Statistics about the Vietnam War

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Facts and Myths

Casualty by Type and Service

Casualty by Pay Grade and Service

Casualty by Race and Pay Grade

Casualty by State Home of Record

Casualty by Calendar Year

The following general information is presented “as is” as a public service.

In Uniform and In Country

• 9,087,000 military personnel served on active duty during the official Vietnam era from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975.
• 2,709,918 Americans served in uniform in Vietnam.
• Of the 2.7 million, between 1 – 1.6 million (40 – 60%) either fought in combat, provided close support or were at least fairly regularly exposed to enemy attack.
• Vietnam Veterans represented 9.7% of their generation.
• 240 men were awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War.
• 8,744,000 GIs were on active duty during the war (Aug 5, 1964 – March 28, 1973).
• 3,403,100 (Including 514,300 offshore) personnel served in the Southeast Asia Theater (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, flight crews based in Thailand, and sailors in adjacent South China Sea waters).
• 7,484 women (6,250 or 83.5% were nurses) served in Vietnam.
• Peak troop strength in Vietnam: 543,482 (April 30, 1968)

Casualties 

• The first man to die in Vietnam was James Davis, in 1961. He was with the 509th Radio Research Station. Davis Station in Saigon was named for him.
• 75,000 were severely disabled.
• 23,214 were 100% disabled.
• 5,283 lost limbs.
• 1,081 sustained multiple amputations.
• Of those killed, 61% were younger than 21.
• 11,465 of those killed were younger than 20 years old.
• Of those killed, 17,539 were married.
• Hostile deaths: 47,378
• Non-hostile deaths: 10,800
• Total: 58,202 (Includes men formerly classified as MIA and Mayaguez casualties). Men who have subsequently died of wounds account for the changing total.
• 8 nurses died — 1 was KIA.
• Married men killed: 17,539
• Highest state death rate: West Virginia – 84.1% (national average 58.9% for every 100,000 males in 1970).
• Wounded: 303,704 — 153,329 hospitalized + 150,375 injured requiring no hospital care.
• Severely disabled: 75,000 — 23,214 – 100% disabled; 5,283 lost limbs; 1,081 sustained multiple amputations.
• Amputation or crippling wounds to the lower extremities were 300% higher than in WWII and 70% higher than Korea. Multiple amputations occurred at the rate of 18.4% compared to 5.7% in WWII.
• Missing in Action: 2,338
• POWs: 766 (114 died in captivity)
• Average age of men killed: 23.1 years.
• Five men killed in Vietnam were only 16 years old.
• One soldier killed in Vietnam was only 15 years old.
• As of January 15, 2004, there are 1,875 Americans still unaccounted for from the Vietnam War

Draftee’s vs. Volunteers

• 25% (648,500) of total forces in country were draftees. (66% of U.S. armed forces members were drafted during WWII.
• Draftees accounted for 30.4% (17,725) of combat deaths in Vietnam.
• Reservists killed: 5,977
• National Guard: 6,140 served: 101 died.
• Total draftees (1965 – 73): 1,728,344.
• Actually served in Vietnam: 38%
• Marine Corps Draft: 42,633.
• Last man drafted: June 30, 1973.

Race and Ethic Background

• 88.4% of the men who actually served in Vietnam were Caucasian; 10.6% (275,000) were black; 1% belonged to other races.
• 86.3% of the men who died in Vietnam were Caucasian (includes Hispanics); 12.5% (7,241) were black; 1.2% belonged to other races.
• 170,000 Hispanics served in Vietnam; 3,070 (5.2% of total) died there.
• 70% of enlisted men killed were of North-west European descent.
• 86.8% of the men who were killed as a result of hostile action were Caucasian; 12.1% (5,711) were black; 1.1% belonged to other races.
• 14.6% (1,530) of non-combat deaths were among blacks.
• 34% of blacks who enlisted volunteered for the combat arms.
• Overall, blacks suffered 12.5% of the deaths in Vietnam at a time when the percentage of blacks of military age was 13.5% of the total population.
• Religion of Dead: Protestant — 64.4%; Catholic — 28.9%; other/none — 6.7%

