1960 in the Vietnam War
| 1960 in the Vietnam War | |||
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← 1959
1961 →
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 A map of South Vietnam showing provincial boundaries and names and military zones (1, II, III, and IV Corps). |
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| Belligerents | |||
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Anti-Communist forces:  South Vietnam United States Kingdom of Laos
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Communist forces:  North Vietnam Viet Cong Pathet Lao
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| Strength | |||
| US: 900 | |||
| Casualties and losses | |||
| US: 5 killed South Vietnam: 2,223 killed |
North Vietnam: casualties | ||
Anti-Communist forces:
Communist forces:
In 1960, the oft-expressed optimism of the United States and the Government of South Vietnam that the Viet Cong were nearly defeated proved mistaken. Instead the Viet Cong became a growing threat and security forces attempted to cope with Viet Cong attacks, assassinations of local officials, and efforts to control villages and rural areas. Throughout the year, the U.S. struggled with the reality that much of the training it had provided to the South Vietnamese army (ARVN) during the previous five years had not been relevant to combating an insurgency. The U.S. changed its policy to allow the Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) to begin providing anti-guerrilla training to ARVN and the paramilitary Civil Guard.
President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam was faced with growing dissatisfaction with his government, culminating in a coup d'état attempt by military officers in November.
North Vietnam's support for the Viet Cong increased, and in December the National Liberation Front (NLF) was created to carry on the struggle. Ostensibly a coalition of anti-Diem organizations, the NLF was largely under the control of North Vietnam's communist party.
President Diem said to General Samuel Williams, the head of the MAAG in Saigon, that the counterinsurgency programs of his government had been successful and that "the Communists have now given up hope of controlling the countryside."
General Williams said that "the internal security situation here now, although at times delicate, is better than it has been at any time in the last two or three years.
In what has been called "the start of the Vietnam War", the Viet Cong attacked and took temporary control of several districts in Kiến Hòa Province (now Bến Tre Province) in the Mekong Delta. The Viet Cong set up "people's committees," and confiscated land from landlords and redistributed it to poor farmers. One of the leaders of the uprising was Madame Nguyễn Thị Định who led the all-female "Long Hair Army." Dinh was the secretary of the Bến Tre Communist Party and later a Viet Cong Major General.
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