http://facultystaff.richmond.edu/~ebolt/history398/People%27sWarAndTranVanTra%20.html
Vietnam War Bibliography by Richard Jensen 2016
Vietnam War Bibliography
by Richard Jensen Jensen is a scholar with many books and articles; he was professor of history for over 35 years at several schools, including the University of Illinois, Harvard, Michigan, West Point, and Moscow State University. Write him at rjensen@uic.edu
US Dept of State, Foreign Relations of the United States 1964-1968. Vietnam (5 vol 1992-2002) recommended The single richest collection of source materials, with complete text of major documents; online at
US State Department documentsForeign Relations of US series, 1958-68; complete text of 21 other volumes of the FRUS series of documents; very comprehensive (excludes many CIA sources)
"The Meaning of Tet" by Victor Davis Hanson, American Heritage (2001) A historian argues that in Vietnam America’s cause was just, its arms effective, and its efforts undermined by critics back home— and that this is how things must work in a free society
See www.amazon.com for more details, reviews, and occasional tables of contents or first chapters
Part 2: Printed Resources
Overviews and Reference
Anderson, David L. Columbia Guide to the Vietnam War (2002)
Mitchell K. Hall, The Vietnam War (2007) 168 pages; short survey
Public Affairs: The Military and the Media, 1968-1973
(1995). Continuation; full-scale history of the war by U.S. Army; much broader than title suggests. Recommended May be located in Government Documents division of library.
Herring, George C. America's Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950-1975 (4th ed 2001), best short history. recommended
Kelley, Michael P., Where We Were in Vietnam: A Comprehensive Guide to the Firebases, Military Installations and Naval Vessels of the Vietnam War, 1945-1975 (2002) useful geographical guide to 10,000 locations
Kolko, Gabriel. Anatomy of a War (1985), major synthesis; best of the pro-Hanoi histories.
Kutler, Stanley ed. Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War (1996) along with Tucker, the best scholarly guide reference to the war. recommended
Lewy, Guenter. America in Vietnam (1978), defends US actions
Moise, Edwin E. , Historical Dictionary of the Vietnam War (2002)
Morrison, Wilbur H. The Elephant and the Tiger: The Full Story of the Vietnam War (1990)
Moss, George D. Vietnam (4th ed 2002) excellent textbook
Moyar, Mark. Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War, 1954-1965, (Cambridge University Press; 412 pages; 2006). A revisionist history that challenges the notion that U.S. involvement in Vietnam was misguided; defends the validity of the domino theory and disputes the notion that Ho Chi Minh was, at heart, a nationalist who would eventually turn against his Communist Chinese allies.
Palmer, Bruce. The Twenty-Five Year War (1984), basic military history
Schlight, John ed. Second Indochina War Symposium (GPO 1986). penetrating essays
Schulzinger, Robert D. A Time for War: The United States and Vietnam, 1941-1975 (1997). Good overview. recommended
Spector, Ronald. After Tet: The Bloodiest Year in Vietnam (1992), very broad coverage of 1968
Tucker, Spencer. ed. Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War (1998) Excellent 3 vol. reference set; also one-volume abridgement (2001); along with Kutler, the best scholarly reference book on the war. recommended
"The War in Vietnam: A Multimedia Chronicle from CBS News and the New York Times" (1995). isbn = 1-57595-005-7. Excellent cd-rom (hard to find--try www.ebay.com ); includes 2,170 NY Times reports, 40 CBS film clips, excerpts from Pentagon Papers, and much more. full review
Vlastos, Stephen. "Television Wars: Representations of the Vietnam War in Television Documentaries," Radical History Review 36 (1986): 115-132.
Air Power, Navy
Burdick, Frank A. "The Christmas Bombing of North Vietnam: The Limitations of Force. Journal of Political & Military Sociology (1984) 12: 213-228. argues Linebacker II did not win the peace.
