Zachary Abuza, Renovating Politics in Contemporary Vietnam. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2001. v, 273 pp.
Melanie Beresford, Vietnam. New York: Columbia University Press, 1988.
Georges Boudarel, Bui Xuan Quang, Chan Tin, Daniel Hemery, Le Duc Tho, Michael Myers, Nam Cao, Nguyen Duc Nhuan, Nguyen Khac Vien, and Tran Van Tra, La bureaucratie au Vietnam. (Vietnam-Asie-Debat-1.) Paris: l'Harmattan, 1983. 261 pp.
Robert K. Brigham, Guerrilla Diplomacy: The NLF's Foreign Relations and the Viet Nam War. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999. xviii, 215 pp.
Thomas Campbell, "Facing the Enemy." Naval History, February 1996, pp. 42-45. Cambell became an adviser to RVN Marines late in 1965. Interesting items include an incident of a PAVN soldier who only appeared to be chained to his machine gun.
George Carver, "The Faceless Viet Cong," Foreign Affairs 44:3 (April 1966), pp. 347-372. An overall picture of the Viet Cong and Vietnamese Communism. The journal did not mention, when publishing this, that the author was a very senior CIA analyst.
David Chanoff and Doan Van Toai, Portrait of the Enemy. New York: Random House, 1986. xxii, 215 pp. Reprinted as 'Vietnam': A Portrait of Its People at War. I.B. Tauris, 1996. 215 pp.
James M. Cloninger, Jr., "Analysis of Communist Vietnamese Special Operations Forces During the Vietnam War and the Lessons That Can Be Applied to Current and Future U.S. Militry Operations" M.S. Thesis, Naval Postgraduate School, June 2005. xiii, 65 pp.
Council of Ministers of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Central Intelligence Agency, January 1977. Vii, 103 pp. Detailed biographical profiles, including dates of trips abroad. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in two parts: Front matter and pp. 1-50 (Hoang Anh to Pham Hung) and pp. 51-103 (Pham Hung, continued, to Nghiem Xuan Yem, and index).
Michael R. Dedrick, Southern Voices: Biet Dong and the National Liberation Front. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2022 (forthcoming). Oral histories of members of the special attack units that the Americans usually called "sappers."
John Edmund Delezen, Red Plateau: Memoir of a North Vietnamese Soldier. Corps Productions, 2006. 141 pp. The life of Nguyen Van Tung, a PAVN soldier, as written by Delezen, who had served as a recon Marine in the same area (northern I Corps) as Tung, and who became friends with Tung while visiting Vietnam long after the war.
Doan Van Toai and David Chanoff, The Vietnamese Gulag. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986. 351 pp.
David W.P. Elliott, "Revolutionary Re-Integration: A Comparison of the Foundation of Post-Liberation Political Systems in North Vietnam and China." Ph.D. dissertation, Political Science, Cornell, 1976. 722 pp. 76-15903.
Edward J. Emering, Viet Cong: A Photographic Portrait. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Military History, 1999. Photos captured by US and allied forces during the war.
Bernard Fall, The Viet-Minh Regime: Government and Administration in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Ithaca: Cornell University/New York: Institute of Pacific Relations, 1954. ix, 143 pp. Rev. and enl. ed. New York: Institue of Pacific Relations/Ithaca: Cornell University, 1956. xi, 196 pp. The 1956 edition has been placed online by Hathi Trust.
Bernard Fall, Le Viet Minh, 1945-1960. Preface by Paul Mus. Paris: Armand Colin, 1960. xii, 377 pp.
Christopher Giebel, Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communism: Ton Duc Thang and the Politics of History and Memory. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2004.
Christopher E. Goscha, Thailand and the Southeast Asian Networks of the Vietnamese Revolution, 1885-1954. Richmond, United Kingdom: Curzon Press, 1999. (Nordic Institute of Asian Studies Monograph Series, no. 79.) 418 pp. An impressive piece of research.
Christopher E. Goscha and Benoît de Tréglodé, eds., Naissance d'un État-Parti: Le Viêt Nam depuis 1945/The Birth of a Party-State: Vietnam since 1945. Paris: les Indes Savantes, 2004. 463 pp.
Martin Grossheim, "Revisionism in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam: New Evidence from the East German Archives." Cold War History, 5:4 (November 2005), pp. 451-477.
