The Gulf of Tonkin

The United States and the Escalation in the Vietnam War

Tal Tovy

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781317431992
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Historia
• Subtopic: Guerra de Vietnam

The Gulf of Tonkin: The United States and the Escalation in the Vietnam War analyzes the events that led to the escalation of the conflict in Vietnam and increased American involvement.

On August 4, 1964, the captains of two American destroyers, the USS Maddox and the USS Turner Joy, reported that their ships were being attacked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats. This report came on top of a previous report by the captain of the USS Maddox, indicating that he had been attacked by torpedo boats two nights earlier. The text introduces readers to the historiography of these incidents and how the perception of the events changed over time. The attacks, which were collectively called the Gulf of Tonkin incident, are presented in the context not only of the Vietnam War but also of the Cold War and U.S. government powers, enabling students to understand the events' full ramifications. Using essential primary documents, Tal Tovy provides an accessible introduction to a vital turning point in U.S. and international affairs.

This book will be useful to all students of the Vietnam War, American military history, and foreign policy history.

CHAPTER 1

The Road to Vietnam

The United States Foreign Policy after World War II

In order to understand the events that took place in the summer of 1964, one must have an understanding of two historical frameworks. The first—external (macro)—is that of American foreign policy during the post-World-War-II era, and the second—internal (micro)—is the U.S. policy toward Vietnam as influenced by the external historical framework. This chapter focuses on outlining the connecting lines between the global events and the roots of the American involvement in Vietnam. Thus, we can outline the framework which will help us understand the development and progression of the American policy toward the evolving conflict in Vietnam. This chapter does not analyze the complexity of the political history of the beginning of the Cold War, and neither will it look for the guilty parties responsible for its outbreak; rather, it will discuss the central processes and events which characterized this era, and which had a direct impact on the gradual development of the American involvement in Vietnam. In other words, the factors that drove the United States into Vietnam require a general discussion of the position and role of the United States within the international system, as shaped by the aftermath of World War II.

AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY AFTER WORLD WAR II

The defeat of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, combined with the decline of the political power of European states, especially Britain and France, after the war, created a political vacuum in the post-war world. Gradually the United States and the Soviet Union started to enter this space, attempting to bring parts of it into their spheres of influence.¹ The designers of American foreign policy entered the new era carrying a unique cultural legacy, especially when compared to the American view of the political culture of the other Western democracies.² This new era posed new and unfamiliar challenges for the United States, which suddenly faced a powerful political and ideological adversary—the Soviet Union. In a gradual process, spanning several years after the end of the war, the United States accepted (and some might say took upon itself) the powers and roles previously held by its Western allies and the defeated Axis powers. During this era, the United States employed its economic, military, and technological resources, fully developed as a result of the war, in an attempt to rebuild the post-war world and establish a new international order.³

It would be a mistake to state that the Cold War immediately followed the end of World War II, or that American or Soviet political activism was the cause of the inter-power confrontation.⁴ Moreover, from examining President Truman’s policy during the first year of his presidency, it is clear that he was trying to follow in President Roosevelt’s footsteps. However, the idea of inter-bloc cooperation in the post-war world gradually waned during 1946.⁵

It is important to remember that while the Cold War was the predominant phenomenon in shaping the post-World-War-II world, it should be treated as a historical event that did not take place in a void but was rather one of the most important consequences of the war. Throughout history, and particularly in the history of the New Era, we can identify a struggle between two or more powers for regional or global hegemony. The struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union is, thus, just another manifestation of this historical paradigm. The uniqueness of the post-World-War-II world superpower struggle lies in the immense military might of the two powers, and the formation of a military balance of terror, which prevented a direct military confrontation but did not prevent the continuation of the military aspect of the struggle via a long series of proxy wars.

Sidebar 1.1: Proxy War

A proxy war is an armed conflict between two states or non-state actors which act at the instigation of or on behalf of other parties that are not directly involved in the hostilities. In order for a conflict to be considered a proxy war, there must be a direct, long-term relationship between the external actors and the belligerents involved. The aforementioned relationship usually takes the form of funding, military training, arms, or other forms of material assistance which assist a belligerent party in sustaining its war effort.

