hi, i’m john green, this is crashcourseus history, and today we’re going to talk about the cold war again. really less aboutthe “cold,†more about the “war.†as usual, we’re not going to focus so muchon the generals and the tactics, but instead on why the wars were fought and what it allmeant. and today we get to visit a part of the worldthat we haven’t seen much on this series:
East Orange Board Of Education, [spins] asia. not my best work.intro so, we’re gonna start today with the placewhere the cold war really heated up, at least as far as america’s concerned.mr green, it’s vietnam. close, me from the past, but like all yourromantic endeavors, unsuccessful. the correct
answer is of course korea. like mftp, manyamericans have forgotten about the korean war, which lasted three years from 1950 to1953 and is sometimes called the forgotten war.but it was real. the korean war was the first real like shooting war that americans wereinvolved in after world war ii and it was the only time that american troops directlyengaged with an honest to goodness communist power.i’m referring not to north korea, but to china, which became communist in 1949 andqualifies as a major world power because it was, and also is, huge. we love you china.just kidding, you’re not watching. because of the great fire wall.so the end of wwii left korea split between
a communist north led by kim il crazypantssung and an anti-communist but hardly democratic south led by syngman rhee.the two were supposed to reunite, but that was impossible because they were constantlyfighting that cost around 100,000 lives. the civil war between the two koreas turnedinto a full-fledged international conflict in june of 1950 when kim il sung invaded thesouth, and the us responded. truman thought that kim’s invasion was being pushed bythe soviets and that it was a challenge to the “free world.â€truman went to the united nations and he got authorization, but he didn’t go to congressand never called the korean war a “war.†insisting instead that american troops wereleading a un “police action†but that
was kind of a misleading statement.general douglas macarthur was in command of this tiny little police force at the startof the war because he was the highest ranking general in the region. he was also reallypopular, at least with the press, although not so much with other generals, or with thepresident. under macarthur, un forces – which basicallymeant american and south korean forces -- pushed the north koreans back past the 38th parallelwhere the two countries had been divided, and then truman made a fateful decision: theunited states would try to re-unify korea as a non-communist state.which, if you’ve looked at a map recently, you’ll notice went swimmingly. america’sallies and the un all agreed to this idea,
so up north they went, all the way to thenorthern border with china at the yalu river. at that point, chinese forces, feeling thatamerican forces were a smidge too close to china, counter-attacked on november 1, 1950and by christmas the two sides were stalemated again at the 38th parallel, right where theystarted. the war dragged on for two more years withthe u.s. pursuing a “scorched earth†policy and dropping more bombs on korea than hadbeen dropped in the entire pacific theater during wwii.the two sides tried to negotiate a peace treaty, but the sticking point was the repatriationof north korean and chinese prisoners who didn’t want to go back to their communisthomelands.
meanwhile, at home, americans were growingtired of a war that they weren’t winning, which helped to swing the election of 1952for dwight eisenhower. also he was also running against perennialpresidential loser adlai stevenson, who was perceived as an egghead intellectual becausehis name was adlai stevenson. in addition to helping get ike elected, thekorean war had a number of profound effects. first and most importantly, it was expensive,both in terms of lives and money. in 3 years of fighting 33,629 americans werekilled, 102,000 were wounded and nearly 4 million koreans and chinese were killed, wounded,or missing. the majority of korean casualties were civilians.the korean war also further strengthened executive
power in the united states – truman wentto war without a declaration and congress acquiesced – this doesn’t mean that thewar was initially was unpopular, it wasn’t. people wanted to see america do somethingabout communism and allowing kim to take the south and possibly threaten japan was unacceptable.however, the whole idea that you don’t really need to declare war to go to war, while notnew in america, sure has been important the last 60 years.and the korean war also strengthened the cold war mentality. i mean, this was the heightof the red scare. also, the korean war set the stage for america’slonger, more destructive, and more well known engagement in asia, the vietnam war.oh it’s time for the mystery document? the
rules here are simple.i guess the author of the mystery document. i’m either right or i get shocked.alright, let’s see what we’ve got. "the declaration of the french revolutionmade in 1791 on the rights of man and the citizen also states: "all men are born freeand with equal rights, and must always remain free and have equal rights."those are undeniable truths. nevertheless, for more than eighty years,the french imperialists, abusing the standard of liberty, equality, and fraternity, haveviolated our fatherland and oppressed our fellow citizens. they have acted contraryto the ideals of humanity and justice. in the field of politics, they have deprivedour people of every democratic liberty.
