The Best And The Brightest (David Halberstam)

This book features almost all the people who had a hand in the decision on the US’ involvement in Vietnam. There was no question that these were the best and the brightest, which all more makes the reader wonders why the US eventually found herself in the quagmire. By the end of the book the reader may still not find the answer, but what he or she will find is a lesson in human folly and how the illusion of superior ability can lead one to arrogance, or perhaps less, over-confidence, but ending in hubris nevertheless.

This book is cleverly structured, the first half featuring one president (and the presidency) and the second half the next. Under this over-arching framework, the author added the layers below the presidents, starting with the national security advisor, secretaries of defense and states, their deputies and assistants, then the chief of staffs, and finally the ambassadors to South Vietnam. In some cases these happen to be the same people who worked across the administrations, in others there were multiples changes. But all the time the message was consistent – these are the most brilliant people, although in different ways. Yet there was no denying that these were the best and the brightest.

And thus the reader is led to ask – why then did the US eventually slipped into the Vietnam War which killed more than 50,000 Americans, severely draining the treasury, divided the country, and lost the country of a lot of its prestige and goodwill? The author did not provide a simplistic answer to this complex question, rather, he showed the mixture of personalities, beliefs, politics, and self-interest that slowly pushes the country deeper and deeper into a situation from which they could not extricate themselves, even after some have changed their minds about the US’ involvement.

At the beginning there were those who did not know what Vietnam was about, besides the unpalatable fact that it was a French colony which the French should quit, but would not. But in view of the need for France’s support in Europe a little sweetener for them in Vietnam is of negligible cost to the US. Then there were those who framed it with cold-war rhetoric of having to stop the spread of Communism in Asia. After “losing” China, it would be unthinkable to let the rest of the dominoes fall. Later it began to look to others like it was a good place to fight a good war. To be sure, there were those who tried to stop the tide and where impossible, to at least retard it. But these were in the minority, their cases always weak and their stance uncoordinated. In the end they were among the earliest casualties, and the author took us up the hierarchy again, only this time showing the sequence of the casualties: the ambassadors, the deputy and assistant secretaries, the secretaries, and ultimately the president himself. Few came out looking good, those who escaped rather unscathed politically would look unprincipled in the book.

The author did not just write a book that recorded the events and the decisions, he wrote a book to caution decision makers of all kinds. His message is for people to remember that arrogance has no place even (or especially) among the best and the brightest, for the game will eventually play you. But the biggest chill that the author gave me was not the fact that if the best and the brightest can fall into such a folly what more the lesser beings, it was that it is precisely when you think you have control of the game that you lose control. When you think you have resisted the tide because you managed to not give your opponent all that he wanted, you have actually forgotten what you had to give him in exchange for that. The illusion of being on top of things will lure you into the trap. I think this book should be kept handy, not because it would serve as a reference, but it would serve as a good reminder that even if you think you are the best and the brightest, you can still be catastrophically wrong. And then you would have to live with it.

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John F. Kennedy: An Unfinished Life (Robert Dallek)

This single volume biography of John F. Kennedy is an ambitious project trying to cover as many aspects of his life as possible, reasonably giving more coverage of his presidency compared to his life before being elected. To someone who wants to learn about the President, this book is a very useful read. The coverage is rather complete, and the tone unbiased. While giving to attention to much of the President's vision and efforts in realising them, the author has also not left out the human failings frequently associated with the President, namely his womanising. Beyond this, the author has given a great amount of details on the medical and physical conditions of John F. Kennedy, helping us to understand a lot more of what he had to endure physically while going through the grueling demands of a presidency.

It is obvious that the author did a great amount of research. Unfortunately, I found the writing in this book rather patchy. There were too many parts in the book where he almost quoted conversations after conversations in his attempt to relate the story. I found this sloppy. Although he was able to string enough quotes from different people to tell the story, I felt it lacking in effort. This was especially the case when relating the Cuban Missile Crisis. The author did not attempt to give his own voice, preferring to quote conversations wholesale, perhaps hoping that this would present the raw data to the readers.

Fortunately this was not always the case and there were in other chapters in the book when he did show his commendable ability to write. On page 605, I found his transition about the "trouble" very smooth and well-executed. Another example was when he included his thesis (at least this was the first time I heard it put this way) was when he was describing JFK's dilemma about Vietnam and Diem, bringing into consideration the US' decision to continue supporting Chiang Kai-Shek in China years earlier when he they knew he was corrupt and was not the one to win the war, and in Korea when US' intervention saved Seoul.

In the epilogue, the author went into an interesting speculation about the 'what-ifs', a 'must-do' for JFK biographers. This is an exercise that is fraught with danger because there is just no way anybody can know for sure. However, the author's attempt was a logical, reasonable and sound, making an extrapolation based on JFK's known positions about various issues, moderated by factors such as no longer having to worry about another election and possible developments in world events. Again, there is just no way to tell and so there always remain the possibility of one making an overly optimistic prediction based on our own over-estimation of the President.

As this book made clear, scholars who took a scientific approach to evaluating the achievements of JFK were normally underwhelmed. Perhaps one of the reasons people continue to think much of him is the belief that the world would indeed be a better had he lived. But perhaps it was because he died young, like Ayrton Senna who would always be the greatest F1 driver in many people's eyes. Yet if there was one thing that we ought to give JFK credit for, we should all remember that despite the tremendous pressure he faced during the Cuban Missile Crisis, he played a significant role in not letting it happen.

Briefings of McNamara tended to be sessions where people tried to fool him, and he tried to convince them they cannot.

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