what summarizes the human cost of the vietnam war?

OMB tables for FY2017 show total cost of homeland defense for all Departments and agencies was $71.8 billion in FY2015, $72.9 billion with supplemental, $71.7 billion in FY2016, and $70.5 billion in FY2017. The United States entered Vietnam with the principal purpose of preventing a communist takeover of the region. Once again, a valid approach to resourcing and costing the war must look beyond the number of military personnel and justify the total number of personnel. Psychologically, the effects ran even deeper. Yes, to me (who served in Vietnam with the US Army for 11 months in 1970) it seemed like an utter waste of time and resources. It also has been revised to show the FY2018 costs of the U.S. train and assist missions in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria in depth. The Vietnam War (article) | 1960s America | Khan Academy The difficulties in defining military expenditures do create differences in estimates of the percent of GDP, but they are comparatively minor. Neighbouring countries Laos and Cambodia both suffered enormous human loss and material devastation, as well as the rise of terroristic and genocidal regimes. . Some declared that Vietnam was a nationalist conflict that Washington had no business intervening in. ^1 1. Updates? Between July 1966 and December 1973, more than 503,000 U.S. military personnel deserted, and a robust anti-war movement among American forces spawned violent protests, killings and mass incarcerations of personnel stationed in Vietnam as well as within the United States. Meanwhile, the United States, its military demoralized and its civilian electorate deeply divided, began a process of coming to terms with defeat in what had been its longest and most controversial war. There was little that had not been bombed, blasted or shot up from roads to railways, buildings to bridges, ports to power stations. Which best describes the cost of the Vietnam War in human terms? I have a question about the draft: how were the young man selected? More than 3 million people (including over 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War, and more than half of the dead were Vietnamese civilians. Cost and force size pressures also tend to create pressure to rely on sudden and temporary "surges," which may or may not be effective, and the use of short rotations and temporary duty personnelaffecting levels of experience and capability. World War II. Do you mean which of those statements is accurate on the death toll of both sides? That is simply how they viewed the war from their perspective. US Air Force commander Curtis Le May once threatened to bomb [Vietnam] back to the Stone Age, a promise that was very nearly delivered. Metrics showing allied funding and aid activity help put the U.S. spending effort in the proper perspective. This is especially true when the U.S. deploys large ground combat units, where civilians and contractors have become critical parts of the "tooth to tail" ratio. He believed that if one Southeast Asian nation fell to communism, more would follow. The human costs of the long conflict were harsh for all involved. The Vietnam War was a 19-year conflict involving Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. The latter report, Another report by Lynn M. Williams and Susan B. Epstein, The GAO has examined the way in which the Department of Defense includes and does not include the cost of war in the OCO account. The U.S. military has estimated that between 200,000 and 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers died. All Rights Reserved. These defoliants denuded large areas of Vietnam, leaving farmland barren and untouchable for several years. Direct link to David Alexander's post Question 1: "did it seem , Posted 4 years ago. The Human Cost Of The Vietnam War | Jungle War | War Stories AN ARMY NURSE RECALLS VIETNAM`S HUMAN COST - Chicago Tribune He authorized a series of bombing campaigns, most notably Operation Rolling Thunder, and also committed hundreds of thousands of US ground troops to the fight. Failing to address casualties does not defuse the issues they raise or the reality that they too are a cost of war. Oh, I think that if you consider the Holocaust or the slaughters at the time of Indian partition, you might find things more horrible. The total military deaths for all countries have been estimated at 1.3 million, of whom 58,000 were Americans. HISTORY.com works with a wide range of writers and editors to create accurate and informative content. Opposition to the war in the United States bitterly divided Americans, even after President Richard Nixon signed the Paris Peace Accords and ordered the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973. Use the notes you completed during the lesson to summarize the reasons the United States aided France in Vietnam. Vietnamese farmers could not return to some areas for years and when they did, they faced the danger of triggering landmines and unexploded aerial bombs left by departing forces. What were the assumptions underlying the US involvement in Southeast Asia? The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. Which is correct? For America, True 'Victory' In Vietnam Was Not Worth The Cost Only limited break outs of these key data are provided by war. military knowledge. Several charts summarize GAO criticism of the way DoD included given costs in the OCO account, and indicate that DoD may correct its reporting in the future. It