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The New Face of War
The author, a U.S. journalist, describes his experiences in Vietnam during the early years of the war and suggests what lessons America should learn from the conflict
- GenresMilitary Fiction
384 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1965
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October 26, 2021
Malcolm W. Browne draws upon his personal experience during a five-year tour as a reporter in Vietnam to contribute some interesting, and many flawed, observations to the Vietnam War scholarship.
For instance, he argues that despite all the power plays, the Saigon ministries, as well as the South Vietnamese government as a whole, "with all their red tape, favoritism, inefficiency and politics," had not changed in any significant aspect since the French colonial regime. The profound inactivity of the whole Vietnamese administration was powerful enough to frustrate any innovator, and it succeeded in challenging Diem too.
Although the Vietnamese population hated the French colonialists enough to revolt and overthrow them, they also envied the colonial class and imitated French ways for prestige. French automobiles, night clubs, clothing, and so on were considered symbols of status. The same combination of detestation and envy was directed at the French colonial official, who, like a little king, could have any girl he wanted, take anything he fancied, and punish those who objected. "It is a sad observation of humanity that many Vietnamese hated this kind of thing not so much because of what it was but because it was a Frenchman doing it," observes Browne. During Diem's regime, nothing seemed to have changed but the color of the faces: now Vietnamese were occupying the same lucrative positions and punishing the same people.
According to Browne, it is hard to measure Diem's popularity, for he was never exposed to a free election, but it seemed to him that Diem was actually popular among many Vietnamese for a long time. He came to power just at the time when his nation became independent, so he rode "the crest of a revolutionary wave." Furthermore, he had been a good provincial mandarin at the time and was known for his personal honesty, stubbornness, and courage. Many able young Vietnamese returned to their country from France in the first years of his rule, fascinated by the idea of building a nation they would be proud of. However, in November 1963, those same young people danced and sang in the streets of Saigon after hearing the news of the Prime Minister's overthrow and assassination.
Browne lists several reasons for the burning hate for Diem that engulfed the Vietnamese people in the final years Diem's government. He was a Roman Catholic in a non-Christian country. So far so good. Here comes the major issue I have with his book, though: Browne also thinks Diem was "a ruthless dictator." Diem was not a dictator. Diem was an effective leader, who defeated, with few resources at his disposal, rival politicians, pro-French dissidents in the South Vietnamese Army, two angry religious sects, and a brotherhood of organized criminals and brought order and prosperity to South Vietnam. He understood that a modern Vietnam that preserved Vietnamese traditions was closer to the hearts of most Vietnamese than Western democracy or Communism.
For the bigger part of Diem's term in office, the Saigon government prevailed in its struggle with the Northern Communists. In the late 1950s, Diem virtually eradicated the secret Communist networks in South Vietnam, hastening Hanoi’s decision to move from political struggle and limited assassinations to a large-scale insurgency. During 1960 and 1961, the insurgents succeeded in eliminating or reducing the government’s power in some areas, and the Diem government was not particularly effective when it came to counterinsurgency. But the reason for that was not that Diem and the American advisers in South Vietnam did not understand the importance of counterinsurgency forces to the defense of South Vietnam. Much of the responsibility for the travails of 1960 and 1961 belonged to American Ambassador Elbridge Durbrow and other Americans, who chose to provide the South Vietnamese militia and other counterinsurgency forces with fewer funds than they needed.
The main reason for the gradual downfall of South Vietnam's government after Diem's death was exactly the lack of Diem and those who had served in his administration. The country's government was deprived of strong leaders. Many of those in power in the post-Diem years did not possess the needed leadership skills and the late Prime Minister's talent. The new Saigon government removed remarkably capable men because of their past loyalty to Diem or because of pressure from the belligerent Buddhists. Government officials did not want to oppose the Buddhists after seeing Diem lose the favor of America for resisting them. Therefore, just as some American officials had wanted, the Prime Minister's overthrow led to political freedom. This freedom, however, did not improve matters, but rather enabled the enemies of the government to undermine its authority and arouse strife among religious groups.
Even the Northern communists, who outwardly derided South Vietnam's Prime Minister for being “My-Diem” (America-Diem), viewed him as a great leader. Bui Tin, a communist who joined Ho Chi Minh's party in 1945 and thirty years later was honored with the task of accepting South Vietnam's surrender at Independence Palace in Saigon, later said, "“Although we criticized Ngo Dinh Diem publicly as an American puppet, Ho Chi Minh adopted a more sober appraisal. He realized Diem was a patriot like himself but in a different way. Later many other people came to accept and value Diem as a leader who was imbued with the spirit of nationalism, and who lived an honest and clean life and, like Ho Chi Minh, was unmarried." Bui Tin himself considered Diem a man of outstanding patriotism, courage, and political talent. Because Ho had embraced a foreign ideology, his comrade viewed him as Diem's inferior.
In general, although THE NEW FACE OF WAR is a stylistically compelling work written by an eyewitness, I was disappointed by it. I finished it because it was interesting for me to finally read an account of a reporter who represented those American journalists in Vietnam who grossly exaggerated Diem's shortcomings and rarely discussed his virtues. (Other, more famous, representatives of that group were David Halberstam, Neil Sheehan, and Stanley Karnow.) However, having read works of other scholars, I do not believe the author's conclusions to be accurate.
Note: Geoffrey Shaw mentions a curious incident in his book The Lost Mandate of Heaven: The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam. Malcolm Browne, along with Halberstam, Sheehan, and their fellow reporters, were informed in advance of a Buddhist demonstration by militant Buddhist leaders. During the riot, Buddhist protesters attacked one of the reporters, breaking his camera, and were overall the aggressors. Afterwards, Browne, Halberstam, and the rest wrote a report to President John F. Kennedy, in which they claimed that it was the police who attacked their colleague and that Diem and Nhu were turning South Vietnam into a police state. That was an outright lie. I refuse to trust Malcolm W. Browne after such reporting.
