A Tragic War

This is a work of literature about the Americanization of the Vietnam War under the presidency of Lyndon Johnson. One major dimension of the human condition is tragic and that the Americanization of the war and Lyndon Johnson's role relating to Vietnam were a tragedy. It was a disaster for the people of Vietnam and America. Yet, the people who launched it were men of intelligence and ability doing what they believed was right and important, that God was on their - our - side. They were the representatives of a nation not only great in power but, for all its faults, then great in moral stature. Their beliefs and actions were those that dominated their time and place. And, still, their mission utterly failed, wreaking death and destruction and undermining the social fabrics of both countries. It is easy to say that they erred, that this could have been avoided - many said so at the time. But, they did what they did with much thought and without being evil or perverse. The world is still paying the price.

The novella follows the progress of the war from the decision to send American ground troops and bombers in early 1965 to Johnson's refusal to escalate further and to withdraw from the election of 1968 after the Tet offensive of that year and aftermaths of that decision. It is seen through the eyes of Johnson, his council of war, his young aide, young Americans in the peace movement and soldiers on both sides.

Other wars have been tragic: Thucydides wrote one of the world's great tragedies about the conduct of Athens in the Peloponnesian War in the form of the war's history. The tragedy of Vietnam has had consequences which have shaped much of the subsequent world and whose meaning transcends its time. It calls for telling.