Index IntroductionAmerican interventionDiem – Persecution of BuddhistsRoaring thunderVietnamizationConclusionIntroductionThe years following the Second World War were full of turmoil for Vietnam. The Vietnam War, which began simply with civilians attempting to gain independence, became more of a common ground for superpowers to express their influence in relation to the Cold War. This essay is influenced by some works that show very similar information and criticism about the events that occurred during the Vietnam War. Through them I will criticize the events that happened and show how, in the long term, the Vietnam War continued for a long time mainly due to involvement with the Cold War and that the struggle for independence was not seen as the root cause but a catalyst of the situation. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get Original Essay Essentially the Vietnam War was between 1945 and 1975. It all started with Vietnam becoming a French colony after World War II, where Vietnam went to war against the French to fight for independence, which lasted eight years. This shows how the Vietnam War began as a struggle for independence where the war was not about being for or against communism but rather the fight for national liberation. The effects of the Cold War were revealed after the Japanese surrendered on August 14, leaving no effective government in Vietnam. The intervention of the United States The return of the Japanese had given way to the beginning of the guerrilla war inspired by Mao. The guerrilla tactics were to strike when possible, hit and run and, with this mentality, survive the opponent. This is due to the Geneva Agreement, which officially put an end to French imperialism but divided Vietnam in two; being the North and the South, where at the time it was believed that with the subsequent elections in 1956, they would be reunified. The problem was that North Vietnam was communist and the South was anti-communist. This resulted in US intervention and blocking of the election as the US had understood that the leader of North Vietnam, Viet Minh – Ho Chi Minh, would win; ultimately making Vietnam a communist country. This could be seen as the first US intervention in terms of war. What needs to be criticized is that Vietnam would have been reunified and the independence issue would have been resolved. However, with the involvement of the United States, this shows how it was only a means to prevent the spread of communism and that the war was prolonged because of the United States. Other reasons historians believe the United States became involved were military vows and the commitment America had previously made to Vietnam. However, it is criticized that America could have easily broken the promises it made and pulled strings to recover, if any, from the humiliation. Therefore, America's entry into the Vietnam War was due to Cold War concerns, and destroying communism seemed like a more serious goal for the United States to ally with South Vietnam. Making Vietnam turn communist would prove disastrous, as the United States believed that a continuing domino effect would hit Asia if one country became communist and the next also became communist. Vietnam, therefore, in later years became a site of "civil" war as it was seen primarily as an American war, as historians describe it, against communism with them "in command ofAsian puppets." An example of US involvement that does not benefit the needs of the population is the entrance to the village of My Lai. Military troops had massacred between 400 and 500 Vietnamese civilians. As one historian writes: "With the use of air strikes and indiscriminate artillery fire harmed and alienated the very people these operations were supposed to protect"; shows how this incident became a microcosm of the American style of warfare in Vietnam only to put on a show against communism Diem – Persecution of Buddhists During the early years of the war, the United States had sent resources to the French and advisors with large investments to support the southern government. Critics believe that the leader, Ngo Dinh Diem, was trying to do peace with the North and so was assassinated by the ARVN or Army of Vietnam. Diem had angered civilians many times. For example, when the Buddhist persecution episode occurred. Although most of the villagers were ancestral worshipers, there were many Buddhists in urban cities such as Saigon. Diem being Catholic was seen as repression when it was forbidden to hold flags on Buddha's birthday. President Kennedy forced Diem to make amends, but relying on empty promises, Diem did not address the situation which made matters worse. In June 1963, a Buddhist monk named Thich Quang Duc had set himself on fire as an act of rebellion against Diem's ​​policies. Several suicide rituals followed. This prompted Diem's ​​brother-in-law to raid the Pagoda, capturing many monks and killing about thirty of them. Kennedy believed that support for Diem had dramatically declined, which was an essential element of winning the war, creating a strong government, and stopping the Communist rebellion. It is incidents like this that remind us that the Vietnam War was essential to its people, but then realizing that their own leaders wanted to