It could be argued that Truman had played an important role in Vietnam financially, which led to further US involvement. Truman gave France $2 Billion, 78% of their costs. Truman also gave $50 billion in economic aid to the region. Truman related the Vietnam conflict with the Cold War and therefore believed that the Vietminh were taking orders from Stalin. The Truman doctrine gave USA a reason to intervene into the situation. Truman was still receiving criticism for the loss of China, and with this in mind he couldn’t afford for there to be another communist country in the east. Truman needed to show that he was still against communism but at the same time even though Truman gave financial aid to the French, he didn’t want military involvement or to send troops to South East Asia. Truman had a deeper concern with European affairs in the 1940’s and Korea in 1950’s. In one of Truman’s speeches he said “We are gradually increasing our stake in the outcome of the struggle…we are dangerously close to the point of being so deeply committed to direct intervention. These situations, unfortunately, have a way of snowballing.” This shows that Truman had given the Vietnam War serious consideration and thought, he was cautious about his actions and to a certain extent he was careful with his actions.
Eisenhower feared that if Indo-China fell to communisms that the surrounding countries would follow, this is similar to Kennedy’s statement of Vietnam being the cornerstone of containment. This was called the domino effect because the Americans believed that the surrounding countries would fall to communism one by one in a similar fashion to dominoes. Eisenhower continued Truman’s policy of giving aid to the French because he believed that the USA had to give some support to the French. In addition to this Eisenhower also sent 300 US personnel to help France, this was the first American personnel put into South East Asia. Despite the fact that the Americans had sent in personnel the French surrendered with 7,200 dead and 11,000 taken as prisoners. At Geneva in 1054 the Geneva Accords, a peace settlement, was agreed. In 1956 it was intended that a general election would be held for all four countries that made up Indo-China, Laos, Cambodia, North and South Vietnam. America never agreed to this because they believed that if an election was called Ho Chi Minh would win on average 80% of the votes. Therefore the USA didn’t sign the Geneva Accords and they enlisted Ngo Dinh Diem as leader of South Vietnam. Immediately the amount of aid given was increased to $500 million a year, and more ‘advisors’ were sent in. By 1960, there were over 1,500 US personnel in South East Asia. The USA, led by Eisenhower, was gradually increasing its involvement and power in Vietnam.
Diem was what America called ‘the best of a bad bunch’, he wasn’t the most popular Prime minister, he was Catholic in a predominantly Buddhist country. It seemed as if he had no compassion for the peasants, and it looked as if he abused his power to give jobs to his family. Many people opposed the government of Diem. It would seem that Eisenhower’s decisions led to a downward spiral of knock-on effects that resulted in America being heavily involved in the Vietnam situation, although he kept on Truman’s policy. It would seem as though Truman and Eisenhower increased US involvement considerably. It was for this reason that they suffered a lot of opposition through the media, people of America and advisors.
The Truman doctrine played a vital role in both Presidents careers as well as the many others that succeeded them such as kennedy, Johnson and even Nixon. Eisenhower was more passive that Truman, but this doesn’t meant that he shouldn’t be held equally responsible for the situation in Vietnam.
