Lesson video

Hello and welcome to today's history lesson.

My name is Mr. Merrett and I'll be guiding you through today's lesson.

Let's get started.

So today's lesson is looking at Vietnamization.

And in order to do that effectively, we need to be using some key terms.

And our key terms for today are Vietnamization, honor and withdrawal.

Vietnamization was the US policy of withdrawing its troops and transferring responsibility of the war to the government in South Vietnam.

Honor means knowing and doing what is morally right.

And withdrawal means leaving a place or a situation.

And by the end of today's lesson, we're gonna be able to describe the policy of Vietnamization.

And to go about doing that, we'll be splitting today's learning into three different learning cycles.

Our first learning cycle is Nixon's promise.

And with that in mind, let's get started.

So 1968 was a difficult year for the United States.

The Tet Offensive at the beginning of the year had rocked America's belief that they could win the war in Vietnam.

Anti-war protests increased and coupled with civil rights protests, especially after the assassination of the black civil rights leader, Martin Luther King, it created a backdrop of violence and disorder right across the US.

President Johnson also announced that he would not run for reelection, which came as a complete surprise to everybody.

And presidential hopeful, Robert Kennedy, who was the brother of assassinated president John F.

Kennedy, was himself assassinated.

Fear of the direction that America was heading gripped the nation.

And onto this stage stepped Richard Nixon.

The Republican candidate promised that he would bring us together again.

He'd be tough on crime.

He would reduce riots and protest in the streets.

He would make everybody feel safe.

He'd make everybody feel happy to get as well.

He also claimed to have a plan to bring peace with honor in Vietnam.

He would end the war in Vietnam in a way that didn't bring shame to the US.

And in a country that was facing an existential crisis, Nixon offered hope that things could return to normal, or at the very least, some semblance of normality.

So quick check for understanding here.

What did Nixon promise to gain from the Vietnam War if he was elected president in 1968?

Did he promise peace in our time?

Did he promise to give peace a chance, or did he promise peace with honor?

So choose one of those now.

Okay, so if you chose C, then congratulations.

Peace with honor was Nixon's rallying cry.

So let's go for our first task for today then.

So Nixon promised to bring peace with honor, and to kind of go into a bit more detail with that, what that actually involved was that it meant that Nixon would be negotiating with North Vietnam to bring an end to the war as soon as he possibly could.

But it also made sure that South Vietnam was in a position to fight off North Vietnam without US troops being present.

So there's those two aspects there.

Can he negotiate with the North Vietnamese to bring a decent end to the war as quickly as possible?

But can he also make sure that their allies, South Vietnam, is able to stand on their own two feet if necessary?

So what I would like you to do, taking those two bullet points there, I want you to explain why Nixon thought these would deliver peace with honor for the USA.

So pause the video now, have a go at that task and I'll see you once you've finished.

Okay, welcome back.

Hopefully, you got on fine with that task.

So I've just got a little bit of an idea of what you could've written on the screen here in front of you.

So you could've said that negotiating with North Vietnam would mean no risk of the USA being defeated in a war, and could mean that North Vietnam's allies stopping North Vietnam from invading South Vietnam.

So the hope is that if America negotiated with North Vietnam, but at the same time was also talking to the North Vietnamese allies, which were China and Russia, then perhaps those big communist superpowers could also have a little word in North Vietnam's ear and make it clear that we need to try and bring peace to the region.

So that was also America's hopes, and that's another avenue that Nixon was exploring as well.

You could also say that the USA needed South Vietnam to be able to defend itself, because it'll be a disaster if North Vietnam won after the US withdrew and essentially thousands of Americans would've died for nothing.

So that's something you could have said there in order to fulfill that first task.

But I'm sure whatever you've got is absolutely fine as long as it has taken into account those two bullet points there.

So let's move on then to our second learning cycle for today, which is actually in the question, what was Vietnamization?

So welcome back, hopefully, you got something to say about that source there, you've worked a few things out about it.

Just to put it into context now though.

So the man firing the weapon is a soldier in the South Vietnamese Army, or ARVN, as they were known.

And the man standing behind him is a soldier who is training him in the use of that weapon.

