Expanding Involvement in Vietnam

When Lyndon B. Johnson assumed the U.S. Presidency after the death of John F. Kennedy, he did not consider the turbulent situation in South Vietnam a priority. Progressive social reforms of the Great Society and War on Poverty were of greater concern to Johnson. He did believe, however, in the Domino Theory: that if one country came under Communist rule, neighboring countries would soon follow. Soon after taking office, Johnson issued National Security Action Memorandum No. 273, establishing his administration's commitment to containing North Vietnam's aggression through military means—thus reversing Kennedy's policy to withdraw U.S. military presence from Vietnam. In effect, Johnson escalated the war, following the controversial Gulf of Tonkin incident.

Background

At the time Johnson took office in 1963, there were 16,000 American military advisors in South Vietnam, in the midst of the deteriorating political and military situation that existed in the region. The South Vietnamese war effort was hindered by widespread corruption in the government of Ngo Dinh Diem, the first president of South Vietnam (in power since 1955). The South Vietnamese Army, the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), was unable to stop the advances of the Nothern Viet Cong army. In 1961, the newly elected Kennedy Administration promised more aid to the war effort (including money, weapons, supplies), but these were of little effect. Doubt arose among Washington D.D. policy-makers that Diem was capable of defeating the opposing Chinese Communist regime in the North; some feared Diem might negotiate with Ho Chi Minh, the president of North Vietnam. Discussions about South Vietnamese regime change began in Washington and were concluded on November 2, 1963, when the CIA aided a group of ARVN officers in the overthrew of Diem. To help contain the post-coup chaos, Kennedy increased the number of US advisors in South Vietnam to 16,000.

The South Vietnamese governement was run by a twelve member military revolutionary council, headed by General Duong Van Minh. There was chronic instability in the ARVN, as several coups—not all successful—occurred within a short period of time. Johnson was assuming the presidency at a tenuous time of military setbacks and political instability in South Vietnam.

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident proved an escalating factor of the war and justification of continued American presence in Vietnam. During this incident, the destroyer U.S.S. Maddox engaged 3 North Vietnamese Navy torpedo boats in a sea battle, resulting in several North Vietnamese casualties. On August 2, 1964, the U.S.S. Maddox, conducting an intelligence mission along the coast of North Vietnam, allegedly fired upon and damaged several torpedo boats; the boats had been stalking the Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin. Two days later, in the same area, the Maddox along with the U.S.S. Turner Joy each reported they had been attacked by North Vietnamese ships. The second attack prompted retaliatory air strikes. 

In response, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave the President broad powers to conduct military operations in Southeast Asia without declaring war, and thus without seeking congressional approval. This served as Johnson's legal justification for deploying U.S. forces and the commencement of open warfare against North Vietnam. Although at the time Congress denied that the Resolution was a full-scale declaration of war, the Tonkin Resolution allowed the President full discretion to commit military forces; thus, Johnson had initiated America's direct involvement in the ground war in Vietnam. While the Johnson administration claimed Vietnamese boats had fired first, subsequent investigations suggest that the battle was initiated by the Maddox. Some historians believe that Johnson knowingly used the Gulf of Tonkin incident to gain the support of the American people to enter into the Vietnam War.

Americanization of the War

Under President Johnson, the number of American troops in Vietnam rose from 16,000 in 1964 to more than 553,000 by 1969. The U.S. also financed and supplied the forces of all the American allies in the Vietnam War including Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, the Phillipines, and the Republic of Korea (second only to the Americans in troop strength). The period after 1964 is thus referred to as the Americanization of the war, with the United States taking on the primary responsibilities of fighting the North Vietnamese.

President Johnson had already appointed General William C. Westmoreland to succeed General Harkins as Commander of MACV in June 1964. Westmoreland expanded American troop strength in South Vietnam. On February 14, 1965, the National Leadership Committee installed Air Vice-Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky as prime minister. In 1966, the junta selected General Nguyễn Văn Thiệu to run for president with Ky on the ballot as the vice-presidential candidate in the 1967 election. Thieu and Ky were elected and remained in office for the duration of the war. In the presidential election of 1971, Thieu ran for the presidency unopposed. With the installation of the Thieu and Ky government (the Second Republic), the U.S. had a pliable, stable, and semi-legitimate government in Saigon with which to establish a relationship.

Rolling Thunder

In February of 1965, a U.S. air base at Pleiku in the Central Highlands of South Vietnam was attacked twice by the NLF, resulting in the deaths of over a dozen U.S. personnel. These guerrilla attacks prompted the administration to order retaliatory air strikes against North Vietnam. Operation Rolling Thunder was the code name given to a sustained strategic bombing campaign targeted against the North by aircraft of the U.S. Air Force and Navy that was inaugurated on March 2, 1965. Its original purpose was to bolster the morale in South Vietnam and to serve as a signaling device to Hanoi. U.S. airpower would act as a method of "strategic persuasion," deterring the North Vietnamese politically by the fear of continued or increased bombardment. Rolling Thunder gradually escalated in intensity, with aircraft striking only carefully selected targets. When that did not work, its goals were altered to target the nation's industrial base, transportation network, and its (continually increasing) air defenses. After more than a million sorties were flown and three-quarters of a million tons of bombs were dropped, Rolling Thunder ended on November 11, 1968.

War Conditions

For U.S. troops participating in this and other operations (Operation Masher/White Wing, Operation Attleboro, Operation Cedar Falls, Operation Junction City, and dozens of others) the war boiled down to hard marching through some of the most difficult (and unfamiliar) terrain on the planet and weather conditions that were alternately hot and dry or cold and wet. The Americans learned that PAVN (which was basically a light infantry force) was not a rag-tag band of guerrillas, but was instead a highly disciplined, proficient, and well-motivated force. Guerrilla warfare tactics made it difficult for the U.S. military to distinguish friend from foe. Desertion rates increased, and morale plummeted. North Vietnam, utilizing the Ho Chi Minh and Sihanouk Trails, matched the U.S. at every point of the escalation, funneling manpower and supplies to the southern battlefields. In 1967 and 1968, U.S. soldiers were being killed at the rate of over 1,000 per month. Meanwhile, the Viet Cong's ranks grew from approximately 5,000 in 1959 to 100,000 in 1964.

Walt Rostow shows President Lyndon B. Johnson a model of the Khe Sanh area

President Johnson believed in the "Domino Effect" and escalated America's involvement in Vietnam.