Littauer, Raphael and Normal Uphoff, eds. The Air War in Indochina (1972), detailed semitechnical reports & statistics
Meilinger, Phillip S. The Paths of Heaven: The Evolution of Airpower Theory. (Air University Press, 1997)
Marolda, Edward J. By Sea, Air, and Land: An Illustrated History, of the U.S. Navy and the War in Southeast Asia (1992)
Marolda, Edward J. and Oscar P. Fitzgerald. The United States Navy and the Vietnam Conflict. Vol. 2, From Military Assistance to Combat, 1959-1965 (1986.) official history
Mersky, Peter B. and Norman Polmar. The Naval Air War in Vietnam (1981)
Michel, Marshall. Clashes: Air Combat over North Vietnam 1965-1972 (1997);
Milne, David, "Our equivalent of guerrilla warfare: Walt Rostow and the Bombing of North Vietnam, 1961-1968," Journal of Military History, 71 (Jan. 2007), 169–203.
Momyer, William W. Airpower in Three Wars (GPO, 1979)
Mrozek, Donald J. Air Power and the Ground War in Vietnam: Ideas and Actions. (Air University Press, 1988).
Office of U.S. Air Force History. The United States Air Force in Southeast Asia, 1961-1973 (GPO, 1986) excellent official history.
Pape, Robert A. Jr. "Coercive Air Power in the Vietnam War." International Security (1990) 15: 103-46, good analysis; reprinted in his book, Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (1996)
Sbrega, John J, "Southeast Asia." in Benjamin Franklin Cooling ed. Case Studies in the Development of Close Air Support (GPO, 1990) 411-90.
Schlight, John. The War in South Vietnam, The Years of the Offensive, 1965—1968. The United States Air Force in Southeast Asia. [1988) excellent Air Force official history
Thompson, James Clay. Rolling Thunder (1980)
Tilford, Earl H. Jr. Crosswinds: The Air Force's Setup in Vietnam (1993)
Tucker, Spencer. ed. Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War (1998)
Bergerud, Eric M. Red Thunder, Tropic Lightning: The World of a Combat Division in Vietnam (1993). Excellent descriptions and recollections; good teaching resource.
Cable, Larry E. Conflict of Myths: The Development of American Counterinsurgency Doctrine and the Vietnam War (1986)
Carland, John M., Stemming the Tide: Combat Operations May 1965 to October 1966 (2000) CMH Pub. 91-5-1. excellent official Army history
Davidson, Phillip B. Vietnam at War: The History, 1946-1975 (1988), good military history; strong on Giap's strategy
Matthews, Lloyd J. and Dale E. Brown. eds. Assessing the Vietnam War (1987), good collection of military perspectives
Moore, Harold G. and Joseph Galloway. We Were Soldiers Once...And Young: Ia Drang--The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam (1993) narrative of first major American battle; basis of movie
Palmer, Bruce. The 25-Year War: America's Military Role in Vietnam (1984), good critique by top general
Savage, Paul L. and Richard A. Gabriel. "Cohesion and Disintegration in the American Army." Armed Forces and Society 2 (May 1976): 340-76, controversial article exaggerated the breakdown
Sharp U. S. G. and W. C. Westmoreland. Report on the War in Vietnam (as of 30 June 1968) (1968) official report by top commanders.
Sorley, Lewis. Thunderbolt: General Creighton Abrams and the Army of His Times (1992) very good biography
Stanton, Shelby L. The Rise and Fall of an American Army: U.S. Ground Forces in Vietnam, 1965-1973 (1985), excellent military history, best on actual combat operations
Hunt, Michael, and Niu Jun, eds. Towards a History of Chinese Communist Foreign Relations, 1920s-1960s: Personalities and Interpretive Approaches (1995)
Garson, Robert. "Lyndon B. Johnson and the China Enigma," Journal of Contemporary History, {1997), 32: 63-79
Jian, Chen. "China's Involvement in the Vietnam War, 1964-1969," China Quarterly (1995), 142: 357-387. Military support 1962-69 designed mostly to try to counter Moscow's influence.
Lawson, Eugene K. The Sino-Vietnamese Conflict (1984)
Zhai, Qiang. "Transplanting the Chinese Model: Chinese Military Advisers and the First Vietnam War, 1950-1954." Journal of Military History (1993) 57: 689-715. Chinese strategists planned and often commanded in the war.
Zhai, Qiang. "Opposing Negotiations: China and the Vietnam Peace Talks, 1965-1968," Pacific Historical Review, 68 (Feb 1999) 21+. Fearing the USSR and trying to maximize its influence over NVN, China opposed peace talks. Online at Infotrac.
