Term
Paper
The Vietnam
War or more precisely the “Vietnam Conflict” because there was never a formal
congressional declaration of war, occurred in the context of the post-World War
II partition of the country in North Vietnam
and South Vietnam. American involvement was also an outgrowth of
the Cold War as the North Vietnamese were allied with China and the Soviet Union while South Vietnam
was allied with the West. A principal
architect of American military involvement in Vietnam was Robert McNamara who, as
Secretary of Defense under President John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson,
oversaw the escalation of American involvement from about 500 advisors in 1960
when Kennedy was elected to several hundred thousand troops by the time
McNamara left office in early 1968.