François Guillemot, "Death and Suffering at First Hand: Youth Shock Brigades during the Vietnam War (1950–1975)," Journal of Vietnamese Studies, Vol. 4, No. 3 (Fall 2009), pp. 17-60. The groups the United States usually called the Assault Youth.
François Guillemot, Des Vietnamiennes dans la guerre civile: l'autre moitié de la guerre, 1945-1975. Paris: Les Indes Savantes, 2014. 243 pp. Pages 93-198 are devoted to what Guillemot calls "Les Jeunesses de choc" (Thanh nien xung phong, Assault Youth).
Bertrand de Hartingh, Independance et dependance, puissance et impuissance Vietnamienne, le cas de la Republique Democratique. Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 1998.
William D. Henderson, Why the Vietcong Fought: A Study of Motivation and Control in a Modern Army in Combat. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1979.
Stephen T. Hosmer, Viet Cong Repression and its Implications for the Future. Lexington, MA: Heath, 1970. ix, 172 pp. A RAND Corporation study.
David Hunt, Vietnam's Southern Revolution: From Peasant Insurrection to Total War. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2008. xi, 272 pp. A study of the way the revolution was experienced by those involved in it, in the upper Mekong Delta, from 1959 to 1968.
The Impact of the Sapper on the Viet-Nam War. Saigon: United States Mission in Vietnam, October 1969. 17 pp. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Lt. Col. Jonathan F. Ladd, USA, "Viet Cong Portrait." Military Review, XLIV:7 (July 1964), pp. 67-80. Lt. Col. Ladd, who had recently (I believe 1962-63) served as senior adivsor to the ARVN 21st Division in the southwest half of the Mekong Delta, to some extent exaggerates the external links of the Viet Cong, but at the same time makes in clear that the Viet Cong had solid roots in local society.
Michael Lee Lanning and Dan Cragg, Inside the VC and the NVA: The Real Story of North Vietnam's Armed Forces. New York: Fawcett, 1992. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2008. xv, 332 pp.
Thomas K. Latimer, "Hanoi's Leaders and Their South Vietnam Policies: 1954-1968." Ph.D. dissertation, History, Georgetown University, 1972. iv, 360 pp. AAT 7234184. Full text available online if you are browsing from an institution that subscribes to ProQuest Dissertations and Theses.
Aaron Lillie, "Politics, Protest and Revolution: The Origin and Evolution of the Urban Networks of the NLF and the Communist Party in Central Vietnam, 1930-1975," Ph.D. dissertation, History, University of Washington, 2021. DA 28549600. xiii, 330 pp. Deals mostly with the period up to 1968.
Mai Anh Nguyen, "Parenting Patriots: Filial Piety, Family Socialization, and Insurgency in the Vietnam War," Journal of Vietnamese Studies 18:4 (Fall 2023), pp. 1-29. People motivated to join the National Liberation Front.
James W. McCoy, Secrets of the Viet Cong. New York: Hippocrene, 1992. 549 pp. This book, which appears on brief skim to have been rather carelessly written, without much use of Vietnamese sources, really deals with the North Vietnamese Army more than the Viet Cong (though it is careless about the distinction between the two).
Céline Marangé, Le communisme vietnamien (1919-1991): Construction d'un État-nation entre Moscou et Pékin. Paris: Sciences Po., 2012. 611 pp.
Harish C. Mehta, People’s Diplomacy of Vietnam: Soft Power in the Resistance War, 1965-1972. Cambridge Scholars Publishing Limited, 2019. 271 pp.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Viet-Nam, Infiltration of Communist Armed Elements and Clandestine Introduction of Arms from North to South Vietnam. Saigon, June 1967. 53 pp. The text, though apparently not all the maps and photos that originally accompanied it, has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Virginia Morris and Clive Hills, Giao Lien: Women of the Communist Underground. Spellmount Publishers, 2010. 256 pp. History Press, 2012. 224 pp.
