Customer Reviews

The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Vietnam War (Politically Incorrect Guides) (Library Edition)

5 star:		(38)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I'm a 28 year old college graduate and would consider myself fairly intelligent. But, I really didn't know a thing about the Vietnam War - well, certainly nothing accurate - until I read this book.

I grew up in California, public and private schools. My understanding of the Vietnam War was ridiculously off base when it came to the facts and the chronology of events...

This book was an eye opener and should be required reading for anyone interesting in American history... Google "history of Vietnam War" and read some of the stuff people have published - "a million American deaths..."? Clearly, this media controlled war has been permanently filtered in our memory. Read this book to get the real story and you'll also have a few good laughs along the way.

I highly recommend this book to everyone.

I have read all of Jennings' work and always await his latest eagerly. This PIG is different and equally fantastic. I served as an artillery officer during the early years of the war. I taught trigonometry at Ft. Sill (no "war stories" here). As I look back I am amazed at how little we new about the decisions and motivations of the key players at the time. Jennings knows this subject as well as anyone and his insights are needed now that we are again looking for answers on the subject of politics and war.

I came to admire Phillip Jennings when I reviewed his "Nam-a-Rama" Nam-A-Rama and, later, his "Good-bye Mexico" Goodbye Mexico. We even exchanged a few emails. I found him to be as you would expect from his books. He is brilliant, funny, deeply in love with American, but doesn't have time or the inclination to take guff from anyone. I am not saying I know the author, but just that my email exchanges confirm what I suspected from the books. Since I knew he was a true veteran of the Vietnam War and a very talented writer, I was hoping someday we would get his take on the War. So, I was extremely delighted when I saw his name on this book. As I read it, I found that Jennings had surpassed my hopes. I had a friend who was with SOG in the 60s and everything he told me about his work there (and there was much he could not tell) absolutely agrees with this book.

What is so politically incorrect about this book? Jennings demonstrates that America had won the war by 1973 and the only reason the South had to suffer defeat in 1975 was the liberals (mostly Democrats) in the U.S. Congress that cut off funding to support the South. They could do this because the sympathetic press was spinning the war as a defeat and unwinnable since the Tet Offensive in 1968, which was, by the way, a huge loss for the North.

He also shows how America SUPPORTED the war. We have seen this phenomenon again and again, when decades after the fact everyone knows as fact something that was utterly untrue at the time. Jennings points out another interesting distortion of history. Many more people claim to be veterans of the Vietnam War than were ever there. This is also true of the VVAW that did the "Winter Soldier" investigation that John Kerry was involved with and made many false accusations against our soldiers. However, these lies and calumnies are still quoted as fact in far too many places. Jennings lays the problems with Cambodia, Laos, and other places at the feet of the North. Their aggression and violation of those nations' sovereignty led to the expansion of the War beyond Vietnam's boundaries.

By reading this book you will learn why we were in Vietnam anyway, what JFK did there, how LBJ expanded it and what is limited war strategy cost us (and what it did not accomplish). Jennings also explains how we won the war and why it is still talked about as a loss in our society. He devotes a whole chapter the anti-War movement and corrects so many myths surrounding it. I can honestly and truthfully say that while I did not serve in Vietnam or in the military I was never part of the anti-War movement and would have gone had I been called to do so. In fact, I had a plan laid out my number did come up in the lottery. The final chapter deals with the myths surrounding the Vietnam Veterans and their reentering society.

If you have read any of these guides before you will know that they also have lots of other cool things. Side boxes listing books to read that overthrow the popular distortions of the subject. There are others with great quotes, anecdotes and helpful facts you can use when discussing the War with your friends imprisoned in a conventional mindset. You will also get some clarity about the reality behind the reputations of people like Westmoreland, Colby, Abrams, McNamara, and others.

Jennings also provides you with reading lists for the best books on the war (among the 300 or so in his library and he has read during his own study), the best movies on the War and mini-reviews of them, and a proper explanation of the Pentagon Papers. He exposes people like Peter Arnett and their phony reporting of the War, and he provides a really neat insight into the growth of the Vietnamese as immigrants within America. They number around 1.5 million, which, Jennings points out, makes them the 4th largest minority group in America.

I hope everyone reads this book. Yet, I am sure that many will attack it without taking the time to read it. They clutch to the lefty agenda about the War and will not tolerate any facts disturbing their delusions. But you don't have to be one of them.

Terrific and highly recommended.

Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI

This is an extremely well written and well documented book. Pres Kennedy observed that the real enemy of truth is not the lie but the myth. This book goes a long way to confront and refute so many of the fallacies and myths about the war and the soldiers who fought it. I just wish this were required reading in high schools and colleges to offset the Zinn/Chomsky propaganda. Ed Hayes

The Vietnam War has never been one of my reading priorities; and I likely wouldn't have read this book except that a highly decorated friend of mine, who flew with "Commando Saber" (Misty) in Vietnam in the 1960s, suggested that I might like to read it. I could hardly refuse. But when I read it, I did so with an eye jaundiced by the post-Vietnam era in the United States with its many trials and ongoing tribulations. The Vietnam War, it seems, ushered in a new era in America; and, as a result, this is not the country I was raised in and it's not the country I'd like my children and grandchildren to have to live in. And much of this is due to the liberals who, through their socialist ideology, ignorance, and ineptitude, "lost" the Vietnam War (if one can truly say that it was lost) and who, along with their disciples, are now the ones rocking our once great nation to its foundations. This book, then, at least in my view, is as much about today's America as it is about the Vietnam War. And this review is written with that in mind. Caution is advised.

Let me begin by saying that this book truly reflects my recollections of the Vietnam War. As I remember it, and as this book clearly shows: We were ushered into the Vietnam War by a weak vacillating president, John F. Kennedy, who talked big, but never lived up to his eloquent language (an accepted liberal failing). Then, when the war was upon us, it was directed by an unprincipled leader, Lyndon Baines Johnson, and his cohorts who thought they knew it all (much as our current president and his appointees do) and who micro-managed the war to America's detriment and to the untimely deaths of tens of thousands of South Vietnamese and U.S. soldiers, marines, and airmen all to no purpose. Of course, the liberal mainstream media of the time, the "New York Times," "Washington Post," "Time" "Newsweek," CBS et. al., supported this liberal administration (as they do all liberal administrations) but viewed our participation in what they called a "civil war" as unwarranted; ignoring the fact that it was actually a war of communist aggression by North Vietnam against the sovereign, free, internationally recognized nations of South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.

Anti-war demonstrations, of course, were instigated and staged all across the country (as they are today when they serve the purpose) promoted and led by socialist/communist activists and packed with what can only be termed "useful idiots," as one ex-communist later described them. Jane Fonda, considered by most older Americans to be a traitor, even went to Hanoi, in North Vietnam, to support the communists (as many of America's most prominent actors seemingly do today in the name of environmentalism, socialism, stupidity, etc.) and had the temerity, or was it the ignorance, to proclaim that American soldiers were "war criminals" and that the North Vietnamese were fighting for THEIR "freedom and independence." (Then, she returned to that evil capitalist United States where she resumed her acting career, increased her fortune, and was eventually named one of the world's 100 most important women of the 20th Century.)

Later in the war: U.S. and South Vietnamese military forces virtually destroyed the Viet Cong as a fighting force during its ill-fated Tet offensive only to have the "New York Times" and the rest of the liberal media proclaim that it was a disaster for America and that there was no way the war could be won. President Johnson subsequently declined to run for re-election and, in 1968, Richard Nixon was elected and set about doing what his predecessor had never done --- try to win the war.

To that end, he destroyed the communists' base of operations across the boarder from South Vietnam in "neutral" Cambodia in accordance with international law, began reducing America's military presence in South Vietnam, and initiated precise strategic bombings in North Vietnam (of all places). This brought the communists to the bargaining table and forced them to negotiate a peaceful end to the hostilities. America had, for all intents and purposes, won the war. South Vietnam remained a free and sovereign non-communist nation, and with America's promised support would remain so. But America's liberal Congress had other ideas. They negated America's obligations, as stated in the Paris Agreement which ended the war, by mandating that, in the future, the United States could not support South Vietnam in any military way, even if it was once again invaded by North Vietnam. Not surprisingly, the communists rebuilt their shattered military and, then, not fearing the United States military, once again invaded South Vietnam. And surprise, surprise: In 1975, South Vietnam fell victim to communist enslavement.

That is the way I saw it, and that is the way this book reports it. And, that is the way it was. But the communist/socialist activists weren't quite finished: Following the war, a small clique of communist sympathizers, who claimed to be Vietnam veterans, set about to destroy America's and America's soldiers reputations by claiming that they and their supposed buddies in arms routinely committed atrocities against civilians throughout the war. None of them, however, was ever shown to have actually been in Vietnam, nor even in the military. On the contrary, they all simply vanished into the woodwork, much as cockroaches do, and none ever testified under oath or provided any evidence as to the truth of their allegations, and none were ever prosecuted for their confessed war crimes. But the damage was done.

One of them, however, John F. Kerry, was particularly despicable. He testified before Congress, saying almost verbatim the same anti-war diatribe that Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest ranking intelligence officer ever to defect from the Soviet Union, said that he had used as spy chief in Romania. (Kerry, of course, went on to become a United States Senator from Massachusetts and eventually ran for president.)

