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Author Topic: Vietnam reading list  (Read 2092 times)

Offline Dags

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Vietnam reading list
« on: December 12, 2019, 12:49:23 PM »
Apologies if this has been done before but inspired by Tom's find here:  https://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=118199.90

I've nearly finished Mark Bowden's Hué book but are there any other books that the hive mind can recommend for a bit of holiday reading and research? Ideally available for the iPad....

Offline Stosstruppen

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #1 on: December 12, 2019, 01:21:12 PM »
A Bright Shining Lie is very good, more on the political aspect though.
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Offline robh

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #2 on: December 12, 2019, 02:27:24 PM »
Lex McAuley's book on The Battle of Long Tan is an excellent read. 

Offline tomrommel1

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #3 on: December 12, 2019, 02:33:27 PM »
I have read so far in no particular order:

West Dickens Avenue: A Marine at Khe Sanh (English Edition)

In January 1968, John Corbett and his fellow leathernecks of the 26th Marine Regiment fortified a remote outpost at a place in South Vietnam called Khe Sanh. Within days of their arrival, twenty thousand North Vietnamese soldiers surrounded the base. What followed over the next seventy-seven days became one of the deadliest fights of the Vietnam War—and one of the greatest battles in military history.

Gunbird Driver: A Marine Huey Pilot's War in Vietnam (English Edition)

Gunbird Driver is a memoir of the Vietnam War as seen through the eyes of a young pilot flying an armed UH-1E's in Marine Observation Squadron 6. The book provides information about the missions, operations, and the living conditions at Ky Ha, and about the fellow Marines with whom he served. It also contains several chapters on shipboard operation from deployment aboard the USS Princeton.

The Magnificent Bastards: The Joint Army-Marine Defense of Dong Ha, 1968 (English Edition)

On April 29, 1968, the North Vietnamese Army is spotted less than four miles from the U.S. Marines’ Dong Ha Combat Base. Intense fighting develops in nearby Dai Do as the 2d Battalion, 4th Marines, known as
 “the Magnificent Bastards,” struggles to eject NVA forces from this strategic position.

Six Silent Men (101st LRP Rangers Book 1) (English Edition)

"No way in hell you could survive 'out there' with six men. You couldn't live thirty minutes 'out there' with only six men."

Fields of Fire: A Novel (English Edition)

They each had their reasons for joining the Marines. They each had their illusions. Goodrich came from Harvard. Snake got the tattoo—“Death Before Dishonor”—before he got the uniform. And Hodges was haunted by the ghosts of family heroes. They were three young men from different worlds, plunged into a white-hot, murderous realm of jungle warfare as it was fought by one Marine platoon in the An Hoa Basin, 1969. They had no way of knowing what awaited them. Nothing could have prepared them for the madness to come. And in the heat and horror of battle they took on new identities, took on each other, and were each reborn in fields of fire.

Fields of Fire is James Webb’s classic novel of the Vietnam War, a novel of poetic power, razor-sharp observation, and agonizing human truths seen through the prism of nonstop combat. Weaving together a cast of vivid characters, Fields of Fire captures the journey of unformed men through a man-made hell—until each man finds his fate.

The 13th Valley (English Edition)

A work that has served as a literary cornerstone for the Vietnam generation, The 13th Valley follows the strange and terrifying Vietnam combat experiences of James Chelini, a telephone-systems installer who finds himself an infantryman in territory controlled by the North Vietnamese Army. Spiraling deeper and deeper into a world of conflict and darkness, this harrowing account of Chelini's plunge and immersion into jungle warfare traces his evolution

We Were Soldiers Once . . . and Young: Ia Drang—The Battle That Changed the War in Vietnam (English Edition)

In November 1965, some 450 men of the First Battalion, Seventh Cavalry, under the command of Lt. Col. Harold Moore, were dropped into a small clearing in the Ia Drang Valley. They were immediately surrounded by 2,000 North Vietnamese soldiers. Three days later, only two and a half miles away, a sister battalion was brutally slaughtered. Together, these actions at the landing zones X-Ray and Albany constituted one of the most savage and significant battles of the Vietnam War. They were the first major engagements between the US Army and the People’s Army of Vietnam.
 How these Americans persevered—sacrificing themselves for their comrades and never giving up—creates a vivid portrait of war at its most devastating and inspiring. Lt. Gen. Moore and Joseph L. Galloway—the only journalist on the ground throughout the fighting—interviewed hundreds of men who fought in the battle, including the North Vietnamese commanders. Their poignant account rises above the ordeal it chronicles to depict men facing the ultimate challenge, dealing with it in ways they would have once found unimaginable. It reveals to us, as rarely before, man’s most heroic and horrendous endeavor.

