Talk:Vietnam War

This badly needs copyediting. --Larry Sanger 10:02, 15 September 2007 (CDT)

Article

Vietnam War, also known as the II Indochina War or United State War (in Vietnam), was a conflict which lasted from 1956 to 1975. It saw South Vietnam and a multinational task force led by the United States of America with support coming from Republic of Korea, Australia, Philiphinas, New Zeland, Thailand, Taiwan and Spain and fighting and defeated by National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam, also known as Viet Cong, and North Vietnam.

Origins

North Vietnam and South Vietnam were parts of French Indochina. In 1957 they won their independence from the French Union after the Indochina War which culminated in the french defeat in the Battle of Diem Bien Phu.

In the late 50's, many new Asian countries won their independence from european colonial powers. At the same time the Cold War began and the United States didn't want to lose influence in the World.

In the 1954 Geneva Conference, both Vietnams summoned a referendum in July of 1956 to determine if the people of Vietnam wanted to reform into one country. Vgo Dinh Diem, president of South Vietnam, knew that to win that referendum would be very difficult because, and this is a key to understand this war for writers like Jonathan Schell, vietnam people wanted to be a one country.

As a result of War World II, when Nazi Germany wasn't contained early in its expansionistic political regime, a political class of citizens in the United States developed that was concerned that history could repeat itself, this time with the Soviet Union and the communism expansion. It was the described as the Domino theory.

Military history

This war had four phases.

From 1956 to 1965 when fighting vitnamits against vietnaminits, but in 1959 died two firsth assesors from United States in Bien Hoa Base.

From 1965 to 1968 when South Vietnam Army (ARNV) and United States won in land and they recover area.

From 1968 to 1973 when the War was very unpopular in United States and in the rest of the World (speciali afther the Battle of Khe Sanh and the Tet Offensive).

From 1973 to 1975 when South Vietnam fought alone against NFL and principally North Vietnam Army (NVA).

Work in Progress

Further comment

Why the article was moved

The article above was moved by request of Richard Jensen, history editor, because it needs considerable work and probably cannot be improved, at least not in its present form. --Larry Sanger 13:10, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

Bibliography: Additions

Herr, Michael. Dispatches (London: Picador, 1977). Isn't this a relevant book? It's one of the great books, anyway. It's also a U.K. edition, because I live there.Jeffrey Scott Bernstein 04:00, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

yes, it's very well done. Richard Jensen 04:20, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

Opening paragraph

Needs and opening paragraph or two, in accordance with CZ:Article Mechanics, that gives the dates, casualty figures, outcome, etc.--basic facts about the war. --Larry Sanger 11:31, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

How about this for a start?

The Vietnam War, a military conflict in which the United States joined forces with the South Vietnamese Army against the Communist North Vietnamese, lasted from 1959 to 1975. The war cost the lives of over 58,000 Americans, with a further 304,000 wounded, and ended with the United States abandoning its goal to keep a divided Vietnam from reunifying under Communist control, which took place in 1975-1976.Jeffrey Scott Bernstein 11:53, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

OK but too US-centric? I'll work on it some more. Richard Jensen 17:08, 8 October 2007 (CDT)

I have several concerns here, which, I suspect, may be coming out of Cold War thinking, where nationalism was rarely considered if there was any Communist involvement. When speaking of the division, should there not be at least some mention of Diem preventing the referendum on reunification, agreed upon in 1954 at the Geneva Conference, and scheduled for 1956? Somewhere in this area, if it doesn't exist, is when the North Vietnamese party decided on a military solution, with the formation of the 559 Transportation Group (i.e., May 1959), which set up the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

"Vietnam War" isn't the greatest of names, but "Second Indochina War" isn't greatly better. Again, come back to Cold War policy, where the U.S. supported the restoral of French colonial authority after the Japanese mission, ironically when Ho was asking the OSS mission under MAJ Archimedes Patti for a copy of the U.S. Declaration of Independence to use as a model for declaring Vietnamese independence. See Archimedes L.A. Patti, Why Viet Nam?: Prelude to America's albatross, http://www.amazon.com/Why-Viet-Nam-Americas-albatross/dp/0520041569

"the United States abandoning its goals" -- this needs to be very carefully sourced, and can be challenged. For example, the most telling statement of goals inside the Johnson Administration was the memo from Assistant Secretary of Defense (International Security Affairs) McNaughton to SecDef McNamara, http://vietnam.vassar.edu/ladrang03.html Also see COL H.R. McMaster's book, Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam http://www.amazon.com/Dereliction-Duty-Johnson-McNamara-Vietnam/dp/0060929081/ref=sr_1_1/105-4759583-4530845?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185120160&sr=1-1

...said Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) (Please sign your talk page posts by simply adding four tildes, ~~~~.)

the 1956 elections were pretty much a red herring, and not very relevant to the military history. Neither North nor South wanted them--neither could tolerate a free election in their own territory. Richard Jensen 17:23, 12 May 2008 (CDT)

Diem certainly did not, although I've seen various analyses of Ho's position. I'm not suggesting the elections would have been terribly honest had they been held, but, if they were held, I suspect Ho would have won. He would have won from a combination of ruthlessness, ideology, but also being perceived as a Vietnamese nationalist, where Diem was perceived as a Catholic mandarin.

You make a point, though, that I think is relevant. The fact that neither side wanted a free election does not speak well to them as states that would not have had an insurgency. The North indeed was a police state, but it was more homogeneous a state than the South. I'm not suggesting a strict Confucian ethos, but there was a clear authority in the North. In the South, even after the VNQDD and KMT were insignificant, there still was Buddhist vs. Catholic, Hoa Hao, Cao Dai, mountain people vs. lowlanders, and, in general, no sense of national identity.

I compliment you, Sir, in the elegance of bringing the Red Herring Scare into a discussion in which Communism was a factor. Perhaps in another universe, Joe McCarthy was a fishmonger. It was with some metaphorical shock when I confronted the array of colors of herring at a Scandinavian buffet, there presumably being some political allegory therein. :-)

...said Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) (Please sign your talk page posts by simply adding four tildes, ~~~~.)

well to nibble a bit more: the 1956 election topic was raised by antiwar Americans years later to argue that NVN was really democratic because it would have won an election that was never held. The French agreed to this election, then left. SVN and the US rejected the Geneva accords, of course. Richard Jensen 03:11, 13 May 2008 (CDT)

I'd never dream of saying either Diem or Ho were democrats, which has never been a prerequisite for winning elections. I'm from New Jersey, where the motto was "vote early and often." NVN would have won, as Ho, at the least, tried to project an image of being of the people. Diem had a chance of winning only if Catholic loyalists voted. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:42, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

the point is that Communism would collapse if it allowed free elections, so they were not allowed. Richard Jensen 20:52, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

I have no doubt that Ho would have never permitted a second election had he won the first, but Communism in 1956 would no more have collapsed than did that of the Soviet Union. Ho would have made use of elections; Diem didn't want them, because he would certainly have lost the first and only election. Neither had clean hands. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:59, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

to allow democracy means to give up total rule by the party. No FIRST election is possible. Single elections did indeed overthrow Communism in Poland, USSR and Nicaragua (years later of course). Ho would like elections in the South, but not the North. Vice versa for Diem. The French, who inserted those terms, were long gone. Richard Jensen 21:20, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

Holding elections is not equivalent to allowing democracy

Your words above, I believe, were:

the 1956 election topic was raised by antiwar Americans years later to argue that NVN was really democratic because it would have won an election that was never held.

