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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (766623)	12/5/2007 6:35:58 PM
From: Karen Lawrence	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

Actually the French had been there 100 years...from 1854 until the Geneva peace accords of 1954...but the French played the part of evil overlords to the vietnamese. Overarching the mess there was the threat of China invading and aiding the north vietnam communist govt... in 1961 - As Kennedy weighed the merits of these recommendations (invade/withdraw from vietnam) , some of his other advisers urged the president to withdraw from Vietnam altogether, claiming that it was a "dead-end alley." The thing about Kennedy was he knew "when to hold 'em" - stance against Russia/Cuba and he knew "when to fold 'em" - viet nam and there's no doubt in my mind had he lived, Kennedy would have kept us out of Vietnam. From 1956-1960, the Communist Party of Vietnam desired to reunify the country through political means alone. Accepting the Soviet Union's model of political struggle, the Communist Party tried unsuccessfully to cause Diem's collapse by exerting tremendous internal political pressure. After Diem's success against Communist cells in the South, however, southern Communistsconvinced the Party to adopt more violent tactics to guarantee Diem's downfall. At the Fifteenth Party Plenum in January 1959, the Communist Party finally approved the use of revolutionary violence to overthrow Ngo Dinh Diem's government. In May 1959, and again in September 1960, the Party confirmed its use of revolutionary violence and the combination of the political and armed struggle movements. The result was the creation of a broad-based united front to help mobilize southerners in opposition to the Saigon government. The National Liberation Front The united front had long and historic roots in Vietnam. Used earlier in the century by the Communists to mobilize anti-French forces, the united front brought together Communists and non-Communists in an umbrella organization that had limited, but important goals. On December 20, 1960, the Party' s new united front, the National Liberation Front (NLF), was born. Anyone could join this front as long as they opposed Ngo Dinh Diem. Many non-Communists who did join the Front may not have realized that the Party would ultimately dissolve the NLF and limit non-Communist representation in a unified government. Marines hodling up a captured National Liberation Front flag. Photo courtesy of the Soc.History.War.Vietnam Home PageThe character of the NLF and its relationship to the Communists in Hanoi has caused considerable debate among scholars, anti-war activists, and policy makers. From the birth of the NLF in 1960, government officials in Washington claimed that Hanoi directed the NLF's violent attacks against the Saigon government. In a series of government "white papers," Washington insiders denounced the NLF, claiming that it was merely a puppet of Hanoi. The NLF, in contrast, argued that it was autonomous and independent of the Communists in Hanoi and that it was made up mostly of non-Communists. Many anti-war activists supported the NLF's claims. Washington continued to discredit the NLF, however, calling it the "Viet Cong," a derogatory and slang term meaning Vietnamese Communist. December 1961 White Paper In 1961, President Kennedy sent a team to Vietnam to report on conditions in South Vietnam and to assess future American aid requirements. The report, now known as the "December 1961 White Paper," argued for an increase in military, technical, and economic aid, and the introduction of large-scale American advisers to help stabilize Diem's government and crush the NLF. As Kennedy weighed the merits of these recommendations, some of his other advisers urged the president to withdraw from Vietnam altogether, claiming that it was a "dead-end alley." In typical Kennedy fashion, the president chose a middle route. Instead of a large-scale military buildup as the white paper had called for or an immediate withdrawal, Kennedy sought a limited partnership with Diem. The United States would increase the level of its military involvement in South Vietnam through more machinery and advisers, but would not intervene whole-scale with troops. This arrangement was problematic from the start, and soon reports from Vietnam indicated that the NLF was increasing its control in the countryside. To counteract the NLF's success , Washington and Saigon launched an ambitious and deadly military effort in the rural areas. Called the Strategic Hamlet Program, the new counterinsurgency plan rounded up villagers and placed them in hamlets constructed by South Vietnamese soldiers. The idea was to isolate the NLF from villagers, its base of support. This plan was based on the British experience in Malaya, but conditions in South Vietnam were distinct, and the strategic hamlet concept produced limited results. According to interviews conducted by U. S. advisers in the field, the strategic hamlet program had a negative impact on relations between peasants and the Saigon government. In the past, many rural Vietnamese viewed Diem as a distant annoyance, but the strategic hamlet program brought government policies to the countryside. Many villagers resented being forced off of their ancestral farm land, and some have suggested that the failure of the strategic hamlet concept actually increased cadre ranks in the NLF. vietnam.vassar.edu