The Vietnam War last from year 1945 to 1975 was the longest-ever conflict that the United States ever participated in. The war accounted the lives of more than 60,000 American citizens and approximately 2 million Vietnamese. The participation of the United States in the said war resulted to the enactment of the War Power Acts of 1973, which demanded Congressional approval before the President can deploy US forces overseas.

How long did the Vietnam war last for the united states? It was almost 30 years conflict that the US ever participated in. The main reason why the United States participated in the Vietnam War was to put a stop to the spread of communism in the Southern Vietnam as part of their wide scale strategy of containment. Following the French Armada’s defeat in the region, peace talks were then held in Geneva, which resulted to the conceding of independence to Cambodia and Laos and the division of Vietnam into South and North.

The spread of Communism was quite evident on both local as well as the International front. In the US, majority of the 50s era saw the American citizens experiencing the so-called Red Scare that was lead by Sen. Joseph McCarthy, as he found the concept of communism very conflicting.

For the time being, on the International front, every single country in the Eastern Europe has started to embrace communism soon after World War II ended. It started with China followed by other countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. From there, United States began to implement the containment philosophy as they felt that they were losing this Cold War.

With this in mind, the US began to send its first batch of military advisers to aid France in the War against Communism in the Northern Vietnam. Simultaneously, the UN and the United States had launched operations against the Chinese and North Korean forces in the Korean War.

For France, it was not about preventing the spread of communism, just like what the Americans did, but to maintain the Colonial power and also to re-establish their national pride after being humiliated during the Second World War When it became clear to the French that any attempts to keep Indochina as a colony in the expense of blood was pointless, France immediately pulled out its forces in year 1954.

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