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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by the domino theory,

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the philosophical study of pizza.

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All right, here's the excerpt.

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[ mumbles ]

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All right, and the question:

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In addition to foreign aid, the United States used military force

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in Korea and Vietnam with a primary goal of... what?

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And here are the potential answers.

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[ mumbles ]

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All right. Well, what exactly were we up to in Korea and Vietnam?

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Well, they're pretty small countries, sure, but we sent

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a full military force to fight in their internal conflicts.

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So there must have been something that lured us across the Pacific Ocean.

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So let's see which answer can best describe why we showed up to the dance.

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Did we use military force in Korea and Vietnam with the goal of A -

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discouraging domestic immigration?

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Huh? Well, actually, these military operations didn't really have

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anything to do with preventing the in-flow or out-flow of people and goods.

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So that knocks out A and B.

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Was a primary goal of intervening in Korea and Vietnam to

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D - demonstrate U.S. power to the United Nations?

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Well, sending a military force into a country certainly makes a strong statement,

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but the ongoing conflicts in Korea and Vietnam received mixed support in the U.N.

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For them it was might makes kind of right. So it ain't D.

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Which means the U.S. used military force in Korea and Vietnam in order to C -

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prevent the spread of communism.

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During the Cold War, the U.S. was very concerned about domino theory,

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the idea that if one country fell to communism, the ideology

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would spread throughout the region and possibly the world.

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So when communists made gains in Korea and Vietnam,

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the U.S. decided to intervene, hoping to stem the bleeding, so to speak.

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So C is the correct answer.

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And for the U.S. officials worried about the communist threat,

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well, the only thing to fear was the fear of it spreading itself.

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