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My father served in this war as an American soldier. He he suffered and my family suffered. Because we were a career military family living in military communities, I knew a number of children of casualties. Putting the American casualties dead last is an intentional slap in the face of the families of those Americans who died. The lost soldiers are gone, so only their relatives and friends are left behind to see how this article is being used and manipulated.
To the person or persons who did this: you are not making a great moral point, you are hurting people who lost their fathers or husbands, brothers or sons. I have mixed feelings about this war, but I would never play with casualty lists or show gross insensitivity to surviving family and friends just to make a "moral poinBold textt".
2602:306:BDA0:97A0:58A1:2906:F359:8B24 ( talk) 19:41, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
"Hispanic" was not a common label until the 1970s and the 1980 census. Most Hispanics - especially Mexican-Americans - would have been classified as "white" in the military. Therefore those numbers are highly suspect. 72.191.185.14 ( talk)
How do people feel about adding additional detail, breaking down casualties by year (like here http://www.rjsmith.com/kia_tbl.html) or month, or geographical area, or presenting sums from major battles? Should that sort of thing be on this page or additional pages? Is going into excruciating detail (for example, attempting to list every single US soldier KIA) appropriate for wikipedia? Wsacul 17:05, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
==Arrogant== how many peopled?
I find it pretty arrogant that your casualty listing for Vietnam makes sure to point out where the U.S. may have killed civilians but you sure don’t want to point out how many S. Vietnamese were kill by the Vet con and Northern Vietnamese Army.
2602:306:BDA0:97A0:58A1:2906:F359:8B24 (
talk)
19:24, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
Example: (Bold font is the author issues with the categorization)
NVA (North Vietnamese Army) and the VC (Viet Cong) < No doubt that the U.S. is responisble for killing these murders.• ~900,000 killed and/or missing North Vietnamese civilians < And being these are NV civilians no doubt the U.S. did this too.• at least 500,000 killed by Allied bombings South Vietnamese Army • ~1,000,000 killed and/or missing South Vietnamese civilians • anywhere from 1,000,000 to 2,500,000 killed and/or died of starvation, wounds, disease, drought, friendly fire, atrocities etc. • > 100,000 killed or wounded by US ordnance since 1975 • 200,000 affected by US Agent Orange < So you find it a need to make sure to point out that these last two listings are U.S. Kills but who’s responsible for the set of numbers above. Beside the friendly fire did the S. Vietnamese do this to them selves? Well hell then why were they in a war with NVA. I’m you’re your attitude is that it goes with out saying, but it doesn’t you’ve just decided pointed out the U.S. instigated casualties to cast bad light on the nation. For instant the Agent Orange kills are most likily a exaggeration and whether they are or aren’t you point them out in blatant disregard for the reason it was used to make it look like the U.S. just gassed them to gas them. In fact your main article on Nam doesn’t point out the Agent Orange use at all except for the “Social Attitudes and Treatment of Veterans” (God fobid you talk about the liberal hippies who spit on those soldiers). You might want to talk about those instances of AO use if your going to point them out as being a reason for some of the dead. They used the Agent too wipe out over run areas and most likely killed twice as many of the enemy on those instances. I’m not saying that it not sad what happen I’m just saying you skewing a fact intentionally by not giving all the information anywhere eles. Not to mention that fact that in the main article under the Vietnam search you state that you’re using numbers from a government that won the Southern half. Yes, I’m sure those numbers aren’t skewed at all. Obviously the rest of the SVC death are not due to America or you would have pointed it out, so who then nice vague description. I’m just jumping the gun but I’m sure you’ll be sure and correct that to say, starvation, wounds, disease, drought, atrocities etc… by NVA and VC cutting of food, medicine and through attacks on the S. Vietnamese, and by friendly fire.
Just thought I’d help you clean that up.
To improve the article, it would be nice to have as many deaths as possible attributed: i.e. how many civilians and how many combatants were killed by US, north vietnamese, etc. forces. Jens Nielsen 22:07, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
The figures, at least for US casualties, don't agree with those in the main Vietnam War article. The biggest discrepancy is wounded: 153,303 there, 128,000 here. Can anybody fix these? — MikeG (talk) 14:17, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
US casualties don't appear to be listed on this page. Why not?
Casualites as of November 7 2001:
Country | Branch of service | Number served | Killed | Wounded | Missing |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
USA [2] | Army | 4,368,000 | 38,218 | 96,802 | 617 {A} |
Marines | 794,000 | 14,840 | 51,392 | 242{B} | |
Navy | 1,842,000 | 2,565 | 4,178 | 401{C} | |
Air Force | 1,740,000 | 2,587 | 1,021 | 649 {D} | |
Coast Guard | 7 | 59 | 0 {E} | ||
Civilians | 38 {F} | ||||
Total | 8,744,000 | 58,217 | 153,452 | 1,947 |
Note: Footnote # 1 gives breakdown of Casualty by Branch of service as follows:
Army-38,209; Marines-14,838; Navy-2,555; Air Force-2,584; Coast Guard-7. Total:58,193. As of 12/1998
Originalname37 (
talk)
18:21, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
There are no refrences for this article.... and this is the sort of article needs them! please add some if you have time. Ahudson 16:54, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
122.104.135.222 (
talk)
02:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
is
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/ a credible site.
although only numbers are being quotes, a quick look at the site will see it has significant bias.
could its numbers be found elsewhere?
122.104.135.222 ( talk) 02:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
Over one million Americans died in Vietnam? That number seems not only inaccurate but grossly inflated. I'm pretty sure that most historical accounts have the number of U.S. dead at around 60,000. I checked the casualty records at the archive and the list is around 58,193. I think the guy who wrote 1,000,000 must have added up the totals for all the different subsets, failing to realize each subset was just categorizing the same casualties in a different way.
It seems to me that many of the discrepancies in VPA/VC casualties could be explained by differing chronological scopes for various estimates. The absurdly high figure of 1.1 million Communist deaths could very well be referring to every VPA and VC combatant killed from 1945 to 1989 - as I recall the press release in question is a very vague three-line French affair. For all I know ARVN troops are lumped in there too. It is doubtful that this figure refers specifically to the period of American involvement in Vietnam. Kensai Max 05:35, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
The U.S. section says there were "58,209 KIA and other dead", but I don't see that number in the given source. Also, the MIA link appears to be dead now. Superm401 - Talk 09:35, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Should we perhaps try to list every individual casualtie we can as well? -- 67.162.31.148 ( talk) 23:12, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Any chance of adding casualties from those two countries as well? I know there's less agreement on the figures than for North and South Vietnam, but omitting the subject entirely seems like the wrong approach. 87.74.32.50 ( talk) 16:15, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
Where are the casualty figures for these countries? They were part of the war too.
Also, there is way too much emphasis on Rummel here. Rummel is a controversial figure whose work appears to have been virtually ignored by mainstream scholarship. Gatoclass ( talk) 08:05, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
"Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge killed 1-3 million Cambodians in the killing fields, out of a population of around 8 million.[72][73][74][75]"
Rummel is over used in this and other articles on the Vietnam War,this article just seems to be one Rummel observation after another. I lost count of how many times his name is mentioned in this article. Seems someone had a Rummel book for Christmas. It would be a good idea to list other sources as there are many around. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 12:51, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
The reference http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB6.1A.GIF (used five times in this article) is not a source, but a list of sources. In the foonote should be indicated which specific source (plus page nr.) is referred to. S711 ( talk) 08:26, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
Ok, so I understand that this article touches on controversy. But I find little mention of the US atrocities referenced in popular culture, or by vietnam veterans. I thought the info would be easier to find on wikipedia, but it's nonexistent. I'd reference some Vietnam vets, but it would be original research.
