How and why did the U.S. get involved in Vietnam?

The serious involvement of the United States government in Vietnam began with the 1954 Geneva Convention and the partitioning of Vietnam into Communist and non-Communist areas. The issue was Communism; the U.S. didn't want a Communist government of ANY sort in the area. We supported Ngo Dinh Diem, a former French-chosen Premier, to be the leader of the new South Vietnam, although the French opposed him for this position. President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent Army General J. Lawton Collins to Saigon in 1954 as a special envoy to help in the training of the South Vietnamese military; his presence suggested that the U.S. might also begin financing Diem's efforts. The CIA had Edward G. Lansdale in the area to conduct paramilitary operations against North Vietnam. Both offered advice. But Diem wanted American money, not American advice. Eisenhower was also being lobbied by his Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, in Diem's favor. The bottom line was that both the State Department and the CIA were looking for a leader with enough moxie to pull South Vietnam together and serve as a counterpoint to Ho Chi Minh. Although not without some misgiving, that person turned out to be Diem.

For whatever reason--anti-Communist fervor, a belief in the correctness of our moral vision, a feeling that we were the saviors of the free world--the U.S. stayed in Vietnam and supported Diem. Even as Washington secured a promise from the French to support Diem in October of 1954, it decided to channel economic and military assistance directly to Diem rather than through the French mission in Saigon. From this point, assistance was to grow through military advisors and many forms of economic support through the Presidencies of Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy until we reached the point in 1964 when it became important to then-President Lyndon Johnson to make the anti-Communist effort in Southeast Asia an American military affair.

 

Readings:

1. Kolko, pp. 72- 79.
2. Langguth, pp. 81-111.

Questions for consideration and further discussion:

1. Why did the United States consider it important to interject itself into Southeast Asian matters?
2. What fears might the French have had about the choice of Diem as a leader?
3. Lansdale supported Diem and Collins did not; why might that have been?
4. What gave France and the United States any right to make decisions about the future of Vietnam?