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The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam Hardcover – Illustrated, January 9, 2018
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Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize (Biography)
New York Times Bestseller
In chronicling the adventurous life of legendary CIA operative Edward Lansdale, The Road Not Taken definitively reframes our understanding of the Vietnam War.
- Print length768 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherLiveright
- Publication dateJanuary 9, 2018
- Dimensions6.6 x 2 x 9.6 inches
- ISBN-100871409410
- ISBN-13978-0871409416
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Lansdale’s legacy stands as a rebuke both to anti-interventionists who assume that fragile states should stand or fall on their own and to arch-hawks who believe that massive commitments of American military forces are necessary to win any war.Highlighted by 120 Kindle readers
Lansdale’s greatest gift was for establishing a rapport with foreigners even if he did not speak their language.Highlighted by 113 Kindle readers
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
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― Fredrik Logevall, The New York Times Book Review
"Superb biography."
― Mark Bowden, New York Times
"The Road Not Taken is an impressive work, an epic and elegant biography based on voluminous archival sources. It belongs to a genre of books that takes a seemingly obscure hero and uses his story as a vehicle to capture a whole era.... Mr. Boot’s full-bodied biography does not ignore Lansdale’s failures and shortcomings―not least his difficult relations with his family―but it properly concentrates on his ideas and his attempts to apply them in Southeast Asia. ... The Road Not Taken gives a vivid portrait of a remarkable man and intelligently challenges the lazy assumption that failed wars are destined to fail or that failure, if it comes, cannot be saved from the worst possible outcome."
― Robert D. Kaplan, The Wall Street Journal
"'The Road Not Taken'… is expansive and detailed, it is well written, and it sheds light on a good deal about U.S. covert activities in postwar Southeast Asia….. [Boot] believes that Lansdale's approach was the wiser one, but he is cautious in his analysis of what went wrong… A lot of his book is committed to restoring a sense of proportion to his subject's image as a political Svengali, or "Lawrence of Asia.""
― Louis Menand, The New Yorker
"A brilliant, extremely well-written book about a forgotten figure who was one of the most extraordinary and utterly unorthodox espionage agents in history."
― Steve Forbes, Forbes
"Edward Lansdale is probably the greatest cold warrior that most Americans have never heard of. Max Boot has written a fascinating account of how this California college humorist, frat boy and advertising executive evolved into a counterinsurgency expert before the term was even coined…. Max Boot has become one of the master chroniclers of American counterinsurgency efforts, and his biography of Mr. Lansdale is a tribute to a guy who recognized the threat of insurgency in a post-World War II environment where most American leaders saw only brute force as a solution to any political-military problem…. This book should be read in Baghdad and Kabul, not only by Americans, but by local leaders."
― Gary Anderson, Washington Times
"Max Boot capably and readably tracks the fascinating but ultimately depressing trajectory of this shadowy figure, who, as a murky undercover operative and a literary and cinematic avatar, looms over or lurks behind some of the crucial moments in U.S. foreign policy in the decades following World War II, culminating in its greatest disaster."
― James G. Hershberg, Washington Post
"Deeply researched and evenhanded, The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam is a superb scholarly achievement. . . . [Boot] comes at Lansdale having already written two major books on small wars and counterinsurgency, a solid foundation that he takes to a new level here with rigorous research and dogged investigation into little-known corners of Lansdale’s life."
― Carter Malkasian, Foreign Policy
"In this fine portrait of Edward Lansdale, Max Boot adds to his well-deserved reputation as being among the most insightful and productive of contemporary historians. This is a superb book. Diligently researched and gracefully written, it builds on a comprehensive analysis of Lansdale’s triumphs in the post–World War II Philippines to provide much new material, and expose old myths, about one of the most fascinating, and in many ways ultimately saddest, members of the supporting cast in the later war in Vietnam."
― Lewis Sorley, National Review
"Comprehensively researched and insightfully written―Boot is, as always, an extremely talented writer."
― Christian Science Monitor
"An exceptionally well-written, captivating tale of one of the most distinctive characters in American Cold War history…. The Road Not Taken is highly recommended reading for historians of the Cold War and military leaders, Foreign Service officers, and intelligence personnel wrestling with America’s current challenges in the small wars of the 21st century, as well as general readers looking for an exhilarating story of a fascinating character in American history."