Some examples from the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group:
http://www.latimes.com/vietnam
I'm obviously not well versed in wiki-protocol: is this not the place for this info or something? Atrocities seem relevant when discussing casualties. Hard to define atrocity when the enemy hides behind women and children. Civilians are casualties in a hut to hut firefight. Of course if you survive, you run the risk some distant citizen will blame you for trying to live another day.
-Learning Newbie 24.247.198.115 ( talk) 02:46, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how credible Australian schoolbooks are or which scholarly census is referred to when it comes to thinking that 3,000,000 North Vietnamese civilians were killed by the USAF. I know people sometimes unfortunately cite rjsmith's mistaken interpretation of the death toll reported in the AFP report, which in itself just claimed 2,000,000 for *all of Vietnam*, not North Vietnam alone with an equal number to be added for S. Vietnam (what rjsmith for some reason says).
First off, anything over a few hundred thousand wouldn't make any sense (and I hope these remarks prove that I'm *not* trying to pass off apologetics for the U.S. military campaign in Vietnam here), because as writers as opposed as Noam Chomsky and Guenter Lewy have pointed out, it was South Vietnam that suffered the most damage during the war, not North Vietnam. (Well, maybe Cambodia and Laos were hurt just as much, but let's set that aside for now.) I think there's solid evidence that U.S. pilots periodically murdered North Vietnamese civilians during Rolling Thunder at least (e.g. at the Quynh Lap(sp.?) leper colony), but nowhere nearly as much as it would take to produce a fatality rate eclipsing the one in Japan or, for that matter, North Korea (and note that the USAAF/USAF operations in those countries were, as a matter of centrally-organized policy, meant to inflict massive devastation on civilian life). By contrast, the American military's free-fire zone, forced relocation of the rural citizenry, etc. SOPs naturally could be expected to result in the vast loss of civilian life that *actually* took place in South Vietnam. I agree without reluctance that this was really, awfully evil, not the responsibility of a few isolated U.S. soldiers or pilots, etc. but the intent, more or less explicit, of the American high command and personnel of comparable stature, protogenocidal if not outright genocidal in character, and so on.
Moreover, I should like to note that the indeterminate "hundreds of thousands" figure is one that I got from a copy in the Texas Tech University online Vietnam War archives of an SRV (postwar Vietnamese communist) government tract. I suppose if they had suffered no less than 15 times that much in the northern half of the country, they might've been keen on pointing that out (if for propaganda purposes only). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.69.137.27 ( talk) 18:40, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
ttk love you knom and ever
Air force captain, Brian Wilson, who carried out bomb-damage assessments in free-fire zones throughout the delta, saw the results firsthand. "It was the epitome of immorality…One of the times I counted bodies after an air strike—which always ended with two napalm bombs which would just fry everything that was left—I counted sixty-two bodies. In my report I described them as so many women between fifteen and twenty-five and so many children—usually in their mothers' arms or very close to them—and so many old people." When he later read the official tally of dead, he found that it listed them as 130 VC killed.
vietnam news of the war how did it effect the troops? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.230.154.116 ( talk) 15:14, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
The article states that US forces killed 2 million civilians during the war; however, the source says only that 2 million citizens were killed TOTAL in the North and South. I am therefore removing this part of the section because it is not supported by the source until a credible number can be found. Anytus ( talk) 17:24, 30 June 2010 (UTC)
Where is the evidence that 2 million were directly killed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.40.0.8 ( talk) 19:52, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
I personally congratulate [redacted] on a perfectly [redacted] article full of pro-US bias, and figures and statistics, even the most historically well known ones, completely twisted to their liking. But this is the usual [redacted] people should expect from this "high standard encyclopedia" I suppose. Long Live America!-- Propaganda328 ( talk) 14:01, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
This article is awful. How comes it doesn't mention how many civilians where killed by the USA? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sulla1982 ( talk • contribs) 07:38, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I think a subject such as this, clearly shows the importance of implementing a truly international Global WP along with a US WP and a British WP. Many American editors believes WP English is an (North) American WP specifically. Similarly many British editors wrongly believes WP English to be a truly British WP too. I can easily understand their views, since the official language of WP English is English (British English in fact), rather confusing to US or British readers and editors I guess. I hope that in the future we could implement US WP, British WP and above all Global WP. The language of "Global WP" should probably be English, since this language is the preferred language in international affairs. Currently WP English is actually "Global WP" as is, but as stated it is too confusing to US and British editors/readers.
I have encountered these issues again and again in various contexts. Many articles have a very distorted POV and peculiar foci because of this. I don't blame anyone, but the underlying misconceptions have some real and problematic effects on the WP English. If anyone have any suitable links to groups and/or people working on these issues, please share them below, it will be much appreciated. Thank you. RhinoMind ( talk) 16:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
1178 US soldiers died in the last 24 years? From your own source, in the past 28 years only 71 US soldiers died, so wtf. Also over 50,000 white people died, it says about 48,000. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.90.27.224 ( talk) 07:06, 14 November 2010 (UTC)
Shouldn't there be a total number? Casualties on all sides including civilian. Maybe even including post-war casualties due to famine, injuries and such. The total number is what I was looking for and it's not mentioned anywhere. Even a ballpark figure would be better than nothing. Is it 500.000 or 5.000.000 or 15.000.000? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rudiedirkx ( talk • contribs) 03:02, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
The estimates vary too widely to be stated in absolutes, but the main Vietnam War article provides the range. Population and Development Review estimates slightly less than one million Vietnamese soldiers and civilians died directly or indirectly as a consequence of the conflict; the Vietnamese government claimed over 3 million dead. Wounded is typically three times dead. In Cambodia, there were about a quarter of a million deaths (one million total casualties), according to Sliwinski, Heuveline, Kiernan, Etcheson, Banister and Johnson. In Laos, probably somewhat less than 100,000 were killed. The number is most commonly put at 1.5-2 million altogether. The war with France cost an additional 500,000 lives. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 04:14, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
I have added a section under that title as there was not one before but an editor seems to think that it is not needed. If there are sections for deaths caused by North/VietCong.South Vietnamese military then obviously there should be a section for the American military as they were the major power in the actual war, not to have one seems strange to say the least and also I feel biased. Maybe others would like to explain their reasons for not having a section for deaths caused by the American military. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 11:30, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
I think we should keep a balance on the pictures, we have at the moment I believe too many showing Viet Cong atrocities and need to lose some. We have the massacre at Hue,a terrorist attack and Đắk Sơn Massacre. For the Americans we have My Lai and for the south we have the bombing of the village with the kid running naked so there is clearly a need for a NPOV to cut down on the VietCong ones or add more of the Americans and South Vietnamese which will just be too many pics altogether. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 23:52, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
Inclusion of sources that have not been properly written is causing this article problems. So please write your sources out properly so that they are not just raw url's. Also when adding a PDF file as a source I suggest putting in a page number so all can see what is actually being referenced. You added a 113 page PDF for your claims about NVA/VC wearing civilians clothes,do you expect everyone to wade thru 113 pages of a Rand report to find what you have sourced? Zrdragon12 ( talk) 05:43, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
Obviously this is a fairly new term,probably arrived since the Iraq war in conventional use.To be insurgents you need to be fighting against the recognised government of a country. South Vietnam was not recognised by the UN at all. Vietnam was divided in the 1954 Geneva accords on a temp basis until 1956 when elections should have been held. The Americans and Diem did not want elections held as Ho Chi Minh would have won them so they set up the South Vietnam state. The people fighting against that were Vietnamese so they were not insurgents against any recognised government,it was a civil war that had been going on since the end of WW2.Please provide you thoughts or evidence that states otherwise
The Geneva Agreements, which were issued on July 21, 1954,[11] carefully worded the division of northern and southern Vietnam as a "provisional military demarcation line",[12] "on either side of which the forces of the two parties shall be regrouped after their withdrawal".[12] To specifically put aside any notion that it was a partition, they further stated, in the Final Declaration, Article 6: "The Conference recognizes that the essential purpose of the agreement relating to Vietnam is to settle military questions with a view to ending hostilities and that the military demarcation line is provisional and should not in any way be interpreted as constituting a political or territorial boundary".. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 19:49, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
Answer
Hi Zrdragon. I hear you and agree absolutely. But why dont YOU change it then? Maybe the initial writer wasnt aware of this? You dont have to promptly stigmatise anybody. Just change what you find wrong. If it needs documentation, just provide that. Its really easy.
