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The Korean War and Vietnam in Hindsight

Fiona said:
Serious question. What is it about these countries that makes you think it was justified to launch a war in the first place? What were you fighting for ?
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Who is "you"?

I suppose the Allies could have allowed Japan to keep both Indochina and the entire Korean peninsula in return for abandoning their Pacific island chains. I am sure they would have agreed if they were also allowed to keep the Netherlands East Indies and a guarantee of free shipping lanes back to the home islands.

That would have prevented both the Korean and Vietnam wars. Case closed.
 
dudalb said:
I have to point out that North Vietnam was....and is... a dictatorshop.
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And that's why the US, striving to spread democracy around the world, supported someone like Diem who, like Batista, Castillo, Pinochet, Videla and Suharto, to name a few other US allies, was noted for his democratic and human rights track record.

dudalb said:
I don't find the legtimacy argument compelling.
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I'm not surprised. The irony that the USA supports the side that doesn't want elections is apparently lost on you?

But I'd like to go one step further. Don't think of the ideologies involved. Just think of "self determination of the people". I don't get this whole (temporary) division of Vietnam. In 1945, the French returned to Vietnam to reassert their position as the colonial occupier. They set up a "government" in South Vietnam as a pure puppet regime. In 1945-1954, the Southern regime and army fought on the side of their colonial occupiers. They were collaborators. And they get rewarded with half of the country. WTF? Do you think that Pétain in 1945 should have kept his half of France?

And IMHO, that the US took over the role of the French here is quite inconsequential. The French didn't have enough manpower to keep up the job as they had other fish to fry - in case, I think, Algerians to torture.
 
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theprestige said:
Considering how people have fared everywhere communist regimes have gained power, and considering how agressively the Soviet Union and the PRC were promoting communist revolutions everywhere they could, I'm going to stay firmly on the side of "preventing the spread of communism is a good idea".
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Could you please explain to me how many soldiers, aircraft, and ships it takes to prevent a people from changing their form of government?
 
Puppycow said:
In hindsight, given what a human tragedy as well as security threat North Korea has been for decades, it seems like we should have fought the war until it was finished, if victory was possible. However, I don't know how much more it would have taken to win the war. I shudder to think about what might have happened if we hadn't intervened and the North had taken over the whole peninsula.

On the other hand, Vietnam has not been much of a security threat since we left, and today you can visit there and talk with the locals and it seems to be evolving into a comparatively benign country (compared to North Korea). This suggests to me that we should have gotten out a lot sooner. Besides, there is no longer any South/North divide in Vietnam like in Korea.

I'm not sure what lessons we can learn from this other than that we can't really know what the long-term consequences will be when we end an overseas war.
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I don't think the ultimate shape of either country had that much to do with us. We have incredible ability to blow things up, smash, destroy, protect, and defend - but I think armies are irrelevant to ideology.
 
ddt said:
Quite. After Ho Chi Minh's forces had driven the French out, 1954, at the Geneva conference, the country was temporarily divided in two regions. Within two years, in both regions elections should have been held and the country reunited. There were elections in North Vietnam. The US backed dictatorship of Diem in the South did not hold elections.

It's quite clear how (un)justified the US' involvement in Vietnam was. The South Vietnamese regime had no legitimacy at all.
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By that logic, the north didn't have any legitimacy either, as the elections there were rigged.
 
Essentially, the West (French and then US) were fighting alongside a brutal puppet government they could manipulate for their own benefit while the communist regimes (USSR and China) were trying to spread another brutal puppet government that they could manipulate for their own benefit.

Legitimacy and the will and well being of "the people" had nothing to do with that save for a cynical propaganda tool...
 
Simon39759 said:
Essentially, the West (French and then US) were fighting alongside a brutal puppet government they could manipulate for their own benefit while the communist regimes (USSR and China) were trying to spread another brutal puppet government that they could manipulate for their own benefit.

