Download or read book The Vietnamese National Military Academy and the Vi t Nam War written by D. A. M. NGUYEN and published by . This book was released on 2020-12-28 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This monograph outlines the history of the Vietnamese National Military Academy (VNMA) from 1948 to 1975. The new institution trained military cadres according to the standards of advanced armies in the world. The application of the 4-year program became supple because of the needs and conditions of the battlegrounds. The VNMA went through a challenging journey to keep up with the world-famous military schools like the U.S. Military Academy (1802); Ecole Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr (1802), and the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst (1812). Due to the unique circumstances of South Vietnam, the tasks of the VNMA were somewhat different and more complex than the other schools named above. That is, the VNMA must produce the military cadres to pursuing both national defense and nation-building endeavors. The history of VNMA was closely linked to the historical struggle of the Republic of Vietnam. After April 30, 1975, military researchers continued to investigate relevant issues and incidents to give answers to the ultimate question of whether the final collapse was inevitable or by taking different strategies that could make North Vietnam abandon its intention to invade South Vietnam? They are: 1. After the signing of the 1954 Peace Accord Treaty, the North Vietnamese still retained the war machine as in the first Indochina war. Since 1959, they had already explored the infiltration route to the South across Laos and Cambodia, known as the Hồ Chí Minh trail. 2. The Domino Theory, initiated by President Eisenhower in 1954 and followed through by both presidents Kennedy and Johnson, no longer had any geopolitical value under President Nixon. 3. The U.S. and South Vietnamese planners failed to interpret the strategy named the "General Offensive and General Uprising" developed by North Vietnamese leader Lê Duẩn since 1964. 4. The Tết Offensive of 1968, an utter military defeat for the Communist forces, turned out to be a psychological victory to them and a turning point of the Vietnam war. 5. The failure of Operation Lam Sơn 719 by the South Vietnamese forces in February 1971 in southern Laos. 6. The U.S. military forces, when landed in South Vietnam in 1965, did not have any clear objectives. The strategy of "Search and Destroy" - measured by body-count and kill-ratio - initiated by General Westmoreland in 1965 was not a strategy per se, but because there were no other strategies. 7. The "Vietnamization Plan" was, in fact, a clumsy label. The U.S. should have fully equipped the ARVN much earlier for them to fight their war. 8. The main drawback of the Paris Agreement in 1973 was that it allowed North Vietnamese troops to remain in the South after a ceasefire. 9. Throughout the war, the U.S. and Vietnamese governments failed to convince the international public opinion and especially in the United States, why Americans should have fought in Vietnam, and why the people of South Vietnam fought against the Communists? 10. The three closest reasons which led to the final collapse of South Vietnam were (1) the imperfect Agreement on Ending the War of 1973; (2) the untimely withdrawal and retrenchment of the South Vietnamese Army from the Military Regions 1 and 2; and (3) the fact that President Ford was not able to convince the U.S. Congress to aid South Vietnam to continue fighting. This book could be of good use by three primary readers: (1) the young Vietnamese generations who are not fluent in reading Vietnamese; (2) the Vietnamese-American military cadres in the U.S. Army who want to know more about the history of the Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces; and (3) scholars specializing in military history research around the world.
Download or read book The Army and Vietnam written by Andrew F. Krepinevich Jr. and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 1986-05-01 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many senior army officials still claim that if they had been given enough soldiers and weapons, the United States could have won the war in Vietnam. In this probing analysis of U.S. military policy in Vietnam, career army officer and strategist Andrew F. Krepinevich, Jr., argues that precisely because of this mindset the war was lost before it was fought. The army assumed that it could transplant to Indochina the operational methods that had been successful in the European battle theaters of World War II, an approach that proved ill-suited to the way the Vietnamese Communist forces fought. Theirs was a war of insurgency, and counterinsurgency, Krepinevich contends, requires light infantry formations, firepower restraint, and the resolution of political and social problems within the nation. To the very end, top military commanders refused to recognize this. Krepinevich documents the deep division not only between the American military and civilian leaders over the very nature of the war, but also within the U.S. Army itself. Through extensive research in declassified material and interviews with officers and men with battlefield experience, he shows that those engaged in the combat understood early on that they were involved in a different kind of conflict. Their reports and urgings were discounted by the generals, who pressed on with a conventional war that brought devastation but little success. A thorough analysis of the U.S. Army's role in the Vietnam War, The Army and Vietnam demonstrates with chilling persuasiveness the ways in which the army was unprepared to fight—lessons applicable to today's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Download or read book No Sure Victory written by Gregory A. Daddis and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conventional wisdom holds that the US Army in Vietnam, thrust into an unconventional war where occupying terrain was a meaningless measure of success, depended on body counts as its sole measure of military progress. In No Sure Victory, Army officer and historian Gregory Daddis looks far deeper into the Army's techniques for measuring military success and presents a much more complicated-and disturbing-account of the American misadventure in Indochina. Daddis shows how the US Army, which confronted an unfamiliar enemy and an even more unfamiliar form of warfare, adopted a massive, and eventually unmanageable, system of measurements and formulas to track the progress of military operations that ranged from pacification efforts to search-and-destroy missions. The Army's monthly "Measurement of Progress" reports covered innumerable aspects of the fighting in Vietnam-force ratios, Vietcong/North Vietnamese Army incidents, tactical air sorties, weapons losses, security of base areas and roads, population control, area control, and hamlet defenses. Concentrating more on data collection and less on data analysis, these indiscriminate attempts to gauge success may actually have hindered the army's ability to evaluate the true outcome of the fight at hand--a roadblock that Daddis believes significantly contributed to the many failures that American forces suffered in Vietnam. Filled with incisive analysis and rich historical detail, No Sure Victory is not only a valuable case study in unconventional warfare, but a cautionary tale that offers important perspectives on how to measure performance in current and future armed conflict. Given America's ongoing counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, No Sure Victory provides valuable historical perspective on how to measure--and mismeasure--military success.