National Interrogation Center. Some reports (probably quite a lot, though there are only a few I have noticed so far) of the interrogations of captured Communist personnel, carried out at the National Interrogation Center, have been placed online in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Tran Xuan Thuong, a.k.a. Tran Kim Tien, NIC Case No. 043/23/67, was a tank driver in the PAVN 1963-1965. He was infiltrated into South Vietnam in December 1965, and was captured after taking part in an attack on an ARVN armored school in Gia Dinh province in 1966. Reports on his interrogation: NVA Armored Regiment 202 Chemical Warfare Training in NVN, NIC Report No. 081/67, 20 January 1967, and NVA Armored Regiment 202 Atomic Warfare Training in NVN, NIC Report No. 084/67, 23 January 1967.
Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, "'Between the Storms': North Vietnam's Strategy during the Second Indochina War (1955-1973)." Ph.D. dissertation, Yale, 2008. UMI 3317185. 321 pp.
Lien-Hang T. Nguyen, Hanoi's War: An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012. xiv, 444 pp.
Ninh, Kim Ngoc Bao, "Revolution, Politics and Culture in Socialist Vietnam, 1945-1965." Ph.D. Dissertation, Political Science, Yale, 1996. 464 pp. DA 9635392.
Ninh, Kim Ngoc Bao A World Transformed: The Politics of Culture in Revolutionary Vietnam, 1945-1965. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002. xv, 317 pp.
Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff, G-2, U.S. Army, Vietnam, History of the 273 VC Regiment, July 1964 - December 1969. ii, 33 pp. The battalions making up this regiment originated in IV Corps, but they came north to Tay Ninh province to be joined into the 273 Regiment in 1964. It operated in III Corps until 1969, when it returned to IV Corps. Much of the text (pp. 24, 25, 26, and 29, and the maps, are missing) has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Marc Opper, People's Wars in China, Malaya, and Vietnam. Ann Arbor: Universty of Michigan Press, 2020. xiv, 381 pp. The main focus is on China, but there is one chapter (pp. 205-233) on the Vietnam War, and one comparative chapter.
Lt. Col. George S. Patton, USA, "Why They Fight." Military Review, XLV:12 (December 1965), pp. 16-23. Viet Cong motivation.
Pham Hong Linh, "The Congresses and Plenums of the Communist Party of Viet Nam." Goes up to 1984. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Douglas Pike, Viet Cong: The Organization and Techniques of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Cambridge, MA: M.I.T. Press, 1966. xx, 490 pp. Pike was one of the two most conspicuous US officials, supposed to be experts on Vietnamese Communism, who wrote publicly in the mid-1960s. (The other, George Carver—see above—had far more actual expertise.)
Douglas Pike, History of Vietnamese Communism, 1925-1976. Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1978. xiv, 181 pp. Wrong dates, wrong statistics, wrong geography, mistranslations, and every other type of factual error. A few examples:
On p. 88, discussing the Geneva Conference of 1954, Pike says: "The Republic of Vietnam, in which Bao Dai was soon to be deposed by referendum in favor of Ngo Dinh Diem, did not attend and in fact denounced the whole affair." Mention of "the Republic of Vietnam" is an anachronism here; Diem did not start calling his government that until 1955. More important, this government did send an official delegation to the Geneva Conference. The proposals made at the conference by Tran Van Do, who as Foreign Minister in Diem's cabinet was head of this delegation, have been published in the Pentagon Papers (see Gravel edition, vol. I, pp. 569-70) and various other places.
Also on p. 88, Pike says that Le Duan was talking with western journalists in Hanoi during the Geneva Conference of 1954, telling them Vietnam was being betrayed. Le Duan was nowhere near Hanoi during that conference, and would not have dreamed of talking with western journalists had he been there.
p. 111, lines 4-12: "Open rebellion broke out in November 1956 . . . rebellion began, most humiliatingly, in Ho Chi Minh's home province of Nghe An. In two weeks the rioting and insurrection had spread throughout most of the province. A full PAVN division took nearly a month to put down the uprising. Elsewhere in the country other uprisings developed. The worst of these was near Vinh, beginning on November 8 . . ." The problem is that Vinh was the capital of Nghe An province. Apparently Pike had seen some accounts describing an uprising in Nghe An province, and some describing an uprising near Vinh, and didn't realize that Vinh was in Nghe An and that all these accounts referred to the same uprising. So he wrote it up as two uprisings, one in Nghe An and one in an unnamed province containing Vinh.
