Mark Bradley and Marilyn Young, “Making Sense of the Vietnam Wars” (Oxford UP, 2008)

Mark Bradley and Marilyn Young, “Making Sense of the Vietnam Wars” (Oxford UP, 2008)

What to think about the Vietnam War? A righteous struggle against global Communist tyranny? An episode in American imperialism? A civil war into which the United States blindly stumbled? And what of the Vietnamese perspective? How did they–both North and South–understand the war? Mark Bradley and Marilyn Young have assembled a crack team of historians to consider (or rather reconsider) these questions in Making Sense of the Vietnam Wars: Transnational and International Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008). The book is part of the National History Center‘s Reinterpreting History series. The pieces in it are wide-ranging: some see the war from the heights of international diplomacy, others from the hamlets of the Mekong Delta. They introduce new themes, for example, the role of American racial stereotypes in the conflict. More than anything else, however, they are nuanced. Their authors provide no simple answers because there are none. You will not find easy explanations, good guys and bad guys, or ideological drum-beating in these pages. What you will find is a sensitive effort to understand an event of mind-boggling, irreducible complexity. There’s a lesson here: we may think we know what we are doing on far-away shores, but we are fooling ourselves. Reminds one a bit of Tolstoy’s thoughts on the philosophy of history at the end of War and Peace. Still worth a read, as is this book. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/military-history

Episoder(1616)

Scott Carney and Jason Miklian, "The Vortex: A True Story of History's Deadliest Storm, an Unspeakable War, and Liberation" (Ecco Press, 2022)

Scott Carney and Jason Miklian, "The Vortex: A True Story of History's Deadliest Storm, an Unspeakable War, and Liberation" (Ecco Press, 2022)

In November 1970, a storm set a collision course with the most densely populated coastline on Earth. Over the course of just a few hours, the Great Bhola Cyclone would kill 500,000 people and begin a ...

29 Apr 202358min

B. A. Friedman, "On Operations: Operational Art and Military Disciplines" (US Naval Institute Press, 2021)

B. A. Friedman, "On Operations: Operational Art and Military Disciplines" (US Naval Institute Press, 2021)

On Operations: Operational Art and Military Disciplines (US Naval Institute Press, 2021) traces the history of the development of military staffs and ideas on the operational level of war and operatio...

28 Apr 202340min

Robin Prior, "Conquer We Must: A Military History of Britain, 1914-1945" (Yale UP, 2022)

Robin Prior, "Conquer We Must: A Military History of Britain, 1914-1945" (Yale UP, 2022)

The First and Second World Wars were separated by a mere two decades, making the period 1914-1945 an unprecedentedly intense and violent era of history. But how did Britain develop its complex militar...

28 Apr 20231h

Benjamin L. Carp, "The Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American Revolution" (Yale UP, 2023)

Benjamin L. Carp, "The Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American Revolution" (Yale UP, 2023)

New York City, the strategic center of the Revolutionary War, was the most important place in North America in 1776. That summer, an unruly rebel army under George Washington repeatedly threatened to ...

25 Apr 20231h 3min

Beth Bailey, "An Army Afire: How the US Army Confronted Its Racial Crisis in the Vietnam Era" (UNC Press, 2023)

Beth Bailey, "An Army Afire: How the US Army Confronted Its Racial Crisis in the Vietnam Era" (UNC Press, 2023)

By the Tet Offensive in early 1968, what had been widely heralded as the best qualified, best-trained army in US history was descending into crisis as the Vietnam War raged without end. Morale was tan...

25 Apr 202344min

George Black, "The Long Reckoning: A Story of War, Peace, and Redemption in Vietnam" (Knopf, 2023)

George Black, "The Long Reckoning: A Story of War, Peace, and Redemption in Vietnam" (Knopf, 2023)

The American war in Vietnam has left many long-lasting scars that have not yet been sufficiently examined. The worst of them were inflicted in a tiny area bounded by the demilitarized zone between Nor...

23 Apr 20231h 4min

Tom Hutton, "Hitler's Maladies and Their Impact on World War II" (Texas Tech UP, 2023)

Tom Hutton, "Hitler's Maladies and Their Impact on World War II" (Texas Tech UP, 2023)

Toward the end of World War II, Hitler's many health complications became even more pronounced, making an evil man yet more erratic and dangerous. While the subject of Hitler's health has been catalog...

23 Apr 202350min

Crispin Brooks and Kiril Feferman, "Beyond the Pale: The Holocaust in the North Caucasus" (U Rochester Press, 2020)

Crispin Brooks and Kiril Feferman, "Beyond the Pale: The Holocaust in the North Caucasus" (U Rochester Press, 2020)

Crispin Brooks and Kiril Feferman's edited volume Beyond the Pale: The Holocaust in the North Caucasus (U Rochester Press, 2020) is the first book devoted exclusively to the Holocaust in the North Cau...

22 Apr 20231h 51min

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