Turn in Take Home Test (It Is Due in Your Class Period So If You Type It, Then Make Sure

AP U.S. History

April 17 -21-2017

Turn in Take Home Test (It is due in your class period so if you type it, then make sure you can print it).

I will stay after school on Wednesday and Friday this week for after school reviews. Come and stay as long as you’d like but there are two important rules: I start at 2:30 so try to be here on time and, when you leave please exit the building. These are serious so come with a topic and be respectful.

Once again our schedule is going to be warped. We will all go to homeroom or testing on Tuesday and Thursday this week. So, the first two class of the day may be messed up. See the Wednesday lesson plan for details.

What we will do is discuss Vietnam up to 1968 and then later in the week look at LBJ’s program known as the Great Society (some of this is also called the War on Poverty). Then the next week we will transition to Nixon 1968-1973

MONDAY and TUESDAY

• Examine the background causes of the Vietnam conflict (1955 – 1968)
• Explain the sources for protest at home against the war.

MaterialsStrategy/Format

PPT and video clipsLecture-discussionL.CCR.1-2

Student Activities

I. Chronological Reasoning (1,2, 3)

II. Comparison and Context (4, 5)

III. Crafting Historical Arguments/Evidence 6, 7)

IV. Historical Interpretation and Synthesis (8, 9)

Introduction

The Early Years 1955 – 1964

• The war in Vietnam was a reflection of the “domino theory” that being that if one nation falls to communism, then it will poison its neighbors. By 1949 China was communist and Taiwan (Nationalist China) was our ally but the situation presented a constant threat of a major war. In Korea, the North and South were still divided at the 38th parallel (as it is today). SEATO, a version of NATO was created to stop the spread but in reality this was never that strong.
• In the 1940s Ho Chi Minh had espoused communism and sought, as Kim il-sung had attempted in Korea to unify the peninsula under Marxist principles. The U.S. has no strategic interests in Vietnam nor had their ever been much trade with Vietnam, a former French colony.
• In the early 1950s the Viet Minh nationalists had expelled the French and the 1954 Geneva Accords had divided Vietnam (again similarly to Korea) at the 17th Parallel promising free elections in 1956 to decide the political status. With help from the United States, South Vietnam carried out the election only in South Vietnam rather than countrywide. States. Since Diem had alienated many South Vietnamese during his tenure, communist sympathizers in South Vietnam established the National Liberation Front (NLF), also known as the Viet Cong, in 1960 to use guerrilla warfare against the South Vietnamese. The leader of South Vietnam (The Republic of South Vietnam) Ngo Diem was supported by the U.S. with money and military equipment while the Chinese (and Soviets to a lesser degree) supported the North led by Ho Chi Minh. During the JFK years the U.S. continued to support Diem but doubts were creeping it. The picture below shows one form of protest against Diem. Buddhist monks sometimes would self-immolate. Clearly, when these images appeared on TV, people asked why were supporting Diem? In 1963 with CIA support Diem’s body guard killed him. Thus began a long chain of U.S. direct involvement. Did JFK order the hit?

Vietnam Escalation: the Gulf of Tonkin Incident 1964

• Of course, in 1963 JFK was himself assassinated. Now it was LBJ’s decision how to handle Vietnam. His decisions would have lasting implications. LBJ, typical to his style and rough-hewn nature once said in an interview that “bitch killed the woman that I truly loved.” This was his way of saying that Vietnam destroyed his legacy as a civil rights president. And it did. Most people know little about LBJ than his failures in Vietnam. President Lyndon Johnson was reluctant to commit the United States to fight in South Vietnam. "I just don't think it's worth fighting for," he told McGeorge Bundy, his national security adviser. The president feared looking like a weakling, and he was convinced that his dream of a Great Society would be destroyed if he backed down on the communist challenge in Asia. Each step in deepening U.S. involvement in Vietnam made it harder to admit failure and reverse direction.
• President Johnson campaigned in the 1964 election with the promise not to escalate the war. "We are not about to send American boys 9 or 10,000 miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves," he said. But following reports that the North Vietnamese had attacked an American destroyer (which was engaged in a clandestine intelligence mission) off the Vietnamese coast, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, giving President Lyndon Johnson power to "take all necessary measures." The vote was amazingly unanimous and the event that escalated the Vietnam War was highly questionable (again the source of many conspiracy theories).
• In early 1965, Viet Cong units (communist insurgents) operating autonomously attacked a South Vietnamese garrison near Pleiku, killing eight Americans. Convinced that the communists were escalating the war, Johnson began the bombing campaign against North Vietnam that would last for 2 ½ years. He also sent the first regular U.S. ground combat troops to Vietnam. Johnson announced that the lessons of history dictated that the United States use its might to resist aggression. “We did not choose to be the guardians at the gate, but there is no one else,” Johnson said. He ordered 210,000 American ground troops to Vietnam.
• By April 1967, we had a force of 470,000 men in Vietnam. We were learning that there was no light at the end of the tunnel. The Johnson administration's strategy--which included search and destroy missions in the South and calibrated bombings in the North--proved ineffective, though highly destructive. Despite the presence of 549,000 American troops, the United States had failed to cut supply lines from the North along the so-called Ho Chi Minh Trail, which ran along the border through Laos and Cambodia. By 1967, the U.S. goal was less about saving South Vietnam and more about avoiding a humiliating defeat. By 1971 a series of leaks from within the Defense Department collectively known as the Pentagon Papers showed that there was no real strategy at all in Vietnam.

