The Gulf of Tonkin incident was an international confrontation that led to the United States engaging more directly in the Vietnam War. It consisted of a confrontation on August 2, 1964, when United States forces were carrying out covert operations close to North Vietnamese territorial waters and North Vietnamese forces responded. The United States government falsely claimed that a second incident occurred on August 4, 1964, between North Vietnamese and United States ships in the waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. Originally, US military claims blamed North Vietnam for the confrontation and the ostensible, but in fact imaginary, incident on August 4. Later investigation revealed that the second attack never happened; the official American claim is that it was based mostly on erroneously interpreted communications intercepts. The National Security Agency, a subsidiary of the US Defense Department, deliberately skewed intelligence to create the impression that an attack had been carried out.
Operation Rolling Thunder was a gradual and sustained aerial bombardment campaign conducted by the United States (U.S.) 2nd Air Division, U.S. Navy, and Republic of Vietnam Air Force (RVNAF) against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, China and North Korea from 2 March 1965 until 2 November 1968, during the Vietnam War.
The Vietnam People's Navy, or the Naval Service, also known as the Vietnamese People's Navy or simply Vietnam/Vietnamese Navy, is the naval branch of the Vietnam People's Army and is responsible for the protection of the country's national waters, islands, and interests of the maritime economy, as well as for the co-ordination of maritime police, customs service and the border defence force.
Military Assistance Command, Vietnam – Studies and Observations Group (MACV-SOG) was a highly classified, multi-service United States special operations unit which conducted covert unconventional warfare operations before and during the Vietnam War.
USS O'Brien (DD-725), an Allen M. Sumner-class destroyer, was the fourth ship of the United States Navy to be named after Captain Jeremiah O'Brien and his five brothers, Gideon, John, William, Dennis and Joseph, who captured HMS Margaretta on 12 June 1775 during the American Revolution.
DESOTO patrols were patrols conducted by U.S. Navy destroyers equipped with a mobile "van" of signals-intelligence equipment used for intelligence collection in hostile waters. The USS De Haven became the namesake for these patrols. De Haven performed the first patrol off the coast of China in April 1962. The USS Agerholm carried out the first patrol to target North Vietnam in the Gulf of Tonkin in December 1962.
William Dawson Waugh was a United States Army Special Forces soldier and Central Intelligence Agency paramilitary operations officer who served more than 50 years between the U.S. Army's Green Berets and the CIA's Special Activities Division.
Franklin Douglas "Doug" Miller was an American and United States Army Special Forces staff sergeant during the Vietnam War who was awarded the United States military's highest decoration—the Medal of Honor—for his actions above and beyond the call of duty on January 5, 1970. He was also awarded a Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and six Purple Hearts during his six years service in Southeast Asia.
USS Fortify (AM-446/MSO-446) was an Agile-class minesweeper acquired by the U.S. Navy for the task of removing Contact, Magnetic, and Acoustic mines that had been placed in the water to prevent the safe passage of ships.
USS Loyalty (AM-457/MSO-457) was an Aggressive-class minesweeper acquired by the U.S. Navy for the task of removing mines that had been placed in the water to prevent the safe passage of ships.
The 1959 to 1963 phase of the Vietnam War started after the North Vietnamese had made a firm decision to commit to a military intervention in the guerrilla war in the South Vietnam, a buildup phase began, between the 1959 North Vietnamese decision and the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which led to a major US escalation of its involvement. Vietnamese communists saw this as a second phase of their revolution, the US now substituting for the French.
During the Cold War in the 1960s, the United States and South Vietnam began a period of gradual escalation and direct intervention referred to as the "Americanization" of joint warfare in South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. At the start of the decade, United States aid to South Vietnam consisted largely of supplies with approximately 900 military observers and trainers. After the assassination of both Ngo Dinh Diem and John F. Kennedy close to the end of 1963 and Gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964 and amid continuing political instability in the South, the Lyndon Johnson Administration made a policy commitment to safeguard the South Vietnamese regime directly. The American military forces and other anti-communist SEATO countries increased their support, sending large scale combat forces into South Vietnam; at its height in 1969, slightly more than 400,000 American troops were deployed. The People's Army of Vietnam and the allied Viet Cong fought back, keeping to countryside strongholds while the anti-communist allied forces tended to control the cities. The most notable conflict of this era was the 1968 Tet Offensive, a widespread campaign by the communist forces to attack across all of South Vietnam; while the offensive was largely repelled, it was a strategic success in seeding doubt as to the long-term viability of the South Vietnamese state. This phase of the war lasted until the election of Richard Nixon and the change of U.S. policy to Vietnamization, or ending the direct involvement and phased withdrawal of U.S. combat troops and giving the main combat role back to the South Vietnamese military.
South Vietnam was in political chaos during much of the year, as generals competed for power and Buddhists protested against the government. The Viet Cong (VC) communist guerrillas expanded their operations and defeated the South Vietnamese Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) in many battles. North Vietnam made a definitive judgement in January to assist the VC insurgency with men and material. In November, North Vietnam ordered the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) to infiltrate units into South Vietnam and undertake joint military operations with the VC.
The Sacred Sword of the Patriots League (SSPL) (Mặt trận gươm thiêng ái quốc) was a sustained black operation that originated in the Central Intelligence Agency and was carried out by the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam – Studies and Observations Group (MACV-SOG) during the Vietnam War. It involved a combination of psychological warfare (PSYWAR) and psychological operations (PSYOP), today known as military information support operations (MISO).
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution or the Southeast Asia Resolution, Pub. L.Tooltip Public Law 88–408, 78 Stat. 384, enacted August 10, 1964, was a joint resolution that the United States Congress passed on August 7, 1964, in response to the Gulf of Tonkin incident.
Project Copper was a coordinated military action undertaken by the Kingdom of Laos and the Khmer Republic from 1 January–May 1971. It used U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) funds channeled through the Central Intelligence Agency to train three Cambodian battalions to interdict the Sihanouk Trail before it joined the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Committed to battle in southern Laos on 1 January 1971, one battalion deserted the battlefield, a second one mutinied during training, and a third had to be repurposed after suffering 80 casualties. By late January, the project was temporarily suspended.
Operation Silver Buckle, an offensive staged in Military Region 4 of the Kingdom of Laos, was the deepest Royal Lao Armed Forces penetration to date of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Reaching the Trailside village of Moung Nong, the forward two companies attacked the rear of the 50,000 People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) garrison on 8 February 1971, just as Operation Lam Son 719 was launched by the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). Overrun and scattered while suffering serious casualties, the Groupement Mobile 30 irregular regiment of Silver Buckle had tied up at least six PAVN battalions, preventing them from opposing Lam Son 719.
The Commando Raiders or Commando Raider Teams (CRTs) were a Laotian elite paramilitary Special Operations and pathfinder force, which operated closely with the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) during the final phase of the Laotian Civil War, from 1968 to 1973.