RhinoMind ( talk) 22:00, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
These figures cannot be suppressed as coincidental to the war's result. The sources cited clearly link them. It's not as though people were going on boats for a vacation; the entire ethnic Chinese community was expelled and forced onto the boats. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 22:11, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
"Stumink (talk | contribs) . . (23,676 bytes) (+52) . . (Vandalism really. This to clarify that the 26,000 figure includes NLF operatives, informants and supporters, not just civillians. This is sourced."
Is it sourced? Ogden Reid, a member of a congressional committee investigating Phoenix in 1971, "if the Union had had a Phoenix program during the Civil War, its targets would have been civilians like Jefferson Davis or the mayor of Macon, Georgia."
It targeted civilians NLF operatives, informants and supporters, they were the civilian infrastructure of the Viet Cong government.Would you actually like to see the original declassified documents that state who they were targeting? I got them. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 15:15, 1 October 2012 (UTC)
Who is trying to omit the Cambodian and Laotian deaths from being listed here? First it was attempted not to mention them. Then when they were mentioned some idiot decided to pretend it was just a civil war. I somehow don't think the person is too stupid to know it's ridiculous to characterize a war that involves at least two if not more countries as just a civil war. The only conclusion one can take is that person or persons is doing it in order to commit historical fraud.
Whoever it is you better give it up cuz you won't succeed. Wikipedia has explicit rules and rewriting history is simply not allowed. We will not stand for it and you not get away with it. That means just as the holocaust casualties are mentioned in the world war two causalities page, likewise ALL casualties of the Vietnam war should be and shall be mentioned HERE!!! Loginnigol ( talk) 19:34, 11 October 2012 (UTC)
Nguyen, how about reading Greiner's book instead of googling? You may start with the Kindle preview, where you find the killings I listed mentioned in the Introduction. Greiner's main sources are the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group and the Peers Commission. Cortagravatas ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:54, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
Nguyen, the comment regarding your last editing-out of my list from Prof. Greiner's book ("funny how Greiner didn't mention about communists' torture, killings and forced labor of US, ARVN troops, or of t..") was rather out of place, as Prof. Greiner's book is about the US involvement in Vietnam. Crimes committed by other participants are addressed elsewhere on this page, so if you think too little is being said about these crimes, feel free to expand the respective sections. But the next time you remove my summary from the introduction of Prof. Greiner's book, I'll have to report you for vandalism. Cortagravatas ( talk)19:11, 29 December 2012 (GMT)
1. Bumping off unarmed civilians and then counting them as VC, as was done in the course of Operation Speedy Express, is intentional murder. Besides, who said that "Deaths caused by US military" means only democidal killings?
2. Newsweek source was moved to "specific incidents".
3. If the South or North Vietnamese sections are too short for your taste, why don't you expand them?
4. "Deaths caused by US military" is the most appropriate section for Greiner's list. Cortagravatas ( talk)20:30 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
Feel free to report to whoever you like. Greiner's list is neither apologetic nor condemning, but a plain statement of facts. The heading of the section is "Deaths caused by US military" or so, which means that your considerations about VC/NVA having killed more civilians/non-combatants are irrelevant here; if you want to make that point, do it in the sections dedicated to deaths caused by VC/NVA. As to killings of VC prisoners, the essential information, which Greiner expands on later in the book, is that a considerable number of veterans referred to it as SOP, so there's nothing "speculative" about this information. And please spare me the nonsense about a "highly pro-communist, anti-American tone" in that section. Neither Greiner nor I are pro-communist or anti-American. You, on the other hand, seem to argue from an ideological position that perceives any mention of crimes committed by American forces as "highly pro-communist" and "anti-American". Try to show a little more objectivity. Cortagravatas ( talk)20:30 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
PS: "My Lai (4)" and "My Khe (4)" are the names of two places where massacres occurred. These two plus the other five mentioned in the first item of Greiner's list makes 7 massacres, not 8 as per your "math". Cortagravatas ( talk)20:35 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
"Specific incidents" are one thing, Greiner's overall tally of "incidents" (based on the files of the Peers Commission, the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group and other sources) is another. There are sections on deaths caused by VC/NVA, South Vietnam and South Korea regardless of whether some of the massacres mentioned in these sections are also mentioned under "specific incidents", so why should the section about deaths caused by the American military be different? I'm beginning to get the impression that Prof. Greiner's research touched a raw nerve of American nationalist pride and that this is the reason for so much opposition to his list. Please bear one thing in mind when comparing the length of this section with the length of sections about deaths caused by other participants: there's nothing extraordinary about atrocities committed by VC/NVA, South Vietnamese or South Korean forces, insofar as these pertained to authoritarian regimes with little concern for human rights. The United States of America, on the other hand, are supposed to be a democracy that respects human rights. US forces in Vietnam were supposed to fight according to rules of engagement meant to protect non-combatants. Their objective was to protect the people of South Vietnam and to win their hearts and minds. Wrongs committed in violation of such high aspirations and principles deserve more attention and require explanation if the world's mightiest nation is to learn from its history. Prof. Greiner's book is an attempt to provide as complete as possible a picture of what went wrong as concerns treatment of non-combatants by US forces in Vietnam and why things got so badly out of control. I strongly recommend that you read this book, which is available in English translation. And I wish you a Happy New Year. Cortagravatas ( talk)21:41, 31 December 2012 (GMT).
Nguyen, that was an excellent post. I bow before your experience, and if you would like to tell me more about it, please do so. However, you got me wrong when you understood that I considered NVA/VC atrocities to be «not as serious, or "better"» than crimes committed by the American military. What I wrote was the following: «Please bear one thing in mind when comparing the length of this section with the length of sections about deaths caused by other participants: there's nothing extraordinary about atrocities committed by VC/NVA, South Vietnamese or South Korean forces, insofar as these pertained to authoritarian regimes with little concern for human rights. The United States of America, on the other hand, are supposed to be a democracy that respects human rights. US forces in Vietnam were supposed to fight according to rules of engagement meant to protect non-combatants. Their objective was to protect the people of South Vietnam and to win their hearts and minds. Wrongs committed in violation of such high aspirations and principles deserve more attention and require explanation if the world's mightiest nation is to learn from its history.» No, I didn't say that atrocities committed by criminal dictatorships are not as bad as atrocities committed by democracies that claim and are supposed to uphold human rights. My point is that one shouldn't sweep atrocities committed by democracies under the carpet or reduce them to a marginal issue with the argument that criminal dictatorships did much worse. Instead one should explore them and learn from them. Criminal dictatorships like Nazi Germany or the communist regimes of North Vietnam, North Korea and Cambodia cannot be improved, and the only lesson to be learned from their crimes - which outweigh crimes committed by democracies both quantitatively and qualitatively - is that they should be kept from coming into being or abolished where existing, preferably by peaceful means but if necessary (as in the case of Nazi Germany) by military force. Democracies, on the other hand, can be improved by criticism, which includes exposing practices unworthy of democratic states. One should not overemphasize crimes committed by democracies, to be sure, let alone invoke them to play down crimes committed by dictatorships. But one should document and condemn the failure of democratic self-control mechanisms so that these self-control mechanisms are improved and made more effective. I hope you can agree with that. As concerns Nazi crimes, you may want to visit the blog I write for, which is dedicated to providing information about these crimes and refuting the claims of ideologically motivated apologists. It is called "Holocaust Controversies", and the link is http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.pt/ . Best regards, Cortagravatas ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:22, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Nguyen1310 ( talk) 04:41, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
There are some good sources on Viet Cong terrorism here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_terrorism#Vietnam 70.131.124.176 ( talk) 05:11, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
Given the substantial ammount of credible sources in the book, could it be used as sources?-- Zeraful ( talk) 13:49, 15 August 2013 (UTC)
It's a completely valid source, but watch as no one makes use of it. The blatant pro-US bias of this sites Vietnam articles is disgusting. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.20.65.149 ( talk) 00:56, 7 April 2014 (UTC)
Turse has been completely discredited as a source. See: https://cross-currents.berkeley.edu/e-journal/issue-12/zinoman-and-kulik. 74.96.114.147 ( talk) 12:27, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
The historical correct name of the war at hand is The Second Indochina War. The war has many other names, like the Vietnam War in USA and parts of the west and The American War in Vietnam and south-east Asia. Since Wikipedia (en) is an international project and strive for neutrality and balanced information, writers are encouraged to use the name The Second Indochina War. RhinoMind ( talk) 20:03, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
I've been trying my best to either confirm or debunk this myth but I'm finding a lot of contradictory information.
