Doug Miller wrote:
In article .com, wrote:
Shall we move this to a newsgroup where it is on-topic?

You are, of course, free to stop reading, or responding, at any time you wish.

I've cross-posted to alt.war.vietnam and set followups there.

anus detector on

Please do not remove the ON-TOPIC newsgroup from the distribution.


Doug Miller wrote:
In article .com,
wrote:

The tide of the war shifted because American GROUND forces were
withdrawn Vietnam and despite the fact that South Vietnam was
capable of defending itself. South Vietnam failed to defend itself
because of the incompetence and corruption of its government.

Not correct, as explained below.

North Vietnam didn't have any signficant air support for their
troops in South Vietnam, and they were outnumbered in South
Vietnam. So why couldn't South Vietnam hold its own without
American air support.

Because without American air support, it was not possible to interdict the
supply lines that the North needed to support their invasion. If American air
support had been available, the invasion could not have succeeded.


Were the NVA better supplied tban the ARVN troops?

Quite possibly they were, given the support that they received from China and
the Soviet Union.

I had thought a major goal of Nixon's diplomacy with the Soviet
Union and China was to reduce their support for North Vietnam.

Don't you think the US was at least as capable of supplying
South Vietnam.


Didn't South
Vietnam have an airforce of their own?

Yes, they had a typical third-world air force.

You mean, like North Vietnam?

Did the NVA have any air support in South Vietnam?


So why couln't the South Vietnamese fight better _on their own
soil_ than the NVA?

Beside the point.

No, that is precisely the point. There is no question that
limitations on US air support from 1973 on weakened the SOuth
Vietnamese. The point is that by itself it did not, or should
not have weakened the South Vietnamese to the point where they
were militarily inferior to the NVA.

Without supply lines, the NVA invasion could not have
succeeded - and without American air interdiction,
those supply lines could not be interrupted.

Agreed. But that is beside the point.



This is also reflected by the fact that it took two more
years of fighting before the North Vietnamese were
able to take Saigon to end the war.

Prior to that point, they had been losing.
After that, they began winning. And
that makes your point how?

How were they losing prior to the cease fire? They
had held onto the 'Parrot's Beak' even WITH American
ground forces in country and with the North being bombed.
If South Vietnam had a competant, effective, and honest
government the communists would never have won.

The only reason they agreed to the cease-fire in the
first place isthat they
were getting their asses kicked.


The main reason they agreed to the Cease Fire that it
was the most expedient way to get the rest of the US
Forces out of Vietnam. I'm quite sure they never had
any intent of honoring it any longer than they needed
to accomplish that.

Yes, and if they had not been getting their asses kicked -- i.e. if they had
been winning -- continuing to fight would have been the most expedient means
of achieving that objective. Hence their desire for a cease-fire.


That is just plain nuts. Obviously it was much more expedient,
and much less costly to eliminate the US via the Cease Fire than
to drive us out militarily. Driving us out would have cost
the communists time and casualties. Negotiating us out cost
them less time and no casualties.

--

FF