Why do you think the United States failed to suppress the Communist insurgency in South Vietnam? (Why did the United States lose the Vietnam War?)

Here are the instructions (the reading assignments that the essay should be based on will be provided below):

A. CONTENT (3 – 6 pages) Please do not write only “to fill space.”

1.) There are specific reading assignments about the Vietnam War that you must use to write the final essay.

2.) Using the assigned readings, your paper should address the following question: Why do you think the United States failed to suppress the Communist insurgency in South Vietnam?

B. STYLE

1.) A college-level essay is expected to have a main idea or thesis that unites the entire paper and is supported by concrete examples. Every paragraph should have a clear topic sentence and be about one point.

2.) The paper should contain your original and thoughtful analysis of the topic (not a Wikipedia-style description of what you arbitrarily judge to be “the facts”). Support your views with specific examples. Serious inaccuracy, logical fallacies, and ignorance of the assigned reading material will hurt your grade. Your ideas are important and interesting to me, but I consider “AI” produced material an absurd waste of time. The AI indicator in the “Turnitin” program must be 0 %.

3.) Sources: I have already provided sources for you to study. Of course, there are many sources about the Vietnam War, and you are free to study and use them. But please remember that citing an “authority” does not validate a claim. If you cite a source, you must also briefly summarize and evaluate its veracity (meaning the quality of the argument, not the “prestige” of a person or institution). Do not write rambling essays that are vaguely about the subject and filled with repetitive and superficial statements (like “AI” produces). Do not attach a “phony” bibliography of sources you have not read and are not interested in.

4.) Try to use the best grammar and style that you can. However, I will not grade the essays according to grammar. If you write a paper in YOUR OWN WORDS which expresses YOUR OWN IDEAS, I will be very tolerant of grammar and style. Sincerity and good organization will help you overcome linguistic inadequacies (as long as can understand).

C. FORMAT: All essays must be typed, double spaced, in 12 pt. letter size, Times New Roman Font, and checked with an English spell-checker. Please use MS Word or an easily compatible program (I won’t download new programs to open the file). No pictures, graphs, tables, etc., unless absolutely necessary!

BIBLIOGRAPHY (PDFs are attached):

Grantham, Dewey W. Recent America: The United States since 1945, 1998.

Herring, George C. “The Nightmare of Vietnam,” in Oates, Stephen B., Portrait of

America, 1987: 410 – 425.

Ho Chi Minh, “The Vietnamese Declaration of Independence,” in Kevin Reilly, Readings

in World Civilizations Vol 2., 1992: 278 – 281.

Verrone, Richard Burks, Voices from Vietnam: Eye-witness Accounts of the War, 1954-

1975, 2005.