Unit 5: How effective was the US @ stopping the spread of communism?

Korea

Cuba

Vietnam

North Korea is ruled by the communist leader kim il sung.
while the south is ruled by the capitalist leader syngman Rhee.

in 1950 North Korea invaded most of the south, president truman sent warships, advisers, and supplies to the south.

Korea was taken over by japan until the end of WWII in 1945 then they were freed by the US and the Soviet Union. The US freed the south and the USSR freed the north.

the US wanted the UN to condemn the action of N. Korea, but they had to vote.
the UN did not allow communist china into the UN in 1949, the USSR to protest walked out of the UN, which mean there were no communist countries in the UN.
The US influenced the UN to agree to help S. Korea by being the largest contributor to the UN's budget.
The UN agreed to us force against north korea
After the vote, the North is pushed back to the border at china, china joined north korea and pushed the UN troops back past the 38th parallel.
The leader in charge of all the troops General Mac Arthur wanted to invade china with nuclear weapons, but president truman disagreed and removed him from his position.

once castro overthrew batista he started to nationalize american businesses, the us decided to take action against him.

the us placed a trade embargo, then the CIA launched the bay of pigs invasion to overthrow Castro. The CIA trained 1700 Cuban exiles, they provided them with all the necessary equipment for to fight the Cuban troops but they were still defeated. As a result the USSR sent supplies to Cuba such as, nuclear missiles.

Cuba was ruled by General Fulgencio Batista who was a cruel dictator that had the support of the US.
cuba was going through extreme poverty and a lot of unemployment.
Fidel Castro began a revolution against batista, castro had the support of the cuban people.

in 1962 the USSR began building nuclear missiles launch sites in Cuba
the us obtained spy plane images that proved the existence of such sites
the us announced the Cuban blockade to prevent any missiles from getting to Cuba.
the "showdown" is the closest the US and the USSR ever got to a nuclear war. the USSR returned to the Soviet Union with the missiles, and US removed the missiles from turkey, but it was kept a secret from the world to make it seem like the the US won the Cuban Missile Crisis.

the French took over Vietnam until 1941, Vietminh freedom fighters wanted independence so they fought with the french until the Japanese came along to try and take over Vietnam to.
the Vietminh continued to fight japan until they are forced to leave because they lost WW ll, the french tried to regain control over Vietnam but the Vietminh continued fighting, the french got help from the US, in 1954 the Vietminh signed the Geneva Accords and divided Vietnam in half. The french left but the US continued to fight communism.
the us assigned south vietnam a leader, Ngo Dinh Diem he was extremely anti-communist he also wanted vietnam to be one country again. Many vietnamese people disliked him and he had little control over south vietnam. when he was killed the us continued to fight communism.

Viet Cong Tactics

the Viet cong also had several tactics that were more effective than the tactics the US had. They did not want the US to lose the was they only wanted them wear them down and make them quit.

US tactics

the US had several tactics, which were not really effective, in order to defeat the Vietcong during the Vietnam war.

  1. operation rolling thunder- the US bombed Vietnam in order to stop the delivery of supplies, weapons, and troops. Unfortunately there were some problems with this tactic too, they did not disrupt the supply delivery, and they killed many innocent people making people in the US oppose to the war.
  1. Search and Destroy- the US would go to villages and destroy everything the VC need to fight. That also had many problem: they kill and destroy the houses of innocent people, and the VC always moved before the US would even get there. images of soldiers destroying the villages made the us look even worse and raised the opposition to the war even more.
  1. Strategic Hamlets- this strategy was to separate the VC and the farms, so that the enemy was found easily. farmers/peasants/villagers were moved to "safe zones" that had been cleared from the enemy. However this tactic has some problems that came with them: the Vietnamese didn't want to be moved from their homes, also the VC often tricked the US and got into the "safe zone."
  1. Chemical Weapons- A spray was dropped from planes in order to kill the leaves off trees in order to see where to drop the bombs. This tactic had several problems as well such as many people being harmed with the chemicals, and made the us look like monsters to the people of Vietnam.
  1. Use of peasants/ farmers- the VC was friendly with peasants so that they would give them supplied, so that they could hide weapons/soldiers with them, the VC dressed like the peasants in order to blend in, so that they would not inform the Us about them, and so that they could pass along information about the US troops to the VC. If the peasants refused then they would terrify them, by killing those who would not cooperate.
  1. Hanging onto American Belts- this tactic involved the VC fighting extremely close to the US, so that the bombers and planes could not be used. The US was not going to bomb their own men.
  1. Tunnel Complex- the VC had around 150 miles of tunnels these were to avoid the bombs the US had, they smuggled weapons, and they hid after firefight.
  1. Booby Traps- they were designed to scare the US and lower their morale, also the lower the number fighters available, safe tool because the VC did not have to around to cause the damage, also very cheap to make

The US withdrew from the war because: 1.it was expensive- around $950 billion 2. the loss lives- 58,148 americans died and 304,000 were wounded. 25% were drafted 3. tet offensive- a surprise attack that the VC launched in order to take over more than 100 cities in south vietnam. even if the US won them back it proved that they were not going to stop fighting. 4. vietnamization- the plan of president Nixon to train vietnamese people to fight in the war instead of the US.