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Gen. William C. Westmoreland Was RightBy Dale Andrade | Vietnam | 7 comments | Print This Post | Email This Post During 1965 and 1966 the Communists fought the Americans toe to toe, making little effort to act like guerrillas. Those years saw the largest percentage of attacks by battalion-size enemy units or larger—even greater than in the years of the two biggest enemy offensives of the war, 1968 and 1972. By spring 1967, the consensus among the Communist leadership was that the high-intensity main force campaign was unsuccessful, and thus the North Vietnamese shifted to a stand-off strategy. The enemy now rarely sought out battles with the Americans, and main force units either split up or faded into the jungles to await new developments. According to U.S. statistics for 1967, attacks by “small units”—usually defined as company size or smaller—totaled 1,484, a jump of more than 80 percent over the previous year. Subscribe Today
Westmoreland’s strategy had worked in the sense that it pushed the enemy main forces away from the populated areas and temporarily took the initiative from the Communists. South Vietnam was preserved in the short term, though there was much more to be done. Yet despite early successes against the enemy, Westmoreland did not see that he had, in a way, been lucky. For almost two years the North Vietnamese followed a strategy that played to the American advantages of technology, mobility, and firepower. Once Hanoi backed away from main force attacks, its efforts were more successful. The main forces were still there, of course, and the Communists would use them again when the time was right. But the ultimate symbol of American strategic failure, the Tet Offensive, was still to come. In late January 1968, the Communists attacked almost every major city and town; and, though all were pushed back and as many as 50,000 VC and NVA were killed, the offensive proved to be a huge political victory for the Communists. Despite more than two years of fighting, Westmoreland had failed to take and hold the initiative, and now the United States was running out of time. In June 1968 General Creighton Abrams, Westmoreland’s deputy, took command of MACV. Historian Sorley argues that Abrams “brought to the post a radically different understanding of the nature of the war and how it ought to be prosecuted” and that he executed a “dramatic shift in concept of the nature and conduct” of operations, which Abrams called “one war.” Sorley ignores the heavy enemy losses suffered during the Tet Offensive, which allowed Abrams to operate with much less resistance than had been the case only a few months earlier. In October, Abrams reported, “There’s more freedom of movement throughout Vietnam today than there’s been since the start of the U.S. build up.” He attributed this to the weakened state of the enemy and predicted “This situation presents an opportunity for further offensive operations.” Abrams moved the 1st Cavalry Division to the region west of Saigon, using the unit’s airmobility to run constant offensive operations along the border where it would “be in a good posture for pouncing on any new units coming over from Cambodia.” In I Corps he used the 101st Airborne Division in the A Shau Valley campaign in an attempt to prevent the North Vietnamese from moving men and materiel to the populated coastal regions. In the Central Highlands, the 4th Infantry Division continued its wide-ranging operations aimed at keeping the enemy back over the border. Indeed, many of Abrams’ operations could be called “search and destroy”—such as the large-unit sweep in May 1969 that included the controversial battle on “Hamburger Hill” in the A Shau Valley. These operations paid off. “The enemy has made a major decision to shift his emphasis from the military to the political,” Abrams reported in November. “This decision was forced upon him by the enemy’s own recognition of his rapidly deteriorating military posture. . . .” The enemy’s “reduced military capabilities” gave the allies the perfect chance to “pull the rug” from under Communist attempts to reassert control over the population. Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6Help HistoryNet by bookmarking to
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7 Comments to “Gen. William C. Westmoreland Was Right”
No mention is ever made that the “Allies” encouraged Ho Chi Min to fight the Japanese on the promise that Viet Nam would be united under his leadership. The Allis were influenced by Joe Stalan to separate nations i.e. N/S Korea, N/S Viet Nam, E/W Germany. Fortunately Japan was our war and the Atomic Bomb prevented Russia from entering to any degree (Kurel Is.) or we would have had a N/S Japan. Then the French tried to maintain the South Separate from the North and dien bien phu ended their attempts. Then comes Lyndon Johnson who tries to micro manage the conflict from the White House with the aid of that Ford car company reject, MacNamara. The rest is history. Sorry for misspelled words. But then, America is lost without a shot.
