DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
PRINCIPAL WARS
IN WHICH THE UNITED STATES PARTICIPATED
U.S. MILITARY PERSONNEL SERVING AND
CASUALTIES
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Branch
of Service/ Number serving/ Battle deaths/ Other deaths/
Wounds
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REVOLUTIONARY
WAR 1775-1783
TOTAL / - / 4,435 / - / 6,188
ARMY / - / 4,044 / -
/6,004
NAVY / - / 342 / - / 114
MARINES / - / 49 / - / 70
WAR OF
1812 1812-1815
TOTAL /286,730 / 2,260/ - / 4,505
ARMY / - / 1,950 / - /
4,000
NAVY / - / 265 / - / 439
MARINES / - / 45 / - / 66
MEXICAN
WAR 1846-1848
TOTAL / 78,718 / 1,733 /11,550 / 4,152
ARMY / - / 1,721 /
11,550 / 4,102
NAVY / - / 1 / - / 3
MARINES / - / 11 / - / 47
CIVIL
WAR (UNION FORCES ONLY) 1861-1865
TOTAL / 2,213,363 / 140,414 /224,097 /
281,881
ARMY / 2,128,948 / 138,154 /221,374 / 280,040
NAVY / - / 2,112 /
2,411 / 1,710
MARINES / 84,415 / 148 / 312 / 131
SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR
TOTAL / 306,760 / 385 / 2,061 / 1,662
ARMY / 280,564 / 369 / 2,061 /
1,594
NAVY / 22,875 / 10 / - / 47
MARINES / 3,321 / 6 / - /
21
WORLD WAR I 1917-1918
TOTAL / 4,734,991 / 53,402 / 63,114 /
204,002
ARMY / 4,057,101 / 50,510 / 55,868 / 193,663
NAVY / 599,051 / 431
/ 6,856 / 819
MARINES / 78,839 / 2,461 / 390 / 9,520
WORLD WAR II
1941-1946
TOTAL / 16,112,566 / 291,557 / 113,842 / 671,846
ARMY /
11,260,000 / 234,874 /83,400 / 565,861
NAVY / 4,183,466 / 36,950 / 25,664 /
37,778
MARINES / 669,100 / 19,733 / 4,778 / 68,207
KOREAN CONFLICT
1950-1953
TOTAL / 5,720,000 / 33,651 / 3,262 / 103,284
ARMY / 2,834,000 /
27,709 / 2,452 / 77,596
NAVY / 1,177,000 / 475 / 173 / 1,576
MARINES /
424,000 / 4,269 / 339 / 23,744
AIR FORCE/ 1,285,000 / 1,198 / 298 /
368
VIETNAM CONFLICT 1964-1973
TOTAL / 8,744,000 / 47,378 / 10,799 /
153,303
ARMY / 4,368,000 / 30,922 / 7,273 / 96,802
NAVY / 1,842,000 /
1,631 / 931 / 4,178
MARINES / 794,000 / 13,084 / 1,753 / 51,392
AIR FORCE
/1,740,000 / 1,741 / 842 / 931
further
information
Dien Bien Phu
1954
battle changed Vietnam's history
By Bruce Kennedy
CNN
Interactive
(CNN) -- It is seen by many military scholars as
one of the great battles of the 20th century -- and a defining moment in the
history of Southeast Asia. And yet the Battle of Dien Bien Phu receives rarely
more than a passing mention in most history texts.
After World War II, France
was able to reinstall its colonial government in what was then known as
Indochina. By 1946 a Vietnamese independence movement, led by communist Ho Chi
Minh, was fighting French troops for control of northern Vietnam. The Viet Minh,
as the insurgents were called, used guerrilla tactics that the French found
difficult to counter.
In late 1953, as both sides prepared for peace talks in
the Indochina War, French military commanders picked Dien Bien Phu, a village in
northwestern Vietnam near the Laotian and Chinese borders, as the place to pick
a fight with the Viet Minh.
