Westmoreland's War

Reassessing American Strategy in Vietnam

De: Gregory A. Daddis

Narrado por: Jonathan Yen

General William C. Westmoreland has long been derided for his failed strategy of "attrition" in the Vietnam War. Historians have argued that Westmoreland's strategy placed a premium on high "body counts" through a "big unit war" that relied almost solely on search and destroy missions. Many believe the US Army failed in Vietnam because of Westmoreland's misguided and narrow strategy.

In a groundbreaking reassessment of American military strategy in Vietnam, Gregory Daddis overturns conventional wisdom and shows how Westmoreland did indeed develop a comprehensive campaign which included counterinsurgency, civic action, and the importance of gaining political support from the South Vietnamese population. Exploring the realities of a large, yet not wholly unconventional environment, Daddis reinterprets the complex political and military battlefields of Vietnam. Without searching for blame, he analyzes how American civil and military leaders developed strategy and how Westmoreland attempted to implement a sweeping strategic vision.

Westmoreland's War is a landmark reinterpretation of one of America's most divisive wars, outlining the multiple, interconnected aspects of American military strategy in Vietnam-combat operations, pacification, nation building, and the training of the South Vietnamese armed forces. Daddis offers a critical reassessment of one of the defining moments in American history.

©2014 Oxford University Press (P)2018 Tantor

A Different Prospective Of General Westmoreland

The author gave a interesting prospective of General Westmoreland's conduct of strategy during the Vietnam War.

Defense of Westmoreland comes up short

The Vietnam War was not in the US national interest. What it would take to prevail was much more than US strategists expected. Daddis is correct to argue that much was not Westmoreland's fault.

However, I've read many other books on Vietnam and am aware of officers who fought in that war who learned more, came up with better ideas than Westmoreland did, and whose lessons were too often not learned up the chain of command. Read, for example, About Face by David Hackworth. Or Silence Was A Weapon by Stuart Herrington.

Both David Hackworth and Lewis Sorley point to training problems that led to many more casualties than necessary. Hackworth compensated with his own troops by specializing his men and training them in their specialties. This drastically cut casualties.

Westmoreland made the training problem worse by having drafties spend only 12 months in Vietnam. The casualties were much higher among recent arrivals. They could have been kept in Vietnam longer with extensive training in their first months in country as a way to cut casualties. Ticket punching officers rotating through commands kept the officers too inexperienced as well, again getting more people killed as a result.

I could go on. But again my point: Westie could have performed far better than he did. You have to read other books on the war to judge this one and to judge Westmoreland.

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