ABSTRACT

At the conclusion of the Gulf War in 1991, a jubilant President George H. W. Bush declared, ‘By God, we’ve kicked the Vietnam syndrome once and for all’.2 Bush’s optimism that the United States had fi nally left behind the legacy of defeat in the Vietnam War was misplaced. Some fi fteen years later the ‘Vietnam analogy’ is still being used in popular and elite discourse in an attempt to understand, explain and critique the US intervention in Iraq. As the military and political situation in Iraq worsens, critics of the Bush administration’s policy assert that the United States is becoming ‘bogged down’ in an increasingly complex, unending occupation that is developing into a ‘Vietnam-style quagmire’. Those who support the US war effort, however, claim that Iraq is nothing like Vietnam and that the analogy is misplaced. This chapter argues that Vietnam is generally not an appropriate analogy to interpret the course of events in Iraq due to differences in the international context of the two confl icts; the objectives and tactics of the United States; the strength of nationalism; and the nature of the insurgency. The analogy cannot be dismissed entirely, however, as it does provide a guide to understanding the sustainability of US public support; the confl ict’s impact on US credibility; the likely nature of a US withdrawal; and the long-term effects of the war on US foreign policy.