Vietnam and Iraq Wars - Essay Example

The invasion of Iraq was started in an attempt to stop the rise of international terrorism, which started after the attacks of September eleventh, in the year 2001. The invasion was started on the grounds of allegations that there was cooperation and coordination between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. This paper seeks to analyze the two invasions, which were carried out by the American forces in the lights of broad and diverse academic resources. Furthermore, this paper will seek to compare and contrast between the things, which the American soldiers carried with them in Vietnam to the things, which they carried in Iraq.

The US was embroiled in the Vietnam conflict during the 1960s and 1970s. Vietnam had been partitioned into North and South after the French withdrawal. North Vietnam had begun to sponsor a communist insurgency in the South (Barbier, 34). This was considered to be a threat to US interests which feared a domino affect that would result in communist revolutions in neighboring countries. The United States deployed its military forces in Vietnam. It used classical counter insurgency tactics like sweep and search operations, resettlement of hostile villages, torture of suspected insurgents, air strikes against North Vietnamese forces, and assassination campaigns against communist collaborators.

However the North Vietnamese continued to fight back by creating a large pain threshold. They were able to absorb heavy casualties and sustain a war of attrition against the United States. By 1973, the US had retreated from Vietnam by signing a negotiated settlement with North Vietnam. The United States retreat from Vietnam was considered to be a major military setback. It would spawn decades of reluctance inside the US to commit ground troops into any major conflict. Iraq WarThe Iraq War was launched in the year 2003 with the specific purpose of overthrowing the regime of Saddam Hussein.

US forces quickly overthrew the regime within twenty one days but were embroiled in a guerilla conflict with local insurgents. The US has deployed massive numbers of troops in order to achieve its military objectives. It has formed collaborative relationships with local Iraqi forces in order to tame the insurgency. US forces in the year 2007 launched a massive troop surge which was an attempt to pacify the county. The key strategy was to conduct a section by section sweep of suspected insurgent areas.

US forces would ensure a permanent presence by establishing checkpoints and outposts. The surge has relatively pacified Iraq with a number of insurgent groups joining the US led allied government (Barbier, 45).Standard Issue Weapons and EquipmentUS forces in Vietnam were not adequately trained to handle guerilla warfare. The US military doctrine considered guerillas as mere nuisances during conflict zones. The average US soldier was a draftee who had been pushed into the Vietnamese jungle for a couple of months.

However the Kenney Administration deployed Special Forces in order to fight the guerilla threat. US Special Forces were involved in pacification campaigns that involved searching and destroying guerilla positions. The UH-1 (Huey) helicopter was extensively applied for such missions (Barbier, 32). US troops in Vietnam carried M-16 rifles which enabled rapid fire against concentrated