Customer Reviews

The End of the Line: The Seige of Khe Sanh

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4 star:		(2)
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This is an excellent book, on many levels. It tells the story of Khe Sanh, and the siege of the valiant Marines who held the hill against staggering odds, a story I vaguely remember from my youth, seeing headlines in the morning paper and hearing on the nightly news.

It may also be one of the best books on Vietnam. I say that because the author, Bob Pisor, intersperses the action befalling the Marines at Khe Sanh with straightforward reporting on the overall conduct of the war in Vietnam: General Westmoreland, constantly pleading for more and more men, just one more build-up of forces, before victory is achieved.

In addition, we also read about the battle, and the war, from the view from the North Vietnamese, who always wondered about our conduct of the war. For example, the North Vietnamese wondered why so few soldiers, of all those in Vietnam, actually were in the field, engaged in combat. This reporting provides interesting viewpoints.

I highly recommend this book, both for its specific information about the valiant fight put up by the Marines, and for its overall reporting of the Vietnam war. Can be a hard-to-find book, but it is well worth the effort. I highly recommend this work.

I am a college student who read this book for a critical book review. My father served was at Khe Sanh then later served with 1/9 in I Corps. We talked extensively about many sections of the book and he could find no faults with it. I found it to be an excellent read that really kept my attention. The only thing it lacked was that it relied heavily on American sources of information about what went on at Khe Sanh but even today it is tough to get Vetnamese sources. I recommend it for anyone looking for a book about the Marine experience in Vietnam or about Khe Sanh.

A very good peice of literature that gave a true sense of what the U.S. Marines that where there serving their country where involved with. I also apreciated the point of veiw from the NVA/VC, as well as the overveiw of the French errors at Dien Bien Phu.

As a Marine who was in I Corps I can report that Mr. Pisor has portrayed an accurate discription of life at Khe Sanh. Probably one of the best documents published about the VietNam war.

This is an excellent book. I was in Special Forces at the time, and did not understand the anger some SF had at the Marines when this event occurred. The abandonment of the SF at the Lang Vei camp, in spite of prior agreements that the Marines would come to the rescue if the SF camp was attacked is explained here. I was also intrigued that the Marines at Khe Sanh got rid of their M16's and got back the M14 when the M16's Jammed.
Also interesting was the fact that the US had a battle plan of the TET offensive and choose to not believe it was a real document.
The terrible conditions at Khe Sanh are explained in detail. The forcing the Marines to defend the hill when the Marines said it was a bad place to fight is explained too. The changes of rationalization of the hill fight, from the original it is of no value, to, it must be held, to it is of no value, just prior to bulldozing the fort back to dust is explained too.
A great read.

This book does an excellent job of weaving together all the disparate elements that culminated in the battle of Khe Sanh. Pisor's description of the carpet bombing of the valley, and the strategies that were in place at the time, was unusually informative and thought-provoking.