Biographical Books on Vietnam War

SAILORS TO THE END The Deadly Fire on the USS FORRESTAL and the Heroes Who Fought It Gregory A. Freeman @2003 On 29 Jul 1967 in the Tonkin Gulf off the coast of Vietnam, the USS FORRESTAL, burst into flames. A rocket is accidentally fired on deck striking a plane. A bomb falls to the deck and 90 seconds later explodes killing the trained fire fighters rushing to put the fire out. 134 men die. Indexed. List of dead. Map. Pictures. Notes.

SCREAM OF EAGLES
The Dramatic Account of the U.S. Navy's
TOP GUN Fighter Pilots
How They took Back The Skies Over Vietnam
Robert K. Wilcox
@1992

In the darkest days of the Vietnam War, when the U.S. Navy's kill ratio dropped to a deadly 2:1, battle hardened fighter pilots formed the Fighter Weapons School known as TOP GUN.

No index, personal pictures, glossary

THE SEIGE OF KHE SANH: An Oral History Eric Hammel 1990 Wave upon wave of massive attacks had nearly wiped out th 26th Marines' defensive positions at Khe Sanh. Two divisions of crack NVA troops surrounded the hill, and the Marines were being pounded with mortars, rockets, and artillery in one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the war: Khe Sanh. Here are the first-person accounts of the men who fought and survived that terrifying siege.... Description from book Book is indexed. No pictures but has maps and documentation. Each chapter is full of first-hand accounts by many many men

SEALS UDT/SEAL Operations in Vietnam T.L. Bosiljevac @1990 From the front of book... "Makes "Rambo" seem like a harlequin romance." index, large appendix with notes and glossary

The Second Indochina War A Short Political and Military History, 1954-1975 William S. Turley @1987 From the front of book... "Makes "Rambo" seem like a harlequin romance." index, large appendix with notes and glossary

THE SEIGE OF KHE SANH: An Oral History Eric Hammel 1990 Wave upon wave of massive attacks had nearly wiped out th 26th Marines' defensive positions at Khe Sanh. Two divisions of crack NVA troops surrounded the hill, and the Marines were being pounded with mortars, rockets, and artillery in one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the war: Khe Sanh. Here are the first-person accounts of the men who fought and survived that terrifying siege.... Description from book Book is indexed. No pictures but has maps and documentation. Each chapter is full of first-hand accounts by many many men

SEVEN FIREFIGHTS IN VIETNAM John A. Cash, John Albright and Allan W. Sandstrum illustrated by Greg Beecham These accounts are based upon official U.S. Army records - daily journals, journal files and action reports. The illustrations are dramatic and add to the records Indexed. Glossary. Ink illustrations

SHADOW WARRIOR Felix I. Rodriguez and John Weisman 1990 Personal Narrative of Felix Rodriguez a real-life CIA foot soldier whose career spanned from the 1961-1988 and saw it all Indexed. Photographs

SHALLOW GRAVES
Two Women and Vietnam
Wendy Wilder Larsen and Tran Thi Nga
@ 1986

1970 An American civilian teachers view of Vietnam and the story of a Vietnamese female officer worker. Written as short poems.

No index, Glossary. Vietnamese historical timeline

SHRAPNEL IN THE HEART
Letters and Remembrances from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
Laura Palmer
@ 1987

Published in 1987 Laura Palmer's book has indepth biographies of men who died in service in Vietnam... including remembrances and family stories. Palmer was a news reporter covering the war and her knowledge and compassion are very apparent

No index, book has portrait shots of the men listed

THE SIEGE AT HUE George W. Smith 2000 31 Jan 1968. The Tet Offensive. 36 major South Vietnamese cities and towns are attacked at the same time. Day-to-day record of the fight to liberate Hue. Indexed. Photographs and maps

SILENCE WAS A WEAPON The Vietnam War in the Villages Stuart A. Herrington @1982 These are the recollections of one American intelligence advisor, whose job was to root out the Vietcong from the villages of rural Hau Nghia province. index, large appendix with notes and glossary

SIX SILENT MEN 101st LRP/Rangers Book one Reynel Martinez 1997 1965 Thirty-two men were selected for the infant LRRP Detachment of the 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division. Old=timers called it the suicide unit. No index. Pictures. Glossary.

SIX SILENT MEN F Long Range Patrol 58 101st LRP/Ranger Book two Kenn Miller 1997 1967. The elite 1st Brigade LRRPs of the 101st Airborne Division become F Co., 58th Infantry...they continue the deadly, daring LRRP tradition. description from book No index. No pictures.

SIX SILENT MEN 101st LRP/Rangers Book three Gary A. Linderer 1997 1969 Based on Linderer on personal experience and extensive interviews with other combat vets of the 101st's Lurp companies...final chapter. Pictures of Roy Reynolds and Keith Hammond both KIA No index. Pictures. Glossary.

