Humanities and Social Sciences

History Program

Selected Works on Australia and the Vietnam War: a Supplement to Peter Cook's Bibliography

Official History

The following volumes of the official Australian Government history under the general editorship of Peter Edwards have been published in Sydney by Allen & Unwin in conjunction with the Australian War Memorial:
Peter Edwards with Gregory Pemberton, Crises and Commitments: the Politics and Diplomacy of Australia's Involvement in Southeast Asian Conflicts 1948-1965, 1992.
Ian McNeill, To Long Tan: the Australian Army and the Vietnam War 1950-1966, 1993.
Brendan O'Keefe with F. B. Smith, 'Agent Orange: the Australian Aftermath', Medicine at War: Medical Aspects of Australia's Involvement in Southeast Asian Conflicts 1950-1972, 1994.
Chris Coulthard-Clark, The RAAF in Vietnam: Australian Air Involvement in the Vietnam War 1962-1975, 1995.
Peter Edwards, A Nation at War: Australian Politics, Society and Diplomacy during the Vietnam War 1965-1975, 1997.
Jeffrey Grey, Up Top: The Royal Australian Navy and Southeast Asian Conflicts 1955-1972, 1998.
There is another volume to come on military operations 1967-1972.
Students can learn much by reading this official history alongside unofficial and more critical works such as those written or edited by Terry Burstall, Frank Frost, Ann-Mari Jordens, Peter King, Greg Langley, John Murphy, Val Noone, Greg Pemberton and Michael Sexton.

General ­ Australian

Terry Burstall, Vietnam: the Australian Dilemma, Brisbane, Queensland University Press, 1993.
Robin Gerster and Jan Bassett, Seizures of Youth: the Sixties and Australia, Melbourne, Hyland House, 1991.
Jeffrey Grey and Jeff Doyle (eds), Vietnam: War, Myth and Memory - Comparative perspectives on Australia's war in Vietnam, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1992.
Greg Langley, A Decade of Dissent: Vietnam and the conflict on the Australian home front, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1992.
Siobhan McHugh, Minefields and Miniskirts: Australian Women and the Vietnam War, Sydney, Doubleday, 1993.
John Murphy, Harvest of Fear: a history of Australia's Vietnam War, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1993.
Peter Pierce, Jeffrey Grey, Jeff Doyle (eds), Vietnam Days: Australia and the Impact of Vietnam, Ringwood, Penguin, 1991.

General ­ American

David Dellinger, Vietnam Revisited: From Covert Action to Invasion to Reconstruction, Boston, South End Press, 1986.
Gloria Emerson, Winners and Losers: Battles, Retreats, Gains, Losses and Ruins from the Vietnam War, New York, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978.
Marvin Gettleman, Jane Franklin, Marilyn Young, and H. Bruce Franklin (eds), Vietnam and America: a Documented History, New York, Grove, 1985.
Daniel Hallin, The 'Uncensored War': the Media and Vietnam, New York, Oxford University Press, 1986.
George Herring, America's Longest War: the United States and Vietnam, 1950-1975, New York, John Wiley, 1979.
George Kahin, Intervention: How America Became Involved in Vietnam, New York, Knopf, 1986.
Stanley Karnow, Vietnam: a History, Ringwood, Penguin, 1984.
Gabriel Kolko, Vietnam: Anatomy of a War 1940-1975, London, Allen & Unwin, 1986.
James Olson (ed.), Dictionary of the Vietnam War, New York, Greenwood Press, 1988.
Harry Summers, Vietnam War Almanac, New York, Facts on File Publications, 1985.

Australian Military History

Terry Burstall, The Soldiers' Story: The Battle of Xa Long Tan Vietnam, 18 August 1966, St. Lucia, University of Queensland Press, 1986.
Terry Burstall, A Soldier Returns: a Long Tan veteran discovers the other side of Vietnam, St. Lucia, University of Queensland Press, 1990.
John Dux and, P. J Young, Agent Orange: the Bitter Harvest, Sydney, Hodder & Stoughton, 1980.
Frank Frost, Australia's War in Vietnam, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1987.
Lex McAulay, The Battle of Long Tan, Melbourne, Hutchinson, 1986.
McCulloch, Jock, The Politics of Agent Orange: the Australian Experience, Melbourne, Heinemann, 1984.
There are also books on most of the units that fought in Vietnam.