I don't see that saying, anywhere, that Ho would permit democracy, nor did I say that. What I did say, as did many other students of the period, is that Ho had the popularity to win an election over Diem.

Ho was capable of working in coalitions, and did so in the late 40s with the VNQDD, Vietnamese KMT, Cao Dai, etc. I do not disagree that his eventual goal, at which he'd probably succeeed, was to put his Lao Dong Party in control. He was, in no way, a democrat.

For tactical reasons, however, he had every reason to participate in elections were they held in 1956. Diem's 1955 or so election were hardly an exercise in Jeffersonian democracy with the integrity of the ballot held sacred.

The U.S. wanted an anticommunist client in the fifties; whether it was democratic was irrelevant to John Foster Dulles. Why should Southeast Asia be different than South America?

My personal opinion, which I know I cannot prove, is that had Ho been elected, he would have built a nationalistic Communist state, somewhat analogous to Yugoslavia under Tito. On Ho's death, however, while Vietnam certainly had its ethnic conflicts, they were not remotely on the scale of those in the Balkans, and I suspect Vietnam, much like other former Soviet clients, would move to a form of culturally appropriate democracy. Can't know, of course, and no, I don't think of kindly Uncle Ho, or even Nguyen Ai Quoc. Howard C. Berkowitz 21:56, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

Howard C. Berkowitz 21:56, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

what I am arguing is that free elections --with a chance of losing--were anathema to Ho. The profoundly violated his belief that his party represented the people. Democracy is still not on Hanoi's agenda in 2008. (Ho by the early 1960s was a symbol who had little real power.) Richard Jensen 17:50, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

And Diem's opinion about free elections, with a chance of losing, were different in what manner? My point is that no actor with any power was especially concerned with democracy. The U.S. wanted anticommunism, and freedoms were not especially part of it. Diem wouldn't have wanted an election that a Buddhist could have won.

there was a difference. LBJ demanded free elections (in the South only); Kennedy did not). Richard Jensen 18:34, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Yes, he certainly put a great deal of force behind his demands. Ah, memories slipping away...I can't remember any being held. We all know, of course, that Johnson never told a lie, and never let his ego get the better of him.

Elections were in fact held in 1967 and Thieu won with 34% of the vote in a 9-man race. Time magazine said "To try to transplant democracy to Viet Nam in the year 1967 would seem a rash and reckless enterprise in the worst of places at the worst of times. Yet this year, South Viet Nam has promulgated a constitution written by a popularly elected Constituent Assembly. Voters in more than 4,000 villages and hamlets have gone to the polls to choose their own local officials. And last week the people of South Viet Nam chose a President, Nguyen Van Thieu, a Vice President, Nguyen Cao Ky, and 60 Senators in a free election that confounded the fledgling nation's friendly critics and its mortal enemies. In the U.S. and Viet Nam, by word and by bullet, it was an election conducted under fire." Time archives Sept 15 1967 Richard Jensen 21:27, 3 July 2008 (CDT)]

"Demanding" was one of the in-words of that period. I still chuckle at one of the campus protesters going up to a dean to deliver non-negotiable. That worthy confirmed, "Non-negotiable, correct?" "YES, imperialist stooge!" "Well, then we clearly have nothing to negotiate. Good day." 20:37, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

It's not whitewashing the North Vietnamese to state the reality that no one was making any particular effort to build a democracy. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:02, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Weaknesses of South Vietnam?

Excuse me, where is the source for this section. It sounds as if, the person that wrote this part, is trying to avoid the fact that the US were responsible for betraying the South Vietnamese government after the Paris Peace Accord, and not supplying them with ammunition and military aid . I know ARVN officers personally, and they literally ran out of bullets on the frontline. Why would the ARVN sell (corruption) ammunition, when their lives depended on it. In fact, how many South Vietnamese soldiers died in the war? Over 1 million. Vietnamese people lacked Patriotism?! That is obsurd. The national anthem's lyrics alone would contest that. Third-world? South Vietnam was NOT third-world. during that time. I've got photos to prove this fact. I'm deleting this section. Ann Hoang 22:14, 9 March 2008 (CDT)

We don't delete sections. If you have some documented evidence otherwise let's please ADD it. Richard Jensen 22:36, 9 March 2008 (CDT)

You may want to read this: http://www.vietamericanvets.com/Page-Records-HeroicAllies.htm. I will soon change the article to reflect this point of view, let me know if there are any objections. Ann Hoang 06:55, 1 May 2008 (CDT)

yes there are objections indeed. The article blames the US --wjen in fact the US had left Vietnam. The link at http://www.vietamericanvets.com/Page-Records-HeroicAllies.htm assumes the Saigon government was totally incompetent--Saigon refused to buy batterioes, Saigon refused to allow planes be cannibalized for spare parts. Saigon waited for American B-52 bombers instead of sending up its own planes. The article falsely assumes that the North was getting vast subsidies. It never tells what Saigon did with the billions of dollars of US aid it received. It says that only one or two brave units performed well. It does not even mention the vast air force the south had. Anyone serious about the South Vietnamese military has to do better and there are many books and articles listed at Vietnam War Bibliography. Richard Jensen 17:25, 1 May 2008 (CDT)

Your Bibliography is missing Robert K. Brigham's book http://www.amazon.com/ARVN-Death-Vietnamese-Modern-Studies/dp/0700614338. Ann Hoang 07:34, 6 May 2008 (CDT)

thanks for catching that--I saw it at the Society for Military History meeting last year and meant to include it.Richard Jensen 08:36, 6 May 2008 (CDT)

Bibliography

people looking for online sources might want to start with Vietnam War Bibliography by Richard Jensen Richard Jensen 22:45, 9 March 2008 (CDT)

Baffling, in Washington and elsewhere

I will reiterate that the Johnson Administration leadership was baffled. Remember that serious U.S. involvement in the region began in 1959-1961 in Laos, and I suspect Simons and Heintges had a thought or two. They were in regular communications with people like Bernard Fall.

While I can't speak from personal knowledge until 1966 or so, the Pentagon Papers do give indications that there were people, outside top circles, that certainly understood some of the dynamics in the country. Lansdale was shunted aside, but Roger Hilsman, with WWII guerilla experience, did have some insights. Unfortunately, he was too low in the food chain.