Ethics, Legality
Buzzanco, Robert. "The American Military's Rationale Against the Vietnam War." Political Science Quarterly 101 (1986): 559-76.
Falk, Richard. The Vietnam War and International Law (4v, 1969-1976) by prominent dove
Chatterji, Subarno. Memories of a Lost War: American Poetic Responses to the Vietnam War (2001)
Coonts, Stephen. Flight of the Intruder (1986) Navy pilot
Del Vecchio, John. The Thirteenth Valley (1982), combat novel
Dinh, Linh, ed. Night, Again: Contemporary Fiction from Vietnam (1996) translations of 13 short stories reviews
Ehrhart, W. D. ed. Carrying the Darkness: American Indochina: The Poetry of the Vietnam War (1985), anthology of poems
Greenberg, Martin, and Augustus Richard Norton eds. Touring Nam: The Vietnam War Reader (1985), short stories
Hillstron, Kevin and Laurie Collier Hillstrom, The Vietnam Experience: A Concise Encyclopedia of American Literature, Songs and Film (1998); 44 scholarly essays
Huong, Duong Thu. Novel Without a Name (1996), about disenchanted North Vietnamese soldier. reviews
Lomperis, Timothy J. "Reading the Wind": The Literature of the Vietnam War (1987).
Ringnalda, Donald. "Fighting and Writing: America's Vietnam War Literature." Journal of American Studies 22 (1988): 25-42
Adair, Gilbert. Hollywood's Vietnam: From the Green Berets to Full Metal Jacket (1989)
Anderegg, Michael, ed. Inventing Vietnam: The War in Film and Television (1991)
Anderson, Terry H. "Amerian Popular Music and the War in Vietnam," Peace and Change 11 (Sp 1986): 51-65; rock and folk were dovish, while country music was hawkish
Julia Bleakney, Revisiting Vietnam: Memoirs, Memorials, Museums (2006) 220 pp
Denisoff, R. Serge, and Richard A. Peterson, eds. The Sounds of Social Change (1972).
Devine, Jeremy M. Vietnam at 24 Frames a Second: A Critical and Thematic Analysis of over 400 Films about the Vietnam War (1999)
Dittmar, Linda, and Gene Michaud. From Hanoi to Hollywood: The Vietnam War in American Film (1990)
Hellmann, John. American Myth and the Legacy of Vietnam (1986)
Herzog, Tobey C. Vietnam War Stories: Innocence Lost (1992), reader's guide to genre of war novels
Hillstron, Kevin and Laurie Collier Hillstrom, The Vietnam Experience: A Concise Encyclopedia of American Literature, Songs and Film (1998); 44 scholarly essays
Jeffords, Susan. The Remasculinaztion of America: Gender and the Vietnam War (1989). Images of war reveal patriarchal values and the primacy of gender, rather than class or race.
Johannessen, Larry R. Illumination Rounds: Teaching the Literature of the Vietnam War (1992)
Just, Ward, ed. Reporting Vietnam: American Journalism 1959-1975 (2000). Library of America 2 vol anthology of reporting; recommended
McAdams, Frank The American War Film : History and Hollywood (2002)
Martin, Andrew. Receptions of War: Vietnam in American Culture (1993) re films, novels, TV.
Myers, Thomas. Walking Point: American Narratives of Vietnam (1988)
Reyes, Adelaida. Songs of the Caged, Songs of the Free: Music and the Vietnamese Refugee Experience (1999) Review & Table of Contents
Walsh, Jeffrey, and James Aulich, eds. Vietnam Images: War and Representation (1989)
Home Front, Public Opinion, Peace Movements
Baritz, Loren. Backfire: A History of How American Culture Led Us Into Vietnam and Made Us Fight the Way We Did (1985). High tech approach led to misunderstanding of pre-tech peasants.
Garfinkle, Adam. Telltale Hearts: The Origins and Impacts of the Vietnam Antiwar Movement (1995), protesters prolonged the war and had lasting impact on American attitudes.
Gartner, Scott S. ; Gary M. Segura; and Michael Wilkening, "All Politics Are Local: Local Losses and Individual Attitudes Towards the Vietnam War," Journal of Conflict Resolution, 41 (1997), 669-94. Statistical study of California public opinion toward war. Online at Infotrac.