Note 7 on p. 161, discussing collectivization, treats "work exchange team" and "cooperative" as two different names for the same type of organization. This is incorrect; the work exchange team was smaller and retained much greater elements of private ownership. This error leads Pike at the bottom of the page to say that there were 4,722 work exchange teams in North Vietnam in 1958. In fact there were at least 100,000 work exchange teams in that year; 4,722 was a figure for the number of cooperatives.
Note 12 on p. 163 gives seven supposed quotes from a report by General Giap on land reform. None of them is really a verbatim translation of the Vietnamese original (Nhan Dan, October 31, 1956, p. 2). The first, third, fourth, and seventh are seriously inaccurate. Note in particular that the third quote says "We attacked indiscriminately all families owning land..." where the original had referred to indiscriminate attacks on "landlords." Not more than one tenth of the families owning land were classified as landlords. One would have expected Pike to have noticed the absurdity of this mistranslation, since he was under the mistaken impression (see p. 101) that 98 percent of the farmers in the Red River Delta owned the land they farmed, an error derived from misinterpretation of data collected by Yves Henry in the 1930s. The fourth and seventh of the translated quotes from General Giap referred to executions where the Vietnamese original did not mention executions, and so on.
Douglas Pike, PAVN: People's Army of Vietnam. Novato, CA: Presidio, 1986. vii, 384 pp. (there is a book club printing that has viii, 373 pp.). Likely to become notorious for Pike's supposed evidence (presented in note 27 to chapter 4) that there was really a North Vietnamese attack against U.S. ships in the second Tonkin Gulf incident, August 4, 1964. He took a sentence published in Hanoi about combat between North Vietnamese and American vessels in the first Tonkin Gulf incident (August 2, 1964), deleted the words "On 2 August 1964" from the beginning of the sentence, and published the remainder of the sentence in quotation marks as a description of the second incident.
Sophie Quinn-Judge,
"The Ideological Debate in the DRV and the Significance of the Anti-Party Affair, 1967-68,"
Cold War History, 5:4 (November 2005), pp. 479-500.
Rand Corporation (later, RAND Corporation). This "think tank" financed by the U.S. military
conducted a great deal of research on the Vietnam War. The Viet Cong Motivation and Morale Project
was particularly important; it compiled a huge amount of information,
more than 60,000 pages, by in-depth interviewing of
former members of Communist organizations in Vietnam, mostly defectors, but also some prisoners. Most Rand
publications can be purchased in hard copy through the
RAND Corporation online bookstore, and some can be purchased in various formats
through the National Technical Information Service (NTIS). But many also can be read
online for free, courtesy of the Rand Corporation. Some Rand publications relevant to this section of my bibliography are listed below,
but many others are in other sections, especially
The Big War, 1964-1972;
In the
Villages: Pacification; and
Theories
of Limited War and Counterinsurgency.
The RAND Interviews. During the war, the RAND Corporation conducted very extensive interviewing of Viet Cong prisoners and defectors,
and some interviewing of other Vietnamese such as refugees. The records of these interviews form a very valuable source. Some of them have recently
become available online, through the Virtual Vietnam
Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
W. Phillips Davison,
User's Guide to the Rand Interviews in
Vietnam. R-1024-ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, 1972. vii, 56 pp.
Frank Denton,
Two Analytical Aids for
Use with the Rand Interviews. RM-5338-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. x, 80 pp. This was
originally published in May 1967. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of May 1967.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series AG -- Active Influence within the Viet Cong North Vietnam Armed Forces. - Interview repts. 1964-1968.
Available through NTIS. 649 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series AGR -- Attitudes of Refugees Toward Various Aspects of the War. - Interview repts. for 1965.
Available through NTIS. 84 interviews with refugees.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series BH -- Attitudes Toward Halt of Bombing of North Vietnam. - Interview repts. for summer 1968.
Available through NTIS. 54 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Series C -- Reactions of Viet Cong to 1967 Tet Talks. - Interview repts. Nov 67-Jan 68.
Available through NTIS
Rand Vietnam Interview Series DT -- Activities of Viet Cong within Dinh Tuong Province. - Interview repts. 1965-Jan 68.
Available on microfiche through NTIS. 285 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series FD -- Reasons for Joining the Viet Cong. - Interview repts. for 1967.
Available through NTIS. 47 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series FX, LX, and SX -- Infiltration Routes and Methods. - Interview repts. 1967-1968.
