Even today, there are an estimated five million pieces of unexploded ordnance still scattered around Vietnam. The total defense burden is projected to decline from 2.8% in FY2017 to 2.5% in FY2021 and FY2.3% in 2030. Or were both parties perhaps working together? The status of the FY2018 OCO requests for DoD and State are now highly uncertain and these charts focus on FY2001-FY2017. It affected 700,000 American veterans. Nixon sought to deflate the anti-war movement by appealing to a silent majority of Americans who he believed supported the war effort. What does human cost mean? - Definitions.net 1) It became involved in Vietnam because of the fear of the domino theory potentially happening in Vietnam. The total military deaths for all countries have been estimated at 1.3 million, of whom 58,000 were Americans. The United States defeat in Vietnam led to a period of despondency in America. Direct link to Kim Kutz Elliott's post All American men had to r, Posted 2 years ago. These were not linked to progress in stability operations and creating effective host country forces. Between July 1966 and December 1973, more than 503,000 U.S. military personnel deserted, and a robust anti-war movement among American forces spawned violent protests, killings and mass incarcerations of personnel stationed in Vietnam as well as within the United States. By 1962, the U.S. military presence in South Vietnam had reached some 9,000 troops, compared with fewer than 800 during the 1950s. They do not include the build-up the Trump Administration has said will begin in FY2019. Vietnam, a nation in Southeast Asia on the eastern edge of the Indochinese peninsula, had been under French colonial rule since the 19th century. Vietnam emerged from the war as a potent military power within Southeast Asia, but its agriculture, business, and industry were disrupted, large parts of its countryside were scarred by bombs and defoliation and laced with land mines, and its cities and towns were heavily damaged. Date accessed: May 01, 2023 By 1969 more than 500,000 U.S. military personnel were stationed in Vietnam. When the war was over France received their "colony" back. The Wooden Horse: A Gift Even as the enemy body count (at times exaggerated by U.S. and South Vietnamese authorities) mounted steadily, DRV and Viet Cong troops refused to stop fighting, encouraged by the fact that they could easily reoccupy lost territory with manpower and supplies delivered via the Ho Chi Minh Trail through Cambodia and Laos. Kennedys expansion stemmed in part from Cold War-era fears about the domino theory: if communism took hold in Vietnam, it would topple democracies throughout the whole of Southeast Asia, it was thought. Which is correct? peoples' experiences? More than 1.3 million Vietnamese soldiers and about 58,000 U.S. troops were killed. A team sent by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 to report on conditions in South Vietnam advised a build-up of American military, economic and technical aid in order to help Diem confront the Viet Cong threat. Date published: July 3, 2019 The origins of American involvement in Vietnam date back to the end of the Second World War, when the Vietnamese were struggling against the continued French colonial presence in their country. These pressuresplus political sensitivity over U.S casualtieshelped create plans and/or the willingness to withdraw quickly from Iraq and Afghanistan. War protesters: it costs too much money, social problems at home, it's not our war, it can't be won, begins WWII against China and Russia, we should not be the 'police power' around the world. Key metrics are provided for the U.S. use of airpower, showing a major rise in support of Afghan forces in CY2017. In January 1973, the United States and North Vietnam concluded a final peace agreement, ending open hostilities between the two nations. During one, on May 4, 1970, at Kent State University in Ohio, National Guardsmen shot and killed four students. As many as one-quarter of these boat people as they became known are believed to have perished at sea. 1. Reasons for US involvement in Vietnam - The Vietnam War - National 5 Do you mean which of those statements is accurate on the death toll of both sides? . Vietnam veterans also had to contend with physical problems, such as the effects of chemical defoliants. Reports of the Tet Offensive stunned the U.S. public, however, especially after news broke that Westmoreland had requested an additional 200,000 troops, despite repeated assurances that victory in the Vietnam War was imminent. After the My Lai Massacre, anti-war protests continued to build as the conflict wore on. Neither this bombing or the ground war was confined by the borders of Vietnam. All Rights Reserved. They show the cost by war, by service, and by broad cost category for the entire OCO account. In contrast to the air attacks on North Vietnam, the U.S.-South Vietnamese war effort in the south was fought primarily on the ground, largely under the command of General William Westmoreland, in coordination with the government of General Nguyen Van Thieu in Saigon. These war costs stalled some of Lyndon Johnsons Great Society reforms, including anti-poverty measures and improvements to social security. There have been several legal attempts to seek compensation from the US government and chemical manufacturers. Both the Executive Branch and the Congress have failed to reform any key aspect of the defense and foreign policy budgets to look beyond input budgeting by line item and by military service, and doing so on an annual basis. Vietnam was ruined. The cost of all-volunteer forces limits the total force pool. It was 146% of the $619.7 billion total ($560.7 Baseline plus the $58.8 billion in OCO costs). Feeding, supplying and paying the armies and navies was, by far, the largest expenditure of the