Best and the Brightest
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Product Description
Republished on its twentieth anniversary — with a special introduction that examines the Vietnam experience in light of subsequent events — The Best and the Brightest stands as the definitive source on the origins of America’s involvement in Vietnam. This critically-acclaimed work masterfully captures an era as it gives us unforgettable portraits of the well-intentioned men — Robert McNamara, McGeorge Bundy, and George Ball, among others — who orchestrated our disastrous engagement with Vietnam during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. Here is a tale as significant today as it was twenty years ago — and all the more compelling because of the past perspective.
David Clennon co-starred as Miles on the television series “thirtysomething.” His many film credits include Sweet Dreams, The Right Stuff, Being There, Home, and Missing.
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I know that this will appear to be a weird review, since I bought the book but refused to read it. I have read three additional books on the Vietnam War and was looking forwards to reading Halberstam’s version of it, since he’s such a excellent writer.
Recent books about Vietnam have access to documents not previously available to writers. Now, with a more factual rendering of the Vietnam War, it is simpler to know what was going on during that time. One of the things I learned was that David Halberstam, a reporter for the NY Times during the Diem period, was one of the contributors to the mess we called the Vietnam quagmire.
His reporting was far from objective, and he painted such a distorted picture of Diem because of his personal dislike of the man, that it helped in the November removal/murder of Diem. After that event, the war went downhill, and eventually US troops were injected into the war.
Basically, it seems that Halberstam was part of the problem to the point that the NY Times was going to remove him from Vietnam until Kennedy requested the removal. The Times refused, then, not wanting to appear to do something forced on them by the President.
So, why can’t I read the book? If Halberstam was not objective during the war, how can I expect him to be objective after the war. He’s not going to tell us how incorrect he was about removing Diem, etc., and how he misreported battle results to make Diem look terrible. Now available North Vietnam/Communist documents disprove most of Halberstam’s battle assessments. They freely admitted to themselves that Diem’s military was beating them, and that Diem was a strong President who they, the Communists, want to see gone. Sorry to say, the US Gov’t helped do that for North Vietnam…and Halberstam was one of the reporters who helped in that process. Check out President Kennedy’s remarks about Halberstam if you don’t judge me.
That is why I can’t read his book. If anyone has read the book, agrees with my assessment, but says that Halberstam admitted his mistakes, please let me know. I’ll read the book then and only then.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Halberstam “Best and Brightest” book would raise sharp critism of military reporting, chain of mandate, and the ability to place a figure on “win or loss” progress reports; blistering critisms of the theory of containment and late recognition of western warfare tactics.
Halberstam provided a bias favoritism of the Kennedy Administration protraying them as intellectual rationalist who recruited some of the most brillant literary minds to the team: McNamara, Bundy, and Rusk. Kennedy vision of constitutional strictness was a bold. Kennedy was an independant thinker. Kennedy’s desire for peace and stablity was admirable. The American people loved Kennedy, he stood for virtue, courage, and uprightness in the face of evil.
Halberstam claims internal Intelligence battles would cause strong mistrust as he elaborates on state department visit to viet nam to gather accurate information relating to the Ma kong valley. Halberstam protrays Lyndon Johnson as the Vice President who assumed mandate of a group of brillant Kennedy staffers after Kennedy’s assassination. Johnson would continue the war in Vietnam. Nixon would face political pressure to lower America’s military commitment and eventual return soldiers home.
The philosophy of mutual destruction was starting to materialize. Nuclear weapon erect up after the “Bay of Pigs” and the Cubian missile crisis caused increased military spending in long range and submarine mobile capability. Deterence through first strike destruction and might caused the Russians to back down. Diem was not well loved in America or Vietnam. The miltary would send advisors to train southern vietnam officers in western counter guerilla fighting tactics. Halberstam shared insight into the coup the killed Diem. Military Advisors increase from 3000 to 16000 increasing the inherit danger of apt involved.
Kennian strategy of containment of communism became well loved with the Kennedy Administration following an Berlin era of the Cold war. The communist had taken China. Kennedy would feel Vietnam symbolized a stand against communism expansion. There was already a series of tensions or conflicts against communism: Berlin airlift, Korean War, China, and Yugoslavic Europe.
All-purpose Max Taylor, Chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff judge a war in Vietnam could be won using Ariel bombing. Drawing from experiences from the Korean war Taylor hoped to gain a victory within a year. The Vietcong did not rely on resource linked with Petroleum. They could blend in with the local population, remain mobile, and converge in massive shock force. The effectiveness of the bombing battle in weaken the enemy was ineffective.
