“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 over very quickly," said Dwight D. Eisenhower, former US President, 1954. "The ‘domino theory' was a myth. That the US was right not to invade North Vietnam or Laos for fear of triggering Chinese intervention," said Max Boot, American historian. The Domino Theory, which argued that if one country fell to communist forces, then all of the surrounding countries would follow, was first proposed as policy by the Eisenhower administration. It was, and is still, commonly hypothesised that it applied to Vietnam. John F. Kennedy, then a Senator, said in a speech to the American Friends of Vietnam: "Burma, Thailand, India, Japan, the Philippines and obviously Laos and Cambodia are among those whose security would be threatened if the Red Tide of Communism overflowed into Vietnam." In January 1959, the North's Central Committee (of the ruling communist party) issued a secret resolution authorising an "armed struggle". This authorised the southern communists to begin large-scale operations against the South Vietnamese military. North Vietnam provided troops and supplies in earnest, and the infiltration of men and weapons from the north began along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. In his inaugural address after winning the 1960 US presidential elections, John F. Kennedy made the ambitious pledge to "pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and success of liberty." The Legacy of the Korean War has ultimately created the idea of a limited war. Although Kennedy stressed long-range missile parity with the Soviets, he was also interested in using special forces for counterinsurgency warfare in Third World countries threatened by communist insurgencies. Although they were originally intended for use behind front lines after a conventional invasion of Europe, Kennedy believed that the guerrilla tactics employed by special forces such as the Green Berets would be effective in a "brush fire" war in Vietnam. The Kennedy administration remained essentially committed to the Cold War foreign policy inherited from the Truman and Eisenhower administrations. In 1961, the US had 50,000 troops based in Korea, and Kennedy faced a three-part crisis ��" the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion, the construction of the Berlin Wall, and a negotiated settlement between the pro-Western government of Laos and the Pathet Lao communist movement. These made Kennedy believe that another failure on the part of the US to gain control and stop communist expansion would fatally damage US credibility with its allies and his own reputation. Kennedy determined to "draw a line in the sand" and prevent a communist victory in Vietnam, saying, "Now we have a problem making our power credible and Vietnam looks like the place." Kennedy's policy towards South Vietnam rested on the assumption that Diem (first South Vietnam President) and his forces must ultimately defeat the guerrillas on their own. He was against the deployment of American combat troops and observed that "to introduce US forces in large numbers there today, while it might have an initially favourable military impact, would almost certainly lead to adverse political and, in the long run, adverse military consequences." Presumably, what he feared was a strategic ambush like that into which the French had earlier fallen. However, the quality of the South Vietnamese military remained poor. Bad leadership, corruption, and political interference all played a part in emasculating the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. The frequency of guerrilla attacks rose as the insurgency gathered steam. While Hanoi's support for the National Liberation Front (NLF) played a role, South Vietnamese governmental incompetence was at the core of the crisis. Dear Egyptian Mail readers, your contributions to and/or comments on articles published in this corner are welcome. We promise to publish whatever is deemed publishable at the end of this series. [email protected]
