(3) VIETNAM WAR (1954-1975)

 

The iconic twentieth century war after 1945 – as visual image in popular culture or imagination, and as metaphor and archetype in history or politics.

In terms of visual image in popular culture or imagination, Vietnam is a war most people can see in their mind’s eye, whether accurate or not. I have a theory that we all have a mythic or psychic geography of cities and landmarks we can see in our mind’s eye or psyche – and so too we each have a mythic or psychic history. And Vietnam looms large in our modern mythology.

It originates from the modern proliferation of visual images that inform our mythic or psychic geography and history – predominantly on screen in film or television. For Vietnam, there was the prevalence of images from the war itself, often stylized as the first war fought on television, which was a substantial part of why the American civilian population and government turned against it, as well as fictional depictions of it in American mass media and popular culture.

The imagery from the war itself endured beyond the defeat of the Americans or of South Vietnam in those fictional depictions, including my favorite film of all time, Apocalypse Now. As such, Vietnam lent itself to the most enduring iconic images of war in the twentieth century – the ubiquitous choppers or helicopters, the Viet Cong or Charlie, napalm, fragging, My Lai, Tet, the fall of Saigon, and so on.

And the endurance of the Vietnam War in history is also in large part because of its historical significance, not least because it continues as an enduring historical Rorschach test or metaphor. President Kennedy famously quipped that while victory has a thousand fathers, defeat is an orphan. Ironically, however, that quip doesn’t apply to Vietnam, where almost everyone seems to claim it as vindication for their own ideas or ideologies – although the only ones who might do so unequivocally would be the Vietnamese themselves.

Our entry here is for the Vietnam War involving the United States in varying levels of engagement from about 1954, with the height of its military engagement from about 1965 to 1972. However, that war was also the Second Indochina War, following almost directly from the First Indochina War 1945-1954 against the French colonial regime – and in turn followed by the Third Indochina War 1975-1991, primarily between Vietnam and Cambodia but also the brief Sino-Vietnamese War against Vietnam’s former Chinese ally. And arguably these are part of a long line of Vietnam Wars, dating back to Vietnamese resistance to Imperial China and the Mongols.

American historiography of the war often poses the questions of whether the war was justifiable or moral, and whether it was winnable – with a tendency to answer both questions in the negative, although that is clouded by the historical reality of defeat on one hand and parallels with the Korean War on the other. It’s as much a part of that historical Rorschach test as the rest of the war.

At very least, the Americans should have queried how they could improve upon the French defeat, let alone double down on it. In this, ironically, they lapsed into similar errors of military judgement as Germany in both world wars in their failure to understand the nature of war, which involved understanding the limitations of military force in war and limitations of national power in the world.

I’ve seen arguments, with various degrees of persuasive force although I have yet to be persuaded by them, as to how the United States might have “won” – interestingly, these seem to cluster either near its starting point or its finishing point, with the former being more persuasive for obvious reasons, although with the obvious counterpoint that not starting it at all may have been better yet.

Finally, as a historical archetype, Vietnam seems to combine most of the predominant threads of war in the twentieth century – anti-colonial war or war of independence, civil war, proxy war, and most famously above all, guerrilla war or insurgency, perhaps the definitive type of war in the twentieth century (and beyond).

 

ART OF WAR

It’s been famously said that the Americans won all the battles but lost the war. However, almost as famous is the Vietnamese rejoinder (to Col. Harry Summers Jr) – “That may be so. But it is also irrelevant.” And so it was, as for the Vietnamese, the Vietnam War was not about battles but winning the war – which was a matter of endurance or outlasting their adversary.

It, along with other successful modern insurgencies, has often led to observations of guerrilla warfare as synonymous with, or even definitive of the art of war. Not so much in pre-modern history – although it did occur in the right circumstances, you don’t tend to hear too much of successful guerrilla warfare, because states were prepared to wipe out or displace entire populations to eliminate resistance.

However, counter-insurgency in modern warfare is notoriously tricky. There is arguably a modern, smart way of winning against insurgency, or there remains the more brutal way, but few modern states have demonstrated the means or above all patience to achieve the former without invariably lapsing into the latter or something resembling it. Just ask the Americans about the coup against Diem, My Lai, the bombing, napalm, Agent Orange or the Phoenix program.

Of course, insurgency can be tricky as well. After all, what do you do with all your forces while you are avoiding all those battles – but at the same time hoping to expand your political control? Insurgencies often default to a brutal answer – killing civilians. You know, those civilian collaborators or representatives of your enemy. Even those insurgencies seen as the “good” ones. Just ask the city of Hue during the Tet Offensive.

 

WORLD WAR

Vietnam as world war? Surely not? Although even in strict terms of combat, Vietnam was not that localized as a battlefield. It was after all the Indochina War – expanding to Laos and Cambodia, while also involving China and Thailand at its borders.

Beyond that, it evolved from being part of one world war to another. The Vietnamese resistance to French colonialism was caught up in the Second World War – involving Americans, Chinese, Japanese and British one way or another in Indochina. And after the Second World War, the Americans sponsored the French in the First Indochina War, before becoming involved more directly in the Second Indochina War after France was defeated. And that was part of the larger cold war – with the Soviet Union and China provided substantial aid or forces to North Vietnam, while Australia, South Korea and the Philippines all provided combat forces to support the Americans and South Vietnam.

 

STILL FIGHTING THE VIETNAM WAR

The stereotypical Vietnam veteran is or was often depicted as “”still fighting the Vietnam War” – I’m not sure to what extent that stereotype is accurate, such as whether they may have had disproportionately high rates of PTSD. Beyond that, the Vietnam War cast a long shadow, particularly with refugees and persistent allegations of MIAs or prisoners retained by Vietnam.

For the actual Vietnam War, we’re not still fighting it. If anything, Vietnam is probably more positive or even a potential ally towards the United States than it is to its former ally, China.

But for the Vietnam War as enduring imagery, metaphor and archetype, we’re still fighting the Vietnam War – with new wars constantly being compared to it.

 

GOOD GUYS AND BAD GUYS

Defeat may be more an orphan – and never more so than in terms of morality for the defeated. Not many people these days tend to argue for the Americans as the good guys, although that begs the question of how one distinguishes it from, say, the Korean War, which tends not to be seen in the same terms.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****

S-TIER (GOD TIER)