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Book reviewsJames Kiras a , Paul B. Rich b , J. F. Hemlebenc , Charles D. Melson d , Walter Blasi e &Erwin A. Schmidl fa PhD Candidate Centre for Security StudiesUniversity of Hullb Centre of International Studies University ofCambridgec Lieutenant Colonel, US Marine CorpsInstructor, Marine Corps Command and StaffColleged Headquarters US Marine Corps, WashingtonDCe Austrian Ministry of Defence, Viennaf Austrian Institute for Military Studies,ViennaPublished online: 26 Nov 2007.

To cite this article: James Kiras , Paul B. Rich , J. F. Hemleben , Charles D.Melson , Walter Blasi & Erwin A. Schmidl (1999) Book reviews, Small Wars &Insurgencies, 10:3, 150-157, DOI: 10.1080/09592319908423254

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Jeffrey Record, The Wrong War: Why We Lost in Vietnam. Annapolis, MD: NavalInstitute Press, 1998). Pp.256, bibliog., index. $27.95. ISBN 1-55750-699-X.

A quarter of a century has not dampened the enthusiasm with which Americans (andothers) seek to uncover new truths regarding the reasons for the failure to prevent thecommunist victory in Vietnam. Explanations have ranged from the incompetence ormalevolence of the American military or the civilian leadership, either personified inan individual or collectively as a group, to the justness of the insurgent cause and theinevitability of its victory. Monographs have grappled with the question of whether ornot the Vietnam War could have been won and if so, how that seeminglyinsurmountable task could have been accomplished.

The author, Jeffrey Record, has firsthand knowledge of some of the events ofwhich he speaks; during the Vietnam War he was a member of the controversial CivilOperations for Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS) programme. Personalillustrative anecdotes are interspersed throughout the text and make for interestingreading. Record is no stranger to policy and controversy; his earlier works includereassessments of the US victory in the Gulf War, American strategy and the fallacy ofapplying the concept of appeasement to Vietnam. Additionally, he has worked inacademic, commercial and public service positions.

The press release for the strangely titled The Wrong War - strange in that adifferent book with the same title (on Korea) and published within the last decade iscited in the author's bibliography - touts 'incendiary answers' to the major strategicand operational questions regarding the US involvement in Vietnam. The two majorquestions tackled by the author deal, unsurprisingly, with the responsibility for theconduct of the war and whether or not alternative actions would have produced adifferent result. Behind his argument are key assumptions as to why the US lost, themajority of which focus on the advice given by Sun Tzu some 2,500 years ago, namelythe ability to know one's own strengths and limitations, in addition to those of one'sadversary.

Quite simply, the overconfidence in US and Republic of Vietnam capabilities,coupled with a grossly inflated assessment of the importance of Vietnam for US policyand a gross underestimation of the adversary to be defeated, were major determinantsof defeat. The author concludes that the potential military 'means' to achieve thestrategic 'end' in Vietnam would have been unpalatable to the American body politicand, in any event, ultimately irrelevant. The cost of providing continued'Americanization' of the war, either in the form of more ground troops or on-callairpower, far surpassed the geopolitical or strategic benefits to be gained. Given thestate of the armed forces of South Vietnam, such investment would have onlyprolonged the inevitable offensive that would end in the seizure of Saigon.

The thrust of Record's work is that the strategies applied in Vietnam were faulty.The strategy of attrition, pursued by General William C. Westmoreland, would neverforce the North Vietnamese to accept that victory in the South was too costly aproposition. Record also challenges the criticism of officers such as Admiral UlyssesS. Sharp Jr that the civilian leadership 'micromanaged' the aerial campaign. Behindhis assessment of these strategies Record seeks to debunk the 'stab in the back' myth

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perpetuated after the war, in which the civilian leadership is blamed for excessiveinterference in the military conduct of the war. If anything, he asserts, the militarycommanders asked for too little resources to do the job at hand.

One of the key factors contributing to the failure of both the ground and aerialcampaigns and expounded at length by Record was the incompetence of the militaryleadership and the excessively bureaucratic and competitive services that directedthem. In other words, when seeking those to blame for failure to save South Vietnam,it should be shared among the technocratic civilian leaders and defense analysts andtimid and overly managerial military officers.