war. Some battled with alcoholism and drug abuse while many succumbed to suicide. Though the NLF claimed to be autonomous and that most of its members were not communists, many in Washington assumed it was a puppet of Hanoi. The difficulties in defining military expenditures do create differences in estimates of the percent of GDP, but they are comparatively minor. On November 15, 1969, the largest anti-war demonstration in American history took place in Washington, D.C., as over 250,000 Americans gathered peacefully, calling for withdrawal of American troops from Vietnam. Which best describes the cost of the Vietnam War in human terms? More than 3 million people (including over 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half of the dead were Vietnamese civilians. Were LBJ and Nixon bad decision makers or was it just too much to handle? Under a broad free market policy put in place in 1986, the economy began to improve, boosted by oil export revenues and an influx of foreign capital. In 1982 the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated in Washington, D.C., inscribed with the names of 57,939 members of U.S. armed forces who had died or were missing as a result of the war. Kissinger and North Vietnamese representatives drafted a peace agreement by early fall, but leaders in Saigon rejected it, and in December Nixon authorized a number of bombing raids against targets in Hanoi and Haiphong. Other people may have felt differently. With his approval ratings dropping in an election year, Johnson called a halt to bombing in much of North Vietnam (though bombings continued in the south) and promised to dedicate the rest of his term to seeking peace rather than reelection. The annual cost of all U.S. aid in FY2016 is $5.79 billion, which is 13 percent of the OCO cost of $46.2 billion for that year. The Department of Defense also provides a range of other metrics on U.S. activities, and a costing of air support activity, although these are not linked to the budget. Vietnam War | Facts, Summary, Years, Timeline, Casualties - Britannica Yet, the theory of human capi-tal has been applied widely, as for example in estimating the costs of illness or injury.1 In 1931, J. Clark estimated the cost of death and disability resulting from the First World War [2]. The Department of Defense has, however, provided a supplement to the FY2018 budget request that does provide many useful insights, and the only integrated discussion of civil-military issues in the FY2018 budget submission. Two decades of military intervention and bankrolling friendly regimes cost the United States almost $US170 billion (close to $1 trillion in todays terms). from Johns Hopkins and his MA and Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. create tension? or did they just enlist and were picked randomly? Seeking to regain control of the region, France backed Emperor Bao and set up the state of Vietnam in July 1949, with the city of Saigon as its capital. Heavy bombing by B-52 aircraft or shelling made these zones uninhabitable, as refugees poured into camps in designated safe areas near Saigon and other cities. Was the war in Vietnam a civil war or a global Cold War confrontation? Which best describes the cost of the Vietnam War in human terms? They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. 4. Total personnel are another key measure of the cost of war, particularly when high-cost all-volunteer forces are involved, and casualties are a key political consideration. All recent estimates show that the burden the Afghan and Iraq/Syria wars placed on the economy did not equal the burden that the peacetime Reagan build up created, and that the percentage has dropped sharply since most U.S. combat troops left Afghanistan and Iraq. One caveat to this, however, was that men who were in college could be excused from the draft. Vinh (population 72,000), Vietnam's Dresden, was subjected to 4,131 attacks over a four year period (and 4,700 overall in the war), resulting in the destruction of nearly of all of its homes, 31 schools, the university, four hospitals, the main bookstore and cinema and two churches along with an historic 18th century Buddhist pagoda that served as cultural center of the city, a museum of the . Meanwhile, the United States, its military demoralized and its civilian electorate deeply divided, began a process of coming to terms with defeat in what had been its longest and most controversial war. AN ARMY NURSE RECALLS VIETNAM`S HUMAN COST - Chicago Tribune introduction in the play This draft disproportionately targeted certain populations, mostly the poor making it very unpopular. There were a number of long-term and short-term reasons to explain why the USA became involved in Vietnam in the late 1950s. This section supplements the OCO cost data with some brief metrics on the overall size of the U.S. effort in Afghanistan. Sign up to receive The Evening, a daily brief on the news, events, and people shaping the world of international affairs. The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. The war had cost 58,000 American and 2 million Vietnamese lives. The Congressional Research Service (CRS), and the General Accountability Office (GAO), have provided several reports that do provide important insights into the cost of America's wars and the problems in the ways in which they are reported. This inevitably has reduced the number of military in the force mix and made reporting military, civilian, and contract personnel a critical aspect of reporting on force costs and trends. The final tables reflect the acute dependence on contractors, and show that the ratio of this dependence has increased over time. Use the notes you completed during the lesson to write a paragraph explaining the effects of the end of World War I on the U.S. economy. See Media Page for more interview, contact, and