Advice and Support: The Final Years

In “Advice and Support: The Final Years” Jeffrey J. Clarke describes the U.S. Army advisory effort to the South Vietnamese armed forces during the period when the U.S. commitment in Southeast Asia was at its peak. The account encompasses a broad spectrum of activities at several levels, from the physically demanding work of the battalion advisers on the ground to the more sophisticated undertakings of our senior military officers at the highest echelons of the American military assistance command in Saigon. Among critical subjects treated are our command relationships with the South Vietnamese army, our politico-military efforts to help reform both the South Vietnamese military and government, and our implementation of the Vietnamization policy inaugurated in 1969. The result tell us much about the U.S. Army's role as an agent of national policy in a critical but often neglected arena, and constitutes a major contribution to our understanding of not only events that occurred in Vietnam, but also the decisions and actions that produced them.