Choosing War: The Lost Chance for Peace and the Escalation of War in Vietnam
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Book Overview
Why, then, did major war break out? Logevall shows it was partly because of the timidity of the key opponents of U.S. involvement, and partly because of the staunch opposition of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations to early negotiations. His superlative account shows that U.S. officials chose war over disengagement despite deep doubts about the war's prospects and about Vietnam's importance to U.S. security and over the opposition of important voices in the Congress, in the press, and in the world community. They did so because of concerns about credibility-not so much America's or the Democratic party's credibility, but their own personal credibility.
Based on six years of painstaking research, this book is the first to place American policymaking on Vietnam in 1963-65 in its wider international context using multiarchival sources, many of them recently declassified. Here we see for the first time how the war played in the key world capitals-not merely in Washington, Saigon, and Hanoi, but also in Paris and London, in Tokyo and Ottawa, in Moscow and Beijing.
Choosing War is a powerful and devastating account of fear, favor, and hypocrisy at the highest echelons of American government, a book that will change forever our understanding of the tragedy that was the Vietnam War.
Customer Reviews
Rated 5 starsA Very Excellent Work
In Choosing War, Mr. Logevall presents a very cogent and deeply reasoned assessment of America's entry into the futile and eventually tragic landscape of an Americanized war in Vietnam. There are so many commonly held beliefs about the necessity of America's involvement there was to prevent the spread of Communism, that it is refreshing, but painful, to read about how and why America went so wrong - and how many chances we...
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Rated 5 starsScathing & Illuminating Examination Of Why Vietnam....
This fascinating, extremely readable, and carefully researched book by historian Frederik Logevall has an intriguing thesis closely paralleling that of several other emerging scholars regarding the origins and prosecution of the Vietnam War. Like David Kaiser's provocative indictment in "American Tragedy; Kennedy, Johnson, & The Origins Of The Vietnam War" of both the military and civilian advisors to Presidents Eisenhower,...
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Rated 5 starslucid, persuasive account
In this masterful study of how the United States committed hundreds of thousands of ground troops to the war in Vietnam, Fredrik Logevall persuasively argues that the war was a choice, not an inevitable outcome of the Cold War. Based on exhaustive research, Logevall conclusively demonstrates that President Johnson had a variety of viable options and that the escalation of the war was not the only possible or feasible course...
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Rated 5 starsExtraordinary research and compelling arguement
CHOOSING WAR makes an important contribution to the literature on the Vietnam War. With cogent analysis, detailed research, and stunning clarity, Logevall has crafted a book that should become the standard account of the "Long 1964." Not only does he illuminate the heretofore understudied international angle of this period, he makes a crucial contribution to our understanding of the role of domestic politics in the making...
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