By 1966, I was working with first the Center for Research in Social Systems at American University, and then the Human Resources Research Organization at George Washington University. CRESS (formerly the Special Operations Research Office) was doing some quite insightful studies of attitudes in the countryside; I watched analyses going back and forth to the Special Warfare Center at Fort Bragg. Unfortunately, things that might be clear to a United States Army Special Forces major seemed to disappear somewhere before reaching McNamara's offices in Pentagon room 3E880. CIA was also producing serious analysis.

At HumRRO, while some of the research tools were awkward, our staff was sending Vietnamese-speaking analysts into villages. The MACV weekly Lessons Learned series spread useful knowledge within the command, but not above it, or apparently even in its senior headquarters.

Oh -- between the two jobs, I worked on tactical sensors and remote sensors for the McNamara line. The "people sniffer" actually worked, although it did result in quite a few water buffalo being bombed. The best sensor that came out of the Night Vision Laboratory, however, was rejected. It had a species of bedbug, exquisitely sensitive to human scent, glued to a microphone that would be dropped over the Ho Chi Minh trail. When porters passed, the excited bedbug would set off a transmitter, and call down bombs on its own position...brave bedbug. A general rejected the idea of using them, because he told the NWL that he refused to put any veteran in the position of answering "what did you do in the war, daddy" with "I was a bedbug wrangler."

McNamara and Johnson each brought their unique talents at bafflement to the situation. McNamara was convinced that the Lao Dong Party thought just as did his Harvard colleagues, and would realize, from a cost-effectiveness standpoint, they were beaten. He also developed a "signaling" system, "sending the message" that when the North Vietnamese set up S-75 Dvina/SA-2 GUIDELINE surface-to-air missile batteries, that the U.S. refrained from bombing the batteries "clearly" sent a message to the Politburo that it should reciprocate the retraint by not firing the missiles. Postwar interviews indicated that this had not even occurred to the North Vietnamese.

Johnson, meanwhile, chose to micromanage the bombing campaigns at his Tuesday lunches, which had no Air Force or Navy air warfare people in attendance, and only occasionally Max Taylor, a conventional land commander. No one there had any unconventional warfare experience, but they still seemed to feel qualified to tell whether a 500 or 750 pound bomb should be dropped on a given target. Given this hubris, given Johnson's ego, and given his Senate-bred belief everything was negotiable, why should it have been expected the Administration would make rational decisions.

Data were there; some passed across my desk. Unfortunately, it either never got to Robert Strange McNamara, or was rejected out of hand. How dare mere soldiers and area specialists tell statisticians, lawyers, and economists how things worked?

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, wait outside";

But it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide,

The troopship's on the tide, my boys, the troopship's on the tide,

O it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide.

Howard C. Berkowitz 20:38, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

yes but the army, navy, air force, CIA and Congress were also baffled, as was RAND and Harvard, so suggesting that it was only McNamara and LBJ is not true. The Kennedy's were baffled too, I might add, along with Ike. But they all agreed on containing Communist expansion--the alternatives were unthinkable at the time. Once containment was dropped by Nixon, entirely new approaches opened up (ie US-China and US-USSR deals squeezing out the North)Richard Jensen 21:25, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

Sorry, but I was seeing, at the time, Army Special Forces and other groups, military and intelligence. Aside from USAJFKSWC, there was good stuff coming out of 5SFG and Marine CAP. I didn't see MACV-SOG at the time, but that and other SACSA material that's come out shows some reasonability. As far as the Air Force, Edwin Lansdale immediately comes to mind, but I can also dig up some references online.

Where the Kennedys may themselves have been confused, McNamara could confuse at intercontinental ranges. LBJ preferred to deliver up-close-and-personal confusion, as when commanding staff audiences from the Presidential Porcelain Throne. Howard C. Berkowitz 21:45, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

"being there" doesn't quite do the job when we are talking about the highest levels. The point is that the chiefs of staff were all pretty baffled, as the Pentagon Papers show. CZ must avoid blaming everything on McNamara. The line of argument in the article is that the US was trapped because of multiple conflicting goals. Richard Jensen

Being there is relevant to knowing what was in the system. I agree completely that there were multiple goals. H.R. McMaster's interviews with Army Chief of Staff Harold Johnson are especially insightful -- Harold Johnson thought, at the time, he could do more from the inside, but, afterwards, regretted not resigning in protest. There was, indeed, a lot of JCS politics. Navy and Air Force weren't heavily involved, but the Marines, again, pushed from the inside.

There's probably better documentation, in the Pentagon Papers, of information about realities being rejected by the Office of the Secretary of Defense than any other key power center. CIA played political games but also made some good information available -- Adams' War of Numbers is a good source on this. MACV, unfortunately, was rather brilliant at self-delusion under Westmoreland; a fascinating what-if is if Abrams had gotten command earlier.

I would never blame everything on McNamara; I merely find him the greatest hypocrite and epitome of hubris. Johnson bears huge guilt, although he's more a figure out of classic tragedy when one looks at his domestic agenda. Rusk and McGeorge Bundy didn't exactly distinguish themselves. Taylor wanted every war to fit his model in The Uncertain Trumpet. Indeed, the only person that occasionally attended the Tuesday lunches and brought in any reality was George Ball. Howard C. Berkowitz 22:06, 30 June 2008 (CDT)

RJ draft next sections, for comment before insertion

Ground war 1965-68

Westmoreland's tactics worked.

Westmoreland's tactics killed many of the enemy, and caused to more indigenous units to fragment. Westmoreland's tactics, however, had little effect on the decisionmakers in Hanoi. Clausewitz 1, Westmoreland 0. Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

With the US increasing the pace of search and destroy (and the ARVN avoiding combat), the NLF was systematically pushed back. "Search and Destroy" gave way after 1968 to new tactics.

The new tactics need to be explained, not just mentioned as an aside.Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

As the Viet Cong dispersed into smaller and smaller units, so too did the US forces, until they were running platoon and even squad operations that blanketed far more of the countryside, chasing the fragmented enemy back into remote, uninhabited areas or out of SVN all together. Not only low-level NLF sympathizers but even Viet Cong officers and NLF political cadres started to surrender, accepting the generous resettlement terms offered by the GVN. At the end of 1964, only 42% of the South Vietnamese people lived in cities or villages that were securely under GVN control. (20% were in villages controlled by the NLF, and 37% were in contested zones.) At the end of 1967, 67% of the population was "secure," and only a few remote villages with less than 2% of the population were still ruled by the NLF. Hanoi seemed to believe that the rugged Central Highlands region, which contained a third of the area but only 7% of SVN's people, would make a good base for guerrilla warfare. The US Army "Special Forces" ("Green Berets") contested this strategy by systematically arming the Montagnard tribesmen against the Communists.

