who decided to use agent orange in vietnam
Agent Orange In mid-1961, President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam asked the United States to conduct aerial herbicide spraying in his country.[18] In August of that year, the Republic of Vietnam Air Force conducted herbicide operations with American help. But Diem's request launched a policy debate in the White House and the State and Defense Departments. However, U.S. officials considered using it, pointing out that the British had already used herbicides and defoliants during the Malayan Emergency in the 1950s. In November 1961, President John F. Kennedy authorized the start of Operation Ranch Hand, the codename for the U.S. Air Force's herbicide program in Vietnam.
Vietnam War Kennedy advisors Maxwell Taylor and Walt Rostow recommended that U.S. troops be sent to South Vietnam disguised as flood relief workers.[132] Kennedy rejected the idea but increased military assistance yet again. In April 1962, John Kenneth Galbraith warned Kennedy of the "danger we shall replace the French as a colonial force in the area and bleed as the French did."[133] By November 1963, there were 16,000 American military personnel in South Vietnam, up from Eisenhower's 900 advisors.[134]
Vietnam War There are several competing views on the conflict, with some on the North Vietnamese and National Liberation Front side viewing the struggle against US forces as a colonial war and a continuation of the First Indochina War against forces from France and later on the United States[79] especially the light of the failed Geneva Conference calls for elections. Other interpretations of the North Vietnamese side include viewing it as a civil war especially in the early and later phases following the U.S interlude between 1965 and 1970[80] as well as a war of liberation.[79] The perspective of some Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam, the successor to the Viet Cong were motivated in part by significant social changes in the post-WW2 Vietnam, and had initially saw it as a revolutionary war supported by Hanoi[81][82] The pro-government side in South Vietnam viewed it as a civil war, a defensive war against communism[80][83] or were motivated to fight to defend their homes and families.[84] The U.S. government viewed its involvement in the war as a way to prevent a communist takeover of South Vietnam. This was part of the domino theory of a wider containment policy, with the stated aim of stopping the spread of communism.[85]
Billy Brown (actor) Voices for the Marines commercials.[8]