Conscription

Michael Hamel-Green, 'The Resisters', in Peter King (ed.), Australia's Vietnam: Australia in the Second Indo-China War, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1983.
Garrie Hutchinson, Not Going to Vietnam: Journeys through Two Wars, Sceptre, 1999.
Ann-Mari Jordens, 'Conscription', pp. 88-89 in Graeme Aplin, S. G. Foster, and Michael McKernan, (eds), Australia: a Historical Dictionary Sydney, Fairfax Syme & Weldon, 1987.
Ann-Mari Jordens, Conscientious Objection and the Vietnam War, Canberra, Australian National University, Peace Research Centre Working Paper no. 73, 1989.
Ann-Mari Jordens, 'Conscription and dissent: the genesis of anti-war protest', pp. 60-81 in Gregory Pemberton (ed.), Vietnam Remembered, Sydney, Weldon, 1990.
Robert Scates, Draftmen Go Free: a History of the Anti-conscription Movement in Australia, Melbourne, published by the author, 1989.
Simon Towsend, 'A letter from army prison', Australian, 22 May 1968, reprinted in Henry Mayer (ed.), Australian Politics: a Second Reader, Melbourne, Cheshire, 1969.
Downdraft: a Draft Resistance Manual, Highett, Draft Resisters Union, n.d., (first edition 1971, second edition 1972).

Australian journalists in Vietnam

A number of Australian journalists have written books about Vietnam. Here is a sample which pays particular attention to the conflicting views of two internationally known ones, Wilfred Burchett and Denis Warner, both of whom wrote books about the war in that crucial year of 1965 (Morris West's novel dates from the same year). Also included are books written by Burchett and Warner after the war.
Wilfred Burchett, Vietnam: Inside Story of the Guerilla War, New York, International Publishing, 1965.
Wilfred Burchett, Grasshoppers and Elephants: Why Vietnam Fell, Melbourne, Outback Press, 1977.
[Compare David Marr's retrospective essay, 'Burchett on Vietnam', pp. 212-239 in Ben Kiernan (ed.), Burchett Reporting the Other Side of the World, London, Quartet, 1986.]
Denis Warner, The Last Confucian: Vietnam, South-East Asia and the West, Ringwood, Penguin, 1964.
Denis Warner, Not by Guns Alone, Sydney, Hutchinson, 1977.
Denis Warner, Not Always on Horseback: an Australian correspondent at war and peace in Asia 1961-1993, Allen & Unwin, 1997.
Morris West, The Ambassador, London, Heinemann, 1965.
Gerald Stone, War Without Honour, Melbourne, Jacaranda, 1966.
Ian McKay, Australians in Vietnam, Adelaide, Rigby, 1968.
Hugh Lunn, Vietnam: a Reporter's War, St. Lucia, Queensland University Press, 1985.

Religion and the Vietnam War

Val Noone, Disturbing the War: Melbourne Catholics and Vietnam, Melbourne, Spectrum, 1993.
Max Charlesworth and Val Noone, 'Christians, Vietnam and the theory of the just war', in Ken Maddock and Barry Wright (eds), War: Australia and Vietnam, Sydney, Harper & Row, 1987, pp. 148-159.
Philip Mendes, The New Left, the Jews and the Vietnam War 1965-1972, Melbourne, Lazare Press, 1993.

Background Vietnamese History

Three books by Australian-based authors are helpful in understanding the beginning stages of the Vietnam War:

Greg Lockhart, Nation in Arms: the Origins of the People's Army of Vietnam, Sydney, Asian Studies Assocation of Australia with Allen & Unwin, 1989.
Carlyle Thayer, War by other Means: National Liberation and Revolution in Viet-Nam 1954-60, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1989.
David Marr, Vietnam 1945: the Quest for Power, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1995.