Deck 26: A Nation Divided: The Vietnam War, 1945-1975

Question 1

Who did the United States select to head the new government in South Vietnam after its establishment in 1954?

A) Ngo Dinh Diem
B) Ho Chi Minh
C) Thich Quang Duc
D) Ngo Dinh Nhu

Answer 1

Ngo Dinh Diem

Question 2

During the Cold War, which nation did the United States support in its efforts to regain control of its Vietnam colony?

A) Great Britain
B) Japan
C) France
D) China

Answer 2

France

Question 3

How did critics of the peace movement during the Vietnam War react to the 1967 photograph "Flower Power"?

A) They saw this gesture as an insincere ploy to distract the soldiers just before demonstrators stormed the Pentagon.
B) They realized that the war was futile and began to demand that President Johnson withdraw troops from Vietnam.
C) They called for further escalation of the war into Cambodia and Laos despite protestors' demands for peace.
D) They perceived this image to be a stark contrast between government-sponsored violence in Vietnam and American citizens' demand for peace.

Answer 3

They saw this gesture as an insincere ploy to distract the soldiers just before demonstrators stormed the Pentagon.

Question 4

Why did Lyndon B. Johnson insist on taking the oath of office with Jackie Kennedy at his side after John F. Kennedy's assassination in Dallas as shown in this photograph taken by Cecil Stoughton?

A) to demonstrate to the public that she supported his presidency
B) to put a stop to widespread rumors that he had no right to the presidency
C) to show that the supposed friction between him and President Kennedy was a myth
D) to quell suspicions that he had had a hand in the assassination of President Kennedy

Question 5

What was the major result of the Geneva Accords of 1954?

A) Vietnam gained complete independence from France.
B) Vietnam was temporarily partitioned along the seventeenth parallel.
C) North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam.
D) France withdrew completely from Vietnam.

Question 6

What happened in Vietnam shortly before the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November 1963?

A) a withdrawal of U.S. forces in South Vietnam
B) a Kennedy-supported military coup resulting in Ngo Dinh Diem's murder
C) an attempt by Ngo Dinh Diem to negotiate with Ho Chi Minh
D) a decision by the Kennedy administration to turn to diplomacy in Vietnam

Question 7

What did New York Times reporter David Halberstam mean when, in 1962, he summed up the military dilemma in Vietnam by stating "It is often impossible to separate the cruel and dedicated foe you want to kill from the simple and illiterate peasant you want to woo"?

A) Communist troops inflicted heavy losses on South Vietnamese civilians.
B) Communist troops launched their attacks from strongholds in North Vietnam.
C) Communist troops blended into the civilian population so they were harder to detect.
D) Communist troops often made civilians act as suicide bombers.

Question 8

What was President Kennedy's policy regarding U.S. involvement in Vietnam?

A) He tried to settle the conflict with North Vietnam through diplomatic negotiations.
B) He escalated involvement by sending in combat troops for the first time.
C) He sent more financial aid and increased the number of military "advisers" in South Vietnam.
D) He urged Congress to declare war on North Vietnam.

Question 9

Why did political cartoonist Ira Levine draw President Johnson's gallbladder incision in the shape of South Vietnam in his political cartoon Johnson's Scar?

A) to imply that U.S. involvement there was a scar on the Johnson administration
B) to symbolize the damage done to U.S. forces by Vietcong guerillas
C) to garner U.S. support for Johnson's leadership in fighting there
D) to underscore the idea that fighting communism in Asia was a core U.S. interest

Question 10

President Truman's key advisers and National Security Council Report 68 (NSC-68) mistakenly believed that communism in Vietnam was .

A) a way for Japan to gain more natural resources in this region
B) not a serious concern after World War II
C) controlled or financed by the Soviet Union
D) assisted by financial and military help from the Chinese

Question 11

The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution .

A) officially partitioned Vietnam into two separate northern and southern nations
B) was an official declaration of war by Congress on North Vietnam
C) gave President Johnson the power to wage undeclared war in Vietnam
D) officially ended the war in Vietnam

Question 12

The National Liberation Front (NLF) that united factions in South Vietnam opposed to the Diem regime into a fighting coalition was derisively called by President Diem.

A) Vietminh
B) "tough little miracle men"
C) Vietcong
D) Dien Bien Phu

Question 13

What did Marcus Edwin's 1953 cartoon How About the Other Buttons? imply about the role of Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union during the Cold War?