Gustainis, J. Justin. American Rhetoric and the Vietnam War (1993)
Hallin, Daniel. "The Media, the War in Vietnam, and Political Support: A Critique of the Thesis of an Oppositional Media," Journal of Politics 46 (1984) 2-24.
Heineman, Kenneth. "The Silent Majority Speaks: Antiwar Protest and Backlash, 1965-1972," Peace & Change 17 (1992): 402-433.
Katz, Andrew Z. "Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: The Nixon Administration and the Pursuit of Peace with Honor in Vietnam.," Presidential Studies Quarterly, (1997) 27: 496-513. Online at Infotrac.
Mueller, John. War, Presidents, and Public Opinion (1973), good starting point.
Page, Benjamin I., and Richard A. Brody. "Policy Voting and the Electoral Process: The Vietnam War Issue," American Political Science Review (1972) 66: 979-95.
Tomes, Robert R. Apocalypse Then: American Intellectuals and the Vietnam War, 1954-1975 (1998)
Verba, Sidney, Richard A. Brody, Edwin P. Parker, Norman H. Nie, Nelson W. Polsby, Paul Ekman, and Gordon S. Black. "Public Opinion and the War in Vietnam," American Political Science Review (1967) 61: 317-33.
Rorabaugh, William J. Berkeley at War, the 1960s (1989)
Guan, Ang Cheng. "Decision-making Leading to the Tet Offensive (1968) - The Vietnamese Communist Perspective," 33 Journal of Contemporary History, (July 1998) 341-52. Examines factional disputes in Hanoi. Online at Infotrac.
Kolko, Gabriel. Anatomy of a War (1985), major history; pro-Ho
Kolko, Gabriel. Vietnam: Anatomy of a Peace (1997), the Communists won the war but their incompetence means they have lost the peace.
Lanning, Michael Lee and Cragg, Dan. Inside the VC and the NVA: The Real Story of North Vietnam's Armed Forces (1992), solid study based on RAND reports.
McCoy, J. W. Secrets of the Viet Cong (1992), good semitechnical descriptions of PAVN and Viet Cong techniques and organization
Merli, M. Giovanna. "Socioeconomic Background and War Mortality During Vietnam's Wars," Demography, (2000) 37: 1-22
For North Vietnamese, explores socioeconomic status and war mortality. Data obtained from retrospective information on kin survival and other socioeconomic characteristics given by respondents in the 1995 Vietnam Longitudinal Survey conducted in Vietnam. Findings are opposite to those often cited to describe the experience of young Americans who fought in the Vietnam war. In Vietnam, sons of better-educated fathers bore the burden of war disproportionately in relation to sons of fathers with less education, both in proportion serving in the military and in diminished survival chances in combat. The Vietnamese experience testifies to the ability of a nation to reorder society temporarily and to persuade higher-status groups to contribute fully to the war effort.
Military History Institute of Vietnam, Victory in Vietnam: The Official History of the People's Army of Vietnam, 1954 1975 (2002), Hanoi's official history, translated by M L Pribbenow This detailed account describes the ebb and flow of the war as seen from Hanoi. It discloses particularly difficult times in the PAVN's struggle: 1955 59, when Diem almost destroyed the Communist movement in the South; 1961 62, when American helicopter assaults and M-113 armored personnel carriers inflicted serious losses on their forces; and 1966, when U.S. troop strength and air power increased dramatically. It also elaborates on the role of the Ho Chi Minh Trail in the Communist effort, confirming its crucial importance and telling how the United States came close to shutting the supply line down on several occasions. The book confirms the extent to which the North orchestrated events in the South and also reveals much about Communist infiltration--accompanied by statistics--from 1959 until the end of the war. While many Americans believed that North Vietnam only began sending regular units south after the U.S. commitment of ground forces in 1965, this account reveals that by the time Marines landed in Da Nang in April 1965 there were already at least four North Vietnamese regiments in the South.
Van Dyke, Jon M. North Vietnam's Strategy for Survival (1972), coping with air raids
Victory in Vietnam: The Official History of the People's Army of Vietnam, 1954--1975: The Military History Institute of Vietnam (2002); Hanoi's offical history
Origins
Anderson, David. "Why Vietnam? Postrevisionist Answers and a Neorealist Suggestion." Diplomatic History 13 (1989): 419-29
Bradley, Mark. "Imagining America: The United States in Radical Vietnamese Anticolonial Discourse," Journal of American-East Asian Relations 4 (1995) 299-329. From late 19th century to 1940s anti-French discourse often used referred to American Revolution.
