Vietnam War Bibliography:

The Big War, 1964-1972

Lt. Col. Harry O. Amos, USA, "Artillery Support of Vietnamese" Military Review, August 1966 (vol. XLVI, no. 8), pp. 30-41. U.S. artillery support for non-U.S. units.

Dale Andrade, "Westmoreland Was Right: Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Vietnam War," Samll Wars & Insurgencies 19:2 (2008), pp. 145-181.

Pierre Asselin, "Hanoi and Americanization of the War in Vietnam: New Evidence from Vietnam." Pacific Historical Review, 74:3 (August 2005), pp. 427-439. Hanoi's reaction in 1965 first to the prospect and then to the reality of a major escalation of U.S. involvement in the war.

Jean Bertolino, Vietnam sanglant: au sud et au nord du 17e parallele, 1967-1968. Paris: Stock, 1968. 226 pp. Bertolino, a journalist, was in Vietnam for all or almost all of 1967. He expresses affection for the American GIs serving in Vietnam, but his tone is hostile to the U.S. war effort. Approximately half the book is about the South, and half about the North.

Col. Robert W. Black, A Ranger Born: A Memoir of Combat and Valor from Korea to Vietnam. New York: Ballantine, 2002. xiii, 317 pp. Pages 142-286 cover Vietnam. Black arrived in November 1967 as a major, and served his whole tour as district senior adviser for Rach Kien district, in Long An province. He noticed a serious decline in the discipline and behavior of U.S. troops in the area, during 1968.

Frank Boccia, The Crouching Beast: A United States Army Lieutenant's Account of the Battle for Hamburger Hill, May 1969. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2013. vii, 463 pp. Boccia commanded First Platoon, B Company, 3/187 Infantry, 3d Brigade, 101st Airborne Division.

Kevin M. Boylan, "Goodnight Saigon: American Provincial Advisors' Final Impressions of the Vietnam War," Journal of Military History, 78:1 (January 2014), pp. 233-70. Based on Completion of Tour Reports written by 47 Province Senior Advisors whose tours ended between 1969 and 1973. Extremely interesting.

Dean Brelis, photographs by Jill Krementz, The Face of South Vietnam. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968. 250 pp. The text, pp. 1-112, is by Brelis, who was in Vietnam as a correspondent for NBC from August 1965 to August 1966. The photos, pp. 113-244, are by Krementz. Photo captions, with dates, are pp. 245-50.

Larry Cable, Unholy Grail: The US and the Wars in Vietnam, 1965-8. New York: Routledge, 1991.

Central Intelligence Agency, The Situation in South Vietnam. A weekly report, very useful. A considerable number of issues, mostly from the years 1964 and 1968, have been declassified and are available online.

Robert F. Curtis, The Typhoon Truce, 1970: Three Days in Vietnam when Nature Intervened in the War. Casemate, 2015. 264 pp. Two strong typhoons within a week, in October 1970, forced a temporary halt to the war in northern I Corps.

Lt. Col. Gregory A. Daddis, "No Sure Victory: Measuring U.S. Army Effectiveness and Progress in the Vietnam War." Ph.D. dissertation, History, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2009. UMI 3352667. xiv, 412 pp.

Gregory A. Daddis, No Sure Victory: Measuring U.S. Army Effectiveness and Progress in the Vietnam War. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. xix, 333 pp.

Gregory Daddis, "Planning for a War in Paradise: The 1966 Honolulu Conference and the Shape of the Vietnam War," Journd of Cold War History 21:3 (2019), pp.152-84.

Gregory A. Daddis, "The Problem of Metrics: Assessing Progress and Effectiveness in the Vietnam War." War in History, 19:1 (January 2012), pp. 73-98.

Gregory A. Daddis, Westmoreland's War: Reassessing American Strategy in Vietnam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. xxv, 250 pp. Argues that Westmoreland's policies were more complex and sophisticated than has usually been recognized.

Gregory A. Daddis, Withdrawal: Reassessing America's Final Years in Vietnam. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. xviii, 300 pp.

Jacques Danois, Envoyé spécial au Vietnam. Bruxelles: Pierre de Meyere, 1967. 225 pp. Danois, a Belgian journalist, worked for Radio Luxembourg. He began covering Vietnam in 1963 (I don't know whether he was in Vietnam continuously, or intermittently). Much of the book is transcripts of interviews with people in Vietnam.

