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Summary: A worthy effort to set the record straight.
Review: "A Better War" is a good book, and, surprisingly at this late date, one that needed to be written. It had flaws, however, and I can't help but imagine that his editors could have served Mr. Sorley better. For example, I agree with some of the other reviewers that the use of italics in quotations from recordings of General Abrams made the process of reading the book less than smooth. While the technique imparts some information, it was, in my reading, difficult to wade through. All in all, however, the book's thesis is unassailable. The performance of the U.S. Military in Vietnam was impressive and, within the guidelines created for it by the civilian leadership in Washington, incredibly successful. By the end of American involvement, South Vietnam was a nation, viable and remarkably secure given the efforts of the North and it's allies to destroy it. Had the United States insisted upon the North's compliance with the agreements they made, South Vietnam would be with us today, as would millions of Vietnamese, Laotian and Cambodian victims of communism. Whether or not Mr. Sorley adequately treats the beliefs, predictions and arguments of the war's opponents casts no shadow on this undeniable fact. Nor was it his intention to explicate all of the arguments for or against American involvement in the war. Mr. Sorley's point is that South Vietnam did not fall because the American and South Vietnamese military could not win an "unwinnable" war. South Vietnam fell because of the failure of the United States to live up to the promises it made to provide aid to a sovereign ally in its defense against aggression from a Soviet client state. Is it too much to ask that, after 25 years, even those of us who opposed the war at the time face the facts? "A Better War" gives us an opportunity to come clean and finally learn the "lesson of Vietnam."
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Summary: Rethinking the Years After Tet
Review: "There came a time when the war was won," writes historian Lewis Sorley in his book A Better War. "The fighting wasn't over, but the war was won." Not by Hanoi, as we have come to believe from most history books, but by the United States and South Vietnam. With this controversial statement, Sorley has fired the first salvo in what is sure to be a contentious debate about the final four years of American involvement in Vietnam. Historians have concentrated mostly on the early days of the War from the introduction of combat troops in 1965 through the Tet Offensive in 1968. But after that, there are only a handful of histories examining what was actually a crucial period in the war. A Better War takes up the story in late 1968, after three changes dramatically altered the fighting in Vietnam. Sorley does a fine job of outlining these. From Dale Andrade's review in Joint Force Quarterly, no. 23 (Autumn/Winter 99-00), pp. 107-108.
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Summary: Praise for Lewis Sorley's A BETTER WAR
Review: "The story of how Creighton Abrams moved toward his better war is one that must be told if ever we are to understand what happened to us as a nation in those tragic years. It will be a long time indeed before anyone tells that story better than it is set forth by Lewis Sorley in this magnificent book." -General Donn A. Starry, U.S. Army (Retired) "The research supporting A BETTER WAR is the best I have seen on the conflict in Vietnam, [and] Lewis Sorley's insight and analysis far surpass other books about the war. He makes clear that, had we stayed the course, a different story would have evolved, but the brutal fact is that at the critical point we abandoned our ally."-General Bruce A. Palmer, Jr., U.S. Army (Retired) "A masterful treatment of military realities and court intrigue; of strategic competence and political betrayal. Carefully researched and exactingly detailed, there are revelations on every page." -John M. Del Vecchio "Bob Sorley, working with newly discovered documentation, has illuminated in this fine book the historically neglected final four years of the Vietnam conflict. In the process he has found a number of surprises, and he's done a great service to history and to all those who fought in this tragic episode. This book fills a gap among the half-dozen key volumes essential for understanding the Vietnam War."-General John R. Galvin, Former Supreme Allied Commander, Europe "A compelling narrative and a powerful antidote to the self-justifying myth that the Vietnam War was "unwinnable." By 1972, when Creighton Abrams departed from Vietnam, the Viet Cong had been decimated and the North Vietnamese military effectively neutralized. That advantageous position was subsequently squandered in large part through our own actions-for by then too many had developed a vested interest in seeing South Vietnam defeated."-James Schlesinger, Former Secretary of Defense "A BETTER WAR is a revelation, and too often a heartbreaking one."-Rob Cowley, Editor MHQ: Military History Quarterly "In his illuminating narrative of Creighton Abram's war, Lewis Sorley has deployed all his talents as historian and storyteller. A BETTER WAR reaffirms the strength of Abram's spirit and vision as well as his undeniable accomplishments in the face of enormous obstacles."-W.E.B. Griffin "Lewis Sorley has done a great job making sense out of a complex piece of history. I'd classify it "compulsory reading" for anyone who wants to understand the American involvement in Vietnam."-General John W. Vessey, U.S. Army (Retired) "[A BETTER WAR] does much to fill an important gap, and does so on the basis of authentic, primary source material. As a result it provides a far truer understanding of the "second half" of the Vietnam War than we have seen before, and brings out with clarity how it was ultimately caused to end in defeat. The author is to be commended for his initiative in opening up the records of the MACV weekly updates, and for a work of unique value with information well beyond anything previously available."-General Andrew J. Goodpaster, U.S. Army (Retired)
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Summary: history or hagiography?