Interestingly, he's not actually a US soldier, he's an Australian soldier.

Although it was primarily the US who was the foreign power involved in helping the South Vietnamese army, it wasn't just the US who were there.

There were other soldiers from other nations as well, Australia being one of them.

Australia were there primarily as a training force rather than a fighting force.

But just something to bear in mind there.

There were other nations involved in the Vietnam War as well, although the foreign power was primarily, by a long, long way, the US.

So hopefully, that gives you an idea about what Vietnamization might actually mean.

But let's discuss that in little more detail now then.

So Nixon's vague promise of peace with honor, I mean, that in itself is very, very vague, it certainly needs a lot more detail.

What that actually translated to is his policy of Vietnamization.

And the main aspect of Vietnamization, certainly from an American perspective, was the withdrawal of US ground troops.

And the reason for that is that Nixon needed to reduce casualties from US troops and also calm some of the anti-war protests as well.

And in place of US ground troops, the South Vietnamese army, ARVN, would increase in size and ability.

That's the plan as the main aspects there of Vietnamization.

Now it would still be heavily funded by the US, it wasn't the case that the US would leave and ARVN would be left with whatever weapons they had at the time, artillery, helicopters, the heavy machinery like that would be provided as well as course there's more conventional weapons like handguns and rifles.

And as well as that the US would take time to train the ARVN, and this is the hope that there'll be a seamless transition between American soldiers and South Vietnamese soldiers.

This was important as Nixon was keen to promote the honorable aspect of Vietnamization.

South Vietnam had to remain an independent non-communist country after the withdrawal of US troops.

And in order for this to happen, the country needed to be in a position to successfully fight off communist attacks from the north if they came.

If they couldn't do this, then US involvement in Vietnam would, essentially, all have been for nothing.

So just to kind of make that clear, Vietnamization involved the withdrawal of US troops.

It involved the expansion of ARVN.

It provided, or the US provided training and equipment.

The withdrawal with honor was a key aspect of Vietnamization.

America, Nixon needed South Vietnam to be able to fight with the communists.

And South Vietnam needed to remain an independent non-communist country.

So those are the key aspects there of Vietnamization.

Now, quick check for understanding to make sure we've got all of that.

Vietnamization meant the immediate withdrawal of the US' troops from Vietnam.

Is that true or is that false?

Decide now.

Okay, if you chose false, then very well done.

It is indeed false, but why is it false?

Let's justify this answer now.

Is it false because the US would get their ground troops out as soon as North Vietnam had been defeated?

Or is it false because the US would get their ground troops out as soon as the ARVN were trained and ready to take over?

So choose your justification now.

All right, if you chose B, then congratulations.

That is indeed correct.

The US would only fully withdraw from Vietnam once they felt that ARVN were ready and capable to take over.

That, at the very least, is the plan.

Right, let's look at our second task for today then.

So I've got a source on the screen here in front of you.

So this is a photo showing President Nixon giving a television speech, a televised speech about US troop levels in South Vietnam in 1971.

Now what I'd like us to do with this particular source is I want you to think what can you infer from this source about Nixon's policy of Vietnamization?

I want you to suggest two inferences.

So two things we can draw from this source that tells us something about Vietnamization.

So pause the video, have a go at that task now and I'll see you once you're finished.

Okay, welcome back.

Right, so let's have a little look and see what I've come up with.

Hopefully, you got something very similar to this or the very least is something on the same lines as this.

So the two things that I picked up from this source.

One inference is that Nixon wanted to show that Vietnamization was working.

His graph, if you could make that out in the background, his graph shows how US troop numbers in South Vietnam were decreasing.

So the line is taking a really, really sharp decline.

Another inference is that the withdrawal of US troops was the most important feature of Vietnamization for the US public.

Nixon has not shown the TV audience information about ARVN military reinforcements, for example.

The key aspects of Vietnamization from an American civilian perspective was just getting their boys out of Vietnam, so reduce casualty figures.

Okay, let's move on now then to our final learning cycle for today, which is the impact of Vietnamization.

So Vietnamization failed to achieve many of its aims, although it received a mixed reception at the time.

