was a slow process.

The U.S. began deploying advisors as early as 1950, to assist the French against the Viet Minh.

November 1, 1955, is often cited as the beginning when the U.S. began providing military advisors to the South.


The U.S. entered the Vietnam War with a significant escalation in 1965, when the first combat troops were deployed and sustained bombing of North Vietnam began, following the Gulf of Tonkin Incident in 1964.

[CTyankee]

10. I saw this unfold as a young mother. My son was 3 years old. I feared the war would drag on until he was 18 and he would

be drafted and sent to the jungles of Vietnam. It scared the hell out of me! I joined Clergy and Laity Concerned about Vietnam and later Another Mother for Peace. Hell yes, I was radicalized!

[Emile]

15. The first US soldier killed in Vietnam

The first U.S. soldier killed in the Vietnam War was Technical Sergeant Richard B. Fitzgibbon Jr., who died on June 8, 1956, though he was not killed in action but murdered by another American airman. However, the first American to die in ground combat was Specialist 4 James T. Davis, who was killed on December 22, 1961.

[Kid Berwyn]

3. Johnson lied America into war via Gulf of Tonkin.

Wasn’t clear until Maj. John Newman, USA, wrote “JKF and Vietnam: Deception, Intrigue, and the Struggle for Power.” Then an active duty professor at West Point, Maj. Newman uncovered the missing part from the official history — “the Pentagon Papers.”

President Kennedy said he would not send US draftees to fight in another country’s civil war and signed National Security Action Memorandum 263 to put the Administration’s official policy in writing. Read NSAM 263 here:

https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/nsam-jfk/nsam-263.htm

Four days after the assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, LBJ reverses the policy to stay and support South Vietnam in its "contest against the externally directed and supported Communist conspiracy in NSAM 273:

https://irp.fas.org/offdocs/nsam-lbj/nsam-273.htm

National Security Action Memorandum 263 (NSAM 263) is documentary proof JFK ordered US out of Vietnam. And after CIA and Pentagon leadership lied to his face about the Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961, President Kennedy would never have fallen for their rationale for escalating US presence in South Vietnam, their Gulf of Tonkin “Big Lie” on America.


https://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1366764&mesg_id=1367923

https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/jmnpp

“In the final analysis, it's their war," (JFK) said. "They're the ones who have to win it or lose it. We can help them. We can give them equipment. We can send our men out there as advisers. But they have to win it -- the people of Vietnam -- against the Communists."

[Jilly_in_VA]

67. Because he was lied TO by the generals

Let's not forget that part!

[Kid Berwyn]

75. And the admirals, and the NSA, but most of all the CIA.

That agency fed LBJ different "numbers" than they had been giving JFK. And Johnson gave them what they wanted: war.

Here's some history little known outside those who've read Newman and, more recently, James W. Douglass:

After JFK assassination, President Truman put his concerns about CIA in print.

One month after the assassination, President Harry S Truman expressed public concern CIA had strayed off the reservation from intelligence gathering of foreign news sources to cloak-and-dagger operations.

Limit CIA Role To Intelligence

By Harry S Truman
The Washington Post, December 22, 1963 - page A11

INDEPENDENCE, MO., Dec. 21 — I think it has become necessary to take another look at the purpose and operations of our Central Intelligence Agency—CIA. At least, I would like to submit here the original reason why I thought it necessary to organize this Agency during my Administration, what I expected it to do and how it was to operate as an arm of the President.

I think it is fairly obvious that by and large a President's performance in office is as effective as the information he has and the information he gets. That is to say, that assuming the President himself possesses a knowledge of our history, a sensitive understanding of our institutions, and an insight into the needs and aspirations of the people, he needs to have available to him the most accurate and up-to-the-minute information on what is going on everywhere in the world, and particularly of the trends and developments in all the danger spots in the contest between East and West. This is an immense task and requires a special kind of an intelligence facility.

Of course, every President has available to him all the information gathered by the many intelligence agencies already in existence. The Departments of State, Defense, Commerce, Interior and others are constantly engaged in extensive information gathering and have done excellent work.

But their collective information reached the President all too frequently in conflicting conclusions. At times, the intelligence reports tended to be slanted to conform to established positions of a given department. This becomes confusing and what's worse, such intelligence is of little use to a President in reaching the right decisions.

Therefore, I decided to set up a special organization charged with the collection of all intelligence reports from every available source, and to have those reports reach me as President without department "treatment" or interpretations.

I wanted and needed the information in its "natural raw" state and in as comprehensive a volume as it was practical for me to make full use of it. But the most important thing about this move was to guard against the chance of intelligence being used to influence or to lead the President into unwise decisions—and I thought it was necessary that the President do his own thinking and evaluating.