Available through NTIS.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series K and KO -- Elements of Viet Cong and North Vietnam Cohesion. - Interview repts. 1967-1968.
Available through NTIS. 87 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series PIE -- Viet Cong Infrastructure in South Vietnamese Villages. - Interview repts. 1965-1966.
Available through NTIS. 102 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series PT -- Viet Cong Knowledge of Paris Negotiations. - Interview repts. for summer of 1968.
Available through NTIS. 47 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series Tet-VC -- Organizational Activities of Viet Cong during the Tet Offensive. - Interview repts. for 1968.
Available through NTIS. 82 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series V -- Viet Cong Organizational Activities at Hamlet/Village Level. - Interview repts. 1967-1968.
Available through NTIS. 106 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series XN -- Effects of Bombing of North Vietnam. - Interview repts. for Apr 68.
Available through NTIS. 115 interviews.
Rand Vietnam Interview Series Z -- Viet Cong Organization and Motivation and Experiences of Its Members. - Interview repts. for 1964.
Available through NTIS. 137 interviews; this was the first
interview series Rand conducted in Vietnam.
Mary Anderson, Michael Arnsten, and Harvey Averch,
Insurgent Organization and
Operations: A Case Study of the Viet Cong in the Delta, 1964-1966. RM-5239-1-ISA/ARPA. Santa
Monica, CA: Rand, 1975. xxiii, 169 pp. A study of the Viet Cong in Dinh Tuong province, in the upper
Mekong Delta. This was originally published in August 1967. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of August 1967.
J.M. Carrier and C.A.H. Thomson,
Viet Cong Motivation and Morale:
The Special Case of Chieu Hoi. Santa Monica, CA:
Rand, 1975. RM-4830-2-ISA/ARPA. xxiii, 165pp. This was originally
published in May 1966. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of May 1966.
Walter P. Davison and Joseph J. Zasloff,
A Profile of Viet Cong Cadres. Santa Monica: Rand, 1966 (1975?).
RM-4983-1-ISA/ARPA. xiii, 57 pp.
Walter P. Davison,
Some Observations on
Viet Cong Operations in the Villages. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. RM-5267-2-ISA/ARPA.
xix, 179 pp. This was originally published in July 1967. It was republished (I am not sure whether
there were any changes or additions) in May 1968; that version was xvi, 179 pp. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of May 1968.
Frank H. Denton,
Some Effects of
Military Operations on Viet Cong Attitudes. Santa Monica: Rand,
1975. RM-4966-1-ISA/ARPA. xiii, 53 pp. This was originally
published in November 1966. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of November 1966.
Frank H. Denton,
Volunteers for the
Viet Cong. RM-5647-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. xvii, 21 pp. This was originally
published in September 1968. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of September 1966.
The 1968 version of
this report, xiii, 21 pp., has been placed on-line in the
Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
John C. Donnell,
Viet Cong Recruitment: Why and How Men
Join. D-14436-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, November 1966. xv, 196 pp. plus numerous appendices
paginated separately. This document was originally classified "Confidential."
John C. Donnell,
Viet Cong Recruitment: Why and How Men
Join. RM-5486-1-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. xxv, 174 pp. This was originally
published in December 1967. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of December 1967.
John C. Donnell and Melvin Gurtov,
North Vietnam: Left of Moscow,
Right of Peking. P-3794. Santa Monica: Rand, February 1968.
57 pp. The text has also been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in two parts:
pp. 1-49 (text) and
pp. 50-57 (notes and bibliography).
John C. Donnell, Guy J. Pauker, and Joseph J. Zasloff,
Viet Cong
Motivation and Morale in 1964: A Preliminary Report. Santa Monica:
Rand, 1975. RM-4507/3-ISA. xv, 54 pp. This was originally published in March 1965. The 1975
version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, and the main text has been reformatted to fit
into considerably fewer pages, but the cover and title page give no indication that this is a new
version; they show a date of March 1965. The original 1965 version, xiii, 74 pp, has been placed online in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in two parts:
Front matter and pp. 1-31 and
pp. 32-74.
David W.P. Elliott and C.A.H. Thomson,
A Look at the VC Cadres: Dinh
Tuong Province, 1965-1966. RM-5114-1. Santa Monica: Rand,
1967. 89 pp.
