Asked at a news conference if U.S. troops are fighting in Vietnam, President Kennedy answers “No.” He was technically correct, but U.S. soldiers were serving as combat advisers with the South Vietnamese army, and U.S. pilots were flying missions with the South Vietnamese Air Force. While acting in this advisory capacity, some soldiers invariably got wounded, and press correspondents based in Saigon were beginning to see casualties from the “support” missions and ask questions.
This Day in HIstory
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Vietnam War
1962Kennedy says U.S. troops are not fighting
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Article Details:
Kennedy says U.S. troops are not fighting
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Author
History.com Staff
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Website Name
History.com
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Year Published
2009
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Title
Kennedy says U.S. troops are not fighting
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URL
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/kennedy-says-u-s-troops-are-not-fighting
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Access Date
February 20, 2019
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Publisher
A+E Networks
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Also on this day
Lead Story
1967
On this day in 1967, at the Los Angeles Coliseum, the Green Bay Packers beat the Kansas City Chiefs in the first-ever world championship game of American football. In the mid-1960s, the intense competition for players and fans between the National Football League (NFL) and the upstart American Football League (AFL)...
American Revolution
1777
Having recognized the need for their territory to assert its independence from both Britain and New York and remove themselves from the war they were waging against each other, a convention of future Vermonters assembles in Westminster and declares independence from the crown of Great Britain and the colony of...
Automotive
1936
On January 15, 1936, Edsel Ford, the son of auto industry pioneer Henry Ford, forms a philanthropic organization called the Ford Foundation with a donation of $25,000. The foundation, which was established in part as a legal way for the Ford family to avoid the hefty inheritance taxes that President...
Civil War
1865
On this day in 1865, Fort Fisher in North Carolina falls to Union forces, and Wilmington, North Carolina, the Confederacy’s most important blockade-running port, is closed. When President Abraham Lincoln declared a blockade of Southern ports in 1861, Rebel engineers began construction on a fortress at the mouth of New Inlet,...
Cold War
1953
Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee prior to taking office as the new secretary of state, John Foster Dulles argues that U.S. foreign policy must strive for the “liberation of captive peoples” living under communist rule. Though Dulles called for a more vigorous anticommunist policy, he remained vague about exactly...
Crime
1981
On this day in 1981, Hill Street Blues, television’s landmark cops-and-robbers drama, debuts on NBC. When the series first appeared, the police show had largely been given up for dead. Critics savaged stodgy and moralistic melodramas,and scoffed at lighter fare like Starsky and Hutch. Created by Steven Bochco and Michael...
Disaster
1919
Fiery hot molasses floods the streets of Boston on this day in 1919, killing 21 people and injuring scores of others. The molasses burst from a huge tank at the United States Industrial Alcohol Company building in the heart of the city. The United States Industrial Alcohol building was located on...
General Interest
1559
Two months after the death of her half-sister, Queen Mary I of England, Elizabeth Tudor, the 25-year-old daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, is crowned Queen Elizabeth I at Westminster Abbey in London. The two half-sisters, both daughters of Henry VIII, had a stormy relationship during Mary’s five-year reign. Mary,...
1870
On January 14, 1870, the first recorded use of a donkey to represent the Democratic Party appears in Harper’s Weekly. Drawn by political illustrator Thomas Nast, the cartoon is entitled “A Live Jackass Kicking a Dead Lion.” The jackass (donkey) is tagged “Copperhead Papers,” referring to the Democrat-dominated newspapers of...
1929
On January 15, 1929, Martin Luther King Jr. is born in Atlanta, Georgia, the son of a Baptist minister. King received a doctorate degree in theology and in 1955 helped organized the first major protest of the African-American civil rights movement: the successful Montgomery Bus Boycott. Influenced by Mohandas Gandhi,...
1970
The Republic of Biafra, a breakaway state of eastern Nigeria, surrenders to Nigeria after three years of costly fighting.In 1960, Nigeria gained independence from Britain. Six years later, the Muslim Hausas in northern Nigeria began massacring the Christian Igbos in the region, prompting tens of thousands of Igbos to flee...