A) Stalin had nationalistic ambitions for taking over the locations shown in the cartoon.
B) The Soviet Union was considering using nuclear warfare in Korea.
C) Stalin had the opportunity to resolve the conflict in Indochina just as he had done in Korea.
D) The Soviet Union was responsible for the start of the Korean War.

Question 14

What were the "steel horses" used by North Vietnamese civilians on the Ho Chi Minh Trail?

A) military jeeps with soldiers sent to the Vietcong
B) old-fashioned automobiles loaded with supplies for Communist forces in the south
C) army tanks sent to the Communists in South Vietnam
D) bicycles that carried supplies and weapons to Communist troops in the south

Question 15

In 1945, Vietnamese forces formed a provisional government in Hanoi and declared independence under the leadership of _ .

A) Ngo Dinh Diem
B) Mao Zedong
C) Thich Quang Duc
D) Ho Chi Minh

Question 16

The best explanation for the enduring power of this image taken by Associated Press photographer Malcolm Browne is .

A) the clash between the modernity of the car and the ancient practice of Buddhism
B) the contrast between the serenity of the monk and violence of the flames
C) Western viewers' general lack of familiarity with Buddhist practices
D) the fact that Ngo Dinh Diem would inflict such brutality on his people

Question 17

This photograph of Ho Chi Minh sitting with Vietnamese children in 1954 reinforced his reputation in Vietnam as a(n) .

A) accomplished educator
B) wise elder who loved his nation
C) military dictator and follower of communism
D) enemy of the United States and the West

Question 18

was the belief held by the Truman and Eisenhower administrations that a communist takeover of Vietnam would soon result in the same fate in other nations in Southeast Asia.

A) Containment
B) Brinksmanship
C) Vietnamization
D) The domino theory

Question 19

The Vietminh were .

A) Vietnamese communists
B) Chinese military forces sent to train Vietnamese communist troops
C) Vietnamese supporters of French colonialism
D) Vietnamese opposed to Communism

Question 20

Unlike the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO) _ .

A) excluded European nations from membership
B) focused on humanitarian relief rather than containment of communism
C) required member nations to send troops to support South Vietnam
D) left each member nation's commitment for mutual defense vague

Question 21

What was President Nixon's main goal through his Vietnamization program?

A) winning the war through the escalation of American ground forces in Vietnam
B) turning over most of the ground fighting to the South Vietnamese Army
C) negotiating for peace directly with the North Vietnamese government
D) disarming the peace movement by publicizing pictures of withdrawing American troops

Question 22

What did Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams mean when he commented on his snapshot "Saigon Execution" by stating that "pictures do not always tell the full story, and this is one case where this is true"?

A) The photograph intended to draw on American sympathies for the execution of an innocent civilian, but it actually revealed that this person was an armed Communist guerrilla.
B) This photograph was meant to show that Saigon was under law and order, but it instead portrayed a city in the midst of chaos.
C) This photograph tried to show support for South Vietnamese General Nguyen Ngoc Loan's action for executing an armed Vietcong terrorist, but it was actually condemned by Americans as a cold-blooded execution.
D) The photograph was meant to condemn General Loan's vicious regime in Saigon, but Americans instead saw him as a hero fighting against communism.

Question 23

What did American pilots in Vietnam primarily imply when they satirically quipped "Only you can prevent forests"?

A) Harmful defoliants like Agent Orange were sprayed on trees in order to expose Vietcong hideouts.
B) Napalm dropped in jungles burned large acreage of forests and jungles.
C) Trails were cleared through the jungles of South Vietnam so that American troops could conduct search-and-destroy missions.
D) Bombs and missiles dropped in the jungles destroyed much of the native vegetation.

Question 24

What message do the snapshots "Reaching Out" on the left and of gunner James Farley on the right, which were both taken by Life magazine photographer Larry Burrows, convey to the public about the Vietnam War?

A) Both younger and older soldiers were participants in combat.
B) American military combat was a shared burden as well as an individual experience.
C) Combat produced both doubts and idealism in American soldiers.
D) Combat resulted in both cowardice and bravery.

Question 25

Who did most conservative Southern whites and white Northern blue-collar workers support in the 1968 presidential election?

