Fortudinae

Just as happened in Kenya, Peng's CTs were gradually picked off as they conducted night raids for food on the crops of the hamlets. The CTs could threaten internees but they couldn't get anything from them; that was strictly controlled. The hamlet fields were a bait to lure CTs where they could be spotted, then tracked back to their base camps.
Just as in Kenya the SH was a success in Malaya.

Where the Vietminh succeeded the Vietcong failed because of the hamlet program. Once the VC agent in charge of the program was caught, the program worked so well that the VC were forced to accept direct NVA help, which they preferred to avoid. The NVA used the VC as regulars, which they weren't built to be, until they were used up. By the end they were so depleted that the NV simply tossed them out, where they had expected to become the rulers of SVietnam. When the VC didn't need direct NV support, the NVA representative was a friendly old man; when they had to ask for help they got a young hardline NVA rep who took over and began running the VC.

Which is totally irrelevant as the Allies did in fact win the SEAsia war - part of which took place in SVietnam.

Shek

The CEP and SEP, along with the decision to use smaller rather than larger patrols, scored the biggest successes for the destruction of communist sanctuaries in the Malayan interior.

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"So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand." Thucydides 1.20.3

troung

I can get a list of books for you after the new year...

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To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

troung

Malay and Vietnam had little in common. The MRLA was not being fed weapons, people and ammo by another nation in large numbers to allow them to form fully armed divisions and corps. The MRLA was small and unable to overcome its own ethnic origins. They sure as **** did not have tanks, bombers, long range artillery, personal automatic weapons in large numbers, rockets and patrol boats. The MRLA did not have massive safe zones in other nations. The MRLA was not publically supported by other nations.

Put the commonwealth forces fighting the VC/NVA the way they fought the MRLA and they would have lost as well. Malaya was not the size or scope of the war in Vietnam.

Shek

Thanks.

Squitter89

Well, the Americans Where doing a good job and they started Weakening in its defense lines. Reason being the Americans just quit. Just quit. They pulled back and America could have won but they quit. Also because im English and we were/are the Americans Allies Suprisingly we were still recovering from WWII [London bombing, France Poland, Germany, Italy, Also Paying off debts we owed to the US when the Factorys in Liverpool and London were bombed also trying to rebuild the RAF, and the Royal Navy.]Therefore we could not aford to go to war.---

Fortudinae

You're talking about Phase III, which never occurred in Malaya. It would have been dependent on the CTs seizure of modern equippage from government forces.
While Phase III occurred in SVN, it wasn't the normal progression from Phase II to Phase III. What passes for Phase III was in fact the regular NVA - which hadn't been involved directly up to then - intervening to prevent the imminent destruction of the VC.
The NVA were never supposed to intervene; The VC were supposed to seize control and build a conventional army, in the same manner that the Vietminh became the NVA.
Once again - we didn't "lose" -we wrecked the VC and sent them back to Phase -I, then trashed the NVA which was supposed to be held in reserve for other tasks. Mission accomplished, withdrew - it was NEVER the aim to keep the pisspot Saigon regime in power. The result of the "Vietnam" war? The Chinese got a troublesome tough little enemy on their southern border for all their effort.

Fortudinae

I don't know how you come by this - were you there? I was.

After Tet the NVA were hurting so bad that they couldn't even seize Khesanh as a face-saver for their crushing defeat in Hue. It became an exercise in futility going at them with regular operations because they would simply flee, inflicting H&I on our forces.
They were scared to death of open warfare with US forces after Tet and Khesanh.
That equalled a broken arrow - which was what we wanted.
Weakening its defense lines? What are you talking about?
It became possible to convert line infantry doing regular ops in ICorps to COIN units, because there was little left for regular infantry to do.
You know nothing about what the Americans did - much less if they "quit".

beansprout

its hard to say though....America had the man power and the resources at its desposible, but sending troops and unable to find the enemy is a waste of time & money. fighting a guerilla warfare for the U.S will led them to nowhere...with china backing NV with endless supplies of weapons, military management wasnt all of a prob for North Vietnam.

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He conquers who endures - Persius

el_guapo

The US was actually winning the war, and forced North Vietnam go to the negotiation tables at least twice. Iron Triangle was destroyed by bombers which was one of the staging areas against the South, such as Tet Offensive. Even with Westmorland's atrrition strategy, NVA, and VC were losing simply because of the commitment to the strategy. Vietnam War could of ended sooner if the US actually attacked North Vietnam with ground forces. Chinese, or Russia wouldn't have come to the assistance to the North. It wasn't that kind of relationship. Certainly not like Cuba, and Russia. North Vietnamese were patriots primarily, then communist. Cambodian operations, and Laos were good ideas, but the liberal hordes condemned it.