well stan that sounds like a frenchman whoreally doesn’t want to be french anymore. so it’s somebody who’s very disappointedby the way the france has been running their colonies. i’m going to guess that it’snorth vietnamese leader and crash course chalk board person: ho chi minh.wait stan says he needs his real name. it’s nguyen sinh cung. yes!so, this document it points out that, at least rhetorically, ho chi minh was fighting forliberation from a colonial power as much as, if not more than, he was trying to establisha communist dictatorship in vietnam. but because of the cold war and its prevailing theories,the united states could only see ho as a communist stooge, a tool of the kremlin.under the so-called “domino theory†vietnam
was just another domino that had to be proppedup or else the rest of south east asia would fall to communism like a row of, dominos.that wasn’t my best work. now, in retrospect, this was a fundamentalmisunderstanding, but it’s important to remember that at the time, people felt thatthey didn’t want the soviet union to expand the way that, say, nazi germany had.america’s involvement in vietnam, like most things cold war, dates back to world war ii,but it really picked up in the 1950s as we threw our support behind the french in theirwar to maintain their colonial empire. wait, stan, how why would we fight with the frenchto maintain a colonial empire? oh right, because we were blinded by our fear of communism.now, eisenhower wisely refused to send troops
or use atomic weapons to help the french.really good call. and the geneva accords were supposed to setup elections to reunite north and south, which had been divided after wwii, but then we didn’tlet that happen. because sometimes democracies don’t votefor our guy. instead, the u.s. began supporting the repressive, elitist regime of ngo dinhdiem as a bulwark against communism. diem was a catholic in a majority buddhistcountry and his support of landowners didn’t win him any fans. but he was against communism,which was good enough for us. the first major involvement of american troops,then called advisors, began in the early 1960s. technically, their role was to advise thearmy of the republic of vietnam, also called
arvin. it was doomed.how did they not know this was doomed? let’s fight for arvin. against this guy. you arescary. seriously. anyway, pretty quickly this advising turnedinto shooting, and the first american advisors were killed in 1961, during john kennedy’spresidency. however, most americans consider vietnam tobe lyndon johnson’s war, and they aren’t wrong. the major escalation of american troopsstarted under johnson, especially in 1965 after the gulf of tonkin incident.this is one of the great incidents in all of american history. so, in august 1964, northkorean patrol boats attacked us warships in the gulf of tonkin.as a result johnson asked congress to authorize
the president to take “all necessary measuresto repel armed attack†in vietnam, which congress dutifully did with the gulf of tonkinresolution. so why is this one of the great incidentsin american history? because the whole patrol boats attacking warships thing? that didn’thappen. none of that stuff happened except we did actually go to war.now, in retrospect, this seems like a terrible idea but it was very popular at the time becauseto quote the historian james patterson, “preventing communism, after all, remained the guidingstar of american policy.â€[1] wait a second, did i just say to quote historian james patterson,like the crime novelist? oh it’s a different guy apparently. that’s a bummer.he doesn’t write his own books because he’s
so busy with his secret career - being a historian.so, the number of american troops began a steady increase and so did the bombing. thefrightfully named operation rolling thunder began in the spring of 1965. and in marchof that year two marine battalions arrived at danang airbase authorized to attack theenemy. no advising about it. but, johnson didn’t actually tell the americanpublic that our troops had this authorization, which was part of a widening credibility gapbetween what the government told americans about the war and what was really happening.let’s go to the thoughtbubble. by 1968 there were about half a million americansoldiers in vietnam and the government was confidently saying that victory was just aroundthe corner. but then in january vietnamese