Did Blacks and Latinos suffer disproportionate casualties during the war? Were they disproportionately drafted? Was there one year were blacks were 20% of the casualties? Were they less in other years? What was the total population in the country and in the military of minorities? Were latinos counted as white?
I can't find any reliable sources on at least the first two pages of Google. Is there an expert watching who can weigh in? This seems like a glaring oversight on this page. Even if we think something is a conspiracy theory or nonsense, if it is widely reported on, as this particular claim is, we should cover it. PraetorianFury ( talk) 19:10, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Done PraetorianFury ( talk) 21:23, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
Xenophrenic has removed criticism of Turse rather disingenuously stating "rmv unsupported BLP vio" and "doesn't address that specific content" in their edit summary, and specifically removing the suggestion that "Turse has been accused of falsifying references" according to the source provided, i.e. Kulik and Zinoman. Yet if either Xenophrenic or his mate Capitalismojo bothered to actually read the source they would note the source does indeed accuse him of exactly this. Note "Four of his citations of marine testimony claiming support for his account are demonstrably false." on page 177 [9] and "These are the first two of Turse’s citations that are clearly false." on page 178 [10]. Turse is clearly a tainted source and the fact that one supporter needs to write a half page paragraph watering down the criticism of his work makes it quite clear this has no place in this article in the first place. 101.169.213.82 ( talk) 12:33, 10 February 2015 (UTC)
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Mztourist, A bicyclette, I've taken a look at the official SRV source that A bicyclette puts forward:
- Theo số liệu thống kê, toàn quốc có: 1.146.250 liệt sĩ, trong đó:
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Pháp: 191.605 liệt sĩ.
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Mỹ: 849.018 liệt sĩ.
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong chiến trang bảo vệ Tổ quốc: 105.627 liệt sĩ."
[1]
References
Is the specific incidents section really necessary? Almost all of them are covered earlier in the page and we could just do a See Also to List of massacres in Vietnam. Mztourist ( talk) 05:03, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
I disagree. Its better to leave it. A bicyclette ( talk) 10:21, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
I have raised the issue of the WP:RS of a purported Vietnamese Government document detailing North Vietnamese and Vietcong casualties at WP:RSN here: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Vietnamese Government document on Vietnam War casualties together with a suggestion as to how such document, if accepted, should be presented. regards Mztourist ( talk) 08:26, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
IP 113.189.175.11 is edit-warring, making changes to the page in relation to PAVN/VC missing here: [11] which based on my Google translate is not supported by the (already questionable) underlying document. IP 113.189.175.11 must follow WP:BRD and discuss the issue here or should be blocked for edit-warring. Mztourist ( talk) 07:20, 3 September 2018 (UTC)
The concept of democide is specious and really only accepted by a single thinker: Rummel. Adding to this, the notion of democide seems superfluous to this page (how many discrete subcategories of death should we account for?), and it requires a sort of mind reading and assumption of intent. So we see, for instance, that while the US is responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths during the course of the war, all but ~6000 appear as "justified" or are shrugged off as "collateral damage" if we look at Rummel's "democide" estimates. Apart from an obvious display of ideological bias, this seems a bit misleading -- a cursory glance at the chart in the middle of this article would have an uninformed reader coming away with the impression that the US only killed upwards of 10,000 people in Vietnam.
Given 1) Rummel (and his ideological bias) already saturate this page, 2) Rummel's concept of "democide" is fairly heterodox in the field of political science, and 3) these estimates are misleading and likely unnecessary, I'd suggest all references to "democide" ought to be removed from this page.
I will just go ahead and make a discussion as I have been following some edits from a user. As there is only one user seemingly active on this topic, I am going to bring in some necessary checks to maintain objectivity. This is in reference to these edits here which I restored [12].
The following edits I found highly problematic given that it revolves around removing references to the same topical area of war crimes:
I won't speculate on the motivations. But I am RVing so that a BRD process can be engaged.
Deogyusan has been blocked as another sock of User:A bicyclette, accordingly this conversation ends and the page has been reverted to the last good version. Mztourist ( talk) 03:58, 24 September 2019 (UTC)
Per the article. https://www.thedailybeast.com/lost-souls-the-search-for-vietnams-300000-or-more-mias
"The Vietnamese government puts the number [of officially missing] at 300,000, but the actual number of those whose bodies were buried in anonymous graves or never found and buried at all is widely believed to be closer to 500,000. "
article is not about how "unclear it is" how such and such numbers connect to anything else. this is drawing conclusions about something which isn't stated and clearly misrepresenting the article.
Moyar was wrong. 849,018 dead are INCULDING the number of missing. I'm Vietnamese, and I see he was wrong when translated Vietnamese source. See this first data, which Moyar translated - http://datafile.chinhsachquandoi.gov.vn/Qu%E1%BA%A3n%20l%C3%BD%20ch%E1%BB%89%20%C4%91%E1%BA%A1o/Chuy%C3%AAn%20%C4%91%E1%BB%81%204.doc
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Mỹ: 849.018 liệt sĩ. - In Vietnamese, "liệt sĩ" = dead + missing, not only "dead" (in Vietnamese, "missing" = "liệt sĩ cần tìm kiếm quy tập"). "Theo số lượng thống kê, đến nay số hài cốt liệt sĩ cần tìm kiếm quy tập còn khoảng 207.000, tập trung ở những địa bàn vùng sâu, vùng xa, hiểm trở, việc tìm kiếm rất khó khăn do thiếu thông tin..." - 207,000 are number of missing, and they were counted in "liệt sĩ" (849.018 total) Cucthanh ( talk) 10:19, 7 December 2022 (UTC)
As the subject summary says, this article — by some distance the most egregious whitewashing of American imperialism I've ever encountered on Wikipedia — desperately requires input from editors who are
In its current state, this article reads like a Japanese history textbook describing the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, or a mid-career David Irving book about the Holocaust. The most recent comment on this talk page — right above mine — is somebody who clearly cannot read Vietnamese insisting to a Vietnamese person that the claims in a Vietnamese government source cannot be trusted — despite being unable to read them, as they are written in Vietnamese. Foxmilder ( talk) 09:02, 11 January 2024 (UTC)
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My father served in this war as an American soldier. He he suffered and my family suffered. Because we were a career military family living in military communities, I knew a number of children of casualties. Putting the American casualties dead last is an intentional slap in the face of the families of those Americans who died. The lost soldiers are gone, so only their relatives and friends are left behind to see how this article is being used and manipulated.