Phase Line Green: The Battle for Hue, 1968 (English Edition)

The bloody monthlong battle for the Citadel in Hue pitted U.S. Marines against an entrenched North Vietnamese Army force. By official accounts it was a tactical and moral victory for the Marines and the United States. But here survivor Nicholas Warr describes with urgency and outrage the Marines' savage house-to-house fighting--ordered without air, naval, or artillery support by officers with no experience in that type of combat.

Sparing few in the telling, Warr's firsthand narrative tells of desperate Marine suicide charges and of the Marines' selfless devotion to their comrades. His riveting account of the most vicious urban combat since World War II offers an unparalleled view of how a small-unit commander copes with the conflicting demands and responsibilities thrust upon him by the enemy, his men, and the chain of command.

Hope that helps and is enough for a bit of holiday reading.
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Offline 88D

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #4 on: December 12, 2019, 02:38:31 PM »
A couple have read and would recommend.
Black April, the 25 year century, lost mandate of heaven, hell in An loc, Vietnam's forgotten army, Vietnam under communism 1975-1982.

Recently downloaded Nguyen cao kys book "how we lost the Vietnam war" but have not got around to reading it yet.

Offline Will Bailie

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #5 on: December 12, 2019, 05:06:11 PM »
Michael Herr's "Dispatches", based on (or possibly "inspired by") his experiences in Vietnam as a correspondent for Esquire Magazine.  Very readable, focussed on the experience of being in Vietnam rather than the details of specific campaigns.

Offline Ash

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #6 on: December 12, 2019, 09:01:54 PM »
'The 13th Valley' by John M. Del Vecchio

'Chickenhawk' by Robert Mason

'Nam' by Mark Baker

'A Rumor of War' by Philip Caputo

Offline BlindFool

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #7 on: December 13, 2019, 04:45:27 AM »
If I die in a combat zone - Tim O’Brien

Dispatches - Michael Herr (awesome book)

Matterhorn - Karl Marlantes

The Dying Place - David A Maurer (Spec Forces/Montagnards....awesome)

Vietnam Journal (Book 1 to 7) - Don Lomax (The best adult themed comic series on the war).

Combat Photography:
Requiem - Horst Faas
Nam - Tim Page
Vietnam Inc - Philip Jones Griffiths

Tunnels of Cu Chi - Tom Mangold

Low Level Hell -  Hugh Mills (Loach scouts and Cobra Gunship action)
« Last Edit: December 13, 2019, 05:06:57 AM by BlindFool »

Offline Etranger

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #8 on: December 13, 2019, 06:13:38 AM »
Some good suggestion there. May I add 'The Tiger Man of Vietnam' about an Australian SF advisor who ended up running a Montagnard guerrilla force. Shades of Apocalypse Now in the story.   https://www.hachette.com.au/frank-walker/the-tiger-man-of-vietnam
« Last Edit: December 13, 2019, 12:21:58 PM by Etranger »
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Offline Belisarius

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #9 on: December 13, 2019, 09:27:08 AM »
Chickenhawk I would certainly endorse, it stays in my mind 20 years after reading it .  Vietnam by Max Hastings , maybe his best book . Dispatches , certainly.  I’m afraid couldn’t finish the 13th valley . The GMT boardgame  Fire in the Lake is fabulous and covers the whole war , I recommend it as an immersive experience.

Offline Etranger

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #10 on: December 13, 2019, 12:20:36 PM »
If you backdate to the French-Indochina war, Bernard Fall's The Street With No Name and Hell in a Very Small Place are must reads (as are a lot of his other writings), whilst Martin Windrow's The Last Valley is a comprehensive account of Dien Bien Phu.

Add Graham Green's The Quiet American for fiction, and the 2002 remake of the movie of the novel for the atmosphere -  the original film was given a very pro=American slant, completely distorting the novel's message.
« Last Edit: December 13, 2019, 12:22:35 PM by Etranger »

Offline traveller

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #11 on: December 13, 2019, 12:32:57 PM »
A Bantam War Book "Seven Firefights in Vietnam" - good book for wargames scenarios, make sure you get the "Specially Illustrated Edition"


Offline Stosstruppen

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #13 on: December 13, 2019, 01:19:29 PM »
I'll add to my original comment,

I'll second, We were Soldiers, Phase Line Green ( Limited in scope on Hue but gritty and interesting), and Fields of Fire (a novel but written by a Vietnam vet, it is outstanding).

I'd add Boys of Company C, and Nam by Mark Baker (a series of vignettes).

Offline fusilierdan

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Re: Vietnam reading list
« Reply #14 on: December 14, 2019, 02:29:22 AM »