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Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost Kindle Edition
by Joe Allen (Author), John Pilger (Foreword) Format: Kindle Edition
3.6 3.6 out of 5 stars (7)
As the United States now faces a major defeat in its occupation of Iraq, the history of the Vietnam War, as a historic blunder for US military forces abroad, and the true story of how it was stopped, take on a fresh importance. Unlike most books on the topic, constructed as specialized academic studies, The (Last) War the United States Lost examines the lessons of the Vietnam era with Joe Allen’s eye of both a dedicated historian and an engaged participant in today’s antiwar movement.
Many damaging myths about the Vietnam era persist, including the accusations that antiwar activists routinely jeered and spat at returning soldiers or that the war finally ended because Congress cut off its funding. Writing in a clear and accessible style, Allen reclaims the stories of the courageous GI revolt; its dynamic relationship with the civil rights movement and the peace movement; the development of coffee houses where these groups came to speak out, debate, and organize; and the struggles waged throughout barracks, bases, and military prisons to challenge the rule of military command.
Allen’s analysis of the US failure in Vietnam is also the story of the hubris of US imperial overreach, a new chapter of which is unfolding in the Middle East today.
Joe Allen is a regular contributor to the International Socialist Review and a longstanding social justice fighter, involved in the ongoing struggles for labor, the abolition of the death penalty, and to free the political prisoner Gary Tyler.
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Publisher : Haymarket Books (5 December 2016)
Language : English
File size : 2.0 MB
Text-to-Speech : Not enabled
Print length : 230 pages
Customer Reviews:
3.6 3.6 out of 5 stars (7)
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Joe Allen
Joe Allen worked for nearly a decade at UPS between its Watertown, Massachusetts and Chicago, Illinois Jefferson Street hubs. Starting out as a part-time loader he worked his way through a series of part-time sorting and driving jobs until his final year at UPS where he was a package car driver in Chicago's Loop.
Allen's work life has largely revolved different sections of the freight and logistics including for such major employers as A.P.A Transport (Canton, Mass.), Yellow Freight (Maspeth, NY), and UPS. He has been a member of several Teamster local unions and a member of Teamsters for a Democratic Union. He campaigned for Ron Carey's reelection in 1996, and for Tom Leedham in the two following Teamster elections.
Born and raised in Stoughton, Massachusetts, Allen has lived in Chicago for two decades. He is the son and nephew of United States Marines. His previous books Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost and 'People Wasn't Made to Burn': A Trues Story of Race, Murder, and Justice in Chicago were both published by Haymarket books.
Joe Allen has been a socialist since he read Michael Harrington's The Other America in high school. He studied for several years at U-Mass Boston. Allen has contributed over the years to Socialist Worker (U.S.), the International Socialist Review, Counterpunch, In These Times, and Jacobin.
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Gaylen Halbert
5.0 out of 5 stars Essential summary of Viet Nam WarReviewed in the United States on 21 July 2008
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I have 14 books in my library about the Vietnam war. I believe Joe Allen's book is the most accurate summary of the etiology of the war,"in country" events and what was happening stateside. I was not in the military, but I lived through and participated in much of what Joe so aptly describes. If this book had been published and was read by High School students circa 2000 perhaps there would have been a more substantial resistance to the Iraq debacle. I believe Iraq is the [next] war the U.S.lost.
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Victoria Lomakin
1.0 out of 5 stars shipping problemReviewed in the United States on 20 January 2020
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Book arrived wrinkled and half of it was soaking wet.
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Arkansaw Traveler
2.0 out of 5 stars Anti-American Socialist/Communist Slant on VietnamReviewed in the United States on 4 October 2008
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This book was written by Joe Allen, a regular contributor to the International Socialist Review, and is only interesting as representing the viewpoint of Socialists and unrepentent Communists with regard to the greatest threat to world peace (as they see it), the United States. If you're an historian of the type that seeks representation from all sides, such as reading Mein Kampf to understand where Hitler was coming from, this book is valuable to see how facts, attitudes and intentions can be subverted, misstated or omitted to support a polemic for one side, and one side only.
The thrust of this book can be seen in several of the author's statements:
On page 203, "In 1965, the United States invaded (South Vietnam) to prevent the NLF from coming to power and reuniting the country that the United States had divided and conquered." This is false on three counts.
The dedication: "This book is dedicated to all .... who continue to suffer death and deformity as a result of America's use of weapons of mass destruction in Southeast Asia from 1960 to 1975." Since WMDs are usually limited in definition to Chemical, Biological and Nuclear weapons directed against mass populations (and do not include herbicides), one wonders what the author is talking about. In addition, the time period is wrong.
Page 91, commenting on the SNCC statement issued in 1966: "SNCC activitists were seen as heroes, not only to an entire generation of young people in the United States..." Really? Was there no support for the war at all among young people?
One of the more interesting facets of this book is that it includes some of the more extreme statements of Martin Luther King, Jr., that were downplayed or ignored in the post-1968 elevation of Rev. King to superhero status by the US media, a status that is not disputed by this reviewer. Nonetheless, the author makes use of MLK's most extreme statements, many not well-founded and some modified or adjusted to become less inflammatory by MLK himself almost immediately. The point is, that intemperate statements by national leaders taken out of context become used to condemn the US out of hand by its enemies.