Review: A Better War is not history but a hagiography of Gen. Creighton Abrams, who apparently could do no wrong. It is "history" as seen by the American mission in Saigon, with little attention paid to much else and what appears to be a deliberate attempt by the author to ignore unpleasant facts, such as the political pressures in the U.S. to withdraw and the appalling casualties sustained by the South Vietnamese in the Laotian invasion of 1971. The book seems largely based on tape recordings of Gen. Abrams, some of which border on the incoherent or at least the irrelevant, and which are quoted verbatim far beyond any reasonable limit - a good historian would have summed them up and quoted only what was significant regarding a given point. History? Sure, if your idea of a history of the Civil War would be Jefferson Davis' memoirs. (For credibility's sake, I spent two tours in Vietnam as an infantryman with the 1st Air Cavalry Division.)
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Summary: Best Look Yet at Abrams' War
Review: Any student or scholar of the war must read this book to comprehend the Vietnam War from 1968 to 1975. While there are plenty of books whose authors assume that Vietnamization was ineffective or it was a return to counterinsurgency, Dr. Sorley provides the best scholarly account of the effectiveness of the situation in South Vietnam. The shift from Westmoreland's Search and Destroy strategy to Abrams' rebuilding of South Vietnam and strengthening of ARVN is an accomplishment that has long needed to be acknowledged.
Unfortunately, After McNamara's and Westmoreland's war sqaundered and divided U.S. support and demoralized the South Vietnamize, the American people did not have the national will or patience to support a the conflict any longer. Even if future scholars do not agree with the author's conclusions, they well atleast have to acknowledge "A Better War."
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Summary: Mixed Review
Review: As a younger reader (24 yrs.) who was not alive during the Vietnam era, this book offered insight that has not been typically presented by other accounts of the war. However, the book is not without its shortcomings. I would agree that the book is not an easy read; Sorley quotes entirely too often from both written and oral sources which tends to take away from the real message of the book. In terms of the flow of the book, although it is written chronologically, one does not get a sense of following the war very easily from the point where Sorely begins to the end, it overlaps in some areas. The book also seems to be a full fledged attempt to glorify General Abrams -- so much so that I believe the title of the book is a misnomer and should have included his name. In addition, the book comes across as the military's history, not the impartial observer which I would have preferred. Despite these shortcomings, the book does have value. I thought the book increased in quality dramatically over its last third. Chapters focusing on veterans, the cease fire and selected other issues are very enlightening. Sorley seems to quote less often, and at more appropriate times, so the the reading is easier and more informative. Had he written the entire book in this manner it would have been a far superior account. I would recommend that this book be read as a companion to one of the more established histories of Vietnam. Although it seems to miss the big picture of why the U.S. withdrew and of why South Vietnam collapsed, it offers insight into the smaller victories late in the war and the quality of leadership from Abrams. As a very one sided approach to the history, it offers a nice counterbalance to histories and accounts that have condemned the war and its leaders in a wholesale manner.
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Summary: Sorley gets it right, again.
