Summary
Chapter 14 explains a period of confrontation in the Cold War, from 1960 to 1973. When John F. Kennedy became president in 1961, he inherited several serious Cold War challenges from Dwight D. Eisenhower. During the next 34 months, the United States encountered crises in the Caribbean, central Europe, and Southeast Asia, where the Soviet Union asserted its influence. To meet these challenges, Kennedy embraced “Flexible Response” as his strategy of symmetric containment of communist expansion. Nevertheless, he failed to roll back this threat in Cuba and Vietnam.
After Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, the new president, Lyndon B. Johnson, expanded on his containment strategy by dramatically increasing the American commitment in Vietnam. He sent up as many as 543,000 American service personnel to that nation. Meanwhile, Johnson faced growing opposition from many anti-war groups on the home front. So great were these domestic pressures and so indecisive were American military efforts in the Vietnam War that Johnson did not run for re-election in 1968. Republican candidate Richard M. Nixon won the presidential election that year. Between 1969 and 1973, he gradually withdrew the U.S. military from South Vietnam, which succumbed to North Vietnamese pressure and surrendered in 1975. This failure to roll back communist expansion constituted the first major defeat in American history.
Glossary
Creighton Abrams- (1914-1974), U.S. Army general, commander of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, the head of the American effort in South Vietnam, from 1968 to 1972. A proponent of clear and hold operations rather than William Westmoreland’s search and destroy, Abrams also oversaw the Vietnamization program during the Vietnam War. Following his departure from Southeast Asia, Abrams was Chief of Staff of the Army until his death in 1974.
“Americanization”- The gradual replacement of South Vietnamese troops with American combat units beginning in 1965 during the Vietnam War.
Anti-War Movement- Domestic opposition to the American war effort in Vietnam, mostly student-led, but also garnering extensive support from intellectuals and civil-rights movements. Initial unrest was muted in 1964 against the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution but as the war escalated so did the vocal opposition to it, culminating with the bloody events at Kent State University in 1970.
Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN)- The major ground forces of South Vietnam during the Vietnam War, equipped and trained by the United States; considered by many, perhaps unfairly, to be largely ineffectual.
air mobility- The use of helicopters to move men and supplies to and from the battlefield. The United States Army utilized air mobility extensively during the Vietnam War as part of William Westmoreland’s search and destroy operational approach.
B-52 “Stratofortress”- Boeing-produced jet-powered heavy bomber. As a strategic bomber the B-52 is capable of carrying conventional bomb loads, as well as nuclear weapons and missiles. Since its debut in the Cold War it remained the Air Force’s principal strategic bomber, allowing them to argue for their continued dominance in national defense.
Ap Bac, Battle of – A January 2, 1963 engagement between an overwhelming outnumbered group of Viet Cong fighters and American-advised Army of the Republic of South Vietnam. The poor performance of the ARVN convinced some of the increased need of American assistance.
Bay of Pigs- An April 17, 1961 amphibious assault by some 1,400 American-supplied and trained counter-revolutionaries on the southwest coast of Cuba. Planned by the Central Intelligence Agency and approved by the Kennedy administration, the operation ultimately proved a dismal failure, undermining American credibility and bolstering a Cuba-Soviet Union partnership.
Berlin Crisis- A diplomatic and military confrontation in 1961 regarding the Soviet demand that American forces withdrawal from the partitioned German city of West Berlin.
Cambodian Incursion- The April-July 1970 military campaign into Cambodia by American and South Vietnamese forces during the Vietnam War in order to find and destroy enemy bases and supplies.
Combined Action Program- A U.S. Marine pacification effort during the Vietnam War beginning in 1965. Marine units lived in villages and hamlets while training, caring for, and protecting South Vietnamese civilians.
“Counterinsurgency”- Counter-guerrilla warfare that utilizes varied methods to defeat insurgencies, usually involving a struggle over political legitimacy and power.
Cuban Missile Crisis- An October 1962 confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union over the existence of Soviet nuclear weapons in Cuba capable of reaching almost all of the continental United States. An American naval quarantine forced negotiations that resulted in the removal of the missiles, thus averting the closest instance of nuclear confrontation in the Cold War.
