General Giap is one of those people whose influence on specific events warrants an extensive and engaging conversation. James Warren's book attempts just such a conversation, but alas, much of the story is dense and left with gaping holes. The latter flaw is somewhat excusable as sources for Giap's life are sometimes sparse. Still, the book is approachable, but temper expectations. Recommended for readers looking for information on Giap, or with an interest in learning more about key players in the conflicts in the region.

This will be a brief review as I am currently deployed and the internet connection here is shoddy, at best. I will attempt to update it upon my return. This book was a fairly entertaining read; it attempts to cover an expansive series of events and, as is mentioned by some of the other reviewers, tends to come up a little short. The book is just too short to accurately and adequately cover all of the nuance that it attempts to. It is an entertaining read though, and I would recommend others read it. ( )

Giap: The General Who defeated America in Vietnam by James A. Warren is a chronlogic history of Giap who, with Ho Chi Min and others, defeated both France and the United States in Vietnam. Giap was educated in the best schools of Vietnam. He was an ardent revolutionary and wanted to rid his country of the colonial masters who had been bleeding the country dry. He was a Communist and hewed to the doctrines of Mao Tse Tung, but adapted those doctrines to the realities of Vietnam.

Those realities were first the nation was a colony of France and his initial drive was to remove that nation from power in Vetnam. He began slowly and had several defeats while working towards the final battle of Dien Bien Phu, which for all practical purposes ended the French hold in Indochina. However, at the same time time the United States was becoming embroiled in Vietnam for different reasons. Those reasons were to prevent a communist party takeover of Vietnam - the "domino theory."

Giap continued the fight with development of his army and myriad other methods to disrupt the South Vietnamese govenment. His outstanding ability to be patient and to see that the war could be fought in other places besides the battlefield - especially the eye to disruption of both French and American societies leading eventualy to withdrawal of the forces of those nations. The book dicusses both Giap's failings and his successes as well as the failings of the French and Americans in the war(s) for Vietnam.

I found the writing to be quite "dense" at times with the use of acronyms which I had to constantly review in my memory to keep up with who was doing what. The paucity of data from the vietnamese standpoint limits the book. I give it three stars ( )

The book unsuccessfully attempts to cover the period of 1942 to 1975 in a mere 218 pages covering a biography of General Giap. While it was worth reading, it just was not satisfying. Many locations mentioned in the text are not reflected in the accompanying maps. It is a decent overview of Giap's general military strategy.
But I, also, will wait for a multi-volume set to properly set forth Giap's biography.
The book masquerades as a biography but is really a short history of two major military conflicts in Vietnam. ----- one French, the other American. ( )

Giap, by James Warren, is a brief biography of General Giap, one of the master-minds behind the French & American defeats in Viet Nam. Warren's book is informative, if brief, mainly due to the scarcity of specific information from Communist sources. Giap, even though mostly self-taught, was able to adapt the strategies of Mao to the sous toon in Viet Nam. Extremely patient, ruthless and intelligent, he was able to out-perform, outlast, and outright defeat, the French and Americans.

Giap is a well written book, offering insight into one of the principal architects of the Communist visitors in Viet Nam. The fact that it focuses on the Vietnamese point of view of the conflict makes it an even more valuable addition to the scholarship on this subject. Definitely recommended for anyone interested in learning something new about the Viet Nam war. ( )