My Lai Massacre Research Paper

631 Words3 Pages
Joseph Scarimbolo HIST 2112 Wed/Fri 11am Vietnam Writing 11/07/2014 (1) The official version of the My Lai assault differed greatly from soldier’s testimonies as opposed to the official view of the assault. The objective of the American military was clear, it was to search and destroy My Lai. What wasn’t clear was what to do with any civilians who we might encounter there. On March 16, 1968, Charlie Company, was ordered into combat by Captain Ernest Medina. The 150 soldiers, led by Lt. William Calley, went into the town, and four hours later more than 500 civilians, many of them unarmed women, children, and old men died. Charlie Company had not encountered a single enemy. People were rounded up into ditches and gunned down. Only weeks earlier, the Americans were ambushed by the Vietcong there and killed 80 of them. Given this, there was reasonable assumption that if the Americans were to go back there, that there would be more resistance. The difference in views was because there was much confusion on the part of the American military. The Vietcong were able to blend into the community. The Vietcong figured if the American military wanted them then they would have to kill everyone in the village…show more content…
It was very brutal. New tactics were used by U.S. troops to fight in Vietnam. The jungle provided cover for the Vietcong. To neutralize this, American planes dropped napalm. . The use of these weapons often wounded civilians and left villages and their surroundings in wrecks. Another military tactic was the search and destroy mission. In these missions, soldiers would take civilians with suspected ties to the Vietcong, destroy their livestock and burn their villages. I do think that this was not an isolated incident. This was indicative of larger problem with the war. The American government had to get the Vietcong at any costs, even if came with lots of civilian

More about My Lai Massacre Research Paper

Open Document