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Title: The Myth of Inevitable Us Defeat in Vietnam (Strategy and History Series) by C. Dale Walton, W. W. Rostow ISBN: 0-7146-8191-1 Publisher: Frank Cass & Co Pub. Date: January, 2002 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $28.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4 (1 review)
Rating: 4
Summary: Very Interesting, a Solid Read.
Comment: Many works on the American involvement in Vietnam focus on the innumerable mistakes we made over the course of nearly 15 years and conclude that the war was unwinnable from the start and America was doomed to failure. In this well-researched work, Dale Walton also examines numerous American mistakes, but draws the opposite and more logical conclusion: America was not doomed to fail in Vietnam and only did so as a result of numerous bad (and more importantly, avoidable) decisions on the part of policy-makers and military leaders. Had any number of these decisions been reversed at various points during the conflict, South Vietnam might still be a viable, democratic nation to this day.
Walton's book is extremely well organized and features 7 main chapters, each of which focuses on one aspect of the conflict and the associated problems. For example, Chapter 4 discusses US involvement and non-involvement in Laos and Cambodia. In July of 1962, President Kennedy signed the Laos Accords, a treaty which required that both the US and North Vietnam respect Laos' neutrality and prohibited any actions therein. Walton argues that it was bad enough to treat Indochina as a divided theater, but what was worse was that the US continued to honor the treaty long after it was clear to everyone that North Vietnam was violating the agreement and resupplying guerrillas in the South through the Ho Chi Minh trail. This was one of many instances in which the US government wished to have the best of both worlds: extremely limited involvement but also definite victory. It was not to be. Chapter 5 discusses how American policy was severely limited in its thinking because of an unnecessarily high fear of Chinese involvement. US fear of PRC involvement (as had occurred in Korea) stopped many potentially successful policies from being implemented. And yet intelligence showed that the PRC neither wanted to start a war with the US nor would it have been militarily ready (due to the disastrous reforms of Mao) for much of the period of America's involvement.
Ultimately, Walton's analysis is counterfactual and therefore open to debate. Perhaps success in Vietnam would've been more difficult than his book suggests, and maybe it could've been easier! But even if complete success in American terms would've been nearly impossible, the war could have been fought more efficiently and effectively. I found Walton's chapter on airpower to be the most interesting example of this inefficiency. Quite frequently you hear that the US dropped more tons of bombs in Vietnam than it did in all other wars combined. This is true, but as Walton notes, the tonnage is less important than the targets, and in Vietnam the US dropped 70% of its high-explosives in the South! Moreover, he states, the idea that the North was undeveloped and had nothing to bomb was a myth. The North wasn't as industrialized as many countries, but there were still industrial targets in Hanoi and Haiphong which weren't attacked by Johnson. Also, the low level of industrialization simply meant that the NVA had to import their military technology from the PRC and USSR. Thus the railroads and highway networks were an extremely important target for a strategic bombing campaign and yet the US stayed its hand. Johnson believed that a system of graduated pressure, bombing some targets but holding back from others as a gesture of peace, would bring the North to the bargaining table. He also implemented 16 bombing halts which he hoped would accomplish the same objective. But rather than tempting the North into accepting a settlement, these actions only proved that the US was not fully committed to Vietnam and wished to get out. Walton examines this topic and many others in great detail, providing a plethora of citations and commentary in the excellent footnotes.
I give the book four stars instead of five simply because it is written in a somewhat dry, scholarly tone. The book feels like a collection of academic essays, which is not a bad thing, but the prose isn't thrilling and a reader unfamiliar with Vietnam may not be drawn in. But to anyone with a good background in the history will certainly find this an informative and intriguing read.
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Title: Anti-Americanism by Jean Francois Revel, DIARMID CAMMELL ISBN: 1893554856 Publisher: Encounter Books Pub. Date: September, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.95 |
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Title: A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America's Last Years in Vietnam by Lewis Sorley ISBN: 0156013096 Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: 01 September, 2000 List Price(USD): $27.00 |
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Title: America in Vietnam by Guenter Lewy ISBN: 0195027329 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: April, 1980 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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Title: Vietnam: The Necessary War: A Reinterpretation of America's Most Disastrous Military Conflict by Michael Lind ISBN: 0684870274 Publisher: Free Press Pub. Date: 16 July, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: Ripples of Battle : How Wars of the Past Still Determine How We Fight, How We Live, and How We Think by VICTOR HANSON ISBN: 0385504004 Publisher: Doubleday Pub. Date: 16 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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