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 | | Vietnam: Anatomy of a Peace by Gabriel Kolko ISBN-10: 9780415159890 ISBN-10: 0-415-15989-X ISBN-13: 9780415159890 ISBN-13: 978-0-415-15989-0 Hardcover 1997-05-06 Routledge Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description Vietnam has experienced huge political and economic development since the war. Vietnam: Anatomy of a Peace argues that victory in 1975 caught the Communists wholly unprepared to cope with the reconstruction of the war-torn nation. After 1986, confused and vulnerable to promises of aid, the Communists began to accept International Monetary Fund guidance and embarked on market reforms. The IMF achieved what American military power could not, and the Communists began irresistibly to abandon their social ideology. Gabriel Kolko looks at the main economic phases the Communists have embarked upon since 1986 and describes the loosening of socialist ideology and outlines the transition to nascent capitalism. Based on extensive research and over 30 years first hand experience, Vietnam: Anatomy of a Peace is a vivid portrait of Vietnam today and a timely examination of developing economies in Asia. Market reforms are producing serious social and economic difficulties in Vietnam; inequality has created a divided class society and industrial workers are among the most exploited in the world. In light of these problems, Kolko outlines how Communists are coping with the contradictions between daily realities and their original idealistic aims. Kolko argues that neither an intentional socialist nor a market strategy have determined recent Vietnamese history and that the Communist has little control over development during peace time. After successfully confronting both France and the United States in war, the Communists are now close to losing the cause for which they fought. | ||
Amazon.com Review The Vietnam War was the longest-running international conflict of the 20th century. Gabriel Kolko, a Canadian scholar, argues that although the eventual victor had plenty of time to prepare for rule, the end of the war caught the Communists "unprepared for peace." Faced with the daunting task of rebuilding two ruined economies and forging a single nation, the Vietnamese Communist Party began to abandon some of the doctrinal tenets over which the war was, in some measure, fought. In time, it even adopted a market philosophy, which has caused disillusionment among some of its older cadres; in the near future, Kolko writes, "socialism's lingering institutional residues are likely to be eroded even further." Kolko provides a fine account of that sad war's denouement. | ||
Reviews | ||
personal regrets interfere with objectivity The author is definitely very knowledgeable about the subject but his personal regret at how the communists have really screwed things up is almost always apparent. A lot of what he claims to be fact just isn't so: the author's last visit to VN was in 87. Having lived there from 92 to 97, and having worked for the local press, I am sure that things are not as apocalyptic as he makes them seem-- for the party or people of VN. Taken with the usual grain of salt required for this subject, it is nonetheless a fascinating work for the VN political junkie. | ||
Tragedy in Perspective Kolko reminds us that the Vietnamese were fighting _for_ something, not just against the U.S. in their tragic and destructive war. While the goal of _de jure_ independence was achieved, the dream of a just society languished. Kolko illustrates how this goal was destroyed by Communist authoritarianism, a costly war against Pol Pot, Western (and IMF) pressures, and the greed for power and money of Vietnam's new elite. In Vietnam's uncertain future, Kolko argues, only democracy and a renewed commitment to establishing social justice can win back the peace. The book concludes with a deeply moving epilogue on the necessity and risks of resisting injustice, that everyone alive should read. | ||
Kolko's Shortcoming In an otherwise excellent work, Kolko fails to understand the fundamental purpose of the Vietnam War. It was not a war for an ideology, communism, as he implies but a War of National Liberation against the Japanese, the French and in its final stage the Americans. In the context of Cold War foreign aid patterns, a war against American imperialism had some communist overtones but these were not central to the movement. Kolko, a communist sympathizer, decries Vietnam's government abandoning communist economic policy arguing this hurts those who fought in the war the most. This is mere adaptation to a changing global context. Ho Chi Minh was first and foremost a nationalist. | ||