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The Geneva Accords
arranged a settlement which brought about an end to the First Indochina war. The agreement was reached at the end of the Geneva Conference. A ceasefire was signed and France agreed to withdraw its troops from the region. French Indochina was split into three countries: Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Vietnam was to be temporarily divided along the 17th Parallel until elections could be held to unite the country -
Ngo Diem Meets with JFK
Ambassador Lodge meets President Diem for the first time. Under instructions from President Kennedy, Lodge tells Diem to fire his brother, the much-hated Nhu, and to reform his government. But Diem arrogantly refuses even to discuss such matters with Lodge -
Diem Overthrown
On orders from U.S. President John F. Kennedy, Henry Cabot Lodge, the American ambassador to South Vietnam, refused to meet with Diệm. Upon hearing that a coup d'état was being designed by ARVN generals led by General Dương Văn Minh, the United States gave secret assurances to the generals that the U.S. would not interfere. Dương Văn Minh and his co-conspirators overthrew the government on November 1, 1963 -
Henry Lodge Meets With Johnson
President Johnson declares he will not "lose Vietnam" during a meeting with Ambassador Lodge in Washington. By year's end, there are 16,300 American military advisors in South Vietnam which received $500 million in U.S. aid during 1963 -
US Anti-War Demostrations
Opposition to U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War began slowly and in small numbers in 1964 on various college campuses in the United States. Countercultural works such as the notorious MacBird by Barbara Garson encouraged a spirit of nonconformism and anti-establishmentarianism. This anti-war sentiment developed during a time of unprecedented student activism reinforced in numbers by the demographically significant baby boomers, but grew to include a wide and varied cross-section of Americans f -
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
was a joint resolution which the United States Congress passed on August 7, 1964 in response to a sea battle between the North Vietnamese Navy's Torpedo Squadron 135 -
Operation Rolling Thunder
was the title of a gradual and sustained U.S. 2nd Air Division (later Seventh Air Force), U.S. Navy, and Republic of Vietnam Air Force (VNAF) aerial bombardment campaign conducted against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam) from March 2nd, 1965 until November 1st, 1968, during the Vietnam War. -
Mylai Massacre
was the mass murder of 347–504 unarmed citizens in South Vietnam on March 16, 1968, conducted by a unit of the United States Army. All of the victims were civilians and most were women, children (including babies), and elderly people. Many of the victims were raped, beaten, tortured, and some of the bodies were found mutilated -
South Vietnamese Incursion in Cambodia