alienate the public, so the fight for independence seemed to come from within the individual of a civilian Vietnamese. historians argue that Buddhists were a minority and that raising flags should not have been a concern during the civil war and that these people segregated themselves, but others think differently. Once again, it would appear that America wanted to criticize Diem for his acts as a corrupt leader, but they were only concerned with the people's support for demolishing communism. From this we can see that Vietnam did indeed experience a civil war, but alongside and within the “American War”. What really turned the war around was the famous Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964. This was a way for the United States to become more directly involved in the war. Many, however, believe that the United States' anti-communist intervention and ideas were promoted against communism after Japan's retreat. It shows how Americans had a strong influence on the war from the beginning. However, for the United States to officially enter the war, the war had to be approved by Congress. The Southern and US armies were involved in an incident where it was claimed that there were two skirmishes in the waters with the North when in reality there was only one and at this point congress is being asked to accept actions to go to war and do anything to stop the spread of communism were already in the past. There appears to have been alterations in the facts, and what must be criticized is that there is almost no account of this event from the North Vietnamese point of view, therefore making the incident and events seem impractical and an excuse for do whatever the United States wanted to do.so.Roaring ThunderShortly after the Tonkin Incident, US President Kennedy was assassinated, and subsequent President Lyndon B. Johnson used the Tonkin Resolution as a means of finding his own solution to the war. This was due to fighting against two difficult enemies of the same alignment of communist ideas: the well-trained Northern communist soldiers and also the guerrilla members located in the South known as Viet Cong who were not in uniform, which made it really difficult for them to be view. The North was supported by the communist USSR and China as a means to align Vietnam with them and compete with each other to see who has a better communist lifestyle. Previously, only the American foreign policy of "containment" was expressed in the Vietnam War, then the communist powers were also indirectly involved in the war by providing tons of weapons to help the North. In an attempt to paralyze the North, the United States attempted a ten-year bombing campaign, known as Rolling Thunder, in which it dropped tons of bombs per day. This became the indirect incident that was an event part of the Cold War. Opinion in the West on the war and its commitment changed around 1967-1968, when the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, believed that they had made a terrible mistake and so decided to resign because he believed that the goal was to contain communism and not necessarily win it. What the Tet Offensive did was shock the White House and the military because they "assured the public that the war was at an end." The scale of the offensive disproved those claims and caused many Americans to question the continuing costs of the war. The Tet Offensive was an event in which Northern soldiers infiltrated South Vietnam and gained control of the American embassy and many cities. The United States eventually recaptured the cities, but the military attack was so effective that it dealt a blow to America's sense of being the supreme power incapable of defeat. This in terms lowered their 'brazenness' in being 'superior' against the USSR. What is being criticized here is not watching the enemy directly attack the United States, but just seeing the other superpower behind the scenes causing problems. What the US didn't consider, being so engulfed in the idea that communism was ultimately controlled by the Kremlin, was that the North Koreans themselves were a new enemy, and so turning a blind eye to this really brought the Americans down. he could have won the war he wanted to fight but he didn't know how to fight the war he was asked to win,' Hanson says. He goes on to say: "Tet is such a symbolic and paradoxical event that its meaning remains as obscure and controversial as the war of which it was a part." This forced Johnson to retreat with new President Nixon promising to end the war honorably, emphasizing the Vietnamization of the war. Even thinking about “Vietnamizing” the war signified the very fact that Americans also believed that the Southern-led war was ultimately under American control and perspective. “Vietnamizing” meant that countries and people handled the situation. Many argue that it should have been this way from the beginning and that the Americans should not have intervened because it was a civil war. Nixon also had the goal of trying to destroy supply chains through bombing, secretly concluding a peace agreement, with unfortunate effects as the war continued. After the Watergates scandal, Nixon was forced to resign. General Ford became the last president before the United States left Vietnam,.