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VIETNAM: THE TEN THOUSAND DAYW, 7 L 1L Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War Michael Maclear was also executive producer of the television series of the same name. Born in London, he worked as a Fleet Street journalist and in the London office of the Chicago Tribune, until emigrating to Canada in 1954. He became Far East correspondent for CBC, getting exclusive coverage of Castro's entry to Havana, the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, and for over ten years, Vietnam. In Vietnam, he was first to interview American prisoners of war in Hanoi, and is acknowledged as the most experienced television reporter of the war from the West. His film of the death of Ho Chi Minh was shown in more than eighty five countries, and his articles for the New York Times were syndicated worldwide. In 1978, he became an independent producer to initiate a television history of the war he had covered so closely. Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War Michael Maclear Thames Methuen A Thames/Methuen Paperback VIETNAM: THE TEN THOUSAND DAY WAR ISBN O 423 00580 4 First published in Great Britain 1981 by Eyre Methuen Ltd in association with Thames Television International Ltd Copyright,© 1981 by TOW Copyright Holdings Ltd This Thames/Methuen Paperback edition published 1982 by Methuen London Ltd. 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE in association with Thames Television International Ltd, 149 Tottenham Court Road, London WIP 91L Filmset, printed and bound in Great Britain by Hazell Watson & Viney Ltd, Aylesbury, Bucks This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. To my wife, Mariko, who shared the preoccupation for fully twenty years Contents Maps viii Acknowledgements xi Introduction xiii I The First Reversal l 2 France in Vietnam 27 3 Dien Bien Phu 43 4 Early Hopes 63 5 Assassination 89 6 Days of Decision 109 7 Carrot and Stick 135 8 Countdown 151 9 Uneasy Allies 178 10 Westy's War 205 11 The Trail 236 12 Siege 255 13 The Tet Inquiry 274 14 Front Line America 301 15 The Guerrilla Society 325 16 The Village War 347 17 Soldiering On 362 18 Four More Years 387 19 Final Offensive 427 20 Surrender 452 Epilogue 469 Bibliography 481 Index 483