For instance, he argues that despite all the power plays, the Saigon ministries, as well as the South Vietnamese government as a whole, "with all their red tape, favoritism, inefficiency and politics," had not changed in any significant aspect since the French colonial regime. The profound inactivity of the whole Vietnamese administration was powerful enough to frustrate any innovator, and it succeeded in challenging Diem too.
Although the Vietnamese population hated the French colonialists enough to revolt and overthrow them, they also envied the colonial class and imitated French ways for prestige. French automobiles, night clubs, clothing, and so on were considered symbols of status. The same combination of detestation and envy was directed at the French colonial official, who, like a little king, could have any girl he wanted, take anything he fancied, and punish those who objected. "It is a sad observation of humanity that many Vietnamese hated this kind of thing not so much because of what it was but because it was a Frenchman doing it," observes Browne. During Diem's regime, nothing seemed to have changed but the color of the faces: now Vietnamese were occupying the same lucrative positions and punishing the same people.
According to Browne, it is hard to measure Diem's popularity, for he was never exposed to a free election, but it seemed to him that Diem was actually popular among many Vietnamese for a long time. He came to power just at the time when his nation became independent, so he rode "the crest of a revolutionary wave." Furthermore, he had been a good provincial mandarin at the time and was known for his personal honesty, stubbornness, and courage. Many able young Vietnamese returned to their country from France in the first years of his rule, fascinated by the idea of building a nation they would be proud of. However, in November 1963, those same young people danced and sang in the streets of Saigon after hearing the news of the Prime Minister's overthrow and assassination.
Browne lists several reasons for the burning hate for Diem that engulfed the Vietnamese people in the final years Diem's government. He was a Roman Catholic in a non-Christian country. So far so good. Here comes the major issue I have with his book, though: Browne also thinks Diem was "a ruthless dictator." Diem was not a dictator. Diem was an effective leader, who defeated, with few resources at his disposal, rival politicians, pro-French dissidents in the South Vietnamese Army, two angry religious sects, and a brotherhood of organized criminals and brought order and prosperity to South Vietnam. He understood that a modern Vietnam that preserved Vietnamese traditions was closer to the hearts of most Vietnamese than Western democracy or Communism.
For the bigger part of Diem's term in office, the Saigon government prevailed in its struggle with the Northern Communists. In the late 1950s, Diem virtually eradicated the secret Communist networks in South Vietnam, hastening Hanoi’s decision to move from political struggle and limited assassinations to a large-scale insurgency. During 1960 and 1961, the insurgents succeeded in eliminating or reducing the government’s power in some areas, and the Diem government was not particularly effective when it came to counterinsurgency. But the reason for that was not that Diem and the American advisers in South Vietnam did not understand the importance of counterinsurgency forces to the defense of South Vietnam. Much of the responsibility for the travails of 1960 and 1961 belonged to American Ambassador Elbridge Durbrow and other Americans, who chose to provide the South Vietnamese militia and other counterinsurgency forces with fewer funds than they needed.
The main reason for the gradual downfall of South Vietnam's government after Diem's death was exactly the lack of Diem and those who had served in his administration. The country's government was deprived of strong leaders. Many of those in power in the post-Diem years did not possess the needed leadership skills and the late Prime Minister's talent. The new Saigon government removed remarkably capable men because of their past loyalty to Diem or because of pressure from the belligerent Buddhists. Government officials did not want to oppose the Buddhists after seeing Diem lose the favor of America for resisting them. Therefore, just as some American officials had wanted, the Prime Minister's overthrow led to political freedom. This freedom, however, did not improve matters, but rather enabled the enemies of the government to undermine its authority and arouse strife among religious groups.
Even the Northern communists, who outwardly derided South Vietnam's Prime Minister for being “My-Diem” (America-Diem), viewed him as a great leader. Bui Tin, a communist who joined Ho Chi Minh's party in 1945 and thirty years later was honored with the task of accepting South Vietnam's surrender at Independence Palace in Saigon, later said, "“Although we criticized Ngo Dinh Diem publicly as an American puppet, Ho Chi Minh adopted a more sober appraisal. He realized Diem was a patriot like himself but in a different way. Later many other people came to accept and value Diem as a leader who was imbued with the spirit of nationalism, and who lived an honest and clean life and, like Ho Chi Minh, was unmarried." Bui Tin himself considered Diem a man of outstanding patriotism, courage, and political talent. Because Ho had embraced a foreign ideology, his comrade viewed him as Diem's inferior.
In general, although THE NEW FACE OF WAR is a stylistically compelling work written by an eyewitness, I was disappointed by it. I finished it because it was interesting for me to finally read an account of a reporter who represented those American journalists in Vietnam who grossly exaggerated Diem's shortcomings and rarely discussed his virtues. (Other, more famous, representatives of that group were David Halberstam, Neil Sheehan, and Stanley Karnow.) However, having read works of other scholars, I do not believe the author's conclusions to be accurate.
Note: Geoffrey Shaw mentions a curious incident in his book The Lost Mandate of Heaven: The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam. Malcolm Browne, along with Halberstam, Sheehan, and their fellow reporters, were informed in advance of a Buddhist demonstration by militant Buddhist leaders. During the riot, Buddhist protesters attacked one of the reporters, breaking his camera, and were overall the aggressors. Afterwards, Browne, Halberstam, and the rest wrote a report to President John F. Kennedy, in which they claimed that it was the police who attacked their colleague and that Diem and Nhu were turning South Vietnam into a police state. That was an outright lie. I refuse to trust Malcolm W. Browne after such reporting.
Displaying 1 of 1 review