Since the responsibility for decision making was his—then he had to be sure that no information is kept from him for whatever reason at the discretion of any one department or agency, or that unpleasant facts be kept from him. There are always those who would want to shield a President from bad news or misjudgments to spare him from being "upset."

For some time I have been disturbed by the way CIA has been diverted from its original assignment. It has become an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the Government. This has led to trouble and may have compounded our difficulties in several explosive areas.

I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. Some of the complications and embarrassment I think we have experienced are in part attributable to the fact that this quiet intelligence arm of the President has been so removed from its intended role that it is being interpreted as a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue—and a subject for cold war enemy propaganda.

With all the nonsense put out by Communist propaganda about "Yankee imperialism," "exploitive capitalism," "war-mongering," "monopolists," in their name-calling assault on the West, the last thing we needed was for the CIA to be seized upon as something akin to a subverting influence in the affairs of other people.

I well knew the first temporary director of the CIA, Adm. Souers, and the later permanent directors of the CIA, Gen. Hoyt Vandenberg and Allen Dulles. These were men of the highest character, patriotism and integrity—and I assume this is true of all those who continue in charge.

But there are now some searching questions that need to be answered. I, therefore, would like to see the CIA be restored to its original assignment as the intelligence arm of the President, and that whatever else it can properly perform in that special field—and that its operational duties be terminated or properly used elsewhere.

We have grown up as a nation, respected for our free institutions and for our ability to maintain a free and open society. There is something about the way the CIA has been functioning that is casting a shadow over our historic position and I feel that we need to correct it.

SOURCE: http://www.maebrussell.com/Prouty/Harry%20Truman's%20CIA%20article.html

That would be better known, but for some reason it got left out of the Washington Post's afternoon edition and out of most all of the nation’s other newspapers. Nevertheless, to put some emphasis on Truman’s essay, former CIA Director Allen Dulles tried to get a retraction:

Are Presidents Afraid of the CIA?

By Ray McGovern
December 29, 2009

Excerpt…

Fox Guarding Hen House

The well-connected Dulles got himself appointed to the Warren Commission and took the lead in shaping the investigation of JFK’s assassination.

Documents in the Truman Library show that he then mounted a small domestic covert action of his own to neutralize any future airing of Truman’s and Souers’s warnings about covert action.

So important was this to Dulles that he invented a pretext to get himself invited to visit Truman in Independence, Missouri. On the afternoon of April 17, 1964, Dulles spent a half-hour trying to get the former President to retract what he had said in his op-ed. No dice, said Truman.

No problem, thought Dulles. Four days later, in a formal memo for his old buddy Lawrence Houston, CIA General Counsel from 1947 to 1973, Dulles fabricated a private retraction, claiming that Truman told him the Washington Post article was “all wrong,” and that Truman “seemed quite astounded at it.”

No doubt Dulles thought it might be handy to have such a memo in CIA files, just in case.

A fabricated retraction? It certainly seems so, because Truman did not change his tune. Far from it.

In a June 10, 1964, letter to the managing editor of Look magazine, for example, Truman restated his critique of covert action, emphasizing that he never intended the CIA to get involved in “strange activities.”

CONTINUED...

SOURCE: http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/122909b.html

Truman did not point a finger of blame at CIA, Secret Service cough Rowley, the Mafia or anyone. However, it is difficult to think of an innocent explanation for Mr. Dulles’ response and actions — months before President Lyndon B. Johnson would appoint him to the Warren Commission, where he covered up the CIA-Mafia Castro assassination plots and a whole lot more.

[Jilly_in_VA]

76. Good old Allen Dulles

I hope he is burning in hell as we speak. Hey boys, throw some more coal on that fire!

[Kid Berwyn]

88. Maximum temperatures, please. And for John McCloy...

McCloy and Dulles have important NAZI links that are largely forgotten. LBJ appointed them to the Warren Commission, where they conveniently left out a lot about what they knew, how they did it, and who they did it for:

Two members of the Warren Commission helped bring NAZIs into US mainstream.



And that played a key role in the rise of post-war fascism. Allen Dulles, as a top official of the OSS and CIA, incorporated NAZI war criminals into the CIA from its founding. John McCloy, as High Commissioner for Germany, allowed Klaus Barbie, Alfred Krupp, eight members of his board, and who-knows-who-else to escape justice. Of course, Dulles and McCloy also were barons of Wall Street and Beltway Insiders, at the heart of the military industrial complex. We all can see what that means for the United States today.