― Peter Mansoor, Journal of American Greatness
"A capacious biography…. The book is chock-full of operational information on Lansdale’s deeds, both quiet and ugly…. This book might work as a star vehicle for Tom Hanks or Matt Damon…. A useful addition to the literature on US foreign policy during the half century bracketed by the US occupation of the Philippines and the disastrous 2003 intervention in Iraq."
― John Reed, Financial Times
"A brilliant biography of the life―and a riveting description of the times―of Edward Lansdale, one of the most significant figures in post-WWII Philippines and then Vietnam. Just as David Halberstam did in The Best and the Brightest, Max Boot uses superb storytelling skills to cast new light on America's agonizing involvement in Vietnam. The Road Not Taken not only tells Edward Lansdale's story with novelistic verve but also situates it wonderfully in the context of his tumultuous experiences―and offers important lessons for the present day."
― General David Petraeus (U.S. Army, Ret.)
"Boot marshals sharp, devastating anecdotes to show how Lansdale’s ideas were dismissed or misunderstood by his contemporaries. . . . The stories this volume tells about voluntary isolation and lack of knowledge, vision, or respect for anything outside U.S. security culture, in all its violent, self-reinforcing whiteness and maleness, have a terrible timelessness to them . . . . We are in his debt for writing a book about another time that challenges us to raise those questions in ours."
― Heather Hurlburt, Washington Monthly
"Max Boot, one of the premier military historians writing today, has created a fascinating portrait of Edward Lansdale, a maverick in the mold of T.E. Lawrence. But The Road Not Taken is much more than a biography, begging comparison with monumental narratives like Neil Sheehan's A Bright Shining Lie. Boot gives us a compelling look back on the Vietnam tragedy, showing that it was by no means the inevitable result of forces beyond the control of our political and military leaders. "
― Philip Caputo, author of Rumor of War
"I couldn’t stop reading this engrossing biography of Edward Lansdale, a man who loved his country’s ideals and who secretly fought for them in the Philippines, Vietnam, and Washington, DC. Lansdale’s story is relevant today, because he was a key figure in the debate over how and how not to use military force to achieve American foreign policy aims. Through Lansdale’s efforts we got it right in the Philippines, but no one listened to him in Vietnam. He was forgotten by the time we moved into Afghanistan and Iraq. I fervently hope our policy makers read this book."
― Karl Marlantes, author of Matterhorn
"As one of the last few links to Lansdale, who was also one of his closest on-the-ground collaborators, I can attest that this biography of him is the best, most accurate, revealing and complete portrait yet produced. Even with all I knew, I learned a great deal more that was new which broadened my understanding of this extraordinary man. The very human way he helped the Filipino and Vietnamese people defend their inalienable rights is a shining model to be followed by current and future generations of Americans assigned abroad to assist fragile nations."
― Rufus Phillips, author of Why Vietnam Matters
"A remarkable piece of work, superbly researched and documented. In an ideal world, it would be required reading for all senior American diplomats being posted to underdeveloped nations. Having worked with Lansdale during an important period in his career, I particularly noted how Max Boot skillfully dissected his modus operandi."
― Lieutenant General Samuel V. Wilson (U.S. Army, Ret.)
"A probing, timely study of wrong turns in the American conduct of the Vietnam War. A historian of America's ‘small wars’ with a keen eye for the nuances of counterinsurgency, Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow Boot (Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Times to the Present, 2013, etc.) finds a perfect personification of America's Vietnam in Edward Lansdale (1908-1987), much as Neil Sheehan did with John Paul Vann 30 years ago with his book A Bright Shining Lie. . . . Controversial in some of its conclusions, perhaps, as Lansdale's arguments were in their day, and essential reading for students of military policy and the Vietnam conflict."
― Kirkus Reviews, starred review
"A superb history of the Vietnam conflict and includes fascinating military detail and a firm grasp of both American and Vietnamese politics. Boot’s expertise in counterinsurgency makes his arguments compelling, and his rich portrait of Lansdale as a creative if unpredictable maverick adds a new level of understanding not only to Lansdale himself, but also to the entire Vietnam era. This important book―substantially enhanced by excerpts from Lansdale’s own writing and augmented by outstanding maps―deserves to be read alongside Neil Sheehan’s award-winning A Bright Shining Lie (1988)."
