ABSTRACT
When it became apparent that pacification efforts were yielding little in terms of permanent territorial control, the United States began employing an overwhelming amount of firepower in an attempt to prevent the communists from utilizing the land and the people of South Vietnam. As the struggle in South Vietnam became an escalating military stalemate, the rippling antiwar movement in the United States swelled into a tidal wave that threatened to swamp the Lyndon B. Johnson administration. His public relations campaign was primarily designed to provide a justification for a major American military escalation. President Johnson and his principal foreign-policy advisers decided to only wage a limited war in Southeast Asia. Although his military advisers often urged bold moves, the president would not approve either an American invasion of North Vietnam or an unrestricted bombing campaign against Hanoi and the rest of the Red River basin.
