America in Vietnam | 
 enlarge | Author: Guenter Lewy
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Category: Book
List Price: $19.99
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Rating:  2 reviews
Sales Rank: 598809
Media: Paperback
Pages: 560
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.8 x 5.3 x 1.1
ISBN: 0195027329
Dewey Decimal Number: 959.7043373
EAN: 9780195027327
Publication Date: May 29, 1980
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Condition: Slight water damage to text. Book is ACCEPTABLE with noted wear to cover and pages. Binding intact. May contain highlighting, inscriptions or notations. We offer a no-hassle guarantee on all our items. Orders generally ship by the next business day. Default Text
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Product Description
Based on a variety of classified military records, Lewy provides the first systematic analysis of the course of the Vietnam War, the reasons for the failure of American strategy and tactics, and the causes of the final collapse of South Vietnam.
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| Customer Reviews:
Still worth reading October 23, 2003
Schmerguls (Sioux City, Ia USA)
37 out of 43 found this review helpful
Though this book was published in 1978, only three years after Vietnam fell to the Communists, this book says some insightful things about the war in Vietnam and makes many valid points. Lewy demonstrates the superficiality of the more extreme opponents of the war--those who accused the US of violating international law but were blind to the horrors involved in the actions of North Vietnam and the Viet Cong. This is a well-researched and balanced study of the issues which engaged the interest of the world while the war was going on, and is illuminating and full of important information.
Still one the best general studies of the Vietnam War July 23, 2005
S. Pollock (Ontario, Canada)
18 out of 23 found this review helpful
Lewy's history of the war in Indochina is balanced and judicious.
He is not an apologist for the war, but rather highly critical. He does, however, demolish the arguments of the Left that held the U.S. responsible for genocide, quasi-, de facto-genocide and war crimes as policy. He refutes these and other such claims in what are, in my opinion, perhaps the three most important chapters: "Military Tactics and the Law of War", "Terrorism, Counterinsurgency and Genocide", and "Atrocities: Fact and Fiction."
Lewy takes apart the assertions of the pro-Communist Left on their own terms, carefully citing international war crimes treaties and conventions, to show how such "legal experts" as Prof. Richard Falk have misinterpreted and ignored crucial sections of such conventions.
He studiously compiles statistics on many U.S. atrocities and in no way tries to downplay their severity. However, his study of NVA/VC show that terrorism was methodicol, highly organized and an integral part of Communist strategy. They "rallied" the "support" of the population through a major program of murder. 37,000 people (80% civilian - typically school teachers and other potential anti-Communist leaders at the village level) were killed. Individuals were tortured and disembowled in the town square as their family and friends were forced to watch. Such acts had the desired effect of terrorizing the peasants into passive support. While holding Hue for 26 days in 1968, the NVA murdered and kidnapped some 5,800 civilians (many of whom were buried alive). A favorite NVA tactic was to shell civilian areas of major cities and massive throngs of civilian refugees fleeing South.
The important distinction Lewy makes is that while American atrocities were perpetrated at the small-unit level by a few individuals who then tried to cover-up their crimes, Communist atrocities were official strategy, committed on a wide-scale. Those who committed them did not cover their tracks because they were in no danger of being penalized.
Lewy also carefully examines the existing data regarding the proportion of African-American casualties to the number of African-Americans of draft age; the level of drug use among US soldiers; the incidence of racial violence among US soldiers; and the social condition of Vietnam veterans. The results are very interesting. Some myths are demolished.
I don't mean to imply that the whole book is about war crimes and so forth. This is a general history that broadly asseses the major aspects of the war from the political to the military to the social.
This is one of the best general introductions to the war out there. Another excellent starting point, though less comprehensive and more polemical, is Podhoretz's "Why We Were In Vietnam."
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