A) Richard Nixon
B) George Wallace
C) Hubert H. Humphrey
D) Robert Kennedy

Question 26

This drawing of a Vietcong hideout shows that it was specifically built in order to
)

A) prevent an American war of attrition in South Vietnam
B) lodge North Vietnamese troops who had invaded South Vietnam
C) combat American air superiority and bombings
D) shelter local villagers from American search-and-destroy missions

Question 27

What did this Doonesbury cartoon intend to lampoon?

A) the inaccuracies and meaninglessness of body counts
B) the tensions between enlisted men and officers
C) the dissociation of the military from the day-to-day life of the Vietnamese
D) the difficulties of distinguishing the Vietcong from civilians

Question 28

Why were events at the village of My Lai referred to as a massacre?

A) The confirmed body count was remarkably high.
B) The images released to the public were gruesome.
C) The U.S. military tortured its enemies there.
D) The victims killed there were unarmed villagers.

Question 29

Founded in 1962, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) .

A) shared many goals with communists
B) organized violent protests from its inception
C) criticized both the war abroad and capitalism at home
D) focused its efforts on protesting the war in Vietnam

Question 30

How was the Nixon Doctrine different from previous diplomatic actions taken by the United States in global geopolitics?

A) The United States would continue to intervene in regional conflicts taking place all over the world.
B) The United States would share a sphere of influence in Southeast Asia with China and the Soviet Union.
C) The United States now expected its friends to take the lead in defending themselves.
D) The United States would be the primary nation policing the actions of Southeast Asian nations.

Question 31

The primary purpose of this map is to show that .

A) North and South Vietnam eventually reunited as one Communist nation
B) China changed the course of the war in Vietnam in a 20-year period
C) the United States spent over 20 years trying to defeat Communist forces in Vietnam
D) the Cold War spread beyond Southeast Asia because of the Vietnam War

Question 32

What pioneering war protest action did faculty and students at the University of Michigan introduce to the general public in 1965?

A) teach-ins about the Vietnam War
B) burning of draft cards
C) street marches against the war
D) writing the popular chant "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?"

Question 33

Based on public opinion polls taken between 1965 and 1973, how did most Americans feel about the war in Vietnam and the peace movement at home?

A) Most Americans supported the war but disliked the peace movement.
B) Most Americans opposed the war but supported the peace movement.
C) Most Americans were evenly divided between supporting the war and supporting the peace movement.
D) Most Americans disliked both the war and the peace movement.

Question 34

The Tet Offensive was .

A) the American-planned assassination of South Vietnamese president Ngo Dinh Diem
B) a massacre of innocent South Vietnamese villagers by American soldiers
C) the beginning of American aerial bombings in Cambodia and Laos
D) a North Vietnamese and Vietcong assault on over 100 cities and towns in South Vietnam

Question 35

What were the consequences of the My Lai massacre for commanding officer Lieutenant William Calley?

A) He kept the events secret and was accused of responsibility decades later.
B) He was never brought to trial and regarded as a hero.
C) He successfully argued that higher-ranking officials were responsible.
D) He was convicted of murder and pardoned by Nixon.

Question 36

What does this map imply about the results of the 1968 presidential election?

A) New England and the Northeast mostly voted for the conservative cause.
B) Most of Humphrey's support came from states in the Far West.
C) The Democratic Party was able to hold on to its stronghold in the Deep South.
D) The peace movement helped the conservative cause, which led to Nixon's election.

Question 37

Why did many male American antiwar protestors choose to burn their draft cards during the Vietnam War?

A) They supported a communist-run government in Vietnam.
B) They believed they were intentionally committing treason against the United States.
C) They saw this action as a form of free speech against the war.
D) The Supreme Court had legalized burning draft cards as free speech.

Question 38

What was ironic about this photograph taken by Army photographer Ron Haeberle of soon- to-be executed victims of the 1968 massacre at My Lai?

A) Americans were more outraged with the publication of the photograph rather than the killings of these villagers.
B) The incident was referred to as a massacre when only a small number of villagers had been killed.
C) The woman on the left buttoning her blouse had just been raped by the same men who were getting ready to kill her.
D) The women in this photograph were Vietcong terrorists who had recently killed marines from the platoons involved this incident.

Question 39

What were CBS-TV news anchor Walter Cronkite's intentions when he told viewers on February 27, 1968, that "we have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds"?