All-purpose Taylor curtailed the usage of nuclear tactical weapons because he felt the could not be limited to a point area and nuclear strike estimates of 300 million killed in one day caused him to dread the obliterative potential. At the end of the book, Nixon would start his ABM and Strategic reduction of global missile counts.
Airstrikes required ground troop keeping bases open to attack the enemy. Airbases were key to continue the air offensive. As a result the philosophy of containment would be replace with “search and ruin” tactics. Weaken the enemy before they could attack. Special Forces would seek out strong hold pockets where the Vietcong resided an ruin them.
Nixon launching operation Rolling Thunder would suggest a nonstop judge in the air offensive effectivenes but the “Tet Offensive” would demostrate remaining the might of the Vietcong. Its surprising three administrations would struggle with foreign policy, political battles interfering with military campaigns, and confusion about western warfare tactics and objectives. A ground war was need with 500,000 fighting and more than 200,000 increase being requested. Traditional western warfare shock tactics and perfect destruction strategies coming to late in the war. Conclusions, limited fighting could never work. Abandonment of the war took longer than the American public expected. Closure of the war was political regardless of military accessments of “wins”. Military doctrine would never again judge in the philosophy of containment or political handcuffing. The Military commanders would seek better preparation and design and freedom to fight a military war an not a political war.
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
The problem with a book that was written as far back as this is that new events hadn’t come to light and persons who knew what they were talking about didn’t get a chance to say it. Do you question an American journalist living safely back in the US whether communism was terrible. Or do you question a refugee who just escaped from Vietnam whether Americans fighting in Vietnam was wortwhile. Or even better yet, how about asking an American teenager from California who lived in Vietnam from the Tet Offensive of 1968 until the pull out of troops in 1972, who later became a fledglin photojournalist who sneaked into Vietnam to find out the truth of what happened, something persons well paid journalists like Halberstam would never risk doing once they got legendary. Read tales about Vietnam from very unfamous journalists who were held for 11 months ONLY because they were American, and then you’ve got the tale of what really happened in Vietnam.
It’s called “The Bamboo Chest: An Adventure in Healing the Trauma of War”. Maybe Halberstam should interview Cork Graham about his memoir. Maybe many more journalist should get out of their “excellent ancient boy” network and see what the world has offered and then “The Best And Brightest” would be a lot more accurate and there wouldn’t be such an avoidance of noting sources. I guess it’s all perspective. One American journalist pals around with generals and officers speculatingon the communist threat and then there were persons who really believed in what they were doing because they’d seen what had happened in North Vietnam, Africa, and Cuba. And then when we lost, they saw what many never saw except persons who paying attention in countries like Nicaragua, Poland, El Salvador.
Sure get “The Best and Brightest” if you want to know about what people guessed about Vietnam before 1975, and then IN ORDER TO KNOW WHAT REALLY HAPPENED in Vietnam read “The Bamboo Chest: An Adventure in Healing the Trauma of War” by Cork Graham and you’ll get what was missed by us over here. You’ll get an American’s personal perspective of what only a Vietnamese political prisoner could know. And then you can follow along with Graham as he continues reporting in Central America and gets so disgusted with how it was turning into another Vietnam debacle through the help of nonstop inaccurate reporting that he became the second American trained by the US Navy SEALs and participated in that war as a corpsman. Sure refreshing than rehashing reason for why we lost, as a replacement for of seeing how we could have won as evidenced by the American victory in Central America–only the ignorant or persons who’ve never left the US on anything additional than a “fact finding junket” would say that there wasn’t a Domino Theory. What do you call what happened Central America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia? No domino theory, then why were American weapons lost in Vietnam in 1975 turning up as arms of the communist FLMN in El Salvador, having been shipped to Nicaragua and smuggled across the Gulf of Fonseca. Cold War. . .right! How about HOT WAR!
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
This is a wonderful study of the dreadful people who committed the crime of aggression against Vietnam. It shows how they fooled themselves, and others too, that theirs was some noble mission, to save additional nations from communism. In fact, it was a crime, resulting in the killing of three million innocent Vietnamese, who were killed trying to save their country from a savage, unjustified and illegal assault. So, not the best, nor the brightest.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
Please contact me in about two weeks after I’ve finished reading
this fantastic book from a very excellent and brilliant leader. Thanks
HurdreyAngus Jordan
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5