Having been, for a while, the programmer at George Washington University's HumRRO research center, doing the CONUS statistical analysis of the Hamlet Evaluation System, I think these percentages have to be explained, and some confidence level put on them. Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

In 1967, the Saigon political scene stabilized, as the Buddhist and student protesters ran out of steam and General Nguyen Van Thieu, a competent, fiercely anti-Communist Catholic, became President. The NLF failed to disrupt the national legislative election of 1966, or the presidential elections of 1967, which consolidated Thieu-ARVN control over GVN. Thieu failed to eliminate the systematic politicization, corruption, time-serving and favoritism in the ARVN. Nervous about spies in ARVN, the MACV kept it at arms length and never exercised direct control. ARVN and MACV operated two different wars. MACV advisors did work closely with 900,000 local GVN officials in a well-organized pacification program called CORDS (Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development.) It stressed technical aid, local self government, and land distribution to peasant farmers. A majority of tenant farmers received title to their own land in one of the most successful transfer projects in any nation. On the other hand, hundreds of thousands of peasants entered squalid refugee camps when CORDS moved them out of villages that could not be protected. In the Phoenix Program (part of CORDS with a strong CIA component) GVN police identified and arrested (and sometimes killed) the NLF secret police agents engaged in assassination.

From the standpoint purely of prose, the preceding and following paragraphs seem somewhat contradictory. The paragraph above picks up metrics that remind me of a contemporary observation in the U.S. Army:

Twinkle twinkle little star

We are winning, yes we are

General Westmoreland told me true.

If you doubt him, who are you? McNamara says so too.

My recommendation is to be explicit that there were very mixed messages.Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The more the American soldiers worked in the hamlets, the more they came to despise the corruption, inefficiency and even cowardice of GVN and ARVN.

Even that is ambiguous. There were also some deeply respected ARVN officers, and the U.S. personnel were aware of them not having the appropriate connections and bribes to rise to the level appropriate to their talents. Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The basic problem was that despite the decline of the NLF, the GVN still failed to pick up popular support. Most peasants, refugees and townfolk remained alienated and skeptical. The superior motivation of the enemy troubled the Americans (especially in contrast with South Koreans, who fought fiercely for their independence.) "Why can't our Vietnamese do as well as Ho's?" Soldiers resented the peasants ("gooks") who seemed sullen, unappreciative, unpatriotic and untrustworthy. The Viet Cong resorted more and more to booby-traps that (during the whole war) killed about 4,000 Americans and injured perhaps 30,000 (and killed or injured many thousands of peasants.)

It became more and more likely that after an ambush or boobytrap angry GIs would take out their frustrations against the nearest "gooks." Vietnamese they perceived as potential enemies. MACV did not appreciate the danger that atrocities might be committed by Americans. In March 1968, just after the Tet offensive, one Army company massacred several hundred women and children at the hamlet of My Lai. The company captain

Battalion lieutenant colonel, Brigade colonel, Division major general, Field Force lieutenant general and MACV general were acquitted or not charged. I'm not saying they necessarily should be, but there is a very relevant comparison to the Yamashita doctrine, with the tabi being on the other foot, as it were. (For the record, I believe Yamashita was innocent of the Phillipine charges, demonstrably tried to prevent atrocities, but committed the mortal sin of having beaten MacArthur).Howard C. Berkowitz 13:51, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

was acquitted but platoon commander Lt. William Calley (a junior college dropout who was rushed through OCS) was sentenced to life imprisonment by a 1971 court martial. He was released in 1975. The case became a focus of national guilt and self-doubt, with antiwar leaders alleging there were many atrocities that had been successfully covered up.

Tet 1968

Order needs to change.

Hanoi made a decision to demonstrate the impotence of the GVN in the cities, with a multi-pronged campaign beginning at Khe Sanh, attracting the attention of US decisionmakers, with LBJ having his own model of the base in the White House basement. When there were multiple urban attacks during Tet, with great civilian casualties, even though the indigenous Viet Cong were largely destroyed, there was no reason for the urban population to believe the GVN could provide security. (See Insurgency#Political rhetoric, myths and models, with special attention to security. "Magic Diamond" diagrams, before and after Tet, could be illustrative. Howard C. Berkowitz 14:01, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The climactic moment of the war came in February 1968 during the truce usually observed during the "Tet" holiday season. Hanoi made an all-out bid for victory, and was decisively defeated. It was in desperate shape, defeated on the battlefields and pushed out of most of the villages it once controlled. Rolling Thunder had destroyed dreams of socialist industrialization in the North and ruined practically the entire economy above the level of the rice paddies.

Aside from the Lao Dong cadre, who had such a dream? Howard C. Berkowitz 14:01, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The rulers in Hanoi had the dream, says Nicholas Tarling, The Cambridge History of Southeast Asia p. 163 Richard Jensen 17:31, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

And they realized it. The NLF might have had objections, but I was simply not seeing huge village security in the actual MACV field reporting. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:54, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The "tail" of the PAVN had grown as its teeth receded, for the bombing had made resupply extraordinarily difficult. The solution was one last all-out effort, aimed especially at a new target, the GVN bureaus and ARVN complexes in the cities. The Politburo theorized that the GVN was a hollow shell held together only by American firepower. They truly believed the proletariat in the cities would rise up and throw off the puppets once the tocsin was sounded; indeed, the very legitimacy of their enterprise hinged on the premise that the people of South Vietnam hated their government and really wanted Communist control. As a preliminary diversion, PAVN sent two of its divisions to surround an isolated Marine outpost at Khe Sanh, near the border. Johnson personally took control of the defense. When the media back home warned darkly of another disaster like Dien Bien Phu, LBJ made his generals swear they would never surrender Khe Sanh. They committed 5% of their ground strength to the outpost (about 6,000 men) and held another 15-20% in reserve just in case. The enemy was blasted with 22,000 airstrikes and massive artillery bombardments. When the siege was lifted, the Marines had lost 205 killed, the PAVN probably 10,000.

Hoping that Khe Sanh had tied down Westmoreland, the PAVN and Viet Cong struck on January 31, throwing 100,000 regular and militia troops against 36 of 44 provincial capitals and 5 of 6 major cities. They avoided American strongholds and targeted GVN government offices and ARVN installations. The ARVN recoiled in shock, then fought bravely and fiercely. American television viewers watched in utter disbelief as MPs fought to recapture the courtyard of the embassy in Saigon, which had been seized by 15 Viet Cong sappers. The harshest fighting came in the old imperial capital of Hue. The city fell to the PAVN, which immediately set out to identify and execute thousands of government supporters among the civilian population. The allies fought back fiercely, with all the firepower at their command (including the big guns of naval ships in the harbor). House to house fighting recaptured Hue on February 24. Five thousand enemy bodies were recovered (the US lost 216 dead, and ARVN 384). Nationwide, the enemy lost tens of thousands killed, and many more who were wounded or totally demoralized. US lost 1,100 dead, ARVN 2,300. The people of South Vietnam did not rise up; the NLF tocsin fell on deaf ears. However, the pacification program temporarily collapsed in half the country, and a half million more people became refugees. Despite the enormous damage done to the GVN at all levels, the NLF was in even worse shape, and it never recovered.

