How far was the fighting of the Guerrilla force the most important reason why the US withdrew from Vietnam?

How far was the fighting of the Guerrilla force the most important reason why the US withdrew from Vietnam?
During the Cold War between Russia and America in the years 1945 – 1991 another conflict between the communist North of Vietnam ruled by Ho Chi Minh and the anti-communist south ruled by Diem began in 1959. Ho chi minh supporters in the south known as the Vietcong began trying to overthrow Diem’s corrupt government. Diem asked America for help to defeat the Vietcong to which they were more than eager to help as if they were defeated this would mean another communist country would emerge which could lead to the domino theory. This was the theory that if one country feel under communism, all others around it would too. In 1976 America withdrew from the war in Vietnam. There are several factors that cause debate for why America withdrew from the war. These are the guerrilla tactics used by the Vietcong, the American tactics, failure by the Americans to win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants and public opinion of the war by American citizens. In this essay I aim to show why I believe the American tactics were the most important reason for why the US withdrew from Vietnam and I aim to demonstrate this by comparing these factors against each other and using the sources to help illustrate my points.
I believe the most important reason for the American withdrawal from Vietnam was the tactics used by the American troops. The American used many tactics to try defeat the Vietcong, although a lot of them were considered unreasonable and immoral. There was the use of strategic hamlets which were walled of villages created by the Americans made to keep Vietnamese peasants in and Vietcong soldiers out. There was also the use of chemical weapons like Agent Orange and napalm, used as defoliants and to destroy the land and crops. Other more conventional tactics like the bombing of North Vietnam and helicopters and finally search and destroy missions of the Vietnamese peasant villages. This led to the American withdrawal and defeat in Vietnam as the strategic hamlets would ultimately be moving Vietcong members closer to the Americans as when a whole village is moved it may have several Vietcong members. As well as that the helicopters did not help very much as now the Vietnamese had radar stations so they knew when helicopters were coming and they also created a new tactic called ‘hugging’ which was when the Vietcong stayed so close to the Americans that they could not use air strikes because of the risk of hitting their own soldiers. I think this also led to the American defeat as defoliants like Agent Orange did uncover the Ho Chi Minh trail, but the Vietcong had now created tunnels. Also the use of chemical weapons like napalm and the search and destroy missions killed many innocent civilians, men, women and children and people back home in America soon found out about this and once images of these attacks got out, public opinion of the war became very bad and many people stopped supporting the war and began to protest for it to end. The American tactics also caused a failure for the Americans to win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants as they were killing innocent civilians which lost their support for America and the Diem government and made them want to help the Vietcong. This then made Americans involvement in the war seem unnecessary as America no longer supported it and the Vietnamese no longer wanted them there which eventually made them withdraw from Vietnam. Although on the other hand, it could be argued that even without the American tactics, the Americans still would of failed to win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people due to their lack of respect and racism towards the Vietnamese people and their backing of an unpopular government, this would still of failed to win public opinion in America. Despite this, this is still the most important reason as without the napalm and search and story attacks that had caused controversy in America and failed to gain public opinion, if America had gotten the support it needed from the Vietnamese and Americans, they could of gone on to defeat the Vietcong.
Another reason that led to the defeat of American in the Vietnam War was the guerrilla tactics used by the Vietcong. A number of strategic tactics were used by the Vietcong like their use of booby traps. They were as simple as a concealed hole under a path which could break the ankle of anyone stepping on it or more lethal was the punji traps – a deep hole with upturned bamboo spikes with points covered in human excrement. Disguise was also used by the Vietcong as they had no specific uniform so dressed up as Vietnamese peasants in order to blend in so the American soldiers never really knew who they were targeting. As well as that the Vietcong built supply lines like the Ho Chi Minh trail to send supplies to troops and then created tunnels, from simple dugouts to a complex network of tunnels to hide from the enemy, transport and keep supplies and from which to ambush the enemy. This led to the American defeat as if the American troops could not see where their enemy was, they would find it hard to wipe out the enemy at the risk of killing innocent civilians. The supply lines and tunnels also led to the American defeat as they kept the Vietnamese constantly topped with supplies and soldiers and the tunnels also providing a good hiding spot and gave the Vietnamese the element of surprise. Finally the booby traps led to Americas defeat as the traps caused enough injury to a soldier to put him out of action and ultimately an injured soldier needed 2 or 3 soldiers to help take him to safety while a dead soldier would only need 1 or 2 so the loss of soldiers would weaken the unit and army. Guerrilla tactics closely link to winning the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants as the success from these tactics and the failure of the American tactics caused the south Vietnamese peasants to begin supporting the Vietcong instead. Also the guerrilla tactics were much more affective then the American tactics as the Vietcong tactics were suited specifically to the land and the jungle environment, using the jungle to their advantage while the American tactics were the same that America had been using in all of the other wars that were suited to a more urban environment. Although on the other hand, it could be argued that the guerrilla tactics were purely developed because ho chi minh realised that they were too weak to fight the US face to face, this shows how the guerrillas were weak and only ever responded to the US development of tactics. Although despite these reasons, I still believe the American tactics are the most important reason as if it weren’t for these, the guerrilla tactics would not have been created.
The last reason for why America withdrew from Vietnam was the failure of the American military to win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants. There were a number of reasons for this like the land reform. The Vietcong had made sure that in areas under their control, land was taken from the rich land owners and given to the poor peasants but rulers of South Vietnam would not carry out policies like this. This made the South Vietnamese Diem government very unpopular and as the Americans were backing this government this also assisted in pushing the Vietnamese away from supporting them and towards the Vietcong. This is also shown in a source written by DeGroot, a historian from United States from the book ‘America and the Vietnam War’ when he says ‘Defeat was inevitable not because the Americans used the wrong strategy, but because America backed an ally which had no future in Vietnam.’ As well as that the uses of the American tactics like napalm bombs and search and destroy missions lost the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants entirely as during these attacks many innocent civilians, men, women and children were killed, especially when they were originally on the side of the Americans, this would ultimately make the want to turn to the Vietcong. Finally there was a big lack of respect and a lot of racism from the Americans towards the Vietnamese peasants which pushed the locals towards supporting the Vietcong, this also lead to resentment as a quote from a US soldier in 1993 described, ‘We never trusted any of them, I already hated them before I went over there…slant-eyed people, you couldn’t trust them.’ Also the Americans had slang terms to refer to the Vietnamese suck as ‘Gook’, ‘Dink’ or ‘Slope’. The failure to win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people linked with the American and the guerrilla tactics as the American tactics were partly responsible for the failure to win the support of the Vietnamese and the success of the guerrilla tactics helped gained the Vietcong support from the Vietnamese peasants from the south. Although it could be argued that even without the Vietnamese support, America could have won against Vietnam if they had gone down harder on them with the military and the support of the Vietnamese would not have mattered. Despite all these strengths of this argument and the importance of the support of the Vietnamese people in the withdrawal of American from Vietnam, I still believe American tactics are the most important reason for why America withdrew as the American tactics were one of the main reasons for why they could not win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese peasants.
In conclusion, I believe the fighting of the guerrilla force was an important factor for why America withdrew from Vietnam although I think the American military tactics were the most important as they were one of the main reasons for why they could not win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people, the horrendous cruelty that was caused towards the Vietnamese people was also the main reason for why public opinion of the war in America was very bad and many Americans no longer supported the war and wanted it to end and the American tactics were also the reason for why the Vietcong had to create the guerrilla tactics in order to have a chance of defeating the Americans.