What a German soldier of WWII thought of US soldiers.

[Zincwarrior]

Glen: I agree that it was a strategic and tactical mistake. Once we are in, though, it is best to win the wars we fight. We could have won that one without occupying the North, just like Korea. And the crappy authoritarian regime would have morphed into a tolerably democratic one, like Korea. Moreover, a lot of good Vietnamese, Cambodians, Meo, and Montagnard's who trusted our promises wouldn't have been executed.

I don't think that there was enough of a national interest to fight in Vietnam or Laos. But, once we were in we should have won the war--which despite a lot of armchair civilian pontifications could have been done relatively easily. Cut your enemy off from supply and they collapse, and cutting off North Vietnam from supply was not difficult at all. And failing to win wars because of what the world perceives to be a lack of will just leads to more wars in the future.

Unfortunately, we not only got involved for reasons that remain nebulous, the tactics we used--which were imposed by LBJ and Robert McNamara (at the recommendations of numerous DC grandees)--were brain dead. They were the classic tactics used by mandarins who have a pool of free draftees to use as cannon fodder with no possible risks to themselves.

How would you have cut them off from supply?

[Jeep]

How would you have cut them off from supply?

North Vietnam is one of those relatively few countries that it is pretty easy to cut off. Its northern border with China is mountainous jungle; as is its western border with Laos. That means most supply must come by sea. There were (if my memory is correct) only two rail lines between China and North Vietnam, and both passed over various river gorges on bridges.

Some supply came by way of those railroads, but the chaos in China with the Cultural Revolution, and its growing hatred of the Soviet Union keep the volume down. In addition, most North Vietnamese ports were too small for much volume--the vast majority of weapons, ammunition, POL and the like came through Haiphong. Later in the war, the Cambodian ports were used to supply the NVA troops in southern Cambodia, but we cut those in 1970 and they stayed cut.

So the strategy was pretty obvious from the start. Mine Haiphong harbor (and Vinh and all other ports), cut the railroads to China (admittedly it was harder before laser-guided bombs) and then pound the internal road/rail infrastructure. It would have worked. We know that because it did work in 1972. We cut the NVA off from supply (even food, which was mainly locally grown, was hard to get to the NVA divisions in Laos and Cambodia without POL for the trucks that were the primary carrier on the Ho Chi Minh trail).

That strategy was repeatedly proposed to LBJ and McNamara. LBJ's kitchen cabinet of people like Arthur Goldberg, Clark Clifford, Abe Fortas and his old Senate cronies all told him it was too dangerous politically.

Earlier, JFK decided not to fight a war with North Vietnam over Laos and turned it "neutral." It wasn't. South eastern Laos became an NVA colony--they moved or killed the relatively few inhabitants, but the Ho Chi Minh trail could not have operated if American troops continued to be stationed in that area. That was the place to fight the war if we were going to do it on the ground, and the T'ai and Meo hlll tribes would have been excellent allies. (The Lao? Not so much). Overall, though, a naval/air war was the way to do it.

Now cutting North Vietnam off from supply would not have stopped a small scale guerilla war in the South, supported by the supply sampans the NVA sent down the coast. But it would have been a war of limited numbers of VC (and very few NVA)with captured weapons, limited ammunition, and no spare parts because North Vietnam could not have supported more than that.

As it turned out, the VC guerilla war (much supported by the NVA with modern equipment as the war went on) was a loser. The NVA won the war by launching tank columns through the Central Highlands (thank you Col Phil Kaplan, chief USA advisor in the Highlands at the time) and towards Saigon and it was South Vietnam that ran out of supply--significantly including ammunition. (Thank you U. S. House of Representatives and the Watergate class of 1974).

[Zincwarrior]

The US did massive bombing and interdiction yet still failed to close the Ho Chi Minh trail. Even now the US was unable to stop forces in Afghanistan and Iraq from resupplying guerillas.

Additionally, this would have likely brought the Chinese into the war.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Re-fighting past wars is always interesting. IIRC, Ho Chi Minh after WWII asked the USA to support him in riding Viet Nam of the French. The USA had a problem with our allies that wanted us to defeat the Japanese AND support their colonial empires. Churchill wanted diversion of resources from attacking Japan directly to screwing around in South East Asia, Burma, The 'Dutch' East Indies for those reasons. Ho got no support and turned to the socialist countries. Perhaps he was a socialist, he did work as a waiter, dishwasher in Boston, I recall. However, he was a Viet Namese nationalist and didn't like the Chinese as most Viet Namese felt. They have fought them for a 1000 years. We might have turned into a neutral socialist but counterweight to the Chinese. Recall, we supported Tito and supplied him with weaponery. His air force was USA planes (true it was Canadair Sabres).