Download or read book The Battle of Ap Bac Vietnam written by David M. Toczek and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2001-04-30 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Toczek provides the first description of the entire battle of Ap Bac and places it in the larger context of the Vietnam War. The study thoroughly examines the January 1963 battle, complete with detailed supporting maps. Ironically, Ap Bac's great importance lies in American policymakers' perception of the battle as unimportant; for all their intelligence and drive, senior American government officials missed the early warning signs of a flawed policy in Southeast Asia by ignoring the lessons of the defeat of the South Vietnamese Army (ARVN) on 2 January 1963. The outcome of Ap Bac was a direct reflection of how the U.S. Army organized, equipped, and trained the ARVN. With all the ARVN officer corps's shortcomings, the South Vietnamese Army could not successfully conduct an American combined arms operations against a smaller, less well-equipped enemy. American leadership, both military and civilian, failed to draw any connection between ARVN's dismal performance and American policies toward South Vietnam. Although certain tactical changes resulted from the battle, the larger issue of American policy remained unchanged, including the structure of the advisory system.
Download or read book Public Affairs written by William M. Hammond and published by Government Printing Office. This book was released on 1988 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: United States Army in Vietnam. CMH Pub. 91-13. Draws upon previously unavailable Army and Defense Department records to interpret the part the press played during the Vietnam War. Discusses the roles of the following in the creation of information policy: Military Assistance Command's Office of Information in Saigon; White House; State Department; Defense Department; and the United States Embassy in Saigon.
Download or read book Avoiding Vietnam written by Conrad C. Crane and published by . This book was released on 2002 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As American operations against terrorism spread around the globe to places like Afghanistan and the Philippines, an increasing tendency has been for commentators to draw parallels with past experience in Vietnam. Even soldiers on the ground have begun to speak in such terms. The author analyzes the Army's response to that defeat in Southeast Asia and its long-term impact. Contrary to the accepted wisdom that nations which lose wars tend to learn best how to correct their mistakes, he argues that Americans tried to forget the unhappy experience with counterinsurgency by refocusing on conventional wars. While that process eventually produced the powerful force that won the Persian Gulf War, it left an Army with force structure, doctrine, and attitudes that are much less applicable to the peace operations and counterterrorism campaign it now faces. The author asserts that the Army must change in order to operate effectively in the full spectrum of future requirements, and it is time to reexamine the war in Vietnam. He also draws attention to the service's "Lessons Learned" process, and provides insights as to how the experience gained in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM should be analyzed and applied.
Download or read book Westmoreland written by Lewis Sorley and published by HMH. This book was released on 2011-10-11 with total page 437 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A terrific book, lively and brisk . . . a must read for anyone who tries to understand the Vietnam War.” —Thomas E. Ricks Is it possible that the riddle of America’s military failure in Vietnam has a one-word, one-man answer? Until we understand Gen. William Westmoreland, we will never know what went wrong in the Vietnam War. An Eagle Scout at fifteen, First Captain of his West Point class, Westmoreland fought in two wars and became Superintendent at West Point. Then he was chosen to lead the war effort in Vietnam for four crucial years. He proved a disaster. Unable to think creatively about unconventional warfare, Westmoreland chose an unavailing strategy, stuck to it in the face of all opposition, and stood accused of fudging the results when it mattered most. In this definitive portrait, prize-winning military historian Lewis Sorley makes a plausible case that the war could have been won were it not for General Westmoreland. An authoritative study offering tragic lessons crucial for the future of American leadership, Westmoreland is essential reading. “Eye-opening and sometimes maddening, Sorley’s Westmoreland is not to be missed.” —John Prados, author of Vietnam: The History of an Unwinnable War, 1945–1975
Download or read book Westmoreland s War written by Gregory Daddis and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2014 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This groundbreaking study offers a major reinterpretation of American strategy during the first half of the Vietnam War. Gregory A. Daddis argues senior military leaders developed a comprehensive campaign strategy, one not confined to 'attrition' of enemy forces. This innovative work is a must for a genuine understanding of the Vietnam War.
