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Originally Posted by TSGracchus
Wiki has a decent article in Vietnam War deaths in general, Vietnamese and American.
Vietnam War casualties - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The important figure is for total war dead, but I'll isolate bombing dead in a moment.
And for Operation Rolling Thunder in the north:
The Pentagon estimates 15,000 civilians killed, and a total of 171,500 killed in the "Cease-Fire War" that resulted in the final victory of Hanoi. I've found estimates of 65,000 Vietnamese executed for political reasons after the war, I'm not sure how accurate those are. I cannot find a good toll of accidental deaths of "boat people," nor of deaths in reeducation camps (that the death toll in those camps was not high, is generally agreed, and all of the prisoners were released in 1978, so that they spent a maximum of 3 years). The term "the killing fields" refers to Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, not to Vietnam; the Khmer Rouge were so awful that Vietnam actually invaded the country in 1978 to topple them.
Including the civilian war casualties and the executions, and fudging upward a bit for those unaccounted for, I think an estimated 100,000 civilian deaths would not be unreasonable, almost all of them in the first few years after the war ended. |
You didnt answer the question. This is what you said:
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A lot more civilian Vietnamese were killed by U.S. soldiers and bombers during the years of the war than were killed afterwards by the Vietnamese government.
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According to your numbers, as many as 100,000 civilian vietnamese were killed by the US military. As you stated and the various sources show, after the war 65,000 were shot out of hand, as many as 250,000 died in reducation camps, thousands died fleeing, and though you tried to duck it, Cambodia is directly related. North Vietnam and the Khemer Rouge worked together during th war to attempt to control both countries. When the US left, the Khemer Rouge was unable to be stopped and democracy changed to communism, and millions were murdered. Now, militarily, we had won in vietnam. This means that most likely had we reinforced our position instead of retreating, the civilians deaths would have dropped precipiticely. This is where Iraq might draw a stunning parrallel. Only a year ago, we faced the same issue. Iraq nearing a civil war, politicians pressing the US to retreat. Instead of walking, we surged forward and decimated the enemy.
Point being, I would check your facts before making assumptions. Its obvious many times more civilians died as a result of the US leaving vietnam, not to mention the quality of life for those who survived, and the effect it had on the surrounding countries, plus the waste of american lives.