Customer Reviews

How We Won the War

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Generals Dung and Giap, the two great military strategists of North Vietnam, describe the methods they used in the Ho Chi Minh Campaign. This was the 1975 offensive that culminated in the fall of Saigon and ended the Vietnam War.

Written in Party Speak, this short volume is a lengthy read. Buried within the patriotic prose are the important strategic decisions that allowed the communists to complete in five months what they originally planned to accomplish in two years. Credit for these decisions - blanketing all geographic areas of the South, utilizing the regular army along with local insurgents, establishing good roads for rapid deployment of regular troops, maintaining flexibility and rapidly following up on enemy errors - is always given to the Party. There is no personalization either of friend or foe. The United States is named "the U.S." throughout the essay, and the South Vietnamese army and government institutions are called "the enemy" or "the puppet."

The objective of this book was the description, in broad terms, of the strategies employed by North Vietnam in 1975 well after withdrawal of U.S. troops. If you are looking for details in tactics employed throughout the campaign, you will not find them here. Nor is this the book in which Gen. Giap supposedly stated that groups such at the Vietnam Veterans Against the War gave the North the resolve to carry on. This book is for the reader already familiar with the course of the war after the Paris Agreement, who is interested in hearing in the words of the victors how they envisioned the means of bringing down the South Vietnamese government.

I have read General Giap's work both in the original Vietnamese and in English. There is little to no valuable insight contained within the political dogma and Party rhetoric that fills this puffed-up praise of General Giap. The reader should keep in mind this work was not originally published to discuss the strategy and tactics of the final push to capture the Republic of Vietnam. Instead, it was published to praise General Giap and portray him to the Vietnamese people as a hero of the Communist Party who outwitted and defeated the foreign invaders, thus placing Giap in a class with other heroes of Vietnamese history such as Le Loi and the 2 Trung Sisters. This is NOT a serious analysis of the final events of the Vietnam war, and offers little promise other than to satisfy a curiosity for how the Communist Party interprets history for the people of Vietnam.

This book is mostly filled with self-congratulatory propaganda. It is written for an audience that is decidedly non-military, and it is therefore very light on substance that is useful to professional warfighters. Although it does have a few useful nuggets, Che Gueverra's book is much more enlightening if you want to learn about guerilla warfare. The title is even misleading. "How we Won the War" implies a discussion of the entire conlfict, but this book only deals with the final 1975 offensive. The two commentaries in the front are both by unabashed communist sympathizers who don't even understand the book well enough to see it for what it is, a 25 page pep-talk, and see it instead as a "how to" guide for revolutions everywhere, which it is not. It is on the Commandant's reading list, so every Marine should read it, but don't expect to get too much out of it. Of the 20-odd books I have read from the reading list, this is by far the most disappointing, and least useful.

If you're interested in really finding out how General Giap masterminded the military victory in Vietnam, this book isn't going to answer the question. Instead, Giap takes the opportunity simply to reinforce the stated political positions of the Vietnamese communist movement in book form in a way that's not particular original or well-written.

If you're a communist, you'll probably enjoy saying "Right on!" as he makes an endless stream of broad generalizations about the political side of the victory, but if you're interested in finding out about what Giap is truly a genius at doing, fighting a guerilla war, you won't really find this book satisfying.

In this book, North Vietnam's head commie General, Vo Nguyen Giap, (Vo Nu-en Yap) raps a bunch of nationalistic commie rhetoric as he explains how North Vietnam reunited with South Vietnam.

It's insightful because it shows the head commie general's strategy for the war. For one, they knew the US was 10,000 miles away. They 'bled' the US to death, knowing they could lose 10 Vietnamese for every American, and they'd still win. They also persuaded the US press to their side, and the US countryside was rife with their political organizers.

I'm not choosing sides in this review, but Giap fails to talk about how most of his units were usually completely wiped out anytime they confronted the US military head-on. But wars are fought on political levels as well as military, and that's where they won. This knowledge is what the book will give you, if you can read past the weird translation and Giap's constant rhetoric. You can have the strongest, best military on the planet and still lose if your country's politicos fail you, and the domestic front doesn't have the 'national will' to back you up.

Very useful for the insurgent in you. Especially, enlightening is where Giap said that organizations such as "Viet Nam Vets Against the War" (started by John Kerry) gave the North courage and resolve.

First, this is published by an extreme left-wing anti-US military company. It is forwarded by pointless political propaganda.

However, this follows the theme of the entire book. While there is some useful strategic information in Giap's words, you have to wade through tons of Communist ideology to siphon out a few ounces of outdated information.

At best, this is a diluted companion to other more informative texts. Or for indoctrination into any pro-Communist anti-U.S. group.

The book is awesome! Great