Survey of World History Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words - 1

Survey of World History - Essay Example In this paper, we are going to take into consideration, the different cultural encounters that took place in various regions of the world from the 1800’s up to today. This paper would examine the chief wars that took place, the de- colonization of Africa, the Cold War and Japan’s opening to the outside world. One of the main wars that occurred due to military conflict was the â€Å"Vietnam War† which took place between Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia from 1959, (Bernard Fall, 1958) which came to an end only in 1975. The origins of the Vietnam War took place between the 1940’s and 1950’s with nationalists groups like the Ho Chi Minh’s ‘Viet Minh’ fighting against colonial rule. This war took place between the communists and the allies of North Vietnam against the South Vietnam government which was supported by the United States and other member nations of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) (American Experience, 1983) (Encyclopedia Britannica) the chief conflict that led to the war was North Vietnam’s desire to unify the whole country and bring it under the Communist regime. On the other hand, the government of South Vietnam battled to preserve Vietnam on the lines of the West. In the 1950’s a good number of military advisers introduced combat units that were trained and stationed in Vietnam. The Vietnam War was one of the worst wars in history destroying both life and property and raising the toll of casualties to about 2 million civilians, 1.1 million from north Vietnam, about 200,000 from the U.S. military forces and from south Vietnam the death toll was about 250,000 soldiers. Though Vietnam had emerged a recognized military power when the war ended, yet the scars of the war had not left them because their business, industries and agriculture suffered a great deal due to the countryside been destroyed by land mines, bombs and heavy defoliation. The cultural face of Vietnam was defaced by this tragic war. The aftermath of the