John R. Deane Jr., Lessons in Leadership: My Life in the US Army from World War II to Vietnam. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2018. 304 pp. One chapter covers Deane's service in vietnam. I belive he was chief of staff, Field Force Vietnam, from February to July 1966; assistant commander of the 1st Infantry Division from July to December; and commander of the 173rd Airborne Brigade from December 1966 to August 1967.

William R. Desobry, "Debriefing Report of BG William R. Desobry, August 1965 - January 1968." General Desobry had been Deputy Senior Adiisor for IV Corps 6 August 1965 to 2 June 1966, and Senior Adviosor 3 June 1966 to 14 January 1968. He headed Advisory Team 96. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

J. Robert Falabella, Vietnam Memoirs: A Passage to Sorrow. New York: Pageant Press International, 1971. 154 pp. Falabella served a one-year tour, 1967-68, as a Catholic Chaplain with the 25th Infantry Division.

Charles Bracelen Flood, The War of the Innocents. New York: McGraw Hill, 1970; pb Bantam, 1991. By a journalist who was in Vietnam from late 1966 to late 1967, covering both air and ground operations, particularly in Phu Yen province.

Randy E.M. Foster, Vietnam Firebases, 1965-73: American and Australian Forces. Oxford and New York: Osprey, 2008. 64 pp.

Captain Jim E. Fulbrook, "Lam Son 719." Published in three parts in U.S. Army Aviation Digest, June-August, 1988. Part I, "Prelude to Air Assault," 32:6 (June 1986), pp. 3-15; Part II, "The Battle," 32:7 (July 1986), pp. 35-45;   Part III, "Reflections and Values," 32:8 (August 1986), pp. 3-13. All three parts have been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

David J. Garms, With the Dragon's Children. Exposition Press, 1973. The author was an AID employee, in the chieu hoi program in Go Cong province (eastern Mekong Delta), July 1967 to August 1968.

James Gibson, The Perfect War: Technowar in Vietnam. Boston: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986. Pb titled The Perfect War: The War We Couldn't Lose and How We Did. New York: Vintage, 1988.

Brigadier General J. McKinley Gibson, USA, Ret., "An Air Line of Communications for Armor." Military Review, 54:4 (April 1974), pp. 25-31. In March and April 1969, in Operation Malin Craig, Task Force Remagen (elements of the 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division [Mechanized]) was operating in the area of Khe Sanh with no land supply route; it was supplied entirely by air.

Ronald J. Glasser M.D., 365 Days. New York: George Braziller, 1971. A book by a U.S. Army doctor about what he was told about the war by wounded men who passed through the hospital where he served.

Lt. Col. David H. Hackworth, USA, "Target Acquisition, Vietnam Style." Military Review, April 1968 (vol. XLVIII, no. 4), pp. 73-79.

John M. Hawkins, "The Costs of Artillery: Eliminating Harrassment and Interdiction Fire During the Vietnam War." Journal of Military History 70:1 (January 2006), pp. 91-122. (See also the exchange of letters about this between Lewis Sorley and Major Hawkins, in the July 2006 issue, pp. 914-916).

John M. Hawkins, "The Limits of Fire Support: American Finances and Firepower Restraint during the Vietnam War." Ph.D. dissertation, Texas A & M University, 2013. DA 3607520.

William Head, "Triangle of Iron and Rubber: Ground Actions and Airpower During Operation Attleboro," Air Power History, 67:4 (Winter 2020) pp. 33-44. Northern III Corps, November 1966.

Headquarters, U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, produced monthly and yearly summaries of events. These unclassifed publications were written by the MACV Office of Information for release to the press. The Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, has placed online the texts of several of these reports:

Michael A. Hennessy, Strategy in Vietnam: The Marines and Revolutionary Warfare in I Corps, 1965-1972. Praeger, 1997. 232 pp.

Michael Herr, Dispatches. New York: Knopf, 1977. 260 pp. pb New York: Avon, 1978. 278 pp. Herr went to Vietnam as a reporter for Esquire in 1967.

Margaret Herrgesell, ed., Dear Margaret, Today I Died . . . Letters from Vietnam by LTC Oscar Herrgesell. San Antonio: Naylor, 1974. vii, 93 pp. Letters LTC Herrgesell wrote between arrival for his second tour in Vietnam, February 1972, and his death July 29, 1972, in IV corps.

