Vietnam Intro

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorHigh School, 11th grade November 2001

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More than 55,000 American soldiers, more than 1 million South Vietnamese, and between 500,000 and 1 million North Vietnamese people, both civilians and soldiers, were dead by the end of the Viet Nam war in 1975. The conflict in Viet Nam was the longest war the United States ever fought. It lasted from 1957 to 1975. Many people still wonder today why we ever took part in the war in the first place, a civil war between the Communist ruled North Viet Nam and the rebelling South Viet Nam. Why was it so important for the United States to get involved in the war effort in Viet Nam? There were many factors that brought the United States to Viet Nam. The Domino Theory applied to the conflict in Viet Nam is still the most widely understood reason for the intervention of the United States into the war. Another reason the United States was involved inViet Nam was that the president, Lyndon B.

Johnson, was given the power to send troops into Viet Nam even though Congress hadn't declared war. Another reason the U.S. was in Viet Nam was that the French used our fear of communism to scare us into helping them fight the Vietnamese. The U.S. was also forced into fighting the war because the NVA, North Vietnamese Army, attacked some of the U.S. advisors in Viet Nam, thus forcing our country to make a decision, to lose dignity and let a small country attack us with out retaliating, or retaliate and wage war.