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Triumph Regained: The Vietnam War, 1965-1968 is the long-awaited
sequel to the immensely influential Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam
War, 1954-1965. Like its predecessor, this book overturns the
conventional wisdom using a treasure trove of new sources, many of
them from the North Vietnamese side. Rejecting the standard
depiction of U.S. military intervention as a hopeless folly, it
shows America's war to have been a strategic necessity that could
have ended victoriously had President Lyndon Johnson heeded the
advice of his generals. In light of Johnson's refusal to use
American ground forces beyond South Vietnam, General William
Westmoreland employed the best military strategy available. Once
the White House loosened the restraints on Operation Rolling
Thunder, American bombing inflicted far greater damage on the North
Vietnamese supply system than has been previously understood, and
it nearly compelled North Vietnam to capitulate. The book
demonstrates that American military operations enabled the South
Vietnamese government to recover from the massive instability that
followed the assassination of President Ngo Dinh Diem. American
culture sustained public support for the war through the end of
1968, giving South Vietnam realistic hopes for long-term survival.
America's defense of South Vietnam averted the imminent fall of key
Asian nations to Communism and sowed strife inside the Communist
camp, to the long-term detriment of America's great-power rivals,
China and the Soviet Union.
Current foreign aid programs are failing because they are based
upon flawed assumptions about how countries develop. They attempt
to achieve development without first achieving good governance and
security, which are essential prerequisites for sustainable
development. In focusing on the poorer members of society, they
neglect the elites upon whose leadership the quality of governance
and security depends. By downplaying the relevance of cultural
factors to development, they avoid altering cultural
characteristics that account for most of the weaknesses of elites
in poor nations. Drawing on a wealth of examples from around the
world, the author shows that foreign aid can be made much more
effective by focusing it on human capital development. Training,
education, and other forms of assistance can confer both skills and
cultural attributes on current and future leaders, especially those
responsible for security and governance.
Drawing on a wealth of new evidence from all sides, Triumph
Forsaken, first published in 2007, overturns most of the historical
orthodoxy on the Vietnam War. Through the analysis of international
perceptions and power, it shows that South Vietnam was a vital
interest of the United States. The book provides many insights into
the overthrow of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem in 1963
and demonstrates that the coup negated the South Vietnamese
government's tremendous, and hitherto unappreciated, military and
political gains between 1954 and 1963. After Diem's assassination,
President Lyndon Johnson had at his disposal several aggressive
policy options that could have enabled South Vietnam to continue
the war without a massive US troop infusion, but he ruled out these
options because of faulty assumptions and inadequate intelligence,
making such an infusion the only means of saving the country.
Drawing on a wealth of new evidence from all sides, Triumph
Forsaken, first published in 2007, overturns most of the historical
orthodoxy on the Vietnam War. Through the analysis of international
perceptions and power, it shows that South Vietnam was a vital
interest of the United States. The book provides many insights into
the overthrow of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem in 1963
and demonstrates that the coup negated the South Vietnamese
government's tremendous, and hitherto unappreciated, military and
political gains between 1954 and 1963. After Diem's assassination,
President Lyndon Johnson had at his disposal several aggressive
policy options that could have enabled South Vietnam to continue
the war without a massive US troop infusion, but he ruled out these
options because of faulty assumptions and inadequate intelligence,
making such an infusion the only means of saving the country.
This study explodes prevailing myths about the Phoenix Program, the
CIA's top-secret effort to destroy the Viet Cong by neutralizing
its "civilian" leaders. Drawing on recently declassified documents
and interviews with American, South Vietnamese, and North
Vietnamese sources, Mark Moyar examines the attempts to eradicate
the Viet Cong infrastructure and analyzes their effectiveness. He
addresses misconceptions about these efforts and provides an
accurate, complete picture of the allies' decapitation of the Viet
Cong shadow government. Combining social and political history with
a study of military operations, Moyar offers a fresh interpretation
of the crucial role the shadow government played in the Viet Cong's
ascent. Detailed accounts of intelligence operations provide an
insider's view of their development and reveal what really happened
in the safe havens of the Viet Cong. Filled with new information,
Moyar's study sets the record straight about one of the last
secrets of the Vietnam War and offers poignant lessons for dealing
with future Third World insurgencies. This Bison Books edition
includes a new preface and chapter by the author.