The History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: The Joint Chiefs of Staff and the War in Vietnam, 1960-1968. Written during the war by the Historical Division, Joint Secretariat, Joint Chiefs of Staff, as a classified study. Part I (1960-1964) is chapters 1-16. Part II (1965-1966) is chapters 17-39. Part III (1967-1968) is chapters 40-54. Substantial portions have been declassified, and publication by the GPO should occur soon. In the meantime,
the table of contents for all three parts,
and the text of the chapters making up Part II,
chapter 17: "The US Commitment Grows",
chapter 18: "The Quantum Jump--Rolling Thunder",
chapter 19: "Limited Deployment of US Forces",
chapter 20: "Logistic Requirements - Shift to a War Footing",
chapter 21: "Planning for Deployment - March-June 1965",
chapter 22: "Growth of Forces in RVN to End of 1965",
chapter 23: "Ground Combat Operations - RVN, July-December 1965",
chapter 24: "Air, Naval, and Subsidiary Operations",
chapter 25: "Rolling Thunder Continues",
chapter 26: "Enemy Air Defenses - Rolling Thunder",
chapter 27: "The Civil Side - Developments in RVN",
chapter 28: "Chapter 28: The Search for a Peaceful Solution - 1965",
chapter 29: "Less than War but No Peace: The Situation in January-February 1966",
chapter 30: "Reinstating Rolling Thunder",
chapter 31: "Rolling Thunder - Planning and Policy, February-June 1966",
chapter 32: "Deployments and Forces--1966",
chapter 33: "The War on the Ground--Strategy and Operations-1966",
chapter 34: "Arc Light - Market Time - Game Warden",
chapter 35: "Border Area Problems and the Barrier",
chapter 36: "Operations Against North Vietnam, July 1966-January 1967",
chapter 37: "Expanding the Base--Logistic Progress and Problems, 1966",
chapter 38: "The GVN-1966",
chapter 39: "Efforts Toward Negotiation - The Truce Periods 1966",
maps for Part II,
have been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of, the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

Larry Hughes, You Can See a Lot Standing under a Flare in the Republic of Vietnam. New York: Morrow, 1969. 340 pp. Hughes was an Army Information Specialist in Vietnam from 1966 to 1967.

"Improving South Vietnam's Internal Security Scene." May 1970. This report, prepared under the auspices of the Office of the Secretary of Defense with input from JCS, State, CIA, and AID, was a response to NSSM 19 of February 11, 1969. 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. 1-43 (interesting order of battle figures on pp. 5-6),   pages 44-56 and A-1 to B-24 (the projected situation of South Vietnam after a peace settlement, on p. 44, is interesting),   pages B-1-1 to D-17   pages E-1 to F-1-2, and some additional attachments regarding Phung Hoang.

General George Joulwan, with David Chanoff, Watchman at the Gates: A Soldier's Journey from Berlin to Bosnia. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2021. x, 258 pp. Joulwan's first Vietnam tour (pp. 29-47) began in June 1966. He was in the First Infantry Division, initially commanding B Company, 1/26 Infantry, later becoming the battalion S-3.

Mark Jury, The Vietnam Photo Book. New York: Grossman, 1971. 160 pp. New York: Vintage, 1986. 160 pp. Jury was a roving photojournalist for USARV, July 1969 to July 1970.

Faris R. Kirkland, "The Attack on Cap Mui Lay, Vietnam, July 1968." Journal of Military History, 61:4 (October 1996), pp. 735-760. Attack on PAVN artillery just north of the eastern end of the DMZ. If you browse the Internet through an institution that has subscribed to JSTOR, you can access the text directly or go through the JSTOR Journal of Military History browse page.

Kuno Knoebl, Victor Charlie: The Face of War in Viet-Nam. New York: Praeger, 1967. xiv, 304 pp. Original, in German, published 1966.

Meredith H. Lair, "'Beauty, bullets, and ice cream': Reimagining daily life in the 'Nam." Ph.D. dissertation, History, Pennsylvania State University, 2004. 295 pp. AAT 3147644. The American command's policy of making life in the rear areas pleasant and comfortable. The full text is available online if you are browsing the Internet from an institution, such as Clemson University, that has a subscription to ProQuest "Dissertations and Theses: Full Text."

Jack Lewis, ed., Dateline: Vietnam. North Hollywood, CA: Challenge Publications, 1966. Accounts by USMC combat correspondents.

Major George D. Livingston, Jr., USA, "Pershing II: Success Amid Chaos" Military Review, May 1970, pp. 56-60

Mary McCarthy, "Report from Vietnam I: The Home Program." New York Review of Books, 8:7 (April 20, 1967).

