![]() But President Eisenhower and Secretary of State Dulles decided that, to prevent the southern half of Vietnam from voting for Ho Chi Minh, they would attempt (in violation of their promise to abide by the Geneva Accords) to replace the French and establish an American sphere of influence there. ![]() Experts agreed that the people would vote 80% for Ho Chi Minh, who was their national hero. An election was promised within 2 years in which the people of all Vietnam would be reunited under the one government they preferred. When in 1954 the Vietnamese people under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh finally defeated France in their 8-year war for independence, Vietnam was temporarily divided by the Geneva Accords into 2 zones, so that the French and the small minority of mandarin Vietnamese (rich landlords and officials) who fought on the French side could have time to settle their affairs in the South. I DOUBT THERE WILL EVER be a clearer example of how a nation lets itself in for war-through power striving and the paranoid projection of its own aggressiveness-than in America's involvement in Vietnam.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |