Slippery Slope of Communism
            
             The overarching reason that America became embroiled in the
             communist/nationalist conflict in Vietnam in the late 1950s was the attempt
             to halt the domino effect of communism in the region. The domino effect was
             first can be defined as a cumulative effect produced when one event sets
             off a chain of similar events. In this case, the U.S. had a policy of
             containment when it came to dealing with the communist U.S.S.R. and the
             Peoples Republic of China. The theory went that if the U.S. allowed a
             currently non-communist country fall into communist rule, then this would
             increase the likelihood that a neighboring country would then be subject to
             falling under communist rule as well. Thus, one domino topples into
             another and so on. By pursuing a policy of actively thwarting attempts at
             communist rule wherever it could, the U.S. government felt it could stem
             the tide of communism and by proxy, the influence of the U.S.S.R. and
             China.
             U.S. global planning has always been sophisticated and careful, as one
             would expect from a major superpower with a highly centralized and class
             conscious dominant social group. Their power, in turn, is rooted in their
             ownership and management of the economy, as is the norm in most societies.
             During World War II, American planners were well aware that the United
             States was going to emerge as a world-dominant power, in a position of
             hegemony that had few historical parallels, and they organized and met in
             order to deal with this situation. Planning for after the war involved
             dividing the world up into regional sections, and approaching each region
             differently but with the ultimate purpose of benefiting U.S.A. aims and
             policies in some way.
             Early participation against the communist led insurgency into what was then
             called South Vietnam consisted of the Eisenhower administration sending in
             military advisors and C.I.A. operatives to help train and bolster t...