We had greatly reduced the capabilities of the Vietcong (particularly during the Tet offensive which was a disaster for the VC in military terms, one they never fully recovered from), and built up the government in the South enough that it was apparently stable against the VC. Then we pulled out, which wasn't really the problem, the problem was that when we pulled out our ground soldiers we also stopped air support and re-supply. With such assistance its quite possible that South Vietnam could have continued, and that the situations like that of the "boat people" and those stuck in "re-education camps" in the South could have been avoided.
Personally I think we should be more reluctant to go to war. But once we are at war we should be more reluctant to cut and run when the job isn't over. Doing that gets the worst of both worlds. You get the casualties and destruction of the war, without achieving any of your aims.
This war isn't ever going to result in 58,000 American KIA. The enemy is much less capable then the Vietnamese communists, and also more fragmented and more likely to fight different insurgent groups, which the communist forces in Vietnam where unlikely to do. On the negative side, our forces, while better armed, trained, equipped, and supported then our forces in Vietnam where, are much smaller. |