Legitimacy and the will and well being of "the people" had nothing to do with that save for a cynical propaganda tool...
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Quiz question: who petitioned - citing the US declaration of independence and Wilson's 14 points - the delegates of the 1919 Versailles conference to grant his country independence?
 
Fiona said:
Serious question. What is it about these countries that makes you think it was justified to launch a war in the first place? What were you fighting for ?
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Domino theory was very much in force 50's-70's.
 
Very different wars. What most folks think of as victory was not possible in either case. We went nose-to-nose with Communism in at least a dozen places in 1945-85. Most times, nothing happened. These two got out of hand.
 
ImaginalDisc said:
Could you please explain to me how many soldiers, aircraft, and ships it takes to prevent a people from changing their form of government?
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Depends on the situation. In some cases, none at all. In others, no amount is great enough to do the job.

In between, we have situations like the Korean Peninsula, where the spread of communism was halted through outright warfare, and could possibly have been rolled back further up the peninsula to the Korea-China border with a greater application of force. Similarly in Vietnam. The North Vietnamese Army (communist, intent on establishing a PRC-backed communist hegemony in the region) was almost entirely used up during the spectacular but disastrous Tet Offensive. A greater application of force at that time, rather than a systematic retreat and withdrawal, would have almost certainly resulted in decisive defeat for the communist forces in Vietnam.

Then, of course, there's the case of Eastern Europe at the end of World War 2 and during the Cold War. Had the western allies been willing to apply force against the Soviet Union immediately following the fall of Nazi Germany, the Eastern European nations might have peacefully elected socialist governments, but certainly would not have suffered for two generations under the tyrannical and inhumane Stalinist regime of the Soviet Union.

And let's not forget the FARC. The Colombian people don't seem to be in any hurry to vote themselves a communist regime. Not being an expert in such matters, I can't give you an exact amount of force would be necessary to root the rebels out of their mountain camps, but I'm sure it's finite, and well within the resources of any one of several powers in the Americas.
 
theprestige said:
And let's not forget the FARC. The Colombian people don't seem to be in any hurry to vote themselves a communist regime. Not being an expert in such matters, I can't give you an exact amount of force would be necessary to root the rebels out of their mountain camps, but I'm sure it's finite, and well within the resources of any one of several powers in the Americas.
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but what would the consequences of this be? Would the elimination of the FARC mean an end to a socialist counterforce in Colombia - or simply result in a mutation?

This kind of thinking is at the root of a lot of drawn out wars: we see it in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Israel, Chechnya and on and on down the line. If only we could "eliminate" the Taliban/Chechens/FARC/Vietnames Commies, then we'd have everything fixed!

What supports all of these guerilla/resistance movements though are the people of the country. For every fighter there are 10 non-fighters in ideological and social alignment.

In my opinion, I have not seen ANY example of where a swamp was successfully "drained".

I've seen cases where after years of extreme brutality the forces have been temporarily bullied into submission (Chechnya) but most governments don't have the will, political capital or the capacity to effect that kind of evil in order to achieve their end.

So what we're left with are never-ending conflicts while the dominant power pursues its fantasy of completely eliminating its opponent - not realizing that the very pursuit of such a policy ensures its continued failure.

Even the "success" of Russia in chechnya is a mirage: the region is still ripe for resistance even if it has been pummelled into temporary submission.

The blood spilt will echoe down the generations until once again Russia will be forced to either: put them down brutally again, or come to some kind of political recognition of their opponents that involves power-sharing and some degree of autonomy. Recall the years when FARC had a safe-haven: violence levels were at an all time low.

Remove the safe-haven and pursue a policy of elimination and you end up making things worse for everyone.
 