Mary McCarthy, "Report from Vietnam II: The Problems of Success." New York Review of Books, 8:8 (May 4, 1967).

Tom Mangold and John Penycate, The Tunnels of Cu Chi: The Untold Story of Vietnam. New York: Random House, 1985. Excellent account of the tunnel complex northwest of Saigon, which contained the Vietcong headquarters for activities directed against Saigon. Based on extensive interviews both with Vietcong who served in the tunnels, and with American "tunnel rats" who fought to dig the Vietcong out. (See also article by Olson & Morton, below.)

Howard Means, Colin Powell: Soldier/Statesman - Statesman/Soldier. New York: Fine, 1992; pb New York: Ballentine, 1993. Powell arrived in Vietnam an LT1 advisor to the ARVN 1st Division in December 1962, and as a Major to serve as a battalion XO, later division G-3, in the Americal starting June 1968.

Sewall Menzel, Battle Captain: Cold War Campaigning with the U.S. Army in Vietnam, Cambodia & Laos, 1967-1971. Bloomington, IN: AuthorHouse, 2007. xi, 358 pp. (Previously announced as At the Cutting Edge. Booksurge, 2006.) Menzel arrived in Vietnam late 1967 with 3d Brigade, 101st Airborne. He became intelligence officer for the 1/506. He was in the Tet Offensive. In June 1968 he was shifted from the 101st to command an MAT training PF troops in Lam Dong province. He returned to Vietnam in December 1969 to serve with the 11th Armored Cavalry; he was in the Cambodian Incursion. From late 1970 to mid 1971 he was at J-2 (intelligence) at MACV, assigned to the Laos desk. He was there for the planning of Lam Son 719, then transferred to MR IV desk, but kept track of the Laotian incursion even after the transfer. This is not just a recounting of his experiences; he has a lot of dicussion of the context, events before he arrived and after he left.

Harvey Meyerson, Vinh Long. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970. xxiv, 220 pp.

Michael F. Morris, "Invading North Vietnam," Naval History 34:5 (October 2020). Operation Butt Stroke was a plan drawn up in 1967 for possible implementation around May 1968, to land four to seven brigades of US and RVN forces near Dong Hoi and then push southward to the DMZ, to destroy PAVN forces, especially PAVN artillery just north of the DMZ.

John E. Mueller, "The Search for the 'Breaking Point' in Vietnam: The Statistics of a Deadly Quarrel." International Studies Quarterly, 24:4 (December 1980), pp. 497-519. Available through JSTOR.

National Security Study Memorandum (NSSM) One: "The Situation in Vietnam." On January 21, 1969, Henry Kissinger presented a long list of questions about the Vietnam War (many of them in multiple parts) to the Departments of State and Defense, the JCS, the CIA, MACV, and the U.S. Ambassador in Saigon. He made a deliberate effort to get the divergent views of different organizations, rather than have them reach a consensus and then give him the consensus. A long summary of the results has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in six parts: front matter including cover letter of March 22, 1969, general summary (32 pp.), and Vietnam Questions (6 pp);   summary of responses to questions 1-10 (Communist forces, policies, and capabilities);   summary of responses to questions 11-15 (RVN forces, and pacification);   summary of responses to questions 16-21 (pacification, operations and administration in countryside);   summary of responses to questions 22-26 (Vietnamese politics; military operations);   summary of responses to questions 27-29 (effectiveness of bombing).

Office, Deputy Secretary of the General Staff (Coordination and Reports), Office of the Chief of Staff, U.S. Army, Army Activities Report: SE Asia. CSOCS-74. A weekly publication. Some issues have been placed online by the Army. Go to Army Heritage Collection Online and click on
Manuscripts/Archives >Browse >Browse ALL digital Documents by historical time period >Vietnam War (primarily 1964-1975) >MACV Command Historian's Collection. Within this, click on

Kenneth R. Olson and Lois Wright Morton, "Why Were the Soil Tunnels of Cu Chi and Iron Triangle in Vietnam So Resilient?" Open Journal of Soil Science, 7:2 (February 2017), 34-51. (See also book by Mangold & Penycate, above.)

Robert E. O'Melia, "Attack at Quang Tri." Vietnam Magazine, June 2000, pp. 46-51. The VC took Quang Tri city on April 6, 1967, held it for several hours. The author was in the USAID compound.

