Vietnam War casualties

The Vietnam War began in 1955 and ended in 1975 when North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon. During this period, the war escalated from an insurgency in South Vietnam sponsored by the North Vietnamese government to direct military intervention in the south by North Vietnam, as well as the active participation of military forces of the United States and other countries. The war also spilled over into the neighbouring countries of Cambodia and Laos. An exhaustive reckoning of the total casualties must include statistical information available for each theater of the war. The Republic of Vietnam was where most of the fighting took place, and it accordingly suffered most from the war.

Major incidents

 * 1968 Tet Offensive - Hanoi failed in its most ambitious goal of producing a general uprising in the South, it suffered more than 45,267 (mainly Viet Cong) deaths but gained a propaganda, political and strategic victory.


 * 1972 Easter Offensive - This saw 50,000 to 75,000 North Vietnamese combatants killed plus their loss of over 250-700 tanks and APCs. The attack was broken up mainly by US air power. It was still a North Vietnamese tactical victory.

Civilian deaths in Vietnam war
195,000-430,000 South Vietnamese civilians died in the war. 50,000-65,000 North Vietnamese civilians died in the war. It was difficult to distinguish between civilians and military personnel on the Viet Cong side since many dressed as civilians.

Deaths caused by North Vietnam/VC forces
R.J. Rummel estimated that NVA/VC forces killed around 164,000 civilians in democide between 1954 and 1975 in South Vietnam, from a range of between 106,000 and 227,000. Rummel's summary has a mid-level estimate of 17,000 South Vietnamese civil servants (ARVN's local millitia) killed by North Vietnamese forces (including the Viet Cong). In addition, at least 36,000 Southern civilians were executed for various reasons in the period 1967–1972. About 130 American and 16,000 South Vietnamese POWs died in captivity. During the peak war years, almost a third of civilian deaths were the result of Viet Cong atrocities.

Deaths caused by South Vietnam
From 1964 to 1975, an estimated 1,500 persons died during the forced relocations of 1,200,000 civilians, another 5,000 prisoners died from ill-treatment and about 30,000 suspected communists and fighters were executed. 6,000 civilians died in the more extensive shellings. In Quang Nam province 4,700 civilians were killed in 1969. This totals 50,000 deaths caused by South Vietnam, excluding North Vietnamese forces killed by the ARVN in combat.

Deaths caused by the American military
Rummel estimated that American forces committed around 5,500 democidal killings between 1960 and 1972, from a range of between 4,000 and 10,000. The Phoenix Program, a counterinsurgency program executed by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), United States special operations forces, and the Republic of Vietnam's security apparatus, killed 26,369 suspected NLF operatives and informants. Estimates for the number of North Vietnamese civilian deaths resulting from US bombing range from 50,000-65,000. American bombing in Cambodia killed at least 40,000 combatants and civilians.

18.2 million gallons of Agent Orange (Dioxin) was sprayed by the U.S. military over more than 10% of Southern Vietnam, as part of the U.S. herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. Vietnam's government claimed that 400,000 people were killed or maimed as a result of after effects, and that 500,000 children were born with birth defects.

German historian Bernd Greiner mentions the following war crimes reported, and/or investigated by the Peers Commission and the Vietnam War Crimes Working Group, among other sources:

- Seven massacres officially confirmed by the American side. My Lai (4) and My Khe (4) claimed the largest number of victims with 420 and 90 respectively, and in five other places altogether about 100 civilians were executed.

- Two further massacres were reported by soldiers who had taken part in them, one north of Duc Pho in Quang Ngai Province in the summer of 1968 (14 victims), another in Binh Dinh province on 20 July 1969 (25 victims).

- Tiger Force, a special operations force, murdered hundreds, possibly over a thousand, civilians.

- In the course of large-scale operations an unknown number of non-combatants were killed either accidentally or deliberately – with some estimating more than 5,000 allegedly died in the course of Operation Speedy Express. Excluding deaths from artillery and air attacks, the total number of victims may have reached tens of thousands during the entire war.

- According to the 'Information Bureau of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam' (PRG), between April 1968 and the end of 1970 American ground troops killed about 6,500 civilians in the course of twenty-one operations either on their own or alongside their allies. Three of the massacres reported on the American side were not mentioned on the PRG list.

Deaths caused by the South Korean military
ROK Capital Division massacred Tay Vinh citizens between February and March 1966. ROK Capital Division massacred Binh An citizens on 26 February 1966. In October, 1966, Tinh Son citizens were massacred. 2nd Marine Brigade massacred Binh Tai citizens on 9 October 1966. In December, 1966, Blue Dragon Brigade massacred Binh Hoa citizens. Second Marine Brigade massacred Phong Nhi citizens on 12 February 1968. South Korean Marines massacred Ha My citizens on 25 February 1968.