Review: As one who served two tours with the 1st Air Cavalry Division in Vietnam, I concur with Dr. Sorley's thesis that we won the Vietnam War and then let the victory slip through our fingers by not living up to the pledges we made to the South Vietnamese Government. But there were earlier opportunties to have won a military victory as well. If we had been allowed to pursue the NVA in Cambodia right after the first and second battles of the Ia Drang in 1965 and 1966, respectively, we could have forced Hanoi to the negotiating table much earlier. While I too hold the late, great General Creighton Abrams and his approach to Vietnamization of the war in high regard, I think General Westmoreland deserves equal respect. If General Westmoreland had been given the geographical latitude he needed to prosecute a war of annihiltion, Westy would not have been forced to fight a war of attrition -- something Americans do not fight well at all. Nevertheless, Dr. Sorley brings to this book the same kind of dogged and thorough research that he brings to all of his writings. Clearly, a five-star addition to my personal library Wm. Hamilton, Ph.D.
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Summary: What Reviewers and Readers Think
Review: At this writing there have been 31 reviews of Lewis Sorley's book "A Better War." Twenty reviewers gave it five-star acclaim, three reviewers awarded it four-star approbation. There was one three-star review and seven negative, one-star reviews. Fifty-four readers found the reviews helpful, 33 did not. Of the positive reviews (five- and four-star), 14 of them garnered 49 helpful votes from readers and five unhelpful votes; nine of the positive reviews received no reader vote one way or the other. One reader found the three-star review unhelpful. The seven negative reviewers all awarded Sorley's book one-star. Readers found the negative reviews helpful in only five instances and unhelpful 27 times. There was one negative review that received no votes. Overall, 62 percent of readers found the reviews helpful, 38 percent did not. The negative reviews garnered 82 percent of the unhelpful votes, while the positive reviews got 90 percent of the helpful votes. I've read "A Better War," and I give it a solid four-star rating. But even if I hadn't, the tally of opinion and helpful votes shown here, compared with the negative response to the negative reviews, would encourage me to buy it.
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Summary: Author Sorley Corrects the Record
Review: Author Lewis Sorley has done all Americans, especially Vietnam veterans, a service by producing this meticulously researched, balanced study of the Vietnam War's final (post-Westmoreland) years. I served almost four years in Vietnam between January 1971 and the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. I rarely review books about the war because too many of them evoke the sentiment, "If that was Vietnam, where was I?" But as one who fought the Vietcong guerrillas and struggled to ferret out their shadow government, who felt the fury of the NVA's 1972 Easter Offensive, and who ultimately left Vietnam on a marine helicopter from the embassy roof, I can say without qualification that author Sorley has got it right. He is on the mark when he points out the success of Cambodian sanctuary raids in 1970 and the long-overdue, successful emphasis on pacification pushed by General Abrams and Ambassador Bunker. He is equally correct in his statement that, by late 1972, it was our war to lose as Hanoi's legions faltered in disarray in the wake of the 13-division attack on South Vietnam that had been launched to bolster sagging revolutionary morale in the South. I served in a province that, under the Westmoreland strategy, was a revolutionary hotbed, where a simple trip to pick up the mail was an invitation to ambush. When Abrams, Colby, Vann, and Bunker got their hands on the throttle, this same province became a different place, with significant increases in security, massive morale problems and defections among the Vietcong cadre who had once ruled the countryside, and a significant economic upturn. This was the Vietnam of Sorley's "Better War." Sadly, as some of the reviews of this fine work demonstrate, the truth about that tragic war is too painful to some aging, unreconstructed members of the antiwar movement, some of whom cannot, 25 years later, admit that their love affair with the feisty Vietcong was misplaced, or that their country's men and women in arms had sown the seeds of victory under General Abrams. Bravo Sorley!
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Summary: This is Not History, and Sorley's Not A Historian
Review: Authors who present questionable or controversial theories must possess or create high credibility, to say nothing of dignity. Sorley demonstrates none of these qualities in this book. One of his methods of proving his government policy and military theses is to criticized silly statements by Jane Fonda and Walter Cronkite. This is a junior high school-style of debate. Even worse is the endless worship of Creighton Abrams and his staff. There is page after page of completely un-objective writing on Abrams, which is truly embarrassing to read. No historian would ever associate himself with such clearly biased prose. Sorley and fellow revisionist Michael Lind are the two leaders of a revival of Vietnam war theories which are laughed at by respected historians such as Karnow, Herring, and Gardner. Vietnam journalist and author William Prochnau says with dripping sarcasm that Sorley and Lind "have rediscovered the rightness of our escapade in Southeast Asia, using all the reasons the old gang [McNamara, Rostow, Bundy, et al.] did."
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