The Quicksand War: Prelude to Vietnam

The Quicksand War: Prelude to Vietnam, by Lucien Bodard (Atlantic-Little, Brown, $7.95).

An anecdotalist, Lucien Bodard is still capable of describing the events of the war in Indochina up to about 1950 so that they have meaning for today. He is enough of the journalist to seek the bizarre, and historian enough to remember the importance of accurate reporting. His account of that earlier war reminds us again of the courage and the errors of the French. It is a coldly detailed story of the terror and efficiency of the Communists. Bodard places at stage center the two chief protagonists, the French and the Vietminh, but the drama is overshadowed by the Americans and Chinese. He recognized that the events in Korea would dominate the future of Indochina. When Americans failed to win there the threshold of possible failure in Indochina was reached. Bodard’s sympathies are not at all with our contemporary “hawks” but his mocking, cynical account can be read with profit even by them. His conclusions do not follow inescapably from his facts; in fact, they seem to fly in the face of them. He provides, nevertheless, some idea of the political and military problems which made for French failure, a failure that was not inevitable.

WJ

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W. D. Jacobs

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The Quicksand War: Prelude to Vietnam, by Lucien Bodard (Atlantic-Little, Brown, $7.95).

An anecdotalist, Lucien Bodard is still capable of describing the events of the war in Indochina up to about 1950 so that they have meaning for today. He is enough of the journalist to seek the bizarre, and historian enough to remember the importance of accurate reporting. His account of that earlier war reminds us again of the courage and the errors of the French. It is a coldly detailed story of the terror and efficiency of the Communists. Bodard places at stage center the two chief protagonists, the French and the Vietminh, but the drama is overshadowed by the Americans and Chinese. He recognized that the events in Korea would dominate the future of Indochina. When Americans failed to win there the threshold of possible failure in Indochina was reached. Bodard’s sympathies are not at all with our contemporary “hawks” but his mocking, cynical account can be read with profit even by them. His conclusions do not follow inescapably from his facts; in fact, they seem to fly in the face of them. He provides, nevertheless, some idea of the political and military problems which made for French failure, a failure that was not inevitable.