To the person or persons who did this: you are not making a great moral point, you are hurting people who lost their fathers or husbands, brothers or sons. I have mixed feelings about this war, but I would never play with casualty lists or show gross insensitivity to surviving family and friends just to make a "moral poinBold textt".
2602:306:BDA0:97A0:58A1:2906:F359:8B24 ( talk) 19:41, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
"Hispanic" was not a common label until the 1970s and the 1980 census. Most Hispanics - especially Mexican-Americans - would have been classified as "white" in the military. Therefore those numbers are highly suspect. 72.191.185.14 ( talk)
How do people feel about adding additional detail, breaking down casualties by year (like here http://www.rjsmith.com/kia_tbl.html) or month, or geographical area, or presenting sums from major battles? Should that sort of thing be on this page or additional pages? Is going into excruciating detail (for example, attempting to list every single US soldier KIA) appropriate for wikipedia? Wsacul 17:05, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
==Arrogant== how many peopled?
I find it pretty arrogant that your casualty listing for Vietnam makes sure to point out where the U.S. may have killed civilians but you sure don’t want to point out how many S. Vietnamese were kill by the Vet con and Northern Vietnamese Army.
2602:306:BDA0:97A0:58A1:2906:F359:8B24 (
talk)
19:24, 14 December 2013 (UTC)
Example: (Bold font is the author issues with the categorization)
NVA (North Vietnamese Army) and the VC (Viet Cong) < No doubt that the U.S. is responisble for killing these murders.• ~900,000 killed and/or missing North Vietnamese civilians < And being these are NV civilians no doubt the U.S. did this too.• at least 500,000 killed by Allied bombings South Vietnamese Army • ~1,000,000 killed and/or missing South Vietnamese civilians • anywhere from 1,000,000 to 2,500,000 killed and/or died of starvation, wounds, disease, drought, friendly fire, atrocities etc. • > 100,000 killed or wounded by US ordnance since 1975 • 200,000 affected by US Agent Orange < So you find it a need to make sure to point out that these last two listings are U.S. Kills but who’s responsible for the set of numbers above. Beside the friendly fire did the S. Vietnamese do this to them selves? Well hell then why were they in a war with NVA. I’m you’re your attitude is that it goes with out saying, but it doesn’t you’ve just decided pointed out the U.S. instigated casualties to cast bad light on the nation. For instant the Agent Orange kills are most likily a exaggeration and whether they are or aren’t you point them out in blatant disregard for the reason it was used to make it look like the U.S. just gassed them to gas them. In fact your main article on Nam doesn’t point out the Agent Orange use at all except for the “Social Attitudes and Treatment of Veterans” (God fobid you talk about the liberal hippies who spit on those soldiers). You might want to talk about those instances of AO use if your going to point them out as being a reason for some of the dead. They used the Agent too wipe out over run areas and most likely killed twice as many of the enemy on those instances. I’m not saying that it not sad what happen I’m just saying you skewing a fact intentionally by not giving all the information anywhere eles. Not to mention that fact that in the main article under the Vietnam search you state that you’re using numbers from a government that won the Southern half. Yes, I’m sure those numbers aren’t skewed at all. Obviously the rest of the SVC death are not due to America or you would have pointed it out, so who then nice vague description. I’m just jumping the gun but I’m sure you’ll be sure and correct that to say, starvation, wounds, disease, drought, atrocities etc… by NVA and VC cutting of food, medicine and through attacks on the S. Vietnamese, and by friendly fire.
Just thought I’d help you clean that up.
To improve the article, it would be nice to have as many deaths as possible attributed: i.e. how many civilians and how many combatants were killed by US, north vietnamese, etc. forces. Jens Nielsen 22:07, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
The figures, at least for US casualties, don't agree with those in the main Vietnam War article. The biggest discrepancy is wounded: 153,303 there, 128,000 here. Can anybody fix these? — MikeG (talk) 14:17, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
US casualties don't appear to be listed on this page. Why not?
Casualites as of November 7 2001:
Country | Branch of service | Number served | Killed | Wounded | Missing |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
USA [2] | Army | 4,368,000 | 38,218 | 96,802 | 617 {A} |
Marines | 794,000 | 14,840 | 51,392 | 242{B} | |
Navy | 1,842,000 | 2,565 | 4,178 | 401{C} | |
Air Force | 1,740,000 | 2,587 | 1,021 | 649 {D} | |
Coast Guard | 7 | 59 | 0 {E} | ||
Civilians | 38 {F} | ||||
Total | 8,744,000 | 58,217 | 153,452 | 1,947 |
Note: Footnote # 1 gives breakdown of Casualty by Branch of service as follows:
Army-38,209; Marines-14,838; Navy-2,555; Air Force-2,584; Coast Guard-7. Total:58,193. As of 12/1998
Originalname37 (
talk)
18:21, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
There are no refrences for this article.... and this is the sort of article needs them! please add some if you have time. Ahudson 16:54, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
122.104.135.222 (
talk)
02:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
is
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/ a credible site.
although only numbers are being quotes, a quick look at the site will see it has significant bias.
could its numbers be found elsewhere?
122.104.135.222 ( talk) 02:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)
Over one million Americans died in Vietnam? That number seems not only inaccurate but grossly inflated. I'm pretty sure that most historical accounts have the number of U.S. dead at around 60,000. I checked the casualty records at the archive and the list is around 58,193. I think the guy who wrote 1,000,000 must have added up the totals for all the different subsets, failing to realize each subset was just categorizing the same casualties in a different way.
It seems to me that many of the discrepancies in VPA/VC casualties could be explained by differing chronological scopes for various estimates. The absurdly high figure of 1.1 million Communist deaths could very well be referring to every VPA and VC combatant killed from 1945 to 1989 - as I recall the press release in question is a very vague three-line French affair. For all I know ARVN troops are lumped in there too. It is doubtful that this figure refers specifically to the period of American involvement in Vietnam. Kensai Max 05:35, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
The U.S. section says there were "58,209 KIA and other dead", but I don't see that number in the given source. Also, the MIA link appears to be dead now. Superm401 - Talk 09:35, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Should we perhaps try to list every individual casualtie we can as well? -- 67.162.31.148 ( talk) 23:12, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
Any chance of adding casualties from those two countries as well? I know there's less agreement on the figures than for North and South Vietnam, but omitting the subject entirely seems like the wrong approach. 87.74.32.50 ( talk) 16:15, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
Where are the casualty figures for these countries? They were part of the war too.
Also, there is way too much emphasis on Rummel here. Rummel is a controversial figure whose work appears to have been virtually ignored by mainstream scholarship. Gatoclass ( talk) 08:05, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
"Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge killed 1-3 million Cambodians in the killing fields, out of a population of around 8 million.[72][73][74][75]"
Rummel is over used in this and other articles on the Vietnam War,this article just seems to be one Rummel observation after another. I lost count of how many times his name is mentioned in this article. Seems someone had a Rummel book for Christmas. It would be a good idea to list other sources as there are many around. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 12:51, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
The reference http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB6.1A.GIF (used five times in this article) is not a source, but a list of sources. In the foonote should be indicated which specific source (plus page nr.) is referred to. S711 ( talk) 08:26, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
Ok, so I understand that this article touches on controversy. But I find little mention of the US atrocities referenced in popular culture, or by vietnam veterans. I thought the info would be easier to find on wikipedia, but it's nonexistent. I'd reference some Vietnam vets, but it would be original research.
Some examples from the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group:
http://www.latimes.com/vietnam
I'm obviously not well versed in wiki-protocol: is this not the place for this info or something? Atrocities seem relevant when discussing casualties. Hard to define atrocity when the enemy hides behind women and children. Civilians are casualties in a hut to hut firefight. Of course if you survive, you run the risk some distant citizen will blame you for trying to live another day.
