Vietnam
An instance of containment
- Concerned by expansionist Communist ideology and Soviet repression, the United States sought to contain communism through a variety of measures, including major military engagements in Vietnam.
- This is 8.2's Korea sentence with Vietnam substituted, which places both wars inside one policy.
- So the causes of Vietnam are the causes of containment, and an answer should start there rather than with the war itself.
The CED places Vietnam inside...
So the causes of Vietnam are the causes of containment.
And an instance of decolonisation
- Postwar decolonisation and the emergence of powerful nationalist movements in Asia led both sides in the Cold War to seek allies among new nations, many of which remained nonaligned.
- 8.7 gave this sentence for Africa and the Middle East; here the CED repeats it for Asia.
- So Vietnam sits at the intersection of two processes: a superpower rivalry and a nationalist movement in a decolonising world.
Vietnam sits at the intersection of...
8.7's sentence repeated for Asia.
A constitutional question
- Americans debated the appropriate power of the executive branch in conducting foreign and military policy.
- 3.9's separation of powers is the frame: how much may a president do without Congress?
- So the war produced a domestic institutional argument as well as a foreign one, and the CED lists it as a development in its own right.
Containment, decolonisation, or the domestic argument?
Sort each element of the Vietnam War.
The constitutional question the war raised was about...
3.9's separation of powers is the frame.
The CED gives Korea and Vietnam the same sentence, so the difference lies elsewhere. 8.12 supplies it: although anti-communist foreign policy faced little domestic opposition in previous years, the Vietnam War inspired sizable and passionate anti-war protests — the policy was continuous; the reaction at home was not.
The difference between Korea and Vietnam in this course is the reaction at home.
The policy sentence is the same for both.
And an opposition that was new
- 8.12 states it: although anti-communist foreign policy faced little domestic opposition in previous years, the Vietnam War inspired sizable and passionate anti-war protests.
- In previous years... little domestic opposition is the comparison that makes Vietnam distinctive within the Cold War.
- So the difference between Korea and Vietnam in this course is not the policy but the reaction at home.
Select both effects this lesson names.
Earlier Cold War policy had faced little domestic opposition.
Causes and effects
- The objective is the causes and effects of the Vietnam War.
- Causes: containment, a nationalist movement in a decolonising Asia, and the search for allies among new nations.
- Effects: a debate over executive power, and anti-war protests on a scale earlier Cold War policy had not produced.
Two wars fought under the same doctrine can produce opposite politics if one of them lasts long enough for a generation to grow up asking why. The doctrine did not change; the audience did.
Concerned by expansionist Communist ideology and Soviet repression, the United States sought to contain communism through a variety of measures, including major military engagements in Vietnam, and postwar decolonisation and... powerful nationalist movements in Asia led both sides... to seek allies among new nations, many of which remained nonaligned. Americans debated the appropriate power of the executive branch in conducting foreign and military policy, and 8.12 records that Vietnam inspired sizable and passionate anti-war protests where earlier policy had faced little domestic opposition.