The Cold War did not erupt because of a single event creating a chain reaction, but rather as the result of an ongoing process, which gradually escalated between 1945 and 1949 and which involved many issues.⁶ We can state that during the post-war era an atmosphere of mutual apprehension developed between the two superpowers.⁷ The death of President Roosevelt (April 12, 1945) and the transfer of the presidency to Harry Truman did not bring about a dramatic change in the United States’ attitude toward the Soviet Union. Moreover, Truman, who had inherited the framework of the Yalta accords signed by his predecessor, together with Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, and Winston Churchill, the British prime minister, did not deviate from this framework, in spite of the Soviet breach of the articles dealing with the political future of Poland.⁸ Despite Truman’s rough and aggressive style, compared to Roosevelt’s mild and peaceful tone, we can state that, at least during 1945, Truman remained loyal to Roosevelt’s legacy. This legacy aspired to create a new world order, where the role of the United States and the Soviet Union would be to prevent another global conflict of the magnitude of World War II. A clear expression of the continuity in American foreign policy and of the will to realize the vision of collaboration with the Soviet Union can be found in the agreements reached between Truman and Stalin during the Potsdam conference (July 17–August 2, 1945) on the issues crucial to the national security needs of the Soviet Union,⁹ in spite of the worrying signals concerning Stalin’s intentions toward Eastern Europe.¹⁰

In contrast to the spirit of cooperation that prevailed in Potsdam and the various understandings reached by the powers, toward the end of 1945 and at the beginning of 1946 the one-sidedness of Stalin’s policies, especially those concerning Eastern Europe, started to become apparent to the Truman administration.¹¹ These states, which had been liberated by the Red Army from the yoke of the Nazi occupation, were rapidly undergoing a process of “Sovietization” that was gradually turning the Eastern European states into satellites of the Soviet Union.¹² Additionally, in respect to East Germany, it soon became clear that Stalin had no intention of fulfilling his commitment, given in Potsdam, to regard Germany as one political-economic unit, thus cementing the understanding within the American administration that the Soviet Union was laying the foundations for the establishment of East Germany as a separate political entity.¹³

The United States also perceived signs of Soviet aggression in several locations on the southern and southeastern fringes of Europe. Thus, for example, the Soviet Union was applying heavy pressure on Turkey, demanding that it allow a Soviet military presence in the Bosphorus and Dardanelle straits, and in addition refusing to pull its military forces out of the northern part of Iran.¹⁴ This must be viewed in conjunction with the impasse and paralysis prevailing in the forum of foreign ministers of the victorious allies, which was operating in parallel to the United Nations Security Council. This forum was supposed to become the political infrastructure of the new world order, and aid in the resolution of international crises.

THE BEGINNING OF THE COLD WAR

aid:pstyle="Text" content-type="flush-left">At the beginning of 1946, two speeches were made which reflect the increasing tension between the Soviet Union and the West.¹⁵ The first speech was delivered by Stalin (February 9, 1946), in which he emphasized the unbridgeable chasm between Communism and Capitalism, and outlined the path to the ultimate victory of Communism:¹⁶

Marxists have more than once stated that the capitalist system of world economy contains the elements of a general crisis and military conflicts, that, in view of that, the development of world capitalism in our times does not proceed smoothly and evenly, but through crises and catastrophic wars. The point is that the uneven development of capitalist countries usually leads, in the course of time, to a sharp disturbance of the equilibrium within the world system of capitalism, and that group of capitalist countries [that] regards itself as being less securely provides [sic] with raw materials and markets usually attempts to change the situation and to redistribute “spheres of influence” in its own favor by employing armed force. As a result of this, the capitalist world is split into two hostile camps, and war breaks out between them.

The second speech (March 5, 1946), known as the “Fulton Speech” or “Iron Curtain” speech, was delivered by the ousted British prime minister Winston Churchill at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, with President Truman in attendance:¹⁷

A shadow has fallen upon the scenes so lately lighted by the Allied victory. Nobody knows what Soviet Russia and its Communist international organization intend to do in the immediate future, or what are the limits, if any, to their expansive and proselytizing tendencies…From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe…all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and, in some cases, increasing measure of control from Moscow…The Communist parties, which were very small in all these Eastern States of Europe, have been raised to pre-eminence and power far beyond their numbers and are seeking everywhere to obtain totalitarian control. Police governments are prevailing in nearly every case, and so far…there is no true democracy.¹⁸

In his speech Churchill drew a geographical-ideological line, which he named the “Iron Curtain,” dividing Europe into two blocs:¹⁹ the Eastern Bloc, ruled by the Soviet Union, and the Western Bloc, under the leadership of the United States. These two speeches can be viewed as the final shattering of Roosevelt’s vision of cooperation between the two superpowers of the post-war world. Both speeches underline the ideological dimension as having a decisive influence on the development and conduct of the Cold War. However, we cannot ignore the other political, geopolitical, and economic factors which also had a significant influence on the Cold War.²⁰

On February 22, 1946, George Kennan, the American chargé d’affaires in Moscow, sent an 8,000-word telegram to Secretary of State George Marshall.²¹ The telegram, which became known as the “Long Telegram,” was published a year later as an article in the prestigious Foreign Affairs journal.²² In his telegram, Kennan made a central argument which became one of the underpinnings of American foreign policy throughout the Cold W...