citation details. The next few years would bring even more carnage, including the horrifying revelation that U.S. soldiers had mercilessly slaughtered more than 400 unarmed civilians in the village of My Lai in March 1968. These estimates do not include post-war deaths from famine and disease; or the millions killed by regimes like the Khmer Rouge, who came to power largely because of the disruption created by the Vietnam War. The nation spent more than $120 billion on the conflict in Vietnam from 1965-73; this massive spending led to widespread inflation, exacerbated by a worldwide oil crisis in 1973 and skyrocketing fuel prices. A mass exodus in 1975 of people loyal to the South Vietnamese cause was followed by another wave in 1978 of boat people, refugees fleeing the economic restructuring imposed by the communist regime. The Presidents FY2017 budget request included $1,553.6 billion for contingency operations funded in the base budget. One of the most common defoliants used in Vietnam, Agent Orange, was later found to contain carcinogenic dioxins. He believed that if one Southeast Asian nation fell to communism, more would follow. Direct link to Davin V Jones's post That is simply how they v, Posted 5 months ago. As the first U.S. troops were withdrawn, those who remained became increasingly angry and frustrated, exacerbating problems with morale and leadership. , arn from other Posted 7 years ago. Confidence in the Domino Theory was undermined, if not destroyed. Fearful that the war would jeopardize his domestic agenda, Johnson concealed the extent of the military escalation from the American public. The United States lost almost 60,000 personnel and civilians in Vietnam: 58,269 servicemen were killed and another 1,672 recorded as missing. an estimated 25,000 American servicemen and 757,143 Vietnamese dead about 200,000 American servicemen and an estimated 4 million Vietnamese dead 58,000 American servicemen and an estimated 1.5 million Vietnamese dead 58,000 American servicemen and an estimated 250,000 Vietnamese dead Though the majority of Vietnam veterans returned home without serious problems, a large number found the readjustment to civilian life difficult. After Hos communist forces took power in the north, armed conflict between northern and southern armies continued until the northern Viet Minhs decisive victory in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954. Many returning veterans faced negative reactions from both opponents of the war (who viewed them as having killed innocent civilians) and its supporters (who saw them as having lost the war), along with physical damage including the effects of exposure to the toxic herbicide Agent Orange, millions of gallons of which had been dumped by U.S. planes on the dense forests of Vietnam. What effect did Nixon's promise to unify the nation and restore law and order have on his . Check all of the boxes that apply. Map showing the division between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. Direct link to Jacob, Samour's post 1) It became involved in , Posted 7 years ago. In the early 1900s the country was part of a French colony. By nearly every metric, the Vietnam War was, in the common sense of the word, a war. As the second of the Indochina Wars, the Vietnam War was originally fought between North and South Vietnam. Opposition to the war in the United States bitterly divided Americans, even after President Richard Nixon signed the Paris Peace Accords and ordered the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973. By 2014, almost 100,000 veterans had taken their own lives. People were killed during the war. However, SIGIR stopped its operations in 2011. Since 1941 Congress has declared war only six times, all during World War II. These debates led to a revisiting of Americas Cold War leadership. The Human Cost | Outrider For the last several decades, there has been little real effort to examine the costs of key missions and strategic commitments and the longer term trends in force planning and cost. This was 161% of the $560.7 billion Baseline that include base, defense-related nuclear and other related budget costs. If anything it was the french's fault for everything. The U.S. bombings made Laos the most heavily bombed country per capita in the world. Three alternative cost estimates are also summarized in this section. 3. Almost two million refugees were eventually relocated to the US, Australia, Canada, France and other European countries. The U.S. War in Vietnam - Statistics & Facts | Statista Work by Todd Harrison, for example, shows that total U.S. defense-related costs totaled some $905 billion in FY2017: At the same time, if one does use the $619.7 billion total for the U.S., it is: U.S. military spending has risen steadily over time, but without any serious net assessment of the patterns in that growth, the comparative efficiency of U.S. spending on baseline and war activity, and how allied and potential threat states use their budgets and resources. Failing to address casualties does not defuse the issues they raise or the reality that they too are a cost of war. Congress soon passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave Johnson broad war-making powers, and U.S. planes began regular bombing raids, codenamed Operation Rolling Thunder, the following year. The Human Cost - NHHC Before World War Two Vietnam . Those who argue that the United States opponents won the war cite the United States overall objectives and outcomes. Official data only exist on federal homeland defense efforts, not state and local ones. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, but his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, continued the work that Kennedy had started. It was 150% of the IISS estimate of $604.5 billion for 2016.
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