A) He was urging the United States to seek a negotiated peace in Vietnam since the war was a stalemate.
B) He was advising President Johnson not to run for reelection because of the Vietnam crisis.
C) He was suggesting an escalated aerial bombing of North Vietnam to bring the war to a quick end.
D) He was recommending that the United States instigate another military coup in South Vietnam to stabilize and strengthen that government.

Question 40

Although peace activists in the United States had a variety of reasons for opposing the war in Vietnam, one thing they all had in common was that the war .

A) had a negative impact on African Americans
B) was destroying American democracy
C) could be brought to a quick end if the United States negotiated directly with Ho Chi Minh
D) would end faster if more students were involved in the peace movement

Question 41

How did President Nixon expand the conflict in Vietnam in April 1970 and shatter the public consensus he had carefully created for his Vietnamization policy?

A) He resumed massive aerial bombings on North Vietnam.
B) He ordered an American ground force invasion of neighboring Cambodia.
C) He alarmed North Vietnamese communists by visiting China and the Soviet Union.
D) He supported the mass murders committed by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

Question 42

Effects of the Vietnam War included the .

A) increased support for overseas warfare
B) obliteration of communism in Southeast Asia
C) surrender of the Vietcong
D) erosion of American confidence in the government

Question 43

What feeling can be inferred from the photo of the South Vietnamese attempting to flee Saigon from the roof of the American Embassy in 1975?

A) security because the South Vietnamese were not in imminent danger
B) satisfaction because the evacuation was a triumph for the United States
C) disdain because Americans were not eager to help their Vietnamese allies
D) disheartenment because many of those in line would not be able to escape

Question 44

The term détente has been used to describe President Nixon's .

A) methods of improving U.S. relations with China and the Soviet Union
B) threat to use nuclear weapons against the Vietcong during the Vietnam War
C) attempts to get China and the Soviet Union to declare war on each other
D) failed efforts to conceal the role that he played in the Watergate scandal

Question 45

The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I) .

A) constituted the first step in negotiating peace with North Vietnam
B) was an agreement with the Soviet Union limiting intercontinental ballistic missiles
C) constituted the beginning of new diplomatic relations with China
D) was used by President Nixon as evidence to support escalation in Vietnam.

Question 46

How did the War Powers Resolution of 1973 limit the president's authority?

A) He had to seek congressional approval for any overseas deployment of American troops that lasted for more than 60 days.
B) He could not ask Congress to consider approval of funds to friendly foreign governments that were at war.
C) He could not authorize arms shipments to friendly foreign governments that were at war.
D) He lost the power to command aerial forces to bomb unfriendly governments and regimes.

Question 47

What is one conclusion that can be made by evaluating the evidence on this chart?

A) The Vietnam War was exclusively a ground war for American troops.
B) The American public supported troop escalation in Vietnam after the surprise North Vietnamese attacks during the Tet Offensive.
C) Despite the unpopularity of the war, nearly 40 percent of the nation still believed that the United States had done the right thing by sending troops to Vietnam.
D) Aerial bombings increased in the last years of the war due to the Communist presence in Cambodia.

Question 48

In 1971, The New York Times published the Pentagon Papers, a classified Department of Defense study that confirmed that .

A) U.S. involvement in Vietnam was illegal, because Congress never declared war
B) the Pentagon believed the Vietnam War was unwinnable
C) President Nixon was secretly collaborating with the Vietcong
D) Presidents Kennedy and Johnson had lied to the public about the U.S. role in Vietnam

Question 49

What made the 1970 killings of four students who were protesting the U.S. invasion of Cambodia at Kent State University so ironic?

A) Americans feared that a war undertaken to protect American democracy was instead of destroying it.
B) The four victims had just been drafted to go serve in Vietnam and Cambodia.
C) Nixon had recently called the student protestors such as those at Kent State "bums blowing up campuses" while the public perceived them as martyrs.
D) The Kent State shootings unmasked the "town and gown" divide that resulted in counterprotests to support the war.

Question 50

Which of the following do these two graphics illustrate about the Vietnam War?

A) More American soldiers died in Vietnam than in World War II.
B) The war was unpopular with many Americans.
C) More than 50 percent of the American military was deployed to Vietnam during the course of the war.
D) The greatest antiwar protests in the national capital came during the first three years of American ground troops being sent to Vietnam.