Background:

The American who let the Nazis rebuild Germany

https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/november-2021/the-american-who-let-the-nazis-rebuild-germany/

CIA and NAZI War Criminals

https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB146/index.htm

The NAZI connections of two prominent Warren Commission are NEVER brought up anytime the Warren Commission is mentioned on TV or in the NYT. That's why I sound like a broken record, my Friend: For as long as I live, I want people to know that the government of the United States of America "changed" after the assassination of President Kennedy. Today, the likes of traitors such as Trump and George W Bush are free to practice "Money trumps peace" at the expense of the U.S. Constitution and We the People.

[Ritabert]

4. You don't even have to go back that far.

Dubya Bush got us into two unfunded wars that lasted decades and did nothing except balloon the debt.

[dalton99a]

6. +1

https://www.dvidshub.net/news/527817/iraq-grave-and-gathering-danger-bush-tells-un

[popsdenver]

29. Balloon the debt, it did

I remember Rumsfeld saying Desert Storm, would take three days, and three billion dollars..........and the three billion would be paid back to us, from oil revenue paid by the new IRAQ Government...............

The costs of that war are currently at TWO TRILLION, and still counting.......and the only winners were U.S. Oil Companies, Dick Cheney's beloved Halliburton, and the gargantuan Military Industrial Complex........

And now, the Republicans have brought wars back to the table, to further enrich the MIC........

[PatSeg]

36. Ah yes, you're bringing back memories

A few benefited from that Mideast debacle and it was so obvious at the time. Republicans were spending money like drunken sailors. But that's okay, a Democratic administration will come along and clean up the mess like they always do.

[popsdenver]

43. I bring up current things

and memories of countless atrocities that have happened the past 5-6 DECADES, and people look at me like I'm crazy.
The intentional Friday night news dumps, and the three day new cycle have accomplished what the Republicans have intended....
They have been working at this since the corruption of the 1980 election by HWBush, whose actions could be labeled as Treason....

My title for a book about the past 46+ years would be: WHILE THE NATION SLEPT

[PatSeg]

58. Not everyone is paying close attention

Last edited Fri Feb 27, 2026, 02:04 PM - Edit history (1)

to world events. There was a time when I was much younger that I didn't. I started becoming somewhat more aware during the Clinton years, but once Bush was appointed President, I became a 24/7 news junkie. Of course, that was when I found DU.

[Ritabert]

63. I've been paying attention since 1969. Reagan really made me pay attention.

[PatSeg]

83. I remember we paid a lot of attention

during the Nixon years. Most young people did back then, primarily because of the Vietnam War and the draft. I recall many intense discussions among our friends. A lot of the Reagan years were a blur for me, but I was really struggling to survive back then.

[Ritabert]

97. I didn't realize what Reagan and his minions were up to until later...

....but they started the middle class on the downhill slide. Their Savings & Loan scam ended up doubling (or in the case of California tripling) home prices. All if a sudden it took two paychecks to afford a house.

[PatSeg]

101. It is often different when you right in the middle of it

I remember not liking Reagan and I couldn't stand Nancy, but it wasn't until years later that I realized how much damage he did. Times were really hard for us and for most of our friends. During the Clinton years, everything seemed to turn around not just for me, but for many of my friends as well.

[Ritabert]

60. You are so right.

[Ritabert]

59. Liars all.

[WhiteTara]

39. you took the words off my keyboard

We are still feeling the repercussions of those ill fated wars.

[Ritabert]

62. The reason we are in the economic mess we're in.

[leftstreet]

52. +1

[Ocelot II]

5. After Vietnam divided in half in the '50s the US provided financial support to the south,

and Kennedy sent military advisors in the early '60s to support south Vietnam's army. My earliest recollection of actual military involvement would have been in about 1964-65 after the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, and it escalated drastically from there. It turned out to be LBJ's undoing, and it seemed to reach quagmire status by 1969 at the latest, when nobody could figure out how to get out of it and Nixon promised a "secret plan" to end it. In all it lasted 20 years, from 1955 to 1975. It was always a proxy war of the US vs. the USSR/China, just as a war with Iran would be a proxy war vs. Russia.

[Deuxcents]

78. I thought Eisenhower had *advisors* in Vietnam during his administration at the request of the French

[Ocelot II]

82. He did. Kennedy started the escalation.

[Celerity]

87. Truman started that in 1950.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_in_the_Vietnam_War

1950s

May 1, 1950 — After the capture of Hainan Island from Chinese Nationalist forces by the Chinese People's Liberation Army, President Truman approves $10 million in military assistance for anti-communist efforts in Indochina. The Defense Attaché Office was established in Saigon in May 1950, a formal recognition of Vietnam (vice French Indochina). This was the beginning of formal U.S. military personnel assignments in Vietnam. U.S. Naval, Army, and Air Force personnel established their respective attachés at this time.

September 1950 — Truman sends the Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) Indochina to Vietnam to assist the French. Truman claimed they were not sent as combat troops, but to supervise the use of $10 million worth of U.S. military equipment to support the French in their effort to fight the Viet Minh forces.

