Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam

Do you believe the President sits atop the government as an independent judge of what should be done by the executive branch - a final point at which group-think might be turned aside? Read this book to find out how it really works. The President can easily be a captive of the political system and is not free to act, simply because he is as afraid as anyone else of being blamed if things go wrong. He can be managed by those below him by skillful use of, or cover-ups of essential documents and studies. Words and phrases in reports can be ordered to be changed, an honest report can be rewritten by a superior, meetings can be called off or scheduled to reinforce or diminish the importance of an issue. This history of the lead-up to full involvement by the United States in the war in Vietnam shows how the national security establishment (JCS, DoD, CIA and State) can be blinded by a particular vision of a situation that, to their thinking, dictates a course of action, in this case, the involvement of U.S. troops in combat in Southeast Asia. Obsessed with the suppression/containment of Communism at a time when the US was unchallenged, no one could see that those opposed to the partition of Vietnam would continue to fight no matter what the United States decided to do. Despite the eagerness of North Vietnam to avoid a U.S. combat role, the possibility of compromise and negotiation was resolutely shut off. Anyone the least bit interested in international affairs should read this book because it reveals the inner workings of power. It presents, heavily documented with notes, a detailed account of such things as the Tonkin Gulf incident and the domino theory, a useful ploy known in the 1960's not to be based in reality. Anyone interested in American Presidencies will also find illumination here. Both Kennedy and LBJ were very much against rushing into the Vietnam conflict, yet both uninthusiastically took the necessary steps to make it happen. The fact that each of them could have stopped the process using their authority, but instead yielded to relentless pressure shows how human they were and reinforces the tragedy of the conflict for the country, the soldiers and the commander in chief.

In the first place, Gareth Porter was 'on the ground' as an independent scholar, un-armed and un-protected in Vietnam's I Corp in '68. It was already notorious as scene of the heaviest fighting, and it was later infamous as the locale of the My Lai massacre. His courage and commitment cannot be matched by the plethora of chicken hawks who attempt to obfuscate the causes of the debacle and justify the taking of 3 million lives. How could the disastrous consequences of the exercise of power be taken on so blindly? I think of another folly now openly admitted, which was exposed by the same methods of investigation. "I did it just because I could" is the simple reason President Bill Clinton gave Larry King as to why he went at it with Monica - and he called his rationale the worst of all reasons humans can use for immoral conduct. Thanks to Kenneth Starr, we even know which senator Clinton was on the phone with during one of his assignations, because mundane documents were meticulously interrelated until no one could hide much of anything. To a much higher purpose, Gareth Porter has sifted through day by day logs of the Kennedy & Johnson era White House and examined relevant notes, memoirs and meeting transcripts kept by the players and staff. His investigation is no less meticulous, and we see how both JFK and LBJ tried to be more in tune with larger political issues and more worthwhile national agendas as they sought viable alternatives. But Perils also reveals how `the Whiz Kids' were able to throw in more and more firepower and destruction through a series of short term, dispassionate maneuverings of their `Commander in Chief.' It was fascinating to have this glimpse of the inner workings of two administrations as the events played out into rivers of blood. Time after time after time, JFK especially would be assured that certain things would be done along the more diplomatic lines he wanted; that new possibilities for peace, or at least for de-escalation, would be opened and new options explored. He would think this, as we can see from various eyewitness accounts laid out in `Perils' because the assignments he made and agreements he entered into were documented and are recounted here. And time after time after time, we see how the players would walk out of the meetings and do the opposite of what they'd just assured the President they would do for him, and do it in his name. Then you look at the players who kept JFK impotent, and you realize that they all had connections to that `military industrial complex' of which Ike had so recently warned. Gareth calls that the `National Security Apparatus' and it has only grown stronger. The relevance of Perils of Dominance is striking as we stand on the verge of yet another escalation. As with Vietnam to Laos to Cambodia, we're seemingly to be taken from Afghanistan to Iraq to Iran, with no one to hold a candle to Kennedy's brilliance in attempting to stop the madness.