Neese, Harvey, and John O'Donnell, eds. Prelude to Tragedy: Vietnam, 1960-1965 (2000), stresses success of counter-insurgency programs in Malaya and the Philippines.
Short, Anthony. Origins of the Vietnam War (1989), fair-handed treatment of many governments; focus on 1954
Showalter, Dennis E. "Dien Bien Phu in Three Cultures," War & Society 16 (1998) 93-108.
Smith, R. B. The International History of the Vietnam War (3 vol, 1983, 1985, 1991), stresses Soviet & Cinese role, to 1965
Spector, Ronald H. Advice and Support: The Early Years of the U.S. Army in Vietnam, 1941-1960 (1983), thorough & balanced
Personal Accounts, Reporting
Unit after-action and other official reports:
Archives II Textual Reference Branch
National Archives and Records Administration
8601 Adelphi Road
College Park, MD 20740-6001 (301)-713-7250
Lewis, Lloyd B. The Tainted War: Culture and Identity in the Vietnam War Narratives (1985)
Loeb, Jeff. "MIA: African American Autobiography of the Vietnam War," African American Review 31 (1997) 105-123.
McCain, John. Faith of My Fathers: A Family Memoir (1999) the Senator was a POW
Marshall, Kathryn. In the Combat Zone: An Oral History of American Women in Vietnam, 1966-1975 (1987)
McDonough, James. Platoon Leader (1985), Army combat 1970
Myers, Thomas. Walking Point: American Narratives of Vietnam (1988)
Newman, Robert S. "Objectivity and Subjectivities: Oral Narratives from Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam," Oral History Review 21 (1993): 89-97. Focus on refugees.
Prochnau, William. Once Upon a Distant War (1995) Read Chapter 1
Prescott, Renate W. "The Vietnam War and the Teaching and Writing of Oral History: The Reliability of the Narrator," The Oral History Review (1999) 26#2p p47+ online at Infotrac
Reporting Vietnam: American Journalism 1959-1969, 1969-1975 (2v 1998, Library of America edition) Table of Contents vol 1
Santoli, Al. To Bear Any Burden (1985), right war fought wrong way, according to interviews with Americans and Vietnamese
Tang, Truong Nhu. A Vietcong Memoir (1985), very revealing account by senior NLF official; shows NLF atrocities, use of US antiwar movement, collapse of NLF after Tet
Terry, Wallace, ed. Bloods: An Oral History of the Vietnam War by Black Veterans (1984)
Tomes, Robert R. Apocalypse Then: American Intellectuals and the Vietnam War, 1954-1975 (1998)
Barrett, David M ed. Lyndon B. Johnson's Vietnam Papers: A Documentary Collection (1997)
Bowman, John S. ed. The World Almanac of the Vietnam War (1985), detailed chronology; much on air, land, sea & guerrilla campaigns.
Divine, Robert A. "Vietnam Reconsidered." Diplomatic History 12 (Win 1988): 79-93. Historiography.
Duiker, William J. Historical Dictionary of Vietnam (1998 2nd ed)
Hess, Gary R. "The Unending Debate: Historians and the Vietnam War." Diplomatic History 18 (Sp 1994): 239-64. very convenient overview of scholarship. Identifies Clausewitzians, who hold that civilians sent the military to fight the wrong war; the "hearts and minders," who conclude that pacification was underutilized; and "legitimacists," who believe the US had a moral duty to intervene. A neo-orthodox school focuses on the home front.
Kutler, Stanley ed. Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War (1996) along with Tucker, best single reference on war.
McMahon, Robert J. "The Cold War in Asia: Toward a New Synthesis?" Diplomatic History 12 (summer 1988): 307-27.
Keylin, Arleen and Suri Boiangiu eds. , Front Page Vietnam (1979), replicas of 150 front pages of New York Times, 1950-79.