establishes a seemingly U.S. Military Spending: The Cost of Wars - Center for Strategic and What is even more striking, is the failure of both recent presidents and the Congress to properly analyze and justify the cost of America's wars. This caused a refugee crisis and thousands of deaths at sea, forcing Western nations to accept large numbers of refugees. The defeat in Vietnam, they argued, was a betrayal of the US military by civilian politicians. Fearful that the war would jeopardize his domestic agenda, Johnson concealed the extent of the military escalation from the American public. The end result in both countries was a resurgence in threat capabilities that forced the U.S. to redeploygreatly increasing the marginal cost of the war. It affected 700,000 American veterans. Between two million and three million people are believed to have fled these countries in the aftermath of the Vietnam War. Reporting by the Executive Branch seems almost designed to obscure the real costs of conflict, and avoid linking them to an examination of strategy, its effectiveness, and the prospects for conflict termination. Military Resources: Vietnam War | National Archives By the end of 1967, Hanois communist leadership was growing impatient as well, and sought to strike a decisive blow aimed at forcing the better-supplied United States to give up hopes of success. I can only speak for myself. Given the estimates that the real costs are already well over $4 trillion, these multipliers would be more than doubled if any of the alternative war costs cited earlier are correct. There were debates and recriminations over American involvement and a loss of faith in the US government. Inscribed on the black granite walls are the names of more than 58,000 men and women who gave their lives or remain missing. Further, without such an estimate, there is no credible basis for either Executive Branch or Congressional review of the budgets and plans for such wars, much less of the ability to effectively execute given strategies, and provide credible indicators of the cost effectiveness and progress of key elements of military and civil activity. The costs of the Vietnam War They illustrate two reporting problems: The charts and tables in this section focus on total DoD spending by year, and OCO expenditure by war. After Hos communist forces took power in the north, armed conflict between northern and southern armies continued until the northern Viet Minhs decisive victory in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954. Seeking to regain control of the region, France backed Emperor Bao and set up the state of Vietnam in July 1949, with the city of Saigon as its capital. Definition of human cost in the Definitions.net dictionary. Work by Todd Harrison, for example, shows that total U.S. defense-related costs totaled some $905 billion in FY2017: At the same time, if one does use the $619.7 billion total for the U.S., it is: U.S. military spending has risen steadily over time, but without any serious net assessment of the patterns in that growth, the comparative efficiency of U.S. spending on baseline and war activity, and how allied and potential threat states use their budgets and resources. They are more than 18 times more expensive than the first Gulf War in 1991. Homeland defense has become more expensive than any ongoing U.S. war or active combat effort. The economic and human costs of the Vietnam War were devastating. America was deeply affected by these heavy losses and struggled to understand the meaning, significance and lessons of the Vietnam War. What can you le Though the issue remains contentious, these increased rates have been linked to their exposure to Agent Orange. During the Vietnam War's official duration (4 August 1964-27 January 1973), 1,631 Sailors and 13,095 Marines were killed in action; 4,178 and 51,392 respectively were wounded. Authors: Jennifer Llewellyn, Jim Southey, Steve Thompson The nation spent more than $120 billion on the conflict in Vietnam from 1965-73; this massive spending led to widespread inflation, exacerbated by a worldwide oil crisis in 1973 and skyrocketing fuel prices. In 1995 Vietnam released its official estimate of the number of people killed during the Vietnam War: as many as 2,000,000 civilians on both sides and some 1,100,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong fighters. Direct link to Davin V Jones's post That is simply how they v, Posted 5 months ago. If you're behind a web filter, please make sure that the domains *.kastatic.org and *.kasandbox.org are unblocked. War between North and South Vietnam continued, however, until April 30, 1975, when DRV forces captured Saigon, renaming it Ho Chi Minh City (Ho himself died in 1969). In January 1973, the United States and North Vietnam concluded a final peace agreement, ending open hostilities between the two nations. People were killed during the war. Vinh (population 72,000), Vietnam's Dresden, was subjected to 4,131 attacks over a four year period (and 4,700 overall in the war), resulting in the destruction of nearly of all of its homes, 31 schools, the university, four hospitals, the main bookstore and cinema and two churches along with an historic 18th century Buddhist pagoda that served as cultural center of the city, a museum of the . Learn about the war that enmeshed the United States in a battle against communism in Southeast Asia for more than twenty years. This not only claimed lives but also devastated cities, buildings, infrastructure, farmland