Following the outbreak of the Korean War, Truman announces "acceleration in the furnishing of military assistance to the forces of France and the Associated States in Indochina...", and sends 123 non-combat troops to help with supplies to fight against the communist Viet Minh.

1951 — Truman authorizes $150 million in French support.

snip

[muriel_volestrangler]

96. November 1, 1955 "the official beginning of American involvement in the war"

November 1, 1955 — President Eisenhower deploys MAAG to train the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. This marks the official beginning of American involvement in the war as recognized by the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
...
July 8, 1959 — Chester M. Ovnand and Dale R. Buis become the first two American advisers to die in Vietnam

[3_Limes]

7. Guess I didn't really ask the right question.

What I wanted to know was - at what point did the average American realize the the war was either not worth the cost, or already lost? ( The available histories reflect the decisions of politicians and generals with various ulterior agendas, so they don't really capture the public sentiment which was probably more reflective of reality.)

[Ocelot II]

17. Maybe on February 27, 1968:

[PatSeg]

38. It was probably around that time,

that I started to become aware of what was happening in Vietnam. I really don't remember it becoming a huge issue before that, but of course, I was very young.

[Jilly_in_VA]

69. That' was definitely the time

many average Americans "Got the word", so to speak. If "Uncle Walter" said it was wrong, then it was WRONG and there were no two ways about it.

[KitFox]

37. I was in college 1967-1971. There were anti war and civil rights protests all the time. I remember things gaining steam

after the Tet Offensive, but what really seemed to galvanize opinion was Kent State. Images of National Guard firing on, wounding and killing students. It was similarly reminiscent of law enforcement in the South spraying fire hoses, turning police dogs loose, and beating peaceful protestors and bombing the church that killed little girls, that galvanized support for the civil rights movement. Assassinations of JFK, ML King and RFK were raw in our minds. I was out protesting then and am still at it.

[Ocelot II]

41. I started college in 1965 and I had a roommate who was already into the antiwar movement.

By the time LBJ announced he wasn't going to run again in 1968 it was really in full swing. My small college campus was pretty involved. Like you, I was out protesting then and am still at it - and wondering why I have to haul my tired old ass out into the street again after all this time.

[303squadron]

66. I cannot speak for the average American but...

I was 13 in 1966 and I was already a political junkie. Since November 22, 1963, the day JFK was shot, I had started to listen to Eric Servareid. Starting on that date he began his run of political commentary at the end of Cronkite’s broadcast.

This was back in the day when the Fairness Doctrine was in force on broadcast TV. If you gave one side of a political argument, you had to give the other side. Eric was known as Eric Severalsides because he did this night after night.

But here was his logic: if one side said that ABC was correct, then we would see 1,2,3 in the future. If the other side said XYZ, then we would see 24,25,26 in the future. For instance, if South Vietnam really wanted to be the bastion of freedom and democracy that some American planners said they were, you would have expected a more virulent defense of their country than the was exhibited by their army.

Using this logic he deduced by 1966 that the war was unwinnable.

That’s when I knew. 1966. I was 5 years away from the draft and I considered the war unwinnable (and morally wrong).

[haele]

8. Don't have to look that far back.

Anyone remember Operation Iraqi Liberation - er -Operation Iraqi Freedom?

Ya, in Vietnam, we were just sending in advisors to help the South Vietnamese against Maoist aggressors. We were "just helping" the simple, freedom loving farmers and hospitality service facility owners of Vietnam.

In Iraq, we were just saving them from a dictator, and of course "they" - the simple Iraqi goat herders and bazaar merchants, would greet us as liberators.

So, who's going to greet us with flowers and gratitude in Iran?

[3_Limes]

11. True! Iraq is probably a much better example

OTOH, we really don't have much of a stake in this conflict. It's a favor to Israel that they'ne been pushing for for years and a distraction from the Epstien files. Not sure how that changes how this will play out, but I'm pretty sure that it will.

[Mossfern]

9. I remember discussing in in my "Problems of Democracy" class in High Schol

1964 - 1965. I remember being quite confused as I was only 16 years old and just couldn't understand, me being quite naive and idealistic.

[popsdenver]

47. LOL Moss

I remember our Social Studies Teacher in 8th grade (1963) pounding civics into our heads.....I don't think they have taught Civics, or how our federal and state governments work since then.......

In addition that Teacher nearly got fired from the Denver Public Schools, for mandating that we also read four books:
The Ugly American......Animal Farm......1984....... Sinclair's?, The Jungle.......

[surfered]

13. If there's one thing we've learned, we cannot trust anything JD Vance says.

Just like Trump, he’s a shameless liar, too.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

14. Yes, I remember,

Russia thought the same thing with Ukraine, how well has that turned out so far?