― Mark Levine, Booklist, starred review
"Boot outshines everything ever written about the legendary CIA operative Edward Lansdale (1908–1987) in this exhaustive, fact-filled, and analytical biography."
― Publisher's Weekly
About the Author
Product details
- Publisher : Liveright; Illustrated edition (January 9, 2018)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 768 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0871409410
- ISBN-13 : 978-0871409416
- Item Weight : 2.69 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.6 x 2 x 9.6 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #292,996 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #195 in Vietnam War Biographies (Books)
- #416 in Political Intelligence
- #548 in Vietnam War History (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author

Max Boot is a bestselling author, historian, and policy analyst who has been called one of the “world’s leading authorities on armed conflict” by the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He is a columnist for the Washington Post, a global affairs analyst for CNN, and the Jeane J. Kirkpatrick senior fellow in national security studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is the author of the New York Times bestsellers "The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam" and "Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Times to the Present." His other books include the widely acclaimed: "The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the Rise of American Power" and "War Made New: Technology, Warfare, and the Course of History, 1500 to Today." He has been called "a master historian" by the New York Times and a "a penetrating writer and thinker" by The Wall Street Journal. For more information, see www.maxboot.net.
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Lansdale’s incredible story begins with his induction into the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) at the beginning of World War II. His experience during the war was rather mundane (he compiled intelligence reports from a desk in San Francisco); it was the post-war opportunity to live and work in the Philippines that changed his life, and arguably the course of history. Lansdale immediately fell in love with the land, its people – and a young widow named Pat Kelly. According to Boot, Lansdale would, over the course of several years, establish himself as perhaps the preeminent expert in the entire US government on the Philippines. He did so by ingratiating himself with everyone, from the president to the farmer in the field. The linchpin of Lansdale’s success was empathy with the people. It would form the cornerstone of his counter-insurgency philosophy.
Lansdale finagled his way back to the Philippines in late 1950, this time attached to a unit of the newly created Central Intelligence Agency. He would serve as advisor and consigliere to Ramon Magsaysay, the new minister of defense. The two would form a brotherhood in fighting the Communist Huk rebellion and create the model for effective counter-insurgency operations. “Magsaysay did pretty much everything that Lansdale wanted,” Boot writes, “not because he was a paid American agent but because he had such faith in his friend’s acumen.” Boot gushes that the defeat of the Huks represented “one of the CIA’s biggest covert-action successes ever.” Moreover, “it was achieved largely by one man’s deft manipulation of local politics rather than through costly American spending or heavy-handed American military action.”
The hero of the Philippines was then dispatched to untangle an even more complicated situation: South Vietnam. Boot views Lansdale’s “two and half turbulent and tumultuous years” as head of the Saigon Military Mission as a nearly unqualified success. “Lansdale had labored indefatigably and, on the whole, successfully to construct a stable government against dramatic odds,” he writes. Few expected Ngo Dinh Diem to last two months let alone over two years. In 1956, South Vietnam “stood out as an improbably success story – a ray of sunshine amid diplomatic troubles around the globe.” Lansdale had seemingly done the impossible yet again: build a viable South Vietnamese state as an anti-communist bulwark in South East Asia.
Lansdale became something of a celebrity in the process. The novel “The Ugly American” came out in the fall of 1958. The main character was clearly based, at least in part, on Lansdale, further cementing his reputation as the new Lawrence of Arabia. It also helped get him assigned to lead Operation Mongoose, the Kennedy administration’s slapstick effort to oust Fidel Castro. It would be the low point of his career. Lansdale himself noted sourly that he was treated as if he “were a modern-day Pied Piper capable of magically making governments rise and fall with a few catchy notes from his harmonica.” His fame and notoriety would increasingly alienate him from the bureaucrats at the State Department, CIA, and the military until he was retired from active duty on October 31, 1963 – just weeks before Ngo Dinh Diem was overthrown and executed.
