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Books > Humanities > History > American history > From 1900 > Postwar, from 1945
Initially stationed at the U.S. Army's counterintelligence
headquarters in Saigon, David Noble was sent north to launch the
army's first covert intelligence-gathering operation in Vietnam's
Central Highlands. Living in the region of the
Montagnards-Vietnam's indigenous tribal people, deemed critical to
winning the war-Noble documented strategic hamlets and Green Beret
training camps, where Special Forces teams taught the Montagnards
to use rifles rather than crossbows and spears. In this book, he
relates the formidable challenges he confronted in the course of
his work. Weaving together memoir, excerpts from letters written
home, and photographs, Noble's compelling narrative throws light on
a little-known corner of the Vietnam War in its early years-before
the Tonkin Gulf Resolution and the deployment of combat units-and
traces his transformation from a novice intelligence agent and
believer in the war to a political dissenter and active protester.
For American children raised exclusively in wartime-that is, a Cold
War containing monolithic communism turned hot in the jungles of
Southeast Asia-and the first to grow up with televised combat,
Vietnam was predominately a mediated experience. Walter Cronkite
was the voice of the conflict, and grim, nightly statistics the
most recognizable feature. But as involvement grew, Vietnam
affected numerous changes in child life, comparable to the
childhood impact of previous conflicts-chiefly the Civil War and
World War II-whose intensity and duration also dominated American
culture. In this protracted struggle that took on the look of
permanence from a child's perspective, adult lives were
increasingly militarized, leaving few preadolescents totally
insulated. Over the years 1965 to 1973, the vast majority of
American children integrated at least some elements of the war into
their own routines. Parents, in turn, shaped their children's
perspectives on Vietnam, while the more politicized mothers and
fathers exposed them to the bitter polarization the war engendered.
The fighting only became truly real insomuch as service in Vietnam
called away older community members or was driven home literally
when families shared hardships surrounding separation from cousins,
brothers, and fathers. In seeing the Vietnam War through the eyes
of preadolescent Americans, Joel P. Rhodes suggests broader
developmental implications from being socialized to the political
and ethical ambiguity of Vietnam. Youth during World War II
retained with clarity into adulthood many of the proscriptive
patriotic messages about U.S. rightness, why we fight, heroism, or
sacrifice. In contrast, Vietnam tended to breed childhood
ambivalence, but not necessarily of the hawk and dove kind. This
unique perspective on Vietnam continues to complicate adult notions
of militarism and warfare, while generally lowering expectations of
American leadership and the presidency.
The tactics and technologies of modern air assault - vertical
deployment of troops by helicopter or similar means - emerged
properly during the 1950s in Korea and Algeria. Yet it was during
the Vietnam War that helicopter air assault truly came of age and
by 1965 the United States had established fully airmobile
battalions, brigades, and divisions, including the 1st Cavalry
Division (Airmobile).This division brought to Vietnam a
revolutionary new speed and dexterity in battlefield tactics, using
massed helicopters to liberate its soldiers from traditional
overland methods of combat manoeuvre. However, the communist troops
adjusted their own thinking to handle airmobile assaults.
Specializing in ambush, harassment, infiltration attacks, and
small-scale attrition, the North Vietnamese operated with light
logistics and a deep familiarity with the terrain. They optimized
their defensive tactics to make landing zones as hostile as
possible for assaulting US troops, and from 1966 worked to draw
them into 'Hill Traps', extensive kill zones specially prepared for
defence -in -depth. By the time the 1st Cavalry Division
(Airmobile) withdrew from Vietnam in 1972, it had suffered more
casualties than any other US Army division. Featuring specially
commissioned artwork, archive photographs, and full-colour battle
maps, this study charts the evolution of US airmobile tactics
pitted against North Vietnamese countermeasures. The two sides are
analysed in detail, including training, logistics, weaponry, and
organization.
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