Southeast Asian History

In this landmark work that will forever change your understanding of how and why America went to war in Vietnam, author Fredrik Logevall taps newly accessible diplomatic archives in several nations and traces the path that led two Western nations to tragically lose their way in the jungles of Southeast Asia. He brings to life the bloodiest battles of France’s final years in Indochina - and describes how, from an early point, a succession of American leaders made disastrous policy choices that put America on its own collision course with history.

The 'Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club' was the tongue-in-cheek nickname of the US Seventh Fleet that was stationed off the coast of Vietnam and this book tells the full story of the US Naval air campaign in the Vietnam War from 1965 to 1975.

Singapore has also been a good global citizen. It has played a significant role in the development of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). At the United Nations (UN), Singapore has played a leadership role in the negotiations of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, the UN Convention on International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation (also known as the Singapore Convention on Mediation) and the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.

The true story of the fierce band of women who battled Washington - and Hanoi - to bring their husbands home from the jungles of Vietnam.

Many books have been written on the tragic decisions regarding Vietnam made by the stars of the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. Yet despite many words of analysis and reflection, no historian has been able to explain why such decent and previously successful men stumbled so badly. That changes with Road to Disaster. Historian Brian VanDeMark draws upon decades of archival research, his own interviews with many of those involved, and a wealth of previously unheard recordings by Robert McNamara and Clark Clifford, who served as Defense Secretaries for Kennedy and Johnson.

Precariously positioned between China and India, Burma's population has suffered dictatorship, natural disaster, and the dark legacies of colonial rule. But when decades of military dictatorship finally ended and internationally beloved Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi emerged from long years of house arrest, hopes soared. As historian, former diplomat, and presidential advisor, Thant Myint-U saw the cracks forming. In this insider's diagnosis of a country at a breaking point, he dissects all of the elements that came together to challenge the incipient democracy.

The defeat of South Vietnam was arguably America's worst foreign policy disaster of the twentieth century. Yet a complete understanding of the endgame—from the January 27, 1973 signing of the Paris Peace Accords to South Vietnam's surrender on April 30, 1975—has eluded us. Black April addresses that deficit.

Vietnam is not only a nation — it is a story of survival etched in rice paddies, temples, and revolution. Echoes and Empires: The History of Vietnam is a sweeping, human-scale journey through one of Asia’s most resilient civilizations. Spanning over 4,000 years, this is not just the history of a country — it’s the story of a people who have endured foreign conquest, cultural upheaval, colonization, war, and renewal, yet have never lost their identity or voice. This book guides readers chronologically through the major eras of Vietnamese history — from the mythic origin of Lạc ...

Nothing Ever Dies, Viet Thanh Nguyen writes. All wars are fought twice, the first time on the battlefield, the second time in memory. From the author of the best-selling novel The Sympathizer comes a searching exploration of a conflict that lives on in the collective memory of both the Americans and the Vietnamese.

With his parting words "I shall return," General Douglas MacArthur sealed the fate of the last American forces on Bataan. Yet one young Army Captain, named Russell Volckmann, refused to surrender. He disappeared into the jungles of north Luzon where he raised a Filipino army of over 22,000 men. For the next three years he led a guerrilla war against the Japanese, killing over 50,000 enemy soldiers. At the same time he established radio contact with MacArthur's HQ in Australia and directed Allied forces to key enemy positions.

It was the afternoon of 18 August 1966, hot, humid with grey monsoonal skies. D Company, 6RAR were four kilometres east of their Nui Dat base, on patrol in a rubber plantation not far from the abandoned village of Long Tan. A day after their base had suffered a mortar strike, they were looking for Viet Cong soldiers. Then—just when they were least expecting—they found them. Under withering fire, some Diggers perished, some were grievously wounded, the rest fought on, as they remained under sustained attack. For hours these men fought for their lives against the enemy onslaught.

A timely look at the impact of China's booming emergence on the countries of Southeast Asia.

The reign of the Khmer Rouge, a Cambodian communist regime, began on April 7, 1975 as Khmer Rouge militants entered the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, ultimately gaining control and forcing out its residents. For the next four years, the regime would remain in power and commit what is now referred to as the Cambodian Genocide. Their reign would result in economic turmoil, cultural destruction, and mass death, impacting Cambodia to this day.

Love and Loss in Cambodia is a memoir by Debra Groves Harman. As a teenager, she carried a heavy burden of grief and responsibility. First, her closest person died. Next, her father was critically injured in a traumatic car accident. Perhaps that explains why she's willing to leave the US and go to parts unknown--ending up in Cambodia, or more likely, she's following a traveling man she married in 1993. Memories are drawn from the '90s when the author lived in Sihanoukville and Phnom Penh. That decade was considered dangerous, with Khmer Rouge active on Route 4. When she first arrived in ...

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, carrying 239 passengers, disappeared into the night, never to be seen or heard from again. The incident was inexplicable. In a world defined by advanced technology and interconnectedness, how could an entire aircraft become untraceable? Had the flight been subject to a perfect hijack? And if the plane did crash, where was the wreckage? Drawing together countless eyewitness testimonies, press releases, independent investigative reports and expert opinion, de Changy offers an eloquent and deeply unnerving narrative of what happened to the missing aircraft.

Struggling to reassert control over their Indochinese colonies after World War II, the French established a huge air-land base in the valley of Dien Bien Phu. But when the opposing Vietnamese People's Army (VPA) began massing its forces against the base in late 1953, French commanders seized the opportunity to draw their elusive enemy into a decisive set-piece battle. Defending a series of fortified positions which were reliant upon a single airstrip for reinforcement and resupply, the French troops quickly discovered that they had underestimated their enemy.

Kate Webb, an Australian iconoclast, Catherine Leroy, a French daredevil photographer, and Frances FitzGerald, a blue-blood American intellectual, arrived in Vietnam with starkly different life experiences but one shared purpose: to report on the most consequential story of the decade. At a time when women were considered unfit to be foreign reporters, Frankie, Catherine, and Kate challenged the rules imposed on them by the military, ignored the belittlement of their male peers, and ultimately altered the craft of war reportage for generations.

Whether he is evoking the blind carnage of the Tet offensive, the theatrics of his fellow Americans, or the unraveling of his own illusions, Wolff brings to this work the same uncanny eye for detail, pitiless candor, and mordant wit that made This Boy's Life a modern classic.

Thailand has seen its fair share of struggles. Today, the Thai government struggles to find its place in the world, oscillating between democracy and authoritarian regimes. Even though its name translates to “Land of the Free”, it seems the country has some trouble living up to that name. This captivating guide to the Thai people and their history details the interesting events that led the country to where it is today.

In February 1945, as the US victory in the Pacific drew nearer, the Japanese army grew desperate, and its soldiers guarding U.S. and Allied POWs more sadistic. Starved, shot and beaten, many of the 2,146 prisoners of the Los Baños prison camp in the Philippines - most of them American men, women and children - would not survive much longer unless rescued soon.