Phoenix and the Birds of Prey : The CIA's Secret Campaign to Destroy the Viet Cong [ILLUSTRATED] (Hardcover)

by Mark Moyar (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
Mark Moyar, a young (born in 1971) Harvard-trained historian, unburdened by the stories drummed into the public psyche by those who built careers on the conventional wisdom, has written a remarkable book that challenges what has become the "Jane Fonda" interpretation of the Vietnam War. Based on primary documents and interviews of firsthand participants on all sides of the conflict. Moyar's book focuses on the CIA role in the now notorious Phoenix Program... [Moyar] displays an uncommon grasp of the problems of agent recruitment and handling peculiar to Vietnam, the social and practical challenges faced by the American advisors and the Vietnamese at all levels, and the blinkered reaction of those reading, watching, and criticizing at home. One is forced to wonder how Phoenix and the Birds of Prey will be received by the many contemporary commentators who for years promulgated as truth views that the book exposes as myths, if not falsehoods. Dare we hope for a broad public debate, or is it more likely that Oliver Stone will produce his own "truth" about Phoenix? -- World Intelligence Review, Hayden Peake, Spring 1998

Mr. Moyar does not moralize; war as he describes it is brutish and occasionally gruesome... Mr. Moyar ably demonstrates that young persons can emerge from Harvard with their senses intact, provided they keep their minds open. This is a fine war read. -- The Washington Times, Joseph Goulden, July 5, 1998

Today's best young scholars tend to question the dogma of an antiwar left that has grown gray without abandoning its animus toward those who served. As one example, Mark Moyar won the 1993 prize for historical research at Harvard University by peeling away the shibboleths that have surrounded the Phoenix program, an effort directed against Vietcong leaders. Mr. Moyar's book, "Phoenix and the Birds of Prey" (Naval Institute, 1997), is a product of that research and a groundbreaking piece of revisionist history on the war. -- The Wall Street Journal, James Webb, July 15, 1998

As an impartial, credible observer, Mark Moyar deserves a laurel for bringing the facts of the Phoenix Program to light. -- Special Warfare, Robert B. Adolph Jr., Winter 1999

He succeeds admirably. His work could be a textbook for the do's and don'ts of counterinsurgency warfare. -- Asian Thought & Society, William Nester, January-April 2000

Moyar began this study as an undergraduate thesis at Harvard, and even though he is now only in his mid-twenties, this book makes him a serious scholar of the Vietnam War. -- Infantry, Joe P. Dunn, January-April 1999

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Naval Institute Press; illustrated edition edition (November 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1557505934
• ISBN-13: 978-1557505934
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,101,280 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

43 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An honest and accurate book about the Phoenix program, October 1, 1999

By A Customer

I'm glad to see someone has finally written an accurate, dispassionate account of the Phoenix program and the Vietnam war. As a Phoenix advisor in late 1967 and 1968, I can say from personal experience that Mr. Moyar gets just about everything right in his account of that period. I can only assume from the extent of his research that the rest of the information is just as correct. His descriptions of the attitudes and motivations of the Vietnamese civilians, government officials and military validate many of my own observations and confirm many of my suspicions. I just wish I had known then what I know now.

Reading this book and the reviews about it prompted me to hunt down a copy of Douglas Valentine's book about Phoenix for comparison. I shouldn't have bothered. Clearly Mr. Valentine hasn't heard that old joke about the difference between a fairy tale and a war story. Phoenix and the Birds of Prey does a much better job of presenting the facts.

If I have any criticism of Phoenix and the Birds of Prey, it is that I felt Mr. Moyar applied some of his conclusions about the Phoenix program a little too broadly to all participants. Every district operation was different in some ways depending on the tactical situation, the capabilities of the advisor, and the involvement of the Vietnamese counterparts. But I suppose that is to be expected because he is taking a broad look at the overall program.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is a serious student of the Vietnam war or guerrilla conflicts in general. It should be required reading for all of our military Special Ops people. I would especially recommend the book to all my fellow Vietnam veterans.

As for the anti-war types who have been yelling about the Phoenix program for the last 30 years, they're going to have to find a new horse to ride because that one won't run anymore.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful book, May 6, 1999

By A Customer

I must recommend this book to all readers. As a Vietnamese, I can say that Mr. Mark Moyar understands the Vietnam people and Vietnam war better than most white Americans. Unlike the newsmedia, he appreciates that the Vietnamese are not like white people who just look different. There is a difference of mind. He also knows about Ho Chi Minh and communism and the schemes they used to subvert government in Vietnam. I don't usually like American books about Vietnam, but this one is good.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Well-researched and well-argued., October 22, 1998

By A Customer

It is possible to see the beginning of a revisionist school of historical writing on Vietnam. Spector's AFTER TET, Burkitt's STOLEN VALOR, and now PHOENIX AND THE BIRDS OF PREY all represent a point of view that wants to remove the stigma of absolute failure from the U.S. military efforts in Vietnam. Moyar's book is more than a simple defense of the Phoenix/Phung Hoang program; it is a study of intelligence-gathering, pacification programs and their effectiveness against the NVA and the Viet Cong. Moyar concentrates on the post-Tet period which he argues saw increased American and South Vietnamese success in counterinsurgency. He collates interviews, translated captured documents, official statistics, and memoirs for his history and does a pretty fair job of evaluating the material. Moyar criticizes plenty of Americans and Vietnamese, and credits the NVA/VC for excellent motivation, organization and determination. Not all of his arguments are persuasive, but the breadth of his work must be considered by anyone who wants to challenge him. The response by an earlier "reviewer" at this site ("...CIA propaganda...") is enlightening. One of the moral bases of the 1960s political movements was opposition to the war in Vietnam. The antiwar movement cast the U.S. in a villainous role; My Lai, Cambodia, and inflated body counts made that pretty easy. Over the years, evidence of atrocities, the forced collectivization of agriculture in the reunited South Vietnam, corruption in the Communist Party leadership, and grudging admission by NVA leaders of high losses and military mistakes have made some question whether the war was such a stark "good guys v. bad guys" conflict. Of course, questioning the assumption that the U.S. was on the wrong side in Vietnam would seriously weaken the moral arguments of the antiwar leaders. Is the former South Vietnam better off once the U.S. left? If it is, why did so many leave after reunification, and why is the current Vietnamese leadership so eager to welcome American capitalists? On the other hand, if it was important that we took a stand in South Vietnam, why didn't the U.S. push the Diem and Thieu governments into real political and economic reforms? The real study of the Vietnam War can only begin when historians can set aside the need to prove a theory, and can look at what participants really did and why they thought they had to do it.