Stanley Karnow (1925–2013)

Se uno si aspetta un resoconto storico classico, rimane deluso. Non perché il libro sia scritto male, ma perché la guerriglia si descrive male, si descrive male il lavorìo diplomatico, e le fonti comuniste del Vietnam all'epoca rifiutarono di farsi intervistare (anche alcuni protagonisti statunitensi a dire la verità ma molti meno). Ne deriva un librone che racconta in quasi 500 pagine la storia del Vietnam dagli anni '50 fino a inizio anni '80 (è un testo vecchiotto ma sempre valido) show more molto spesso più dall'ottica americana che da quella vitnamita ma non per mancanza di obiettività quanto di parità di fonti, come detto. E' corredato da foto in bianco e nero, da una fittissima bibliografia, una ottima cronologia e un ottimo indice delle persone. Per chi vuole saperne di più sulla guerra del Vietnam, è una vera e propria bibbia. Due difetti: è un po' verboso e la bibliografia su ogni capitolo inserita a fine libro. Un controsenso, dopo 500 pagine non ricordi di cosa trattava il quinto rigo del primo capitolo, sarebbe stato meglio impaginarla a fine del capitolo stesso. show less

There a few things using the Dewey Decimal System that, IMHO, positively affected my thinking. One is where to file books on the Vietnam War, or any war. It's not in the United States section, it is in the Vietnam section since a war is something that happens to a country, it is not perpetrated by a country. It doesn't matter if one participant is a superpower. A war happens at a place, to a people. This long view that ends with the fall of Saigon starts way back with Vietnam on the fringes show more of Napoleon III's empire and on through post-WW II France handing over a struggle to a United States espousing its domino theory. Well, we left Hitler and Mussolini unmolested and look what happened? At least, that's how the argument went but over all those decades into centuries, really, an internally inconsistent Vietnam struggled to shake off foreign power. Well, at least the part struggled that was ideological, not so much the corrupt and craven leadership of Southern Vietnam... show less

Mr. Karnow is probably more famous for his book on Vietnam but this one is a forceful reminder of earlier times, earlier unpopular wars and how the US became a colonial power sometimes willingly sometimes not. This is just one more area of the world where we have left our footprint without fully realizing what we have done, not nearly comprehending the reactions of the locals to us because of our mixed histories. President McKinley is shown as a weak leader who was hopeless before the show more machinations of Theodore Roosevelt, Dewey, and Senator Lodge. Later on General Douglas MacArthur is shown as major player whose support of the reactionary landowners/businessmen still leaves its imprint on the Philippines today. This is a solid read that might surprise one on how much influence the US has had on Filipino history.

Quote: ( page 310) “Adventurers and bandits of every stripe posed as partisans, and local factionalism riddled the various movements as well. As rival families and clans settled old feuds, duplicitously fighting or helping the enemy to suit their aims. Late n 1944 when the U.S. landings in Leyte presaged the liberation of the archipelago, self styled guerrillas surfaced everywhere in a final frenzy of plunder.
The strongest force was the Peoples Anti Japanese Army, in Tagalog the Hukbong Bayan Laban sa Hapon===Hukbalahap for short , run by a coalition of communists and socialists. Its leaders though mainly urban intellectuals, astutely realized that central Luzon long a caldron of rural unrest was ripe for their efforts.” show less

There a few things using the Dewey Decimal System that, IMHO, positively affected my thinking. One is where to file books on the Vietnam War, or any war. It's not in the United States section, it is in the Vietnam section since a war is something that happens to a country, it is not perpetrated by a country. It doesn't matter if one participant is a superpower. A war happens at a place, to a people. This long view that ends with the fall of Saigon starts way back with Vietnam on the fringes show more of Napoleon III's empire and on through post-WW II France handing over a struggle to a United States espousing its domino theory. Well, we left Hitler and Mussolini unmolested and look what happened? At least, that's how the argument went but over all those decades into centuries, really, an internally inconsistent Vietnam struggled to shake off foreign power. Well, at least the part struggled that was ideological, not so much the corrupt and craven leadership of Southern Vietnam... show less