Socio-Economic Status

• Vietnam veterans have a lower unemployment rate than the same non-vet age groups.
• 76% of the men sent to Vietnam were from lower middle/working class backgrounds.
• Three-fourths had family incomes above the poverty level; 50% were from middle income backgrounds.
• Some 23% of Vietnam vets had fathers with professional, managerial or technical occupations.
• 79% of the men who served in Vietnam had a high school education or better when they entered the military service. (63% of Korean War vets and only 45% of WWII vets had completed high school upon separation.)
• Deaths by region per 100,000 of population: South — 31%, West — 29.9%; Midwest — 28.4%; Northeast — 23.5%.

Winning & Losing

• 82% of veterans who saw heavy combat strongly believe the war was lost because of lack of political will.
• Nearly 75% of the public agrees it was a failure of political will, not of arms.

Honorable Service

• 97% of Vietnam Veterans were honorably discharged.
• 97% of Vietnam-era veterans were honorably discharged.
• 91% of actual Vietnam War veterans and 90% of those who saw heavy combat are proud to have served their country.
• 66% of Vietnam vets say they would serve again if called upon.
• 87% of the public now holds Vietnam veterans in high esteem!!!!!

A significant portion of the above was provided courtesy of the VFW Magazine and the Public Information Office, HQ CP Forward Observer -1st Recon April 12, 1997

FACTS and Myths:

The information provided below including the sources was provided with permission of the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association. Gary Roush

we*******@vh**.org

“No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now. Rarely have so many people been so wrong about so much. Never have the consequences of their misunderstanding been so tragic.” [Nixon]

The Vietnam War has been the subject of thousands of newspaper and magazine articles, hundreds of books, and scores of movies and television documentaries. The great majority of these efforts have erroneously portrayed many myths about the Vietnam War as being facts. [Nixon]

Myth: Most American soldiers were addicted to drugs, guilt-ridden about their role in the war, and deliberately used cruel and inhumane tactics.

91% of Vietnam Veterans say they are glad they served [Westmoreland]

74% said they would serve again even knowing the outcome [Westmoreland]

There is no difference in drug usage between Vietnam Veterans and non veterans of the same age group (from a Veterans Administration study) [Westmoreland]

Isolated atrocities committed by American soldiers produced torrents of outrage from antiwar critics and the news media while Communist atrocities were so common that they received hardly any attention at all. The United States sought to minimize and prevent attacks on civilians while North Vietnam made attacks on civilians a centerpiece of its strategy. Americans who deliberately killed civilians received prison sentences while Communists who did so received commendations. From 1957 to 1973, the National Liberation Front assassinated 36,725 South Vietnamese and abducted another 58,499. The death squads focused on leaders at the village level and on anyone who improved the lives of the peasants such as medical personnel, social workers, and schoolteachers. [Nixon] Atrocities – every war has atrocities. War is brutal and not fair. Innocent people get killed.

Vietnam Veterans are less likely to be in prison – only 1/2 of one percent of Vietnam Veterans have been jailed for crimes. [Westmoreland]

97% were discharged under honorable conditions; the same percentage of honorable discharges as ten years prior to Vietnam [Westmoreland]

85% of Vietnam Veterans made a successful transition to civilian life. [McCaffrey]

Vietnam veterans’ personal income exceeds that of our non-veteran age group by more than 18 percent. [McCaffrey]

Vietnam veterans have a lower unemployment rate than our non-vet age group. [McCaffrey]

87% of the American people hold Vietnam Vets in high esteem. [McCaffrey]

Myth: Most Vietnam veterans were drafted.

2/3 of the men who served in Vietnam were volunteers. 2/3 of the men who served in World War II were drafted. [Westmoreland] Approximately 70% of those killed were volunteers.[McCaffrey]  Many men volunteered for the draft so even some of the draftees were actually volunteers.

Myth: A disproportionate number of blacks were killed in the Vietnam War.

