In the 1950's, the United States started sending troops to Vietnam, over the next 25-years, the war created some of the strongest tensions in US history. Almost 3 million US men and women were sent thousands of miles to fight for what was a questionable and not defined cause. It is estimated that over 2,5 million people on both sides were killed.

Between 1955 and 1960, the North Vietnamese with help from the southern communist Vietcong, tried to take over the government in South Vietnam. In November 1963 President Diem was executed. Shortly after the execution the North Vietnamese began a campagne to rule the whole country, China and Russia helped.

The United States grew nervous over the progress of Ho Chi Minh and the Vietcong and a possible communist takeover. Communism had become a problem to the United States and the Soviet rule spreading into Eastern Europe, Korea and Cuba, the Americans wanted to stop communism from spreading any further.