The Rep’s Inside Scoop - Vietnam War Timeline

Timeline Reference

Last Of the Boys centers on events and people associated with the Vietnam War:


1888 – area comprising today’s Vietnam and Cambodia declared as French colony of Indochina; French military and commercial history in the region dates from the late 1700s


June 1940 – France falls to Nazi Germany and the Axis-allied French Vichy Government assumes government functions within France and for French overseas holdings


September 1940 – The Vichy Government cooperates with Imperial Japanese military forces as Japan occupies Indochina


May 1941 – Vietnamese Communist Party announces intention to organize the people of Vietnam to overthrow the Japanese military occupiers and the French colonial government; the Viet Minh, an association of like-minded popular organizations, is formed


1943 – The Viet Minh, led by Ho Chi Minh, recognized by democratic China and the Allies as primary Vietnamese resistance force against Japan; U. S. Office of Strategic Services (predecessor of today’s Central Intelligence Agency) begins providing the Viet Minh with intelligence, weapons and materiel support; Robert McNamara joins Army Air Force’s Office of Statistical Control


August 1945 – Japan’s surrender ends World War II; France reestablishes military control of Vietnam, but is opposed politically and militarily by the Viet Minh


1946 – Robert McNamara joins Ford Motor Company as manager of planning and financial analysis, one of ten former military officers known within Ford as “The Whiz Kids” for their focus on modern planning and analysis techniques and resultant commercial successes


January 1950 – China’s new communist government officially recognizes and begins supporting the Viet Minh-controlled Democratic Republic of Vietnam region in the north of the country; most non-communist nations recognize the State of Vietnam led from Saigon in the south (with French support)


June 1950 – the Korean War begins on the Korean Peninsula pitting communist-backed forces against non-communist


May 1954 – French forces in Vietnam surrender to Viet Minh forces following the Battle of Dien Bien Phu; Geneva Accords peace treaty establish partition of Vietnam along the 17th Parallel with the north as a communist region and the south non-communist pending 1956 national elections


Spring 1955 – South Vietnam rejects the plan for elections in 1956


1959 – U.S. military advisors in the south number approximately 900


November 1960 – John Kennedy elected U.S. president; Kennedy makes strong statements opposing spread of communism in southeast Asia.  McNamara elected president of Ford, first non-Ford family member to hold the position


January 1961 – only weeks after ascending to the Ford presidency, McNamara accepts Kennedy’s invitation to become Secretary of Defense


1963 – 16,000 U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam as advisors; Lyndon Johnson becomes U.S. president in November following Kennedy’s assassination


March 1965 – first U.S. combat troops ordered to Vietnam with 200,000+ American military personnel in South Vietnam by December; U.S. Forces commander General William Westmoreland named Time Magazine’s “Man of the Year”


May 1968 – secret peace talks initiated between the U.S. and North Vietnam


November 1967 – McNamara tenders his resignation to President Johnson, viewed as evidence of his disagreement with Johnson’s decision to increase U.S. troop counts in Vietnam


December 1968 – U.S. troops in Vietnam peak at 540,000


July 1969 – first U.S. troop reductions in Vietnam ordered by President Richard Nixon


March 1972 – North Vietnam launches the “Easter Offensive” against the south


January 1973 – cease fire agreement is reached via the Paris Peace Accords


March 1973 – all remaining U.S. combat troops withdrawn from Vietnam


March 1975 – North Vietnam launches large-scale invasion of South Vietnam


April 1975 – South Vietnam’s army surrenders to North Vietnam


July 1976 – Socialist Republic of Vietnam established encompassing all of former North Vietnam and South Vietnam


November 1982 – the Vietnam Veterans Memorial dedicated in Washington, D.C.



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Robert McNamara and John Kennedy

Lyndon Johnson and Robert McNamara