SLOW BURN Orrin De Forest and David Chanoff @1991 "In Vietnam, Orrin DeForest was a legendary CIA man who put together an unmatched network of spies, counterspies, defectors and informants to penetrate the inner workings and tactical patterns of the Vietcong." index and glossary

SMALL UNIT ACTION IN VIETNAM
Summer 1966
Captain Francis J. West Jr., USMCR
@ 1967

(Small Unit Action in Vietnam Summer 1966) Was Originally published as a strategic training manual, this remarkable and moving document is an authentic eyewitness account of nine separate actions at the company and battalion level. description from the book

No Index. Chapters are the different unit actions, including unit name, date, location.

Book has pictures and maps.

SNAKE DRIVER! Cobras in Vietnam
A gritty true account of Vietnam combat from the men who flew the AHG-1 Cobras through hell and back...
Bob Rosenburgh
Ivy Books, New York, @ 1993

    The Cobra was a new class of weapons system - the attack helicopter. Long and lean and only thirty-six inches wide, it moved like a shot, carrying the most firepower of any helicopter on earth. A single Cobra armed with seventy-six rockets --each with seventeen-pound warheads -- was the equivalent of an entire howitzer battery.
    This is the saga of the Cobra, its development and introduction into Vietnam during the summer of '67, and the stories of the men who flew it. For a Cobra pilot - a Snake Driver - every launch meant he was going headlong into combat. As key providers of fire support, Snake Drivers always had missions
    description taken from back of book

No index lots of photos and illustrations done by the author

A SNIPER IN THE ARIZONA
2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, in the Arizona Territory, 1946
John J. Culbertson
@ 1999

Culbertson's second book. He served with the 2/5, 1st Marine Div., at An Hoa, from December 1966 to July 1967. He served as a Marine Rifleman, MOS 0311, on Operation Tuscaloosa. He completed 1st Mar Div Sniper School in Da Nang, where he earned the secondary MOS 8541. He was wounded in action and earned three Purple Hearts. He alwo was awarded the Combat Action Ribbon, Presidential Unit Citation, Navy Unit Commendation, Meritorious Unit Commendation, Vietnam Cross of Gallantry with Palm, Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal, and Multiple expert rifleman badges. description from his book No Index. Book has pictures and citation documentation for Captain James A. Graham's Medal of Honor.

SOG The Secret Wars of America's Commandos in Vietnam John L. Plaster @1997 "Code-named the Studies and Observations Group, SOG was the most secret elite U.S. military unit to serve in the Vietnam War - so secret its very existence was denied by the government." Extensive list of interviews. Index and glossary

SON THANG An American War Crime Eric Hammel 1990 On a moonlit night in February 1970, a "killer team" of five young Marines was on patrol deep within Viet Cong - controlled territory southwest of Da Nang. Before that night was over, sixteen unarmed women and children, in the small hamlet of Son Thang-4 were slaughtered, and five young Marines faced courts-martial for premeditated murder. description from book Book is indexed with pictures, maps, and documentation. ... The book's index has been extracted for individual soldiers, fire bases, units and etc. and placed online at online index . View the complete index pages for this book which contains much more information than the extracted online version

SOUL PATROL Ed Emanuel @2003 When Ed Emanuel was handpicked for the first African American special operations LRRP team in Vietnam, he knew his six-man team couldn't have asked for a tougher proving ground than Cu Chi in the summer of 1968 In Memorial

SPECIAL MEN A LRP's Recollections Dennis Foley @1994 "In 1965 and 1966, the important lessons of combat had to be learned the hard way - on the job No Index.

SPECIAL MEN AND SPECIAL MISSIONS Inside American Special Operations Forces 1945 to the Present Joel Nadel with J. R. Wright Book is indexed.

STEEL MY SOLDIERS' HEARTS the Hopeless to Hardcore Transformation of U.S. Army, 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry, Vietnam Col David H. Hackworth and Eilhys England. 1969. Hackworth had completed the writing of a tactical handbook for the Pentagon, he was ordered to put his counterguerilla-fighting teories into action using the 4/39th - a battalion of draftees who had suffered the Army's highest casualty rate. Indexed. Pictures. Glossary

STOLEN VALOR How the Vietnam Generation Was Robbed of its Heroes and its History B. G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley 1998 Burkett, in over ten years of research in the National Archives, filing hundreds of requests for military documents under the Freedom of Information Act, uncovered a massive distortion of history, a distorion than has cost the U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars. Mr. Burkett's work has toppled national political leaders and put criminals in jail. from book Personal opinion of DAB... there are men who live bogus lives of heroism, who have claimed rights and honors they are not entitled to. Burkett has made it a mission to expose these men. Homeless men, Vietnam historians and authors, actors, professors, Congressmen. He writes about them and he sees them prosecuted. Book is indexed. Personal photographs and Identify photos of Vietnam phoneys

THE STORY OF VIETNAM A Background Book on the War in Southeast Asia (Revised edition) Hal Dareff @1971 The first edition was written 1966...this edition was published 1971. Textbook type book with definite political lean. Indexed.

SUMMONS OF THE TRUMPET A History of the Vietnam War From a Military Man's Viewpoint Dave Richard Palmer @1990 The Story of America's involvement in Vietnam- why we entered, what we did, and how we left. Indexed.

SURVIVORS Zalin Grant @1985 The story of nine fighting men taken captive. No Index