" Morse makes the compelling argument that the President has no Constitutional power to act in this fashion and should not be granted a resolution to that effect, which effectively sidesteps the Constitution and its checks and balances system. Interestingly, supporters of the resolution seemed unfazed by this realization. Senator Cooper's back-and-forth with Senators Russell and Fulbright demonstrates this. He continued to probe the nature of the powers the resolution would grant, ultimately articulating that it amounted to approving of the President's current actions and supporting any future ones the President determines to be necessary. Senator Cooper asked, "Then, looking ahead, if the President decided that it was necessary to use such force as could lead into war, we will give him that authority by this resolution?" The supporters agree that this is the case, upon which Cooper points out it is important...
The ideological fear of communism, as well as the presumably unprovoked attacks on U.S. military forces, facilitated a political climate that undermined the Constitution and concentrated undue power within the hands of the President, all with the shaky promise that Congress could revoke the Resolution at a later date should it wish.Tonkin Resolution Turning Point: The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution of 1964 The Vietnam War was one of the saddest conflicts in United States history. Just before the developments that led to this conflict, the Korean War had been unsuccessfully concluded, at least in the minds many, because the two major players in the battle were not willing to engage the other (China and the U.S.). Vietnam was another "line on the sand"
Johnson now had the justification he had been waiting for and disregarded Captain Herrick's second communication. He structured the bombing of four North Vietnamese torpedo boat bases and an oil storage warehouse that had been considered three months beforehand (Gulf of Tonkin, n.d.). President Johnson then went on television and told the American people that recurring actions of aggression against the military of the United States must be met not
Tonkin Gulf Crisis The Debate over the Tonkin Gulf Crisis The Tonkin Gulf Crisis 1964 ranks with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the assassination of President John F. Kennedy as events that David Kaiser of the U.S. Naval War College refers to as "controversies in American political history that dwarf all others (Ford, 1997)." There is evidence that President Lyndon Johnson deliberately lied about the incidents leading to the Vietnam War
Vietnam and 20th Century History Turning Point in the History of the Vietnam War American indirect involvement in the Vietnam affairs began under the Administration of Harry Truman. Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy took a more direct role, politically and economically supporting the provisional South Vietnamese regime and sending American Special Forces as well as CIA agents to Vietnam. It was Lyndon Johnson who turned American involvement into a full-scale war. To understand
USS Maddox On August 2, 1964, North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked the U.S.S. Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin. A few days later, another American ship, the U.S.S. Turner Joy, was also attacked. The Tonkin Gulf Resolution was passed in response to the aggression, authorizing the President to take "all necessary steps, including the use of armed force," to protect American interests ("Gulf of Tonkin Incident," n.d.). The attack marked a
Vietnam War How was the war similar or different to previous U.S. attempts at "containment"? What were the key mistakes the U.S. made, in your view? What where the key turning points of U.S. involvement? Why did the U.S. lose the war? How was the war similar or different to previous U.S. attempts at "containment"? The policy or strategy if the U.S. of 'containment' originated during the formative years of te cold war and it aimed
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