The “draft”- Vietnam War-era conscription of U.S. males into the military, prompting opposition to the conflict from many parts of American society.
“Flexible Response”- The John F. Kennedy administration strategy of containing communism symmetrically. Depending on the threat the American response could be flexible, countering nuclear attacks with a greater nuclear reply, conventional warfare with similar conventional forces, and counterinsurgency tactics for lower level intensity threats.
Gulf of Tonkin Incident- Two separate events in1964 when the USS Maddox and USS Turner Joy reported attacks on their ships on August 2 and August 4, respectively, by North Vietnamese vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin. Using this aggression as justification for a military response, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution led to an escalation of hostilities in the Vietnam War.
Hue, Battle of- A five day battle during the Vietnam War in the South Vietnam city of Hue. Beginning with the Tet Offensive on January 30, 1968, North Vietnamese Army soldiers and Viet Cong fighters quickly captured parts of the city, offering stiff resistance that required street fighting and house clearing operations by U.S. Marine Corps, ARVN, and U.S. Army units.
Ia Drang, Battle- The first major clash of American and North Vietnamese military units during the Vietnam War. The battle in November 1965 in South Vietnam’s Central Highlands represented the first combat test of the U.S. Army’s new airmobile division and the concept. A perceived American victory set the stage for the increased use of helicopters for air mobility and search and destroy missions throughout the Vietnam War.
Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM)- Nuclear missiles, controlled by the Air Force in the United States military, capable of reaching targets as distant as 5,000 miles away. The Cold War ICBM arms race eventually led to diplomatic negotiations in the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) between the United States and Soviet Union in an attempt to reduce the likelihood of nuclear war.
John F. Kennedy- (1917-1963), U.S. president (1961-1963) and the head of state during some of the tensest moments in the Cold War, including the Bay of Pigs invasion, Berlin Crisis, and the Cuban Missile Crisis. His political strategy of flexible response sought to contain communism with symmetric responses to threats.
Khe Sanh, Siege of- The military siege by North Vietnamese Army forces of a U.S. Marine Corps base in South Vietnam’s Central Highlands. Beginning on January 21, 1968, the 6,000 Marines were surrounded by 17,000 NVA troops, in an attempt to distract attention and resources away from the key areas in South Vietnam in preparation for the coming Tet Offensive. Massive American firepower and persistent resupply efforts maintained the U.S. presence until the siege ended seventy-seven days after it began.
“light at the end of the tunnel”- Army General William C. Westmoreland’s reassurance during a press conference in November 1967 that progress in the Vietnam War was positive and the end of the war was near. An optimistic prediction that appeared disingenuous two months later when the Tet Offensive appeared to expand the war and demand more American escalation.
Lyndon Baines Johnson- (1908-1973), Thirty-sixth president of the United States and head of state during the escalation of American commitment in the Vietnam War. The public opposition to the Vietnam War and its intractable nature in part led to Johnson not seeking the re-nomination of the Democratic Party in the 1968 election.
Robert McNamara- (1916-2009), Secretary of defense in the Kennedy and Johnson presidential administrations (1961-1968). A proponent of systems analysis, many of McNamara’s decisions were based upon calculations. Attaining victory in Vietnam was a mathematical problem to him, requiring a balance of American casualties and time against ordnance expended, quantities of American ground troops, and numbers of enemy dead.
Harold G. Moore- (1922- ), U.S. Army officer and a lieutenant colonel in command of the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division during the Vietnam War’s first major use of airmobile forces at the Battle of Ia Drang.
My Lai Massacre- The March 1968 killing of nearly four hundred South Vietnamese civilians by American soldiers during the Vietnam War.
Napalm- Jellied petroleum used tactically and delivered in multiple ways, when ignited napalm adheres to surfaces and burns at a high temperature. Used in World War II and Korea, it is most often associated with the Vietnam War.
