Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu by Bernard B. Fall is a definitive account of one of the most significant battles of the 20th century. In this meticulously researched and vividly written narrative, Fall chronicles the dramatic events of the 1954 siege, where French forces found themselves encircled by the Viet Minh in the remote valley of Dien Bien Phu.Drawing from firsthand accounts, official reports, and his deep expertise on Indochina, Fall captures the in...

This book is devoted to a comparison of the governmental and economic institutions of north and south zones of Viet-Nam; that each zone has its own set of economic and political troubles and that both sides are engaged in military efforts which may well overwhelm them in the end.

In this classic account of the French war in Indochina, Bernard B. Fall vividly captures the sights, sounds, and smells of the savage eight-year conflict in the jungles and mountains of Southeast Asia from 1946 to 1954. The French fought well to the last, but even with the lethal advantages of airpower, they could not stave off the Communist-led Vietnamese nationalists, who countered with a hit-and-run campaign of ambushes, booby traps, and nighttime raids. Defeat came at Dien Bien Phu in ...

**A close-up, action-filled account of the crucial role the U.S. Navy played in the early years of the Cold War, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Fleet at Flood Tide and The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors“A lucid, fast-moving and fitting finale to [Hornfischer’s] career.”—The Wall Street Journal**A landmark chronicle of the U.S. Navy in the Cold War, Who Can Hold the Sea combines narrative history with scenes ...

"A meticulous and masterly narrative" of the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, which doomed the French Empire and led America into Vietnam ( Wall Street Journal ).In December 1953, French paratroopers searching for the elusive Vietnamese army were quickly isolated by their enemy and forced to retreat. They took refuge in their outgunned and desolate jungle base—a small place called Dien Bien Phu.The Vietnamese besieged the ...

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZEONE OF THE MOST ACCLAIMED WORKS OF HISTORY IN RECENT YEARSWinner of the Francis Parkman Prize from the Society of American Historians • Winner of the American Library in Paris Book Award • Winner of the Council on Foreign Relations Arthur Ross Book Award • Finalist for the Cundill Prize in Historical LiteratureNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYTh...

Hailed as a "pithy and compelling account of an intensely relevant topic" (Kirkus Reviews), this wide-ranging volume offers a superb account of a key moment in modern U.S. and world history. Drawing upon the latest research in archives in China, Russia, and Vietnam, Mark Lawrence creates an extraordinary, panoramic view of all sides of the war. His narrative begins well before American forces set foot in Vietnam, delving into French colonialism's contribution to the 1945 Vietnamese revolut...

Pulitzer Prize–winning author Ted Morgan has now written a rich and definitive account of the fateful battle that ended French rule in Indochina—and led inexorably to America’s Vietnam War. Dien Bien Phu was a remote valley on the border of Laos along a simple rural trade route. But it would also be where a great European power fell to an underestimated insurgent army and lost control of a crucial colony. Valley of Death is the untold story of the 1954 battle that, in six ...

"Magnificent . . . [It] has managed not only to fill in the missing pieces of Ho's life but to provide the best account of Ho as a diplomat and a strategist." — The New York Times Book ReviewA New York Times Notable BookA Los Angeles Times Best Book of the YearTo grasp the complicated causes and co...

The essential WWII historical reference detailing RAF Bomber Command's extensive campaign of strategic bombings across occupied Europe.The Royal Air Force Bomber Command's strategic bombing campaign started on the first day of the Second World War and ended five and a half years later with the final victory in Europe. It was a campaign of such enormous scale that historians have only recently begun to piece together the finer details of the individual raids. Aviatio...

A "compassionate and penetrating" landmark history of Vietnam and the Vietnam War ( New York Times Book Review)."Fitzgerald's Pulitzer Prize– and National Book Award–winning study of the Vietnam War remains essential reading thirty years after its initial publication." — Library JournalThis magisterial work, based on Frances FitzGerald's many years of research and travels, takes us inside the history of Vietnam—the tradition...

The first book to give equal weight to the Vietnamese and American sides of the Vietnam war.