the tet offensive of 1968 was a turning point in the Vietnam war

introduction

defiantly a turning point regarding the political changes in America that occurred after especially with jhonsons decision not to run for re-election. also there was a military turning point with the communist war effort as they suffered so badly 60,000, however it is questionable whether tet was a turning point for the americans overall despite having a psychological impact the general support for the war didn't change and the us remained in south Vietnam for another 5 years

us psychologically

despite the shock of the offensive the public opinion had changed very little between 67 and the autumn of 1969 - anti war protest were happening 4 years before tet and some argue that the media had little impact on turning public opinion as it only reflected public opinions and that more often that not causalities did

psychological

images of the us embassy being attacked shook the nation as they realized that nothing was safe over there - we had destroy the town to save it, the administration claimed they were winning the war but tv pictures suggested otherwise, there was various images of the vc being shot dead on camera"we had to destroy the town to save it" it destroyed American conviction that their boys were the good guys - it also underpinned the medias apparent shift in coverage of the war as they had lost Cronkite

communists militarily

never again was an offensive of this scale committed in the rest of the warand 40,000 of vc and pavn best fighters were killed - took Hanoi another 4 year to produce another attack and they didn't achieve their objectives as the people of south Vietnam didn't rise on mass hence discrediting their claim to be a liberation force they also overturned the communist diversionary tactic by winning the battle of khe sahn - the kill ratio was massive 4000 to 40,000

us military

us won militarily - the reaction of politicians and media made into a bigger turning point than it needed to be - took them just to get over the shock of the attack and killed the majority of sv forces 40,000 it took them only 3 weeks to defeat them

us political it was a turning point

Johnson was as shocked as the nation at the tet offensive and it showed that anything could have happened in that country johnsons approval ratings 70/49/36 in just four years , congress and Johnson refused to send extra 200,000 troops at westmorelands request - America had to withdraw according to clark Clifford Johnson announced that he wouldn't be running re-election of the presidency, the wise men saw this as a opportunity to suggest the policy of vietnamisation clark Clifford became completely anti communist after this - tet encouraged anti war presidential candidates to appose Johnson

it wasn't a turning point

politically - despite johnsons announcement of not standing for re-election politically things had changed little because of tet there was not abandonment of strategy and the war continued for another 5 years Nixon intensified the war by bombing Cambodia and laos, arguably things were happening before the offensive McNamara had resigned congress was already starting to argue that being in south east asia wasn't imperitive to the cold war - economically people were more worried by the impact of the war through rising taxation and inflation in 1965 government deficit was $1.6 billion and by 68 $25.3 billion cause rise in inflation and endangered Americas economic wellbeing