Hell in a Very Small Place

The Siege of Dien Bien Phu

By: Bernard B. Fall

Narrated by: Robertson Dean

Like Gettysburg, Stalingrad, Midway, and Tet, the battle at Dien Bien Phu - a strategic attack launched by France against the Vietnamese in 1954 after eight long years of war - marked a historic turning point. By the end of the 56-day siege, a determined Viet Minh guerrilla force had destroyed a large tactical French colonial army in the heart of Southeast Asia. The Vietnamese victory would not only end French occupation of Indochina and offer a sobering premonition of the US' future military defeat in the region but would also provide a new model of modern warfare in which size and sophistication didn't always dictate victory.

Before his death in Vietnam in 1967, Bernard Fall, a critically acclaimed scholar and reporter, drew upon declassified documents from the French Defense Ministry and interviews with thousands of surviving French and Vietnamese soldiers to weave a compelling account of the key battle of Dien Bien Phu. With Fall's thorough and insightful analysis, Hell in a Very Small Place has become one of the benchmarks in war reportage.

©1966 Bernard B. Fall (P)2016 Tantor

Critic reviews

"A thorough account of a brave, sanguinary battle that has since turned out to have immense historic importance." ( The New Yorker)

Great book about Dien Bien Phu

After watching the critically underrated film “Dien Bien Phu 1992) I wanted to know more! So I looked up books about the war. I found this one and it is so in depth! The writer is great and he actually met the people that were there. He sadly died in Nam during the Vietnam War. This book was written in the late 60s so it is not too far removed from the events. The bad side is that there may be more information now. I will try to find a book more closer to contemporary times. This was great!

One of the best books I have read of human conflict

This book was outstanding. The account was riveting and was hard to put down when I started reading it. 5 stars

Great book easy listening

Great book, full of factual details while weaving through the personal stories of the people. story line carries well and avoids the long dry narrative that normally comes with non-fiction set piece battles. A tremendous event that has nearly been forgotten that played such a large role in the American involvement in south east Asia

If you want to learn about the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, this the book.

Very detailed from most other books about the battle which gloss over it. It may feel a bit overwhelming with the unit names and may get lost without a map of the battlefield, make sure you gain some basic knowledge of the terrain, do stop when you hear certain units names so you can look them up and understand the abbreviations.
The narration is good.
You learn more about the prelude to the battle which is important to the battle, I never heard of it before so it was very nice. You go through day by day of the battle at a nice pace.
Go slow and do return to chapters or sections you didn’t understand, I love this book and the audio was helpful as I went to and from work.

Liked it

Heavy subject, but very good. Very detailed review of a very tough battle. It was a heavy listen.

An epic battle- the fight to retain an empire

I served in Viet Nam and I suppose I always had a general idea about Dien Bien Phu having been a major battle where the French lost control of Viet Nam and that it was inflection point were the U.S. became the owner of "the problem". What I didn't know is how valiantly the French soldiers and their allies fought in this epic battle for the soul of a nation. My God, what a story, what courage, what a fight!. Just like my war, brave men fighting a stupid war, lead by myopic generals implementing an impossible strategy with tepid support from home - but what a fight by the soldiers - on both sides. Carnage and suffering last seen in WW I - and Bernard Fall tells it with a skill that puts you inside the wire. If you read military history, read this one.

A lesson in heroism and stupidity.

Great? in depth, accounting of, one of the most important battles of the 20th Century.

Excellent book

The defeat of the French was not a lesson for later US involvement in Vietnam. LBJ needed this war to cover for his domestic policy failures. Either commit to win or remain n out of the conflict.

Tedious

Tedious. I struggled to finish it. I ended up skipping a number of chapters just to get to the end of it.

Must read for the professional soldier and others

This an outstanding book on a battle that a lot of people know about but don't really don't know anything about it other than the French lost.

There is a lot a wisdom that Officers and NCO's can learn from this battle told in this book. Mr Fall tells the story from multiple points of views and in such a way that you feel like your their with the soldiers. I wish Mr Fall would have lived longer so he could have updated the book as new information came out. I think this would have also aloud him to write more from the Vietminh point of view.

The amount of heroism on both side was amazing.