When did America actually enter the Vietnam conflict? Churchill, America and Vietnam, 1941-45 by T.O. Smith details Churchill’s attempts to influence FDR to permit France to re-colonize Indochina before World War II. Yes before December 7th. FDR authored the US position of a trusteeship regarding Indochina. FDR’s policy intended to deny France their desire to re-enslave Indochina. Was the American nightmare for the faded glory of colonial empires?
Today it may seem surprising the future of Vietnam was debated between Churchill and FDR prior to the D-Day landings. This places a large part of their correspondence well into 1943. Ten years later the French would suffer defeat at Dien Bien Phu.
America would begin deploying troops a decade later. Smith’s previous book Britain and the Origins of the Vietnam War reveal how Churchill’s desire to expand their empire would entangle France and America across Indochina.
Smith has drawn upon papers from academic studies of Britain and France along with US Presidential libraries. On the surface many point to the Kennedy order placing American troops into Vietnam in 1963. Smith shows how this timeline is backed up to the mid 1940s. The US role is more accurately triggered to the 1954 Geneva Conference following the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu. Formally US Secretary of State Dulles would return to brief Congress that America would pickup where the French left off to preserve democracy by military means.
This memorandum really makes you consider a deeper look at diplomatic communications leading up to the surprise attack.