According to whom? what is written on the books isnt always right. Vietnam won. By 1975, the US was completely defeated and driven out in humiliation with people trying to hang on to the helicopters as they lifted off from the US Embassy.
Anyone who tells you otherwise is a revisionist trying to rewrite history for some personal purpose.
Famous photo of the fall of Saigon showing the pushing away of desperate Vietnamese who had supported the US in the lost war.
The North Vietnamese/Vietcong won because they got what they wanted. The US left the country.
The North Vietnamese, and their supporters won. While the US and allies such as Australia could be said to have won every battle or major engagement, the end effect is that of the surgeon who says "the operation was a success but the patient died".
Go to Viet Nam today and there is still a lingering suspicion of America and Americans, though some of it is indeed seeded by government propaganda. The US did not actually want peace: Mcc Namara said as much: they wanted victory on their terms and believed it would create peace. The US were not the first nation to think this, and get it wrong: fighting and ideology is very hard, and fighting it allegedly on behalf of others, is even harder. Today's experiences in Iraq are the same: one one hand the powers that be tout that they are fighting to give the average Iraqi "democracy and freedom" and on the other hand these same Iraqi's see US troops treat them with distain and suspicion in their own country and all the while ensuring that the US profits from re-building and securing Iraqi resources.
Viet Nam was a little different, being fought to defeat an opposing ideology, rather than gain resources, but the effect was the same: military might, in terms of weapons and destructive power loses out to those who fight for their beliefs, homes and without a traditional battlefield arangement with most civilians out of the way.
There will always be revisionism of history and those who will use different measures to assess who won or lost. It is up to the critical and sceptical mind to judge for themselves, and not necessarily rely on what the media, government or military say.
The war was lost on several fronts:
1. The VC were able to garner support in the South that made US intelligence available to them in many instances.
2. Ideologically the US believed that the number of VC dead would destroy their belief. This has not happened elsewhere, and failed here too.
3. At home, the US public were watching on television, much of it was in colour, adding to the impact. As to whether anti-war demonstrators were unpatriotic, I will not debate except to say that America prides itself on diversity of views and speech, and you cannot co-opt the language of patriotism to support an unpopular war.
The wider and much larger geopolitical consequence of American involvement--prevention of Communist Domino Theory and instability-- is the reasons for entering the theatre --and was was achieved. The United States Armed Forces, obviously, remained undefeated in this conflict. Unlike the French, who suffered defeat in Bien Dien Phu some 2 decades earlier, facilitating their surrender and brokering of peace to divide the former French colony into two nations.
The United States, as history has indicated, (and I would suggest you read major Vietnamese War History books or text for that matter to understand the impregnability of American military dominance in the region).
The goals of entering the conflict was secured: Namely the prevention of further Communist take over of surrounding South East Asian nations as was feared in the Domino Theory. Impeccable to this equation was the entrenched American interest and relationship with Manila, Bangkok as well as with Kuala Lumpur throughout the 60s-80s. We never lost the war because the United States never issued a declaration of war against Vietnam. Our presence in South Vietnam was for retractory measures, in regards to the prevention of further Communist expansion in SE Asia. Which, as history has declared, has been successful.
History has vindicated America's involvement. And in the end, the Leninist style of communism that was set in place by Ho Chi Minh, ultimately, has adopted the capitalist tendencies of South Vietnam. Thereby adopting the very so called 'American Imperialistic Capitalism', which the north blamed the South of implementing. Ironic and hypocritical that the present-Communist Vietnam has adopted all the policies of the South. The very reasons they waged war with South Vietnam, in the first place.
I highly suggest you read 'Animal Farm' by G. Orwell. Because it is rather complementary.
Absolutely and Chronologically,
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