Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #173102 in Books
• Published on: 2001-04-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 235 pages

Synopsis
Jonathan Neale provides a vivid ground-view account of the Vietnam War explaining why the Americans went in, why the Vietnamese fought until the end, and what the legacy has been for both sides in the decades since. He draws a clear distinction between the goals and actions of the American government and the motivations and experiences of what were mostly working-class troops. The result is a fascinating and moving account of a war which profoundly changed the nature of US domestic and international politics and shaped the political consciousness of a generation of activists.

Customer Reviews

How it was for those who fought it
Examine every Hollywood film ever released about the American war, every column ever written in every major western newspaper ,every documentary ever composed and see what they all have in common. Some will view the war as right but see it as a mistake, either a poor assessment of the risks by the US government or a failing of the press to fulfill their 'civic duty', usually the latter. The second group is much larger but equally unrepresentative of the markets they claim to serve. They also view the war as a mistake and believe that the motivations for war were honorable but view this instance as being pragmatically unsuitable. What both groups have in common is their depiction of the root causes of the thousands of war crimes committed by US forces in South East Asia as being the fault of 'bad apples,' psychopathic rank and file soldiers who brought out the evil that exists in all of us.

Neill sets out to destroy both politically correct discourses and does so with precise impunity. He first of all points out that before the January68 the entire commercial press reported the Vietnam war exactly as the generals desired. A response to the thuggish brutality of the communist north to destroy the freedoms of the helpless but grateful peasants of the south. January68 was the month of the Tet offensive when the Viet Cong stormed every major city in South Vietnam, shattering the lies of the US army press releases of a Vietcong on the retreat.

This does not mean as would often be assumed that he is uncritical of the Vietcong. He rightly attributes the defeat of the Vietcong as being down to the deeply flawed politics of the leadership. They couldn't organize among the urban working class in the south. All working class organizations had been banned in the USSR backed north. To convince the Vietcong to build working class organizations would have undermined their own dictatorship. So there was no proletarian insurrection to join the peasant guerrillas and the war dragged on for another 7 years with no decisive outcomes.

The atrocities committed by US troops are also put in their right context. Yes there were those among them who enjoyed violence, but he shows why in this situation their behaviour encouraged by such compulsory practices as cutting of the ears of those who had been killed. It was also made clear by the generals that shooting civilians to fulfill body count targets set by the white house would be rewarded.

He also shows that after the Tet Offensive 80% or more of US citizens have consistently viewed the war as 'fundamentally wrong' and not as a mere mistake. The analyses and facts of this book offer an extremely rare insight into the brutal war and put it firmly in its context.