Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chien tranh Viet Nam, in Vietnam known as the American War, Vietnamese: Chien tranh My, Khang chien chong My), also known as the Second Indochina War, was a Cold War-era prox war that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam - supported by China and other communist allies - and the government of South Vietnam - supported by the United States and other anti-communist countries. The Viet Cong (also known as the National Liberation Front, or NLF), a lightly armed South Vietnamese communist common front directed by the North, fought a guerrilla war against anti-communist forces in the region. The People's Arm of Vietnam (a.k.a. the North Vietnamese Army) engaged in a more conventional war, at times committing large units into battle. U.S. and South Vietnamese forces relied on air superiority and overwhelming firepower to conduct search and destroy operations, involving ground forces, artiller, and airstrikes.
The U.S. government viewed American involvement in the war as a way to prevent a communist takeover of South Vietnam. This was part of their wider strategy of containment, which aimed to stop the spread of communism. The North Vietnamese government and the Viet Cong were fighting to reunify Vietnam under communist rule. They viewed the conflict as a colonial war, fought initially against France, then against America as France was backed by the U.S., and later against South Vietnam, which it regarded as a U.S. puppet state. Beginning in 1950, American military advisors arrived in what was then French Indochina. U.S. involvement escalated in the early 1960s, with troop levels tripling in 1961 and again in 1962. Regular U.S. combat units were deployed beginning in 1965. Operations crossed international borders, with Laos and Cambodia heavily bombed b the U.S. American involvement in the war peaked in 1968, at the time of the Tet Offensive. After this, U.S. ground forces were gradually withdrawn as part of a policy known as Vietnamization, which aimed to end American involvement in the war. Despite the Paris Peace Accords, which was signed by all parties in Januar 1973, the fighting continued.
U.S. military involvement ended on 15 August 1973 as a result of the Case-Church Amendment passed by the U.S. Congress. The capture of Saigon by the North Vietnamese Army in April 1975 marked the end of the war, and North and South Vietnam were reunified the following year. The war exacted a huge human cost in terms of fatalities (see Vietnam War casualties). Estimates of the number of Vietnamese service members and civilians killed vary from 800,000 to 3.1 million. Some 200,000-300,000 Cambodians, 20,000-200,000 Laotians, and 58,220 U.S. service members also died in the conflict...more
Additional information websites and articles:
http://www.histor.com/topics/vietnam-war
http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/vietnam/timeline.htm
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/
The Vietnam Sndrome
'Anthing That Moves': Civilians And The Vietnam War
The Vietnam Wars: 'Matterhorn'