The Tet Offensive and the Turning Point Year of 1968

• This year was one of the most divisive and traumatic turning points in our history. In early 1968, General Vo Nguyen Giap, the man in charge of North Vietnam's army, believed it was time for the North Vietnamese to make a major surprise attack on South Vietnam. After coordinating with the Viet Cong and moving troops and supplies into position, the Communists made a diversionary attack against the American base at KheSanh on January 21, 1968.
• On January 30, 1968, the real Tet Offensive began. Early in the morning, North Vietnamese troops and Viet Cong forces attacked both towns and cities in South Vietnam, breaking the ceasefire that had been called for the Vietnamese holiday of Tet (the lunar New Year). The attack was highly coordinated.
• The Communists attacked around 100 major cities and towns in South Vietnam. The size and ferocity of the attack surprised both the Americans and the South Vietnamese, but they fought back. The Communists, who had hoped for an uprising from the populous in support of their actions, met heavy resistance instead.
• In some towns and cities, the Communists were repelled quickly, within hours. In others, it took weeks of fighting. In Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, the Communists succeeded in occupying the U.S. embassy, once thought impregnable, for eight hours before they were overtaken by U.S. soldiers. It took about two weeks for U.S. troops and South Vietnamese forces to regain control of Saigon; it took them nearly a month to retake the city of Hue.
• The results of the Tet Offensive were rather strange. In military terms, the United States was the victor of the Tet Offensive for the Communists did not succeed in maintaining control over any part of South Vietnam. The Communist forces also suffered very heavy losses (an estimated 45,000 killed). As a fighting force the Viet Cong were completely destroyed. However, the Tet Offensive showed another side of the war to Americans, one which they did not like. The coordination, strength, and surprise instigated by the Communists led the U.S. to realize that their foe was much stronger than they had expected. In addition, the commander of Vietnam and the President both had made recent statements that the war was nearly over there. Faced with an unhappy American public and depressing news from his military leaders, President Lyndon B. Johnson decided to end the escalation of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. This was also the end of LBJ’s Presidency. He announced that he would not run for President again.

