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Defeat at Dien Bien Phu
French commander ordered his forces to occupy the mountain town Dien Bien Phu to Interfere with the Viet Minh's supply line and force them into battle. Viet Minh’s forces surrounded and bombarded the mountain town defeating the French, which convinced them to make peace and withdrawal from Indochina. -
Geneva Conference
Elections were to be held to reunite Vietnam under a single government, after Geneva Accords divided Vietnam along the 17th parallel. Geneva Conference also recognized Cambodia’s and Lao’s independence. When the time came for elections, nationalist Leader (South) Ngo Dinh Diem refused to hold countrywide elections because he knew that Communist-Controlled north would not allow free-elections and Ho Chi Minh (North) would certainly win. -
Tonkin Resolution
August 2, 1964, President Johnson announced that North Vietnamese torpedo boats had fired on two American Destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. On August 7, the Senate and House passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing the president to “take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression”. -
Operation Rolling Thunder
Johnson expanded American involvement by shifting his policy to a sustained bombing campaign against North Vietnam. -
Teach-in
Group of faculty members and students abandoned their classes at the University of Michigan, and joined a teach-in, where they discussed the issues surrounding the war and their reasons for thinking the United States should pull out. -
SDS
Students for a Democratic Society, a left-wing student organization, organized a march on Washington D.C., drawing more than 20,000 participants, to protest the war. -
Washington's Lincoln Memorial
A rally at Washington’s Lincoln Memorial drew tens of thousands of protesters. -
Tet Offensive
During Tet, the Vietnamese New Year, the vietcong and North Vietnamese launched a massive surprise attack. Guerilla fighters attacked virtually all American air bases in South Vietnam and most of the South’s major cities and provincial capitals. -
Johnson goes public
Johnson addressed the public on television and stated that he would not be running for another presidential term. -
Martin Luther King Jr. is assasinated
James Earl Ray assassinated Martin Luther King Jr., creating riots in several major cities. -
Vietnamization
Nixon announced the withdrawal of 25,000 soldiers from Vietnam. Nixon was cutting back American troops, while South Vietnamese soldiers assumed more of the fighting. -
Massacre at Lai
The media reported that in the spring of 1968, an American platoon under the command of Lieutenant William Calley had massacred possibly more than 200 unarmed South Vietnamese civilians in the hamlet of My Lai. -
Kent State
In April of 1970, Nixon announced that American troops had invaded Cambodia to destroy Viet Cong military bases. Many viewed the Cambodian invasion as a widening of the war, which set of protests. At Kent State University, Ohio National Guard soldiers, armed with tear gas and rifles, fired on demonstrators without an order to do so. The soldiers killed four students and wounded at least nine others. -
Jackson State
Police killed two African American students during a demonstration at Jackson State College in Mississippi. -
The Repeal
Congress, angry by Nixon’s invasion of Cambodia, repealed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, taking away the president’s near complete power. -
The Pentagon Papers
Daniel Ellsberg, a disillusioned former Defense Department worker, leaked what became known as the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times, revealing that the government officials during the Johnson administration quietly questioned the war, while publicly defending it. -
26th Amendment
Anger over the draft fueled discussions of voting age, creating the 26th amendment, giving all citizens, ages 18 and up the right to vote in all state and federal elections. -
US withdrawal of troops
United States and North Vietnam signed an agreement “ending the war and restoring the peace in Vietnam”. The United States promised to withdraw the rest of its troops and both sides agreed to an exchange of prisoners of war. -
War Powers Act
Congress passed the War Powers Act as a way to re-establish some limits on executive power. The act required the president to inform Congress of any commitment of troops abroad within 48 hours and to withdraw them in 60 to 90 days unless Congress explicitly approved the troops commitment. -
South Vietnam Surrenders
The North Vietnamese captured Saigon, South Vietnam’s capital and united Vietnam under communist rule. They remained Saigon, Ho Chi Minh City. -
Robert Kennedy is assassinated
Robert Kennedy appeared to be on his way to winning the Democratic nomination, when he was gunned down by Sirhan Sirhan in a California hotel, after winning the state’s Democratic primary. Sirhan Sirhan was an Arab nationalist angry over the candidate's pro-Israeli remarks a few nights before.