The "Pentagon Papers" A detailed history of U.S. policy toward Vietnam, written inside the Defense Department between 1967 and 1969, accompanied by many of the documents that the authors had used as sources. Originally it was classified "top secret." Large portions were published in 1971, and the whole thing is now available online.

Major General Donn R. Pepke, USA, "Economy of Force in the Central Highlands" Military Review, November 1970, pp. 32-43. Covers the period when General Pepke commanded the 4th Infantry Division in the Central Highlands, November 1968 to November 1969.

Jay Phillips, A Shau: Crucible of the Vietnam War. Salt Lake City, Utah: Izzard Ink, 2021. xvii, 522 pp. The A Shau Valley, in western Thua Thien province, close to Laos, was a crucial PAVN base area.

Hugo Portisch, Eyewitness in Vietnam. Chester Springs, PA: Dufour, 1967. 126 pp. (This was translated from the German, but I have not been able to find a record of its having been published in German.) Portisch was editor of Kurier, the largest (by circulation) newspaper in Austria.

John Prados, A Streetcar Named Pleiku: Vietnam 1965: A Turning Point. Ebook, Now and Then Reader, 2015. The February 1965 incident that sparked the Flaming Dart air strikes against North Vietnam.

John Prados, "The NVA's Operation Dien Bien Phu: The 1969 Siege of Ben Het", in The VVA Veteran, 23:5 (August/September 2003), pp. 27-30. [I believe articles in this publication stay online only about two years after publication.]

John Prados, "Operation Masher: The Boundaries of Force", in The VVA Veteran, February/March 2002. [I believe articles in this publication stay online only about two years after publication.] A large, complex operation in Binh Dinh and Quang Ngai provinces early in 1966, involving elements of the 1st Cavalry Division, Special Forces Team B-57 (Project Delta), the ROK Capitol Division, U.S. and RVN Marines, the ARVN 22d Infantry Division, and other forces, various parts of which were called Operations Masher, White Wing, Thanh Phong II, Lien Kiet 22, Flying Tiger, and Double Eagle.

John Prados, "Operation Mule Shoe", VVA Veteran online, July/August 2022.

Merle L. Pribbenow, "The Fog of War: The Vietnamese View of the Ia Drang Battle." Military Review, 81:1 (Jan-Feb 2001), pp. 93-97. The texts of this and several other items have been put together on a single web page.

Richard L. Prillaman, "Vietnam Update", Infantry, May-June 1969, pp. 18-19.

A. Terry Rambo, Jerry M. Tinker, and John D. LeNoir, The Refugee Situation in Phu-yen Province, Viet-Nam. McLean, Virginia: Human Science Research Inc., July 1967. xx, 214 pp. Based on research conducted in mid 1967. Phu Yen was on the coast in II Corps. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in five parts: Front matter and pp. 1-26;   pp. 27-76;   pp. 77-127;   pp. 128-180;   pp. 181-214.

Rand Corporation (later, RAND Corporation). This "think tank" financed by the U.S. military conducted a great deal of research on the Vietnam War. Most Rand publications can be purchased in hard copy through the RAND Corporation online bookstore, but many also can be read online for free. Some Rand publications relevant to this section of my bibliography are listed below, but many others are in other sections, especially The Communists; In the Villages: Pacification; and Theories of Limited War and Counterinsurgency.

J. Keith Saliba, Death in the Highlands: The Siege of Special Forces Camp Plei Me. Guilford, CT: Stackpole (Rowman & Littlefield), 2020. xii, 250 pp. The prelude to the battle of the Ia Drang Valley.

James A. Sandy, "'They Were Definitely Looking for Us'—Operation Francis Marion and the False Hope of 1967" Michigan War Studies Review, 18 May 2018. A very negative view of 4th Infantry Division operations along the Cambodian border in 1967.

Jonathan Schell, The Military Half: An Account of Destruction in Quang Ngai and Quang Tin. New York: Knopf, 1968. 212 pp. Military operations in central Vietnam near the height of the war.

David B. Sigler, Vietnam Battle Chronology: U.S. Army and Marine Corps Combat Operations, 1965-1973. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1992. 200 pp.

Lewis Sorley, A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and the Final Tragedy of America's Last Years in Vietnam. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1999. xv, 507 pp.

Lewis Sorley, ed., Vietnam Chronicles: The Abrams Tapes, 1968-1972. Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2004. xxvii, 917 pp.

Ronald Spector, After Tet: The Bloodiest Year in Vietnam. New York: The Free Press, 1993. xvii, 390 pp. pb New York: Vintage (Random House), 1994. xvii, 390 pp.