"It was an attempt to interdict the
enemy's rear area, to stop the flow of supplies and reinforcements, to establish
a redoubt in the enemy's rear and disrupt his lines," says Douglas Johnson,
research professor at the U.S. Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute.
"The enemy could then be lured into a killing ground. There was definitely some
of that thinking involved."
Hoping to draw Ho Chi Minh's guerrillas into a
classic battle, the French began to build up their garrison at Dien Bien Phu.
The stronghold was located at the bottom of a bowl-shaped river valley, about 10
miles long. Most French troops and supplies entered Dien Bien Phu from the air
-- either landing at the fort's airstrip or dropping in via parachute.
Dien
Bien Phu's main garrison also would be supported by a series of firebases --
strongpoints on nearby hills that could bring down fire on an attacker. The
strongpoints were given women's names, supposedly after the mistresses of the
French commander, Gen. Christian de Castries. The French assumed any assaults on
their heavily fortified positions would fail or be broken up by their
artillery.
The size of the French garrison at Dien Bien Phu swelled to
somewhere between 13,000 and 16,000 troops by March 1954. About 70 percent of
that force was made up of members of the French Foreign Legion, soldiers from
French colonies in North Africa, and loyal Vietnamese.
Viet Minh
guerrillas and troops from the People's Army of Vietnam surrounded Dien Bien Phu
during the buildup within the French garrison. Their assault on March 13 proved
almost immediately how vulnerable and flawed the French defenses were.
Dien
Bien Phu's outlying firebases were overrun within days of the initial assault.
And the main part of the garrison was amazed to find itself coming under heavy,
withering artillery fire from the surrounding hills. In a major logistical feat,
the Viet Minh had dragged scores of artillery pieces up steeply forested
hillsides the French had written off as impassable.
The French artillery
commander, distraught at his inability to bring counterfire on the well-defended
and well-camouflaged Viet Minh batteries, went into his dugout and killed
himself.
The heavy Viet Minh bombardment also closed Dien Bien Phu's
airstrip. French attempts to resupply and reinforce the garrison via parachute
were frustrated -- as pilots attempting to fly over the region found themselves
facing a barrage from anti-aircraft guns. It was during the resupply effort that
two civilian pilots, James McGovern and Wallace Buford, became the first
Americans killed in Vietnam combat.
The supply planes were forced to fly
higher, and their parachute drops became less accurate. Much of what was
intended for the French forces -- including food, ammunition and, in one case,
essential intelligence information -- landed instead in Viet Minh territory.
Meanwhile, the Viet Minh steadily reduced the French-held area -- using what
their commander, Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, called "a tactic of combined nibbling and
full-scale attack."
Closed off from the outside world, under constant fire,
and flooded by monsoon rains, conditions inside Dien Bien Phu became inhuman.
Casualties piled up inside the garrison's hospital.
Dien Bien Phu
fell to the Viet Minh on May 7. At least 2,200 members of the French forces died
during the siege -- with thousands more taken prisoner. Of the 50,000 or so
Vietnamese who besieged the garrison, there were about 23,000 casualties --
including an estimated 8,000 killed.
The fall of Dien Bien Phu shocked France
and brought an end to French Indochina.
"The very first memory I have of
talking foreign affairs with my father was when Dien Bien Phu fell," Anil
Malhotra, a World Bank official from India, said in a recent interview. "It was
a source of great pride in the developing world. A small Asian nation had
defeated a colonial power, convincingly. It changed history."
Following the
French withdrawal, Vietnam was officially divided into a communist North and
non-communist South -- setting the stage for U.S. involvement.
In 1963, as
Washington was deepening its commitment in Vietnam, Soviet Premier Nikita
Khrushchev made a telling remark to a U.S. official. "If you want to, go ahead
and fight in the jungles of Vietnam," Khrushchev said. "The French fought there
for seven years and still had to quit in the end. Perhaps the Americans will be
able to stick it out for a little longer, but eventually they will have to quit,
too."