Were was winnable simply because of overwhelming US firepower, but will is another thing. Ho Chi Minh knew US would kill them by the bushels. He knew what he was up against. Tet Offensive really sapped the communist forces, after that, they were going downhill. It was a gamble that didn't pay off, and was a disaster for the communist. Strangely, the liberals, and American people saw that as a defeat, but then again the average American isn't quite educated.

Even when the Americans started to withdraw, ARVN forces were doing pretty good with American airpower, and 3 billion dollar army, but the Truman decided to pull the plug on air support, and even aid to SV.

American Airpower was devastating to North Vietnam. Forced them to bargain with SV, and the US.

astralis

el guapo,

several points.

disaster militarily, but big strategic political win.

does that mean liberal = american people? the problem with this was not so much lack of education, but simply because of political overplaying. westmoreland was talking about "the light at the end of the tunnel" and how the "end was beginning to come into view" in 1968, and the tet offensive showed how untrue this was. there were big expectations going into 1968 and 1969, and these expectations were unfulfilled.

yes, the US could have, and would have, won had the ground forces carried the war into north vietnam. but this was a political limitation, done because of fear of cold war spillover and of a repeat of the korean war.

westmoreland utterly failed in fighting under these limitations, because he failed to understand that attrition warfare was boneheaded given that the north vietnamese saw the war as a total one, whereas for the US it was not. as long as the US did not advance into north vietnam, north vietnam would keep on throwing soldiers into the battle. abrams, on the other hand, did far better with less.

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Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

-Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

el_guapo

Of course the North knew politics will play into the war. Ho Chi Minh said "They will kill many of us, and we will kill few of them, and they will lose." Politics, and war don't mix. Let the war be run by the generals, not politicians. Political victory over military victory? Utter nonsense.



Westmorland did a major blow to the communist in Tet, and sensed he could break enemy resolve, so he requested 200,000 more troops. Westmorland wasn't a failure. Creighton Abrams was dealing with a depleted communist forces that was done by West Morland. To say Abrams was better, is nonsense.

Tet didn't happen because the communist were better, it happened because it caught the US and it's allies by surprise since it was a Vietnamese holiday, but US still did win the battles. Tet's goals were not achieved, thus a failure on the communist's part. Yes Americans were uneducated, because they didn't understand the concept of insurgency, and saw battle lines, when infact Vietnam had no battle lines unless you count the DMZ between South, and North Vietnam. There was no enemy frontlines, what did the Americans expect? It was a new kind of war.

Shek

It makes absolute sense on all fronts. The pre-eminent western war philosopher, Clausewitz, speaks quite eloquently to the pre-eminence of politics over war:

As far as the political victory that Astralis speaks of, while Vietnam was not the cause of the Sino-Soviet split, it created the opening for realists like Nixon and Kissenger to exploit the split. Furthermore, if you take the longer view, Vietnam encouraged Soviet adventurism, which brought Afghanistan and the implosion of the Soviet system in the 1980s.

Once again, it makes total sense that Abrams was better. He did more with less and fought the "total" war across the spectrum of the instruments of national power.

It was a new kind of war only for those who had no concept of history or grasp of current affairs. All it took was to read the Army's professional journal for field grade officers to have learned more about insurgency in a tropical environment.
All it took was to read Amazon.com: On Guerrilla Warfare: Mao Tse-tung,Samuel B Griffith: Books (or On Guerrilla Warfare - Google Book Search. Or you could read about the French experience in Vietnam here, Amazon.com: Street Without Joy: Bernard B. Fall: Books. Or, you could read about how the British defeated a communist insurgency in a tropical environment here, Hailer Publishing - great military history books back from out of print status. In fact, both Bernard Fall and Sir Robert K. Thompson both helped to advise the US (to no avail, since their advice wasn't heeded by Westmoreland and the command team in Vietnam). In fact, Bernard Fall was killed by an IED, but of course, that's something new that didn't exist until Iraq, I'm sure.

S-2

The recent experiences were there. Absolute models. Huks in the Phillipines and the Malay Communist Party. With one exception. Both the Huks and the MCP lacked a significant partner nation (NLF/NVN) with land access to SVN through a neutral nation.

That long border created access and, thus, a dimension probably not possible in Malaya or the Phillipines. Cambodia exerted no more sovereignty over those long stretches than Pakistan does today over it's northwest.

Still, that's the only caveat I have. The combined efforts of ARVN, U.S. Armed Forces, ADF, S. Koreans, Thais, should have, with a wee tad of subtle consideration been able to finesse a positive outcome.

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"This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski

astralis

shek,

i actually meant for north vietnam! disaster militarily, big win politically.

but your point remains absolutely true. it was in the aftermath of this that the US finally began to look at more creative methods of dealing with both vietnam and the wider cold war.

perhaps it all went for the best- i wonder if the world really would have been a better place today had abrams been in command from the beginning, and managed to pull out a seperate South Vietnam from his hat.