What led to US military action in the Vietnam - Research Paper Example

China would continue to rule there for the next 1,000 years, until 939 AD when Vietnam would regain some measure of independence (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs). Following this, two families fought for control of the country, and civil war was common until the late 18th century (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs). A peasant revolt in 1802 again unified the country under one governor, but was beaten down by an emperor who ruled as Gia Long (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs).

The Vietnamese, by the time of the entry of American troops into their country, were most likely used to seeing foreigners in their country. The Americans, however, were still about 150 years away. First were the French in 1855, which ruled Vietnam as a colony, along with Cambodia and Laos, and called it French Indochina (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs). The emperor of Vietnam remained in the country at Hue and was given very limited authority, but that was all (Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs).

In 1919, a young man known as Ho Chi Minh joined the French Socialist Party, and became fascinated by the teachings of V.I. Lenin (Lawrence). Lenin, while adamant that full-blown Communist revolution could only occur in countries with high industrialization, encouraged agrarian societies to form small cells of communist supporters (Lawrence). Ho Chi Minh not only believed in this principle, but believed that it formed a road map for him to carry out revolution and free Vietnam from colonial rule forever (Lawrence).

The path to the Vietnam War had, in some ways, begun with his thoughts. Vietnam faced further occupation during World War II. The Japanese entered and quickly took over for France, forcing them to concede French Indochina (Lawrence). In the confusion of the final year of the war, Ho Chi Minh took advantage of the opportunity to bring his party to the forefront of politics by relieving a famine and feeding the starving masses of Vietnamese