Olson, James S. ed. Dictionary of the Vietnam War (1988), many short entries; bibliographies
Olson, James S. ed. The Vietnam War: Handbook of Literature and Research (1993) comprehensive guide
Page, Tim and John Pimlott eds. Nam: The Vietnam Experience 1965-75 (1988), lavishly illustrated, detailed guide to combat & noncombat roles of US forces, written by participants
Pentagon Papers, several editions available, the best is The Pentagon Papers: The Defense Department History of United States Decisionmaking on Vietnam(Beacon Press, 1971) = the 4 vol Gravel edition (vol 5 = index). This was a major history, with many original documents, written by the Defense Department in 1968, and leaked to the New York Times in 1971. Note that Neil Sheehan, et al The Pentagon Papers (1971) includes only a few of the documents and replaces the Pentagon history with a new text written by NY Times reporters.
see Moise's comments Excerpts from Pentagon Papers
Tucker, Spencer. ed. Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War (1998) Excellent 3 vol. reference set; also one-volume abridgement (2000); along with Kutler, the best scholarly reference book on the war. recommended
US Dept of State, Foreign Relations of the United States 1964-1968. Vietnam (4 vol 1992-98) The single richest collection of source materials, with complete text of major documents; online at
Appy, Christian. Working-Class War: American Combat Soldiers and Vietnam (1993), exaggerates class dimension by ignoring officers.
Baskir, Lawrence M. and WIlliam Strauss. Chance and Circumstance (1978), how draft worked
Bergerud, Eric M. Red Thunder, Tropic Lightning: The World of a Combat Division in Vietnam (1994) detailed descriptions and recollections
Bonior, David E. The Vietnam Veteran: A History of Neglect (1984), neglected by older veterans
Camp, Norman M. et al. Stress, Strain, and Vietnam: An Annotated Bibliography of Two Decades of Psychiatric and Social Sciences Literature Reflecting the Effect of the War on the American Soldier (1988)
Curry, G. David. Sunshine Patriots: Punishment and the Vietnam Offender (1985), disciplinary disasters
Dean, Eric T., Jr. Shook Over Hell: Post-Traumatic Stress, Vietnam, and the Civil War (1997), downplays PTSD for Viet vets.
Egendorf, Arthur, et al. Legacies of Vietnam: Comparative Adjustments of Veterans and their Peers (1981)
Hardaway, Robert. Care of the Wounded in Vietnam (1988), technical essays
Gartner, Scott Sigmund. "Differing Evaluations of Vietnamization," The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 29 (Aut 1998) 243-62. Online at Infotrac. Quantitative study showing military success of policy.
Herring, George C. "`Peoples Quite Apart': Americans, South Vietnamese, and the War in Vietnam." Diplomatic History 14 (1990): 1-24, on intercultural relations
Hirschman, Charles, Samuel Preston, and Vu Manh Loi, "Vietnamese Casualties during the American War: A New Estimate," Population and Development Review, 21 (Dec 1995), pp. 783-812. Demographers estimate one million excess civilian and military deaths (plus or minus 175,000). Online at www.northernlight.com
Hunt, Richard A. Pacification: The American Struggle for Vietnam's Hearts and Minds (1995); excellent research.
Jamieson, Neil L. Understanding Vietnam (1993), broad cultural history
Jespersen, Christopher T. "Kissinger, Ford, and Congress: The Very Bitter End in Vietnam" in Pacific Historical Review, Aug 2002, Vol. 71 #3, p439-74 online via EBSCO Host Argues that Ford's administration pursued a deliberate policy of denial to blame the loss of South Vietnam on the shoulders of the Congress. Estimates worth of military and economic assistance supplied to South Vietnam from 1972-1975; looks at SVN's dependency on the U.S. in spite of the Paris Peace Agreement; speculates on reasons behind the emphasis on military aid instead of humanitarian aid.
Lomperis, Timothy J. From People's War to People's Rule: Insurgency, Intervention, and the Lessons of Vietnam (1996)
Metzner, Edward P. More Than a Soldier's War: Pacification in Vietnam (1995)
Moyar, Mark. Phoenix and the Birds of Prey: The CIA's Secret Campaign to Destroy the Viet Cong (1997). >
Ford, Ronnie E. "Tet Revisited: The Strategy of the Communist Vietnamese," Intelligence And National Security 9 (1994): 242-286. Tries to explain why the expected popular uprising did not happen.