Neither recovered. The continuing attrition eventually left the Lao Dong as having all the Monopoly money.

Tet was designed to demonstrate its popularity and legitimacy, and it had failed totally.

Disagree. It fit nicely with Marighella's model of showing the inability of a central government to provide security.

But the central government DID provide the security, hence the failure. Richard Jensen 17:31, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Remembering the rows of bodies in shallow graves in Hue, hands wired behind their backs, there were huge failures of the RVN government to provide security -- especially if the appropriate bribes were not paid. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:54, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

More than half the Communist soldiers in the South were killed in 1968; many others deserted to the GVN. B-52 carpet bombing in the "Iron Triangle" near Saigon destroyed the vast underground tunnel complex and terrorized the surviving Viet Cong. By sending its main force into the cities during Tet, the NLF left a vacuum in the countryside that GVN and US pacification agents could fill.

But did they? I'm reminded of the comment after Arnhem, "my country cannot afford another Montgomery victory."Howard C. Berkowitz 14:01, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

I think they did.

By tunnel complex that was destroyed, are you referring to Cu Chi? The same Cu Chi that is a grim set of tourist attractions today?

It would help if your airpower terminology was a little more precise than "carpet bombing". Are you saying that the B-52's had Combat Skyspot radar coordinates to bomb? If they didn't have specific coordinates, their standard load, the 750 pound Mark 117 bomb, did not have a great deal of earth-penetrating capability. I'd like to see some documentation of the specific ordnance loadouts, including fuze types, that supposedly wiped out tunnel complexes.

With some of the sensors and "brilliant" fuzes available today for, probably, laser-guided bombs, you might be able to hit some of the tunnels consistently. At the time -- and part of my work was on personnel sensors -- the most reliable way to clear a tunnel was to send a small, flexible, and very brave man into it, armed with a handgun. Directly observed artillery fire also could help, but the B-52 had no way of sensing the tunnels and the B-52s of the time could not use laser-guided bombs.

For example, the 25th Infantry Division was plagued by enemy bunkers near the highway between Cu Chi and Saigon. Fires from the bunkers prevented free movement between the two locations. Numerous attempts to reduce the bunkers with artillery, air strikes, and infantry assaults were unsuccessful. An 8-inch howitzer delivering assault fire (i.e., direct fire) finally eliminated the bunkers.

— MG David Ewing Ott, Field Artillery 1954-1973, Department of the Army

By the end of 1968 GVN had pulled itself together and restored its authority in every province.

Authority as in "it was safe for the province chief, without a large security detail, to sleep in any hamlet?" Howard C. Berkowitz 14:01, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

much better than that. we simply do not have reports of NLF control after 1968. By 1969 "Saigon forces were able to sustain the pressure on the revolutionary forces and dramatically expand their control over both population and territory." Elliott The Vietnamese War: (2002) p. 1128 Richard Jensen 17:31, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

"We"? Not what I was seeing coming across my desk at HumRRO, for example, in the Lessons Learned series from Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MAC-V). I hope they are archived somewhere; at the time, they were CONFIDENTIAL but with accelerated declassification in three years. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:54, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Indeed, for the first time GVN found itself in control of more than 90% of the population. "The Tet objectives were beyond our strength," concluded Tran Van Tra, the commander of Vietcong forces in the South. "They were based on the subjective desires of the people who made the plan. Hence our losses were large, in material and manpower, and we were not able to retain the gains we had already made." [draft by Richard Jensen 22:11, 30 June 2008 (CDT)]

Please sign all of your remarks, so that others may follow the exchange properly. --Larry Sanger 14:23, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Scope of article -- too broad or not broad enough?

I understand, although I do not agree, with the original point that the article was U.S.-centric. Nevertheless, the article, at present, is more of a Post-WWII History of Vietnam than a Vietnam War article.

In my opinion, a U.S. oriented war article should go back no farther than 1954 (see CIA activities in Vietnam#Vietnam 1954 for the first, even covert, operation to affect the situation on the ground. The Patti mission belongs in an article perhaps on "Post-WWII Military History of Vietnam", although, just as the Hukbalahap were anti-Japanese Communists, so were the Viet Minh an anti-Japanese group that then became anti-French.

Again not necessarily in the same article, it is quite appropriate to have article(s) that deal with the French colonial period, the US embargo on Japan as a result of Japanese activities in Indochina, and enough background to give an accurate picture of the ...ahem...glowing affection of Vietnamese for China, as demonstrated by the Two Trung Ladies among others. Howard C. Berkowitz 13:34, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Definition

As a definition of the Vietnam War, I respecfully submit that "the successful effort of the Communist Party of Vietnam, led by Ho Chi Minh, to take control of Vietnam" is poor. The efforts of the Communist Party are only the efforts of one party to the war. That is one main outcome of the war, but the outcome does not define the war itself, does it? --Larry Sanger 14:26, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

OK I rephrased the lede (and also removed some small details that are belong in the main text, as well as some editorial commentary that is out of place.)

Surely there isn't only one perspective. At the least, unless this is the article on the American Perspective on the Southeast Asian War Games, 1945-1975, one might suggest:

• Lao Dong party
• NLF non-Lao Dong, while they were around
• Catholic-identified South
• Buddhist-identified South
• Southern nationalists, if any

I can accept not having details (but preferably links) in the main article for the Cao Dai, Hoa Hao, even Binh Nguyen, and, if one is going back into the fifties and forties, the VNQDD, Vietnamese Kuomintang, etc. Perhaps the merchants of Cholon?

There's also third country reactions. Please see CIA activities in Vietnam, especially the 1965 NIE. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:21, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

yes CZ can desire this material but the sources are extremely limited. Nobody gets into the Hanoi archives. Eventually that will change (as it did in Moscow in 1991) Richard Jensen 18:36, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

In my list of non-American interest groups above, only one was based in Hanoi. Are you suggesting that only Hanoi is important, and Buddhist relations with Diem should be ignored? Might there have been a bit more countryside support of the GVN had there been less tolerance of corruption?

Even with Hanoi, there were FBIS and JPRS analyses of trends in Nhan Dan, as well as some reasonable declassified documents. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:43, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Marines vs. Army/Westmoreland vs. Taylor

The note about Marine vs. Army relationships really should be a signed article elaborating on some of the personalities involved, or, at the least, substantial sourcing from both Army and Marine viewpoints.

