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Revision as of 22:31, 28 January 2008 by 97.82.54.192 (talk)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)The Vietnam War, also known as the Second Indochina War, and in Vietnam as the American War, occurred from 1965 to April 30, 1975. The term Vietnam Conflict is often used to refer to events which took place between 1959 and April 30, 1975. The war was fought between the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) and the United States-supported Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam). It concluded with the United States withdrawing under terms of the Paris Peace Accord of 1973 which preserved the division temporarily, but the North Vietnamese soon disregarded the treaty and invaded South Vietnam, which quickly fell without U.S. support, and the country was reunited in 1975. This has been described as a "total" victory on the part of the North Vietnamese.
Noted historian and author Gabriel Kolko has observed, "If we use conventional military criteria, the Americans should have been victorious. They used 15 million tons of munitions (as much as they employed in World War Two), had a vast military superiority over their enemies by any standard one employs, and still they were defeated." Edward N. Luttwak of Time Magazine said, “The customary reward of defeat, if one can survive it, is in the lessons thereby learned, which may yield victory in the next war. But the circumstances of our defeat in Vietnam were sufficiently ambiguous to deny the nation (that) benefit.”
Over 1.4 million military personnel were killed in the war (approximately 6% were members of the United States armed forces), while estimates of civilian fatalities range from 2 to 5.1 million. On April 30 1975, the capital of South Vietnam, Saigon fell to the communist forces of North Vietnam, effectively ending the Vietnam War.
- The landmark series Vietnam: A Television History, first broadcast in 1983, is a special presentation of the award-winning PBS history series, American Experience.
- http://www.counterpunch.org/kolko04292005.html
- http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101850415-141574,00.html