Gilbert, Marc Jason and William Head, eds. The Tet Offensive (1996)
Wirtz, James J. The Tet Offensive: Intelligence Failure in War (1991) excellent
Barclay, Glen St. John. A Very Small Insurance Policy: The Politics of Australian Involvment in Vietnam, 1954-1967 (1988)
Edwards, Peter. A Nation at War: Australian Politics, Society and Diplomacy During the Vietnam War 1965-1975 (1998) excellent; comprehensive. Shows the reaction of Australia to their involvement; shows how the initial support eroded; traces the protest movement against the war and conscription; decisions of successive governments to diplomatic pressures from USA and Indonesia; looks at alleged "water torture" incident and episodes involving conscientious objectors.
Murphy, John. Harvest of Fear: A History of Australia's Vietnam War (1994) online edition
Blackburn, Robert M. Mercenaries and Lyndon Johnson's 'More Flags': The Hiring of Korean, Filipino and Thai Soldiers in the Vietnam War (1994)
Glasser, Jeffrey D. The Secret Vietnam War: The United States Air Force in Thailand, 1961-1975 (1996)
Grey, Jeffrey and Jeff Doyle, eds. Vietnam War: Myth and Memory (1992).
Havens, Thomas R. H. Fire Across the Sea: The Vietnam War and Japan, 1965-1975 (1987)
Logevall, Frederik. Choosing War: The Lost Chance for Peace and the Escalation of War in Vietnam (1999); LBJ ignored European pleas. Read Chapter 1, 1963-64
Sarantakes, Nicholas. "In the Service of Pharaoh? The United States and the Deployment of Korean Troops in Vietnam, 1965-1968", Pacific Historical Review, 68 (Aug 1999) p425+; full text on Infotrac
Washington Perspective: Pentagon
Brower, Charles F. "Strategic Reassessment in Vietnam: The Westmoreland `Alternative Strategy' of 1967-1968," Naval War College Review 44 (Spring 1991) 20-51. LBJ rejected plan to win
Enthoven, Alain C. and K. Wayne Smith. How Much is Enough? Shaping the Defense Program 1961-1969 (1971) McNamara's Whiz Kids strut their statistics; little on Vietnam
Perry, Mark. Four Stars: The Inside Story of the Forty-Year Battle Between the Joint Chiefs of Staff and America's Civilian Leaders (1989).
Shapely, Deborah. Promise and Power: The Life and Times of Robert McNamara (1993), excellent biography. Reviews.
Sorley, Lewis. Honorable Warrior: General Harold K. Johnson and the Ethics of Command (1998)
Stuckey, John D. and Joseph H. Pistorius. "Mobilization for the Vietnam War: A Political and Military Catastrophe." Parameters 15 (1985): 26-38; LBJ's political and diplomatic fears blocked mobilization
Taylor, John M. General Maxwell Taylor: The Sword and the Pen (1989)
Anderson, David L. ed. Shadow on the White House: Presidents and the Vietnam War, 1945-1975 (1993), essays on each President
Arnold, Hugh M. "Official Justifications for America's Role in Indochina, 1949-1967," Asian Affairs (1975), 3:31-48, found 23 different themes for intervention
A Bitter Peace: Washington, Hanoi, and the Making of the Paris Agreement by Pierre Asselin (2002) Read Chapter 1 Argues the peace negotiations were not secondary to the ground and air wars. On the contrary, they dictated battlefield activities by both sides. All sides ignored the peace agreement once it had served certain immediate, cynical purposes. For Washington, those included the release of American prisoners, withdrawing from Vietnam without formally capitulating, and preserving American credibility in the Cold War; for Hanoi, they included the withdrawal of American forces, saving the socialist revolution in the North, and improving the prospects of reunification.
Berman, Larry. "Coming to Grips with Lyndon Johnson's War." Diplomatic History, 17 (Fall 1993) 519-38.
