Archer, Chalmers, Jr.
Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces, 1953-1963. Annapolis,
MD: Naval Institute Press, 2001. Archer, Chalmers, Jr.
Green Berets in the Vanguard: Inside Special Forces, 1953-1963. Annapolis,
MD: Naval Institute Press, 2001.
From advertisement: This work chronicles the author's "experiences as one of the first members of the U.S. Army's Special Forces. His perspective is unique, not only as one of the first to wear the Green Beret but as a black man in the early days of armed forces integration."
Baker, Bob.
1. "The Easter Offensive of 1972: A Failure to Use Intelligence." Military Intelligence 24, no. 1 (Jan.-Mar. 1998): 40-42, 60.
The author concludes that U.S. and South Vietnamese commanders "had prior knowledge of NVA activity in preparation for the attack, but did not use that information to the maximum extent possible."
2. "Warning Intelligence: The Battle of the Bulge and the NVN Easter Offensive." American Intelligence Journal 17, no. 3/4 (1997): 71-79.
The author compares and discusses the role of warning intelligence in the Battle of the Bulge in 1944 and the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive of 1972. He concludes: "Though the location, numbers and types of forces were not the same, the command assumptions, the weather and the use and misuse of intelligence had almost the same catastrophic effects in both clashes....
"In studies of both campaigns, analysts and historians often cite the failure of intelligence to properly inform and alert the commanders of enemy intentions and capabilities as the chief reason for the successful 'surprise' achieved by the assaults. Upon closer examination, the 'cause' lies elsewhere....
"'It was not intelligence (evaluated information of the enemy) that failed. The failure was the commanders and certain G-2's, who did not act on the intelligence they had,' stated one of Patton's subordinates regarding the Bulge. It could just as easily have been written about Easter offensive of 1972."
Bennett,
Donald G. "Spot Report: Intelligence, Vietnam." Military Review
46, no. 8 (1966): 72-77. [Petersen]
Berman, Larry. Perfect Spy: The Incredible Double Life of Pham Xuan An, Time Magazine Reporter and Vietnamese Communist Agent. New York: Collins, 2007.
According to Hampson, AFIO WIN 13-07 (2 Apr. 2007), "the North Vietnamese Communist Party sen[t] Pham Xuan An to California [in 1957] to study journalism." He later worked at the Sacramento Bee, traveled the United States, and returned to South Vietnam as a reporter for Reuters and Time. An was North Vietnamese agent, "feeding Hanoi with valuable information, some of it classified."
Pribbenow, Washington DeCoded (11 Aug. 2007) [http://www.washingtondecoded.com] [reprinted in Intelligencer 15.3 (Summer/Fall 2007)], says that this "fascinating new book" makes "a formidable contribution to untangling the twisted skeins of truth and lies that made up the life, and the myth, of a man whom the Vietnamese Communists now proclaim as their most important and productive spy during the Vietnam War’s American phase." Nevertheless, "[d]espite the author’s conscientious efforts ... much about Pham Xuan An’s life still remains shrouded in mystery."
For Peake, Studies 51.4 (2007), the author "tells a remarkable story based on access" to An's "diaries and hours of interviews with An and those that knew him.... Berman has given us a sympathetic but engrossing biography that also says a great deal about North Vietnamese and American intelligence. It is very worth reading."
Bird, Nancy E. "Vietnam: Lessons for Intelligence in Wartime." International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence 20, no. 2 (Summer 2007): 317-326.
"Examples from Vietnam ... show how obstacles, then as now, can limit the influence of intelligence in the policymaking process."
Bjelajac,
Stavko N. "A Design for Psychological Operations in Vietnam."
Orbis 10 (Spring 1966): 126-137.
Bosiljevac, T.L. SEALs:
UDT/SEAL Operations in Vietnam. Boulder, CO: Paladin Press, 1990. [Gibish]
Brewin, Bob, and Sydney
Shaw. Vietnam on Trial: Westmoreland vs. CBS. New York: Atheneum,
1987.
Brown,
Robert K. "The Phantom Navy of the CIA." Sea Classics 8
(May 1975): 50-62. [Petersen]
Browne,
Malcolm. "A Reporter Looks Back: The CIA and the Fall of Vietnam."
Washington Journalism Review, Jan.-Feb. 1978, 18-19. [Petersen]
Burchett, Wilfred G. The Furtive War: The United States in Vietnam and Laos. New York: International Publishers, 1963.
Clark comment: The author was a pro-communist Australian journalist. As expected, the book portrays the war in Laos from a strongly anti-U.S., anti-CIA slant, a view not per se damning; but Burchett has the nasty habit of bending even well-established facts to fit his particular world view.
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