The Vietnam War

[Valmy]

He wanted American help against the French, not an "alliance."

Look the goal here was keeping them out of the Soviet sphere and keeping their commie-ness contained to Vietnam.  I am not going to quibble over what an alliance is.  The fact is we could have achieved that without the war.  Now if we wanted a non commie non mass murdering regime there that is something else.  But hey they ended up winning and mass murdering and things turned out ok anyway.

[Valmy]

Neither is the Seventh Air Force.

Look I am no fan of the USAF but they never killed tens of thousands of their own people.  Not even they have aim that bad.

[grumbler]

It's my strong impression that the business with the Declaration was all an attempt to hornswoggle the US.  After Din Bin Foo they certainly didn't rule the North in accordance with American values.

I think that the declaration was legitimately an attempt to establish a broad coalition against the return of the French, but that Ho abandoned the coalition-building after the West and the Vietnamese moderates all supported re-imposition of colonial rule.  I think that you are right that, by the time the US-backed French effort to recolonize Vietnam failed in '54, Ho wasn't much interested in trying to curry favor with the US.  I do think that the US should have let the Vietnamese Catholic ship sink with the French one, though.  I don't think there was ever hope that Catholic rule would be either popular or honest.

[derspiess]

Thought this was sorta interesting. 

http://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/viet-minh-seeks-support-soviets

What is most striking about his report to the Soviets is its defensive nature.  The envoy goes to great lengths, for example, to justify the Viet Minh decision to disband the Indochinese Communist Party (ICP) in 1945.  He is keen to prove to the Soviets that the Vietnamese communists are a strong and influential force within Vietnam, just the opposite of the message he had conveyed to the Americans.  Any figures he cites thus need to be taken with a grain of salt, as he was trying hard to convince the Soviet Union that the Vietnamese communists were worthy of support.  He was also eager for an invitation to Moscow to have more direct contact with decision makers.  As the envoy is identified as a representative of the secretariat of the "President of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Vietnam," we can identify him as a direct emissary from Ho Chi Minh.  At this juncture Ho's earlier conciliatory attitude towards France was already being criticized within the ICP, and he may have known that the US Communist Party leader Earl Browder had been forced from power for the sin of having disbanded his party during WWII.  In the end, Ho's leadership would not be endorsed by the Soviet party until he made his trip to Moscow early in 1950, in the entourage of Mao Zedong.   The Soviets finally recognized the DRV at the end of January 1950.

[derspiess]

I do think that the US should have let the Vietnamese Catholic ship sink with the French one, though.  I don't think there was ever hope that Catholic rule would be either popular or honest.

Yeah.  We ended up being about 9 years late on that.

[Zanza]

Neither is the Seventh Air Force.

Look I am no fan of the USAF but they never killed tens of thousands of their own people.  Not even they have aim that bad.

I was under the impression that these genocidial regimes do not consider their victims their "own" people either. They are typically labeled enemies of the state/people/proletariat. So I don't really see a difference between the killing of Vietnamese by Vietnamese and of Vietnamese by Americans. I am sure the victims didn't really care either. In the end, both the Viet Cong and the USA killed a lot of Vietnamese civilians.

[alfred russel]

He wanted American help against the French, not an "alliance."

Look the goal here was keeping them out of the Soviet sphere and keeping their commie-ness contained to Vietnam.  I am not going to quibble over what an alliance is.  The fact is we could have achieved that without the war.  Now if we wanted a non commie non mass murdering regime there that is something else.  But hey they ended up winning and mass murdering and things turned out ok anyway.

I'm not sure how you can be certain of that, or even think it likely. We didn't keep them out of South Vietnam. We didn't keep communism out of Laos or Cambodia. Yes the domino theory didn't go beyond that, but keep in mind from 1945 - 1975 there was an almost constant war against them by the non communist west and following that severe sanctions against them after the invasion of Cambodia. Then Communism collapsed.

The Vietnamese had an ideological commitment that they acted on. This would naturally put them in the Communist orbit in some manner, and up against the US. At the very least, Cambodia and Laos were unstable and weak and easy marks for them.

[Valmy]

I was under the impression that these genocidial regimes do not consider their victims their "own" people either. They are typically labeled enemies of the state/people/proletariat. So I don't really see a difference between the killing of Vietnamese by Vietnamese and of Vietnamese by Americans. I am sure the victims didn't really care either. In the end, both the Viet Cong and the USA killed a lot of Vietnamese civilians.

Ok crazy man.  My point was that Commies were going to Commie but we could have still avoided war with them.  Your response being 'Oh yeah?  Well the seventh air force is like a genocidal regime!!!!!'

Um ok...so what...I think we never should have let the genocidal seventh air force loose on those guys.

[CountDeMoney]

I believe the war could have been winnable had we invaded North Vietnam directly, but in that situation China surely would have directly intervened and nobody wanted to fight another Korean War.

Um correct me if I am wrong but the Chinese and Vietnamese despise each other.  I have a hard time imagining them welcoming Chinese intervention in any situation.

Yes, they hate each other, but wartime makes strange bedfellows.  The Chinese rotated over 300,000 PLA anti-aircraft, engineering and logistical troops through North Vietnam from 1965 to 1968, with the most deployed at 170,000 in 1967, with a total of 1,500 casualties to US firepower by 1973. 

[dps]

It's my strong impression that the business with the Declaration was all an attempt to hornswoggle the US.  After Din Bin Foo they certainly didn't rule the North in accordance with American values.

I think that the declaration was legitimately an attempt to establish a broad coalition against the return of the French, but that Ho abandoned the coalition-building after the West and the Vietnamese moderates all supported re-imposition of colonial rule.  I think that you are right that, by the time the US-backed French effort to recolonize Vietnam failed in '54, Ho wasn't much interested in trying to curry favor with the US.  I do think that the US should have let the Vietnamese Catholic ship sink with the French one, though.  I don't think there was ever hope that Catholic rule would be either popular or honest.

Yeah, by '54 it was too late to try to align ourselves with Ho.  It might have worked in '46.  Sure, it also might not have worked, but it still would have been possible at that point to try.  Communist ideology aside, from the US point of view in 1946, helping Vietnamese nationalists against French attempts to re-impose colonial rule wouldn't have really been any different than helping Polish or Hungarian nationalists oppose Soviet attempts to turn eastern European countries into Soviet satelites.

[Ideologue]

Did we offer a great deal of help in that regard?

[Sheilbh]

The thought of them being another Yugoslavia is an interesting one-- I'm just awfully skeptical we could have pulled it off.  Let alone the notion of willingly condemning the entire country to suffering under communism.

It's especially interesting given how bad PRC-Vietnam relations often were.

[Admiral Yi]

Communist ideology aside, from the US point of view in 1946, helping Vietnamese nationalists against French attempts to re-impose colonial rule wouldn't have really been any different than helping Polish or Hungarian nationalists oppose Soviet attempts to turn eastern European countries into Soviet satelites.

How so?

Surely not in terms of power.  France was crippled in 46 and wholy dependent on Marshall Plan money to fight its colonial wars.

[Capetan Mihali]

Communist ideology aside, from the US point of view in 1946, helping Vietnamese nationalists against French attempts to re-impose colonial rule wouldn't have really been any different than helping Polish or Hungarian nationalists oppose Soviet attempts to turn eastern European countries into Soviet satelites.

As an aside, this is precisely what Enoch Powell (among others) was worried about the US doing to the British (especially re: India) at the end of WWII.

[Valmy]

France was crippled in 46 and wholy dependent on Marshall Plan money to fight its colonial wars.

Yep.  Money well spent.