Army of the Republic of Vietnam
The Army of the Republic of Vietnam lost between 171,331 and 220,357 men during the war. R.J. Rummel estimated that ARVN lost between 219,000 and 313,000 men during the war.

North Vietnamese and Viet Cong Military deaths
According to the Vietnamese government, there were 1,100,000 North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong military personnel deaths during the Vietnam War (including the missing). Rummel reviewed the many casualty data sets, and this number is in keeping with his mid-level estimate of 1,011,000 North Vietnamese combatant deaths. The official US Department of Defense figure was 950,765 communist forces killed in Vietnam from 1965 to 1974. Defense Department officials believed that these body count figures need to be deflated by 30 percent. In addition, Guenter Lewy assumes that one-third of the reported "enemy" killed may have been civilians, concluding that the actual number of deaths of communist military forces was probably closer to 444,000.

United States armed forces
Casualties as of 2 June 2013: During the Vietnam War, 30% of wounded service members died of their wounds.
 * 58,286 KIA or non-combat deaths (including the missing & deaths in captivity)
 * 153,303 WIA
 * 1,645 MIA (originally 2,646)
 * 725-837 POW (660-721 freed/escaped, 65-116 died in captivity)

Specific incidents

 * 2,800-6,000 civilians were killed by the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese forces in the Hue Massacre throughout February, 1968.
 * 1,200 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Tay Vinh massacre between February 12 – March 17, 1966.
 * 380 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Go Dai massacre on February 26, 1966.
 * 66 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Binh Tai massacre on October 9, 1966.
 * 280 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Dien Nien-Phuoc Binh Massacre on October 9, 1966.
 * 430 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Binh Hoa massacre between December 3 and December 6, 1966.
 * 79 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Phong Nhi and Phong Nhat massacre on February 12, 1968.
 * 135 civilians were killed by South Korean forces in Ha My massacre on February 25, 1968.
 * More than 500 civilians were killed by an American Army company in the My Lai Massacre on March 16, 1968.
 * 19 civilians killed by American Forces Feb. 8, 1968 in Quang Nam province.
 * 80-90 civilians killed by American Forces March 16, 1968 at My Khe.
 * A Newsweek journalist claimed an unnamed official told him that an estimated 5,000 civilians died as "collateral damage" from the American military during Operation Speedy Express.
 * Almost 252 Degar civilians were killed by the Viet Cong in the Dak Son Massacre on December 5, 1967.
 * More than 25,000 South Vietnamese civilians were killed and almost a million become temporary refugees, with over 600,000 interned in South Vietnamese Government camps as a result of North Vietnam's 1972 Easter Offensive.
 * At least 81 civilians were killed by American Forces, Tiger Force 101st Airborne Division, during the Song Ve Valley and Operation Wheeler military campaigns.

Deaths after U.S. withdrawal
Up to 155,000 refugees fleeing the final NVA Spring Offensive were killed or abducted on the road to Tuy Hoa in 1975. Sources have estimated that 165,000 South Vietnamese died in the re-education camps out of 1-2.5 million sent, while somewhere between 50,000 and 250,000 were executed. Rummel estimates that slave labor in the "New Economic Zones" caused 50,000 deaths (out of a total 1 million deported). The number of Vietnamese boat people who died is estimated between 200,000 and 400,000, out of the 2.5 million that fled. There were also tens of thousands of suicides after the North Vietnamese take-over. Including Vietnam's foreign democide, Rummel estimates that a minimum of 400,000 and a maximum of slightly less than 2.5 million people died of political violence from 1975-87 at the hands of Hanoi. In 1988, Vietnam suffered a famine that afflicted millions.

Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge killed 1-3 million Cambodians in the killing fields, out of a population of around 8 million. The Pathet Lao killed some 100,000 Hmong people in Laos.

Other nations' casualties
Cambodian Civil War Laotian Civil War
 * 200,000–300,000 killed
 * 20,000–200,000 killed

Military
South Korea Australia Thailand New Zealand Philippines China Soviet Union
 * 5,099 KIA
 * 11,232 WIA
 * 4 MIA
 * 426 KIA, 74 died of other causes
 * 3,129 WIA
 * 6 MIA (All have been accounted for and have been repatriated)
 * 351 KIA
 * 1,358 WIA
 * 37 KIA + 2 Civilians
 * 187 WIA
 * 9 men KIA
 * 1,446 KIA
 * ~16.