‘What Kind of War is This?’

This article explores the nature of the American war in Vietnam in an effort to determine whether it was a response to an indigenous uprising or an external effort by the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) to use a wide array of policies and programs to unite North Vietnam and South Vietnam under the party’s leadership. It argues that, although there initially were elements of the South Vietnamese population that rose against the southern leadership, the CPV gained control of their resistance and relegated it to a secondary role in the CPV war effort.     

To avert impending disaster: American military plans to use atomic weapons during the Korean War

Though historians continue to argue about the role of American nuclear threats in producing an armistice in the Korean War, by 1953 the United States was moving closer to actually escalating the war with the employment of atomic bombs. While military studies and unsatisfactory exercises during the first two years of the conflict had relegated such weapons to a role just as a last resort to prevent a catastrophe, frustration with stalemated peace talks and the aggressiveness of General Mark Clark combined to produce a set of contingencies envisioning an expanded war involving nuclear air strikes.