I'm not entirely certain, but I believe the Vietnam conflict was a symptom of the cold because of the still-firm belief that the United States held that communism was threatening to expand throughout South-East Asia. In turn, Russia handed China weaponry as support, who then armed the Northern Vietnamese whom had gone to war with the North Americans. The United States got involved mainly due to that belief, as well as backing South Vietnam, who highly disagreed with the communism of North Vietnam, China and Russia.
