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In late April 1975, dramatic images from Saigon are beamed across the world. North Vietnamese troops proclaimed final victory. Just how did the US lose the Vietnam War?
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» SOURCES
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We lost because our progress was determined by how many enemy combatants we killed instead of how much territory we'd gain. The battle of hill 937 was a perfect example. On May 10th, 1969 the 101st Airborne division fought the Vietcong on a hill in the A Shau Valley that the 101st called "Hamburger Hill". After 10 days of heavy fighting and casualties, the 101st succeeded in taking the hill. After a few weeks, the hill was simply abandoned by US forces. A few weeks later the Vietcong took back the hill without firing a shot.
North Vietnam had no distractions, the USA had plenty of distractions during the 1965-1975 war. During the last 2 years USSR stepped up aid to North Vietnam and aid to South Vietnam was strangled. North Vietnam violated Paris accords, which really was not a peace treaty and had many flaws.
The Arab oil embargo and the closing of heavy industry during the 1970s' also hurt the USA economy.
Failure to stop the inflow of NVA reinforcement of men and supplies and weapons into Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia led to victory for North Vietnam and its Pathet Lao and Khmer Rouge allies.
Ohmigod, I just realized, that's why we were all so poor everywhere in the US in the 1970's.
It didn't make sense, we were hard working, had resources and resourcefulness, and plenty of technology and knowledge.
All that money dumped into the bottomless hole of Vietnam…. that's why the US was so poor in the 1970's at home.
Real time history,if you can do a hypothetical scenario where north and south Vietnam fought each other without any foreigh aid,who would win?
wow, in very first seconds: "…the north Vietnamese troops entered Saigon…" Yeah, no one from south involved – bad start. The flags are of the NLF, National Liberation Front of the south
We never should've been there to start with and all that happened is we got in deeper and deeper to a point we couldn't get out without losing face.
no, quite false. things were NOT "stablized" in 70-71, LOL
Simple: support of the masses. Every American wanted to win the Pacific War after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Nobody felt emotionally motivated in the war in Vietnam.
Like American supports to Ucraine now
There are three reasons the Vietnamese nationalists won what they call The American War:
3rd most important: public opinion in the U.S. Bit by bit, from veterans and elsewhere the public learned too much about the civilian slaughter and turned against it. As a veteran said: "I went to the VFW and told them in Vietnam we are not the US troops liberating France in 1944 – we are the Germans in Poland and the Ukraine."
2. The mass drafting of young men led to a very large anti-war movement among the troops. Not as organized, visible regiments, but a multitude of individual acts. Who reading this knows what "frag" means? It's from the killing of superior officers in their separate officer tents by rolling in a live grenade. The top military wanted out quickly after the Tet Offensive showed they didn't know what was really happening, and the U.S. Army was unraveling. This video mentions NONE of this.
1. the main reason was the determination and uncompromising sacrifice of the Vietnamese from throughout the nation to continue the fight for sovereignty: in the 1930s against the French; early 1940s against the Japanese; late 1940s thru the 50s, against the French again (this time over 90% financed by the U.S.); and then finally when the U.S. cancelled the elections that Eisenhower said "Everyone I talked to that knew anything about Vietnam said that Ho Chi Minh would win in a landslide," fighting directly against U.S. armed forces.
To this day the U.S. government has not recognized its responsibility and helped Vietnam rebuild, even though it spent a significant part of the national wealth to rebuild Japan and Germany. Birth defects where Agent Orange was sprayed continue to this day.
We never forgot what American Army brought to Vietnamese people.
People who say we didn’t lose the Vietnam war are delusional. When has victory been determined by casualties alone? I guess if that was the case the Soviet Union and China lost world war 2.
Also when has victory been determined by only if one side fights to the death aka “oh well we just got bored and left.” With that logic did Britain not lose the revolutionary war because they decided the colony wasn’t worth their time and effort.
We lost. We failed to achieve our objective and lost. Maybe we should learn firm that and realize defense budget does not automatically equate to victory. Maybe we should learn from that to stay out of pointless wars.
It’s not “why” America lost this tells “how” America lost.
The “Why” is because LBJ signed the “Gulf of Tonkin Resolution” because of the USS Maddox incident, a non-confirmed attack on a American war ship.
The truth wasn’t on America’s side. There was no reason to win. LBJ was on the wrong side of the truth.
The U.S. won militarily but not politically in Vietnam. In the end Vietnam was still unified under a communist government.