forces launched the tet offensive and whileit was eventually repelled, the fact that the north vietnamese were able to mount suchan offensive cast doubts on the claims that u.s. victory was imminent.the vietnam war itself was particularly brutal, with much of the ground fighting taking placein jungles. rather than large-scale offensives, troops were sent on search and destroy missionsand often it was difficult to tell enemy from civilians. capturing territory wasn’t meaningful,so commanders kept track of body counts. like, if more enemy were killed than americans,we were winning. in addition to jungle fighting, there wasa lot of bombing. like, more bombs were dropped on north and south vietnam than both the axisand allied powers used in all of world war
ii. the u.s. used chemical defoliants likeagent orange to get rid of that pesky jungle, and also napalm, which was used to burn trees,homes, and people. television coverage meant that vietnam wasthe first war brought into american living rooms. and people were horrified at what theysaw. they were especially shocked at the my lai massacre, which took place in 1968 butwas only reported a year later, in 1969. these draftees were young, and disproportionatelyfrom the lower classes because enrollment in college or grad school earned you a deferment.so unlike previous american wars, the burden of fighting did not fall evenly across socioeconomicclass. thanks, thoughtbubble. so, as americans athome became increasingly aware of what was
going on in vietnam, protests started. butit’s important to remember that the majority of americans were not out in the streets oron college campuses burning their draft cards. right up through 1968 and maybe even 1970,most americans supported the vietnam war. during the 1968 presidential campaign, richardnixon promised that he had a secret plan to end the war and appealed to the silent majorityof americans who weren’t on board with the anti-war movement.so, the first part of nixon’s secret plan was “vietnamization†-- gradually withdrawingamerican troops and leaving the fighting to the vietnamese.the second part involved more bombing and actually escalating the war by sending americantroops into cambodia in order to cut off the
so-called ho chi minh, named for this guy,a supply line that connected north to south. not only did this not work, it also destabilizedcambodia and helped the khmer rouge to come to power.the khmer rouge represented the absolute worst that communism had to offer, forcing almostall cambodians into communes and massacring one third of the country’s population.so, not a great secret plan. by 1970 the anti-protests had grown and discontent within the armedforces was enormous. vietnam veterans, including future almost-presidentjohn kerry, were participating in protests. and things got even worse when in 1971 thenew york times published the pentagon papers, classified documents that showed that thegovernment had been misleading the public
about the war for years.congress eventually responded by passing the war powers act in 1973 which was supposedto limit the president’s ability to send troops overseas without their approval andprevent another gulf of tonkin resolution. john: how does that work out, stan?stan: not great. john: yeah. i’ll say.after five years of negotiations, nixon and his secretary of state henry kissinger wereable to end america’s involvement in vietnam. in 1973 the paris peace agreement made itpossible for america to withdraw its troops, although it left north korea in control ofsome of south vietnam. the war between north and south vietnam howevercontinued until 1975 when the north finally
conquered the south and created a single,communist vietnam. the vietnam war cost the united states morethan $100 billion spent, 58,000 americans died as well as between 3 and 4 million vietnamesepeople and vietnam was the first war in america thatwe definitively lost. we lost it because we didn’t understand the vietnamese and wedidn’t understand why they were fighting. to return to the historian james patterson,“the unyielding determination of the enemy … wore down the american commitment, whichproved to be far less resolute.â€[2] america expected that its superior technologyand wealth would eventually wear down the vietnamese and they’d just give up communism.but the vietnamese weren’t fighting for
communism. they were fighting for vietnam.this fundamental misunderstanding combined with the government’s dishonesty changedamerican’s relationship with their leaders. before vietnam, most americans trusted theirgovernment, even when they knew it did horrible things. but, after the war, and largely becauseof it, that trust was gone. thanks for watching. i’ll see you next week.crash course is made with the assistance of all of these nice people and also throughyour support at subbable. subbable is a voluntary subscription servicethat allows you to support crash course at the monthly price of your choice including0 dollars. so if you enjoy and value crash course, ihope you’ll consider supporting us through
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