The US military is capable of overwhelming Iran's defenses PDQ, but Iran can, and will, use it's proxies, IE: Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, etc., to attack US troops and Israel while at the same time, Iran can unleash terrorist cells around the world, including here in the US.

This lunatic and his toadies in office are bound and determined to start a world war with all the horrors that come with it.

[BidenRocks]

61. Piece of Cake!

I guarantee Sun Tzu never ascribed to that theory.

When you fight for your home, you have more desire to win.

Nazis in Russia?
US in 'Nam.
Russia in the 'Stan.
US in the ME.
US in the 'Stan.
Russia in Ukraine

US quasi-military thugs in the streets of America while assembling the largest non military arms build-up in our history.
Weapons of war against Americans for Chump's private SS and Gestapo. Loyal to him!

Studying history, I like our chances.

How's that for positive?

[MarineCombatEngineer]

64. Excellent!!!

[popsdenver]

92. I hate to even think this MCE

but another 9/11 would sure take the heat off this nightmare, just like it did the last time........
Trump, RepuliCONs, Epstein, the whole shebang.......

I will forever be convinced that they let that happen, just as they wanted in the PNAC....The Republican's: Project New American Century manifesto in the late 1990's was an outline of what would be needed to massively install their agenda overnight......... .

[Ping Tung]

16. When they asked me to reenlist or extend my enlistment I was told that they wouldn't send me to Vietnam.

Even the master gunny sergeant couldn't keep a straight face. I was already against the war that was just some "advisors" and to keep the South Vietnam "free". Some of us recognized that it was really about LBJ trying to gain some anti-commie creds. He, and most people, thought it would be an easy and short conflict because a few thousand eager to kill
American troops would arrive and the Viet Cong would run away.

I decided that I would take my chances being a protester against the glorious war.

USMC 1961 - 1965

[MarineCombatEngineer]

46. From one Marine to another...

Semper Fi Brother.

USMC 1964-1999.

[Ping Tung]

85. There was a general I admired. Remember him?

General David M. Shoup,1960-1963 Marine Corps Commandant and Medal of Honor recipient, became a prominent critic of the Vietnam War after retiring,
calling it a tragic mistake not worth the cost. He argued against US intervention, famously stating the US should keep its "dirty, bloody, dollar-soaked fingers" out of other nations' affairs.

New York Times

He was Commandant when I was in but I didn't know about this then.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

86. Gen. David M. Shoup, there's a name I haven't heard in ages,

Gen. Smedley Butler is frequently mentioned on DU, but hardly Gen. Shoup, matter of fact, this is the first time I remember hearing his name on DU, and he was right.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_M._Shoup

[Ping Tung]

91. His name just came to my brain while going through this thread. I vaguely recall his name because

at that time I rarely heard it in the usual bitching among the working class. unlike his predecessor who was held in contempt.

[mopinko]

19. family legend-

my dad sent a telegram to bobby kennedy when he was in the wh, telling him to stay out of viet nam, that it wd b a quagmire. he also told him to get a haircut. 😜
on my ‘one of these days’ list to see if the kennedy library has it.

eta, i dont think he got a reply.

[AllaN01Bear]

20. why does they agresser side always say ," it will be over in a few weeKs" but in reality war would last 3/4 years or

[multigraincracker]

22. The reason is oil or some other resource.

[Layzeebeaver]

21. It was quagmire before the US became involved.

Just ask the French…

[dalton99a]

24. +1

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The age of New Imperialism in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries began an unprecedented pursuit and acquisition of colonies all over the world, as colonial powers that included most of Western Europe, the United States, and Japan began to scramble for territories in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. There were several reasons for the French invasion of Vietnam. First, there were incidents where European missionaries were expelled and even killed. In the name of defending the church and Europeans in Vietnam, Napoleon III ordered his navy to invade Vietnam in July 1857. Modern historians understand this as a convenient excuse to expand France's colonial power. Second, as France was competing against other European powers for economic and military superiority, they wanted to secure more strategic geographic positions to promote their international trade and capitalism. Because the Vietnamese lacked the weapons and technology to effectively resist the new western invaders, its leaders had little choice but to sign peace treaties with France in 1862. This treaty gave control of southern Vietnam to France, which was then renamed Cochinchina. However, it would take another 21 years before the French were able to finally conquer northern Vietnam. After doing so in 1883, they renamed that region Tonkin and combined with Cochinchina and central Vietnam (renamed Annam), Vietnam officially became a French colony, known as Indochina. As a colonized nation, Vietnam's natural resources were exploited, its people were treated with disdain and impoverished, and its leaders were rendered powerless. Resistance movements began to develop almost immediately.

