The Co-Vans: U.S. Marine Advisors in Vietnam [Hardcover]

John Grider Miller (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2000

The author, a co-van himself, has captured the experiences of the American advisors in Vietnam in this very readable, often humorous, sometimes poignant book.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 195 pages
• Publisher: Naval Inst Pr (November 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1557505497
• ISBN-13: 978-1557505491
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,067,423 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A well written memoir of 1970, August 3, 2006

By 

Stephen Sossaman (San Francisco CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Co-Vans: U.S. Marine Advisors in Vietnam (Hardcover)

Despite its title and subtitle, this book is less an historical analysis than a memoir of the author's second tour in Viet Nam, in 1970, including the incursions into Cambodia and Laos. The book is a good read for insights into the life of an advisor, and is well written by an apparently modest and honest former advisor. Readers fond of military memoirs will find this one refreshingly free of the bravado of a David Hackworth, free of political rants, and free of the distortions of inter-service rivalries better enjoyed in bars than in memoirs. Miller especially relishes humorous stories of good officers thwarting interference by top brass, a staple of military memoirs that even we former enlisted personnel enjoy. For readers seeking lessons about the nature of advising, a timely topic given the war in Iraq and American military missions elsewhere, the promise of the title is mostly delivered in the last twenty or so pages, when Miller analyzes organizational and cultural weaknesses in Vietnamese marine operations. For flaws he singles out what he calls the Cult of the Commander and the Vietnamese concern for saving face. Miller acknowledges that advising was less about advising than about arranging logistics and fire support. The book implies that he never really overcame the cultural differences with the Viets, always remaining an outsider.

An aside on one small issue: Miller reports hearing allegations in 1965 that the famous CBS footage of GIs burning Vietnamese homes was staged, and he repeats hearsay that CBS executives admitted doctoring the news to destroy Lyndon Johnson. His book does not state whether he still believes those stories. Miller should look for a copy of Vietnam Perspective, a 1965 CBS reprinting of their four-part broadcast series on the war that clearly shows their support for the "courageous decision" to enter the war and their interest in having it won. This "unbiased analysis" ignores critics of the war, being based on interviews with administration officials like Dean Rusk, Robert McNamara, General Earle Wheeler and General Maxwell Taylor. His distrust of CBS might have been unwarranted. If Colonel Miller ever visits Charlottesville, I'd be happy to buy him a drink and show him my copy.