David W.P. Elliott and W.A. Stewart,
Pacification and the Viet Cong
System in Dinh Tuong: 1966-1967. RM-5788-ISA/ARPA. Santa
Monica: Rand Corporation, 1975. xiii, 105 pp. This was originally
published in January 1969. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of January 1969.
David W.P. Elliott and Mai Elliott,
Documents of an Elite Viet Cong
Delta Unit: The Demolition Platoon of the 514th Battalion. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. These
studies were originally published in 1969. The 1975 versions have new
forewords and bibliographies added to the front matter, but the covers and title pages give no indication
that they are new versions; they show dates of 1969.
Part 1: Unit Composition and
Personnel. RM-5848. xv, 107 pp.
Part 2: Party
Organization. RM-5849. xv, 177 pp.
Part 3: Military
Organization and Activities. RM-5850. xv, 125 pp.
Part 4: Political Indoctrination
and Military Training. RM-5851. xv, 98 pp.
Part 5: Personal Letters.
RM-5852. xv, 61 pp.
Leon Gouré and Charles A.H. Thomson,
Some Impressions of Viet
Cong Vulnerabilities: An Interim Report. Santa Monica: Rand, August
1965. RM-4699-1-ISA/ARPA. xi, 94 pp. Originally classified "For Official Use Only."
Leon Gouré, Anthony J. Russo, and Douglas Scott,
Some Findings
of the Viet Cong Motivation and Morale Study, June-December 1965. Santa Monica:
Rand, 1975. RM-4911-2-ISA/ARPA.
xiii, 46 pp. This was originally
published in February 1966. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover gives no indication that
this is a new version; it shows a date of February 1966.
Leon Gouré,
Some Impressions of the Effects of Military Operations
on Viet Cong Behavior. Santa Monica: Rand, 1965. RM-4517-1-ISA.
xi, 21 pp.
Leon Goure,
Inducements and Deterrents
to Defection: An Analysis of the Motives of 125 Defectors. Santa Monica: Rand,
August 1968. RM-5522-1-ISA/ARPA. xiii, 41 pp.
Mostly guerrillas and VC civilian personnel in the sample, some VC
local forces, no main forces or PAVN. This was originally published in August 1968. The 1975 version has
a new foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover gives no indication that
this is a new version; it shows a date of August 1968.
The text
has also been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Melvin Gurtov,
Hanoi on War and Peace. P-3696. Santa Monica, CA:
Rand Corporation, 1967. 40 pp. The full text is available online
to paid subscribers of Questia.
Melvin Gurtov,
Indochina in North Vietnamese
Strategy. P-4605. Santa Monica: Rand, March 1971. 28
pp. The
text has also been placed on-line in the
Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.
Melvin Gurtov,
Viet Cong Cadres and the Cadre System: A Study of
the Main and Local Forces. Santa Monica: Rand, 1967. RM-5414-1-ISA/ARPA.
xv, 97 pp.
Melvin Gurtov,
War in the Delta: Views from Three Viet Cong Battalions.
Santa Monica: Rand, 1967 (1975?). RM-5353-1-ISA/ARPA. xi, 59 pp.
Hans Heymann, Jr.,
Imposing Communism on the Economy of South Vietnam:
A conjectural View. P-4569. Santa Monica: Rand, January 1971. 15
pp. Speculation about the "unthinkable" question
of how the Communists would behave if they emerged from the war in control of South Vietnam.
L.P. Holliday and R.M. Gurfield,
Viet Cong
Logistics. RM-5423-1-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand,
1975. xv, 123 pp. This was originally
published in June 1968. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of June 1968.
Brian M. Jenkins,
Why the North Vietnamese Keep
Fighting. D-20153-ARPA/AGILE. Santa Monica: Rand, April 9, 1970. iii, 9 pp. "For Rand Use
Only." Jenkins seemed
oblivious to crucial factors; I note in particular that when he argued that the "North Vietnamese"
were going to go on fighting for control of South Vietnam, he showed no sign of noticing that many of the
people he was describing as leaders of North Vietnam were actually southerners.
Brian M. Jenkins,
Why the North Vietnamese Will Keep
Fighting. P-4395-1. Santa Monica: Rand, March 1972. 12 pp. Revised version of the previous item.
