Despite this, Fall has also been quietly neglected as a subject of serious historical and intellectual inquiry. As a literary figure his books and frontline war correspondence enjoyed a wide audience, highlighting the enduring resonance and value of his work. A generation later, they read his books again to understand the things both countries had done, right and wrong, in Southeast Asia, and yet again, after 9-11, for what the lessons of the past might teach them about war in Afghanistan and Iraq.Īs an intellectual he was the world’s leading authority on the Indochina region and on French and American experiences there, making singular contributions to the study of Vietnam and revolutionary warfare. In the 1960s, they read Fall to understand the French experience in Indochina and prepare for their own. Fall’s books, notably Street Without Joy: The French Debacle in Indochina (1961) and Hell in a Very Small Place: The Siege of Dien Bien Phu (1966) were instant classics and influenced generations of American soldiers and policymakers. He produced an extraordinary volume of writing – seven books and 200 articles – over the course of a life cut tragically, prematurely short while on patrol with U.S. Bernard Fall (1926-1967) cuts an intriguing figure in the annals of American history.
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