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The Tet Offensive [a] was a major escalation and one of the largest military campaigns of the Vietnam War.The Viet Cong (VC) and North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) launched a surprise attack on 30 January 1968 against the forces of the South Vietnamese Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the United States Armed Forces and their allies.
The forests of Vietnam especially were very vulnerable to a chemical such as Agent Orange, and by the end of the 9 year campaign, 11 million gallons of Agent Orange had been dropped on the region including Laos, Cambodia, and mostly Vietnam. These herbicides not only affected the landscape of Vietnam, but had disastrous effects on the human body.
The year was the most expensive in the Vietnam War with America spending US$77.4 billion (US$ 678 billion in 2025) on the war. The year also became the deadliest of the Vietnam War for America and its allies with 27,915 ARVN soldiers killed and the Americans suffering 16,592 killed compared to around two hundred thousand PAVN/VC killed.
More than 3 million Americans served in the Vietnam War, some 1.5 million of whom actually saw combat in Vietnam. [88] James E. Westheider wrote that "At the height of American involvement in 1968, for example, 543,000 American military personnel were stationed in Vietnam, but only 80,000 were considered combat troops."
Murder, kidnapping, torture and intimidation were a routine part of Viet Cong (VC) and People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) operations during the Vietnam War.They were intended to liquidate opponents such as officials, leaders, military personnel, civilians who collaborated with the South Vietnamese government, erode the morale of South Vietnamese government employees, cow the populace and boost ...
At the time, less than a quarter of Americans polled, 24%, believed it was a mistake to send troops to Vietnam, while 60% of Americans polled believed the opposite. Three years later, in September 1968, 54% of Americans polled believed it was a mistake to send troops to Vietnam, while 37% believed it was not a mistake.
In recalling the 1971 congressional testimony of some US veterans who were critical of the war, one of whom compared US action in Vietnam to genocide, Lewy suggests that some "witnesses sounded as if they had memorized North Vietnamese propaganda." [8] The book is broadly critical of domestic opponents of American participation in the Vietnam ...
Following the French Indochina War was the Vietnam War and American involvement therein. Although the American intervention on behalf of their South Vietnamese ally received a mixed reception. American soldiers committed massacres during the war, with the most infamous being the Mỹ Lai Massacre, and also controversially used Agent Orange.