Shelby L. Stanton, The Rise and Fall of an American Army: U.S. Ground Forces in Vietnam, 1965-1973. Novato, CA: Presidio, 1985. xvii, 411 pp.

Major Homer L. Stapleton, USA, "Trung Luong--Setpiece Vietnam" Military Review, May 1967 (vol. XLVII, no. 5), pp. 36-44. A battle on 11 August 1966, in Chau Thanh district, Dinh Tuong province, in which RF, PF, and RD cadres fought VC forces.

John Steinbeck IV, In Touch. New York: Dell, 1970. 190 pp. The first part of this book describes Steinbeck's service June 1966 to June 1967 with Armed Forces Radio and Television in Saigon, Qui Nhon, and Pleiku.

LTG James W. Sutherland, "Senior Officer Debriefing Report: LTG James W. Sutherland, Jr., CG, XXIV Corps, Period 18 June 1970 thru 9 June 1971." The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

Wallace Thies, When Governments Collide: Coercion and Diplomacy in the Vietnam Conflict, 1964-1968. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. xix, 446 pp.

Jack Lyndon Thomas, Coyote Jack: Drawing Meaning from Life and Vietnam: A Memoir. Houston, TX: Lyndonjacks, 2006. xix, 314 pp. An adviser to RF/PF in Duc Hue district, Hau Nghia province, 1969-70.

Tal Tovy, "From Foe to Friend: The Kit Carson Scout Program in the Vietnam War." Armed Forces & Society 33 (October 2006), pp. 78-93.

The U.S. Army War College and the Military History Institute associated with it have had a variety of oral history programs over the years. An impressive number of oral histories from these various programs have recently been placed online in the Army Heritage Collection Online.

Major General Vinh Loc, ARVN, "Road-Clearing Operation" Military Review, April 1966 (vol. XLVI, no. 4), pp. 22-28. Operation Than Phong, initiated in mid-July 1965, to reopen roads, especially Highway 19 between Qui Nhon and Pleiku.

James A. Warren, Year of the Hawk: America's Descent Into Vietnam, 1965. New York: Scribner, 2021.

Jac Weller, "Highway 19: Then and Now." Military Review, December 1968 (vol. XLVIII, no. 12), pp. 56-64. The road from Qui Nhon to Pleiku.

General William Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports. Memoirs of the man who commanded U.S. forces in Vietnam from 1964 to 1968. Warning: there are differences not only in page numbering but in at least one place in chapter 1 actually in words between the original hardcover (New York: Doubleday, 1976) and the paperback (New York: Dell, 1980. 605 pp.).

General William Westmoreland, monthly assessments of the Vietnam War, originally classified "secret." The declassified texts of some of these have been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University:

Tobias Wolff, In Pharaoh's Army: Memories of the Lost War. New York: Knopf, 1994. Wolff arrived in Vietnam late in 1967, and was assigned as an advisor in the Mekong Delta.

Samuel Zaffiri, Hamburger Hill: May 11-20, 1969. Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1988. ix, 304 pp. The attack against a PAVN force dug in on Ap Bia Mountain (Hill 937), in the A Shau Valley (west of Hue near the Laotian border), by a force that eventually grew to include four battalions of the U.S. 101st Airborne Division and one ARVN battalion.

U.S. Military Policy Documents online in the the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University:

See also U.S. Soldiers on the Ground

See also The Cambodian Incursion of 1970

 

The Easter Offensive of 1972

An Loc anh dung. Paris: Institute de l'Asie du Sud-Est, 1988. 119 pp. I presume this is about the seige of An Loc during the Easter Offensive of 1972.

Dale Andradé, Trial by Fire: The 1972 Easter Offensive, America's Last Vietnam Battle. New York: Hippocrene, 1995. 600 pp.

W. R. Baker, "The Easter Offensive of 1972: A Failure to Use Intelligence." Military Intelligence Professional Bulletin, 24:1 (Jan-March 1998), pp. 40-42, 60.
D 101.84:24/1

W. R. Baker, "HUMINT: A Continuing Crisis?" Published online by Small Wars Journal, May 8, 2017. Baker was assigned in 1971 to the 571st Military Intelligence Detachment at Danang, which ran HUMINT operations in I Corps. The unit provided warnings of the Easter Offensive in 1972, but these warnings were largely ignored, due in part to a lack of respect for HUMINT.