So what course of action would have compelled the North Vietnamese to abandontheir plans for unification? Here Record explores three options. First, the US reserveforces could have been mobilized and North Vietnam invaded from the outset. Second,an invasion of southern Laos would have cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail and prevented theresupply of the Viet Cong insurgents. Finally, an unrestricted and intensive aerialcampaign, targeting the civilian population and critical infrastructure, would haveforced the North Vietnamese to concentrate their resources within their own country,as opposed to sending them south. He ultimately dismisses the latter two options asancillary to the decisive main effort, which he argues should have been an invasion.

Having made this assertion, the author then gets trapped in a conundrum fromwhich he never quite manages to escape. The conundrum is this: the decisive option ispolitically unpalatable, leaving one with ancillary, but likewise unpalatable optionsthat still give the initiative to the adversary. Even if one or all of the alternate optionsare pursued, there is no guarantee that they will have the intended effect. Unfortunatelyfor the reader, the question of just what should or could have been done differently inVietnam remains an unresolved mystery.

One of the presumably unintended points of interest in The Wrong War is thestriking parallel between the strategic problems associated with US strategy during theVietnam War and current US debates regarding the role of airpower. For example,Record's discussion of the potentially open-ended strategy of supporting SouthVietnam from afar with airpower sounds remarkably like the current 'rollback' optionmentioned in US airpower discussion circles.

Additionally, the debate whether an early application of airpower alone could havecompelled an adversary into accepting favourable peace terms has been reopenedrecently regarding its apparent success during the aerial campaign over Serbia,Montenegro and Kosovo. One of the most persistent criticisms of that aerial campaign,which hearkens back to Vietnam, is that airpower was applied incrementally as in'Rolling Thunder' as opposed to the Gulf War's more intensive 'Instant Thunder'.Although there are substantial 'perils of reasoning by historical analogy', to quote thetitle of the one of Record's books, it seems as if the strategic questions so problematicto US policymakers and military leaders for almost three decades are still very muchwith us.

JAMES KIRASPhD Candidate

Centre for Security StudiesUniversity of Hull

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Mark Huband, The Liberian Civil War. London and Portland, OR: Frank Cass,1998. Pp.xxv + 229, 1 map, 14 illus., index. £35/$49.50 (cloth); £16.50/$22.50(paper). ISBN 0-7146-4785-3 and 4340-8.

This book weaves together political analysis with journalistic commentary on thegovernmental breakdown in Liberia in the early 1990s and the resulting savage civilwar, It is a story both of international indifference to a conflict in which no realWestern interests seemed to be involved; as well as a crisis of Liberian identity.Huband also writes of Liberia's historical past and its close links with the UnitedStates. He shows how the US in the 1980s remained committed to supporting the Doeregime during the last phases of the Cold War since the Voice of America was locatedthere. These ties continued despite mounting evidence of human rights abuses, thoughthe US proved reluctant to intervene following the invasion of the country by forcesof the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) led by Charles Taylor. Hubandmanaged to interview Taylor during the conflict and the book is of particular value indeveloping a portrait of the eventual president of this fractured and divided society,who had spent some time in the US and broke out from jail there.

Though weak on the manner that individual leaders and warlords managed tomobilise support in this conflict, Huband's account will be of interest to scholars oflow intensity conflict. For many of the participants it was evident that the war wassimply an end in itself. It provided opportunities for a largely male youth to find a newrole and identity for itself by gathering ideas and symbols from the Western media andblending them with 'indigenous' African ones. The cover of the book shows a youngman armed laden with heavy weapons sporting a Mickey Mouse bag. The troops ofthe NPFL also are described as marching off to the tune of 'O Suzanna' with the words'Oh my brother Don't you cry for me, I'm off to the battlefront, Don't you cry for me'.This was clearly a confused and fractured society with little clear idea of Liberianpatriotism. Taylor, though, comes over as a figure with some form of a vision of a 'newLiberia', and as a rather less sectional warlord than some others in Sub Saharan Africa

Unfortunately the book ends before the introduction of the West Africanpeacekeeping force ECOMOG, led by Nigeria and the removal of the one clear rivalto Taylor in the form of Prince Johnson and the Independent Patriotic Front of Liberia(INPFL). Huband's account lacks any really authoritative insider observation and thereis no clear understanding of the diplomatic rounds to secure an end to the civil war.However, for those interested in issues of international peacekeeping and humanitarianintervention this book points out many of the dilemmas in attempting to resolvecontemporary conflicts rooted in identity politics,

PAUL B. RICHCentre of International Studies

University of Cambridge

G. J. Michaels, Tip of the Spear: US Marine Light Armor in the Gulf War.Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press. Pp.xii + 253, 14 photos, 9 diagrams, notes.$29.95. ISBN 1-55750-599-3.

