How many people here believe Viet Nam was a Guerilla War

[Bandit]

I read here all the time how Viet Nam and Iraq are the same because both were Guerilla wars. I just want all to know that it might have been the case during the early years with the Viet Minh but after 1966 we were engaged against the third largest military in the world at the time. The North Vietnamese Army was a formidable Force in full military uniform and modern weaponry. We were engaged in many regiment strength battles and had hard targets that we attacked and conquered. They were huge bunker compounds with hundreds of miles of underground tunnel complexes that included hospitals and entertainment areas. I find it hard to believe one could think 58,000 American soldiers were killed only by guerillas. There was not a day went by that we didn't have a helicopter shot down or shot up and many fighter jets were shot down. Even B-52s were shot down occasionally. I just wanted people here to know Viet Nam was not a guerilla war. Granted the enemy used jungle tactics but ninty percent of all battles were in remote jungle areas with uniformed soldiers.

[IrateCitizen]

1. Vietnam wasn't a guerrilla war -- it was a civil war

It just happened to consist of guerrilla tactics on the part of the resistance in the South.

But at its heart, it was a civil war that would have ended very quickly if we would have stayed out of it. The official excuse given was to prevent the "domino theory" of Communism. I think that it was still about a "domino theory" -- but that theory had nothing to do with communism, but was really about sovereign self-determination.

If one country realizes it can defy the world colonial order (which is still in effect through neoliberal economics and neoconservative militarist policy), then that gives hope to others and can cause the whole rotten system to come crashing down. It's been a staple of nearly every conflict that the US has gotten itself involved in since WWII.

[JanMichael]

2. I don't like the parallels either.

The only true similarity is that we shouldn't have been there or in Iraq.

After that it gets fuzzy.

[markus]

3. Jungle v. desert

Are your a student of warfare, ur just a lucky survivor of Vietnam. I'm curious what a student of wareware would think about the implications of fighting in Iraq, and in particular the concentration of attacks in the so-called "Sunni Triangle".

As they fighting us there exclusively because that is the center of resistance, or also because the rolling terrain and plant cover gives them some chance they would never have in the open desert?

[Bandit]

4. I am just a lucky surviver

I admit I know nothing of Iraq other than what I read here or hear on the news. I am under the impression though that most action that is going on is not with convential troops. When I was in Viet Nam, every single bit of combat I saw was with fairly large enemy troops. I was a surviver of the Ashaw (sp)Valley I was with the force that relieved the Marines from Khe Sahn after they were underground for 73 days. We were engaged against an enemy that was quite recognizable and fierce. We had one battle that lasted for four days and decimated my company. We started with a Company Plus (We had a Plunger Unit with us)of about a hundred and thirty men and after four days we had 42 survivers left. It wasn't through any Guerilla Warfare that we lost so many men.

[leftofthedial]

5. The VC were guerillas

and even the NVA emplyed guerilla tactics. With the exception of a few campaigns (Tet notably), there was no fixed front and most of those battles were fought over terain with no true strategic value. It was an almost purely tactical war.

There are a few parallels between Iraq and Viet Nam, but there are parallels between nearly any two wars. The Fraudminstration's rhetoric about Iraq is eerily similar to that of Johnson and Nixon about Viet Nam. The kind of puppet government we are trying to set up is similar.

I think the Viet Nam parallel is much stronger in Afghanistan. It is, in effect, a civil war. The opposition is well-armed and organized. They have the tacit support of at least two neighboring nations, including the ability to supply and seek refuge across borders. We are supporting a puppet regime with little popularity and zero power outside the capital.

[markses]

6. Depends how you define "guerilla warfare" and depends on location

Certainly if you were in northern I-Corps (in the area of Khe Sahn) or if you were in the A Shau valley, you were engaging with regiment strength PAVN regulars. If you on the batangan Peninsula or in the area of Cu Chi or even Tay Ninh City, you were probably engaging with light mobile guerilla units that were also part of the local population. Also depends, as you point out, on time period. Post 1966 and especially post-1968, when the NLF units were decimated in the Tet fighting, you were increasingly engaging regular units. however, there remained large portions of the civilian population that engaged in fighting throughout the war, and, if this is a typical characteristic of guerilla warfare, then the Vietnam was - in part - a guerilla war throughout. I say "in part." As you noted, there were many engagements with regiment-strength forces and larger. However, we must question the traditional definition of guerilla warfare in light of Giap's notion of "People's War." Both against the french and against the Americans, the strategy of People's War - the gradual intensification from guerilla style attacks (combined with heavy and - let's not romanticize "resistance" - often brutal recruitment of the local populace - though no more brutal than the dominant war raged against them by the imperialists and local comprador elements) to larger scale regular campaigns. Given this definition, it is strictly speaking incorrect to characterize the war as ONE OR THE OTHER - it was guerilla warfare and regular warfare - by design!

And this combination was dispersed in time and space: not only was there a linear development from guerilla warfare to regular warfare, but there was also uneven development such that certain sectors continue regional guerilla war while regular units engage elsewhere. Again, just as the development over time matters, the regional location matters as well. That's the strategy of People's war as developed by Giap and dispersed throughout Vietnam - even down to autonomous and semi-autonomous cadres (for example, in 1963 cadres in the lower Delta asked their suppliers to cease sending small arms and ammunition for small arms from the North - it was easier to streamline and account for logistics if the units used American supplied arms that they were receiving from locally RVN supplied militia units; rather, the north should send heavier equiptment, like grenade launchers, which they were having a harder time "stealing" from their contacts in the militia and ARVN).

At the end of the day, given what we know about the composition and tactics of the PAVN and NLF, I think it is impossible to say whether it "was" a guerilla war or "wasn't." Vietnam both was and was not a guerilla war, depending on when you were there and where you were and the particular state of development of People's War at that time and place.

[Bandit]

7. I appreciate your very concise and informative response

I personally never witnessed any Viet Cong or Guerilla forces. I do recognize that in other areas there was indeed a form of guerilla activity. I just wanted to make the point that we did indeed fight against convential forces in a convential manner. There seemed to be a lot of mis-information going around.

[Ernesto]

8. When I joined the 2nd bat, 3rd Marines,

as a "casualty replacement" the unit had just been rotated back to the Danang outskirts from the "hill battles (881 & 861)" around Khe Sanh. Around Danang, we were "nickel & dimed" daily by the VC "local yocals". Mostly, these were lethal punks not unlike what we might call "gangsters" here in 'Merica. By the time I went home, 2/3 was back in the shit @ the DMZ where NVA regulars were the BIG problem.... Yes I agree that Vietnam was both guerilla & conventional warfare..... As for the kids in today's Iraq, they are in a "world of shit" (Marine Corps technical term).

[Scott Lee]

9. When you invade, you turn all resisters into freedom fighters

whether it's Vietnam, Iraq or Timbuktu.

This seems to be the lesson America can never learn.