So the US general in charge in Vietnam, who is General Westmoreland, he had asked for 200,000 more troops at the Tet Offensive in order to capitalize on the losses that the communists suffered during that particular stage in the war.

So Westmoreland felt that with just a few more troops, I say a few, with 200,000 more troops, the US could bring an end to the war.

That was what Westmoreland believed.

Instead, the opposite happened.

By 1970, the number of US troops in Vietnam had fallen by close to 200,000.

So the complete opposite of what Westmoreland wanted is what actually happened.

Part of the reason for that is that the president at the time, it was Johnson when Westmoreland first asked for this, he felt that Westmoreland didn't actually have a plan for those 200,000 men.

From Johnson's perspective, Westmoreland's plan was simply just to throw more men at the problem.

There was no clear idea about how exactly those 200,000 men would actually be utilized, where would they be attacking, where would they be defending, what is exactly the purpose of these men.

Westmoreland just wanted more troops in Vietnam.

So because of the fact that there was no real plan and because of the fact that Vietnam was becoming increasingly unpopular amongst the US citizens, Johnson felt that he was just an absolute non-starter.

There's no way he could sanction more men.

And then when Nixon came in, he actually completely reversed the whole idea and actually withdrew significant numbers of men instead as part of the policy of Vietnamization, of course.

Now many people in the US were pleased that Nixon was fulfilling his promise to bring US ground troops home.

So that in itself, from the perspective of the American people, that's a good thing.

However, you still can't please everybody by doing that, because for some people, the withdrawal wasn't happening quickly enough.

So some people were very really happy that it's happening.

Some people were somewhat pleased but felt it could be quicker.

And of course, there are other people, Westmoreland's a great example, who felt that this is the completely the wrong direction it's going in entirely.

So there's no way that Nixon could please everybody.

However, in general, withdrawing US troops did go down well amongst US citizens.

Disturbing reports about US war crimes however, and the expansion of the war into neighboring Laos and Cambodia also meant that the reduction in anti-war protests and riots that Nixon had promised failed to materialize.

It's all very well and good that Nixon is bringing troops home, but he's actually expanding the war, or the troops are committing atrocities in other aspects of the war as well.

So anti-Vietnam war feeling is not reducing at all.

People just got different things to feel angry about instead now.

Many US soldiers as well who've been drafted into the Army against their will, were also pleased to be heading home at this point.

A significant number of those who remained however saw little point in continuing the fight.

Nixon had publicly stated he's trying to end the US involvement in the war.

So from their perspective, why are we still here that, you know, if I die today, the war could be over tomorrow.

What is the purpose of my death?

So from the perspective of American soldiers who were drafted in, who were, from their perspective, stuck in this now pointless war, potentially sacrificing their lives for nothing, there's a lot of anger, there's a lot of resentment that is building up at this point in time.

And that manifests in a few different ways.

Firstly, drug use amongst US soldiers increase dramatically.

Heavy drugs as well.

The heroin use amongst US soldiers, it's estimated that as many as 20% of American troops in Vietnam, at this point in time, were now addicted to heroin.

So we are talking some hard and heavy drugs that are significantly going to impact their ability to fights as well.

This is not a small problem, this is a big problem for American troops at this point in time.

As well as that, possibly linked to that as well, is that we now have increased instances of something called fragging.

And fragging is when troops deliberately target and kill their commanding officers as well.

So not only refusing to obey orders but actively killing your own commanding officer.

We now have instances of this happening amongst US soldiers at this point in time as well.

So the evidence therefore points to an army that effectively is teetering on the edge of mutiny.

These are dark times for the US Army in Vietnam.

Right, let's have a quick check for understanding.

Let's make sure we fully understand what we've been going through now.

So true or false, Vietnamization failed to achieve any of its aims.

Is that true or is that false?

Decide now.

All right, if you chose false, then congratulations.

That is indeed false.

But let's justify that, why is that false?

Is it false because one aim was to stop anti-war protests in the USA?

Or is it false because one aim was to bring US soldiers back from Vietnam?

So choose your justification now.

All right, if you chose B, then congratulations.

