The Roles of The Presidents Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

The Roles of The Presidents - Essay Example Documented evidence available indicates that the administration of President Dwight David Eisenhower is considered to have been responsible for starting the war. His presidency is in fact looked at in two contexts, with the most prominent one involving the strategy he employed to wage the Cold War. He was intensely dedicated to the policy of containing socialism by deploying economic and military aid, forming defensive alliances, and finally by threatening to exercise U.S. military power (Jonathan, 2004). With the exit of the French from Vietnam, it is stated that Eisenhower decided to support the South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem believing to get some success in return. This was not to be the case With this failure, Eisenhower knew that a destructive atomic war was in the offing. Although he wanted to avert this possibility as much as possible, he was on the other prepared to employ clandestine and deliberately misleading methods to achieve his nation's national security goals (Jonathan, 2004). He had used the same strategy in Iran and later in Guatemala working through the Central Intelligence Agency. Although his party lost control of Congress, he won an overwhelming personal victory at the polls. President John F. Escalation of the conflict. President John F. Kennedy ascended into office with a conviction that America might and ought to shape the destiny of the world's developing countries. Primarily, Vietnam was not one of his mental preoccupations. In fact Vietnam was not on his list of priorities nor was it either discussed as a key issue at the transition meeting during the take over from Eisenhower. But sometime in the middle of his administration when the Vietnam issue had become more urgent, Kennedy simply remarked that Eisenhower never uttered the word Vietnam (Sylvia, 2004). He never strongly condemned the Vietnam War, an indication that he aided in its escalation. In fact it is only one of his key advisers who is known to have spoken against the war. President Kennedy started sending American forces to Vietnam in May 1961 and by the end of 1962, the military had received 11,300 US officers operating in South Vietnam, thus slowly escalating American involvement in the war. But towards the end of 1963, the war was still far from being over. This caused President Kennedy to organize the assassination of Diem of the South Vietnam regime. Before Kennedy was able to pull out 1,000 men from Vietnam at the end of the year as he had announced, was assassinated on November 22, 1963, having helped to escalate America's military, political, and maybe psychological commitment to Vietnam (Jonathan, 2004). Responsibility for America's disappointment in the Vietnam War is most squarely placed at the feet of Lyndon Johnson. It was him following President Kennedy's death in 1963 that increased America's military involvement in Vietnam and it was also during his administration that most American casualties were suffered. It is even documented that on 28 June 1966, the United States started bombing petrol, oil and lubricants facilities in the North Vietnamese cities of Hanoi and Haiphong, a move considered in many quarters as directed mainly against civilians (Jonathan, 2004). President Nixon on the other hand must be held accountable nearly as much as Lyndon Johnson for the failure of