1970
Muammar al-Qaddafi, the young Libyan army captain who deposed King Idris in September 1969, is proclaimed premier of Libya by the so-called General People’s Congress. Born in a tent in the Libyan desert, Qaddafi was the son of a Bedouin farmer. He attended university and the Libyan military academy and steadily...
2009
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Hollywood
1993
“The worst program on television–maybe ever…” one reviewer dubbed NBC’s daytime soap opera Santa Barbara upon its debut in July 1984. Critics soon changed their tune about the show, however, and it would run for more than eight years, garnering numerous Daytime Emmy Awards, including the statuette for Best Drama...
Literary
1831
On this day in 1831, Victor Hugo finishes writing Notre Dame de Paris, also known as The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Distracted by other projects, Hugo had continually postponed his deadlines for delivering the book to his publishers, but once he sat down to write it, he completed the novel...
Music
1972
On January 15, 1972, “American Pie,”, an epic poem in musical form that has long been etched in the American popular consciousness, hits #1 on the Billboard charts. The story of Don McLean’s magnum opus begins almost 13 years before its release, on a date with significance well-known to any American...
Old West
1933
After nearly a century of cooperative living, the utopian Amana colonists of Iowa begin using U.S. currency for the first time. The wide-open spaces of the West have always appealed to visionary reformers attempting to start new societies. Among others, the Mormons in Utah, the Hutterites in South Dakota and...
Presidential
1973
President Richard M. Nixon suspends military action in North Vietnam on this day in 1973, giving peace talks between his secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, and North Vietnamese leader Le Duc Tho a chance to succeed. When Nixon inherited the war from President Lyndon Johnson with his election to the...
Sports
1967
On January 15, 1967, the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (NFL) smash the American Football League (AFL)’s Kansas City Chiefs, 35-10, in the first-ever AFL-NFL World Championship, later known as Super Bowl I, at Memorial Coliseum in Los Angeles. Founded in 1960 as a rival to the NFL,...
Vietnam War
1973
Citing “progress” in the Paris peace negotiations between National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam, President Richard Nixon halts the most concentrated bombing of the war, as well as mining, shelling, and all other offensive action against North Vietnam. The cessation of direct attacks...
World War I
1919
A coup launched in Berlin by a group of radical socialist revolutionaries is brutally suppressed by right-wing paramilitary units from January 10 to January 15, 1919; the group’s leaders, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, are murdered. Germany’s long, ultimately losing struggle on the battlefield—culminating in the signing of the...
World War II
1951
On this day, Ilse Koch, wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald concentration camp, is sentenced to life imprisonment in a court in West Germany. Ilse Koch was nicknamed the “Witch of Buchenwald” for her extraordinary sadism. Born in Dresden, Germany, Ilse, a librarian, married SS. Col. Karl Koch in 1936....
Also on this day
-
Lead Story
- 1967 Packers face Chiefs in first Super Bowl
-
American Revolution
- 1777 New Connecticut (Vermont) declares independence
-
Automotive
- 1936 Ford Foundation is born
-
Civil War
- 1865 Fort Fisher falls
-
Cold War
- 1953 Dulles calls for “liberation of captive peoples”
-
Crime
- 1981 Hill Street Blues begins run
-
Disaster
- 1919 Molasses floods Boston streets
-
General Interest
- 1559 Elizabeth crowned queen of England
- 1870 First appearance of the Democratic donkey
- 1929 Martin Luther King Jr. born
- 1970 Biafra surrenders to Nigeria
- 1970 Qaddafi becomes premier of Libya
- 2009 Sully Sullenberger performs Miracle on the Hudson
-
Hollywood
- 1993 Last episode of soap opera Santa Barbara airs
-
Literary
- 1831 The Hunchback of Notre Dame is finished
-
Music
- 1972 “American Pie” hits #1 on the pop charts
-
Old West
- 1933 The utopian Amana colony embraces capitalism
-
Presidential
- 1973 Nixon suspends military action in North Vietnam
-
Sports
- 1967 Packers beat Chiefs in first Super Bowl
-
Vietnam War
- 1962 Kennedy says U.S. troops are not fighting
- 1973 Nixon halts military action against North Vietnam
-
World War I
- 1919 Rebel leaders are murdered in failed coup in Berlin
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World War II
- 1951 The “Witch of Buchenwald” is sentenced to prison