In 1945, after the atom bombs over
Hiroshima and Nagasaki,
when the Japanese had finally surrendered,
France wanted their former colony
Indochina back.
Vietnam, (a part of Indochina), that
had been occupied by France for decades
and then by Japan during the second
world war,
wanted to become an independent
country.
France did not want to give up their
territory,
and thus the First Indochina War began.
US paid the French costs for the war,
as France was ruined
and also helped them with air support.
Where did the French get the idea that
Vietnam belonged to them?
Why did not any western democratic
country
support Vietnam in their struggle for
independence;
not before World War II, and not after?
Where could Vietnam find help?
Why did United States assist the French
army in Vietnam?
Why didn't US give support to
democratic endeavors in Vietnam?
Because The US was not a democracy at
that time.
The US was a racist, right-wing
extremist state.
Black people and native Americans
did not have the same legal rights as
the white people.
Anyway,
In 1954, the Frenchmen were kicked out,
despite all US support.
In the peace talks in Geneva that then
followed,
it was decided that Vietnam should be
divided in two parts
and that an election should be held
within two years,
where the people of North and South
Vietnam should decide
if they wanted to unite and if so, what
kind of regime they wanted.
US prevented these elections and thus
began the Vietnam War.
Two million Vietnamese died in this
war, conservatively estimated,
and nearly sixty thousand young
American men.
Seven million tons of bombs were
dropped
with an explosive force equivalent to
600 Hiroshima bombs.
Ask young Americans or young Europeans
of today,
if they know what this war was about,
and they will probably answer
that it was a war to defend freedom and
democracy against Communism.