Raising the Stakes

#3 in the linear foot of Vietnam War. “Raising the Stakes” covers the period between the downfall of the Diem regime starting in 1962, and the deployment of the Marines in 1965. While raising the stakes gives a good overview of the period, as always, this is one of the most studied periods of the war, because it was the last real chance to avoid the full-blown quagmire that the war became. What I mean by this is that there are probably specialty books that cover the most interesting parts of this period: “Dereliction of Duty” for the view from DC, “A Bright Shining Lie” for the Battle of Ap Bac and the downfall of Diem, and military histories for the air war and special forces.

What this book covers in detail is the immediate post-Diem chaos, with coup after coup (normally just glossed over until Ky and Thieu in many books), the failures of the Diem regime, and the various special forces units. However, I would have preferred a tighter focus on Diem, or the policy-makers in DC who set the war on its course.