Resurrecting the Domino Theory

Viet Nam is still with us.  By almost all accounts, Ken Burns’ documentary on the war is a masterpiece.  Burns tells us, and it seems to be true, that he sought to be even-handed.  Despite his long-term liberal leanings, he plainly intended to honor the troops who fought in this tarnished conflict.

Nevertheless, he—and almost all Americans—accept as valid that our intervention in Viet Nam was a mistake.  So often has this mantra been repeated in the media and our schools that it seems incontrovertible.  Not only were we forced to abandon the field, but in sacrificing thousands of lives we accomplished nothing.

As evidence for this thesis, Burns points to our growing rapprochement with the current communist government.  Why, he wonders, couldn’t we have stood by and done nothing, but obtained the same result without bloodshed?

It is, for instance, taken for granted that the domino theory was wrong.  Those who defended our intervention on the grounds that without it all of Southeast Asia would have fallen to communist China are dismissed as misguided.  After all, Thailand, Burma, and Indonesia did not tumble like dominoes.

The problem with this observation is that it is counter-factual.  We will never know what would have occurred had we remained neutral.  Even so, there is reason to believe that whatever our blunders, we deterred Maoist aggression.

As is sometimes noted, there was no love lost between Ho Chi Minh and Mao.  What this leaves out is that at the outset of the conflict the North Vietnamese did not have the resources to resist their immense neighbor.  A bare decade before, millions of Chinese troops had poured into Korea.  Why not Viet Nam?

In her book Mao: The Unknown Story, Jung Chang describes Mao’s megalomaniacal ambitions.  He meant to overrun Southeast Asia as a prelude to world domination.  Turning China into one vast concentration camp was not enough for him.  He hoped to do this everywhere.

In Korea, we blocked Stalin’s political aspirations.  In fighting back, we sent the message that there were limits to what we would accept.  In Viet Nam, we did the same with Mao.  We signaled that the price he would have to pay was too great for the means he had at hand.

And so the Vietnamese conflict was reduced to a stalemate.  We did not invade the North because we did not want to provoke China into doing something rash.  We did not even interdict the Ho Chi Minh trail for fear that this would escalate the combat.

No doubt grave errors were made.  President Johnson’s micro-management of the bombing campaign was misbegotten.  Meanwhile, General Westmoreland was an inept tactician.  While his hands were tied by strategic considerations, he covered himself with little glory.

This said, and the dithering of the planners acknowledged, the consequence was to stop China.  Thailand and Indonesia did not fall.  They did not become dominoes. 

The lesson for the present is that standing back and allowing North Korea’s Kim Jung-Un free rein could precipitate another domino effect.  If we consider ourselves a helpless giant, we will soon be lashed to the ground more firmly than Gulliver in Lilliput.  What is more, our captors will show less mercy.

If tiny North Korea gets away with intimidating us, so can anyone.  A nuclear-armed Iran would surely be first in line.  It would soon become master of the Middle East and the bane of Israel.  European oil supplies would likewise be held hostage and nuclear warfare could become a reality.

Russia too would be emboldened.  Forget about the Ukraine maintaining its sovereignty.  As for Poland and the Baltic states, they would be hard pressed to safeguard their independence.  Putin is not a cuddly communist bear.  Throw raw meat at his feet and he will gobble it up.

Nor has China turned into a pussycat.  Those who rule this immense domain are not as blood thirsty as Mao, but they too are ambitious.  They also assume that the Middle Kingdom deserves to dominate its sphere of influence.

The game of dominoes has not changed.  Although the pieces have, the inexorableness of a chain reaction has not.  That is, unless we in the United States have the courage, and the intelligence, to effectively intervene.

Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.

Professor of Sociology

Kennesaw State University