Author Allen contends that the US lost the war due to the heroic resistance of the NLF (helped somewhat by North Vietnam), the brave rebellion of common soldiers within the US military which destroyed the fighting quality of US military forces, and the overwhelming political force of the anti-war movement and the sacrifices of its leaders. Obviously anyone doing his duty by serving his country (the US) was venal, cruel, and deserving of public contempt.
Supposedly this book dispells many myths concerning the war, but I was unable to discover any widely-held "myth" by the public that was actually refuted. There were a few strawman myths constructed to show how gullible the public was, but these are easily overlooked.
And lastly, there is a reason this book was published this year (2008). As one of the Haymarket editors says, "As the United States now faces a major defeat in its occupation of Iraq...." Apparently that defeat is fervently desired by the author, John Pilger (who wrote the Foreword) and the Haymarket organization.
With the main thrust being the necessity of defeating American Imperialism, I wonder if the author can point to any territory owned by the US today that it has obtained through imperialism or wars of conquest since World War I. In fact, we have lost territory, most notably the Philippines, but such facts fit poorly into the author's polemic. Instead he just continues to beat the drum: the US is racist, evil, imperialistic, undemocratic, and ready for the most extreme forms of class warfare. Sounds rather like Lenin's "What Is To Be Done."
But the book is clever with well-written propaganda, ignoring inconvenient truths, and concentrating on cherry-picking those events that can be spun to the author's liking, statements by various leaders that tend to support his points, and the ennobling of all those who tend to the left or far-left in the US. This book needs to be read by all, but understood for what it is -- the basis for the ultra-left in their condemnation of the US.
This is a very small book, but as the author states; "This book is not meant to be a substitute for reading many of the fine books by radical historians or memoirs of soldiers and activists..." The reader needs only to put the emphasis on the word "radical" and everything becomes apparent.
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Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost
Joe Allen
,
John Pilger
(Foreword)
4.11
46 ratings9 reviews
As the United States now faces a major defeat in its occupation of Iraq, the history of the Vietnam War, as a historic blunder for US military forces abroad, and the true story of how it was stopped, take on a fresh importance. Unlike most books on the topic, constructed as specialized academic studies, The (Last) War the United States Lost examines the lessons of the Vietnam era with Joe Allen’s eye of both a dedicated historian and an engaged participant in today’s antiwar movement.
Many damaging myths about the Vietnam era persist, including the accusations that antiwar activists routinely jeered and spat at returning soldiers or that the war finally ended because Congress cut off its funding. Writing in a clear and accessible style, Allen reclaims the stories of the courageous GI revolt; its dynamic relationship with the civil rights movement and the peace movement; the development of coffee houses where these groups came to speak out, debate, and organize; and the struggles waged throughout barracks, bases, and military prisons to challenge the rule of military command.
Allen’s analysis of the US failure in Vietnam is also the story of the hubris of US imperial overreach, a new chapter of which is unfolding in the Middle East today.
Joe Allen is a regular contributor to the International Socialist Review and a longstanding social justice fighter, involved in the ongoing struggles for labor, the abolition of the death penalty, and to free the political prisoner Gary Tyler.
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History
Nonfiction
230 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 2008
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Castles
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March 3, 2021
The focus of this book is not on the war itself, but on the counter-reaction to it in the US and how the US government dealt with the war.
Of course, the book is written from a left perspective and rightly accuses the US administration no less than war crimes and even genocide. From the book (and probably from any book that has dealt with and will deal with this war), it seems that most of the participants in that war, with the exception of the Vietnamese, very quickly stopped understanding what they were fighting for and why. That's always the strongest feeling you get from reading or watching any document about this war.
The book is written in simplicity and a flow that reminds me a bit of Anthony Bieber's books, but I must point out that I did not learn many new things that I had not already seen in Ken Burns' fascinating documentary.
The book links Vietnam to Iraq, and it's fascinating to read about all the madness that took place then on the civilian side as well, now that we are after a crazy year in which the Trump regime has taken many demons out of the bottle. The events of Black Life Mater and the Capitol Hill remind us once again of the fragility of the American society and the echoes of the split that accompanied the Vietnam War. Maybe what we see now is still, after so many years, a the result of that war.
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Sara Star
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July 29, 2024
Very readable, concise history, great for people looking to learn about the subject in a way that isn't excusing US imperialism and violence. Very timely read; the chapters on protests could be written today about US crackdown on anti gen0cide protests.
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CoachKevin Madden
1 review
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June 22, 2022
Makes some good points and in hindsight offers a fair perspective BUT it is rife with historical errors.
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kloppy
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December 11, 2023
I'd honestly recommend skipping the first two chapters, which are diatribes against American atrocities that anyone who would pick up a book from Haymarket is hopefully familiar with. The remaining ~140 pages though have lots of useful anecdotes and data about the extent of radicalism outside of just the student movement, but it's by no means a conclusive overview of the cultural impact of the war.