Richard M. Nixon- (1913-1994), Thirty-seventh President of the United States (1969-1974), and Vice President during the Dwight Eisenhower administration (1953-1961). Promising “peace with honor,” Nixon focused on extricating the United States from the Vietnam War. From 1969 to 1974 he gradually withdrew the U.S. military from Southeast Asia, turning over more of the war’s responsibility to the South Vietnamese in the “Vietnamization” program.
Operation CEDAR FALLS- Search and destroy operation during the Vietnam War, lasting from January 8-26, 1967 in the “Iron Triangle” region of South Vietnam.
Operation ATTLEBORO- Search and destroy operation during the Vietnam War lasting from September 14 to November 24, 1966; one of the largest airmobile operations by U.S. Army forces to date in the conflict.
Operation JUNCTION CITY- Extensive military operation from February 22 to May 14, 1967 during the Vietnam War, featuring one of the largest air assaults to date with 240 helicopters participating in one battle on a single day in March.
Operation LINEBACKER- American strategic bombing campaign against North Vietnam during the Vietnam War from May to October 1972.
Operation LINEBACKER II- American strategic bombing campaign against North Vietnam during the Vietnam War from December 18-29, 1972 in an attempt to coerce the North Vietnamese into peace talks.
Operation ROLLING THUNDER- A progressively intensive American strategic bombing campaign against industrial and military targets during the Vietnam War from March 1965 to November 1968.
“peace with honor”- Richard Nixon’s campaign promise in the 1968 election and his 1973 evaluation of the Paris Peace Accords that American withdraw from South Vietnam was extrication without defeat.
Pentagon Papers- Internal classified U.S. Department of Defense histories about the Vietnam War. Secretly copied by a military analyst and leaked to the New York Times who began releasing them to the public in June 1971, the papers revealed that for many years U.S. and political leaders deliberately misled the American public about the war.
Search and Destroy- The U.S. military’s Vietnam War strategy under General William C. Westmoreland where American units lured the enemy into the open in order to capitalize on superior U.S. firepower.
Strategic Air Command (SAC)- United States Air Force command formed in 1946 to execute strategic aviation missions, including long-range bombing and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM). The policy of massive retaliation, and the American devotion to nuclear weapons as a deterrent to open warfare with the Soviet Union, allowed SAC to appropriate a relatively higher proportion of the military budget compared to other branches.
Systems Analysis- The approach used by Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara to analyze complicated issues in component parts by evaluating progress in the Vietnam War through the use of statistics such as body counts and kill ratios.
The Tet Offensive- The communist nation-wide offensive during the Vietnam War by the North Vietnam Army and Viet Cong on January 30, 1968, the night of the Lunar New Year. Hitting almost every major U.S. installation and key urban centers, communist forces suffered a devastating defeat in the face of overwhelming U.S. firepower. Despite these victories, Tet was a public relations failure for the Lyndon Johnson administration and turning point in the conflict.
UH-1 “Huey”- Officially titled the Iroquois, the Huey (nicknamed due to its original designation: HU) was the U.S. Army’s main utility helicopter throughout the Vietnam War and into the 1970s. Its turbine power-plant made it powerful and dependable, and the Huey became the backbone of William Westmoreland’s search and destroy strategy, ferrying troops and supplies quickly to and from the battlefield.
Viet Cong- South Vietnamese communist guerrillas during the Vietnam War.
“Vietnamization”- President Richard Nixon’s policy beginning in 1969 that handed over increased combat responsibility in the Vietnam War to the South Vietnamese while American troops began returning home
Vo Nguyen Giap- (1911- ), North Vietnamese Army general during the Vietnam War, and hero of the Viet Minh defeat of French forces at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
“win hearts and minds”- A counterinsurgency approach that attempts to appeal to indigenous populations through programs that build popular support.
William Westmoreland- (1914-2005), U.S. Army general, and the commander of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam from 1964 to 1968. The mastermind of an aggressive strategy of attrition through search and destroy missions during the Vietnam War, Westmoreland’s optimistic outlook just before the Tet Offensive helped to discredit his approach.
Flashcards
Annotated Bibliography
Bailey, Beth. An Army Afire: How the US Army Confronted Its Racial Crisis in the Vietnam Era. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolia Press, 2023.