Oppose Any Foe is the epic story of America's most elite warriors:
the Special Operations Forces. Born as small appendages to the
conventional armies of World War II, the Special Operations Forces
have grown into a behemoth of 70,000 troops, including Navy SEALs,
Army Special Forces, Air Force Night Stalkers, Special Operations
Marines, Rangers, and Delta Force. Weaving together their triumphs
and tribulations, acclaimed historian Mark Moyar introduces a
colorful cast of military men, brimming with exceptional talent,
courage and selflessness. In a nation where the military is the
most popular institution, America's Special Operations Forces have
become the most popular members of the military. Through nighttime
raids on enemy compounds and combat advising of resistance
movements, special operators have etched their names into the
nation's registry of heroes. Yet the public knows little of the
journey that they took to reach these heights, a journey that was
neither easy nor glamorous. Fighting an uphill battle for most of
their seventy-five year history, the Special Operations Forces
slipped on many an occasion, and fell far on several. Presidents
from Franklin Roosevelt to Barack Obama have enthusiastically
championed Special Operations Forces, but their enthusiasm has
often surpassed their understanding, resulting in misuse or overuse
of the troops. Lacking clearly defined missions, Special Operations
Forces have had to reinvent themselves time and again to prove
their value in the face of fierce critics-many of them from the
conventional military, which from the start opposed the segregation
of talent in special units. Highlighting both the heroism of
America's most elite soldiers and the controversies surrounding
their meteoric growth, Oppose Any Foe presents the first
comprehensive history of these special warriors and their daring
missions. It is essential reading for anyone interested in
America's military history-and the future of warfare.
Current foreign aid programs are failing because they are based
upon flawed assumptions about how countries develop. They attempt
to achieve development without first achieving good governance and
security, which are essential prerequisites for sustainable
development. In focusing on the poorer members of society, they
neglect the elites upon whose leadership the quality of governance
and security depends. By downplaying the relevance of cultural
factors to development, they avoid altering cultural
characteristics that account for most of the weaknesses of elites
in poor nations. Drawing on a wealth of examples from around the
world, the author shows that foreign aid can be made much more
effective by focusing it on human capital development. Training,
education, and other forms of assistance can confer both skills and
cultural attributes on current and future leaders, especially those
responsible for security and governance.
An argument for a dramatically different approach to
counterinsurgency, based on a reinterpretation of the nature of
counterinsurgency warfare. According to the prevailing view of
counterinsurgency, the key to defeating insurgents is selecting
methods that will win the people's hearts and minds. The
hearts-and-minds theory permeates not only most counterinsurgency
books of the twenty-first century but the U.S. Army/Marine Corps
Counterinsurgency Field Manual, the U.S. military's foremost text
on counterinsurgency. Mark Moyar assails this conventional wisdom,
asserting that the key to counterinsurgency is selecting commanders
who have superior leadership abilities. Whereas the
hearts-and-minds school recommends allocating much labor and
treasure to economic, social, and political reforms, Moyar
advocates concentrating resources on security, civil
administration, and leadership development. Moyar presents a
wide-ranging history of counterinsurgency, from the Civil War and
Reconstruction to Afghanistan and Iraq, that draws on the
historical record and interviews with hundreds of counterinsurgency
veterans, including top leaders in today's armed forces. Through a
series of case studies, Moyar identifies the ten critical
attributes of counterinsurgency leadership and reveals why these
attributes have been much more prevalent in some organizations than
others. He explains how the U.S. military and America's allies in
Afghanistan and Iraq should revamp their personnel systems in order
to elevate more individuals with those attributes. A Question of
Command will reshape the study and practice of counterinsurgency
warfare. With counterinsurgency now one of the most pressing issues
facing the United States, this book is a must-read for
policymakers, military officers, and citizens.
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