Quote:
Originally posted by Centurion
I believe the above was said about the Viet Cong in January of 1968.
Just send over 500,000 men to Viet Nam and there is NO WAY the United States would lose that war.
Yet...they did.
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If you are referring to the Tet Offensive...it was a major military defeat for the VC and NVA...out of an estimated force of 70,000...45,000 were killed by the US military and its allies. The VC after Tet was never a viable force after Tet...the burden fell to the NVA.
American, Korean, and Australian forces...1536 killed.
South Vietnamese forces...2,788 killed.
And then Walter Cronkite, America's most respected journalist at that time, suggested that America wasn't winning the war. It was inaccurate, based on a 30 second TV grab and was not much better than stupid as the figures show.
It was the media coverage then...much as the media coverage now...that paints the darkest picture possible...and gives a false impression...to the American people...as well as the world.
The US did not succeed in attaining its ultimate goal in Vietnam...but it did not militarily lose in Vietnam...it simply withdrew in 1973. The South Vietnamese Army collasped in 1975.