-Learning Newbie 24.247.198.115 ( talk) 02:46, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
I don't know how credible Australian schoolbooks are or which scholarly census is referred to when it comes to thinking that 3,000,000 North Vietnamese civilians were killed by the USAF. I know people sometimes unfortunately cite rjsmith's mistaken interpretation of the death toll reported in the AFP report, which in itself just claimed 2,000,000 for *all of Vietnam*, not North Vietnam alone with an equal number to be added for S. Vietnam (what rjsmith for some reason says).
First off, anything over a few hundred thousand wouldn't make any sense (and I hope these remarks prove that I'm *not* trying to pass off apologetics for the U.S. military campaign in Vietnam here), because as writers as opposed as Noam Chomsky and Guenter Lewy have pointed out, it was South Vietnam that suffered the most damage during the war, not North Vietnam. (Well, maybe Cambodia and Laos were hurt just as much, but let's set that aside for now.) I think there's solid evidence that U.S. pilots periodically murdered North Vietnamese civilians during Rolling Thunder at least (e.g. at the Quynh Lap(sp.?) leper colony), but nowhere nearly as much as it would take to produce a fatality rate eclipsing the one in Japan or, for that matter, North Korea (and note that the USAAF/USAF operations in those countries were, as a matter of centrally-organized policy, meant to inflict massive devastation on civilian life). By contrast, the American military's free-fire zone, forced relocation of the rural citizenry, etc. SOPs naturally could be expected to result in the vast loss of civilian life that *actually* took place in South Vietnam. I agree without reluctance that this was really, awfully evil, not the responsibility of a few isolated U.S. soldiers or pilots, etc. but the intent, more or less explicit, of the American high command and personnel of comparable stature, protogenocidal if not outright genocidal in character, and so on.
Moreover, I should like to note that the indeterminate "hundreds of thousands" figure is one that I got from a copy in the Texas Tech University online Vietnam War archives of an SRV (postwar Vietnamese communist) government tract. I suppose if they had suffered no less than 15 times that much in the northern half of the country, they might've been keen on pointing that out (if for propaganda purposes only). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.69.137.27 ( talk) 18:40, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
ttk love you knom and ever
Air force captain, Brian Wilson, who carried out bomb-damage assessments in free-fire zones throughout the delta, saw the results firsthand. "It was the epitome of immorality…One of the times I counted bodies after an air strike—which always ended with two napalm bombs which would just fry everything that was left—I counted sixty-two bodies. In my report I described them as so many women between fifteen and twenty-five and so many children—usually in their mothers' arms or very close to them—and so many old people." When he later read the official tally of dead, he found that it listed them as 130 VC killed.
vietnam news of the war how did it effect the troops? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.230.154.116 ( talk) 15:14, 11 April 2010 (UTC)
The article states that US forces killed 2 million civilians during the war; however, the source says only that 2 million citizens were killed TOTAL in the North and South. I am therefore removing this part of the section because it is not supported by the source until a credible number can be found. Anytus ( talk) 17:24, 30 June 2010 (UTC)
Where is the evidence that 2 million were directly killed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.40.0.8 ( talk) 19:52, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
I personally congratulate [redacted] on a perfectly [redacted] article full of pro-US bias, and figures and statistics, even the most historically well known ones, completely twisted to their liking. But this is the usual [redacted] people should expect from this "high standard encyclopedia" I suppose. Long Live America!-- Propaganda328 ( talk) 14:01, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
This article is awful. How comes it doesn't mention how many civilians where killed by the USA? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sulla1982 ( talk • contribs) 07:38, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
I think a subject such as this, clearly shows the importance of implementing a truly international Global WP along with a US WP and a British WP. Many American editors believes WP English is an (North) American WP specifically. Similarly many British editors wrongly believes WP English to be a truly British WP too. I can easily understand their views, since the official language of WP English is English (British English in fact), rather confusing to US or British readers and editors I guess. I hope that in the future we could implement US WP, British WP and above all Global WP. The language of "Global WP" should probably be English, since this language is the preferred language in international affairs. Currently WP English is actually "Global WP" as is, but as stated it is too confusing to US and British editors/readers.
I have encountered these issues again and again in various contexts. Many articles have a very distorted POV and peculiar foci because of this. I don't blame anyone, but the underlying misconceptions have some real and problematic effects on the WP English. If anyone have any suitable links to groups and/or people working on these issues, please share them below, it will be much appreciated. Thank you. RhinoMind ( talk) 16:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
1178 US soldiers died in the last 24 years? From your own source, in the past 28 years only 71 US soldiers died, so wtf. Also over 50,000 white people died, it says about 48,000. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.90.27.224 ( talk) 07:06, 14 November 2010 (UTC)
Shouldn't there be a total number? Casualties on all sides including civilian. Maybe even including post-war casualties due to famine, injuries and such. The total number is what I was looking for and it's not mentioned anywhere. Even a ballpark figure would be better than nothing. Is it 500.000 or 5.000.000 or 15.000.000? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rudiedirkx ( talk • contribs) 03:02, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
The estimates vary too widely to be stated in absolutes, but the main Vietnam War article provides the range. Population and Development Review estimates slightly less than one million Vietnamese soldiers and civilians died directly or indirectly as a consequence of the conflict; the Vietnamese government claimed over 3 million dead. Wounded is typically three times dead. In Cambodia, there were about a quarter of a million deaths (one million total casualties), according to Sliwinski, Heuveline, Kiernan, Etcheson, Banister and Johnson. In Laos, probably somewhat less than 100,000 were killed. The number is most commonly put at 1.5-2 million altogether. The war with France cost an additional 500,000 lives. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 04:14, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
I have added a section under that title as there was not one before but an editor seems to think that it is not needed. If there are sections for deaths caused by North/VietCong.South Vietnamese military then obviously there should be a section for the American military as they were the major power in the actual war, not to have one seems strange to say the least and also I feel biased. Maybe others would like to explain their reasons for not having a section for deaths caused by the American military. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 11:30, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
I think we should keep a balance on the pictures, we have at the moment I believe too many showing Viet Cong atrocities and need to lose some. We have the massacre at Hue,a terrorist attack and Đắk Sơn Massacre. For the Americans we have My Lai and for the south we have the bombing of the village with the kid running naked so there is clearly a need for a NPOV to cut down on the VietCong ones or add more of the Americans and South Vietnamese which will just be too many pics altogether. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 23:52, 27 September 2012 (UTC)
Inclusion of sources that have not been properly written is causing this article problems. So please write your sources out properly so that they are not just raw url's. Also when adding a PDF file as a source I suggest putting in a page number so all can see what is actually being referenced. You added a 113 page PDF for your claims about NVA/VC wearing civilians clothes,do you expect everyone to wade thru 113 pages of a Rand report to find what you have sourced? Zrdragon12 ( talk) 05:43, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
Obviously this is a fairly new term,probably arrived since the Iraq war in conventional use.To be insurgents you need to be fighting against the recognised government of a country. South Vietnam was not recognised by the UN at all. Vietnam was divided in the 1954 Geneva accords on a temp basis until 1956 when elections should have been held. The Americans and Diem did not want elections held as Ho Chi Minh would have won them so they set up the South Vietnam state. The people fighting against that were Vietnamese so they were not insurgents against any recognised government,it was a civil war that had been going on since the end of WW2.Please provide you thoughts or evidence that states otherwise
The Geneva Agreements, which were issued on July 21, 1954,[11] carefully worded the division of northern and southern Vietnam as a "provisional military demarcation line",[12] "on either side of which the forces of the two parties shall be regrouped after their withdrawal".[12] To specifically put aside any notion that it was a partition, they further stated, in the Final Declaration, Article 6: "The Conference recognizes that the essential purpose of the agreement relating to Vietnam is to settle military questions with a view to ending hostilities and that the military demarcation line is provisional and should not in any way be interpreted as constituting a political or territorial boundary".. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 19:49, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
Answer
Hi Zrdragon. I hear you and agree absolutely. But why dont YOU change it then? Maybe the initial writer wasnt aware of this? You dont have to promptly stigmatise anybody. Just change what you find wrong. If it needs documentation, just provide that. Its really easy.
