Vietnam War Collection: books plus

[outletclock]

John Prados and Ray Stubbe, Valley of Decision.

Neil Sheehan, A Bright Shining Lie. (Books I-III are perhaps all that is necessary.)

Robert Mason, Chickenhawk.

Philip Caputo, A Rumor of War.

Perhaps more tangential to the intended point of the original query, but a fun read nonetheless (the early Vietnam reporters - Halberstam, Sheehan, Arnett et al - through the coup that toppled Diem): William Prochnau, Once Upon a Distant War.

Speaking of Halberstam, I have actually never read either, but do/does The Best and the Brightest and/or The Making of a Quagmire merit inclusion on this list?

And speaking of books not read, here is a book only partially read by me, but which (I think) is thought well of, an assessment I find to be a justified one: Jeffrey Race, War Comes to Long An.

Regards
OC

[jcustis]

I can only offer one, and that is Frank Snepp's Decent Interval.

[outletclock]

Since JCustis mentioned Snepp's Decent Interval, I'll add two other books regarding April 1975:

David Butler, The Fall of Saigon.

Larry Engerman, Tears Before the Rain.

Incidentally, Harry Summers was at the American Embassy helping to conduct the evacuation, I think, which made me think of his On Strategy.

Regards
OC

[slapout9]

"Slow Burn" by Orrin DeForest-excellent book on Intelligence and Interrogation (the way it should be done) for Vietnam.


Buck Sergeants will definitely love Brennon's War

[Old Eagle]

by Douglas Pike. Powerful thesis on the inability of the west to come to grips with the pol-mil strategy of the Peoples' Army. I thoroughly enjoyed the book when it was first published in the 80s. I understand that it has come under some academic criticism in the meantime.

My personal theory is that we are still on the road to victory in VN, and that General Electric and General Motors will prevail where General Westmoreland and General Abrams failed. (I stole this line from somewhere, but as usual, can't remember where.)

[Sasquatch]

Response.....

And helps me clarify my thoughts on the question. And a new one... (Later).

Actually, there are two educational goals,

1. What memoirs. etc will help the strategic corporals (buck Seargeants) do their jobs better, and avoid reinventing the wheel. (The old joke, we fought in Vietnam for one year seven times, or something like that).

2. What really was the broad picture there? How did we get into that mess, and why did it end so badly?

There does not seem to be a version of the Ricks/Woodward first draft of history out there.

A good example is the US Military institutional bias against Body Counts;

The weekly casualty reports on the six PM news is unlikely to have been the subject of family reminiscenses around the dinner table.

[outletclock]

Sasquatch:

Meant respectfully: If the goal is to

help the strategic corporals (buck Seargeants) do their jobs better, and avoid reinventing the wheel

, then for said purpose, why limit the query to Vietnam? Obviously how the US entered the Vietnam War is Vietnam-specific, but helping the strategic corporal would not seem to be. Perhaps books regarding Korea, to take one example, or just as well other conflicts, might be equally (or even more?) useful for said goal?

Regards
OC