Lansdale refused to go quietly into the sunset. He importuned the administration with his ideas on how best to deal with the war in South Vietnam, always emphasizing meaningful political reforms while reducing direct military action to a minimum. He found an advocate in vice president Hubert Humphrey and was eventually sent back to Saigon in 1965 with returning ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge tasked with leading all pacification efforts. It was a dream job that would quickly turn into a nightmare.
Lansdale in Saigon was a man with a lofty title but no budget or authority. It reminded me of my time in Afghanistan when I worked for the Reconstruction Headquarters at Regional Command – South in Kandahar. With no money and precious little manpower resources there was little reason for anyone to listen to us. The same was true for Lansdale, who was increasingly marginalized and chided for not achieving any miracles in his role. In fairness, like Afghanistan in 2010, South Vietnam in 1965 was a basket case. “A regime that could not pick up the garbage in Saigon,” Boot writes, “was not likely to defeat an entrenched insurgency in the countryside.”
Lansdale spent three years in Saigon in his second tour, which ended shortly after the Tet Offensive in 1968. With the notable exception of the constituent assembly election in 1966, Boot says that Lansdale’s mission was a total failure, although not entirely of his fault. He failed to persuade Westmoreland and other decisionmakers toward his view of counterinsurgency. “We mostly sought to destroy enemy forces,” Lansdale later noted. “The enemy sought to gain control of the people.” Boot concedes that it is impossible to know if Lansdale’s more benign approach would have worked, but concludes “His approach, successful of not, would have been more humane and less costly.”
“The Road Not Taken” is a monument to Edward Lansdale. Boot notes that many people in the national security establishment, some of them quite powerful, such as defense secretary Robert McNamara, held low opinions of him, but he never really explores those critical points of view. We never hear from those who desperately wanted to sideline Lansdale, such as when he was considered for ambassador to South Vietnam in 1963, and why they held such strong positions. The book suffers because of it, I think. Overall, however, “The Road Not Taken” is a striking biography of a fascinating man. It is highly recommended to anyone with an interest in the Vietnam War or counterinsurgency more broadly.
Or was it the other way around ?
This account goes all the way back to Lansdale's childhood up through his work in advertising and then his enlistment into the military. Lansdale was a sort of nation builder and cold warrior who did a tour in the Philippines and two tours in Vietnam.
Lansdale seemed to be equally unpopular with the CIA, the State Department, the American military establishment, and Secretary Of Defense Robert McNamara. Lansdale seemed to try to stick to doing things based on his principles rather than tow the party line as they say.
I read this book as part of my ongoing research about the assassination of President Kennedy and I think Vietnam is an important aspect of this greatest of American mysteries.
Author Max Boot mentions Fletcher Prouty who he describes as a conspiracy crank who was mentally unstable because he claimed to have seen a flying saucer. Fletcher Prouty worked directly with Allen Dulles at the CIA up until the time President Kennedy was killed.
Fletcher felt there never was any real military objective in Vietnam. The goal right from the beginning was to create an open ended, bottomless money pit of military spending. Whether that really was the goal the fact remains that that's exactly what happened which is sort of suspicious.
One of the conspiracy theories about the JFK assassination is JFK was interfering with the CIA's and military establishment's schemes in Cuba, Vietnam, and probably other places. One idea is they tried to turn Cuba into another Vietnam during the Bay Of Pigs debacle but JFK refused to escalate the situation. The conspiracy theory is the CIA intentionally caused the Pigs debacle to start failing and then they ran to JFK thinking he would panic and declare all out war on Cuba but that's not how things played out.
Mr. Boot says it was really JFK who began the escalation in Vietnam. But there's an official government document called NSAM 263 which indicates that JFK was planning to end America's involvement in Vietnam. It's creepy because within a few days after JFK got killed Lyndon Johnson drafted a typically vague and carefully worded NSAM document called NSAM 273 which reversed JFK's planned withdrawal from Vietnam.
Fletcher Prouty felt certain that Edward Lansdale was captured in a photograph that was taken in Dealey Plaza on the day of the JFK assassination. The guy's back was turned to the camera but Fletcher felt Lansdale had a very distinctive posture and physical appearance which Fletcher easily recognized.