Konrad Kellen,
Conversations with
NVA and VC Soldiers: A Study of Enemy Motivation and Morale.
D-18967-ISA. Santa Monica: Rand, June 13, 1969. iii, 142 pp. "For RAND Use Only."
Konrad Kellen,
Conversations with
Enemy Soldiers in Late 1968/Early 1969: A Study of Motivation and Morale.
RM-6131-1-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand Corporation, 1975. xvii, 143 pp. A slightly modified
version of the previous item. Said that VC/PAVN morale seemed firm. This was originally
published in September 1970. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of September 1970.
Konrad Kellen,
A Profile of the PAVN Soldier
in South Vietnam. RM-5013-1/ISA/ARPA.
Ranta Monica: Rand, 1975. xi, 62 pp. This was originally
published in June 1966. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of June 1966.
Konrad Kellen,
A View of the VC: Elements of Cohesion in the Enemy Camp in 1966-1967.
RM-5462-1-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, November 1969. xiii, 80 pp.
The text has been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in two parts:
Front matter and pp. 1-36 and
pp. 37-80.
Konrad Kellen,
1971 and Beyond: The View from
Hanoi. P-4634-1. Santa Monica: Rand, June 1971. 21 pp.
Nathan Leites,
The Viet Cong Style of Politics. Santa Monica:
Rand, 1969. RM-5487-1-ISA/ARPA. xxxi, 292 pp.
Guy J. Pauker,
An Essay on
Vietnamization. R-604-ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, March 1971. xi, 93 pp. Argues that the
odds of strengthening the GVN to a point that it could survive long-term, with substantial U.S.
support, are a lot better than the odds of getting an acceptable peace through negotiations.
R. M. Pearce,
The Insurgent Environment. RM-5533-1. Santa Monica: Rand, May 1969.
Victoria Pohle and Constantine Menges,
Time and Limited Success as Enemies
of the Vietcong. P-3491. Santa Monica: Rand, October 1967. 8 pp.
Anders Sweetland,
Rallying Potential
Among the North Vietnamese Armed Forces. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. RM-6375-1-ARPA.
xiii, 43 pp. This was originally
published in December 1970. The 1975 version has a new
foreword and bibliography added to the front matter, but the cover and title page give no indication that
this is a new version; they show a date of December 1970.
Joseph J. Zasloff,
The Role of North Vietnam in the
Southern Insurgency. RM-4140-PR. Santa Monica: Rand, July 1964. xvii, 94 pp.
J.J. Zasloff,
Political Motivation of the
Viet Cong: The Vietminh Regroupees.
RM-4703/2-ISA/ARPA. Santa Monica: Rand, 1975. xviii, 183 pp. (This was originally published in August
1966; it was re-issued in May 1968; it was re-issued in 1975 with a foreword and bibliography added to the
front matter, but without any change to the cover, which still gives the date May 1968). The
1968 version, xiv, 183 pp., has been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project
at Texas Tech University:
Front matter and Intoduction
(pp. i-xiv, 1-22);
Part One, "The Regroupees in the North"
(pp. 23-65);
Part Two, "The Regroupees in the Front" (pp. 67-102,
pp. 103-146);
Part Three, "The Defectors"
(pp. 147-183).
Joseph J. Zasloff,
Origins of the Insurgency in South Vietnam, 1954-1960: The Role of the Southern
Vietminh Cadres. RM-5163/2-ISA/ARPA. May 1968 (original edition March 1967). xiii, 36 pp. Based mainly on interviews with 23 "stay-behind"
cadres, members of the Viet Minh who had remained in the South after the Geneva Accords.
Madeleine Riffaud,
Dans les maquis "Vietcong". Paris: Julliard, 1965. 267 pp. Riffaud was a French journalist. Some of the
articles she published in the French Communist Party newspaper l'Humanité, February 14 to March 4, 1965, have
been translated; see JPRS in Translation Series.
Raul Roman,
"War Stories: Long Overdue," New York Timesj, July 29, 2018, SR10. A version of this article is online with the title
War
Stories We've Been Missing for Fifty Years. Interviews with North vietnamese veterans of the Vietnam War.
Gordon Rottman,
Viet Cong and NVA Tunnels and Fortifications of the Vietnam War. Osprey, 2006. 64 pp.
Pierre Rousset,
Le parti communiste vietnamien. Paris: Maspero, 1975. 363 pp.
