IF YOU WONDER HOW THE U.S. GOT INTO THE WAR IN VIETNAM--

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000200410001-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 9, 1999
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: September 13, 1965
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

~r- YOUMYOMDER HOW THI; U*S9
E
G 0 T IIO Y ~ml 2 VIA R ll4 VllTNAM-
question keep's coming .up: How did the U. S. ever get into the war in Viet-
The
nam? What started, it? And when? And why? Did the U. S. pick this spot to make
a stand against the Communists? On these pages, a Washington newsman traces
the history of the Vietnam crisis from its beginnings a quarter of a century ago.
CPYROHT
i
by Paul Martin
Washington Bureau. Chief
for the
Gannett Group . of Newspapers
'.CPYRGHT
Many Americans are wondering how the United States got
so involved in the war in Southeast Asia.
This is a significant chapter in the Communist design for
postwar territorial expansion, a story of foreign intrigue that .
goes back to the breakup of the old world order in the chaos
of World War II.
Before the war, three associated states of Indo-China
Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam-were under French colonial
rule.
Taking advantage of the prostrate condition of Vichy
France in 1941, the Japanese occupied Indo-China and used
it as a base for further attacks on Thailand, Burma, Malaya,'
Indonesia, and the Philippines.
During the war in the Pacific, 1941-45, the United States
provided military aid to Ho Chi Minh, a Moscow-trained.
Communist and veteran Soviet agent who led a native re-
sistance movement against the Japanese in Indo-China.
President Roosevelt and Marshal Stalin of the Soviet Union
d:_C4.:ss 'd the iu ':.: a c'. Ti~+~u~l' sue. i
in ebe_-aa in. 1943 and Yalta in 1945.
looSeVe]t pmn0Se3 that the area he p.a,'e.3 'z e.; ;Come
kind of international trusteeship at the war's end, to prepare
the people for independence in perhaps 20 to 30 years.
Stalin agreed. The Communist leader said he did not pro-
pose to have the Allies shed blood to return Indo-China to
French masters, whom he termed "rotten" and' "corrupt."
Roosevelt said Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek had assured
him that China had no postwar designs on Southeast Asia.
When the French tried to regain their position in Indo-
China after the war, Ho Chi Minh seized power, proclaimed
a "people's republic," and fired on Hanoi, Dec. 19, 1946,
starting " fVLF0l . Release 1999/09/07 CI
56
The policy of American military and economic assistance
to anti-Communist forces in the area started in 1950:. under
the Truman Administration.
The U. S. Government agreed to provide arms and am-
munition to French Union forces fighting the Communist-led
Viet Minh in Indo-China. Another agreement for dilact eco-
nomic aid to Vietnam was signed in 1951.
Altogether, the U. S. paid approximately 3 billion dollars
of the costs of the losing French struggle against the Viet
Minh. 'After the Communists completed their conquest of
China in 1949, the Viet Minh were supplied across the bor- '
der from Red China.
When Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower took office as Presi-
dent in 1953, world attention was focused on the Korean
War, which had been going on for 2;I years.
Mr. Eisenhower sent word to Peiping by Prime Minister
Nehru of India that, unless truce talks showed satisfactory
progress, the U. S. intended to "move decisively without in-
in o< U- of w p a,:4 .w-culd to 1=,;er be re-
sponsible for confining hostilities to the Korean Peninsula."
An ar ce was a; Panmta?, July 2-6. I9?aR
ending three years of warfare in Korea, at a cost of 157,530 -
American casualties, including 54,246 dead.
The struggle for supremacy in Asia shifted to Indo-China.
Mr. Eisenhower gives a lengthy account in his' book ."Man-
date for Change" (Doubleday, 1961) :
"Toward the end of 1953, the effect of the termination of'
hostilities in Korea began to be felt in Indo-China.... The
Chinese Communists now were able to spare greatly in-
creased quantities of materiel in the form of guns and ammu-
9 W(Y14$ 0b2tfQft1,8r use on the In-
U.S. NEWS i WORLD REPORT, Sept. 19. 1905