Tip of the Spear is the very candid account of one member of the 1st Light ArmoredInfantry Battalion (1st LAI) (Task Force Shepherd), 1st Marine Division duringOperations 'Desert Shield' and 'Desert Storm'. The author, G. J. Michaels composesa very enjoyable read, combining personal experiences, opinions, and relatively

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accurate historical events. He states in his preface that his intent in writing the bookwas to record the service of a group of individuals whose actions should beremembered and to outline lessons to be learned from a chronicle such as this.

Not designed to be a scholarly historical work, Michaels accomplishes somethingunintended through his book. Deep within the pages of Tip of the Spear emerges astudy of leadership from a Marine Sergeant's perspective ... a perspectivecharacterized by high expectation and idealistic views. Set against the backdrop ofAmerica's first, post Cold-War, major theater war, Michaels provides tremendousinsight into the Marine of today. One experiences the feelings, the sense of patriotism,the dedication, the fear, the frustration, and the courage of the 'Nintendo'generation...a generation noted for its impatience, instant gratification, and need forelectronic stimulation. Michaels very accurately conveys how this generation of youngpeople acquitted themselves on the modern battlefield and how their leaderscontributed toward effecting that result.

Michaels' title implies a complete accounting of all Marine light armor in the GulfWar. Even though he does take the reader chronologically from the deployment phaseof Operation 'Desert Shield' to the termination of Operation 'Desert Storm' and talksabout 2nd LAI Battalion's actions in January 1991, most of his information comesfrom interviews from people within his own battalion which was adjacent to elementsof 2nd LAI. I am assuming what he could not derive from interviews he acquired fromofficial records.

The Light Armored Vehicle (LAV) has been in service with Marines since the mid-1980s. It currently deploys in all Marine Expeditionary Units (MEUs), was usedeffectively in Panama, and has been the subject of much discussion recently in the USArmy. This book details the vehicle's employment capabilities and weaknesses in itsfirst major theater war. Michaels does an admirable job describing the small unittactics and techniques adapted for used with the LAV and which were required in theharsh desert environment of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. He describes the spectrum ofLAV operations from screening missions to the myriad of reconnaissance missionsassigned the 1st LAI battalion. What the reader should understand however, is thatoperations above the company level are events from the perspective of a youngsergeant at the platoon level. Consequently, the accuracy of such operations is lessprecise . This, however, by no means detracts from the enjoyment or leadership valueone receives by reading this book.

Every Marine who served in the Gulf War eventually had to grasp the virtuallyimpossible task of navigating the desert at night. One gained a tremendous respect forthe sailor navigating at sea. Night navigation in the Saudi desert was similar. Withoutmaps and initially without global positioning systems (GPS), the Marines of 1stMarine Division learned techniques to navigate the difficult terrain of the Saudi desert.Michaels provides both humorous and serious accounts of this phenomenon.Additionally, he told of the various innovations Marines made to their vehicles, suchas 'hot wiring' the inhibitor switches in the rear hatches so the main gun (25mm) couldhave a 360 degree field of fire. In a training environment a vehicle commander wouldbe relieved of duty and prosecuted for such a vehicle modification affecting safetyequipment. Yet in conflict, even Marines realize the hazards and the trade-offs betweensafety and capability. This example of Michaels' candor permeates the book. Just as inWorld War II when junior soldiers created the hedgehog (the fork-like device added tothe old Sherman tanks designed to bust through the daunting hedgerows of France)Marines of the Gulf War also innovated out of necessity. This might be a surprise tothe average American who assumes the US military is equipped with the very besttechnology has to offer and money has to buy.

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Michaels' attention to detail is extraordinary, from the details of his unit's flight toSaudi Arabia to the events at Kuwaiti International Airport just prior to cessation ofhostilities. _ Having served adjacent to 1st LAI, Michaels' details seem almost flawless.A classic example of his accurate detail appears in his discussion of the friendly fireincident, which occurred on 29 January 1991 near OP 4 on the Saudi/Kuwaiti border.Here an LAV TOW missile variant gunner attached to Delta Company 1st LAIaccidentally fired and destroyed an LAV-25 from the same company. This incident wasinitially written into the official Marine Corps history as an incident of enemy tank fire.Michaels, however, accurately, with compassion, dignity, and understanding, conveysthese events with the appropriate measure of detail.

