Historical Timeline
	1945 World War II ends. Ho Chi Minh appeals to U.S. for help in preventing resumption of French colonial control of Vietnam. 1946 Vietnamese war of independence against France begins, led by Viet Minh under Ho Chi Minh. 1950 U.S. opts to bankroll France's campaign to resume control of Vietnam. Korean War begins. 1953 Korean War ends. 1954 Battle of Dien Bien Phu. France abandons efforts to regain Vietnam. Vietnam temporarily partitioned along the 17th parallel with elections promised in two years. 1956 Ngo Dinh Diem refuses to allow popular elections to reunite Vietnam. 1959 Diem moves to eliminate former Viet Minh members in South Vietnam. 1960 John F. Kennedy elected president. National Liberation Front (Viet Cong) is formed and begins military struggle against repression in South Vietnam. 1962 Cuban missile crisis. 1963 JFK approves military overthrow of Diem. JFK assassinated. 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident reported, leading to Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. Bombing of Vietnam and use of Agent Orange begins. 1968 Tet Offensive. My Lai Massacre. Police respond violently to antiwar protests at Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Nixon elected president. Martin Luther King assassinated. 1969 Nixon orders first withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. Fighting expands into Laos and Cambodia. 1970 Neutral Cambodian government overthrown and replaced with a pro-U.S. government. American troops cross border into Cambodia. Four students shot and killed by National Guard during antiwar protests at Kent State University. Congress repeals Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. 1971 South Vietnamese army, with support of the U.S. Air Force, attacks enemy strongholds in Laos. They are successfully driven back. 1973 Paris Peace Accord signed. U.S. withdraws from Vietnam. 1974 Nixon resigns after Watergate scandal. 1975 Last American troops withdraw from Vietnam. Vietnam reunited under a central government organized by Hanoi. Saigon renamed Ho Chi Minh City. 1995 U.S. ends economic embargo of Vietnam. 1999 U.S. normalizes relations with Vietnam, and reopens U.S. consulate in Vietnam for the first time in 24 years.

THE MILITARY CONFLICT
At the end of World War II, the United States shed its traditionally isolationist position to emerge as an international political power. Worried about the spread of communism, and believing that the Soviet Union was acting as an aggressor by instigating communist revolutions throughout the world, the United States adopted a policy of "containment."

Under this policy, the United States sought to prevent the establishment of communist regimes wherever it could, convinced that all such governments added to the strength of the Soviet Union. This position sometimes put American officials in the awkward position of supporting dictatorships over popularly supported communist governments, as ultimately happened in Vietnam.

Vietnam and bordering countries

Approached by popular communist leader Ho Chi Minh to support Vietnam's independence, the United States opted instead to side with French attempts to regain colonial control. France's efforts failed, and in 1954, Vietnam was temporarily divided along the 17th parallel with the north controlled by Ho Chi Minh and the south by pro-American Ngo Dinh Diem.

When it became clear that Ho Chi Minh would win the planned election in 1956, Diem, with U.S. backing, refused to allow a vote. Tensions mounted and by the early 1960s, Diem's increasingly repressive government was rapidly losing support. In 1963, President John F. Kennedy gave tacit approval to a coup, hoping that new leaders could rally popular support and counter Ho. President Kennedy was mistaken.

When Lyndon Johnson assumed the U.S. presidency following JFK's assassination, he inherited an unstable South Vietnam and 16,500 American troops stationed on the ground there. In 1964, citing a report that later evidence would show was inaccurate, President Johnson announced that American destroyers in international waters had been attacked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats in the Gulf of Tonkin. Congress responded quickly, passing a resolution authorizing the president to "take all necessary measures to repel attacks on U.S. forces." This Gulf of Tonkin Resolution became the basis for U.S. military involvement in Vietnam.

Despite the absence of a formal declaration of war, the United States began a massive bombing campaign that included the use of Agent Orange, a defoliant, to clear the dense jungle that provided cover for the Viet Cong. The poison had a devastating impact on Vietnam's environment and agricultural economy, and on the health of those who were exposed, including American soldiers.

Vietnamese man captured by American soldier

United States involvement increased, peaking in 1968 with more than half a million troops fighting in Vietnam. By 1969, the fighting had secretly expanded into Laos and Cambodia. By the time the U.S. forces withdrew in 1973, approximately 3.1 million American troops had served in Southeast Asia and more than 58,000 had died there. When the war officially ended in 1975, the conflict had claimed the lives of more than 3.8 million North and South Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. Many thousands more were injured, physically and psychologically.

EVENTS IN THE UNITED STATES
Facing strong criticism for his handling of the war, Lyndon Johnson did not seek re-election in 1968. Instead, Richard M. Nixon was voted into office on a promise to end the war "with honor" and to restore "law and order" to American streets, which had become the site of increasing anti-war protests. Participation in the civil rights movement had given many young Americans experience in the politics of protest, including questioning the authority of government and organization demonstrations. Based on college campuses, in church basements, and even at meetings of veterans groups, the anti-war movement ranged from peaceful teach-ins, church services, and rallies to sit-ins, civil disobedience, and the bombing of buildings in which military research was conducted.

News coverage, especially on television, amplified the political pressure to end the war. It was no coincidence that anti-war protesters at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago responded to police brutality with the chant "The whole world is watching." Coverage of American students being beaten-or in the case of Kent State University (1970), being killed by the National Guard for what many perceived as the simple exercise of the American right to free speech-sparked outrage.

In addition, for the first time, footage on the nightly news showed people what was happening on battlefields far from home. Over time, the graphic nature of these images helped to rally the average American behind the anti-war cause. Especially jolting was footage from the Tet Offensive, the massive North Vietnamese attack launched on January 31, 1968, into the heart of Saigon (capital city of South Vietnam). Faced with pictures that undermined claims that America was winning the war, the U.S. government was forced to consider the possibility that there would never be a way to win this war. Debacles like the 1968 My Lai Massacre, in which U.S. soldiers killed the residents of a defenseless village, further exploded public support for the war.

For many years, the United States attempted to fight a heavily technological war against opponents whose strength lay less in weaponry than in their ability to intermingle with the country's entire population and their unshakable commitment to defend their own land. In 1973, the United States decided to abandon that fight and pulled out the last of its troops, leaving its South Vietnamese allies vulnerable. Two years later, the North Vietnamese army marched into Saigon and reunited the country under communist control. The legacy of America's involvement was a South Vietnam governed by communists who continued to fight, using their political and civilian powers against former adversaries.