By Gilbert R. Switzer on Apr 3, 2009 at 10:02 am
To clarify the earlier comment, General Order #1 divided the Korean peninsula into North and South primarily to reflect the advances of the Red Army from the north. Stalin’s “influence” in Korea was in effect the same “influence” used in Germany, and for that matter the same “influence” that the US wielded: an occupying army.
It’s tempting at times for any combatant nation to view a campaign as “our war,” particularly when it was “our bomb” that arguably ended the war.
But it’s also important to note that literally hundreds of thousands of Soviet, Chinese, Korean, Filipino, ANZAC, and other soldiers fought in the theater as well.
By M. O'Connor on Apr 6, 2009 at 5:39 pm
Page 2 – “The popular conception of the enemy in Vietnam is that it was a grassroots insurgency sprung from the peoples’ content with an illegitimate government in Saigon and the presence of a foreign invader.”
The author here tries to downplay two historical truths- the government in Saigon was illegitimate, and the U. S. was a foreign invader. Thirty-three years after the war has ended, and the writer is still calling the Vietnamese “the enemy” and the “North Vietnamese.”
How long will Cold War propaganda be disseminated? When will the day come when American historians will be able to refer to Vietnam by the proper names (yes, that would mean recognition, wouldn’t it?) of the Vietnamese and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam?
Is the author still trying to prove to us the U. S. invasion was justified by reminding us of China and Russia’s involvement? This seems ridiculous when the U. S. supported the French, and then helped set up, support and control Diem’s dictatorship in the south. It took two to tango then, and it matters little now which side took the first step.
Perhaps if we compare the numbers of Chinese and Russian soldiers that served in Vietnam at the time with those of the U. S., Australia, Korea, Thailand, New Zealand, etc. – then we might have a case. Or have there been declassified documents of the Russians offering the Vietnamese nuclear weapons, such as Dulles offered the French, that we do not know about?
By jstrum_bn on Apr 9, 2009 at 1:30 am
As long as there was a “hands off” policy on North Vietnam the military could not effectively prosecute the war.
By R.Kassebaum on Apr 10, 2009 at 10:38 am
BUNDY: “It is an awful mess.
JOHNSON: “What is Laos worth to me? What is Laos worth to this country? We’ve got a treaty, but hell, everybody else has got a treaty out there, and they’re not doing anything about it.”
(From the transcript of a telephone call on May 27, 1964, between President Lyndon B. Johnson and McGeorge Bundy, his national security adviser. A year later. Johnson began the large-scale deployment of troops to Vietnam. The transcript was released in February by the Lyndon B. Johnson Library and Museum in Austin, Texas)
As my deceased friend would remind me, retired Republic of Vietnam Major Julian Dubuc, in September of 1954, the United States, France, Great Britain, New Zealand, Australia, the Philippines, Thailand and Pakistan formed the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, or SEATO. The SEATO charter was vitally important to the American rationale for the Vietnam War. The United States used the organization as its justification for refusing to go forward with the 1956 elections intended to reunify Vietnam, instead maintaining the divide between communist North Vietnam and South Vietnam at the 17th parallel. As the conflict in Vietnam unfolded, the inclusion of Vietnam as a territory under SEATO protection gave the United States the legal framework for its continued involvement there. The problem was Johnson’s structure in running the war as a fool.
From a Disabled Republic of Vietnam Combat Veteran
By JOHN C. BRUNGER on Apr 27, 2009 at 4:17 pm
As myself a Vietnamese who wanted the South to win. I agree that there was not a lot of chances for the United States but I am very thankful for everyone who fought in the war.
By Chuong on Jun 17, 2009 at 5:30 pm
RIP for the fallen on both side
By henrylim88 on Nov 10, 2009 at 12:28 am