Walt and Cushman, for example, should be cited along with Westmoreland. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:38, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

CZ is stating the debate, not taking sides. The main source here is Marine General Victor Krulak, ch 13 of his memoirs on the conflict First to Fight pp 195-204 online; the same point is made by many others, like "The Army and Vietnam," Andrew F. Krepinevich notes (p 175) that the Marines were "never able to sell the idea of CAPS." Kinnard, War Managers" discusses the tension on p 60-1, online Richard Jensen 23:21, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

The start of the Vietnam War

See [1] and, ignoring the credibility of the source and merely looking at the (more or less factual) options they present, it seems to me that 1955 and 1959 are just as reasonable as years for the beginning of the war(s) called "the Vietnam War." The idea that a war that is properly called "the Vietnam War" got started in 1945 is controversial, that is, it is one perspective that others who use the phrase "the Vietnam War" evidently disagree with. Britannica, for instance, has it at 1954 or 1955. So, to present it as CZ's official perspective is precisely to violate our Neutrality Policy. Indeed, one indicator that we are not quite living up to our ideals of neutrality in this case is that there is not a single mention of other commonly-mentioned names for this (these) war(s): the First and Second Indochina Wars. Even if for the historians that is old-fashioned nomenclature (and is it?), it is important that we say that much.

There is a way to get around this without having yet another largely pointless, protracted debate about what the facts are, or what proper usage is. Please let's not have such a debate unless absolutely necessary. In fact, it is what one should normally do in this sort of case: simply present all the facts about how "the Vietnam War" (and other names) are used--the facts about the whole variety of opinions and usages. Of course, if there is one usage that is now in the ascendancy among professional historians, that is the usage we should lead with, and which we should label as such. I can imagine a useful section of the article--perhaps the second section after the intro--in which the question, "When did the Vietnam War start?" is explicitly addressed. After all, naming of historical events can be an extremely touchy subject ;-) and so it is very important that we lay out the various opinions and how they are treated by experts as well as other interested parties. That, along with a bit of qualification in the beginning of the article, might be all that is needed.

What we should not permit is that we state exactly one version of the facts when other reasonably credible sources disagree. I trust that we can all agree with this principle... --Larry Sanger 22:35, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

I addressed the name issue in the lede, linking it to the dating issue, with citations. English-language sources are at least 10-1 in favor of "Vietnam War" Richard Jensen 23:11, 3 July 2008 (CDT)

Is anyone other than Howard and Richard reading this? Richard has done some (thank you, Richard), but I don't expect him to do much more. If you'll do some research about what names have been given to the war(s), and summarize it in a new section as I suggested, I do think that that would help a great deal. --Larry Sanger 17:47, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

address name issue, add NVN details in 1963

RJ, reasonably enough, indicates that historians, whom, alas, are not here en masse, are by no means unanimous about nomenclature, such as First vs. Second Indochina wars. If external groups of specialists have no consensus, it seems appropriate to try to form a CZ consensus and standard.

I find that "first" and "second" really are inadequate, if one is trying to look at a region variously called Vietnam, Indochina, or its separate domains such as Annam and Cochinchina. At the very least, there are periods involving:

1. Pre-French colonialization, establishing some significant traditions, literally over centuries, regarding Vietnamese relations with China. I say these are significant based on some of the fairly bizarre assumptions by U.S. policymakers that China would somehow turn North Vietnam into a proxy.
2. French colonization up to the Japanese invasion
3. World War II, with nationalist guerillas operating against the Japanese, French, or both, as well as playing their own factional games--rather like the Gaullists vs. the Communists in the French Resistance
4. A period that might work as 1945-1954, or even split further. There were Vietnamese nationalists trying to get rid of the French, some of whom certainly were Communists, and some were not. The U.S. involvement up to the entry of the Saigon Military Mission (cover name for CIA mission under Lansdale in 1954) was largely limited to the OSS Patti mission in the late forties. It may be useful to split this period into the beginnings of Maoist Phase II/III warfare against the French.
5. 1954-1956, from the Geneva accords to the recognition that the referendum wasn't going to happen.
6. 1956-1959, a period of exploration of groups especially in the South, consolidation in the North and of Diem's government, and ending with the NVN decision in May 1959 to form the 559 Transportation Group, build the Ho Chi Minh trail, and start serious support of Southern proxies
7. 1959-1961/2 -- various ways to structure this period, depending if one stays purely with Vietnam, or looks at the early U.S. activity in Laos under Heintges, Simons, etc.
8. 1962-1964: Increasing U.S. advisory and combat support, perhaps centered around the Battle of Ap Bac, up either to the Gulf of Tonkin Incident or perhaps the beginning of US-supported covert action against the North (e.g., CINCPAC OPPLAN 34A MAROPS)
9. 1964-1972: overt U.S. involvement
10. 1972-1975: Attempts at developing a viable GVN, terminated by conventional military attack by the PAVM.

If there's mo CZ consensus about periods and wars, I don't see how any serious collaborative work can be done, with various people marching to different drummers. Howard C. Berkowitz 01:30, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

yes there is a consensus. The great majority of historians use "Vietnam war" and only a handful prefer Indochina War (some use both--but give priority to Vietnam war). I found only one university press book that used "Indochina War" in its title. In terms of scholarly articles I found only 64 that use "Indochina war" in the title, versus 1117 articles that use "Vietnam War." Thus 94% to 6% is pretty conclusive. Richard Jensen 02:27, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

We will disagree about this, but I am somewhat less impressed with an academic consensus than what I see in professional military writing, especially when you say the article, or parts of it, were written from an American perspective. During the active war, many of the MACV people weren't especially conversant with the pre-US involvement, although the work from Special Forces officers did reflect it -- and treated the Viet Minh as less than a simple name change.

There has been substantial NSA and USAF declassificaton, and North Vietnamese communications intercepts and prisoner interviews also draw some distinct lines. One is in May 1959, which is the source of the designation for the 559th Transportation Group, the PAVN group that built and ran the Ho Chi Minh trail. The strategic decision to go to a major proxy/outside support was not casually taken by the Politburo, who regarded it as a fundamental change in the war.

I suppose I tend not to give automatic credibility to sweeping statements of what historians believe, a group who seem amazingly consistent compared with most specialty groups. There is a reason, I believe, that there are History and Military Workgroups, and, speaking as a Military editor, I see nothing like the unanimity about "one Vietnam war". It isn't used in the Pentagon Papers. It isn't especially used in Nhan Dan. It isn't reflected by the sequence of military policies chose by the North. US policy certainly didn't reflect it, especially when the U.S. emphasis in 1959-1961 saw Laos as the key area of operations, not Vietnam; compare the covert operator and advisor commitments in both areas.

