Although American leaders in the following decade would establish Vietnam as the central battlefield in the global cold war, U.S. military officials in the 1950s consistently opposed expanded commitments to and intervention in Indochina. Indeed, throughout the early part of that decade, the armed forces worked against military involvement in the First Indochina war more than any other institution, in or out of government. From 1950 to 1954, when the Truman and Eisenhower administrations made a series of irrevocable commitments to the French and then native anti-Communist elements in southern Vietnam, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), its various committees, respective service leaders, and other senior officers working in government voiced serious misgivings about intervention in Indochina, with Army officers in particular opposed to such measures. In light of U.S. limits and priorities, they explained, an expanded role in Vietnam would damage the national interest.

To press their case against involvement in Vietnam, military dissenters presented a complex yet well-developed case against involvement in Indochina based on comprehensive and interrelated political, economic, and military factors.