[MarineCombatEngineer]

50. The movie We Were Soldiers opening depicts the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu.

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Pretty intense.
We should have learned from this, but we didn't, even today.

Critics have said that the movie was as accurate as it gets, the technical advisors, Lt. Col. Hal Moore and reporter, Joe Galloway, who was there, made sure that the directors got it right.

[patphil]

23. We had military advisors in VietNam since the eaerly 50's.

The numbers gradually grew and increased a bit faster under President Kennedy. There were about 16,000 by the time Kennedy was murdered.
But it wasn't until the Gulf of Tonkin incident that President Johnson started the major escalation.
I always felt that incident was pretty much bullshit; just an excuse to go to war.
So now Trump is looking for an excuse to attack Iran. As long as we don't put boots on the ground, it might not become a real problem for us. Remember Iraq and Afghanistan...two really stupid wars that cost us over 4,400 dead servicemen.
The cost in dollars, both related to the war and it's aftermath is in the trillions of dollars.

https://www.hks.harvard.edu/publications/financial-legacy-iraq-and-afghanistan-how-wartime-spending-decisions-will-constrain

The dead and wounded are just part of the price. It's the aftermath that really cost us.

[NNadir]

26. I have a number of monographs on the subject.

I haven't read them in quite some time, decades actually, but as memory serves me well, the best read on the topic was Haberstam's "The Best and the Brightest" about the Kennedy cabinet Lyndon Johnson inherited. In particular, a major villain was Robert McNamara, who had no cultural or military background - he was an automotive executive - who pushed for "containment" in the aggressively cold warrior Kennedy administration.

No one in the Kennedy administration consulted with anyone who knew anything about Vietnamese culture, nor did they have a single advisor familiar with or competent in speaking or reading the Vietnamese language.

That was the problem with the "best and brightest."

Cultural myopia.

We can imagine that the current issue with Iran will be even worse with the worst and the dumbest.

[Ocelot II]

28. Errol Morris' documentary "The Fog of War" covers this really well.

https://www.documentary.org/feature/errol-morris-fog-war-2003

If I can find it online I'd like to watch it again.

[llmart]

27. Not really an answer to your question but...

coincidentally (or probably not a coincidence), I was catching some reruns of Rick Steves on PBS last night and they replayed his episode from when he visited Iran. It was even more pertinent today than when it originally aired. However, I highly doubt that most people watch things that might educate them. They're too busy watching reality crapola and thinking it's real. They don't want to learn anything. They just want to be entertained.

[Xavier Breath]

31. And we'll be greeted as liberators and heroes, right?

[Crowman2009]

32. Unlike 1965, a large percentage of people know the real reason for this current BS war.

That is to distract people from the Epstein files.

[snowybirdie]

33. I remember JFK

Sent military advisers over there to help the Vietnamese soldiers. Around '62 or so. They kept increasing the number til 1964 and LBJ was sold a Bill of goods.

[niyad]

54. The US had advisors there from the early 50's, including when the French

lost in 1954, and the interference in proposed elections, since the possible winner was not to our liking.

[Jilly_in_VA]

70. Ah yes

John Foster Dulles and his evil brother Allen were in on that, because "monolithic Communism", don'tcha know! The evil uncles of Henry Kissinger.

[Deuxcents]

79. I just posted before I saw yours..Eisenhower had advisors in Vietnam at the request of the French

As I remember..

[Crowman2009]

35. Added to that, the most recent protracted wars are still fresh in people's memories.

Unless they are the MAGA talabangelical veterans who can't wait for another holy war.

[Joinfortmill]

42. VOTE. IMPEACH. CHARGE. PROSECUTE. CONVICT. EVERY DAMN ONE OF THESE BUMS!

[Captain Zero]

44. 63-67 so four years. By 67 it was Quagmire.

I was young but I kept thinking that for us WW2 was ONLY 4 YEARS. It seemed to me in 73-74 that Vietnam had gone on forever like 14+ years.

I may be wrong on this framing but I was like 9-22 while Vietnam transpired.

[ColoringFool]

49. WW II in Europe For The US Was 1 Year: D-Day Was 1944.

[nonaa]

95. The American Army's air wing was fighting in Europe long before 1944,

and with losses in the many 1000s, not to mention the Navy and Merchant Marine losses in the Atlantic.

[niyad]

45. In 1948, Ho Chi Minh came to this country, asking for $3 million and

for help in getting the French out of the country. His hero was Thomas Jefferson. The old China hands at the State Dept were instrumental in his being refused . 3 million dollars and help getting the French out. Instead, we interfered in elections, got the Vietnam War and all of its consequences, which still reverberate today. Rubber and colonialism and narrow-minded blindness, and very rich military contractors, etc., etc.

