By: Rishaan Chowdhury
Two years ago, Russia began an unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Despite years of support for separatists in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, Russia’s full fledged attack stunned the world, as it was the first time that a war of this size had been seen on European soil since WWII. Russian forces, who were significantly better equipped and purportedly better trained, were expected to win within weeks. In the opening days of the war the world watched in horror as Russian forces raced towards Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv. However, in one of the most shocking defeats of modern military history, the underequipped, battered Ukrainian forces rallied and repelled the Russians from Kyiv, pushing them back towards the Russian border before the frontlines started to stabilize, leaving Russia in a war that it can’t get out of.
In August of 1964, after over a decade of support for the South Vietnamese regime in their fight against communist guerillas backed by their northern neighbors; American warships were attacked by North Vietnamese torpedo boats in contested international waters. This incident, and further attacks on US military installations six months later led the United States to initiate airstrikes against North Vietnam. Shortly after, the United States sent ground troops into Vietnam. While they were intended to be there for defensive purposes, military leaders advocated for a more aggressive approach. This led the United States to send more soldiers – with public backing – and within a year the number of Americans in Vietnam had climbed from 3500 to 200,000. However the small victories at the beginning quickly became massive losses covered up by leaders in Washington. All of this began the deadliest war for Americans since WWII.
Fast forward sixty years, the Ukraine war has become quite a similar situation. It is a proxy war between the two world powers, where one side is actually fighting. Similar to the Vietnam war, for decades a proxy for a world power was fighting for the cause backed by that power before finally drawing the power into the conflict. America had supported anti-communist South Vietnam for years, despite how corrupt or undemocratic it was, before finally being drawn into the conflict themselves. Likewise Russia has supported the separatists in the Donbas region of Ukraine for years, before now attacking Ukraine themselves. As in Vietnam, one side is being supported by a major power through financial and technological aid while the other side is one of the major powers. In Vietnam this looked like American forces against communist Vietnamese guerillas fighting with Soviet backing. In Ukraine, it's almost identical, with one of the only differences being the war is in Ukraine, not south Asia, and that instead of guerillas, there is a legitimate democratic country on the other side. But both wars led major global powers to get entrenched in fights that they could not get out of, and should have won. Russian forces are stuck in the mud in Ukraine, battling a military that is theoretically eons inferior to them. Likewise in Vietnam, American forces should have on paper quickly overwhelmed the underequipped, less trained communist guerillas. Russia is making the same mistakes Western leaders made in the 1960’s; after getting embroiled in a gridlocked conflict, the solutions that they are seeking to solve their impasse are basically the same. Both the US and Russia tried to solve their gridlock problems by sending more men and more firepower into the problem, making a bad situation worse. These meat grinder tactics led to the deaths of countless young men in Vietnam who died fighting for a defeated cause. In Ukraine it seems that we are watching Russia do the same thing; as casualties mount, Russian President Vladimir Putin has replaced dying troops with drafted conscripts, most of whom are poorly trained and die quickly, only to be replaced by another draftee.
That being said, the Vietnam war is still not a one for one match with Ukraine. Standard to the United States and all the wars that it pulls its allies into, politics in Washington led the country to give half-hearted support to its soldiers at the critical stages of the fight, making the war theirs to lose. Russia can’t relate. One of the benefits of being an autocratic country in a war is that its fight is not plagued by elections and politics. The closest resemblance to political opposition to the Ukraine war in Russia was the attempted “coup” by mercenary group Wagner’s leader in June of last year that quickly ended with a negotiated settlement. In addition to that, the reasoning behind the fight is quite different. Vietnam was — theoretically at least — an ideological clash, a fight between democracy and communism. Ukraine is a war between democracy and autocracy, Russian autocracy being far worse than the communism of North Vietnam. Russian imperialism is the only reasoning behind the war. Propaganda from the Kremlin helped legitimize the war in the eyes of everyday Russians making them feel threatened by Ukraine and NATO. Operations like Ukraine’s attack on the Russian territory of Kursk solidified their beliefs even more. These information bubbles prevent them from seeing the true brutality of the war. The American government did suppress information about Vietnam for years, especially when it came to the extent of American losses. However, after the North Vietnamese Tet offensive – which was a tactical victory for the US but a political and strategic victory for North Vietnam and the Viet Cong – American public support dropped dramatically. As conscription and casualties climbed dramatically following the Tet offensive, the revelation that the narrative of imminent victory – which had been spewed by the Johnson administration for years – was untrue, sparked mass protests and public dissent.
Interestingly, Ukraine’s “Tet Offensive” seems to be lacking the similar effect on Russia. Their invasion of Kursk has not sparked mass dissent against the war. The Kursk incursion initially was thought to finally reveal to the Russian public the extent of the disaster that the war has brought upon Russia, but whether that effect will actually be seen remains unknown.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has many similarities to the Vietnam war. Both are conflicts that major world powers have seemingly gotten stuck in, with no way of exit. In both situations the foreign attackers have resorted to meat grinder tactics, causing the deaths of countless young men and entrenching their respective countries even further. However in Vietnam, the United States began to lose relatively quickly, Russia doesn’t seem to be a victim of a similar fate. Whether Ukraine will be as lucky as the Viet Cong in repelling a devastatingly strong enemy is yet to be seen, but if history is to tell, Russia will lose the war on its own.