Zachary Shore,
"Provoking America: Le Duan and the Origins of the Vietnam War," Journal of Cold War Studies 17:4 (Fall 2015), pp. 86-108.
Judy Stowe,
"Révisionnisme au Vietnam." Communisme, nos. 65-66 (2001), pp. 233-249.
Ton That Thien,
The Foreign Politics of the Communist Party of Vietnam:
A Study in Communist Tactics. Alternate data list this as either Philadelphia:
Taylor & Francis, or New York: Crane Russak, 1989.
Tal Tovy,
"Peasants and Revolutionary Movements: The Viet Cong as a Case Study," War in History, 17:2 (April 2010),
217-230.
Benoît de Tréglodé,
Héros et révolution au Viêt Nam, 1948-1964. Paris:
l'Harmattan, 2001. 445 pp.
Tuong Vu,
"In the Service of World Revolution: Vietnamese Communists' Radical Ambitions through the Three Indochina Wars," Journal of Cold War Studies 21:4
(Fall 2019).
Tuong Vu,
"'To be Patriotic is to Build Socialism': Communist Ideology in
Vietnam's Civil War," in Tuong Vu and Wasana Wongsurawat eds., Dynamics of
the Cold War in Asia: Ideology, Identity and Culture (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), pp. 33-52.
William S. Turley, ed.,
Vietnamese Communism in Comparative Perspective.
Boulder: Westview, 1980. xiii, 271 pp. The full text is available online
to paid subscribers of Questia.
George J. Veith,
"The Politburo and the Paris Peace Accords: The Decisions for War, Peace, and the Return to War, June 1971–June 1973" (pp. 241-255)
Geoge J. Veith and Merle Pribbenow,
The
Return to War: North Vietnamese Decision-Making, 1973-1975. Working Paper #84, Cold War International History Project. November 2017. 158 pp.
The Viet Cong Infrastructure: A Background Paper.
Saigon: United States Mission in Vietnam, June 1970. 48
pp. The text
has been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project at Texas Tech University.
Vietnam Documents and Research Notes, no. 102, The People's Revolutionary
Party of South Viet-Nam, Part I. February 1972. vii, 86 pp. The text has been placed on-line in
the Virtual
Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project at Texas Tech University, in two
parts: Front
matter and a 1965 letter of Comrade "Ba" (Le Duan) to the Saigon Regional Committee,
and a 1965 PRP pamphlet.
Christophe Vigne,
"Le Viêt Nam et ses exilés (1945-2009). Permanence et fluctuation d une politique d'attention et de lien." Ph.D. dissertation,
University of Paris, 2017. Looks at the relations of the DRV (up to 1976) and the SRV (after 1976) with the Viet Kieu, the
Vietnamese communities in other countries.
WGBH, a major public television and radio station in Boston that produces many important documentaries, has placed online
The Vietnam Collection, which includes both video and transcripts of more than 200
interviews with people (mostly Vietnamese and Americans) who were involved with the Indochina wars, conducted during the preparation of the
1983 documentary Vietnam: A Television History and Stanley Karnow's book Vietnam: A History. Bui Tin, Nguyen Co Thach, Nguyen Huu Tho,
Nguyen Thi Binh, Nguyen Thi Dinh, and many others.
Christine Pelzer White,
"Agrarian Reform and National Liberation in the Vietnamese Revolution:
1920-1957." Ph.D. dissertation, Political Science, Cornell, 1981.
531 pp. AAT 8111002.
Warren Wilkins,
Grab Their Belts To Fight Them: The Viet Cong's Big-Unit War Against the U.S., 1965-1966. Annapolis:
Naval Institute Press, 2011. xvi, 283 pp.
James G. Zumwalt,
Bare Feet, Iron Will: Stories from the Other Side of Vietnam's Battlefields. Jacksonville, FL, and Herndon, VA:
Adducent/Veterans Publishing Systems, 2010. ii, 426 pp.
Vietnamese Communism
before 1945
Writings by and about Important Communist Leaders
See also Working Paper
on the North Vietnamese Role in the War in South Vietnam. This 1968 publication included numerous Communist documents as appendices.
Copyright © 1996, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024,
Edwin E. Moise. This document may be reproduced only by permission. Revised April 14, 2024.