and vegetation. The Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) in the north was supported by the Soviet Union, China, and other communist countries, while the United States and its anticommunist allies backed the Republic of Vietnam (ROV) in the south. In March 1965, Johnson made the decisionwith solid support from the American publicto send U.S. combat forces into battle in Vietnam. If you're seeing this message, it means we're having trouble loading external resources on our website. Anne's diary helped the world understand what it was like living in hiding during Though the majority of Vietnam veterans returned home without serious problems, a large number found the readjustment to civilian life difficult. It granted him broad latitude in handling the struggle against communism in Southeast Asia. More than 1.3 million Vietnamese soldiers and about 58,000 U.S. troops were killed. Johnson was motivated by both domestic political and international balance of power considerations. 4.3 times the IISS estimate of $145 billion for China, and 2.9 times the SIPIRI estimate of $215 billion. But while Ho and his supporters wanted a nation modeled after other communist countries, Bao and many others wanted a Vietnam with close economic and cultural ties to the West. The Human Cost. The bombing campaign was meant to disrupt the flow of supplies across the Ho Chi Minh trail into Vietnam and to prevent the rise of the Pathet Lao, or Lao communist forces. They are nearly 2.5 times more expensive than the Vietnam War. Would have Kennedy have done equally as bad or worse had he had the chance? The agreement left North Vietnamese army units where they were in South Vietnam, and low-intensity . Reasons for US involvement in Vietnam - The Vietnam War - National 5 By Ward Wilson. There is no break out in the budget request by war of State/USAID and VA spending for FY2016-FY2018. U.S. military advisers, present in small numbers throughout the 1950s, were introduced on a large scale beginning in 1961, and active combat units were introduced in 1965. Under a broad free market policy put in place in 1986, the economy began to improve, boosted by oil export revenues and an influx of foreign capital. Such profiles are a key warning of basic problems in planning, programming, and budgeting. Why did the United States become involved in Vietnam? By November 1967, the number of American troops in Vietnam was approaching 500,000, and U.S. casualties had reached 15,058 killed and 109,527 wounded. Agent Orange not only effected Vietcong but also US Infantry so that was more horrid than anything I could think of of. See answer Advertisement gavrielle Answer: People could not get shelter, resources they needed to survive. Ironically, members of Congress are fond of criticizing the Administration for lacking a strategy. For some young people, the war symbolized a form of unchecked authority they had come to resent. This version has been revised to correct some of the terminology used and to make it clear that there is no way to fully reflect the proposed FY2018 costs of OCO activity because the President has not yet determined the FY2018 level of effort in Afghanistan, and the current OCO budget data for FY2018 are the cost of extending the FY2017 program. Estimates of the number of people killed in Indochina range from two and a half million to more than four million. Fall of Saigon, capture of Saigon by North Vietnamese forces, which occurred from March 4 to April 30, 1975. or a Hoax: How does the More than two decades of violent conflict had inflicted a devastating toll on Vietnams population: After years of warfare, an estimated 2 million Vietnamese were killed, while 3 million were wounded and another 12 million became refugees. American body counts of the enemy were notoriously unreliable and were often little more than ambitious estimates. The status of the FY2018 OCO requests for DoD and State are now highly uncertain and these charts focus on FY2001-FY2017. With the Cold War intensifying worldwide, the United States hardened its policies against any allies of the Soviet Union, and by 1955 President Dwight D. Eisenhower had pledged his firm support to Diem and South Vietnam. Called the American War in Vietnam (or, in full, the War Against the Americans to Save the Nation), the war was also part of a larger regional conflict (see Indochina wars) and a manifestation of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies. The estimated death toll of Us soldiers is 58,200 soldiers and around 200k - 250k vietnam soldiers perished. During the course of the conflict . Confidence in the Domino Theory was undermined, if not destroyed. There were a number of long-term and short-term reasons to explain why the USA became involved in Vietnam in the late 1950s. Two decades of military intervention and bankrolling friendly regimes cost the United States almost $US170 billion (close to $1 trillion in todays terms). Summary This CRS report provides estimates of the costs of major U.S. wars from the American Revolution through current conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. Information and translations of human cost in the most comprehensive dictionary definitions resource on the web. More than 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam, and more than 150,000 were wounded. 