Unit 4: Achieving Peace With Honor (1968-1972)
Unit Overview:
1968-1972: Unit 4 describes the era of "Vietnamization", or turning the war over to the South Vietnamese. While president Johnson and General Westmoreland had been assuring the American people that North Vietnam and the NLF were on their last legs, during the Tet Holiday in early 1968, suddenly the enemy attacked every major city in Vietnam. The Tet Offensive was the turning point in Vietnam, and the first few lessons in this unit deal with Tet and its aftermath. After Tet, the unit describes political turmoil in the US and ends with the United States sitting at the negotiating table in Paris with the North Vietnamese. The essay you will write in this unit is about the turning point in the Vietnam War and how after 1968, America's number one goal was to achieve peace with honor.
Unit Essay: 1968, the Turning Point
1968, the Turning Point
1968 was the year of fiercest fighting in Vietnam. Most historians consider the Tet Offensive and 1968 to be the turning point in the Vietnamese Conflict: after 1968 the US began to gradually ramp down its commitment to the Vietnam Conflict and the South Vietnamese government, a policy Nixon called, "Achieving Peace With Honor" and others called "Vietnamization". Examine US policy and attitude after Tet and write a 5 paragraph essay analyzing how the actions of United States after 1968 represented a desire to achieve peace with honor rather than victory in Vietnam.
Some helpful links:
The resignation of President Johnson
The Democratic Convention of 1968
"Vietnamization" and the Nixon Doctrine
Unit Videos:
Vietnam, a Televised History Part 6 (55:40)
Vietnam, a Televised History Part 7 (55:42)
Unit Lectures:
Vietnam Era Unit 4 Essay Class
Unit Study Guides:
Unit 4 has 3 quizzes. You can access the quiz study guides by clicking the links below. The documents linked here are Google Docs. To print our download, select "file", "download as" and choose either Word, Open Office Document, or whatever format suits you.
It takes 5-10 minutes each lesson to fill out a quiz study guide, and these will definitely help you to perform well on the quizzes. If you do all three quiz study guides you will also be well-prepared for the test. Since these study guides give you what is important in each lesson, think of them as notes and fill them out as you go.
To watch a short video on how to use these study guides click this link: How to Use Study Guides: Vietnam History
Key Terms:
For this project you must define the terms listed below and explain each term's significance to the unit/era being studied. Your definition should be 2-3 sentences long and may be copied and pasted from a source like Wikipedia, but the significance of the term must be in your own words and based on your own understanding. To fill out a term's significance, ask yourself, "Why is this item included in my study of this unit? Why is this term in a history book?" The answer to this question is your term's significance.
Unit 4 Key Terms:
1. Phoenix Program
2. "Vietnamization"
3. Battle of Khe Sanh
4. My Lai Massacre
5. Tet Offensive
6. Hanoi Hilton
7. Henry Kissinger
8. Operation Linebacker II
9. Nixon Doctrine
10. Detente
11. Nixon's visit to China
12. Paris Peace Accords
13. Operation Menu
Below is an example of a key term done with the proper format:
William the Conqueror: William I (c. 1028[2] – 9 September 1087), also known as William the Conqueror (Guillaume le Conquérant), was the first Norman King of England from Christmas 1066 until his death. He was also Duke of Normandy from 3 July 1035 until his death, under the name William II. Before his conquest of England, he was known as William the Bastard because of the illegitimacy of his birth.To press his claim to the English crown, William invaded England in 1066, leading an army of Normans, Bretons, Flemings, and Frenchmen (from Paris andÎle-de-France) to victory over the English forces of King Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings, and suppressed subsequent English revolts in what has become known as the Norman Conquest.[3] (I copied and pasted this definition from Wikipedia)
Significance: William the Conqueror is significant because his conquest of England created the first nation state in Europe. His rearrangement of English feudal territories to give himself dramatically more power than the the barons and nobles around him caused him to be the most powerful monarch in Europe and eventually led to the rise of other nation states over the next few centuries. (These are my words based on my knowledge of English and European history.)
