Secrets of the Viet Cong [Hardcover]

James W. McCoy (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 549 pages
• Publisher: Hippocrene Books (June 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0781800285
• ISBN-13: 978-0781800280
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 5.9 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,416,175 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars SECRETS OF THE VIET CONG, February 26, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Secrets of the Viet Cong (Hardcover)

I am an experienced officer of the US military who has commanded battalions, regiments, divisions and Field Forces in several wars.I have been trained for operational/strategic level command at a variety of American and foreign training facilities.
When I read Secrets of The Viet Cong I was astonished at the in-depth knowledge of warfighting and military intelligence displayed by the author. He is obviously a well trained and experienced general officer of the highest professionalism.
Secrets of the Viet Cong is not only the most innovative and well researched book that I have read on the 2nd Indochina War, it is also a comprehensive guide book for maneuver warfighting and combat intelligence. The book is loaded with surprising revelations and extrapolated data that is of great use to anyone who truly wants to understand both the North Vietnamese Army and warfighting in general.
The author's discussion of NVA intelligence, especially the machinations of the B2 and B36 units, is enlightening. Only Secrets of the Viet Cong explains: the NVA system of Nomadding used for area control, the exotic NVA Maneuvering Forces Battle System, the strange NVA ambush and power raid tactical forms, the secrets of NVA logistics, and the NVA campaigns in Cambodia, China and Laos. The book also offers a complete explanation of NVA Operational Art.
Not only is Secrets of the Viet Cong of great value to professional soldiers, it is also a book which offers clear explanations of every key aspect of modern warfare. It is a classic book on war that anyone interestted in that subject should read.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent nuts and bolts insights, May 8, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Secrets of the Viet Cong (Hardcover)

This is definitely the most thorough book that I know of on Viet Cong tactics, doctrine, weapons, etc. Especially tactics. The section on the "prepared battlefield" is especially illuminating.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Book Available On The Vietnam war, February 27, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Secrets of the Viet Cong (Hardcover)

I am an avid reader of historical nonfiction and I greatly enjoy a book which is carefully researched. James McCoy's book, Secrets of the Viet Cong, is among the best I have read. Its twenty-four chapters, 550 pages and over 800 footnotes mark it as the leading book on the Vietnam War.
I realize that there are a few people who subscribe to the "popular wisdom" regarding the Vietnam War. Such people depend upon table top books, newspaper accounts and the incomplete works of Pike and others for their information. Their opinions are already shaped by an ignorant prejudice.
Many current (2004) ignorant American writers, historians and bibliographers continue to claim that the Viet Cong was separate from the North Vietnamese Army and criticize those of us who reject that spurious and false differentiation (see Moise's "Vietnam Bibliography" on the internet). Mr. McCoy was one of the first to point out the true state of affairs. Second Indochinese War intelligence expert Sedgwick D. Tourison has answered those modern but ignorant "Vietnam experts" with, "...As the war had escalated markedly in 1964, an escalation which was based on earlier decisions in Hanoi, it had been realized that the Liberation Army's headquarters...could no longer provide professional command of central Vietnam which the coming conflict would demand; operational control over that area passed to the PAVN (North Vietnamese Army) high command, although on paper everything in central Vietnam still referred to the Liberation Army and COSVN...for international reasons the (North Vietnamese) Politburo and the PAVN (NVA) needed to continue the facade that the war in southern Vietnam was a local civil war not directly tied to Hanoi...but all operational control had been passed to Hanoi by 1964." Although American forces continued to refer to the 5th, 7th and 9th NVA Divisions as well as the 81st, 82nd, 83rd and 84th NVA Logistics Groups as "Viet Cong," they were actually North Vietnamese Army units.
Mr. McCoy's book, is so well researched that it far outshines the more pedestrian works available. Secrets of the Viet Cong includes ten maps, over 100 drawings and graphics as well as 170 tables and charts. The sum total of the information included in that supplementary material is equivalent to another 200 pages of information.
Secrets of the Viet Cong should be read and re-read carefully in order to understand that it is a landmark volume of historical nonfiction. I carefully read the content of Mr. McCoy's book and examined it along four categories of analysis: the author, the content, the analysis of the content as presented by the author, and extrapolated conclusion drawn from the content by the author.
James McCoy is a well know author who has written twenty-seven nonfiction books on military science and espionage alone. Most of his books are sold on the internet and have been read by many military and intelligence officers, as well as history buffs and historical researchers. His clients order Mr. McCoy's books from all over the world. He is a recognized expert whose writing reflects detailed knowledge of, and experience with, his subject matter.
The content of Secrets of the Viet Cong is not confined to the well know historical facts which are repeated so endlessly in so many books on the Vietnam War. The book is loaded with information available nowhere else or in any other books. That is why a well known military web site in England has copied content from Secrets of the Viet Cong, word for word into their data base, including many of Mr. McCoy's original drawings.
Any reading of Mr. McCoy's books is an adventure of discovery which reveals facts and processes which have heretofore been ignored. Mr. McCoy has made that material available to professionals and amateurs alike, in a readable form.
Mr. McCoy has also analyzed the meaning of the information included in the content of his book. As a learned professional soldier and pragmatic researcher, his insights knit together the historical facts at hand into patterns of behavior and process which he explains in lucid prose. No important aspect of the issue at hand is ever ignored in any of Mr. Mccoy's books.
In Secrets of the Viet Cong, Mr. McCoy explains for the first time, exactly how the North Vietnamese Army was led and how its leaders thought out and executed their seemingly complex tactics, operational art and strategy. No other author comes near Mr. McCoy in that regard.
Secrets of the Viet Cong also affords another advantage missing from most historical nonfiction which merely regurgitates facts. Mr. McCoy extrapolates the available data and ties its sinews into coherent wholes, as inter-related processes which have rational reasons for their success or failure. Such extrapolation requires an indepth understanding and command of twentieth century military history. Any review of the other available books on the North Vietnamese Army/Viet Cong and the Vietnam War, will reveal just how important such extrapolation is to history.
Any reader who wants to understand the North Vietnamese Army and why it won the Second Indochina War, should read Secrets of the Viet Cong. Any reader who wants to understand why the US armed forces lost the 2nd Indochina War, should read Mr. McCoy's book. Any reader who seeks information, analysis and hostorical extrapolation found in no other book on the Vietnam War, should read Secrets of the Viet Cong.