Sadly, two reasons for America’ defeat. (A) Poor American leadership wouldn’t allow the US military to totally destroy North Vietnam (B) LBJ lost the support of the American people
It’s easy same reason why British lost American revolutionary! Wast Majority of the local population didn’t support them!
american hubris is crazy.. they always think they can win.. thats why they are sleeping on china right now
Why the did they U.S lose? Richard Nixon committed treason intentionally disrupting peace talks
What defeat ? Where is it that the Americans were surrendering to the North Vietnamese. The Americans left in 1973 due to a peace treaty called The Paris Accord. All sides signed it for peace. America left and 2 years later North Vietnam slowly built up attacks on South Vietnam. North Vietnam was on the look out and testing to see if the Americans would come back as they said they would. They couldn’t win the war with America there. Because of Political turmoil in America over the war. The Americans never sent aid or troops to South Vietnam,where the North was being supplied by the USSR and CHINA. There was such infighting in Congress over the war. If anything it was a political loss but not a military loss. North Vietnam knew if America stayed the war could not be won. So they took advantage of that. April 30 1975, Saigon fell and so did South Vietnam.
'That may be so, but it is also irrelevant.' And that is why the US won all the battles but lost the war.
The effects of Agent Orange that you mention aren't in debate like was implied in video
The war was probably already lost after the ARVN overthrew Diem in 1963.
I think you made a typo in the title of this video. The US won Vietnam on the battlefield and left do to political reasons. US lost 58,000 soldiers and killed 1,100,000 Vietcong soldiers. There was also 6,000,000 Vietnamese killed. That's not a loss, that's a substantial win. Google. it.
The Americans did not lose, they just retreated tactically. 😂
US defeat in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Ukraine! "Yankee Go Home!"
As soon as we trusted the arvn to be able to fight without us, south vietnam was doomed. But in reality all of vietnam was doomed for many years to come after the war.
But did the United States really lose the war? How many billions of dollars were transferred to the pockets of the military industrialists?
Hello, I came from Easy German Video
The title has an answer-Because we should have never been there. Period. It had been a decades long civil war we were never suppose dto be in. Our leaders were just greedy and egotistical.
Wars are lost on won in the political arena, planning, planning etc,. the US never had a plan nor any long-term plans, not to mention they were there because of France, so in short the French are to blame for thousands of young Americans and Vietnamese dying for nothing, as to whom really won the US industrial war conglomerate, and every one of Lindon "Backstabber" Johnson close friends, including a certain, Killinager oh sorry Kissinger,
Thx for your efforts.
We didn't loose the war, we gave it away.
I love your videos, but please also mention the Australian & other allied contributions to this war 5:11 (New Zealand, South Korea, Thailand, and the Philippines). It's so often overlooked, yet we only went to war cause 'Big Daddy' US said jump. As a Millennial, it was our fathers that were either drafted or were lucky enough for their birthday to never be called up (my dad got lucky, a very close family friend – genuinely, the nicest guy you'd ever meet – didn't, he suffers from PTSD and inhaled an Agent-Orange type substance, his health has been significantly compromised; he can't work). We sent 60,000 men, 523 died and almost 2,400 were wounded.
We DIDN'T lose the war! South Vietnam DID!
We did not loose. We just came in second.
The usa lost because they didnt help the south vietnamese but enslaved them !
They were like overloards doing as they pleased.
There were so many rapes of women and murder of men that a lot of the south civilians sympathized with the communist and even joined them. Thats why the tet offensive even happened.
In the end the southern soldiers didnt even try because they were happy the usa left as well, knowing that they would be free from foreign dominance !!!!
The scenes of helicopters and people trying to flee were simply those that collaborated with the usa and knew they were finished if caught !! If you look at the other footage from the street you can see most people were happy the war was over regardless of the communist victory !!!!
US was not defeated in Nam. When we left in 1973 SVN was a viable nation, and by end of 73 had retaken most of their territory from NVA. (Viet Cong had been beaten by the Phoenix Program.) But when Nixon was forced out by the fake watergate issue all of his promises and our standing in the world arena went too. Scum dems who started the war ended all aid to SVN. At same time Soviets were sending dozens of supply ships each month to rebuild the NVA. With SVN combat power greatly reduced, and No help from US with Nixon gone, this 3d NVA invasion would succeed in the spring of 1975. To learn more see my detailed work, FATAL FLAWS BOOK 2 1945-1975 B&N
Essentially democracies lose wars while totalitarian states win wars
The US still does not recognize the true reason for its defeat: Vietnamese nationalism. Nationalism is the most powerful force in the world. This is our land. You have no business being here. Nationalism is the same reason why the US met failure in Iraq and Afghanistan.