No fact is an island each one is rich with implications that reach out, so to speak, toward the wider area of surrounding facts. Much like a fabric, any social reality-a town, a university, a revolution, a war-has a pattern and a texture. Therefore, while providing an abundance of firsthand accounts, Turse has supplemented this approach. Yet it would not have been enough simply to accumulate anecdotal evidence of abuses. To be sure, he presents plenty of numbers: for instance, the mind-boggling estimates that overall some 2 million civilians were killed and some 5 million wounded during the war, or that the United States flew 3.4 million aircraft sorties and expended 30 billion pounds of munitions, releasing the equivalent in explosive force of 640 Hiroshima bombs. Turse acknowledges that even now, not enough is known to present this picture in statistical terms. It has been Turse’s great achievement to see that thanks to the special character of the war, its fundamental reality-an accurate overall picture of what was occurring on the ground-has never been assembled that with imagination and years of dogged work this could be done and that even a half-century after the beginning of the American phase of the war, it still should be done. Meticulously piecing together newly released classified information, court-martial records and other Pentagon reports, firsthand interviews in Vietnam and in the United States as well as contemporaneous press accounts and important work by previous scholars, Turse shows that what were often presented as isolated atrocities- episodes of devastation, murder, massacre, rape, torture-were in fact the norm, a continuous stream of atrocity that unfolded year after year throughout the country. The findings disclose an almost unspeakable truth. Now, in Kill Anything That Moves, Nick Turse has, for the first time, put together a comprehensive picture, written with mastery and dignity, of what American forces were actually doing in Vietnam. But such, it turns out, has literally been the case. Is it possible we did not know what we were talking about? After all that has been written (some 30,000 books and counting), it scarcely seems possible. With his policy of Vietnamization at stake, Nixon implements a massive buildup of air power in Southeast Asia and a broadening of the eligible targets.This is a joint Nation/Tom Dispatch article and will appear at .įor half a century, we have been arguing about the Vietnam War. While US bombing and a stiffened ARVN defense was able to turn back the PAVN and NLF offensive, it remains politically impossible to reintroduce sufficient U.S. The city of Loc Ninh (Lộc Ninh), located close to the Cambodian border subsequently became the capital of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam (PRGSVN), a distinction it held until it was disbanded after the war. The South Vietnamese with heavy American air support are able to turn back the attack after a month and a half. For the first time, the US places mines in Haiphong Harbor to cut off the North Vietnamese from foreign support. In addition, six aircraft carriers were assigned to the bombing mission as well as over 100 B-52 bombers. The US committed 74 tactical squadrons to the attack. The campaign was by far the largest and most comprehensive of the war, using a wide variety of aircraft as well as new ‘smart’ bombs. A week after the launch of the offensive, Nixon decides to respond with a massive air campaign against the North. Intelligence reports had predicted a Northern attack, but no one had expected it to come across the DMZ.
The Southern defense is thrown into complete chaos. Upwards of 20,000 PAVN troops cross the DMZ, forcing the South Vietnamese units into a retreat. Massed North Vietnamese Army artillery open a shattering barrage, targeting South Vietnamese positions across the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). The 3-pronged attacks began in the north, center, and south of the country. The goal of Easter Offensive, officially known as The 1972 Spring – Summer Offensive, (also called the Nguyen Hue (Nguyễn Huệ) offensive) was to win a decisive victory in 1972 or at least improve the revolutionary position for future peace talks. March 30-July 1972 The PAVN (People’s Army of Viet Nam) and the NLF begin a major offensive. Organizing Tool Kit for 50 years of GI Resistance Campaign.Resources for Learning about the American War in Viet Nam.Credit Cards, PayPal, ApplePay, & ACH Bank Transfers gladly accepted.Errors in the Official Commemoration Website.
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