This book examines the racial problems in the U.S. Army in the late 1960s and early 1970s as racial relations deteriorated against the backdrop of a failing war effort in Vietnam. Discipline and unit cohesion broke down. Morale declined. Bailey examines how the Army’s leaders attempted to resolve the race problems, even as black soldiers demanded more equality and better treatment in terms of promotions and justice. Militating against racial changes were institutional and individual racisms.
Bath, David. Assured Destruction: Building the Ballistic Missile Culture of the U.S. Air Force. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2020.
This book focuses on the attempts by the U.S. Air Force to develop nuclear ballistic missiles in the late 1950s and culminated in the Cuban Missile Crises in October 1962. The author finds that ballistic missile development also faced some friction internal to the Air Force because the expensive missile systems challenged the primacy of strategic airpower role of the Air Force. This book draws on personal studies of missileer officers in the Air Force.
Clemis, Martin G. The Control War: The Struggle for South Vietnam, 1968-1975. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2018.
The title of this book is literal: the Vietnam War as a war for control of dozens of provinces, hundreds of districts, and thousands of hamlets in South Vietnam. The contest pitted the U.S. military and the South Vietnamese government and military against the Viet Cong insurgents supported by North Vietnam. The resulting battles in combat and in public opinion were unique and random, depending upon localize politics, the environment, geography, and other factors. Clemins examines how and why each side tried to use these factors to achieve victory.
Clodfelter, Mark. The Limits of Air Power: The American Bombing of North Vietnam. New York: Free Press, 1989.
In this seminal work, Clodfelter analyzes the use of bombing campaigns in the Vietnam War, from Lyndon Johnson’s Operation ROLLING THUNDER to Richard Nixon’s LINEBACKER operations. He charts the doctrinal evolution of the U.S. Air Force from the Second World War to Vietnam. and illustrates the limits of using military means to achieve political objectives, in this case the strategic bombing of North Vietnam during a limited war.
Daddis, Gregory. Westmoreland’s War: Reassessing American Strategy in Vietnam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.
In this revisionist book, retired Army officer and history Gregory Daddis attempts to reverse the conventional wisdom about General William Westmoreland’s failures in the Vietnam War. Daddis argues the Westmoreland possessed a rational strategy using counterinsurgency, civic actions, and hearts and minds.
DeBenedetti, Charles, with Charles Chatfield. An American Ordeal: The Antiwar Movement of the Vietnam Era. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1990.
This is a book that charts the peace movement beyond the usual parameters of the late 1960s. Instead, the authors chart the years 1955 to 1975 and illustrate how the primary arguments of the anti-war movement were in place by 1965. Ultimately, the book shows that the movement’s cultural side compromised its political effectiveness.
Freedman, Lawrence. Kennedy’s Wars: Berlin, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Freedman’s work is a study of policy during the Kennedy presidency, and equally treats military and political discussions. The book analyzes three crises of the Kennedy White House and seeks to understand why these instances occurred and how catastrophe was avoided. Freedman ultimately concludes it was Kennedy himself as the reason why these crises did not erupt into hot wars, and that the president had created a safer world than the one he inherited.
Fursenko, Aleksandr, and Timothy Naftali. “One Hell of a Gamble”: The Secret History of the Cuban Missile Crisis. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997.
This book details the most dangerous moment during the Cold War when the two superpowers – the Unite States and the Soviet Union – came the closest to starting a nuclear war. The Cuban Missile Crisis occurred in October 1962 when President John F. Kennedy confronted the Soviet Union’s Nikita Khrushchev when he realized that Soviet nuclear missiles were placed in Cuba. The co-authors draw on records from both sides to tell the most compete history then to date.
House, Jonathan M. A Military History of the Cold War, 1962-1991. Norman: University of Oklahoma, 2020.
In this military history from 1962 to the end of the Cold War, Jonathan House examines the armed conflicts among the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies and proxies. Among the conflicts in this book are the Vietnam War and other regional disputes in the Third World. As often as not, these conflicts started, continued, and ended with results outside American or Soviet control, as well as contrary to their respective strategic goals.