4. URL: https://alphahistory.com/vietnamwar/costs-of-the-vietnam-war/ How did the fear of the Soviet Union and Communism affect American culture and society? This, in turn, creates a strong incentive to try to create effective local forces as soon as possible. answer choices He believed it was the duty of the United States to assist all nations in need. The war exacted an enormous human cost: estimates of the number of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians killed range from 966,000 to 3 million. One by Lina J. Blimes puts the total cost at $4 to $6 trillion by end FY2016. Direct link to David Alexander's post Oh, I think that if you c, Posted 4 years ago. by Anthony H. Cordesman. Even if one uses the higher estimate of military spending used by Todd Harrison, the total is now under 6.0%. Some of the papers from the archive of Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971, Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe via Getty Images, https://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/vietnam-war-history. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial stands as a symbol of America's honor and recognition of the men and women who served and sacrificed their lives in the Vietnam War. Human Resource Cost of the War* - JSTOR Home They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Ronald H. Spector is Professor of History and International Affairs in the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University. This report addresses a number of the issues that result from the failure to deal with the cost of America's wars by providing an overview of the historical trends involved, the broader climate of U.S. defense spending, and the data that have been reported on each war as part of the Overseas budget for the Contingency Operations (OCO) account. Meaning of human cost. Direct link to Jeff Kelman's post How come there was a "Vie, Posted 7 years ago. This section compares current total U.S. baseline and war spending with the spending of other states. A Brief History of the Vietnam War: Combatants, Casualties and The figures of U.S.. Five years after the country's partition, the communist leader of North Korea, Kim Il Sung, decided to attempt to reunify Korea under his control. OCO costs alone were 10.3% of $560.7 billion and 9.5% of the total of $619.7 billion. The civil war in Vietnam lasted from 1955 to 1975, with direct U.S. military involvement from 1964 to 1973. . Before World War Two Vietnam . At the heart of the conflict was the desire of North Vietnam, which had defeated the French colonial administration of Vietnam in 1954, to unify the entire country under a single communist regime modeled after those of the Soviet Union and China. This website is created and maintained by Alpha History. The effort to create meaningful Future Year Defense Programs seem to have been given a final death blow by the Budget Control Act (BCA)legislation originally designed to be so stupid that the Congress could not possibly accept it. In an attempt to limit the volume of American casualties, he announced a program called Vietnamization: withdrawing U.S. troops, increasing aerial and artillery bombardment and giving the South Vietnamese the training and weapons needed to effectively control the ground war. Who betrayed Esugei and left Genghis Khans family behind? The question of who won the Vietnam War has been a subject of debate, and the answer depends on the definition of victory. By 1966, large areas of South Vietnam had been designated as free-fire zones, from which all innocent civilians were supposed to have evacuated and only enemy remained. Even today, there are an estimated five million pieces of unexploded ordnance still scattered around Vietnam. The most important key figures provide you with a compact summary of the topic of "U . The victory of communist regimes in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos triggered one of the largest refugee crises in history. The final tables reflect the acute dependence on contractors, and show that the ratio of this dependence has increased over time. Direct link to Zob Rombie's post The main reason the war e, Posted 4 years ago. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. Direct link to Jeff Kelman's post "John F. Kennedy expan, Posted 2 years ago. To log in and use all the features of Khan Academy, please enable JavaScript in your browser. In addition to the United States, South Korea, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand also committed troops to fight in South Vietnam (albeit on a much smaller scale). The Presidents FY2017 budget request included $1,553.6 billion for contingency operations funded in the base budget. Report Congress authorized troop deployment in Vietnam, but, because it did not issue a declaration of war on North Vietnam or the Viet Cong, the Vietnam War is, technically speaking, not considered a war in the United States. Once again, the data on contractors provide a key picture of the actual size of the U.S. effort in country. Explore the final years of the war in Vietnam, which saw the United States and her Allies confront the brutal realities of loss and withdrawal from a jungle . The DoD semi-annual report now focuses almost exclusively on military activity, and there is no State/USAID counterpart. Past estimates of spending have been consistently wrong, and the inputs have been consistently undercosted. More than 10 times the military expenditures of the three leading NATO European states: France. If the vietnam war was about the north spreading communism articles say that vietnam battled america instead of saying