Vietnam and the Gulf War : Lessons Learned in the Utilization of Assets

This Thesis, Vietnam and the Gulf War: Lessons Learned in the Utilization of Assets, was prepared during Advanced Topics in National Security Law: Legal and Policy Issues of the Indo-China War, Fall 1997. The paper examined the use of non-hardware assets by the United States military during the last two major wars - Vietnam and the Gulf War. I examined how certain non- hardware assets were utilized during Vietnam. These assets included the will and support of the American people, the American and world media, the American military leadership, the American military reserve forces, and the indigenous peoples of Southeast Asia. The paper takes a critical look at the effectiveness of such utilization; examining both the positive and negative aspects in all categories. Alternative proposals for the failed uses are then proposed for the Vietnam War. Finally, the paper looks to how America learned from our experiences in Vietnam and successfully used the same assets in the Gulf War. The conclusion shows that a major reason for the success of the Coalition forces in the Gulf War was the fact that the lessons from Vietnam were not only learned, they were applied.Air Force Inst of Tech Wright-Patterson AFB OH is the author of 'Vietnam and the Gulf War : Lessons Learned in the Utilization of Assets', published 1998 under ISBN 9781423559153 and ISBN 1423559150.