Strange Grounds Of The Vietnam War - 1757 Words

Strange Grounds Americans in Vietnam 1945-1975 An Oral History This book is a collection of 67 first hand people of the Vietnam war by Americans who were involved. The book begins with an Oss mission to help Ho Chi Minh against the Japanese near the end of World War 2 and ends with the all of a sudden evacuation of Saigon in 1975. The range of people included is immense from grunts in the infantry to gung-ho generals, from anti-war activists visiting North Vietnam to the wives of State Department officials in Saigon. The outcome is a big sweeping sight of the United States involvement with Vietnam over thirty years, but at the same time one with the feeling of immediacy that only such personal accounts can offer. The only thing I didn†¦show more content†¦I really do wish there were some Vietnamese voices to, but this book is pretty big and comprehensive as it is, and probably a separate other book is needed to give enough space to a whole other country and culture. Still some awesome and enlightening point of views, and since it moves kind of quickly between all of these personal accounts, it s super gripping. I thought this was a well thought out selection of interviews with people who brought perspectives on Vietnam from lots of different points of view. This book excels by covering the experiences of other participants particularly the agriculture/education/medical volunteers and the diplomatic/intelligence people. Ameroso s story is inspiring in terms of how much grass roots good could be done with a practical approach to aid. Carter s story is maddening in terms of how bad things actually were in the embassy. I notice that another reviewer of this book takes the author to task for including an interview by a reported fraud. If you re only compiling interviews to construct a book, you owe it to the readers to at least do a little checking up on those you include. Still, there is enough excellent material in this book for me to give it highest marks. After you read a couple of books on the Vietnam War you begin to see the same information being stated over and over again. It gets kind of old after a while. This bookShow MoreRelatedHave You Ever Met A Very Influential Person That Everyone1704 Words   |  7 PagesHave you ever met a very influential person that everyone has a different opinion on? Robert Strange McNamara was the secretary of Defense under John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson throughout the 1960s. This was the time period when the United States was involved in the Vietnam War as well and the Cold War against the Soviet Union. In addition, McNamara was hired by the head of the Ford automobile company to help revamp their company. 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