How many died from friendly fire during the Vietnam war?

Answer 1

Gunpowder did much to increase the effects of 'Blue on Blue' friendly fire in conflict. Before that the reason that Knights wore their coat of arms on their armour was to distinguish them to all, to prevent attack from their own side. The ability to kill at a distance has made friendly fire much much more common & has affected all combat situations ever since. Limited visibity in a tropical, jungle, situation makes identification of a target very very difficult and I'm sure this affected casualty rates in Vietnam. Whether this is more or less than other conflicts however I really couldn't speculate on.

Answer 2

Nobody knows for sure. No one was keeping count, not all incidents were reported or even recognized as friendly fire, and the military did not want the subject explored or documented. By late in the war anecdotal rumor had it that as many as one third of all American deaths were due to friendly fire. This would make a total in excess of 19,000. Inaccurate bombing and misdirected artillery fire were frequent causes.

Answer 3

Although it was a very rare occurrence, US artillery, aerial rocket artillery, naval artillery from off shore, as well as bombing from air force and navy planes did sometimes cause casualties to US combatants fighting in close contact with the enemy. If you are practically fighting hand-to-hand with the enemy, and call in fire power support, its bound to give friendly forces a very high pucker factor experience.