USA HISTORY

“We will stay (in Vietnam) because a just nation cannot leave to the cruelties of its enemies a people who have staked their lives and independence on America’s solemn pledge-a pledge which had grown through the commitment of three American Presidents. “We will stay because in Asia-and around the world-are countries whose independence rests, in large measure, on confidence in America’s word and in American protection. To yield to force in Vietnam would weaken that confidence, would undermine the independence of many lands, and would whet the appetite of aggression. We would have to fight in one land, and then we would have to fight in another-or abandon much of Asia to the domination of Communists.”-Lyndon B. Johnson, State of the Union Message, January 12, 1966The foreign policy position for Vietnam explained in the excerpt is most directly based on