The Vietnamese War, as defined to me in the New Standard Encyclopedia, was “ an undeclared war for the control of South Vietnam, starting in 1957 and ending in 1975.” The war began as a Communist guerrilla campaign supported by North Vietnam, who sought control of South Vietnam. The United States feared that Communism would spread, and President Eisenhower’s Domino Theory was born. By 1965 the United States assumed a major role when units of Marines became the first combat troops in South Vietnam. In April, the first North Vietnamese regular units infiltrated South Vi

During the course of this war, which spanned more than a decade, and four presidential administrations over 2,200,000 United States soldiers served in Vietnam. Of that number, 58,191 were killed or were considered missing in action. The average age of a United States soldier in Vietnam was 19. Most of these young men returned home feeling confused and bitter, unsure of how to proceed with everyday life. Most soldiers felt that while they were not in Vietnam physically, their minds were still there. This caused them to hear screaming and to see images of the war rolling through their heads, in a condition we now know as post traumatic stress disorder.

Where this all leaves us, I do not know. I found through the course of writing this paper that this war had many enemies and few allies. In the beginning, I feel that the American people stood firmly behind the actions of our government officials. Yet, as time went on, and the media, who played a very large role of its own in this war, continued to broadcast footage of the overwhelming atrocities, public opinion shifted. In the end, with no hope of a clear resolution in sight, the White House finally concluded that this war was not a victory in the making. As for positive changes, I feel that one of the few changes after the Vietnam war would be the lack of keeping silent, that a lot of Americans of the time had been accustomed to. Gone were the days of “keeping your peace”, to be replaced with giving your opinion and sometimes actually seeing results. I, for myself, come away from this paper with a newfound respect for those young men who fought so bravely and endured horrors beyond imaginatio

Some topics in this essay:
North Vietnamese, South Vietnam, National Guardsmen, White House, Washington DC, South Vietnamese, Vietnam War, Tet Offensive, Cambodia United, President Johnson, south vietnam, north vietnamese, washington dc, tet offensive, vietnam war, north vietnam, control south vietnam, forces tried, south vietnamese, south korea, protesting war,