Huế 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in Vietnam

Description

Author: Bowden, Mark

Publisher: Grove Atlantic

Pub Date: 2017

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: Book: Good.  Binding tight.  No marks, tears, bends or folds.  Very light edge and corner wear.  Dust Jacket: Good.  NOT price clipped.  Light edge and corner wear.

Notes: In January, 1968, when Tet began, I was in radio school at MCRD, San Diego.  I had been in the Corps for 6 months.  Every one of us, me included, was convinced we were going to be pulled from school and sent to Viet Nam as grunts.  It didn’t happen that way, but there is not a Marine alive today who doesn’t know about the battle for Huế.  It is inculcated into you now in boot camp.  It was our generation’s Iwo Jima or Guadalcanal, whether we were there or not.  Bowden  (author of Black Hawk Down) uses Huế as the turning point of the entire Viet Nam war (not just the turning point of the battles of Tet), though there are other battles that may have been more consequential (Ia Drang, Khe Sanh, Hamburger Hill).  On the CMC Professional Reading List.