Overview

A revelatory look at the decisions that led to the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, drawing on the insights and reassessments of one of the war's architects ""I had a part in a great failure. I made mistakes of perception, recommendation and execution. If I have learned anything I should share it."" These are not words that Americans ever expected to hear from McGeorge Bundy, the national security adviser to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. But in the last years of his life, Bundy--the only principal architect of Vietnam strategy to have maintained his public silence--decided to revisit the decisions that had led to war and to look anew at the role he played. He enlisted the collaboration of the political scientist Gordon M. Goldstein, and together they explored what happened and what might have been. With Bundy's death in 1996, that manuscript could not be completed, but Goldstein has built on their collaboration in an original and provocative work of presidential history that distills the essential lessons of America's involvement in Vietnam. Drawing on Goldstein's prodigious research as well as the interviews and analysis he conducted with Bundy, ""Lessons in Disaster"" is a historical tour de force on the uses and misuses of American power. And in our own era, in the wake of presidential decisions that propelled the United States into another war under dubious pretexts, these lessons offer instructive guidance that we must heed if we are not to repeat the mistakes of the past.

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9780805079715

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Reviews

A compelling portrait of a man once serenely confident, searching decades later for self-understanding.... It offers insight into how Bundy, a man of surpassing skill and reputation, could have advised two presidents so badly. On the long shelf of Vietnam books, I know of nothing quite like it. The unfinished quality of Bundy's self-inquest only enhances its power, authenticity and, yes, poignancy.... An extraordinary cautionary tale for all Americans. --Richard Holbrooke, The New York Times Book Review <p> [Goldstein] painstakingly recounts his subject's role as national security adviser and ponders the complexity of the elusive 'inner Bundy'... surprising revelations. -- Publishers Weekly <p> Illuminate[s] the five years (1961-1966) during which the defense of South Vietnam was Americanized.... A strange yet fascinating book. -- Newsweek <p> Astute distillation of the essential lessons now-deceased national security adviser Bundy learned from Vietnam....an invaluable record of Bundy's thoughts and actions during the war, as well as unusually candid commentary on his admitted failures in 'perception, recommendation and execution.'... A significant then-and-now reassessment. -- Kirkus Reviews <p> No American who has lived through the Iraq experience will doubt how important it is for us to understand why and how American presidents take our country to war. Key to understanding how John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson took the nation into Vietnam is the story of McGeorge Bundy's service to both men as national security adviser. Thanks to his many long and penetrating talks with Bundy, his assiduous study of the written record, and his mastery of the interplay among personality, politics, and national security strategy, Gordon Goldstein has brought us a dispassionate, powerful, and brilliant assessment of McGeorge Bundy's performance during the years he was given his cardinal moment in history. Goldstein's book helps us comprehend how Americans were led, step by step, into the abyss of Vietnam. It also provides crucial lessons for future presidents, members of Congress, and citizens as we grapple with the problems of where, when, and how to apply American power around the world. --Michael Beschloss<p> A compelling and personally sympathetic appraisal of Bundy as a brilliant statesman but also as a fallible human being. Despite his remarkable intellect, Bundy ultimately failed to grasp the fundamental novelty of the historical challenge posed by a communism fanatically driven by nationalistic anticolonialist passions. In that context, presidential decision-making became increasingly focused on the imperatives of a local war and less on its damaging impact on America's world role. --Zbigniew Brzezinski<p> Thanks to Gordon Goldstein's superb book, we have fresh evidence for judging between a facile mind and a wise one, and we can now assess more accurately the role of McGeorge Bundy in the Vietnam tragedy. --A. J. Langguth<p> This meticulously researched book gives us remarkable insight into one of the most critical foreign policy decisions in U.S. history. Anyone aspiring to a leadership position in American politics or public policy should carefully examine this perceptive work and its many valuable lessons. --Warren B. Rudman, former U.S. senator (R-N.H.) and former chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board <p> Gordon Goldstein's Lessons inDisaster provides a close, careful look at Kennedy's mindset at the time of his assassination.... As the title suggests, this fast-paced, well-written book is organized around the abiding lessons of Vietnam. Barack Obama and his new foreign policy advisers should read it. --Mike Pride, Concord Monitor

Author Information

Gordon M. Goldstein is a scholar of international affairs who has held executive positions in international security policy and finance. He received a Ph.D. in political science and international relations from Columbia University, and his articles have appeared in ""The New York Times,"" ""Newsweek,"" and ""The Washington Post."" He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and lives in Brooklyn, New York.

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