Our Enemy and Their Threat

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The enemy of the U.S. was any type of Communist but it was the Northern Vietnam that was the enemy in the Vietnam war. The threat they posed was that the neighboring countries of Vietnam would turn into communists (Domino Theory). Soon enough there might be a huge number of Communist countries that would dominate. Our trading would be effected because they could take over trading by Imperialism. We felt threatened that trading would no longer favor the United States. The United States were experts at Imperialism, and they did not want that to change. Imperialism is the creation and maintaining of unequal economic, cultural and territorial relationship, based on domination and subordination. In addition, if Vietnam fell under Communism and so did neighboring countries, they could become allies with Communist China. The United States did not want to fight China for they did not want to start WWIII. Some main groups in Vietnam were the Viet Cong. The VC were every day citizens and the U.S. soldiers could not tell the difference between the VC and the innocent. They hid very successfully by hiding in trees and swamps. They used their surrounding area to fight the U.S. and they used underground tunnel complexes to hide and survive. Another group was the National Liberation Front which was an anti-Diem group. Diem was the president in Southern Vietnam. He was a catholic in a Buddhist country. The NLF was created in 1960 that was controlled by the north Vietnamese. They had the same purpose as the Vietcong.