Download or read book Warriors and Fools written by Harry Rothmann and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2018-04-12 with total page 698 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Warriors and Fools is about the Vietnam War. It seeks to answer one specific question - why did the US fail to achieve its principal objective to defend South Vietnam from communist aggression? The story's findings and conclusions are neither orthodox nor revisionist. Those trying to gain insights on how American civilian leaders lost the war that its military could have won, or how the US Congress, Press, or Antiwar activists caused the US withdrawal and loss of the war will be disappointed. Rather, as this story explains, the answer of why America lost is more linked to human interactions and relationships than what should have been done or not done. For this story reveals that the interrelationship between American civilian and military leaders and advisors was extraordinarily divisive and dysfunctional. So much so that US leaders' decisions resulted in flawed, timid policies and foolish strategies that led to defeat. Moreover, that troublesome interrelationship was primarily a result of mistrusts, misunderstandings, and misperceptions on US leaders' and advisors' roles, responsibilities, and what they thought would lead to a positive end to the war. In addition, primarily because they were ignorant of their opponents' culture and history and overconfident from their past experiences, US civilian and military policymakers ignored or misunderstood their enemy. Indeed, the main North Vietnamese war leaders, whom most Americans did not even know were calling the shots on their pursuit of victory, were determined to end the war militarily, and most persistent in that goal. They also mislead and mystified US civilian and military leaders alike through a brilliant strategy relying on propaganda and ruse that fooled their opponents into believing that a diplomatic solution was possible. The story of how and why the US lost South Vietnam to the communists uses the most recently released documents from the US archives and Presidential taped conversations of the top-secret meetings and behind door conversations of the major American participants from Truman through the Nixon Administrations. It also utilizes the latest, ground breaking research and released documentation of the war from the Communist Vietnamese side of the conflict, Warriors and Fools delves deeply into the decision making, strategies, goals, and motives of the North Vietnam leaders as they waged their war for unification, first against the French and then against the Americans. The book further consults the memoirs, interviews, and oral histories of former South Vietnamese leaders and combatants to discover their views on their struggle to form a new nation free from communist aggression. It then compares the attitudes, desires, and objectives of these Vietnamese leaders to those of the Americans to makes some startling discoveries about what US leaders wanted to accomplish and what their Vietnamese counterparts, both in the North and South, prevented them from achieving. This book is both broad and deep in scope in its narration of the Vietnam War story. It takes the reader from the White House's oval office and Hanoi's Politburo room, to the Pentagon's and North Vietnam Army's command centers, to Vietnam's mountain and rice patty battlefields to show the courage, determination, foolhardiness, mistakes, and horrors of war from both sides. Warriors and Fools should be of interest to those who served in the war, and serious students and teachers of this event and period. It is not intended as light reading, or for someone trying to get just a brief understanding of what happened there and in America at the time.