Having had many of the same experiences as the author, I was riveted to the pagesof this book. It truly brought me back nine years to when I was Operations Officer, 1stTank Battalion, Task Force 'Papa Bear', and rekindled several memories. For thecasual reader interested in war accounts, small unit actions, or case studies inleadership, this book is a 'gold mine'. It truly needs to be included on the Commandantof the Marine Corps official reading list for NCOs, lieutenants, and captains. It hasmuch to teach about combat leadership in contemporary conflict.

J. F. HEMLEBENLieutenant Colonel, US Marine Corps

Instructor, Marine Corps Command and Staff College

John Edmond, Busheat: Minstrel of the Wild. Leeupoort, South Africa: RoanAntelope Books, 1997. Pp.xii+308, 124 photos, index. UK£22/US$36. ISBE 0-620-21884-3.

As a participant in the late, great, Cold War, a minor concern was why the opposition(insurgent or otherwise) always seemed to have more appealing marching, fighting,and working songs? Perhaps this was because poetry and music were elements thatcould be marshalled for a cause with greater ease than nuclear bombers or submarines.Or maybe after a 'search and destroy' operation there was not much to sing about. Thebook being reviewed shows an exception. John Edmond was born in Luanshya,Northern Rhodesia and was educated in Luanshya, Edinburgh, and Pretoria. Followingarmy service, he emigrated to South Africa, where he still resides. John is married andhas four children. He is a game farmer in the Northern Province.

With a chronological approach, Edmond provides the development of his art todocument a vision of history in evocative words and sound. He relates life as a 'WhiteAfrican' migrating from Northern Rhodesia (Zambia), to Southern Rhodesia(Zimbabwe), and finally South Africa in the face of the changing political landscape.Edmond gives a Eurocentric view of southern Africa from pre-history, encompassingthe Rhodesian War, through his post-independence Odyssey.

The book is a trilogy of sorts, 'three stories in one', written with a conversationalstyle. It covers the history of southern Africa, its people, and how they were shaped byevents. It tells of a childhood spent in both Scotland and Africa, covers southernAfrican events, and chronicles Edmond's involvement with Rhodesian and SouthAfrican security forces. It also allows some insight into his love of martial arts,aviation, and the world of music, his overriding passion.

Music was Edmond's first love and after many years of playing and composing inhis spare time, he was able to turn professional. He was a member of several well-

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known groups, and went on to become a household name on South African radio andtelevision. He subsequently became an independent music publisher and still performsregularly.

While pursuing a career as a popular entertainer, Edmond did this with abackground of public aid that started in 1956 with national service in the CentralAfrican Federal Army, including the Congo Crisis in 1960. This firsthand experience asa 'trooper' effected his creative work, and efforts at camp shows during the subsequentwar in Rhodesia saw his music and performances becoming a feature of the conflict.Musical themes ranged from the historic to the heroic, and even common place, as bothlow and high art that was always accessible to the public providing his main audience.In some ways he supported, captured, and promoted the view of the settler society thattried to retain its position of privilege in the face of the 'Winds of Change'.

Included are 24 pages containing 124 photographs and the text is woven with thelyrics of over 100 of Edmond's best known songs. Performance versions are stillavailable (John Edmond All 49 Original Rhodesian Troopie Songs, cassettes A and B,Roan Antelope Music, 1984). For military and civilian veterans of the conflict, thesewere the 'theme songs' of their effort that have lasted long after cause, institutions, andunits have passed. For students of the Rhodesia-Zimbabwe conflict, John Edmond'swords and music (along with contemporaries Clem Tholet and Nick Taylor) providean insight into the world-view and mind-set of one of the war's protagonists just asChimurenga songs provide an indication of the motivation of the nationalist opposition(See Alec J.C. Pongweni, Songs that Won the Liberation War. Harare, Zimbabwe:College Press, 1982).

As a historian I have been aware of the closeness of music and poetry with events,but had lumped such information under the broad category of literary sources in orderto slog on with more conventional interviews and documents for research. This, infact, was to avoid the trickier issue of how to use literary material as part of historicalanalysis. Literary sources can be used if created by a participant, geographical setting,or subject matter. Insight into attitude, impact of experience, and emotional landscapecan be obtained from them. It is these last concerns that make the book reviewed worthreading.