RhinoMind ( talk) 22:00, 2 September 2013 (UTC)
These figures cannot be suppressed as coincidental to the war's result. The sources cited clearly link them. It's not as though people were going on boats for a vacation; the entire ethnic Chinese community was expelled and forced onto the boats. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 22:11, 30 September 2012 (UTC)
"Stumink (talk | contribs) . . (23,676 bytes) (+52) . . (Vandalism really. This to clarify that the 26,000 figure includes NLF operatives, informants and supporters, not just civillians. This is sourced."
Is it sourced? Ogden Reid, a member of a congressional committee investigating Phoenix in 1971, "if the Union had had a Phoenix program during the Civil War, its targets would have been civilians like Jefferson Davis or the mayor of Macon, Georgia."
It targeted civilians NLF operatives, informants and supporters, they were the civilian infrastructure of the Viet Cong government.Would you actually like to see the original declassified documents that state who they were targeting? I got them. Zrdragon12 ( talk) 15:15, 1 October 2012 (UTC)
Who is trying to omit the Cambodian and Laotian deaths from being listed here? First it was attempted not to mention them. Then when they were mentioned some idiot decided to pretend it was just a civil war. I somehow don't think the person is too stupid to know it's ridiculous to characterize a war that involves at least two if not more countries as just a civil war. The only conclusion one can take is that person or persons is doing it in order to commit historical fraud.
Whoever it is you better give it up cuz you won't succeed. Wikipedia has explicit rules and rewriting history is simply not allowed. We will not stand for it and you not get away with it. That means just as the holocaust casualties are mentioned in the world war two causalities page, likewise ALL casualties of the Vietnam war should be and shall be mentioned HERE!!! Loginnigol ( talk) 19:34, 11 October 2012 (UTC)
Nguyen, how about reading Greiner's book instead of googling? You may start with the Kindle preview, where you find the killings I listed mentioned in the Introduction. Greiner's main sources are the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group and the Peers Commission. Cortagravatas ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:54, 13 December 2012 (UTC)
Nguyen, the comment regarding your last editing-out of my list from Prof. Greiner's book ("funny how Greiner didn't mention about communists' torture, killings and forced labor of US, ARVN troops, or of t..") was rather out of place, as Prof. Greiner's book is about the US involvement in Vietnam. Crimes committed by other participants are addressed elsewhere on this page, so if you think too little is being said about these crimes, feel free to expand the respective sections. But the next time you remove my summary from the introduction of Prof. Greiner's book, I'll have to report you for vandalism. Cortagravatas ( talk)19:11, 29 December 2012 (GMT)
1. Bumping off unarmed civilians and then counting them as VC, as was done in the course of Operation Speedy Express, is intentional murder. Besides, who said that "Deaths caused by US military" means only democidal killings?
2. Newsweek source was moved to "specific incidents".
3. If the South or North Vietnamese sections are too short for your taste, why don't you expand them?
4. "Deaths caused by US military" is the most appropriate section for Greiner's list. Cortagravatas ( talk)20:30 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
Feel free to report to whoever you like. Greiner's list is neither apologetic nor condemning, but a plain statement of facts. The heading of the section is "Deaths caused by US military" or so, which means that your considerations about VC/NVA having killed more civilians/non-combatants are irrelevant here; if you want to make that point, do it in the sections dedicated to deaths caused by VC/NVA. As to killings of VC prisoners, the essential information, which Greiner expands on later in the book, is that a considerable number of veterans referred to it as SOP, so there's nothing "speculative" about this information. And please spare me the nonsense about a "highly pro-communist, anti-American tone" in that section. Neither Greiner nor I are pro-communist or anti-American. You, on the other hand, seem to argue from an ideological position that perceives any mention of crimes committed by American forces as "highly pro-communist" and "anti-American". Try to show a little more objectivity. Cortagravatas ( talk)20:30 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
PS: "My Lai (4)" and "My Khe (4)" are the names of two places where massacres occurred. These two plus the other five mentioned in the first item of Greiner's list makes 7 massacres, not 8 as per your "math". Cortagravatas ( talk)20:35 (GMT), 30 December 2012.
"Specific incidents" are one thing, Greiner's overall tally of "incidents" (based on the files of the Peers Commission, the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group and other sources) is another. There are sections on deaths caused by VC/NVA, South Vietnam and South Korea regardless of whether some of the massacres mentioned in these sections are also mentioned under "specific incidents", so why should the section about deaths caused by the American military be different? I'm beginning to get the impression that Prof. Greiner's research touched a raw nerve of American nationalist pride and that this is the reason for so much opposition to his list. Please bear one thing in mind when comparing the length of this section with the length of sections about deaths caused by other participants: there's nothing extraordinary about atrocities committed by VC/NVA, South Vietnamese or South Korean forces, insofar as these pertained to authoritarian regimes with little concern for human rights. The United States of America, on the other hand, are supposed to be a democracy that respects human rights. US forces in Vietnam were supposed to fight according to rules of engagement meant to protect non-combatants. Their objective was to protect the people of South Vietnam and to win their hearts and minds. Wrongs committed in violation of such high aspirations and principles deserve more attention and require explanation if the world's mightiest nation is to learn from its history. Prof. Greiner's book is an attempt to provide as complete as possible a picture of what went wrong as concerns treatment of non-combatants by US forces in Vietnam and why things got so badly out of control. I strongly recommend that you read this book, which is available in English translation. And I wish you a Happy New Year. Cortagravatas ( talk)21:41, 31 December 2012 (GMT).
Nguyen, that was an excellent post. I bow before your experience, and if you would like to tell me more about it, please do so. However, you got me wrong when you understood that I considered NVA/VC atrocities to be «not as serious, or "better"» than crimes committed by the American military. What I wrote was the following: «Please bear one thing in mind when comparing the length of this section with the length of sections about deaths caused by other participants: there's nothing extraordinary about atrocities committed by VC/NVA, South Vietnamese or South Korean forces, insofar as these pertained to authoritarian regimes with little concern for human rights. The United States of America, on the other hand, are supposed to be a democracy that respects human rights. US forces in Vietnam were supposed to fight according to rules of engagement meant to protect non-combatants. Their objective was to protect the people of South Vietnam and to win their hearts and minds. Wrongs committed in violation of such high aspirations and principles deserve more attention and require explanation if the world's mightiest nation is to learn from its history.» No, I didn't say that atrocities committed by criminal dictatorships are not as bad as atrocities committed by democracies that claim and are supposed to uphold human rights. My point is that one shouldn't sweep atrocities committed by democracies under the carpet or reduce them to a marginal issue with the argument that criminal dictatorships did much worse. Instead one should explore them and learn from them. Criminal dictatorships like Nazi Germany or the communist regimes of North Vietnam, North Korea and Cambodia cannot be improved, and the only lesson to be learned from their crimes - which outweigh crimes committed by democracies both quantitatively and qualitatively - is that they should be kept from coming into being or abolished where existing, preferably by peaceful means but if necessary (as in the case of Nazi Germany) by military force. Democracies, on the other hand, can be improved by criticism, which includes exposing practices unworthy of democratic states. One should not overemphasize crimes committed by democracies, to be sure, let alone invoke them to play down crimes committed by dictatorships. But one should document and condemn the failure of democratic self-control mechanisms so that these self-control mechanisms are improved and made more effective. I hope you can agree with that. As concerns Nazi crimes, you may want to visit the blog I write for, which is dedicated to providing information about these crimes and refuting the claims of ideologically motivated apologists. It is called "Holocaust Controversies", and the link is http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot.pt/ . Best regards, Cortagravatas ( talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:22, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Nguyen1310 ( talk) 04:41, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
There are some good sources on Viet Cong terrorism here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_terrorism#Vietnam 70.131.124.176 ( talk) 05:11, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
Given the substantial ammount of credible sources in the book, could it be used as sources?-- Zeraful ( talk) 13:49, 15 August 2013 (UTC)
It's a completely valid source, but watch as no one makes use of it. The blatant pro-US bias of this sites Vietnam articles is disgusting. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.20.65.149 ( talk) 00:56, 7 April 2014 (UTC)
Turse has been completely discredited as a source. See: https://cross-currents.berkeley.edu/e-journal/issue-12/zinoman-and-kulik. 74.96.114.147 ( talk) 12:27, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
The historical correct name of the war at hand is The Second Indochina War. The war has many other names, like the Vietnam War in USA and parts of the west and The American War in Vietnam and south-east Asia. Since Wikipedia (en) is an international project and strive for neutrality and balanced information, writers are encouraged to use the name The Second Indochina War. RhinoMind ( talk) 20:03, 17 December 2013 (UTC)
I've been trying my best to either confirm or debunk this myth but I'm finding a lot of contradictory information.