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theprestige said:
Then, of course, there's the case of Eastern Europe at the end of World War 2 and during the Cold War. Had the western allies been willing to apply force against the Soviet Union immediately following the fall of Nazi Germany, the Eastern European nations might have peacefully elected socialist governments, but certainly would not have suffered for two generations under the tyrannical and inhumane Stalinist regime of the Soviet Union.
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I don't think so. I thought the Yalta Conference had pretty much sliced up Eastern Europe between the Allies and that was that. You also have to keep in mind: how much more willing were the Allies to fight another long, protracted war against a former ally, who, by the way, was better equipped both militarily and in their ability to self-sacrifice and fight in the winter? Eventually, a land conflict with the USSR would involve fighting in the winter an one has been able to beat the Russian winter.

Thanks to Stalin's duplicitous behavior, a Cold War in Europe and abroad was inevitable.

And insofar as China's involvement in the Korean War, I was told by a Chinese national that the only reason China got involved is that Mao's son was killed in action fighting for North Korea and Mao felt the need for revenge. I don't know how true that is, and neither do I have a source that I can cite, but it would seem to make sense. Perhaps someone could help set that straight.

Michael
 
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coalesce said:
I don't think so. I thought the Yalta Conference had pretty much sliced up Eastern Europe between the Allies and that was that. You also have to keep in mind: how much more willing were the Allies to fight another long, protracted war against a former ally, who, by the way, was better equipped both militarily and in their ability to self-sacrifice and fight in the winter? Eventually, a land conflict with the USSR would involve fighting in the winter an one has been able to beat the Russian winter.
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Please refer to the context of my post: ImaginalDisc implied that application of force could not prevent the spread of communism. I disagree, and gave examples where the application of force did prevent or could have prevented the spread of communism.

That the western allies opted not to oppose by force the Soviet expansion into Eastern Europe is a matter of historical record. I do not dispute it. It's also a matter of historical record that Churchill, for one, believed that such an opposition by force was desireable, even if unlikely to find acceptance among the allied populace. And I happen to think that such an application of force, had it been made, would have resulted in a much better outcome for Poland, Chzechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, etc. than the Yalta conference did.
 
dudalb said:
Which is a sad commentary on the stupidity of the Human Race.
If anybody can point out why Communism in practice..forget the theoritical utopia....was much better then Nazism, please do so.
Both were ruthless totalrian systems which murdered millions. Communism just was better at PR, that's all.
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Hitler wasn't content to carry out his tyranny within the borders of Germany and felt the need to invade all of his neighbors.
 
coalesce said:
I don't think so. I thought the Yalta Conference had pretty much sliced up Eastern Europe between the Allies and that was that. You also have to keep in mind: how much more willing were the Allies to fight another long, protracted war against a former ally, who, by the way, was better equipped both militarily and in their ability to self-sacrifice and fight in the winter? Eventually, a land conflict with the USSR would involve fighting in the winter an one has been able to beat the Russian winter.

Thanks to Stalin's duplicitous behavior, a Cold War in Europe and abroad was inevitable.

And insofar as China's involvement in the Korean War, I was told by a Chinese national that the only reason China got involved is that Mao's son was killed in action fighting for North Korea and Mao felt the need for revenge. I don't know how true that is, and neither do I have a source that I can cite, but it would seem to make sense. Perhaps someone could help set that straight.

Michael
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As Heinlein pointed out - at the time- we were the only ones with Atomics. (re:Soviets, etc.)
 
coalesce said:
Thanks to Stalin's duplicitous behavior, a Cold War in Europe and abroad was inevitable.
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Both Kennan and Barraclough suggest that it wouldn't have mattered who ran Russia or whether they were communist or not. The Russians would still have demanded a free hand in Eastern Europe and the dismantlement of German military productive capacity.

Whether this would have cascaded across the continents and the oceans is a moot point but it is overwhelmingly evident that no Russian policymaker wanted a repetition of 1917 and 1941.
 
Puppycow said:
Hitler wasn't content to carry out his tyranny within the borders of Germany and felt the need to invade all of his neighbors.
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Uh, Poland ,Finland and those countries who has the experience of being "liberated" by The Soviet Union might say that Stalin was not much better about it then Hitler, only a little smarter in knowing how far he could go at a time.
 
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