Download or read book The Development and Training of the South Vietnamese Army 1950 1972 written by James Lawton Collins and published by . This book was released on 1975 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Avoiding Vietnam The U S Army s Response to Defeat in Southeast Asia written by and published by DIANE Publishing. This book was released on with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Rolling Thunder in a Gentle Land written by Andrew Wiest and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2013-05-20 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fifteen renowned authors from widely varied backgrounds examine the Vietnam War, providing a fresh insight into this controversial conflict, even for those who have 'read it all before'. First-hand accounts, maps and contemporary photographs, analysis from the soldiers involved and new perspectives from combatants on both sides provide an incisive investigation into a fascinating and terrible war.“This is a superb and compelling reexamination of the major historical, political, and ethical issues that continue to smoulder many decades after the conclusion of the Vietnam War, I highly recommend Rolling Thunder in a Gentle Land. It is among the best books of its kind that I've encountered over the last dozen years.” Tom O'Brien, author of The Things They Carried
Download or read book The Twenty five Year Century written by Quang Thi Lâm and published by University of North Texas Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For Victor Hugo, the nineteenth century could be remembered by only its first two years, which established peace in Europe and France's supremacy on the continent. For General Lam Quang Thi, the twentieth century had only twenty-five years: from 1950 to 1975, during which the Republic of Vietnam and its Army grew up and collapsed with the fall of Saigon. This is the story of those twenty-five years. General Thi fought in the Indochina War as a battery commander on the side of the French. When Viet Minh aggression began after the Geneva Accords, he served in the nascent Vietnamese National Army, and his career covers this army's entire lifespan. He was deputy commander of the 7th Infantry Division, and in 1965 he assumed command of the 9th Infantry Division. In 1966, at the age of thirty-three, he became one of the youngest generals in the Vietnamese Army. He participated in the Tet Offensive before being removed from the front lines for political reasons. When North Vietnam launched the 1972 Great Offensive, he was brought back to the field and eventually promoted to commander of an Army Corps Task Force along the Demilitarized Zone. With the fall of Saigon, he left Vietnam and emigrated to the United States. Like his tactics during battle, General Thi pulls no punches in his denunciation of the various regimes of the Republic, and complacency and arrogance toward Vietnam in the policies of both France and the United States. Without lapsing into bitterness, this is finally a tribute to the soldiers who fell on behalf of a good cause.
Download or read book The Vietnam War Vietnamese and American Perspectives written by Jayne Werner and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-02-18 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume derives from an unprecedented seminar held at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs in November 1990. At the seminar, leading Western diplomatic and military historians and Vietnam scholars met with prominent Vietnamese Communists to reflect on the Vietnam War. The book contains four parts: The Vietnamese Revolution and Political/Military strategy; the war from the American side; the war in the South and Cambodia; and retrospective and postwar issues. In addition to Jane Werner and Luu Doan Huynh, the contributors are Mark Bradley, William Duiker, David Elliott, Christine White, George Vickers, James Harrison, George Herring, Ronald Spector, Paul Joseph, Jeffrey Clarke, Ngo Vinh Long, Benedict Kiernan, Marilyn Young, Keith Taylor, and Tran Van Tra. General Tra was Commander of the People's Liberation Armed Forces of South Vietnam from 1963 to 1975. His eye-opening analysis of the Tet Offensive has never before been available in English.
Download or read book Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War written by James F. Dunnigan and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2014-11-04 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: James F. Dunnigan and Albert A. Nofi's Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War allows us to see what really happened to American forces in Southeast Asia, separating popular myth from explosive reality in a clear, concise manner. Containing more than two hundred examinations of different aspects of the war, the book questions why the American military ignored the lessons taught by previous encounters with insurgency forces; probes the use of group think and mind control by the North Vietnamese; and explores the role technology played in shaping the way the war was fought. Of course, the book also reveals the "dirty little secrets," the truth behind such aspects of the conflict as the rise of the Montagnard mercenaries--the most feared group of soldiers participating in the secret war in Laos-and the details of the hidden struggle for the Ho Chi Minh Trail. With its unique and perceptive examination of the conflict, Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War by James F. Dunnigan & Albert A. Nofi offers a critical addition to the library of Vietnam War history.
Download or read book Avoiding Vietnam written by Conrad C. Crane and published by Strategic Studies Institute. This book was released on 2002 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book On Strategy written by Harry G. Summers and published by Presidio Press. This book was released on 2009-02-04 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stunning in its insight, On Strategy is required reading not just for everyone who is interested in the Vietnam War, but for anyone who is concerned about the place of the United States on the world stage and how America can, and more importantly cannot, employ its immense military force to help bring peace to an increasingly troubled world. “On Stategy is just about the best thing I have read on Vietnam.”—Drew Middleton, The New York Times “Perhaps the most trenchant single postmortem to date of our defeat in Vietnam . . . a classic . . . compact, subtle—and surprisingly readable.”—Newsweek “At our house, we sleep less easily now that Harry G. Summers Jr., Colonel of Infantry, is no longer defending us. After two wars and 38 years of active duty, Summers has retired from the Army. . . . Every taxpayer should mourn his loss. Colonel Summers is perhaps the most influential thinker of our time: his book On Strategy is required reading at the Army and Naval War Colleges.”—Jack Beatty, Boston Globe “This investigation of the U.S. army’s role in the Vietnam War is widely recognized as the single most useful postmortem on the unpopular war.”—The Washington Post Book World “The most detailed exposition of this view—that the U.S. threw away whatever chance for victory it may have had through blunders that must not be repeated—comes from Col. Harry Summers, whose book, On Strategy, has become must reading for young officers.”—Time “A masterful analysis of the strategy, or lack thereof, in the Vietnam War . . . The best critique of the war I have read and a book every policy maker in Washington should absorb.”—Max Cleland, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