And aim is indeed to bring US soldiers back from the Vietnam.

The aim was to reduce anti-war process in the USA.

I think Nixon understood that there's no real possibility of completely stopping them.

There's always gonna be people who are opposed to war.

But at the very least, if you can reduce the quantity, reduce the scale of the anti-war protest, then from Nixon's perspective, Vietnamization, or that aspect of Vietnamization, would've been a success.

Right, so on paper, one of the biggest successes of Vietnamization was the expansion of the ARVN.

So conscription by the South Vietnamese government led to roughly one in nine South Vietnamese citizens joining the army.

A huge number, one in nine men, were part of the army at this point in time.

And that made it the fourth largest army in the world.

Let's just try and put that into perspective.

It is bigger than the army in the UK, it's bigger than the army of France.

There's this tiny little nation in Southeast Asia.

They're the fourth largest army in the world.

And that is because of Vietnamization.

That is a major success of this particular US policy.

Now, whilst there were undoubtedly some very effective ARVN units and officers, some of these units received very high praise from the US officers who were in charge of their training.

Many ARVN troops were only there because they faced imprisonment if they refused to join the army.

So they were drafted in, they didn't want to be there, they had to be there or they are going to jail.

So given the trip between jail or army, many of them chose to join the army and hoped for the best effectively.

But because of this, desertion was common.

Whenever possible, many of these troops just simply left.

They joined the army, they'd done their, or they felt they'd done their bit and that's it.

As soon as they can, they're out of there.

Some officers were also corrupt and they lacked motivation to fight.

So they quite simply just wouldn't put themselves and their own men's lives at risk if it came down to it.

And as well as that, training manuals for heavy equipment such as helicopters were written in English, meaning that specialist ARVN troops first had to learn English before learning how to operate their specialist equipments.

So obviously, the Vietnamese people speak their own native language.

Realistically, if they're gonna learn a European language, it's almost certainly going to have been French, because it was the French who used to control Vietnam at this point in time.

So there's not necessarily a culture of English speakers in Vietnam at this point in time.

So this was a real own goal from the American perspective.

I think it would've been relatively simple to have translated some of these training manuals into Vietnamese before handing 'em out.

They overlooked that, the training manuals went out in English.

And effectively, you then had to either translate them yourself, which takes time, or learn English, which also takes time as well.

The biggest question mark though was how well the South Vietnamese Army would perform once the US had completed with the withdrawal.

Would it be possible for the ARVN to stand and fight against the communist forces?

Up to this point, ARVN operations against the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese Army, the NVA, had relied heavily on US air support.

So in the process of Vietnamization, it was a case of withdrawing US troops slowly and increasing the number of ARVN ground troops in their stead, but you're also providing US air troops or US air support to make sure that those ARVN troops just have that little bit of cover and if necessary, had that little bit of backup fire as well.

Now, when this was not in place, when there was not US air supports, the ARVN tended not to stand and fight against the communists, even when they heavily outnumbered them.

So given the choice, the ARVN wouldn't stand and fight, they would instead just retreat back to safe positions.

As a result, Nixon's promise to act honorably and leave South Vietnam in a position to defend itself against communist aggression, it was very much hanging in the balance.

Right, let's have another very quick check for understanding now.

So which two of the following were ways in which Vietnamization failed in its aims?

Is it because the US had to pay for more military equipment for the ARVN?

Is it because US training failed to meet the needs of the ARVN soldiers?

Is it that the ARVN became the fourth largest army in the world?

Or is it that the ARVN struggled to defend South Vietnam without US air supports?

So choose two of those options now.

Okay, welcome back.

If you chose B and D, then congratulations.

Those are two ways in which Vietnamization failed in its aims.

Right, let's go on then to our first task C.

So what would different people think about Vietnamization?

So what I'd like you to do, I'd like you to look at the four different groups of people that I've got on the screen in front of you there.

So US Army officers, US protestors, ARVN soldiers and Vietcong guerillas.

And I would like you to briefly explain what each of the following groups would think about Vietnamization.

So first and foremost, would they be in favor of Vietnamization?

Is this a policy that they would support?

