Path+to+War

=VIETNAM - THE PATH TO WAR =

You all know that the United States was involved in a major military conflict during the Cold War ... but why? What was America's "path to war"? Using the resources below and Creating America, your task this evening is to write a description in YOUR OWN WORDS of the causes of American involvement in Southeast Asia. Pretend you are writing it as a summary for on online encyclopedia or textbook. Your description should ...


 * be between two and four paragraphs
 * contain the following terms - France, Ho Chi Minh, communism, Ngo Dinh Diem, military advisors, Gulf of Tonkin
 * be IN YOUR OWN WORDS (remember, it's easy to check this online)
 * contain two images THAT RELATE TO YOUR WRITING
 * Should end with the first Marines landing in Vietnam in 1965

Need some help? How about ... //Creating America// [|Into Vietnam (Overview)] from ABC-CLIO [|**Vietnam War** - the **Causes**] [|Timeline of the Vietnam War] [|Vietnam Online Timeline] Causes of the Vietnam War video below US involvement in Vietnam began in WWII when they aided Vietnamese militants to liberate themselves from Japanese rule. The Leader of these troops was Ho Chi Minh. After they successfully liberated themselves, they also decided to liberate themselves from the French, who had colonized Vietnam. A peace conference later held in Geneva dictated that the French had to take the southern part of Vietnam, and prepare for their decolonization. In a year, the whole of Vietnam was to take a free election to unite the whole Country.Ho Chi Minh believed in Communism, where as the leader of the North, Ngo Dinh Diem, was democratic. Ngo Dinh Diem knew that if a free election was held, the Communists would win, so he refused to have an election. The US and France backed Diem, but because free elections were not held in the south, Minh reverted to war to unite the Country. Diem asked the US for military advisors, and he got them. IN 1960 they got 900 and by 1962 there were 11,000. Diem's government was corrupt though, and he was eventually assassinated. The government became increasingly unstable though, and the US was worried that a domino effect would occur if Vietnam fell. The president Lyndon B Johnson announced that the USS maddox had been fired on unprovoked in the Gulf of Tonkin. Johnson ordered that US planes bomb vietnam. Congress granted him the right to send Marines into Vietnam.