Mr. Boot takes exception to the suggestion in Oliver Stone's JFK movie that Edward Lansdale was the mastermind for the JFK assassination. In the movie Fletcher Prouty is represented as Mr. X and Lansdale is represented as General Y.
On that point Mr. Boot is correct I think.
John M. Newman is the author of a book called Oswald And The CIA. Mr. Newman is I would think one of the world's foremost experts on deciphering declassified CIA documents.
I think it was in 2008 that Mr. Newman added an epilogue to his book. In that epilogue Mr. Newman identifies the only individual within the CIA that had the knowledge, authority, and diabolical mind required to mastermind the JFK assassination.
And it was not Edward Lansdale.
So Fletcher Prouty and Oliver Stone were I believe wrong when they gave the impression that Edward Lansdale was the mastermind of the JFK assassination. Unless they had reasons for implicating Lansdale which go beyond just the photograph from Dealey Plaza.
Whether Lansdale really was in Dealey Plaza that day I wouldn't doubt it. But just being there doesn't tell us what his involvement in the assassination may have been if any.
While Mr. Boot criticizes all the 'conspiracy cranks' who believe in the JFK domestic conspiracy, much of what he says in this book is consistent with what people like Fletcher Prouty said.
Fletcher felt the CIA mutated into something Harry Truman never intended when he set up this nefarious agency after World War II. In fact Harry Truman himself came to regret the day he ever created the CIA.
It is a well known and understood historical fact today that the CIA had Henry Cabot Lodge, the American ambassador to Vietnam, instigate a military coup d'état that resulted in the assassination of the president of Vietnam and his brother.
I think the Lodge plot came to light in the Pentagon Papers. If the Pentagon Papers had never been leaked to the press the world would have never even known this.
Getting an ambassador in a foreign country to create a plot to have the leader of that country killed isn't something that normally falls under an ambassador's duties and job description, at least as far as the public understands.
They had many other schemes like that all over the world.
Creating chaos and confusion that led to revolutions and regime changes. Assassination plots. Other acts of terrorism.
These are not conspiracy theories. It's all a matter of public record today.
Some people think John Kennedy was another government leader that was giving them problems.
JFK just happened to be the President Of The United States.
Top reviews from other countries
A former advertising man, Lansdale helped the American war effort as part of the Office of Strategic Services while officially being an officer in the U.S. Army and later the U.S. Air Force. As part of the newly created Central Intelligence Agency, he made his mark by helping Philippine war hero Raymond Magsaysay become President of that country in the early 1950's, becoming his confident and right hand man. He played an important role in defeating the Huk Communist insurgency, which led him to be considered by US authorities as a specialist in what was later to be called counter-insurgency operations. As a result, he was asked to aid the French in their struggle against the Communist Vietnamese.
Lansdale was a supporter President Diem,, and worked hard to convince the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations to continue their aid to what he considered the best solution to defeating a Communist take over of Vietnam.
Interestingly, whether in the Philippines or Vietnam, the CIA operative always had to go through interpreters. Although married to an American woman (Helen), he found a lover in the Philippines, and she often translated for him, while in Vietnam he also depended on others ….not really an ideal situation . Boot's use of his love letters with his Filipina, Pat, borders on voyeurism at times, and gets to be a bit annoying.
Being heavily immersed in Asia. he found himself very isolated from what was happening in Washington DC, and as a result made more enemies than friends with the people in power. He was too much of an independent operator in a world where team players and yes men get ahead.
Boot's very readable account takes us through his frustrations in trying to convince the US government that to win
a war against a nationalist enemy, even a communist one, you have to win over the proverbial hearts and minds of people.
After being forced out of government service, his life in retirement was also not very satisfying.
Typical of Boot's books, at times he likes to throw in a word that might make the reader run to the dictionary, but it
was a fast read. Coming from a specialist in military affairs, on the other hand, it was really weird to see that a L-5 observation plane was a "turboprop", and that Claire Chennault's CAT airline used a "DC 9" aircraft to fly material from the south of Vietnam up into the north before the division of the country in the mid-fifties. Just not true….poor proofreading ? Perhaps. A good book, yes, but I don't think I would have given it a Pulitzer !












