"The Tet Offensive: 50 Years Later" in Discussion with Columbia Prof. Nguyen and Max Boot at NYHistoric Soc.

Lien-Hang Nguyen (b S. Viet Nam 1974) is an assoc. prof. at Columbia Univ. of US & E. Asia history.  Nguyen is the author of the just released book "Hanoi's War: An Int'l Hist. of the War for Peace in Viet Nam."  Nguyen was at the NY Hist. Soc. to discuss her latest book with Max Boot.  Boot is Sr. Fellow for Nat'l Security Studies for the Council on Foreign Relations & author of "The Road Not Taken:  Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy."  This talk is in conjunction with the Viet Nam exhibit at the Historic Soc.  Both are experts on the Viet Nam (VN) War, the years leading up to US involvement and the Cold War aftermath.  Nguyen is fluent in Vietnamese.  She was 5 months when her family fled Saigon in April of 1975.  Her personal story was very interesting.  She is the youngest of 9 children.  Her father was Catholic & part of the anti-communist movement during the massive migration from the North to the South.  Her mother was a Buddhist & worked as a seamstress while her husband became a military recruiter for the South Vietnamese.  "{We were} very typical of many families living through the civil war" said Nguyen.  The family's harrowing escape as told to her by family members began with her father being alerted to US soldiers pulling out in April '75.  He rushed her family onto a fleeing dingy meant for 20 filled with 100 people.  They were rescued by a US military ship then transported & transferred through 3 refugee camps.  The family was brought to a camp in PA and then sponsored by the local Methodist Church.  Her father found employment with Amtrak & her mother for the postal service.  Both parents stressed the importance of education.  Researching the "Tet Offensive" in VN Nguyen said she was granted access to closed archival information in part due to her heritage & fluency.  But the most informative & enlightening materials were obtained through little known memoirs of party officials and "renegade" interviews which would not have passed censorship.  Nguyen proffered surprising revelations of intense power struggles and unbeknownst stories of survival.  Noted:  Ho Chi Minh (HCM) had been exiled to Beijing and more a figurehead than in command of the North Vietnamese Army.  It was HCM's strategy to launch massive general offensives to quell resistance but the north was unable to overcome the Saigon regime only prolonging & exacerbating the agonizing suffering & devastation.  Warfare escalated in 1968-9 with massive bombings, fatalities, LBJ's refusal to run & growing dissension in the US.  Walter Cronkite gave an editorial after visiting VN at the height of the Tet Offensive. "We are mired in stalemate is the only realistic conclusion" and urged "the only rational way out is to negotiate."