Nixon and the end of the Vietnam War 1968-1975

• After his defeat in 1960 Nixon seemed to be out of national politics. But with the Democrats facing a split and the poor showing of the party when Barry Goldwater was defeated by LBJ in 1964, Nixon once again seemed viable.
• For the Democrats a relatively unknown Democrat Senator from Minnesota scored a dramatic "victory" in the New Hampshire presidential primary. Senator Eugene McCarthy, mobilizing college students and running as an anti-war candidate, received 41.9% of the vote. Lyndon Johnson, anticipating no challenge for the nomination, was not on the ballot. On March 31st, President Johnson withdrew from the Presidential race. Hubert Humphrey, Vice President and former Senator from Minnesota, then announced his candidacy. For the duration of the primary campaign, Humphrey was cast in the role of “defender" of administration policy while McCarthy and Robert F. Kennedy waged campaigns critical of administration policy. The Democrats, as the year would prove again and again, were hopelessly divided over the Vietnam War. The spring of 1968 brought more shock and turmoil. Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968. In the wake of his death, a wave of violence broke out in numerous American cities. That evening, Robert Kennedy was campaigning in Indiana and paused to talk to an audience, many of whom had not heard of King's death.
• Thereafter, Kennedy and McCarthy engaged in an increasingly competitive and testy battle for votes in the primary. The difficulty faced by both candidates was that most delegates to the convention would not be selected in primaries. Instead, they would be chosen by state party leaders. Rather than compete in primaries, Hubert Humphrey worked the party apparatus (which he had served for four years as vice president). Thus, as the campaign progressed, Kennedy and McCarthy played the role of "insurgents" while Humphrey remained the "party loyalist."
• For the insurgents, the showdown primary occurred on June 4 in California. Kennedy won the primary with 46.3% of the vote to McCarthy's 41.8%. That evening, Kennedy faced his supporters and network cameras in the ballroom of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. As he finished his statement, he flashed a peace sign and said "On to Chicago and let's win there."It was shortly after midnight on June 5. Kennedy's route from the stage took him through the kitchen of the hotel. There, 22 year-old SirhanSirhan opened fire with a .22 caliber pistol. Several people were injured; Kennedy was shot three times and died less than 24 hours later. SirhanSirhan was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. When California abolished the death penalty, Sirhan's sentence was changed to life in prison.
• Delegates attending the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago were bitterly divided over the war in Vietnam and other issues. These divisions would lead the party that won an overwhelming victory in 1964 to self-destruct before a prime time national television audience.Forces allied with Eugene McCarthy and George McGovern (who inherited much of Kennedy's support) challenged the credentials of several state delegations on the grounds of racial discrimination as well as loyalty to the party. There was bitter debate over a minority resolution that would have, in effect, repudiated the policy of Lyndon Johnson in Vietnam.The convention became most divisive when, in nominating George McGovern for president, Senator Abraham Ribicoff of Connecticut declared that "with George McGovern as president of the United States, we wouldn't have to have Gestapo tactics in the streets of Chicago" Ribicoff was referring to the outbreak of violence between anti-war demonstrators and the Chicago police. Footage of this violence was shown by the television networks throughout the convention. Thousands of demonstrators traveled to Chicago to protest the war and, if possible, disrupt the convention. Although accounts vary, it is clear that some demonstrators sought to provoke the police and that the police responded in an excessively violent manner. eight people were indicted for violating the anti-Riot Act of 1968. The specific charges were crossing state lines with the intent to incite, organize, promote, encourage, participate in, and carry on a riot and to commit acts of violence in furtherance of a riot. The defendants included Abbie Hoffman (leader of the Youth International Party or "Yippies"), Jerry Rubin (co-founder of the "Yippies"), David Dellinger (described as an evangelical Christian Socialist and anti-war activist), Tom Hayden (co-founder of Students for a Democratic Society), Rennie Davis (a national organizer for the SDS),John Froines and Lee Weiner, both activists. The trial judge eventually severed the trial of the last defendant, Bobby Seale (co-founder of the Black Panther Party) from the other defendants. Thus was born the Chicago 7
• To make matters worse, many Southern Democrats bolted the party. The campaign of 1968 also featured a credible third party candidate, Governor George Wallace of Alabama, who vaulted into the national limelight in the 1962 desegregation incident at the University of Alabama. His candidacy injected much uncertainty into the campaign. Democrats feared he would attract normally reliable Democratic voters in the South. Republicans worried that he would attract conservative voters that would otherwise be won by Nixon.
• The Wallace candidacy, given its third party status, was doing surprisingly well in the polls as the general election campaign began. On October 3, George Wallace announced his selection of a vice presidential candidate, retired Air Force General, Curtis LeMay. LeMay was a hero in World War II and served as Air Force Chief of Staff during the Kennedy Administration. At a press conference announcing his selection, LeMay -- to the chagrin of George Wallace -- spoke critically about the public's fear of nuclear weapons and his willingness, if necessary, to use such weapons. After the selection of LeMay, the Wallace candidacy lost the momentum it had been building. His standing in the polls crested at this point (with over 20% of voters expressing a preference) and then declined. No doubt, some were concerned about LeMay's statements. Others, however, either saw the Republican candidate Richard Nixon as a more viable alternative; some Democrat loyalists, while uneasy with Humphrey, did "return to the fold."
• In sunny Miami the Republican Convention convened. As a candidate, Nixon had only to point to the domestic unrest and violence along with the war in Vietnam to argue that it was a time for change. His largely media-based campaign emphasized how the country had deteriorated since 1965 while Nixon spoke of "peace with honor" and "law and order." He had little, if any, difficulty in winning the Republican nomination. As his running mate, Nixon chose a relatively unknown governor of Maryland, Spiro Agnew.
• Knowing that the war was destroying the Democrats, Nixon's position and statements on Vietnam were studiously ambiguous. He promised new leadership that "will end the war and win the peace." He asserted that the "war must be ended. It must be ended honorably." He refused to explain how he would end the war on the grounds that an explanation might interfere with the efforts of the Johnson administration to achieve a settlement or would weaken his own bargaining position if he became President."