Kaplan, Edward. To Kill Nations: American Strategy in the Air-Atomic Age and the Rise of Mutually Assured Destruction. Itaca: Cornell University Press, 2015.
Beginning in 1950 and running to 1965, this book examines the changes in the U.S. Air Force strategic airpower from the premier nuclear platform to one of several purported more viable platforms including the ballistic missile. The decline of strategic airpower also coincides with the rise of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) as the primary American strategy to deter Soviet use of nuclear weapons. Kaplan dissects the personal, cultural, and policy factors that helped make MAD a strategic doctrine.
Kimball, Jeffery P., and William Burr. Nixon’s Nuclear Specter: The Secret Alert of 1969, Madman Diplomacy, and the Vietnam War. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2015.
The co-authors explore the early attempts by newly-elected President Richard Nixon to bring negotiations with North Vietnam to a successful resolution. This resolution did not include, even as early as 1969, an American victory, but rather some way to extricate the United States for an endless, winless war. Nixon utilized the “madman theory” – that he was insane and might use nuclear weapons against the North Vietnamese – to try to intimidate the North Vietnamese, but to no avail.
McMaster, H.R. Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam. New York: Harper Perennial, 1998.
H.R. McMaster attempts to understand what role the U.S. military’s highest officers, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, played in the decisions that led to U.S. involvement in Vietnam. He ultimately concludes that the JCS was culpable for allowing the Johnson administration order military involvement in Southeast Asia. As such, McMaster argues it was not by what the JCS did but rather what they failed to do, as they allowed themselves to be deceived by President Lyndon Johnson, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, General Maxwell Taylor, and National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy.
Maxwell, Jeremy P. Brotherhood in Combat: How African Americans Found Equality in Korea and Vietnam. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2018.
Maxwell combines the history study of the Korea War era, the intervening years, and the Vietnam War era in this social history of African Americans in the U.S. military. He finds racial tensions to be common in the rear areas in theaters of operations or at home in the United States. However, he affirms conclusions of other historians that racial tensions faded in combat units on the front lines. Small unit cohesion broke down barriers. Some of the reduced tensions also occurred because the enemies skin color was yellow. Nevertheless, there remained strong institutional, policy, and individual racisms in the U.S. military.
Moore, Harold G., and Joseph Galloway. We Were Soldiers Once… and Young. New York: Random House, 1992.
Written by the commander of the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of Ia Drang and the only reporter on the ground during the battle, this book chronicles the story of the first large-scale American battle of the Vietnam War against conventional enemy forces. It is one of the most iconic books from the war, told from the perspective of the men who fought for thirty-four days against a very competent People’s Army of Vietnam force.
Roth, Tanya L. Her Cold War: Women in the U.S. Military, 1945-1980. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 2021.
Roth surveys the history of women in the U.S. military from the end of World War II until 1980. Those years are roughly bookmarked by the passing of the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act in 1948 and the disbanding of the Women’s Army Corps in 1978. These decades saw servicewomen filling feminine-typed non-combat roles and enduring discrimination if pregnant or married. They were women first and military persons second. Gradually, however, the women of this generation tried to gain more equality and other recognitions like promotion potential.
Sheehan, Neil. A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam. New York: Vintage, 1988.
About Lt. Col. John Paul Vann and his service in the U.S. Army during the early stages of the Vietnam War, this book won the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction. Sheehan illustrates Vann’s time as an adviser assigned to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam commander of IV Corps, and attempts to show how inept the war was managed during 1963. For his attempts to draw public attention to the situation, Vann was forced from his position in March 1963.
Sorley, Lewis. Westmoreland: The General Who Lost Vietnam. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2011.
Sorley attempts to understand how the United States lost the Vietnam War by focusing on commander of Military Assistance Command, Vietnam until 1968, General William Westmoreland. Ultimately, Sorley places the blame for American military efforts in Southeast Asia failing at the feet of Westmoreland, arguing the general was inflexible in his thinking by choosing and continuing a failed strategy.
