Sen. John McCain diagnosed with brain cancer

[Bengalzona]

The biggest reason why our involvement in Vietnam didn't work was because we were trying to prop up a regime that was so flawed and corrupt that it was universally rejected by its own people.

The South Vietnamese didn't necessarily want to be communist. But the alternative that we supported was the Diem Regime filled with nepotism and corruption and that represented only a tiny religious minority in the country: Catholicism. Diem's position became totally untenable in the early 60's when they began instituting policies that were oppressive to the country's Buddhist majority. Basically, South Vietnam spiraled into a civil war and the North Vietnamese decided to take advantage. We created an 'incident' to justify getting involved and sent troops over to "stop the spread of communism" by supporting the South Vietnamese government. But by that time, the South Vietnamese people had totally lost any faith in their government and the government went through a series of military led coups.

This was never going to turn out the way we wanted it to.