You can write yes or no or potentially mixed.

And why do you think that?

So add some justification for that as well.

I've done the first one for you.

That's why I said for what I believe is that US Army officers would not like Vietnamization.

And it's because from their perspective, they wanna keep fighting to win the war.

And I'm thinking here more of the career soldiers as opposed to the drafted soldiers here.

For them, it's a case of it's part of their honor.

They want to be able to fight and they want to be able to win as well.

So what I'd like you to do is think about this other three groups, pause the video now, complete the table and I'll see you once you've done that.

Okay, welcome back.

Hopefully you got on fine with that task.

Let's just go through this table now and see the sort of things which you could've said.

So a US protestor would almost certainly have been in favor of Vietnamization.

And the reason for that is that Vietnamization meant that the US was withdrawing from Vietnam, and that was one of the main things that the US citizens were protesting against.

They wanted their boys out of Vietnam.

And Vietnamization is doing that.

From the perspective of ARVN soldiers, they probably would not have liked Vietnamization.

And the reason for that is that they understood that they were losing a powerful ally against North Vietnam.

So I don't think any ARVN soldiers were near any illusion about just how important the support that the US soldiers were providing for them.

From the perspective of Vietcong guerillas, they were also pretty quite happy with Vietnamization.

And the reason for that is that it becomes significantly easier to defeat the ARVN.

As we just said, when given the option of fighting the communists without US air support, generally speaking, ARVN soldiers, they turned and retreated rather than standing and fight.

So from the Vietcong guerilla perspective, the war now becomes significantly easier.

Hopefully, you got on fine with that task.

Let's go for our final task of today though.

So what I would like to do now is I'd like you to write an extended answer to this particular question.

So from what you've learned about Vietnamization in this lesson, I'd like you to, first of all, describe the aims of Vietnamization.

I'd then like you to move on and describe one way in which Vietnamization achieved one or more of its aims.

And finally, I'd like you to be able to explain one reason why Vietnamization failed to achieve one or more of its aims.

So what was Vietnamization, what was good about it, what was bad about it?

So using extended answer, include specific detail.

Pause the video now whilst you do that and I'll see you once you've finished.

All right, welcome back.

Hopefully you got on fine with that task there.

I've got an example answer on the screen in front of you here.

So hopefully, yours follows a similar sort of vein to mine.

But let's just see what I've got here.

So Vietnamization aimed to withdraw US troops from Vietnam and replace them with South Vietnamese troops which will be supplied and trained by the US.

These troops had to be ready to successfully fight off any attacks from North Vietnam so the South Vietnam remained an independent non-communist country.

So that's my description of the aims of Vietnamization.

Let's move on to the rest of the answer now.

One way in which Vietnamization succeeded was that Nixon promised to withdraw American soldiers from Vietnam.

And by 1970, he had withdrawn close to 200,000.

Nixon also promised to replace US troops with South Vietnamese troops.

And by 1970, the ARVN was the fourth largest army in the world.

So there I've described some of the achievements, some of the good aspects of Vietnamization, but I've also included specific details there.

I've got some dates in there.

I've got some specific numbers, some specific facts of just how many US troops were withdrawn.

I then got on to say, however, one reason why Vietnamization failed was that although the ARVN was very large, the US did not do a thorough job training the soldiers.

They did not translate training manuals into Vietnamese, which meant that many soldiers couldn't learn to use their equipment properly.

And many ARVN troops did not really want to be in the army.

So they deserted whenever possible.

So they've gone to explain actually a couple of reasons there why the policy of Vietnamization could also be considered a failure.

Hopefully, your answer follows a similar sort of track to what I've given you just there as well.

Right, so to summarize the lesson, so Nixon promised to end US involvement in Vietnam by strengthening the South Vietnamese Army, also known as the ARVN.

Nixon believed this would calm anti-war tensions in the US.

American troops began to withdraw while the US continued to heavily fund the ARVN, and Vietnamization had mixed results for both the US and the South Vietnamese Army.

So thank you very much for joining me today.

Hopefully, you've enjoyed the lesson, hope you've learned something, and hopefully, I'll see you again next time.

Bye-bye.