86% of the men who died in Vietnam were Caucasians, 12.5% were black, 1.2% were other races. (CACF and Westmoreland)

Sociologists Charles C. Moskos and John Sibley Butler, in their recently published book “All That We Can Be,” said they analyzed the claim that blacks were used like cannon fodder during Vietnam “and can report definitely that this charge is untrue. Black fatalities amounted to 12 percent of all Americans killed in Southeast Asia – a figure proportional to the number of blacks in the U.S. population at the time and slightly lower than the proportion of blacks in the Army at the close of the war.” [All That We Can Be]

Myth: The war was fought largely by the poor and uneducated.

Servicemen who went to Vietnam from well-to-do areas had a slightly elevated risk of dying because they were more likely to be pilots or infantry officers.

Vietnam Veterans were the best educated forces our nation had ever sent into combat. 79% had a high school education or better. [McCaffrey]

Here are statistics from the Combat Area Casualty File (CACF) as of November 1993. The CACF is the basis for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (The Wall):

Average age of 58,148 killed in Vietnam was 23.11 years. (Although 58,169 names are in the Nov. 93 database, only 58,148 have both event date and birth date. Event date is used instead of declared dead date for some of those who were listed as missing in action) [CACF]

  Deaths                  Number                  Average Age     

Total                     58,148                     23.11 years

Enlisted                50,274                     22.37 years

Officers                  6,598                       28.43 years

Warrants                1,276                       24.73 years

E1                              525                         20.34 years

USMC 0351           1,122                       20.46 years

ARMY 11B MOS   18,465                     22.55 years

The oldest man killed was 62 years old (TAYLOR, KENNA CLYDE). [CACF]

11,465 KIAs were less than 20 years old.[CACF]

Myth: The average age of an infantryman fighting in Vietnam was 19.

Assuming KIAs accurately represented age groups serving in Vietnam, the average age of an infantryman (MOS 11B) serving in Vietnam to be 19 years old is a myth, it is actually 22. None of the enlisted grades have an average age of less than 20.[CACF] The average man who fought in World War II was 26 years of age. [Westmoreland]

 Myth: The domino theory was proved false.

The domino theory was accurate. The ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand stayed free of Communism because of the U.S. commitment to Vietnam. The Indonesians threw the Soviets out in 1966 because of America’s commitment in Vietnam. Without that commitment, Communism would have swept all the way to the Malacca Straits that is south of Singapore and of great strategic importance to the free world. If you ask people who live in these countries that won the war in Vietnam, they have a different opinion from the American news media. The Vietnam War was the turning point for Communism. [Westmoreland]

Democracy Catching On – In the wake of the Cold War, democracies are flourishing, with 179 of the world’s 192 sovereign states (93%) now electing their legislators, according to the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union. In the last decade, 69 nations have held multi-party elections for the first time in their histories. Three of the five newest democracies are former Soviet republics: Belarus (where elections were first held in November 1995), Armenia (July 1995) and Kyrgyzstan (February 1995). And two are in Africa: Tanzania (October 1995) and Guinea (June 1995). [Parade Magazine]

 Myth: The fighting in Vietnam was not as intense as in World War II.

The average infantryman in the South Pacific during World War II saw about 40 days of combat in four years. The average infantryman in Vietnam saw about 240 days of combat in one year thanks to the mobility of the helicopter.

One out of every 10 Americans who served in Vietnam was a casualty. 58,169 were killed and 304,000 wounded out of 2.59 million who served. Although the percent that died is similar to other wars, amputations or crippling wounds were 300 percent higher than in World War II. 75,000 Vietnam veterans are severely disabled. [McCaffrey]

MEDEVAC helicopters flew nearly 500,000 missions. Over 900,000 patients were airlifted (nearly half were American). The average time lapse between wounding to hospitalization was less than one hour. As a result, less than one percent of all Americans wounded who survived the first 24 hours died. [VHPA 1993]

The helicopter provided unprecedented mobility. Without the helicopter it would have taken three times as many troops to secure the 800 mile border with Cambodia and Laos (the politicians thought the Geneva Conventions of 1954 and the Geneva Accords or 1962 would secure the border) [Westmoreland]

