In the spring of 1972, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in what became known as the Easter Offensive. Almost all of the American forces had already withdrawn from Vietnam except for a small group of American advisers to the South Vietnamese armed forces. The 23rd ARVN Infantry Division and its American advisers were sent to defend the provincial capital of Kontum in the Central Highlands. They were surrounded and attacked by three enemy divisions with heavy artillery and tanks but, with the help of air power, managed to successfully defend Kontum and prevent South Vietnam from being cut in half and defeated. Although much has been written about the Vietnam War, little of it addresses either the Easter Offensive or the Battle of Kontum. In Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam, Thomas P. McKenna fills this gap, offering the only in-depth account available of this violent engagement. McKenna, a U.S. infantry lieutenant colonel assigned as a military adviser to the 23rd Division, participated in the battle of Kontum and combines his personal experiences with years of interviews and research from primary sources to describe the events leading up to the invasion and the battle itself. Kontum sheds new light on the actions of U.S. advisers in combat during the Vietnam War. McKenna’s book is not only an essential historical resource for America’s most controversial war but a personal story of valor and survival.

In the spring of 1972, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in what became known as the Easter Offensive. Almost all of the American forces had already withdrawn from Vietnam except for a small group of American advisers to the South Vietnamese armed forces. The 23rd ARVN Infantry Division and its American advisers were sent to defend the provincial capital of Kontum in the Central Highlands. They were surrounded and attacked by three enemy divisions with heavy artillery and tanks but, with the help of air power, managed to successfully defend Kontum and prevent South Vietnam from being cut in half and defeated. Although much has been written about the Vietnam War, little of it addresses either the Easter Offensive or the Battle of Kontum. In Kontum: The Battle to Save South Vietnam, Thomas P. McKenna fills this gap, offering the only in-depth account available of this violent engagement. McKenna, a U.S. infantry lieutenant colonel assigned as a military adviser to the 23rd Division, participated in the battle of Kontum and combines his personal experiences with years of interviews and research from primary sources to describe the events leading up to the invasion and the battle itself. Kontum sheds new light on the actions of U.S. advisers in combat during the Vietnam War. McKenna's book is not only an essential historical resource for America's most controversial war but a personal story of valor and survival.

A North Vietnamese diary helps an American come to terms with the war

An examination of significant military developments and social and economic conditions during the last three years of the war.

When Gerald Hickey went to Vietnam in 1956 to complete his Ph.D. in anthropology, he didn't realize he would be there for most of the next eighteen years--through the entire Vietnam War. After working with the country folk of the Mekong Delta for several years, in 1963 Hickey was recruited by the Rand Corporation, which was contracted by the U.S. government to study and report on the highland tribes. From the buildup to war, when mountain tribespeople still lived in longhouses and cut and burned brush to clear fields for nice, to near the end of the conflict, when he sailed away from Vietnam on the S.S. Idaho, Gerald Hickey experienced it all. He lived through the horrible Viet Cong night attack on the Nam Dong Special Forces Camp in July 1964, and he survived the full-scale battle at Ban Me Thuot during Tet, 1968. Worst, he witnessed the decline of the mountain people from proud highlanders to refugees from a war none of them wanted and few understood. Hickey became respected by all parties as a fair intermediary between the highlanders, the American mission, and to some extent the Saigon government. His understanding of the montagnards, and his representation of their interests, helped to resolve their conflict with Saigon in 1965 and assured their alliance with U.S. forces through the rest of the war. These are his experiences, told with the calm yet deep emotion of a man who invested a major portion of his life and career in the events of the war and with the people among whom he lived and worked. His is a unique viewpoint and one to which we should attend. "[Hickey's] studies of these independent, brave, and misunderstood people provide the scholarly record; this fine book expresses his devotion and his despair at their inevitable and often cruel assimilation." --Douglas Pike