[The Wizard]

55. Ho Chi Minh warned America

For every ten of my soldiers you kill I will kill one of yours. In the end you will tire.

[niyad]

65. And, in the end, we betrayed our allies. The images of April 1975

are burned into my brain, as are the memories of all the veterans I dealt with.

[ColoringFool]

48. Yes, Back When It Was Indo-China And France Was The Invader.

[The Wizard]

51. In the 1950s

the CIA reported to Washington that getting into Vietnam would be a protracted drawn out war. Throughout its history Vietnam has been invaded several times beginning in the year 1 by the Chinese. After realizing they squandered their resources the Chinese retreated. The same thing happened to the French, Japanese, British and Americans.
Never underestimate people defending their homeland.

[mommymarine2003]

57. I'm not old enough to remember the beginnings, but I remember the 60's and 70's.

My father was a career Marine officer. He was stationed at Red Beach north of Danang in 1966-1967. I remember my father calling home via Ham Radio operators in the U.S. That didn't last long when he told my mother that the road he traveled to be able to call us was full of landmines, and my mother did not want him to get killed in order to call us. I remember him telling us that the base barber was Viet Cong and was found dead one day on the airport tarmac. I will always remember eating dinner on TV trays every night and watching the nightly news where they always posted the number of American and Viet Cong deaths. It was so depressing, and I would wonder would there ever be a day when we would not see those horrible death numbers.

We visited a fellow colonel's home in New Bern, NC one fall day, probably in the late 60's. Their older son had just graduated from the Naval Academy as a young lieutenant. He was going to be a Marine like his dad. He was sent to Viet Nam around Thanksgiving and was dead by Easter. His father believed he had been fragged by his own troops. That family was never the same after that.

Now to the present, my older son joined the Marines in 2001. He served two deployments. He crossed the border into Iraq the first day of the war. His second deployment was to Ramadi,, which was a nightmare. He came back very broken and has 75% disability. It took him about 10 years to climb out of the abyss he was in. I understand how terrible these never-ending wars are. I have a 16-year-old grandson who is a great kid but needs some discipline in his life. Over my dead body, will any of my grandsons join the military, especially with Trump as president.

[ChicagoTeamster]

68. Same with Afghanistan and Iraq. But we were involved in Vietnam from WWII until the disastrous withdrawal in 1975.

No. I'm not old enough to remember the beginnings. But, a lot of Americans are unaware of how the US and British armed and fought with the Viet Minh against the Japanese during WWII and then the British re-armed Japanese POWs to disarm the Viet Minh so that the French could come back and re-claim their colonial territory. The Vietnamese had been promised their independence if they helped fight the Japanese.

This betrayal led them to turn to the Chinese and the Russians for help in fighting the French. From the end of WWII until 1954 when the Vietnamese defeated the French at Dien Bien Phu, the US paid 70% of France's military expenses in Vietnam. The UN brokered Geneva accord partitioned the country into a Communist North and a US backed South Vietnam that the US supported with 900 advisors until beginning escalation in 1960 when the number of advisors increased to 16,000 to support South Vietnam against the Viet Cong.

The escalation continued with Combat troops being committed in 1964 after the Tonkin Gulf incident and more troops kept being committed until we had 500000 troops in Vietnam in 1968.

[BidenRocks]

71. Born April 1955

I grew up with the new fangled televisions and remember back to 1960.
Walter Cronkite, Huntley/Brinkley, more leading the news with the latest body count.
Around 1966 I read my dad's Readers Digest and recall an article titled, "The Blood Red Hands Of Ho Chi Minh".
This is why there are age restrictions on media. I remember that gruesome story 60 years later. It's available on the internets.
I can't say it didn't mess us up.
The Gulf of Tonkin was as fake as anything chump can come up with!

Now when it comes to real naval attacks, let's examine the USS Liberty!
NO, we won't!

All foes, foreign or domestic!
USMC 73-78
Blacksheep

[Botany]

72. A lot of it started (shit had been going with Vietnam, France, China, and others for 100s of years) with WW II

Ho Chi Minh was our ally in fighting the Japanese in WW II and we had promised him and the Vietnamese
people that after the war the country was theirs but that got forgotten and as the French were getting
their asses kicked by the Viet Minh we got sucked more and more into that no win conflict. The Republicans such as Joe McCarthy and others pushed “the red threat” big time. By 1962 JFK realized
that we had to get out but he got murdered and the Military Industrial Complex was making millions on
the war.

Ho Chi Minh had a copy of our Declaration of Independence and a picture of George Washington up
in his home.

[MineralMan]

74. Yes, indeed.

I was just 10 years old in 1955, when Eisenhower made the very first moves toward that war. Despite my youth, I read the daily newspaper every afternoon after school. I remember looking in the World Book Encyclopedia for Vietnam.