NO, we had to support colonial idiocy. Thank you God, that Eisenhower resisted called to nuke them for Dien Bien Phu. Later studies during our war indicated that even liberal use of nukes couldn't shut down the trail. So the military kept pressing for conventional solutions. Given the nationalist bent of the Viet Namese we would still be fighting them if we occupied the North.

There is also the lost cause mythology. It goes like this - we were better fighters, tacticians, etc. - but those darn winners just had to much stuff. The Civil War, WWI and WWII had those whining AARs by the losers.

A second mythology is that the initial 'shock and awe' attack will win a long term war. I cited a book about that in the book thread but am too lazy to look it up. The scholarly author convincingly demonstrates that it doesn't work except against trivial opponents. Major ones fall back and can win the attrition and logistic battles. With intermediate opponents, their convictions will keep them fighting and screwing up your 'successful' occupation.

As an aside - here's an analysis of the logistic problems of fighting China: https://news.usni.org/2019/05/17/stu...ght#more-57794

That's for those who think we have a secret plan to win quickly and the professional literature is incorrect.

[idahojess]

A couple of Vietnam War books I found good (and I read Bright and Shining Lie when I was in junior high school), were Lewis Sorely's "A Better War" and "Ride the Thunder" by Richard Botkin.

Both books focus on the latter part of the war -- post Tet. Sorely's book focuses on General Abram's efforts to secure the population centers. Botkin's book focuses on Col. John Ripley's experience as an adviser in the 1972 Easter offensive, as well as everyday sacrifices of South Vietnamese marines. His story of the "re-education" of Lieutenant Colonel Le Ba Binh (now a US citizen) is chilling. I'd say both books present a somewhat different perspective than what is usually portrayed.

https://www.amazon.com/Better-War-Un.../dp/0156013096

https://www.amazon.com/Ride-Thunder-...s=books&sr=1-1

[Jeep]

The US did massive bombing and interdiction yet still failed to close the Ho Chi Minh trail. Even now the US was unable to stop forces in Afghanistan and Iraq from resupplying guerillas.

Additionally, this would have likely brought the Chinese into the war.

Massive bombing of the Ho Chi Minh trail was clearly the wrong way to interdict--bombing through jungle makes it hard to hit targets and south eastern Laos was simply to big to hit more than a bit here and a bit there.

The key was keeping the supplies out of North Vietnam in the first place. That was impossible to do with Korea in 1950-53 because of its very long land border with China. But North Vietnam was the only place it could be done easily--as it was in 1972. The North Vietnamese Army had to essentially cease operations in the South to conserve supplies--and some units went pretty hungry.

As for Iraq and Afghanistan, they both have very large borders that are open and easy to cross and not easy to seal off. In addition, in Afghanistan, our allies the Pakistanis have been busily supplying the Taliban from the start (just as the Iranians have supplied the Taliban--whom they hate (they hate us more) as well as AQI in Iraq.

But Vietnam was possible to seal off from Russian weapons.

As for the Chinese coming in, that was LBJ's worry. But, (1) how would they get there (not as easy as Korea--its a very, very long way from the Chinese border to South Vietnam); (2) how would they be resupplied; (3) how would they do it in the chaos of the Cultural Revolution; and (4) would the North Vietnamese have accepted that kind of massive help? As Glenn notes the Viets (particularly the Tonkinese in the North) HATED the Chinese. So long as we didn't invade the North--and thus potentially threaten China, Mao's big concern in the 1960's were the Soviets--not us. China would have, and did, help the North a bit but wouldn't have worried about US mines threatening Warsaw Pact shipping in Haiphong Harbor.

[Zincwarrior]

China was able to later attack Vietnam from the North yes? I think you are underestimating their ability to move forces south. They may also have struck through Korea as well.

Putting Johnson aside, if Nixon didn't do what you propose, then clearly there were problems with this.

[Jeep]

Re-fighting past wars is always interesting. IIRC, Ho Chi Minh after WWII asked the USA to support him in riding Viet Nam of the French. The USA had a problem with our allies that wanted us to defeat the Japanese AND support their colonial empires. Churchill wanted diversion of resources from attacking Japan directly to screwing around in South East Asia, Burma, The 'Dutch' East Indies for those reasons. Ho got no support and turned to the socialist countries. Perhaps he was a socialist, he did work as a waiter, dishwasher in Boston, I recall. However, he was a Viet Namese nationalist and didn't like the Chinese as most Viet Namese felt. They have fought them for a 1000 years. We might have turned into a neutral socialist but counterweight to the Chinese. Recall, we supported Tito and supplied him with weaponery. His air force was USA planes (true it was Canadair Sabres).