Just to name a few sources, I don't find an assumption of one continuous war with Bernard Fall, Douglas Pike, the Vietnam Studies series from the Department of the Army, and National Intelligence Estimates.Howard C. Berkowitz 11:23, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

Bernard Fall died 41 years ago, the Pentagon Papers were completed 40 years ago; likewise the Army's Vietnam studies were written in the 1960s. They are not good testimony regarding the ideas of 2008. Historians read all those primary sources and MANY MORE more sources as well. For example, we now have thousands of oral histories from multiple sides. We have access to many of the Soviet documents and nearly all the US documents from the era, and a few Chinese documents, which the people at the time only guessed about. We in 2008 know a great deal about what happened in Thailand and Indonesia and Malaya and Cambodia, and we do not have to speculate. Speculations in 1965 about the future, say in the NIE, are interesting, but they were mostly incorrect, as we now know, and so cannot be relied upon. As for "Indochina war" it is the favorite French term for their part of the war, which ended in 1954. The involvement of the North, the South and the US was continuous at least from 1950 to 1975. Richard Jensen 17:40, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

I truly hope what I am about to write is taken as within the bounds of CZ courtesy, although it may be fairly blunt. I make some of these statements not because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm trying to find a collaborative approach, in CZ, that works in military history -- one that doesn't seem to exist consistently right now.

Were these words to be "heard" aloud, I'd be inclined to put them in the dulcet tones of the sheriff in Cool Hand Luke, saying "what we got here is a failure to com-MUN-i-cate."

Some might say your observations above are better ideas, and some might say they are revisionism. They fairly clearly are dismissive of any citations I am bringing to the table. From my perspective, what is important is what the people making the decisions at the time thought, not people retrospectively looking at them and ascribing motivations they did not have. LBJ, in various interviews, referred to "that pissant, Ho." For a work such as McMaster's, examining internal real decisionmaking in an administration that consciously lied to the American public to further political goals of the Johnson administration, patterns that emerge about top-level decisionmaking in this country are absolutely relevant to the political process today.

In other words, I have yet to be convinced that "the ideas of 2008" are a serious way to better understand decisionmaking that affects the United States, as well as the way the U.S. approaches the decisionmaking of other cultures, than are to look at the declassified contemporary thinking. There's a proverb you might have encountered about flies and vinegar; perhaps I might find myself more receptive to your sweeping statements about "what historians say" if they were phrased in a manner that suggested that other than an academic historian could possibly have any insight into the topic. Thinking in terms of current interactions with professionals in other fields, I find it somewhat ironic that it is far easier to discuss the choices in medication on which my life depends, with physicians willing to listen to ideas based in current literature, than it is for me to make a statement and told I can't possibly understand because I'm not a doctoral-level historian. Funny how I can figure out the clinicopathological correlations of the renin-angiotensin system with having a doctorate in medicine.

You might say that I am reading the current literature in medicine. That is correct. I am reading current research trials and molecular pharmacology, and, sometimes drawing my own conclusions. If your suggestions were that I go to available primary sources about Southeast Asia, read them, and draw conclusions, that might be analogous. Your suggestions, though, tend to be simply that I am wrong because your assumptions about titles of historians' research use a different terminology -- in other words, the secondary and tertiary interpretation, as filtered through your individual viewpoint, citing journals apparently not available outside academia — as opposed to declassified military and intelligence documents.

Unfortunately, it appears that the academic historical community does not make as much material available directly than in medicine or computer science. In other learned disciplines, there isn't an overwhelming need to have JSTOR and Questia and other subscriptions; there are abundant sources of research. The medical tradition is not dead where one can ask an author for a copy of a journal article not otherwise available, and get it in hard copy or PDF. Of course, in looking at historical intelligence documents and such, I can get the NIEs about Southeast Asia, and often the oral histories. I'd certainly appreciate more links to material that supports your conclusion, rather than what are clearly your opinions, and what appears a barely veiled contempt with those who do not have full academic credentials in your field.

There appears to be a meta-problem here that doesn't seem to happen in other areas even of CZ: that rather than an attempt to collaborate and help mutual understanding, there is a pattern of telling other people "you're wrong and I'm right, and you don't have the training or access to understand why." In some details, that may well be correct, but, for example, I'm willing to help a collaborator understand the cognitive process of analyzing military reports, or, when a technology is important as is the IADS and its radar and other components in the Battle of Britain, I'm willing to discuss rather than focus on putdowns. When then-employer was acquired by Orbital Sciences, and we needed to collaborate, the rocket scientists did not say the communications engineers could not understand rocket science. Instead, we looked for ways to establish ways to communicate. We communications engineers are funny that way. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:16, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

My point is that we cannot look at 1% of the materials. Historians systematically track down the sources and and using lots more material (by a factor of maybe 50), AND they vet their books and articles and papers against each other. I would say there are several hundred historians doing serious work on the Vietnam war (books.google lists 1799 books from university presses that discuss the Vietnam war). In recent years scholars have expanded the scope of their work to include many oral histories, and to get access to many archives from UK, Russia and China, Australia, etc. Their findings are reported in the main books and articles, and I've made an effort to list a few of them here. I have a much longer guide to the historiography online that I have maintained for some years now. CZ is an encyclopedia that should reflect the current scholarship and is not the place for the original research that Howard seems to be proposing and sometimes attempting. That fails the reliability test taht is central to CZ's mission. [As for example his proposal yesterday: "If external groups of specialists have no consensus, it seems appropriate to try to form a CZ consensus and standard." ] We have to have external reliability for CZ--that means everything has to be based on the best scholarship. It is very difficult to work through the primary sources without knowing the scholarly literature. It takes 5-8 years to train history PhD's how to do this kind of work. (Non-PhD's also work on Vietnam and they typically have years of field experience in Vietnam, and conduct hundreds of new interviews. )Richard Jensen 18:40, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

names of war as used in titles of articles

it seems that the French prefer the title "Indochina war" because in the first half of the 20th century they called the place Indochina and they called their war (1946-54) the Indochina war. A few writers outside France use the term. An ABC-CLIO search over most major history and political science scholarly journals finds n=64 articles with "Indochina war" in the title. Of these 27 are in French, 32 are in English, and 5 in other languages. The term "Vietnam war" appears in the title of 1027 articles in English and 20 in French. So the French prefer "Indochina war" by 27 to 20, and the English language press prefers "Vietnam war" by 1027-32. I think that answers Larry's question. PS there is a new book on Chinese Military Strategy in the Third Indochina War: The Last Maoist War (2007) by Edward C. O'Dowd, dealing with the war between China and Vietnam that started in 1979. Richard Jensen 19:01, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

Let's assume that for the History Workgroup. There is a Military Workgroup, and not all historical conventions are necessarily used by the professional military, or vice versa. What about, for example, the National Technical Information Service? The Strategic Studies Institute and Center for Army Lessons Learned? And no, simply finding titles isn't enough, until it is determined that, for example, a CALL report thesis from the School of Advanced Military Studies with "Vietnam War" in the title gives detail to the end of Groupement Mobile No. 100, or "Indochina War" covers things like LZ X-Ray. I certainly do not remember MACV reports referring to the Indochina war, just "it's the only war we've got".