Stur, Heather Marie. Beyond Combat: Women and Gender in the Vietnam Era. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
Stur examines how and why the Vietnam War both affirmed and disputed acceptable American gender roles during the middle years of the Cold War. Women could be wholesome all-American girls; or they could be perilous Vietnamese seductresses, spies, or saboteurs. Stur does not ignore masculinity because she explores how notions of American manhood affected and were affected by the experiences of servicemen in Vietnam.
Trauschweizer, Ingo. Maxwell Taylor’s Cold War: From Berlin to Vietnam. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2019.
This biography is contextualized within Cold War history, U.S. military history, and American presidential history. Although Trauschweizer accepts that Taylor was a divisive figure and that he was in part responsible for the Vietnam debacle, Trauschweizer challenges the negative portrayals of Taylor by demonstrating how and why he saw clearly that the United States needs a military capable of meeting major threats like the Soviet Union and local threats like the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong.
Expanded Bibliography
Asselin, Pierre. A Bitter Peace: Washington, Hanoi, and the Making of the Paris Agreement. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007.
Daddis, Gregory. No Sure Victory: Measuring U.S. Army Effectiveness and Progress in the Vietnam War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Galvin, John R. Air Assault: The Development of Airmobile Warfare. New York: Hawthorn Books, 1969.
Grant, William T. Wings of the Eagle: A Kingsmen’s Story. New York: Ivy, 1994.
Herring, George C. LBJ and Vietnam: A Different Kind of War. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994.
Huebner, Andrew. The Warrior Image: Soldiers in American Culture from the Second World War to the Vietnam Era. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007.
Lewis, Adrian. The American Culture of War: The History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Enduring Freedom. London: Routledge, 2012.
Logevall, Fredrik. Choosing War: The Lost Chance for Peace and the Escalation in Vietnam. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.
Longley, Kyle. Grunts: The American Combat Soldier in Vietnam. Armonk, MD: M. E. Sharpe, 2008.
Kindsvatter, Peter. American Soldiers: Ground Combat in the World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas Press, 2003.
Krepinevich, Andrew F., Jr. The Army and Vietnam. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986.
Ives, Christopher K. US Special Forces and Counterinsurgency in Vietnam: Military Innovation and Institutional Failure, 1961–1963. London: Routledge, 2007.
Mills, Hugh L., Jr., with Robert A. Anderson. Low Level Hell: A Scout Pilot in the Big Red One. Novato, CA: Presidio, 1992.
Nagl, John. Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.
Nguyen, Lien-Hang T. Hanoi's War: An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012.
Preston, Andrew. The War Council: McGeorge Bundy, the NSC, and Vietnam. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006.
Reardon, Carol. Launch the Intruders! Attack Squadron 75 and the Linebacker Campaigns of 1972. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2005.
Sorley, Lewis. A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America’s Last Years in Vietnam. New York: Harcourt, 1999.
Spector, Ronald. After Tet: The Bloodiest Year in Vietnam. New York: The Free Press, 1993.
Tolson, John T. Airmobility 1961–1971. Washington, DC: Department of the Army, 1973.
Annotated Weblinks
Site: National Security Archive, The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962: The 40th Anniversary
URL: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/nsa/cuba_mis_cri/index.htm
Description: The National Security Archive is an invaluable resource for anyone doing Cold War history. Journalists and scholars founded the NSArchive in 1985 in response to a rise in government secrecy. It has the world’s largest nongovernmental collection of documents, collecting primary sources the world over. This link will take you to the 40th anniversary page of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and provides visitors with a collection of declassified documents, photographs, audio clips, and essays.
Site: ArmageddonLetters.com
URL: http://www.armageddonletters.com/
Description: The Armageddon Letters is a transmedia project based at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and led by the scholars and filmmakers who created the Academy Award-winning documentary, The Fog of War. The website takes visitors through a series of short films about the Cuban Missile Crisis that tackle questions about the event and urges viewers to think like Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro.
Site: American Rhetoric, John F. Kennedy Ich bin ein Berliner (I am a Berliner)
URL: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jfkberliner.html
Description: Follow this link to watch John F. Kennedy deliver one of the famous speeches of his presidency on the steps of the Schöneberg City Hall steps in Berlin, 26 June 1963.