NO, we had to support colonial idiocy. Thank you God, that Eisenhower resisted called to nuke them for Dien Bien Phu. Later studies during our war indicated that even liberal use of nukes couldn't shut down the trail. So the military kept pressing for conventional solutions. Given the nationalist bent of the Viet Namese we would still be fighting them if we occupied the North.

There is also the lost cause mythology. It goes like this - we were better fighters, tacticians, etc. - but those darn winners just had to much stuff. The Civil War, WWI and WWII had those whining AARs by the losers.

A second mythology is that the initial 'shock and awe' attack will win a long term war. I cited a book about that in the book thread but am too lazy to look it up. The scholarly author convincingly demonstrates that it doesn't work except against trivial opponents. Major ones fall back and can win the attrition and logistic battles. With intermediate opponents, their convictions will keep them fighting and screwing up your 'successful' occupation.

As an aside - here's an analysis of the logistic problems of fighting China: https://news.usni.org/2019/05/17/stu...ght#more-57794

That's for those who think we have a secret plan to win quickly and the professional literature is incorrect.

Glenn: Ho spent his time in Paris, not the states, and was a true blue "international" communist. He was a founding member of the French Communist Party, which was notorious for its subservience to Moscow.

Nevertheless, you are correct. He hated the Chinese, like most Viets. The US government did not, however, understand that in the 1960's You will find statement after statement by the Johnson administration talking about the need to keep the Chinese from taking over Vietnam. In fact, Ho supported the Soviet side in that divide, and got (and wanted) relatively little aid from China. (Which could not afford it). In fairness to LBJ and McNamara, Mao himself appears never to have understood how disliked China was in Vietnam. In fact it appears to this day that the Chinese government and people are baffled about why the Viets hate them so much.

It's also true that we were dealt a lousy hand in Asia after WWII. Once the Reds took over China (using the massive amount of Japanese stores that Stalin gave them while we were trying to be at least somewhat neutral) things were going to be miserable for us. Either we got involved, or the commies were going to roll up a lot of weak states.

Our biggest mistake was to insist that Stalin attack Manchuria in 1945. We thought the Japanese Army was very strong there. It wasn't. It barely existed there as much of it had been secretly shuttled to Japan to face us. Once Stalin had Manchuria and an enormous trove of Japanese weapons and ammunition to give to Mao (and Ho), things were going to be difficult for us. Which is why he did it. He hated Mao, but wanted to tie us down while the Soviet Union was still weak from the war. Meanwhile, we were still hoping to be post-war friends.

Stalin was a lot of things, but stupid was not one of them.

[Jeep]

China was able to later attack Vietnam from the North yes? I think you are underestimating their ability to move forces south. They may also have struck through Korea as well.

Putting Johnson aside, if Nixon didn't do what you propose, then clearly there were problems with this.

Nixon didn't have the votes in Congress, both houses of which were heavily controlled by the Dems. Immediately after he became President, it became "Nixon's war" and people like McNamara became opponents of the war.

As for China, it was poor in the 1960's. In the Korean War it originally used former Nationalist soldiers as its shock troops (knowing they'd be annihilated) armed with Japanese/American and German weapons. Later on they had Soviet Bloc weapons--basically Stalin had the Warsaw Pact pick up Mao's arms and ammunition bills. No one would do that in the 1960's.

Sending troops through the jungles to attack South Vietnam because we had mined the northern ports would have been difficult, expensive, and fruitless. As the Chinese invasion of the North in 1979 showed, the Chinese Army of that time lacked mobility and could not move far from its supply line. Mao could not effectively attack our Navy or Air Force. Besides he was busy with his self-appointed task of purging enemies of the people--ie any possible opponents to himself--from the party in the Cultural Revolution. That was far more important to him than Vietnam.

I'm not arguing we should have gotten involved in Vietnam--only that it could have been won without a large land war. Not many places where that can happen. Vietnam was one.

[Zincwarrior]

Nixon took years to get out of Vietnam. If the administration felt this was a valid tactic they would have taken it.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary facts. The Vietnamese fought the French twice, the Japanese, and then us. Whether or not one supports their political structure, one has to note their extraordinary patriotism. They would not have stopped, and would have found a way to keep fighting.