that the south battled the north alongside america , so is it saying that america fought the whole vietnam gov. Total personnel are another key measure of the cost of war, particularly when high-cost all-volunteer forces are involved, and casualties are a key political consideration. Additionally, supported by aid from China and the Soviet Union, North Vietnam strengthened its air defenses. Despite the later inclusion of the South Vietnamese and the NLF, the dialogue soon reached an impasse, and after a bitter 1968 election season marred by violence, Republican Richard M. Nixon won the presidency. They reflect the acute pressure that the rising cost of the Iraq War put on funding for the Afghan conflict during FY2005 through FY2008; They also show that reduction in troop levels did not bring proportionate cuts in total war costs. The Congress, however, can be criticized for failing to insist on adequate reporting of wartime budgets and examining their costs in detail. In August 1964, the US government received word that two North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked US destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. The terms of this expansion included yet more funding and arms, but a key alteration was the commitment of U.S. soldiers to the region. Reporting on the civil dimensions of war is often lacking, and the civil and military budgets of war are developed and implemented separately by the departments and then reviewed (if at all) by separate Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees in each house and by separate elements in the appropriations committees. Though the NLF claimed to be autonomous and that most of its members were not communists, many in Washington assumed it was a puppet of Hanoi. The origins of American involvement in Vietnam date back to the end of the Second World War, when the Vietnamese were struggling against the continued French colonial presence in their country. The Afghan and Iraq/Syria wars are more than five times more expensive than World War I. State/USAID did not have this option. The American soldiers who returned as veterans of the Vietnam War faced their own personal challenges. (At least 100 names on the memorial are those of servicemen who were actually Canadian citizens.) Summary: Between 1945 and 1954, the Vietnamese waged an anti-colonial war against France, which received $2.6 billion in financial support from the United States. In 1976, Vietnam was unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, though sporadic violence continued over the next 15 years, including conflicts with neighboring China and Cambodia. create tension? In August of 1964, after DRV torpedo boats attacked two U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin, Johnson ordered the retaliatory bombing of military targets in North Vietnam. Seeing an opportunity to seize control, Hos Viet Minh forces immediately rose up, taking over the northern city of Hanoi and declaring a Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV) with Ho as president. These pressuresplus political sensitivity over U.S casualtieshelped create plans and/or the willingness to withdraw quickly from Iraq and Afghanistan. They show the cost by war, by service, and by broad cost category for the entire OCO account. From 1975 to the early 1980s, the world press was filled with horror stories about refugee boats sinking or disintegrating at sea, while thousands of refugees drowned, starved or were murdered by pirates. Which best describes the cost of the Vietnam War in human terms? Communist forces ended the war by seizing control of South Vietnam in 1975, and the country was unified as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam the following year. In contrast, critics on the political right argued the Vietnam War had been winnable but was lost by politicians who restricted terms of engagement, refused to authorise more firepower (including the use of tactical nuclear weapons) and left the army short of men and supplies. If one counts the Cold War, the United States has been at war for virtually every year since 1941. Although North Vietnamese and Viet Cong casualty counts vary wildly, it is generally understood that they suffered several times the number of American casualties. By 1957, the Viet Cong and other opponents of Diems repressive regime began fighting back with attacks on government officials and other targets, and by 1959 they had begun engaging the South Vietnamese army in firefights. The French loss at the battle ended almost a century of French colonial rule in Indochina. Thousands struggled to find and hold down jobs, form new relationships and keep their marriages intact. However, from a constitutional perspective, this conflict did not technically count as a war. When the war was over France received their "colony" back. The United States lost almost 60,000 personnel and civilians in Vietnam: 58,269 servicemen were killed and another 1,672 recorded as missing. It also led to political reluctance to deploy the needed numbers of personnel except on a "creeping incremental" basis and after serious problems emerged in host country capabilitiesextending the length as well as the cost of the war. The memorial, located near the western end of the Mall, is a black granite V-shaped wall inscribed with the names of the approximately 58,000 men and women who were killed or missing in action. Official data only exist on federal homeland defense efforts, not state and local ones.