The French connection: New book provides sweeping history of Vietnam War

The Vietnam War has long been embroiled in debate and analysis in the United States, propagated by the war’s three-decade duration, disputed status and tremendous toll on human life.

The war has continued to resonate within the country’s politics and culture, though America’s Vietnam War narrative is often identified apart from its international historical context.

With the help of previously untapped archives, historian Fredrik Logevall’s new book, “Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam,” traces the history of America’s involvement in Vietnam. The book provides a sweeping narrative that starts with World War I and French colonialism and ends with direct U.S. intervention starting in the late 1950s.

“In order to understand America’s war,” Logevall said, “it’s critically important to understand what went before.”

The French had fought a colonial war in Vietnam — then known as French Indochina — long before Americans picked up the fight. Logevall said he was originally fascinated by America’s decision to support the French in their effort to suppress anti-colonial rebels.

“This was the United States, born out of an anti-colonial reaction,” he said. “And yet here the United States was backing the French in this effort.”

Logevall said the U.S. reaction to the French defeat was more complicated than he originally thought. At first, he assumed American officials simply ignored the French war out of arrogance and pride. Only later in his research did he find that many of them clearly saw that the U.S. was heading down the same path as France. For those skeptics, winning the war was a matter of hope, not conviction.

“One can talk about missed opportunities; one can talk about roads not taken,” Logevall said. “It’s evident that it could’ve been different.”

Much like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan could have been different, Logevall said, had American officials learned more from Vietnam.

“Though history by analogy can be a dangerous exercise,” he added.