The earlier intelligence community reports don't mention Vietnam for things that happened in 1954, such as NIE 63-54: "Consequences Within Indochina of the Fall of Dien Bien Phu."

I'll reiterate that even for your ABC-CLIO search, the title alone doesn't say what the article is about unless there is enough in an abstract to reveal the dates covered. Howard C. Berkowitz 19:27, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

To take up Howard's suggestions: I looked at the military literature and 95% prefers "Vietnam war" rather than "Indochina war." Specifically, I searched the Combined Arms Research Library Digital Library, which includes Command and General Staff College (CGSC) MMAS thesis and School of Advanced Military Studies Monographs. I found 87 monographs using "Vietnam war" in their abstract and only 3 using "Indochina war" (plus one that used both terms in the abstract.) As for dating there is little or no disagreement that a war broke out in 1946 and ended in 1954, and that a war broke out in the late 1950s and ended in 1975. Most historians group them together, since 3 of the 4 parties (North, South, US, France) remained the same. The French left in 1954 and had always called the region Indochina; today articles in French split on use of "Indochina war" or "Vietnam war." About 5% of the studies in English seem to prefer "Indochina war." That is a minority view and it is already included in the opening of the article. Richard Jensen 20:31, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

I am rapidly regarding this as an exercise in futility, but I will try yet again. If I write about the Groupement de Commandos Mixtes Aéroportés, Groupement Mobile No. 100, or Dien Bien Phu, I intend to write about them under the heading "Indochina War". If I write about the Battle of Ap Bac, the Marine Combined Action Platoons, IGLOO WHITE or the nephelometric ammonia-detecting "people sniffer" on which I worked, the changes in ARC LIGHT doctrine with and without COMBAT SKYSPOT, or the Paris Peace Talks, I will write about them under the heading "Vietnam War".

GCMA and GM100 died in Indochina, not Vietnam. Of course there would be more articles about "Vietnam War" in U.S. Army current monographs, because the Vietnam War is the one in which the U.S. Army fought. Strangely, when U.S. Army Special Forces, or their support organizations such as CRESS where I worked, wrote about French experiences, they referred to them as part of the Indochina War.

If "most historians" want to oversimplify, more power to them. Richard and I are not going to agree on this, and I will continue to write about things during Vietnam under Vietnam war, and other things under the appropriate period. Or were the Trung Sisters part of the Vietnam War, when they committed suicide in 43 AD rather than be captured by the Chinese against whom they were fighting?

Is it possible to agree to disagree and get on with the substantive issues? Believe me, Richard, you will have plenty to argue about regarding some of your interpretations of the motivations of the United States and the Republic of Vietnam. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:57, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

OK, Howard, I think we should be asking Richard the simple questions: (1) Richard, when do you think the war properly called the Vietnam War started? (2) Are you claiming that there is 90%+ agreement about that among historians? (3) Finally, do you believe that the CZ article titled Vietnam War should unequivocally assert that the Vietnam War began when you say it began, or are you open to an explanation of different views about this? --Larry Sanger 21:09, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

My reading of how historians handle the dates is presented in the opening lede: most use 1946 to 1975, in two phases. Exactly when the US got involved is a different issue (it depends on whether military aid is meant (large scale $$ aid started 1954), political commitment (probably 1950), soldiers who advised and helped direct combat (1955, a few hundred but 1963 16,000) or combat action (1965).) Am I "open to an explanation of different views about this?" yes indeed, so let's hear them. Richard Jensen

Moving toward a practical resolution of the "when did it start?" question

Richard, you somehow have gotten the notion that I think we should use the title "Indochina War." I think no such thing. I think we should represent the full range of views about how the war is described. The question I raised is what year the war properly called "the Vietnam War" began. It is that question on which I insist there is, in fact, a range of (credible) opinion.

Also, you say, "everything has to be based on the best scholarship." Well, who could disagree with that? But from this platitude, you infer that other legitimate views (e.g., those expressed by the Britannica), that are perhaps regarded as quaint or long since superseded by historians, should not be mentioned except perhaps to be quickly dismissed. Is that right? If so, well, I understand your views on such matters, and repeating them will not advance your case; we understand your views not only on the substantive question but also on the extent of the consensus and the difficulty of history as a subject, and so forth. Those aren't the sort of things we are (interminably) disagreeing about. We are (repeatedly) disagreeing about what the neutrality policy requires, or perhaps whether we should have a neutrality policy. I assert that we do have such a policy, and that it requires that we lay out the full breadth of understanding of a subject. If you disagree with this, I'm afraid you already know what I'm going to say. I don't mean to be peremptory, but you know full well that we've had exactly similar discussions in the past, and I'm simply not interested in having a re-run of the same.

I agree with Howard: there is no consensus, when his sources, as well as Britannica and other encyclopedias and credible sources, put the start of the Vietnam War in 1954, 1955, or 1959, and when "the great majority of historians" according to Richard put it in the mid-1940s. But this doesn't mean that we cannot collaborate or even that we have to argue. Precisely the purpose of the neutrality policy is to outline the basic ground rules in which people who disagree can work together: their mission is to relate the facts that are well-agreed, and where names and accounts differ, you describe all of them, attributing them to their sources. (Which could involve saying, for example, "the vast majority of historians use the name this way..." If that's true, we should say so.) Collaboration is indeed impossible if you think that an article must express "the consensus view" of a topic, when in fact there is no real consensus.

But the first step toward crafting an article that describes the various views is to recognize that there are, in fact, various views. It does not do much good to pretend there are no other views, or to dismiss them with evident contempt.

Let's please stop debating the issue of whether there is a bona fide consensus: there isn't one. Let's also please stop debating the issue of whether historians march in lockstep on this issue: let's suppose Richard is right, and they do. (What will happen--I ask myself--when Richard disagrees with the mainstream historians? Is that even possible? I have to wonder.) This means that to resolve this issue in line with our neutrality policy, we must solve the following practical problem: what is the best way to describe the variety of views about the meaning of "the Vietnam War" in a way that does justice to the various views, and resolves immediate puzzlement on the part of many of our readers who will be very surprised to learn that the Vietnam War began in 1945 or 6 instead of 1959 as he probably read in school (or remembers)? This is the only proper way to reinsert the worms into the can I opened (again, about when the war began), and it is the framework in which I request that we work. This practical problem can't be solved by more of the same sort of frankly tiresome debate.

So let's put an end to this particular discussion. The next step is to fully characterize the range of reasonably credible, published, edited views about the start of the Vietnam War. Looking forward to it.  ;-) --Larry Sanger 19:18, 4 July 2008 (CDT)