More helicopter facts:

Approximately 12,000 helicopters saw action in Vietnam (all services). [VHPA databases]

Army UH-1’s totaled 9,713,762 flight hours in Vietnam between October 1966 and the end of American involvement in early 1973. [VHPA databases]

Army AH-1G’s totaled 1,110,716 flight hours in Vietnam. [VHPA databases]

We believe that the Huey along with the Huey Cobra have more combat flight time than any other aircraft in the history of warfare assuming you count actual hostile fire exposure versus battle area exposure.  As an example, heavy bombers during World War II most often flew missions lasting many hours with only 10 to 20 minutes of that time exposed to hostile fire.  Helicopters in Vietnam seldom flew above 1,500 feet which is traffic pattern altitude for bombers and were always exposed to hostile fire even in their base camps.

Myth: Air America, the airline operated by the CIA in Southeast Asia, and its pilots were involved in drug trafficking.

The 1990 unsuccessful movie “Air America” helped to establish the myth of a connection between Air America, the CIA, and the Laotian drug trade. The movie and a book the movie was based on contend that the CIA condoned a drug trade conducted by a Laotian client; both agree that Air America provided the essential transportation for the trade; and both view the pilots with sympathetic understanding. American-owned airlines never knowingly transported opium in or out of Laos, nor did their American pilots ever profit from its transport. Yet undoubtedly every plane in Laos carried opium at some time, unknown to the pilot and his superiors. For more information see http://www.air-america.org

Facts about the fall of Saigon

Myth: The American military was running for their lives during the fall of Saigon in April 1975.
The picture of a Huey helicopter evacuating people from the top of what was billed as being the U.S. Embassy in Saigon during the last week of April 1975 during the fall of Saigon helped to establish this myth.

This famous picture is the property of UPI Corbus-Bettman Photo Agency. It is one of 42 pictures of this helicopter that UPI photographer, Hubert Van Es took on 29 April 1975 from UPI’s offices on the top floor of the Saigon Hotel which was several blocks from the Pittman Apartments. [People]

Here are some facts to clear up that poor job of reporting by the news media.

It was a “civilian” (Air America) Huey not Army or Marines.

It was NOT the U.S. Embassy. The building is the Pittman Apartments, a 10 story building where the CIA station chief and many of his officers lived, located at 22 Ly Tu Trong St. The U.S. Embassy and its helipad were much larger. The platform is the top of the elevator shaft for the building and was not designed as a helipad.  [People]

The evacuees were Vietnamese not American military.  Two high ranking Vietnamese where among those taken that day to Tan Son Nhut airport, General Tran Van Don and the head of the secret police Tran Kim Tuyen.  Both immigrated to Europe and both have since died.  [People]

The person who can be seen aiding the refugees was CIA operations officer, Mr. O.B. Harnage, who is now retired in Arizona.  The pilots who were flying this helicopter, tail number N4 7004, were Bob Caron who lives in Florida and Jack “Pogo” Hunter who died in 1995.  [People]

Another famous picture.

Myth: Kim Phuc, the little nine year old Vietnamese girl running naked from the napalm strike near Trang Bang on 8 June 1972, was burned by Americans bombing Trang Bang.

No American had involvement in this incident near Trang Bang that burned Phan Thi Kim Phuc. The planes doing the bombing near the village were VNAF (Vietnam Air Force) and were being flown by Vietnamese pilots in support of South Vietnamese troops on the ground. The Vietnamese pilot who dropped the napalm in error is currently living in the United States. Even the AP photographer, Nick Ut, who took the picture was Vietnamese. The incident in the photo took place on the second day of a three day battle between the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) who occupied the village of Trang Bang and the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) who were trying to force the NVA out of the village. Recent reports in the news media that an American commander ordered the air strike that burned Kim Phuc are incorrect. There were no Americans involved in any capacity. “We (Americans) had nothing to do with controlling VNAF,” according to Lieutenant General (Ret) James F. Hollingsworth, the Commanding General of TRAC at that time. Also, it has been incorrectly reported that two of Kim Phuc’s brothers were killed in this incident. They were Kim’s cousins not her brothers.