Berman, Larry. Lyndon Johnson's War (1989), good analysis online edition
Bird, Kai. The Color of Truth - McGeorge Bundy and William Bundy: Brothers in Arms. A Biography (1998) Read Chapter 1 on 1961
Bundy, William P. Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency (1998), highly critical scholarly study by top LBJ advisor. Read Chapter 1 on 1950s
Cohen, Warren I. and Nancy Bernkopf Tucker. Lyndon Johnson Confronts the World: American Foreign Policy, 1963-1968 (1994)
Dallek, Robert. Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973 (1998), best biography. Read Chapter 1 on LBJ as VP
DiLeo, David L. George Ball, Vietnam, and the Rethinking of Containment (1991), LBJ's outspoken dove; realism says stay out
Duiker, William J. U.S. Containment Policy and the Conflict in Vietnam (1994)
Ross A. Fisher, Robert F. Turner, and John Norton Moore. To Oppose Any Foe: The Legacy of U.S. Intervention in Vietnam 2006 - 618 pages
Gardner, Lloyd. Pay Any Price: Lyndon Johnson and the Wars for Vietnam (1995)
Joseph A. Fry, Debating Vietnam: Fulbright, Stennis, and Their Senate Hearings 2006 - 199pp
H.R. Haldeman, The Haldeman Diaries: Inside the Nixon White House (1994); a much more complete version, on CD-ROM, is The Haldeman Diaries: Inside the Nixon White House, the Complete Multimedia Edition (1994), often available via www.ebay.com
Herring, George. LBJ and Vietnam: A Different Kind of War (1994)
Isaacson, Walter. Kissinger (1992), good biography
Jacobs, Lawrence R. ; Robert Y. Shapiro, "Lyndon Johnson, Vietnam, and Public Opinion: Rethinking Realist Theory of Leadership," Presidential Studies Quarterly Sept 1999 29#3 p592+ available on INFOTRAC
The authors use primary archival records from Lyndon Johnson's presidency to rethink realist theory in international relations concerning leadership of public opinion in foreign policy. Much as the realists expect, Johnson pursued a strategy of opinion leadership that was intended to direct public opinion as he and his administration reacted to the country's international position. Using archival evidence and statistical analysis, the authors examine the relationship between public opinion information that was privately channeled to the White House and several measures of Johnson's behavior including presidential statements and military decisions about bombing and troop deployments. They find that Johnson was unresponsive to public opinion and also generally ineffective in directing public opinion. They conclude that realists' analysis of opinion leadership in representative democracies is inadequate and can lead to impractical prescriptions. What is needed is a theory of foreign policy making that incorporates the complexities of opinion leadership.
Kaiser, David E. American Tragedy: Kennedy, Johnson, and the Origins of the Vietnam War (2000).
Kimball, Jeffrey. Nixon's Vietnam War (1998), major study, harsh tone; argues Nixon pretended to be a madman to confuse his foes.
Campbell, Kenneth J. "Once Burned, Twice Cautious: Explaining the Weinberger-Powell Doctrine," Armed Forces and Society (1998) 24: 357-74.
Herring, George C. "Reflecting the Last War: The Persian Gulf and the "Vietnam Syndrome," Journal of Third World Studies (1993) 10: 37-51.
Kimball, Jeffrey P., "The Stab-in-the-back Legend and the Vietnam War," Armed Forces & Society 1988 14(3): 433-458.
Although associated with post-World War I Germany, the "stab-in-the-back" perspective is a common cultural response to defeat in war. An American, post-Vietnam War version maintains that the military could have won the war but for the activities of Democratic presidents, Congress, civilian strategists, the press, and antiwar protesters.
Nixon, Richard. No More Vietnams (1985), says US won the war but lost the peace in 1975 because of Congressional irresponsibility.
Serewicz, Lawrence W. America at the Brink of Empire: Rusk, Kissinger, and the Vietnam War. (LSU Press, 2007. xii, 233 pp. isbn 978-0-8071-3179-4.
Woods, Randall Bennett
"Dixie's Dove: J. William Fulbright, the Vietnam War, and the American South." Journal of Southern History 60 (Aug 1994): 533-52.
Fulbright: A Biography (1995)
Ziemke, Caroline F. "Senator Richard Russell and the 'Lost Cause' in Vietnam, 1954-1968," Georgia Historical Quarterly (1988) 72: 30-71. Powerful Senator who switched from dove to hawk
Copyright (c) 2015 Richard Jensen. This Guide was prepared with support from the National Endowment for Humanities, the Center for Global Partnership of the Japan Foundation, the University of Illinois, RPI, the Gilder-Lehrman Foundation, the Luce Foundation, and the Robert H. Michel Civic Education Grants sponsored by The Dirksen Congressional Center. Scholars are invited to post the complete Guide to campus WWW sites and distribute it to students.