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Ryan Mishap
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November 14, 2013
As the disaster in Iraq continued to be compared with Vietnam, Allen set out to illuminate the history of that conflict, having been obscured by time and distorted by decades of pop culture and political propaganda. Even if you think you know all about it, this book should be read.
By no means exhaustive, this is still a cogent, clear-eyed account that includes the history of colonization in Vietnam and tracks the U.S. involvement since the end of World War II. It examines the results of the war on the ground in Vietnam, in the halls of U.S. power, on campuses, in the streets, in work places, and in the media.
Recommended.
"The devastation wreaked by the United States on Vietnam should have put to rest once and for all the myth of the United States as a nation committed to upholding freedom and democracy throughout the world."
A lesson to be learned from this history also includes the fact that the rhetoric of those in power has never changed. The cops still say and do the same things to demonstrators--same overblown warnings about "violent" protestors, same brutal tactics, same excuses afterwards. The politicians say the same things about lights at the ends of tunnels and freedom and so on. The press dutifully reports. The liberals fear radical action more than the evils of war. The democrats twist themselves into antiwar candidates even though they support the venture overseas. The poor, working class, and people of color do the dirty work.
What did change, with regards to the so-called War on Terror, is that after mass protests prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the antiwar sentiment and action seemed to disappear rather than increase like during the war on Vietnam.
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Mr.
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October 7, 2008
Joe Allen's brief summation of the U.S. war in Vietnam is an excellent and compact history of both the U.S. war of aggression, as well as the domestic revolution that occurred at home. With excellent precision and historical breadth Allen reviews the context of French colonialism in Vietnam, followed by the US' multiple attempts to reclaim the former colony, namely military funding and support, followed by an air invasion, followed by the full-scale deployment of troops. Allen traces the web of deceit that flowed from the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations, which culminated in the secret bombing of Cambodia. Allen demonstrates quite lucidly, how the war was stopped through a combination of resistance at home, NLF resistance, and GI resistance. There are excellent descriptions of the Black Power movement, as well as the rise of working class militancy in the 1970's. Allen demolishes the myth that opposition to the US war was primarily student/intellectual led, and demonstrates that opposition to the war was overwhelmingly led by the working classes. Perhaps the only thing that is missing in this account is an analysis of the economic considerations of US policy makers. Still, an excellent work of history.
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Dictionaryhound
11 reviews
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September 22, 2010
This book highlights what were the major questions, movements, conflicts in the U.S. involved in the build up to the Anti-Vietnam War Movement. It brings into view the debates of Black Civil Rights and Liberation groups, Unions and the Left in relationship to war. It addresses the three key elements that forced the US out of Vietnam: the resistance of the courageous Vietnamese, the anti-war movement in the US and the courageous and suppressed rebellion of soldiers against US military command. Most importantly Allen stresses opposition to the war was there from the beginning of the war. This is a very timely book to read!!!
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Barbara
41 reviews
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September 13, 2009
Based on me throwing a lot of questions to my husband while reading this book, it is accurate and very informative for those of us who were not there. I learned a lot about the US Government, the good and the bad.
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Greg
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Shelved as 'abandoned'
March 31, 2015
Seemed alright, but started off with little I hadn't read before. On to something else!
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
====
Joe Allen (writer)
 | This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these messages)
|
Joe Allen | |
|---|---|
| Born | July 19, 1960 |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation(s) | Author and Journalist |
Joe Allen (born July 19, 1960) is an American author, journalist, historian, and activist. He authored People Wasn't Made to Burn: A True Story of Race, Murder, and Justice in Chicago (ISBN 1608461262) published by Haymarket Books in 2011. His latest book is The Package King: A Rank and File History of United Parcel Service (2016).
Early life
[edit]Allen was born in Stoughton, Massachusetts, the son of Beverly Ann Vigneaux and William Henry Allen. He has three sisters.[citation needed] He graduated from Stoughton High School in 1978. He entered the University of Massachusetts Boston in the fall of 1978 and took classes through 1983 but did not graduate.[citation needed]
His previous books, Vietnam: The (Last) War the U.S. Lost and People Wasn't Made to Burn: A True Story of Race, Murder, and Justice in Chicago, were both published by Haymarket books.[citation needed]
Allen has contributed over the years to the U.S. edition of Socialist Worker, the International Socialist Review, CounterPunch, In These Times, and Jacobin.[citation needed]
Books
[edit]- Vietnam: The (Last) War the US Lost (ISBN 1931859493), foreword by John Pilger, 2007
- People Wasn't Made to Burn (ISBN 1608461262), 2011
- The Package King: A Rank and File History of United Parcel Service, 2016
References
[edit]External links
[edit]- People Wasn't Made to Burn - from Haymarket Books On YouTube.com
- Taylor, Elizabeth; Gary Krist; Joe Allen (June 9, 2012). "Book Discussion on [City of Scoundrels] and [People Wasn't Made to Burn]". Chicago Tribune Printers Row Lit Fest/Book TV. C-SPAN2 Video (49 minutes). Retrieved 18 June 2013.
- Media from Socialism
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