W. R. (Bob) Baker, Break in the Chain: Intelligence Ignored: Military Intelligence in Vietnam and Why the Easter Offensive Should Have Turned out Differently. Philadelphia: Casemate, 2021. xi, 251 pp.

W. R. Baker, "The North Vietnamese Army Easter Offensive of 1972: A Massacre Near the Rockpile?" Published online by Small Wars Journal, 2018.

Richard Botkin, Ride the Thunder: A Vietnam War Story of Honor and Triumph. Los Angeles: WND Books, 2009. xxxiv, 652 pp. Discusses U.S. and RVN Marines in northern I Corps.

Walter J. Boyne, "The Easter Halt". Air Force Magazine, September 1998 (81:9). The Easter Offensive of 1972.

Jacques Despuech, L'offensive du Vendredi saint, printemps 1972: les mois les plus longs de la deuxième guerre d'Indochine. Paris: Fayard, 1973. 357 pp.

Duong Nghiem Mau, et al., Nhung ngay dai tren que huong. Glendale, CA: Dai Nam, (1987?). 300 pp.

Stephen Emerson, North Vietnam's 1972 Easter Offensive: Hanoi's Gamble. Barnesley, South Yorkshire, UK: Pen and Sword Military, 2020. 136 pp. Distributed in the United States by Casemate, of Havertown, PA.

Thomas Fleming, "How Nixon Almost Won the vietnam War: The 1972 Battle of An Loc Proved that He Had Found the Key to Victory," MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History, 24:2 (Winter 2012), pp. 70-79.

John L. Frisbee, "The Air War in Vietnam," Air Force Magazine, September 1972, pp. 48-71. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

Albert Grandolini, The Easter Offensive. Solihull, West Midlands, UK: Helion, 2015.

The Heroic Battle of An-Loc. Saigon: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Vietnam, 1972. 63 pp.

John D. Howard, First In Last Out: An American Paratrooper in Vietnam with the 101st and the Vietnamese Airborne. Guilford, CT: Stackpole, 2017. xii, 252 pp. The 6th Airborne Battalion, an elite ARVN unit, suffered devastating losses in the battle for An Loc. In May 1972, while it was being reconstituted, Major Howard arrived to become senior US adviser to the battalion. He did not have a good relationship with his counterpart. Howard was with the battalion during ARVN post-Easter counterattacks first at An Loc, then in Quang Tri province.

General Lam Quang Thi, Hell in An Loc: The 1972 Easter Offensive and the Battle That Saved South Viet Nam. Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2009. ix, 282 pp.

Thomas H. Lee, "Military Intelligence Operations and the Easter Offensive." Unpublished paper, United States Army Center of Military History, 1990. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

Peter Liebchen, Kontum: Battle for the Central Highlands, 30 March - 10 June 1972. A CHECO report. xv, 118 pp. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University, in three parts: front matter and pp. 1-32, pp. 33-70, and pp. 71-118.

David K. Mann, The 1972 Invasion of Military Region I: Fall of Quang Tri and Defense of Hue. A CHECO report. xi, 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 pp. 1-36, and pp. 37-86.

Mike McDermott, True Faith and Allegiance: An American Paratrooper and the 1972 Battle for An Loc. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2012. xiii, 187 pp. Very good.

Thomas P. McKenna, Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2011. xvi, 344 pp. McKenna was an adviser to the ARVN 23rd Division in this battle.

John Grider Miller, The Bridge at Dong Ha. Annapolis: U.S. Naval Institute Press, 1989. xii, 186 pp. How a U.S. Marine officer destroyed a crucial bridge to delay the NVA thrust into Quang Tri province in April 1972.

K. G. Mortensen, Vietnam: Target for 1972 Blitzkrieg. East St. Kilda, Victoria, Australia: Gerald Griffin Press, 1972. 56 pp.

K. G. Mortensen, The Battle of An Loc, 1972. Foreword by F. P. Serong. Parkville, Victoria, Australia: Gerald Griffin Press, 1996. 108 pp.

Van Nguyen-Marshall, "Appeasing the Spirits Along the 'Highway of Horror': Civic Life in Wartime Republic of Vietnam," War & Society 37:3 (August 2018), 206-22. Efforts to recover and bury the bodies of those killed on the highway from Quang Tri City to Hue.

Charles A. Nicholson, The USAF Response to the Spring 1972 NVN Offensive: Situation & Redeployment - Special Report. ix, 83 pp. A CHECO report. The text.

The Open Invasion of the Republic of Viet-Nam by Communist North Viet-Nam. Saigon: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1972.

