[dctoedt]

FTA: the defeat of American troops and fall of Saigon in 1975

This is a bit misleading: Yes, strategically the U.S. was defeated in 1975, but U.S. troops had pulled out in 1973, having essentially never been beaten on the battlefield — not that it matters, of course.

[kergonath]

You can indeed lose a war whilst having won all the battles.

[Muromec]

A gesture of good will as they say. They never wanted to get to redacted in three days anyway.

[neves]

Have you ever seen the videos of American fleeing Saigon?

[dctoedt]

> Have you ever seen the videos of American fleeing Saigon?

Yes. I was a serving Navy officer at the time. My above comment stands.

[Spooky23]

That’s really splitting hairs. The Republic of Vietnam was a dead man walking, but it was a United States puppet state, and they finally collapsed in 1975.

The cope stuff of “never beaten in the battlefield” is just bullshit. The point of fighting a war is to win. The military bureaucrats tried to apply kill counts as a proxy for victory.

The army pulled out but everything didn’t just end. There was a variety of covert and semi-covert American presence remaining, both in terms of CIA people and “sheep dipped” contractors.

[dctoedt]

> That’s really splitting hairs.

As software people are keenly aware, accuracy in writing is important.

> The Republic of Vietnam was a dead man walking, but it was a United States puppet state, and they finally collapsed in 1975.

I don't disagree. In hindsight, the U.S.'s political strategy was disastrous. American decisionmakers — like all of us — had to make their best judgments based on education and experience (and the often-malign influence of groupthink). Some factors were especially salient:

• As WWII ended, the "Atlanticists" in the State Department supported France's insistence on retaining their Southeast Asian colonies (IIRC, because the U.S. wanted a strong anticommunist France to help stand up to Stalin and the Red Army after Germany's surrender). Also IIRC, FDR was inclined to support Ho Chi Minh's independence movement, but he was gravely ill by then.

• The American political class was very much aware of the lessons of Munich in 1938; of Stalin's conquest of Eastern Europe in 1945; and of North Korea's invasion of South Korea in 1950. It wasn't unreasonable for them to fear the spread of totalitarian communism.

• The governing Democratic Party was acutely aware of the political impact of McCarthyism in the 1950s, including being incessantly attacked by the GOP for having "lost" China in 1949 (as if China was ours to lose).

• Douglas MacArthur's advice to President Kennedy — not to put troops on the ground in Asia — didn't carry the day. [0]

Those interested in this debacle should read David Halberstam's magisterial book The Best and the Brightest. [1]

[0] https://thediplomat.com/2018/10/a-new-take-on-general-macart...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best_and_the_Brightest

[Refreeze5224]

And I would recommend Kill Anything That Moves: The Real American War in Vietnam - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12292260-kill-anything-t...