Guerilla warfare in two civil wars

Last updated Dec 16, 2022 Edit Source

• Guerilla warfare:
  • unconventional
  • small groups conducting ambushes, sabotage, etc to fight a larger enemy
• Vietcong of Vietnam Civil War against Diem’s ARVN and the US
  • more than 2M US vs 200K Vietcong
• Castro’s force in Cuban Revolution against Batista
• Both used Guerilla warfare, which was succesful in some previous wars ex: Chinise Civil War
• Vietnam was supported by China/Soviet, Cuba conencted to soviet later
• They were similar, but the significance of Vietnam was higher.

• P2 - Successful tactics
  • Their tacitics and the use of guerilla warfare was effective
  • Vietcong
    • Punji traps
      • Easily built, effective to damage soilders physically and mentally so significant
    • Networks of tunnel in jungle
      • Enabled vietcong to conduct surprise attacks
      • Soilders lived there to hide from US and bombing
      • Americans couldn’t counter, throwing grenades wasn’t effective due to the structure
        • so significant on the successful guerilla
    • Communication with peasants
      • As Mao (previous success) stated “Political objective needed for guerilla success”, they strictly decided their pro-peasant goal which led to the support of civilians
      • peasants gave shelters, foods, etc for survival
  • Castro
    • Sabotaged industry, such as sugar cane fields
      • Effective, because main source of government’s income
      • furthermore, revolution was because of anti-American bussiness, so effective both strategically and mentally
    • Propaganda: big thing for Castro
      • “History will absolve me” speech and interviews to appeal
      • Became figure of a liberalation
      • Led to resource support from civilians, on Guevara’s fight at the city area
        • Important front of the war, so signiciant
• P3 - Effective Situation
  • Both were in situation where Guerilla warfare becomes effective
    • Both were able to gain support from citizens
      • Unpopular Diem and US Force
        • US widely known as US puppet
        • Opresed population using secret polices and amry forces, mainly communsits
        • Catholic policy, Buddhists burned themselves as protest
        • Even VPOTUS Johnson evaluated his governing policy negatively on his visit
        • Later phase, US damage on civilians by The Operation Rolling Thunder bombing, Agent Orange, Napalm, etc led to further anti-US
        • Led to support of citizens to Vietcong, which was needed for guerilla
          • significant
      • Unpopular Batista
        • Batista used brutal forces to keep Cuba under control
        • Able to present as fighters for liberalization rather than terrorists
        • This led to corporative attitute of some citizens, but wasn’t significant since the fight was short
• However
  • Vietnam
    • US Anti-war movment
      • television development
      • horrific scenes of villages burned, wars, etc affected
      • Anti-war musicians, including John Lennon contributed
    • Political Inability of US
      • weak political leadership
      • Johnson, who decided to enter the war by Tonking Gulf Incident in 1964
        • Aim containment and Domino Theory
      • Johnson viewed Vietcong as unpopular communist forces that could be easily defeated
      • Wrong policy of US not caring civilians (Rolling Thunder bombing etc), led to the outcome
      • However, as historian Tabor says, they had to do so because of guerilla, or lose
        • therefore this was also part of guerilla significance
  • Cuba
    • Cuban Weakness
      • Fight itself ended in 1 year (1958-59), much shorter than Vietnam war
      • Shows the inherent weakness of Batista government
        • unpopularity in the nation, even uS had to cut aid to Batisa in late 1950s
    • Historian Cushion highlights the effect of labor activists and political groups that also fought, independently from Guerilla

• Cuban PhD Paper on Classroom might be good Source
  • Chapter 3 and 5

• Dont need to focus “unsuccessful tactics”, because those did not affect the outcome
  • if we have “evaluate effectiveness” question, should we state unsuccessful tactics?
• PhD Paper on Classroom might be good Source
  • Chapter 3
• Other source URL on slides as well
  • https://www.pbs.org/battlefieldvietnam/guerrilla/index.html
• Also, essay on CLassroom well conpares Vietnam and Cuba
  • Should read it, before writing comparision essay!
  • 「compare and contrast」の正解が書かれているので、書き方を知るために読むべき
• https://classroom.google.com/u/1/c/MzEwNTg1MTE0ODMz