Why did the USA withdraw its forces from Vietnam in 1973? By Laura Reid
The USA’s involvement in Vietnam started in 1954, for a few reasons. Firstly, the Americans were, as always, concerned with the spread of communism. They wanted to stop communism spreading through south-east Asia. They were worried that if one country were to fall to a communist leader, so would neighbouring countries. This was known as the Domino Theory. These reasons for joining the war in Vietnam and the fact that the United States did not want to appear weak were the main reasons that the USA withdrew forces from Vietnam so late, as it took from 1968 when peace talks were made with North Vietnam until 1973 when the majority of soldiers had been withdrawn from Vietnam.
There were many reasons for the USA withdrawing its forces from Vietnam: the tactics of the two armies, the strong anti-war movement in America, the change in public opinion and the one-sided media coverage.
The major turning point for most members of the USA public and government was the Tet Offensive in 1968. Before this event, the US army believed they were winning the war because their casualties and deaths were a lot less than the north-Vietnamese army, who had lost 100,000 soldiers during 1967. The US army had fed the government information that the war was going well and that they were much closer to winning than in reality. In January 1968 the Vietcong and the NVA attacked towns and bases of South Vietnamese troops all over South Vietnam. Thousands of troops died during the attack and it came as a complete shock to America who thought that they had been close to winning the war. The USA government and public felt betrayed and misled by the army from whom they had been receiving positive information about the war, suddenly they realised that the Vietcong were a lot stronger than expected.
Events such as this along with many others, such as My Lai, search and destroy missions, and the use of chemical warfare by the USA, were all exposed by media coverage. This and the change in public opinions about the war were the most significant reasons for the withdrawal of troops from Vietnam. The Vietnam War was the first to ever have full media coverage due to the improvement in technology. People were able to see exactly how awful this was really was, not only for their own soldiers but for the north-Vietnamese especially. The coverage was particularly one-sided, showing how awfully the US army was behaving. The US public were becoming unnerved by the actions of their young soldiers, who were being seen to destroy homes, set fires to areas, and massacre villages. The terrible use of napalm bombs was exposed and an extremely famous and shocking photo was published showing a young girl covered in napalm jelly. The public were also shocked when witnessing the execution of a Vietcong suspect in 1968, live on television. These examples of the media coverage show how the USA could have been led to believe that American troops were doing awful things and that the war should be ended. This one-sided media coverage led to actions being taken by the public to force the government to end the war. The public were gradually changing their views to realise how awful warfare was. At the same time a culture change was happening in the USA, guided by hippies. People believed in love, not war and this generated anti-war feelings. Protests were held by many university students all over USA and the world, putting increasing pressure on the government. This was again exposed by the media so that everyone heard about the protests. People being called to war by the draft, were refusing to go and instead burning their draft papers, not in secret however, but on television as a form of protest. In May 1970 protests on campus became out of control at Kent State University. 4 students died and a few were injured as a result of gun-fire from the National Guardsmen. This incident sparked off hundreds of protests all over the USA. The public were appalled that this sort of massacre had happened on American soil to members of the public who had a right to protest. Again, fuelled by the media, the whole of the USA were in shock and therefore put more pressure on the government to end the war and pull out of Vietnam.