But there is still one last frightening thing: South Vietnam Major Hoi Ba Tran, who lived under Ho Chi Minh as a child, states, as quoted in this book, that he and his classmates were routinely instructed on how to wave red flags and sing "Who loves uncle Ho Chi Minh more than us young children" to instill in them a cult of personality. (In the United States, we now seem to have finally reached that same sad point.)

Bottom line: If you want to learn what really happened in Vietnam, minus the liberal propaganda, and mull its impact on America, then this is the right book for you. But, after reading it and thinking about it myself, I can only wonder: Will this madness never end? Or, is it simply too late for America?

Having soiled myself laughing at Mr Jennings'"Nam-A-Rama", and the more recent "Goodbye Mexico", I was a bit concerned when he turned his obvious satirical skills to writing non-fiction, and a PIG guide to boot! While he certainly knew how to make me laugh, was he up to the task of informing me? The Vietnam war is not a laughing matter, and though we left 35 years ago, the war continues to haunt the American psyche. Leave it to Mr Jennings' to artfully and factually lead us through the falsehoods, lies and deliberate deceptions crafted by the media to support the notion that Vietnam was a failed war, fought by drug addled troops, for the wrong reasons,with little redeeming benefit to the future of southeast Asia or its people.Read this book to find out why they were wrong on all counts; you won't be disappointed.

An insiteful book long overdue. Jennings writes with intelligence, humor, and common sense. As a Marine Vietnam veteran who participated in the landings in 1965 with the 4th Marines, I am grateful that someone has finally recognized that the United States military was prepared, fought valiantly, and delivered time and time again, against an enemy who was repeatedly allowed to live and fight another day because of political and strategic incompetence by our government in Washington. This book, and Lessons In Disaster by Gordon Goldstein, should be required reading in schools and colleges throughout our country. Jennings sums up our political incompetence by asking the question: did anyone in the White House or at the National Security Council ever say "does this make sense" when decided military strategy by majority vote of academic theorists? Jennings is a gifted author.
Robert Peters, Bridgeport, California.

This powerful book is a must read not only for all Vietnam vets who deserve to feel proud of their service, but also for all college and high school students who have been grossly misinformed by liberal revisionist academia, the mass media and virtually all of Hollywoods movies and TV that almost always inaccurately portray Vietnam vets as brutal druggies that did not adapt to civilian life.

The author, Phillip Jennings, clarifies so many of the misconceptions and outright lies that have been perpetuated for years. He makes it clear that this war was a noble cause to try to save the twenty million people of the internationally recognized sovereign nation of South Vietnam from the terror and tyranny of expansionist imperialist communism.

He asks why the "peace movement" did not condemn North Vietnam that was invading South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia with huge help from two of the worst mass murderous truly evil empires in history, the Soviet Union and China.

He recognizes the tremendous dedication, courage and success of our service men in spite of the many limitations placed upon them and the blunders of LBJ and his political team.

Jennings makes innumerable powerful and compelling points including suggesting movies and other books that treat this important issue fairly.

I have a library of more than fifteen books about Vietnam and give this one my highest rating to bring the truth to you in concise and accurate terms

As a Viet Nam veteran I have read many books on that conflict, usually with raised eyebrows and a question like,"What the hell are they talking about?!" Most books seem to have been written by someone who has never seen war, or by someone who has but who has an overriding agenda that prevents them from recognizing the truth when they see it...or perhaps the truth just does not fit into their life. Mr. Jennings has avoided all of this. He tells it like it was, that it was a war that our military did win, definitively, in spite of inept leadership in our country at the highest levels. It is a war that seemed to reward traitors and nay-sayers and vilified true heroes. It is a war that still causes great anger in those of us who were there when we had to come home and face the incredible stupidity we had to face upon returning. It is a war that from a military and humanitarian point of view we can take pride in, just as we should hang our heads in shame at those many highly placed individuals in this country who profited from ridiculing our successes and glorying in our (theoretical) failures. This book is history finally written correctly. Thanks, Phil Jennings. And, by the way, don't go to Viet Nam in the near future...

This book should be required reading in all high school history classes.This war could have been easily won had the democrats in charge had the courage to win. Instead they used our military as cannon fodder because they didn't want to upset the Russians and Chinese.Had Nixon had a republican congress we would have won the war, honored our commitments,and South Vietnam would be free today.The book is well written and documented and shows that the war was lost by the politicians, not the military. Too bad Obama hasn't read it.If he had we would be fighting the war in Afghanistan to win instead of handcuffing our troops with excessively strict rules of engagement which are causing higher casualties to our troops.