From the UC Press Journals Archives: Remembrances of the Vietnam War
From the UC Press Journals Archives: Remembrances of the Vietnam War
April 30, 2025 marks fifty years since the end of what we in the West call the Vietnam War–and what the people of Vietnam call Kháng chiến chống Mỹ (the “Resistance War against America”) or simply, the American War. On this date in 1975, Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was captured by North Vietnamese forces, leading to collapse of the South Vietnamese government and the hasty withdrawal of American personnel and their South Vietnamese partners.
At the time, and over the intervening years, the pages of UC Press’s journals have examined the War from a myriad of angles, from all sides of the conflict–its global economic and political impact, the role of student activism, memory in small-town America, how “the other” is documented in media, the history of failed, secret negotiations, and more.
As part of our commemoration of this historical milestone–an event that still ripples with implications today–UC Press is pleased to offer the following resources, which have been made free to read for a limited period of time.
Vietnam: A Country at War, by Robert Scigliano.
This January, 1963 report from Asian Survey documents the rise of the Vietnamese Communists guerilla forces and presages increased military involvement by the US.
Death and Suffering at First Hand: Youth Shock Brigades during the Vietnam War (1950–1975), by François Guillemot.
Following a group of young girls and women and their “tragic fate, caught between barbarism and heroism,” this groundbreaking research from Journal of Vietnamese Studies chronicles the neglected role of female wartime volunteers on the Hồ Chí Minh Trail.
U.S. Misadventure in Vietnam, by Hans J. Morgenthau.
Writing in the January, 1968 pages of Current History, the author discusses the disastrous US involvement in Southeast Asia in the 1950s and 1960s.
Student Activism in Time of War: Youth in the Republic of Vietnam, 1960s–1970s, by Van Nguyen-Marshall.
From Journal of Vietnamese Studies, this research looks at the role and impact of Vietnamese youth organizations and student protests inside wartime South Vietnam.
Cold War Kidnapping: The Gustav Hertz Case and the Failure of Secret Negotiations in Vietnam, 1965–1967, by Helen N. Pho.
When saving the life of a kidnapped USAID official conflicted with the US goal of South Vietnamese sovereignty, US officials chose the latter. From Pacific Historical Review.
COMING SOON: A JOURNAL OF VIETNAMESE STUDIES VIETNAM WAR COMMEMORATION SPECIAL ISSUE
Explored through the voices of Vietnamese from all sides of the conflict, JVS 20:2 features the first English translations of 13 Vietnamese-language works, including poetry, songs, fiction, memoirs, and reportage, providing a deeper understanding of how Vietnamese people experienced the war’s end and its aftermath.
Vietnam and the Sino-Soviet Conflict, 1965–1976, by Victor C. Funnell.
Published in Communist and Post-Communist Studies (then called Studies in Comparative Communism) during the recent aftermath of the Vietnam War, this historical-political analysis examines the changed relationships between China, the Soviet Union, and the new communist states of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.
Women, Socialism, and the Economy of Wartime North Vietnam, 1960–1975*, by Jayne Werner.
This CPCS article examines the use and role of women’s liberation movements in modernizing Communist states–and the lack of a similar movement in Vietnam to dismantle the previous agrarian order.
Was Vietnam a "Mistake"?, by Earl C. Ravenal.
This case for future American intervention appeared in the July 1974 issue of Asian Survey.
How They Lost: Doctrines, Strategies and Outcomes of the Vietnam War, by Laurence E. Grinter.
In this reckoning published in the pages of Asian Survey shortly after the end of the Vietnam War, the author bemoans our tendency to misunderstand the nature of revolutionary wars.
Star Wars: The Photographer as Polemicist in Vietnam, by Jan Zita Grover.
This 1983 retrospective from Afterimage examines the role of photography in shaping our perceptions of the War.
Rock and Roll in Representations of the Invasion of Vietnam, by David E. James.
"The invasion and rock and roll are intertwined so thoroughly that their interdependence is an exemplary instance of the operationality of modern culture." From Representations.
The Legacy of History in Vietnam, by William J. Duiker.
From Current History: The difficulties of nation building, ten years into a reunified Vietnamese state.
Between Sorrow and Pride: The Morenci Nine, the Vietnam War, and Memory in Small-Town America, by Kyle Longley.
In this historical research from Pacific Historical Review, the author observes how the Vietnam War has impacted and is remembered by a small-town Southwestern community.
The Education Center at The Wall and the Rewriting of History, by Meredith H. Lair.
This article from The Public Historian criticizes plans for an education center on the National Mall that re-imagines the Vietnam War as both a “good war” and the ennobling “lost cause” of the twentieth century.
The Wall, the Screen, and the Image: The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, by Marita Sturken.
This analysis from Representations considers the Vietnam Veterans Memorial as a multifaceted “screen,” both projecting and shielding: a projection of memory and history of the US participation in the Vietnam War and of the experience of the Vietnam veterans since the war, as well as a barrier screening out the “narrative of defeat in preparing for wars to come.”
As one of the world's most forward-thinking publishers, UC Press gives voice, reach, and impact to innovative research and exceptional scholarship. With a global circulation, our journals span the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences, with key subject areas that include history, literature & criticism, film & media, music, religion, and sociology.