CHARLES D. MELSONHeadquarters US Marine Corps, Washington DC

Erwin A. Schmidl, Blaue Helme, Rotes Kreuz: Das österreichischeSanitätskontingent im Kongo, 1960 bis 1963 (Blue Helmets, Red Cross: TheAustrian Medical Unit in the Congo, 1960-63). Innsbrucker Forschungen zurZeitgeschichte Vol. 13, Innsbruck - Wien: StudienVerlag 1995. Pp.273, 95 photos incolour and black & white, 6 maps, bibliog. and annexes. ATS 385/ DM 61.50. ISBN3-7065-1119-3.

Over the past 40 years, Austria has gained a reputation of an experienced troopcontributor to UN and other peace operations. This volume describes the firstparticipation of an Austrian contingent in these operations: the medical unit sent to theUN operation in the Congo in 1960-63. The historical and political background isdescribed, followed by the establishment of the unit, the deployment to severallocations in the Congo, and the experiences gained. This is completed by an overviewof the evolution of peace operations, and of the Austrian participation in thesemissions until the mid-1990s.

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Although 'only' a medical unit, the Austrian experiences seem to be relevant in thelight of recent interest in peace operations, especially as the Congo operation in severalways resembled later 'enforcement' operations. This applies particularly to theexamination of relations within the contingent and with the host population, and howthe commanding officers dealt with stress and fatigue.

The author, now the head of research at the Austrian Institute for Military Studies,was particularly well qualified for this study, because he combined the historian'straining (having several books on various topics to his credit, both in English andGerman) with his experiences in the Austrian Foreign Ministry and also in the field,when he served as observer with the UN mission in South Africa in 1994. His researchincluded archives and private collections in Austria, Britain, and the US, in addition tosome 40 interviews with participants and contemporaries.

A synopsis of the chapter on the incident at Bukavu in December 1960, when theAustrian medical unit was taken prisoner by the Congolese and had to be liberated bya Nigerian UN unit using force, was described in an article by the author in SWI 8/3(Winter 1997) pp.25^0.

WALTER BLASIAustrian Ministry of Defence, Vienna

Noel Malcolm, Kosovo: A Short History. London: Macmillan 1998, 2nd ed. 1999 .Pp.492, 8 maps, bibliog., index. £10. ISBN 0-333-66613-5.

Following his 'Short History' of Bosnia (Macmillan 1994), Noel Malcolm has writtena most timely book on Kosovo's troubled history through the centuries. Given hisscholarly and journalistic credentials, and his mastery of Albanian and Turkish inaddition to several western and Slav languages, Noel Malcolm was able to use a widerange of sources. His book therefore serves as a solid overview and introduction to thehistory of this region, and because of his readable style, as well as the ideal timing ofthe publication just before the outbreak of the 1999 war (the 'new preface' for thesecond edition was written in April 1999), became an instant bestseller.

Considering the contemporary interest, and Malcolm's avowed aim to de-constructsome of the many myths surrounding the past of Albania, Serbia and the Kosovo, itwas inevitable that he often came in for sharp criticism. However, while apparentlyfavouring independence for Kosovo, and certainly not pro-Serb in his argument -indeed some remarks, such as blaming a higher abortion rate among Serb women forthe increase in the Albanian population of the Kosovo: 'it could be said that they hadonly themselves to blame', (p.333) can and should be questioned - it would be wrongto dismiss this study lightly.

Malcolm critically examines some of the 'mythical' interpretations of Kosovo'shistory, including the circumstances of the 1389 battle as well as the Serb 'exodus' inthe late seventeenth century, arriving at interesting results: in the first case, we knowlittle more than that a battle took place in which both leaders were killed; apparentlyit was neither a crushing defeat for the Serbs nor a clear victory for the Ottoman army.Three centuries later, fewer Serbs left the country because of their support of theAustrian armies' invasion than the 'official' Serb version would have it (not much ofa surprise to anyone having dealt with migration issues before). Yet along the samelines, he is critical of speaking too early of an 'Albanian' identity which took centuriesto develop. Indeed, both sides used (and abused) historical facts in the fabrication of

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myth and, eventually, propaganda - unfortunately, the latter usually proves far morepersuasive than any historical study.

In my opinion, Malcolm's solid examination of the sources actually helps us tounderstand the positions taken by both sides in the recent conflict, when bothAlbanians and Serbs used their own versions of 'history' to justify present claims.Therefore, his study contributes to a less biased and more balanced view of this tragicregion. At this point, nobody knows what the future 'solution' for Kosovo will looklike, so any help in dealing with these issues with some understanding of theirhistorical roots is more relevant than ever.

ERWIN A. SCHMIDLAustrian Institute for Military Studies, Vienna

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