Myth: The United States lost the war in Vietnam.

The American military was not defeated in Vietnam. The American military did not lose a battle of any consequence. From a military standpoint, it was almost an unprecedented performance. (Westmoreland quoting Douglas Pike, a professor at the University of California, Berkley a renowned expert on the Vietnam War) [Westmoreland] This included Tet 68, which was a major military defeat for the VC and NVA.
THE UNITED STATES DID NOT LOSE THE WAR IN VIETNAM, THE SOUTH VIETNAMESE DID after the U.S. Congress cut off funding.  The South Vietnamese ran out of fuel, ammunition and other supplies because of a lack of support from Congress while the North Vietnamese were very well supplied by China and the Soviet Union.

Facts about the end of the war:

The fall of Saigon happened 30 April 1975, two years AFTER the American military left Vietnam. The last American troops departed in their entirety 29 March 1973. How could we lose a war we had already stopped fighting? We fought to an agreed stalemate. The peace settlement was signed in Paris on 27 January 1973. It called for release of all U.S. prisoners, withdrawal of U.S. forces, limitation of both sides’ forces inside South Vietnam and a commitment to peaceful reunification. [1996 Information Please Almanac]

The 140,000 evacuees in April 1975 during the fall of Saigon consisted almost entirely of civilians and Vietnamese military, NOT American military running for their lives. [1996 Information Please Almanac]

There were almost twice as many casualties in Southeast Asia (primarily Cambodia) the first two years after the fall of Saigon in 1975 then there were during the ten years the U.S. was involved in Vietnam. [1996 Information Please Almanac]

POW-MIA Issue (unaccounted-for versus missing in action)

Politics & People, On Vietnam, Clinton Should Follow a Hero’s Advice, contained this quote about Vietnam, there has been “the most extensive accounting in the history of human warfare” of those missing in action. While there are still officially more than 2,200 cases, there now are only 55 incidents of American servicemen who were last seen alive but aren’t accounted for. By contrast, there still are 78,000 unaccounted-for Americans from World War II and 8,100 from the Korean conflict.
“The problem is that those who think the Vietnamese haven’t cooperated sufficiently think there is some central repository with answers to all the lingering questions,” notes Gen. John Vessey, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Reagan and Bush administration’s designated representative in MIA negotiations. “In all the years we’ve been working on this we have found that’s not the case.” [The Wall Street Journal]

SOURCES

[Nixon] No More Vietnams by Richard Nixon

[Parade Magazine] August 18, 1996 page 10.

[CACF] (Combat Area Casualty File) November 1993. (The CACF is the basis for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, i.e. The Wall), Center for Electronic Records, National Archives, Washington, DC

[All That We Can Be] All That We Can Be by Charles C. Moskos and John Sibley Butler

[Westmoreland] Speech by General William C. Westmoreland before the Third Annual Reunion of the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association (VHPA) at the Washington, DC Hilton Hotel on July 5th, 1986 (reproduced in a Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association Historical Reference Directory Volume 2A)

[McCaffrey] Speech by Lt. Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey, (reproduced in the Pentagram, June 4, 1993) assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to Vietnam veterans and visitors gathered at “The Wall”, Memorial Day 1993.

 [The Wall Street Journal] The Wall Street Journal, 1 June 1996 page A15.

[VHPA 1993] Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association 1993 Membership Directory page 130.

[VHPA Databases] Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association Databases.

[1996 Information Please Almanac] 1995 Information Please Almanac Atlas & Yearbook 49th edition, Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston & New York 1996, pages 117, 161 and 292.

[Burkett] Stolen Valor: How the Vietnam Generation was Robbed of its Heroes and its History by B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley, Verity Press, Inc., Dallas, TX, 1998. Book review.

[People.com] Vietnam 25 Years Later, by Joe Treen, People.com, 21 April 2000.

Casualty by Type and Service

Casualty by Pay Grade and Service

Casualty by Race and Pay Grade

Casualty by State Home of Record

Casualty by Type and Service

Casualty by Calendar Year