There are always two sides to a story, and if the story is about a war, surely it has various dimensions. For a historian, it is not an easy task to keep track of the motives and intentions behind certain acts of war. There are no two opinions about investigating the causes and effects of a war. However, the insight one could get from those who lived through a war has a distinct position above all other tools of inquiry. Any professor of history teaching in the United States would tell you that ‘Vietnam War’ took place to protect the ‘good folks’ of the south from ‘bad people’ of the north. Despite losing more than 58,000 troops, and withdrawing after a humiliating defeat in Vietnam, the United States still considers the war in Vietnam as ‘just another mistake’ in the Cold War. Nevertheless, America’s campaign in Vietnam, which lasted more than a decade, had a profound impact on millions of Vietnamese. For these people, this war is not the Vietnam War: they call it the ‘American War’. There is a whole generation of people with vivid memories of days and nights of war. For a large number of Vietnamese, the war was just another USA campaign, to serve its own interest. People still remember the times when there were non-stop radio broadcasts about how ‘American Wolves’ were tearing apart their beloved land. The Vietnamese people lived under war and oppression for a very long time. When asked about their opinion
The post ‘Vietnam War’ – what Vietnamese people think of the conflict appeared first on WAR HISTORY ONLINE.