Did Blacks and Latinos suffer disproportionate casualties during the war? Were they disproportionately drafted? Was there one year were blacks were 20% of the casualties? Were they less in other years? What was the total population in the country and in the military of minorities? Were latinos counted as white?
I can't find any reliable sources on at least the first two pages of Google. Is there an expert watching who can weigh in? This seems like a glaring oversight on this page. Even if we think something is a conspiracy theory or nonsense, if it is widely reported on, as this particular claim is, we should cover it. PraetorianFury ( talk) 19:10, 31 January 2014 (UTC)
Done PraetorianFury ( talk) 21:23, 5 February 2014 (UTC)
Xenophrenic has removed criticism of Turse rather disingenuously stating "rmv unsupported BLP vio" and "doesn't address that specific content" in their edit summary, and specifically removing the suggestion that "Turse has been accused of falsifying references" according to the source provided, i.e. Kulik and Zinoman. Yet if either Xenophrenic or his mate Capitalismojo bothered to actually read the source they would note the source does indeed accuse him of exactly this. Note "Four of his citations of marine testimony claiming support for his account are demonstrably false." on page 177 [9] and "These are the first two of Turse’s citations that are clearly false." on page 178 [10]. Turse is clearly a tainted source and the fact that one supporter needs to write a half page paragraph watering down the criticism of his work makes it quite clear this has no place in this article in the first place. 101.169.213.82 ( talk) 12:33, 10 February 2015 (UTC)
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Mztourist, A bicyclette, I've taken a look at the official SRV source that A bicyclette puts forward:
- Theo số liệu thống kê, toàn quốc có: 1.146.250 liệt sĩ, trong đó:
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Pháp: 191.605 liệt sĩ.
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Mỹ: 849.018 liệt sĩ.
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong chiến trang bảo vệ Tổ quốc: 105.627 liệt sĩ."
[1]
References
Is the specific incidents section really necessary? Almost all of them are covered earlier in the page and we could just do a See Also to List of massacres in Vietnam. Mztourist ( talk) 05:03, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
I disagree. Its better to leave it. A bicyclette ( talk) 10:21, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
I have raised the issue of the WP:RS of a purported Vietnamese Government document detailing North Vietnamese and Vietcong casualties at WP:RSN here: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Vietnamese Government document on Vietnam War casualties together with a suggestion as to how such document, if accepted, should be presented. regards Mztourist ( talk) 08:26, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
IP 113.189.175.11 is edit-warring, making changes to the page in relation to PAVN/VC missing here: [11] which based on my Google translate is not supported by the (already questionable) underlying document. IP 113.189.175.11 must follow WP:BRD and discuss the issue here or should be blocked for edit-warring. Mztourist ( talk) 07:20, 3 September 2018 (UTC)
The concept of democide is specious and really only accepted by a single thinker: Rummel. Adding to this, the notion of democide seems superfluous to this page (how many discrete subcategories of death should we account for?), and it requires a sort of mind reading and assumption of intent. So we see, for instance, that while the US is responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths during the course of the war, all but ~6000 appear as "justified" or are shrugged off as "collateral damage" if we look at Rummel's "democide" estimates. Apart from an obvious display of ideological bias, this seems a bit misleading -- a cursory glance at the chart in the middle of this article would have an uninformed reader coming away with the impression that the US only killed upwards of 10,000 people in Vietnam.
Given 1) Rummel (and his ideological bias) already saturate this page, 2) Rummel's concept of "democide" is fairly heterodox in the field of political science, and 3) these estimates are misleading and likely unnecessary, I'd suggest all references to "democide" ought to be removed from this page.
I will just go ahead and make a discussion as I have been following some edits from a user. As there is only one user seemingly active on this topic, I am going to bring in some necessary checks to maintain objectivity. This is in reference to these edits here which I restored [12].
The following edits I found highly problematic given that it revolves around removing references to the same topical area of war crimes:
I won't speculate on the motivations. But I am RVing so that a BRD process can be engaged.
Deogyusan has been blocked as another sock of User:A bicyclette, accordingly this conversation ends and the page has been reverted to the last good version. Mztourist ( talk) 03:58, 24 September 2019 (UTC)
Per the article. https://www.thedailybeast.com/lost-souls-the-search-for-vietnams-300000-or-more-mias
"The Vietnamese government puts the number [of officially missing] at 300,000, but the actual number of those whose bodies were buried in anonymous graves or never found and buried at all is widely believed to be closer to 500,000. "
article is not about how "unclear it is" how such and such numbers connect to anything else. this is drawing conclusions about something which isn't stated and clearly misrepresenting the article.
Moyar was wrong. 849,018 dead are INCULDING the number of missing. I'm Vietnamese, and I see he was wrong when translated Vietnamese source. See this first data, which Moyar translated - http://datafile.chinhsachquandoi.gov.vn/Qu%E1%BA%A3n%20l%C3%BD%20ch%E1%BB%89%20%C4%91%E1%BA%A1o/Chuy%C3%AAn%20%C4%91%E1%BB%81%204.doc
+ Liệt sĩ hy sinh trong kháng chiến chống Mỹ: 849.018 liệt sĩ. - In Vietnamese, "liệt sĩ" = dead + missing, not only "dead" (in Vietnamese, "missing" = "liệt sĩ cần tìm kiếm quy tập"). "Theo số lượng thống kê, đến nay số hài cốt liệt sĩ cần tìm kiếm quy tập còn khoảng 207.000, tập trung ở những địa bàn vùng sâu, vùng xa, hiểm trở, việc tìm kiếm rất khó khăn do thiếu thông tin..." - 207,000 are number of missing, and they were counted in "liệt sĩ" (849.018 total) Cucthanh ( talk) 10:19, 7 December 2022 (UTC)
As the subject summary says, this article — by some distance the most egregious whitewashing of American imperialism I've ever encountered on Wikipedia — desperately requires input from editors who are
In its current state, this article reads like a Japanese history textbook describing the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, or a mid-career David Irving book about the Holocaust. The most recent comment on this talk page — right above mine — is somebody who clearly cannot read Vietnamese insisting to a Vietnamese person that the claims in a Vietnamese government source cannot be trusted — despite being unable to read them, as they are written in Vietnamese. Foxmilder ( talk) 09:02, 11 January 2024 (UTC)