Year of the hawk America's descent into Vietnam, 1965

Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Historian Warren (God, War, and Providence) delivers a solid study of the Vietnam War focused on the rapid escalation of the conflict beginning in 1965. Drawing largely on memoirs and secondary sources, Warren details the history of Vietnamese resistance to French colonial rule, the U.S. government's decision to support France's war against communist insurgents in the 1950s, President Lyndon Johnson's fears that the fall of Saigon would severely damage "American prestige" and his own reputation, and the rise of an American antiwar movement that saw the conflict as "an inherently immoral, inhumane enterprise." He suggests that the war may have been unwinnable, but blames Gen. William Westmoreland's resistance to counterinsurgency tactics in favor of "big-unit search-and-destroy operations," and the South Vietnamese government's "fractiousness and dysfunction," for dooming any chance of victory. Warren also stresses that American and South Vietnamese political and military leaders never gave the Vietnamese people a palatable alternative to Ho Chi Minh's brand of nationalism, which offered "both unity and freedom from foreign domination." Though Warren treads familiar ground, he lucidly explains the origins and "strategic blunders" of the Vietnam War. This is a worthy introduction to a conflict that continues to haunt American politics and culture. Agent: John F. Thornton, the Spieler Agency. (Nov.)

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Review by Library Journal Review

Historian Warren's (God, War, and Providence) account of the Vietnam War delivers valuable lessons about the United States' escalation in Southeast Asia in 1965, and more generally about the lengthy wars that have often entangled U.S. foreign policy. (The recently ended Afghanistan War, for instance, seemed unprecedented but has clear parallels to Warren's narrative of Vietnam.) His book is geared towards a general audience, whom it won't lose in the complexities of academic military history. Warren takes readers into the mindsets of key Vietnam War decision-makers in Washington, Hanoi, and Saigon. This allows for a fuller perspective on the futile government of South Vietnam; it also illuminates how North Vietnam's long view of the conflict worked to its advantage. Warren also brings the antiwar movement into focus, with overviews of the impacts of pacifists and civil rights leaders and of public dissent against American involvement in Vietnam. Maps and an extensive bibliography complete the narrative. VERDICT Highly recommended as a concise study of the United States' entrance into the Vietnam War. Further, it's an excellent primer on how countries can charge down the wrong warpath.--Jacob Sherman, Univ. of Texas at San Antonio

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

A close look at the origins and escalation of America's involvement in Vietnam. Military historian and foreign policy analyst Warren begins with a brief overview of U.S. society in 1965, followed by a synopsis of Vietnamese history up to the point when the French were expelled by Indigenous rebels. While the U.S. had some presence in the country under the Eisenhower administration, officials in the Kennedy administration believed that America needed to support South Vietnam's government against what appeared to be a communist threat. In 1964, Lyndon Johnson ran a campaign centered on a pledge not to send American troops to Vietnam, but only a year later, he reversed course and began the escalation. Warren explores the politics and military decisions on both sides of the conflict, providing insight into the North Vietnamese view of the struggle along with numerous American misreadings of the situation--especially the failure to recognize that the primary enemy was not North Vietnam but the ordinary people of South Vietnam who were engaged in a civil war against their corrupt and uncaring government. The author also provides detailed descriptions of several key battles during the period he covers, notably the Battle of Ia Drang Valley, a "ferocious encounter between the US Army's elite 1st Cavalry Division and the regular army of North Vietnam in the remote jungles of the Central Highlands." That battle brought home to many Americans just how serious the war was going to be. Along the way, Warren offers illuminating profiles of participants on both sides, including future Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf and Vietnamese Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap. For those old enough to remember the war, much of the book will offer painful, pointed reminders of what went wrong at a key point in American history. As a focused study of a pivotal year, this book is a welcome addition to the literature on a misguided war. A well-researched overview of how America got into Vietnam--and why it shouldn't have. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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