Iraq and the Lessons of Vietnam: Or, How Not to Learn from the Past

by Lloyd C. Gardner (Editor), Marilyn B. Young (Editor), Christian G. Appy (Contributor)

Leading historians tease out the connections between the Vietnam War and the Iraq War—and point to the many lessons that went unlearned.

"All the wrong people remember Vietnam. I think all the people who remember it should forget it, and all the people who forgot it should remember it.—Michael Herr, author of Dispatches

From the launch of the "Shock and Awe" invasion in March 2003 through President George W. Bush's declaration of "Mission Accomplished" two months later, the war in Iraq was meant to demonstrate definitively that the United States had learned the lessons of Vietnam. This new book makes clear that something closer to the opposite is true—that U.S. foreign policy makers have learned little from the past, even as they have been obsessed with the "Vietnam Syndrome."

Iraq and the Lessons of Vietnam brings together the country's leading historians of the Vietnam experience. Examining the profound changes that have occurred in the country and the military since the Vietnam War, celebrated historians Marilyn B. Young and Lloyd Gardner have assembled a distinguished group to consider how America has again found itself in the midst of a war in which there is no chance of a speedy victory or a sweeping regime change.

Iraq and the Lessons of Vietnam explores how the "Vietnam Syndrome" fits into the contemporary debate about the purpose and exercise of American power in the world. With contributions from some of the most renowned analysts of American history and foreign policy, this is an essential recovery of the forgotten and misbegotten lessons of Vietnam. Contributors include: Christian Appy, AndrewJ. Bacevich, Alex Danchev, David Elliott, Elizabeth L. Hillman, Gabriel Kolko, Walter LaFeber, Gareth Porter, John Prados.

Genres: History, War, Nonfiction, American, Middle East, Military Fiction, Military History

322 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2007

Reviews

[Pei-jean Lu · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of essays that while interesting are also stating the obvious of the fact that people don’t consider history when getting involved with conflicts.
That’s not to say they don’t also make interesting points, but many of these meander on and keeps on repeating the same issues over and over again.

[Liam · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book seemed a bit over-done at times, and tended to belabor the point to such a degree that it was noticeably repetitive in some places. Part of that was simply structural- some redundancy is to be expected in a work of this type, in which several authors are writing on the same topic or aspects thereof. I suspect that it would not have been quite so noticeable had I read this book prior to 2008, when the Bush administration was still in control of the U.S. government, but if I remember correctly, I don't think I even managed to get hold of a copy until several years after that. Several of the included essays were well worth reading, but despite the fairly stellar cast of contributors the overall quality was somewhat uneven. I found that extremely disappointing. I remember quite well the unease followed by shocked disbelief on the part of most Indo-China scholars at the seemingly endless procession of incredibly incompetent decisions made by the U.S. government leadership during the early years of the Afghanistan & Iraq wars. Those feelings were shared to a large extent by nearly all in the Indo-China studies community, from the most eminent professors and authors of well-known works in the field right down to independent amateur scholars such as myself. I had really hoped for a better, perhaps more magisterial, effort from these authors; in the event, while not a bad book it could perhaps have been a bit better than it is...