I recently read Noam Chomsky's On Power and Ideology, and he references this moment several times throughout the work. He states:
By April 1965, when the U.S. invaded South Vietnam outright, deaths there probably amounted to close to 200,000. While it was the bombing of North Vietnam that attracted international attention, the main U.S. attack, including bombing, was always directed against South Vietnam. Once again, U.S. hegemony in the international system is reflected by the fact that there is no such event in recorded history as the U.S. attack against South Vietnam (rather sanitized history records only a U.S. “defense” of South Vietnam, which was unwise, the official doves later maintained), and the attack was never recognized as such nor condemned by the United Nations.
Consistent with Chomsky's statement, there is no reference to such an event in this timeline. I'm curious if anyone here knows more about this bombing campaign or where I might be able to find some more information on it.
Thanks!
The United States did not invade the Republic of Vietnam. As a vocal anti-war activist, Chomsky may have viewed the military intervention as an act of war and imperialism, but to call it an "invasion" is a very biased conclusion.
He says "there is no such event in recorded history as the U.S. attack against South Vietnam," which is true, because the United States and South Vietnam had signed onto a series of mutual defense agreements which permitted the presence and action of US forces in the country. They at no point were attacking the political entity that was South Vietnam. Chomsky appears to be conflating the National Liberation Front with the South Vietnamese as a whole, ignoring the RVN government.
To directly address his claim of an April 1965 bombing campaign, he may be referring to the initiation of US air combat sorties against communist targets in South Vietnam, but those, at this early point in the war, were generally called in by US advisors embedded with ARVN units. The statement "U.S. hegemony in the international system" blatantly ignores any political self-agency that the South Vietnamese may have had in determining the legality of US actions on their soil.
It's tricky to estimate the war dead at such an early point in the war, as Chomsky could be including any number, either casualties inflicted by the Americans by 1965, casualties inflicted by the South Vietnamese on the NLF by 1965, both, or vice-versa. While the majority of sources counting war dead do not separate by year, Rummel (himself a biased, yet comprehensive source) has a better breakdown by year.
Overall, that paragraph demonstrates a wildly inaccurate and incredibly biased representation of the Vietnam War from an anti-war activist's point of view and should be taken as an opinion, based on inaccurate interpretations of the facts.
