The United States' involvement in Vietnam lasted from 1954 to 1975 and cost between $112 billion and $155 billion. More than 58,000 Americans lost their lives in the war. Another 153,000 were wounded. The Vietnamese losses were even greater. Estimates put the Vietnamese dead at up to 4 million, one tenth of the population. It was the first important military defeat the United States ever faced. Once the United States had committed to getting involved in what seemed like an easy war to win, retreat became more and more difficult. As the war dragged on, the movement against it grew. Ultimately, it permanently changed the way that America thought about itself. Discovering that the United States could lose a war, especially one fought against an enemy with much less impressive weapons, was a humbling and powerful lesson. Understanding what happened is a key to many of the things that have happened in the United States since then.
Gary A. Donaldson writes, "The conflict in Vietnam was a quagmire well before the United States got involved" (72). Originally a part of China, the nation became independent in the 10th century but continued to struggle for its independence. In 1847, France claimed Vietnam, Lao, and Cambodia as the colony of Indochina, and the French were able to crush the first attempts to throw off colonial rule. During World War II, the French Vichy regime gave up most of its territorial rights to the Japanese. A prominent freedom fighter who now called himself Ho Chi Minh led the resistance against the new rulers. Donaldson writes, "Thus, like most Communists during World War II, Ho Chi Minh and his supporters fought on the side of the United States and its allies against the forces of fascism" (73).
After the war, although the U.S. supported Vietnam's desire for independence, that support was "sacrificed for the greater cause of the new cold war" (Donaldson 75). The French managed to regain contro...