Forget the Bushist nitwit who claims this marvelous book's sources are primarily "North Vietnamese". Because, you see, Bushists are not part of the "reality-based community". No, they're in Bizarro Land. So anything that confronts and conflicts with their mental and moral constipation must be Islamo-fascist, LIBERAL, Old Europe or North Vietnamese! Onto the book. Vietnam is the red flag of modern American history and it has been done to death, usually by ax-grinders, memoirists, Restorationists, and Halberstams. There are exceptions: David Kaiser's "American Tragedy", Howard Jones's "Death of a Generation", John Newman's "JFK and Vietnam", Frederik Logevall's "Choosing War". Still, what can one possibly bring to this subject new in terms of information or interpretation? Gareth Porter has the answer. "Perils of Dominance" takes a topic of mind-boggling complexity, weaves a clear and consistent narrative from all the elements, and presents a picture staggering in its basic indictment of back-stabbing, endless lying, high crimes and misdemeanors, and outright treason. The traitors were the Hawk extremists who did all they could to drag John F. Kennedy(who successfully resisted until his execution) and Lyndon Johnson(whose resistance weakened under his huge domestic goals) into the war that killed 60,000 American soldiers and 3,000,000 Southeast Asians. Perhaps the most surprising and moving part of "Perils" is the picture of Lyndon Johnson, a strong opponent of expansion from Dallas through his defeat of Goldwater. We know of Tonkin Gulf, of course. And LBJ has been crucified for 40 years because of the deceptions involved. Porter shows us that it was Johnson himself who was most skeptical of the torpedo lies. And it was Johnson himself who trashed the attempts of the Hawks following the initial incident to fabricate more Tonkin Gulf-type phony attacks to justify the bombing of the North and takeover of the war by the U.S. military. Once elected, of course, LBJ gave up the ghost and the rest is genocidal history. The real hero of the book is John F. Kennedy. Kaiser, Jones and Newman had gone pretty far in making the case that if not for Dallas, there would have been no wider war. And the horrors of the 60s and 70s for Southeast Asia would have been avoided. (At least the U.S. generated part of it.) Gareth Porter clinches it. Kennedy here is a true Machiavellian, outflanking and trumping opponents of his anti-war policy, playing things very close to the vest. Until Diem. The murders of Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother shocked Kennedy. And -- perhaps for the first time -- he understood exactly what he was up against. In the weeks that followed, he spoke often of his own death and possible assassination. Including the morning of November 22, 1963. One hopes for a sequel from Porter, taking us through the anguish of Johnson's second term, and into the intentional genocide of the Whittier Vampire and his Nobel Peace Prize-winning lapdog.

Gareth Porter has written a unique, insightful and marvelous structural analysis of the Vietnam War quagmire. He convincingly posits that unfettered, naked American power is the primary causal force on events of the time, thus disputing the now conventional "Domino Theory" and related ideological theories. US power so far superseded Soviet military and economic strength by the 1950's that total world strategic dominance had been attained. Porter argues that the US didn't stumble into the quagmire of Vietnam. We were propelled there by the belief that we couldn't lose and had much to gain by inserting ourselves, first by being the paymaster for the French and then by our own military intervention. The book fits nicely into an analytical tradition begun more recently by C Wright Mills in "The Power Elite." Porter's book is carefully crafted and well documented so he doesn't attempt to draw out a historical tradition of power abuse in America. One would hope for a Porter follow-on book about this sordid American tradition, probably beginning just after the American Civil War and accounting for more than 200 military interventions up to and including present day Iraq. Review by Phillip Butler, PhD

Gareth Porter has written an controversial account of the origins of the Vietnam War. According to Porter, the origins of US involvement in the Vietnam War, was not the domino theory but a fear of American allies such as Thailand switiching sides from a strong US ally toward having a neutral position with the Chinese if South Vietnam fell.American national security adivisors feared that if Thailand was to become neutral than Chinese infleunce would expand in the region. Another ineteresting contention of Porter's book is that the Vietnamese, Chinese, and the Russians would have signed on to a treaty that would have left a neutral but non-Communist South Vietnam due to their fear of American power. But the American national security establishment thought any neutral South Vietnam could be under the influence of the Chinese and rejected such offers. I would reccomend this book for anyone who are interested in not only the origins of the Vietnam War, but the Second Iraq War as well.