Vietnamization

Paper Summary:

The first part of this paper examines the roots of American involvement in South Vietnam, as well as the American objectives in maintaining two separate Vietnamese nations. In the next part, the paper examines the origins of the policy of Vietnamization, tracing how this policy evolved through the terms of President Johnson to President Nixon. In this section, the paper also looks at how Vietnamization was enacted. The next section details how these Vietnamization policies ultimately proved insufficient in light of the North Vietnamese offensives from 1972 to the final offensive in 1975. In the last part, the paper concludes that Vietnamization failed not as a policy per se, but because Vietnamization failed to meet its own goals. The South Vietnamese armed forces were not yet equipped or trained to stave off their North Vietnamese opponents. This weakness was exacerbated by the fact that Vietnamization was enacted at the very time when the North Vietnamese armed forces were gaining strength in the countryside.

From the Paper:

"More than 25 years after the last helicopter lifted from the United States embassy in Saigon, the Vietnam War continues to cast a shadow on American history. Whether the preservation of South Vietnam was worth the human and financial costs to both the Americans and Vietnamese continues to be the subject of contentious debate.
The chaotic withdrawal of US forces in 1975 was a blow to the collective American psyche that had, until then, yet to experience such a failure. By then, the United States had spent an estimated $150 billion on the Vietnam War, wreaking havoc on its economy in the process. It had dropped seven million tons of bombs in both North and South Vietnam. The war had served as a divisive force, causing tense civil unrest throughout the country."

More papers on Vietnamization:

• Persuasive Essay # 101092 : "Nixon and the Vietnam War"
• Essay # 28954 : "The Vietnam War"
• Research Paper # 66021 : "The Vietnam War: A Narrative History"

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