I asked my father what he thought. He was a B-17 pilot in WWII. He said, "No more wars, thank you very much."

I also remember registering for the draft in 1963, when I turned 18. In 1965, I lost my student status after dropping out of college and knew it was just a matter of time before I was drafted. So I enlisted in the USAF that November. As I expected, I was not sent to Vietnam.

So, yes, I remember the beginnings of the Vietnam War. All too well. I lost high school classmates in it.

[Celerity]

89. Truman was already making moves in 1950, well before Eisenhower was even elected.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100221052697#post87

[MineralMan]

90. Thanks. A little before my time, I guess.

[rzemanfl]

77. Old enough to proofread as well.

[maxrandb]

80. Kind of, but Vietnam actually started for the French before the Korean War ended for us.

I remember a lot about how the US got in, but not the beginning beginning

[mainer]

81. Just go back to the Iraq war -- tells you what you need to know

"It'll be a piece of cake. The people want us to come in. We'll be greeted with flowers. Nation building is so easy. Shock and awe will make them lay down their guns."

We're hearing all that right now.

[flashman13]

84. I would mark the beginning as 1945 when we supported France's return to their former colony.

It went down hill from there. I guess you could say it turned into a quagmire for us when we prevented the plebiscite on North and South reunification in 1956. It was a lost cause from that point until 1973 when we finally left. The final end came in 1975 after we pulled our support from South Vietnam. You could say we were responsible for an ongoing CF for 30 years.

The lesson here is that we got into a prolonged conflict because we totally misunderstood and underestimated the Vietnamese people. The same can be said for Iran at this moment. If Trump makes the mistake of attacking Iran, I am afraid the greatest military in the world is headed for another Vietnam like humiliation. That will be guaranteed if Trump takes on the position of Generalissimo and ignores those pesky military experts. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dan Caine, has already warned Trump that we are ill prepared for any kind of extended conflict (as in more than 3 or 4 days). Trump says it will be over quickly.

What I fear most is that Trump will put the Navy in harms way in a completely untenable situation in the narrow seas in and around the Persian Gulf.

[LudwigPastorius]

93. "Trump will put the Navy in harms way in a completely untenable situation in the narrow seas in and around...

the Persian Gulf."

I think Vic Admiral Kacher told Hegseth and Trump as much, and for doing so, they turned around and fired him as director of the Joint Staff.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pentagon-removes-senior-official-joint-staff-post-sources-say-2026-02-26/

I also think that the reports of Iran buying hypersonic missiles from China better be taken seriously.

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/iran-nears-deal-buy-supersonic-anti-ship-missiles-china-2026-02-24/

[flashman13]

103. They said Admiral Kacher was not a good fit. I agree with you. He was fired because he told them, "don't attack Iran".

That is not what Hogsbreath and Commander Donny wanted to hear.

If there is an attack on Iran the first thing Iran will do is close the Straits of Hormuz. Trump will see that as defiance. The tough guy will order the Navy to force the Straits. That is where we find out just how badly the powers that be have under estimated Iran. Ships will be lost. A great many Americans will die in the effort.

[msfiddlestix]

94. 😮‍💨im old enough, service brat. I remember it like it was yesterday,

[OutNow]

98. Great Book - Fire In The Lake

There are several great sources of info about the origins and the resulting quagmire of Vietnam. The Rand Corporation did a study for the US government that was leaked and became known as The Pentagon Papers. My favorite is The Fire In The Lake by Frances FitzGerald.

I am a Vietnam Era USAF veteran. I naively asked a Major at one point, "Did we pick the wrong side?" after the expose of the ARVN Air Force smuggling massive amount of drugs and the sad situation where our guys were becoming addicted to heroin. His quiet reply was "Don't ask the question again"

[Codifer]

99. In 1967

that is where I spent "The Summer of Love".

Actually, off the coast of North Viet Nam.

My uncle had this big-ass boat... big enough to land airplanes on the roof.

Before that, I remember jokes involving ashes and Buddhist monks and for a bit it sounded like a religious spat with the

Catholics.. I was more interested in sports cars.

"... for I was one and twenty, no use to talk to me."

[kerry-is-my-prez]

100. Old enough but smoked too much pot and drank too much beer.

I went to a high school that partied heavy duty. I wish I would have been more aware and had watched or read about all the Viet Nam build-up and Watergate. I really was not very politically astute until the Clarence Thomas hearings. I did love Abbie Hoffman and the hippies/yippies though and followed them.

[snot]

102. I'm not quite that old,

but I'm old enough to remember that we entered that war based on a lie, i.e., the claimed Gulf of Tonkin incident; and most if not all of the other wars we've been involved in since have also been based on lies.

Why we keep falling for it, I don't know.