Cold War and Prelude to Vietnam

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Cold War and Prelude to Vietnam

• By Michael Kushler

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Military Conflicts involving Communist and/or US
forces

• East Germany (1953) Tibet (1951)
• Czechoslovakia (1968) Afghanistan (79)
• Hungary (1956) Malaysia (48-89)
• Yugoslavia (1948) Indonesia (1967)
• Greece (1945-49) Peru (1980s)
• Korea (1950-53) Bolivia (1967)
• China (1945-49) Ethiopia (70-91)
• Angola (1975-91) Mozambique (70)
• Guatemala (54) Cuba (50-62)

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Countries Supplied by the USSR -or- USA

• -USSR-
• Iran
• Iraq Afghanistan
• India Lebanon
• Pakistan Cuba
• China Libya
• North Vietnam
• Egypt North Korea
• Syria Warsaw Pact

• -USA-
• South Vietnam
• Israel
• South Korea
• NATO
• Philippines
• Taiwan
• Japan
• Mujahedeen (Afgh.)

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Marshall Plan (in millions)
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The Bomb
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Nuclear Test
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Warhead Deployment at Peak Strength

• US 28,100 warheads
• USSR 44,000 warheads
• UK 350 warheads
• France 500 warheads
• China 450 warheads

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USS C. Tuner Joy
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USS Maddox
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You have a row of dominoes set up you knock over
the first one, and what will happen to the last
one is that it will go down very quickly. -
Dwight, D. Eisenhower
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• You can kill ten of my men for every one man I
  kill of yours, but even at those odds, you will
  lose and I will win.
• Ho Chi Minh to the French, late 1940s
• Now we have a problem in making our power
  credible, and Vietnam is the place
• John F. Kennedy, 1961
• This is not a jungle war, but a struggle for
  freedom on every front of human activity.
• L. B. Johnson, 1964
• Tell the Vietnamese theyve got to draw in their
  horns or were going to bomb then back into the
  Stone Age.
• Gen. Curtis LeMay. 1964

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• We are not about to send American boys nine or
  ten thousand miles away from home to do what
  Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.
• Lyndon Johnson, Oct. 1964
• We are at war with the most dangerous enemy that
  has ever faced mankind in his long climb from the
  swamp to the stars, and it has been said if we
  lose that war, and in so doing lose this way of
  freedom of ours, history will record with the
  greatest astonishment that those who had the most
  to lose did the least to prevent its happening.
• Ronald Reagan, 1964

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• "No event in American history is more
  misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was
  misreported then, and it is misremembered now.
  Rarely have so many people been so wrong about so
  much. Never have the consequences of their
  misunderstanding been so tragic."
• Nixion, 1985

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• 91 of the veterans said they are glad they
  served
• 74 said they would serve again knowing the
  outcome.
• There is no difference in drug use between a
  Vietnam veteran and a non veteran of the same age
  group.
• .5 of Vietnam veterans have been jailed for
  crimes
• 85 of Vietnam veterans made a successful
  transition to civilian life

• The average age of a US service man in Vietnam
  was 23.11 years.
• 2/3 of men who served in Vietnam were volunteers.
  2/3 of the men who served in WWII were drafted.
  70 of those killed in Vietnam were volunteers