 WARM- UP 1. WHAT IS THIS CARTOON SAYING AND WHAT ERA IS THIS FROM? EXPLAIN HOW THIS IS INCENSITIVE AND RACIST?

 1940s Cold War Context:  anticommunism.  American moralism.  superpower rivalry.  1940’s Colonialism Context  After WWII Asian Colonies demanded independence from European Nations  1961 Entire Region Decolonized  By 1950s Cold War Context:  The Korean War: containment via confrontation.  The domino theory.  The U.S. as a “nation builder.”

 Indochina includes most of Southeast Asia;  it is a political distinction created by France to include its colonial possessions of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia (also known as French Indochina).

 long history of invasion and colonization  China occupied Vietnam for 1200 years (repelled in 939 AD).  Vietnam independent until the 19 th century.  1800’s France invaded and occupied Southeast Asia (including the southern region of Vietnam)  and for 100 years it was a French colony. While Buddhism is Vietnam’s dominant religion, the French preferred Christianity. 7

 Japan invaded and occupied Vietnam during WWII.  Forced out with allied effort by 1945  France, devastated by WWII, tried to re-occupy Vietnam (with U.S. support) from but was driven out.  The U.S. stepped in to support “South Vietnam” Japanese officer surrenders to an Indian officer in Saigon, The Vietnamese hoped they had finally won their independence,

 The Cold War! The U.S. needed French support for the Marshall Plan and NATO.  The First Indochina War (’46- ’54) was fought by Cold War antagonists:  U.S.S.R. and China supported Vietminh.  The U.S. supported France.

 1. The American failure to understand the effects of Western colonialism in the Third World.  2. Due to American Cold War fears, Americans misinterpreted post-1945 Third World liberation movements (nationalism) as Soviet- led communism.  3. The domino theory did not hold up if insurrections were nationalist-inspired more than communist-inspired, yet the U.S. clung to the domino theory, partly because it sold well. 10

 The Indochina War was a conflict between the French imperialists, who sought to return Vietnam as a colony of France, versus the Vietnamese nationalists  (most of whom were also communists) who sought sovereignty for Vietnam. 11

 Leader of the Vietnamese nationalist movement to bring sovereignty  he was a nationalist. This is what made him appealing to the Vietnamese.  A hero during the Japanese occupation  Helped British and American support, helped drive them out.  1945 When the Japanese were defeated he proclaimed independent Democratic Peoples Republic of Vietnam (NV)  Viet mien- was his Guerilla Army who fought Japanese and later the French for liberation  France declared they still had control of North Vietnam 12

 Grateful to the American liberators and an admirer of the American Revolution,  Seen in his Vietnamese Declaration of Independence.  A Marxist with a proletariat background.  Many communist ideals( US feared this  Advocate of guerilla warfare tactics against foreign occupiers/imperialists.  Not a puppet of the USSR or China.  Truman and others lumped him as a puppet of the Soviets.

 In 1945, Vietnam was liberated from Japanese occupation.  Ho Chi Minh celebrated the Americans as liberators and sends a a letter to Truman begging him to support a Independent Vietnam  Prior to end of the war-FDR caved in to French and British demands to return Vietnam as a colony of France.  FDR felt he needed the French and British as allies in the emerging superpower rivalry with the Soviets.  Truman carried out this policy by supporting the French in the Indochina War of

 No possibilities of an official Independent Vietnam  Vietnamese refused to give up the territories in the North  1946 France Attacks North Vietnamese territories

 The U.S. supported the French, while China and the USSR supported the nationalist communists.  The Indochina War was largely funded and partly supplied by the U.S. in exchange for French support for the American- desired NATO.  The French and Americans sought to carve out the southern region of Vietnam and turn it into “South Vietnam” in a nation-building experiment. South Vietnam would be a pro- U.S. capitalist friend.