Vietnam-The+Path+to+War+Paragraphs

 After being ruled in colonies for as long as they could remember, Vietnam wanted to rule itself. They soon began to fight and overthrow France. During this time, President Truman supplied France with materials to keep from being overthrown. But, by 1954, they had successfully overthrown France. Viet Minh, the group that went into power after France was overthrown, was communist based. Eventually, the country was split down the 17th parallel giving Ho Chi Minh the north and Ngo Dinh Diem the south. Ho Chi Minh led the army that overthrew French power. The French, though, still controlled the southern portion, and since the U.S. didn’t want communism to spread, they stayed on Ngo Dinh Diem’s side. In order to keep the country split and to avoid Minh unifying them and spreading communism, Diem asked the US for military advisors, which he immediately received. War in Vietnam became huge. Kennedy ended up sending 11,000 military advisors. This war was a big deal. Soon Diem had been assassinated.  Soon, the US feared that if Vietnam became communist, many other nations in Asia soon would give into communism as well. They need to keep moving. In 1964, a US ship was attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin. It was an attempted attack by the Northern Vietnamese. US war planes were demanded, by Johnson, to prepare to bomb North Vietnam. This strategy by the US was called Rolling Thunder. Before long, the US had declared war on North Vietnam. After that, the first marines arrived in Vietnam in 1965. 