What is the gulf of tonkin's relationship with the vietnamese war?

Answer 1

Vietnam was a small guerrilla war prior to the Gulf incident. After the incident, Vietnam turned into a full scaled conventional war against North Vietnam.

Cold war=Communists vs Free World (US)

Answer 2

The Gulf Of Tonkin incident (two events) was a catalyst for US engagement in Vietnam. It is a location in which, on the November 2nd and 4th of 1964, two US naval destroyers and 3 North Vietnamese Torpedo boats accosted each other. Sinking one boat, US congress consequently passed the Gulf Of Tonkin Resolution- allowing President Lyndon B. Johnson the legal authority to intervene in any 'South-East Asian' country he saw as being threatened by communist aggression. Ultimately, it was America's justification for their escalation of their war effort in Vietnam.

Answer 3

Keep mind that the 02 August 1964 incident was an actual battle between the North Vietnamese Navy and the US Navy. The 04 August 1964 incident was in question.

It was significant enough to start an open war between the United States and North Vietnam.

Before the "Tonkin Gulf", war was restricted to only South Vietnam.

Answer 4

The TG incident(s) consisted of TWO naval confrontations between the North Viet Navy & the US Navy on 02 & 04 August 1964 in the Tonkin Gulf; resulting in the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which in turn resulted in direct open warfare between Hanoi & Washington, which resulted in America's first air strike against North Vietnam in which their Navy's torpedo base was attacked, which also resulted in America's first POW of the war, USN A4 Skyhawk pilot Alvarez who was shot down during the bombing of the torpedo boat base (Operation Pierce Arrow). From that day onward, the guerrilla war in South Vietnam escalated into conventional war against both the north and the NVA in the South; involving everything from B52s to the battleship USS New Jersey.

Answer 5

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident (August 2, 1964) was an attack and a reported attack (the second attack never happened; the radar on Maddox was disrupted by weather, making it appear that boats were approaching) by North Vietnamese torpedo boats on the US destroyer USS Maddox off the Vietnamese coast . Although American advisors and support personnel had been involved in Vietnam and other parts of Southeast Asia since the mid-1950s, while the areas was still a French colony, the Tonkin Incident marked the beginning of large-scale American deployments to South Vietnam, and is often cited as the official beginning of the Vietnam War for the United States.

The Tet Offensive, a coordinated series of attacks by Vietcong and (for the first time on a large scale) the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) on targets across South Vietnam, launched on January 30, 1968 (the Vietnamese new year, and a time when no attacks were expected). Even though Tet was a military failure, with the NVA in particular taking heavy losses, Tet marked a turning point in the war. North Vietnamese commanders watched the political situation in the United States closely, and understood that they could win by stirring up opposition to the war, rather than winning militarily, which was probably not possible. The Tet Offensive, which unfolded on American TV, convinced many supporters of the war and people who had been on the fence, that the war was unwinnable.

Lyndon Johnson decided not to run for reelection in 1968, partly because he felt responsible for how the war was going. The 1968 election was fought between two candidates who wanted to end the war (Hubert Humphrey and Richard Nixon), with Nixon winning on a slogan of "peace with honor". Although the last US troops did not leave Vietnam until 1973, Tet marked the beginning of a drawdown and and end to the American part in the war ("Vietnamization").

In terms of public support, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident began the war, and Tet ended it. Few Americans noticed the war before Americans were deployed in large numbers after Tonkin, and they began to oppose the war after Tet.

Answer 6

Started open warfare between North Vietnam and the US.