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Books > History > Asian / Middle Eastern history > From 1900 > Postwar, from 1945 > Vietnam War
As a first lieutenant in the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment, U.S.
Army pilot David Porter was section leader in an Aerial Scout
platoon in Vietnam. Their mission was to conduct reconnaissance in
OH-6 aircraft (a.k.a. Light Observation Helicopter or "Loach") near
the Cambodian border. Finding and engaging the enemy at low
altitude in coordination with an AH-1 Cobra gunship circling above,
these units developed a remarkable method of fighting the Viet
Cong: Hunter-Killer Operations. The tactic had great local success
but died with the war. Few today are aware of the hazards these
pilots faced during times of intense combat. Porter's vivid memoir
recounts the internal workings of a legendary air cavalry troop,
in-the-cockpit combat actions, and the men who were key players on
this perilous battleground.
The American war in Vietnam was one of the most morally contentious
events of the twentieth century, and it produced an extraordinary
outpouring of poetry. Yet the prodigious poetic voice of its
American participants remains largely unheard; the complex ethical
terrain of their experiences underexplored. In A Shadow on Our
Hearts, Adam Gilbert rectifies these oversights by utilizing the
vast body of soldier-poetry to examine the war's core moral issues.
The soldier-poets provide important insights into the ethical
dimensions of their physical and psychological surroundings before,
during, and after the war. They also offer profound perspectives on
the relationships between American soldiers and the Vietnamese
people. From firsthand experiences, they reflect on what it meant
to be witnesses, victims, and perpetrators of wartime violence. And
they advance an uncompromising vision of moral responsibility that
indicts a range of culprits for the harms caused by the conflict.
Gilbert explores the powerful and perceptive work of these
soldier-poets through the lens of morality and presents a radically
alternative, deeply personal, and ethically penetrating account of
the American war in Vietnam.
On 8 March, 1965, 3,500 United States Marines of the 9th Marine
Expeditionary Brigade made an amphibious landing at Da Nang on the
south central coast of South Vietnam, marking the beginning of a
conflict that would haunt American politics and society for many
years, even after the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January
1973. For the people of North Vietnam it was just another in a long
line of foreign invaders. For two thousand years they had struggled
for self-determination, coming into conflict during that time with
the Chinese, the Mongols, the European colonial powers, the
Japanese and the French. Now it was the turn of the United States,
a far-away nation reluctant to go to war but determined to prevent
Vietnam from falling into Communist hands. A Short History of the
Vietnam War explains how the United States became involved in its
longest war, a conflict that, from the outset, many claimed it
could never win. It details the escalation of American involvement
from the provision of military advisors and equipment to the
threatened South Vietnamese, to an all-out shooting war involving
American soldiers, airmen and sailors, of whom around 58,000 would
die and more than 300,000 would be wounded. Their struggle was
against an indomitable enemy, able to absorb huge losses in terms
of life and infrastructure. The politics of the war are examined
and the decisions and ambitions of five US presidents are addressed
in the light of what many have described as a defeat for American
might. The book also explores the relationship of the Vietnam War
to the Cold War politics of the time.
By 1969, following the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu, over 500,000
US troops were 'in country' in Vietnam. Before America's longest
war had ended with the fall of Saigon in 1975, 450,000 Vietnamese
had died, along with 36,000 Americans. The Vietnam War was the
first rock 'n' roll war, the first helicopter war with its doctrine
of 'airmobility', and the first television war; it made napalm and
the defoliant Agent Orange infamous, and gave us the New Journalism
of Michael Herr and others. It also saw the establishment of the
Navy SEALs and Delta Force. At home, America fractured, with the
peace movement protesting against the war; at Kent State
University, Ohio National Guardsmen fired on unarmed students,
killing four and injuring nine. Lewis's compelling selection of the
best writing to come out of a war covered by some truly outstanding
writers, both journalists and combatants, includes an eyewitness
account of the first major battle between the US Army and the
People's Army of Vietnam at Ia Drang; a selection of letters home;
Nicholas Tomalin's famous 'The General Goes Zapping Charlie Cong';
Robert Mason's 'R&R', Studs Terkel's account of the police
breaking up an anti-war protest; John Kifner on the shootings at
Kent State; Ron Kovic's 'Born on the Fourth of July'; John T.
Wheeler's 'Khe Sanh: Live in the V Ring'; Pulitzer Prize-winner
Seymour Hersh on the massacre at My Lai; Michael Herr's 'It Made
You Feel Omni'; Viet Cong Truong Nhu Tang's memoir; naval nurse
Maureen Walsh's memoir, 'Burning Flesh'; John Pilger on the fall of
Saigon; and Tim O'Brien's 'If I Die in a Combat Zone'.
This landmark study of the Vietnamese conflict, examined through
the lens of the revolutionary and counter-revolutionary movements
in the rural province of Long An up until American intervention in
the area, offers a human, balanced, penetrating account of war. Two
new forewords by Robert K. Brigham of Vassar College and Jeffrey
Record of the Air War College explore the book's enduring
influence. There is a new end chapter that offers previously
unpublished scholarship on the conflict.
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