CPT John R. Parker III, and CW2 Ronald L. Tusi, "History of F Battery, 79th Artillery, 1 February 1972-31 Jul 1972 (Supplement)." An aerial rocket artillery battery of the 3d Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division, it was heavily involved in the defense of An Loc during the Easter Offensive, then was shifted north to I Corps where it began operations on 27 June, supporting RVN Marines in Quang Tri. The text has been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

William Reeder Jr., Extraordinary Valor: The Fight for Charlie Hill in Vietnam. Globe Pequot / Lyons Press, 2022. 296 pp. Special Forces Major John Duffy won the Medal of Honor for his actions as an adviser to ARVN airborne troops near Dak To in April 1972, during the Easter Offensive.

Paul T. Ringenbach & Peter Melly, The Battle for An Loc, 5 April - 26 June 1972. xiii, 97 pp. A CHECO report. The text has been placed online in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University: front matter and pp. 1-39, pp. 40-66, and pp. 67-97.

Brigadier F.P. Serong, The 1972 Easter Offensive (Southeast Asian Perspectives, no. 10). New York: American Friends of Vietnam, 1974. 63 pp.

Stephan Talty, Saving Bravo: The Greatest Rescue Mission in Navy SEAL History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2018. xvi, 313 pp. The rescue of Iceal Hambleton, shot down in Quang Tri province, April 2, 1972, in an area where PAVN forces were so strong, as a result of the Easter Offensive, that helicopter rescue failed, with considerable casualties, so a team had to sneak in on the ground. (See also under Whitcomb, below).

General Tran Van Nhut, with Christian L. Arevian, An Loc: The Unfinished War. Lubbock: Texas Tech University Press, 2009. xiii, 227 pp. The title is a bit misleading; this is General Nhut's autobiography, with two chapter on the Easter Offensive of 1972, one of which (32 pages) is on the battle at An Loc, north of Saigon. General Nhut was province chief of Binh Long province.

PAVN Lt. Gen. Tran Van Quang, reports on the Easter Offensive, 1972. Russian translations of these reports were found in Russian archives in the 1990s. The Russian text of a report dated 15 September 1972 and an English translation of a report dated 26 June 1972 have been placed on-line in the Virtual Vietnam Archive of the Vietnam Project, at Texas Tech University.

Dai Ta [Colonel] Trinh Tieu, "Mat tran Tan Canh, Kontum 1972"

Col. Gerald H. Turley, The Easter Offensive. Novato, CA: Presidio, 1985. xiv, 344 pp. Foreword by James Webb. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1995. xiv, 344 pp. Col. Turley was caught up in the North Vietnamese offensive across the DMZ in the spring of 1972. This very useful account is based on more research in written sources than most officers bother with when writing their memoirs, but it is still limited to the portion of the fighting in which Turley was actually involved: the opening period of the Easter Offensive, in Quang Tri Province only.

Darrel D. Whitcomb, Moral Imperative: 1972, Combat Rescue, and the End of America's War in Vietnam. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2020. xiv, 370 pp.

Darrel D. Whitcomb, The Rescue of Bat 21. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1998. xvi, 196 pp. The rescue of Iceal Hambleton, shot down in Quang Tri province, April 2, 1972, in an area where PAVN forces were so strong, as a result of the Easter Offensive, that helicopter rescue failed, with considerable casualties, so a team had to sneak in on the ground. Very good, not only on the rescue itself but on the context, and USAF attitudes and behavior patterns. (See also under Talty, above).

Darrel D. Whitcomb, "Rescuing BAT 21." Naval History, 12:2 (March/April 1998). SEAL Tom Norris rescued a downed flier, Iceal Hambleton, under very difficult circumstances in Quang Tri province during the Easter Offensive of 1972.

James H. Willbanks, The Battle of An Loc. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005. xxi, 226 pp. Crucial battle north of Saigon, during the 1972 Easter Offensive. Willbanks served as a U.S. adviser to ARVN forces at An Loc. An earlier and considerably shorter version of this study, listed under U.S. Army Publications, is available online.

See also U.S. Soldiers on the Ground

See also The Cambodian Incursion of 1970

Return to Table of Contents

Next section: Tet and the Battle of Khe Sanh

Copyright © 1996, 1998, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2025, Edwin E. Moise. Opinions in this document are my own. They could not be the opinions of Clemson University, which does not have opinions on the subjects involved. This document may be reproduced only by permission. Revised January 5, 2025.