Vietnam at War (review)

Mark Bradley's Vietnam at War joins an already long list of interpretive surveys of the wars in Vietnam. Unlike most of its predecessors, which tell the story from the U.S. side, Bradley's book focuses on Vietnam and claims agency for the Vietnamese. In contrast to earlier Vietnam-centric books by William Turley and William Duiker, which concentrate on "high" policy, Bradley also skillfully uses art, film, and literature to analyze the role of ordinary people and the often devastating impact of the wars on them.

Vietnam at War nicely explicates the complexity of wars that lasted three decades and had local, national, and international dimensions. A struggle among Vietnamese to determine the shape of their country's post-colonial society began long before Ho Chi Minh's September 1945 declaration of independence, persisted through thirty years of war, and, according to Bradley, continues today. North Vietnamese backing made possible the early success of the insurgency by the National Liberation Front (NLF) in South Vietnam, and the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) won the final battles in 1975. Throughout the war, however, Hanoi and the NLF differed sharply over strategy, tactics, and especially priorities. Major divisions existed within the NLF itself. During what the Vietnamese call the American War, South and North Vietnam each relied heavily on the support of foreign allies, but there were profound conflicts of interest among the various countries, and these tensions grew as the war neared an end.

Bradley focuses on Vietnam, and here he is superb. He does not subscribe to the new "revisionist" school that finds much to admire in South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem. Diem's policies, Bradley argues, alienated peasants and urban dwellers alike, and his government never had more than a narrow base of support in South Vietnam. Vietnam at War is excellent on the rise of the NLF and its shrewd and highly effective use of terror and reform to gain widespread popular support by 1963. The most interesting and perhaps most important chapter covers the period 1965–1968, the height of the war. The chapter deals sparingly with high policy, focusing instead on how Vietnamese of all types and from all regions responded to the conflicting pressures of war. In South Vietnam, social and family ties were disrupted. Military action in the countryside created an estimated four million refugees, generating, in turn, slums in the major cities. The massive U.S. presence produced a service economy riddled with corruption, drug abuse, and prostitution. Western popular culture undermined traditional values. Among the South Vietnamese, war-weariness, alienation, and distrust of the government became pervasive and were eloquently expressed in literature, art, and a multitude of antiwar songs. North Vietnam was much more cohesive, but divisions within the Hanoi leadership provoked a purge in 1967. The U.S. bombing and heavy conscription forced major population dislocations in the North. Despite tight censorship, subsurface tensions were also vented discreetly through art and literature.

Bradley skillfully outlines the ways the 1968 Tet Offensive dramatically changed the war. Militarily, the emphasis shifted from counterinsurgency to conventional operations increasingly waged between the Army of the Republic of Vietnam and the NVA. The enormous losses suffered by the NLF during Tet forced a drawdown, leaving South Vietnam more secure than it had been in years. Nonetheless, the Tet Offensive also exacerbated the South Vietnamese government's problems, especially corruption, and it was no more popular than before. Tensions between South and North Vietnam and their allies became more pronounced, especially as Washington began to extricate itself from the war and execute a major diplomatic realignment with its Cold War adversaries, the Soviet Union and China.

Vietnam at War is especially good on the aftermath. The struggle among Vietnamese continued after the war ended. Hanoi could not match its military triumph with economic and political success. Its economic programs brought disaster, and its wars with China and Cambodia imposed huge additional burdens on a country already reeling from 30 years of fighting. Ultimately, leaders in Hanoi sought...