Site: National Security Archive, LBJ Tapes on the Gulf of Tonkin Incident
URL: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB132/tapes.htm
Description: Follow this link to hear President Lyndon Johnson’s telephone conversations about the Gulf of Tonkin Incident that occurred on 2 August 1964.
Site: The Vietnam Center and Archive
URL: http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/
Description: The gold standard in research on the Vietnam War, Texas Tech University’s Vietnam Center and Archive should be the first stop for anyone looking to learn more about the conflict. Among other things, the Center and Archive houses an invaluable digital materials collection and a sizable oral history project.
Site: Miller Center, Lyndon B. Johnson - Presidential Recordings
URL: http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/presidentialrecordings/johnson
Description: The Miller Center at the University of Virginia is one of the nation’s best institutes that studies the presidency, policy, and political history. Follow this link to listen choose between 800 hours of conversation that President Lyndon Johnson recorded as president between 1963 and 1969. The conversations are searchable, which allows visitors not to be overwhelmed by the sheer size of resources available.
Site: Library of Congress, Veterans History Project
URL: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/diglib/vhp/html/search/search.html
Description: One of the largest oral history projects in the United States, the Library of Congress’s Veterans History Project has interviewed veterans from World War I up to the Global War on Terror. As for the Vietnam War, the project has over 15,100 oral histories. Searchable by such things as conflict, branch or service, gender, service location, and rank, the ability to narrow down interviews means visitors are not overwhelmed.
Site: Cantigny First Division Oral History Project-Phase I
URL: http://libx.bsu.edu/cdm4/collection.php?CISOROOT=/CtgnyOrHis
Description: This site contains forty videotaped and transcribed interviews with veterans of the 1st Infantry Division. Students at Ball State University learned about the history of that division and about oral history techniques. They then interviewed the veterans, most of whom were Vietnam veterans.
Site: West Point, The Vietnam War Battle and Campaign Maps
URL: http://www.westpoint.edu/history/SitePages/Vietnam%20War.aspx
Description: If looking for detailed maps of battles or operations in the Vietnam War, visit this link from the United States Military Academy.
Site: The War Times Journal, Ia Drang 1965 and the Defense of Landing Zone X-Ray
URL: http://www.wtj.com/articles/xray/
Description: This link will take you to an interactive map of combat operations in the Ia Drang Valley in November 1965, as well as a brief narrative history.
Site: LZ X-Ray
URL: http://www.lzxray.com/
Description: This site contains information on the background and battle of Ia Drang on 16-17 November 1965. There are interactive maps, combat camera clips, and LTC Harold G. Moore’s After Action Report. This site contain many other teaching or learning resource on this key battle in Vietnam.
Site: USMC Combat Helicopter Association, Pop-A-Smoke: Visions - A Personal Perspective
URL: http://www.popasmoke.com/visions/index.php?cat=7
Description: Visit this website if you would like to search through some 8,000 photographs of Marine Corps helicopters in Vietnam.
Site: Naval History & Heritage Command, United States Naval Operations Vietnam, Highlights
URL: https://www.history.navy.mil/research/archives/digitized-collections/vietnam-war.html
Description: For a detailed history of U.S. Navy operations in the Vietnam War, visit this Naval History & Heritage Command.
Site: RecordsofWar.com, The US Air Force in Vietnam: The Bud Harton Collection at the Texas Tech Virtual Vietnam Archive
URL: http://www.recordsofwar.com/vietnam/airforce/
Description: A useful resource, the Bud Harton Collection at the Texas Tech Virtual Vietnam Archive offers thousands of scanned pages of official U.S. Air Force in Vietnam documents. If in search of anything from a unit history to evaluation reports, this is a great place to start.
Site: Georgia Tech College of Computing, Vietnam War: Websources
URL: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~tpilsch/Vietnam.html#Quotez
Description: One of the most thorough sites for websources on the internet, this link from Georgia Tech College of Computing offers an incredible number of links to other useful websites on the Vietnam War.
Site: Internet Archive, Fall of Saigon (1975)
URL: http://archive.org/details/gov.archives.arc.1938171
Description: Follow this link to watch U.S. government footage from the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975.