Vietnam at War

by Mark Philip Bradley

For many Westerners, the Vietnam War summons images of American soldiers patrolling rice paddies, battling an elusive enemy as helicopters circle overhead. But there were, in fact, many Vietnam wars--an anti-colonial war with France, a cold war turned hot with the United States, a civil war
between North and South Vietnam and among southern Vietnamese, a revolutionary war of ideas over the vision that should guide Vietnamese society into the postcolonial future, and a postwar war of memory. This book explores the complex ways in which the Vietnamese themselves have made sense of those
conflicts.
Drawing upon the author's twenty years of research--much of it made possible by recently opened Vietnamese archives and other sources-- Vietnam at War departs sharply from prevailing narratives in the West that have made the Vietnamese almost invisible in the making of their own history. Mark Philip
Bradley not only probes the thought and actions of high policy makers in Hanoi and Saigon but also explores how northerners and southerners, men and women, soldiers and civilians, urban elites and rural peasants, and radicals and conservatives came to understand the thirty years of war that enfolded
them and how they reckoned with its aftermath. He sets these experiences within a wider global context by examining the place of the United States, France, the Soviet Union, and China in Vietnamese histories of the war.
Today, as Vietnamese civil society becomes increasingly heterodox and the Vietnamese state seeks to develop a market economy while maintaining its commitment to socialism, the meanings of the conflicts that shaped so much of the country's recent history remain deeply contested. Vietnam at War is
essential reading for anyone who seeks a clearer understanding of the paradoxes and tensions that underlie the Vietnam experience to this day.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, War, College

266 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Terence · Rating 2 out of 5]

The blurb on the dust jacket of my edition says that Vietnam At War is “a penetrating history of how the Vietnamese people experienced the wars for their country” and “Mark Philip Bradley paints a vivid picture of how Vietnamese people of all classes…came to understand the thirty years of bloody warfare that unfolded around them.” It was comments like these and favorable reviews of this book that got it on my GR wishlist and convinced me to acquire it when given opportunity. Unfortunately, that’s not what I got with this book. It’s a perfectly adequate primer on the war in Vietnam (from the French attempt to recolonize the region after 1945 to Saigon’s fall in 1975) but it’s hardly a “penetrating” look at how the Vietnamese experienced the wars; it’s hardly a look at all.

One problem is that the book’s too short. At 196 pages of text in my edition, it wastes too many of them setting the background and not nearly enough talking about the Vietnamese. We meet some individuals: Dang Thuy Tram, a young Northern medical student who worked in a field hospital from 1967 to 1970, when she was killed; the writers Tran Huy Quang and Bao Ninh; Trinh Công Son, a musician; and Dang Nhat Minh, a film-maker. But Bradley barely mentions them and their lives before returning to the straight-up narrative.

This was not the book I expected or hoped for. At the end of the day, I expected to know more about both how the Vietnamese responded intellectually to the wars and how individuals lived through it. I’m sure – if I could read Vietnamese – that I would find a wealth of sources to satisfy my curiosity but lacking that skill I found Bradley’s slim volume a not-very-credible attempt to convey that information to an English-reading audience. (The best parts of the book are the “Introduction” and “Coda,” where the individuals mentioned above are most visible, because they show the kind of book that Bradley could have/should have written.)

Another complaint I have is that the photographs included don’t seem to be very well organized and there are too few.

[Cara Lynn]

Read for school

[Jalen Sowell · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s difficult to find history books from the perspective of the “other side” of conflicts involved major states, given that the story is often told from the perspective, and often to the credit, of the more powerful group. The story of the Vietnam war is often told from the perspective of the Americans, but rarely is full context and consideration given to the Vietnamese and the years and years that led up to the conflict with the USA

I could tell as the book was going along that it was merely brushing on very complex issues, but if you’re like me, and just want a primer into the Vietnamese perspective, this is a great place to start

[Destiny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Contains a few small spoilers:


Overall, I was not the biggest fan of this book. For a book that's entire thesis is "I want to show how the Vietnam War impacted the Vietnamese" there was only two chapters of the book that talked about the impact the war had on the Vietnamese. The first two chapters were about the French war, then the American war, but barely focused on the Vietnamese people. I liked it, but I wish it would have been written in a different way or had a different thesis.

3.25/5

[Sethelarian · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. This was a book I was required to read for a college History class. The book was very factual and informed me about both sides of the conflict.

The only down side was sometimes the book was a little hard to follow because it jumped around the timeline of the war a lot. Other than that I enjoyed reading it.

[Ky Hoang · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was very interested in the Vietnam War because my grandparents experienced it. Now I have a better vision of what it was truly like.

[J Siukiel · Rating 3 out of 5]

A serviceable overview of the war. It is a good starting point for those interested in learning about the Vietnam War

[Josie Lam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gave a lot of details pertaining to what led up to the Vietnam War and who actually "won" the war based on the aftermath. Reading this book allowed me to learn more about the difficulties of living in Vietnam at the time of the war and how much the people/soldiers struggled. It also included many facts about the soldiers and how they faced many issues both mentally and physically after the war. Although this book was a good read, it did not go well with my subtopic.

[Samina Nguyen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vietnam at War was much shorter than most of the other war novels I had read, so I think it could've gotten into more detail. However, it did give me another perspective of the war and how people dealt with it.

[Ainiah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gives a rather comprehensive overview of how the Vietnam War came to be and how it ended. Easy to read and doesn't overwhelm with too many details. Personal stories included as well.

[authorial · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite a thorough view of the different perspectives of the Vietnamese identity from 1920s onwards, especially following the Anti-Colonial and American wars from 1950s-1975.

[Haley Baugher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gave me a huge insight on what it was like to be in the war as a Vietnamese