1. Reflecting on Vietnam: A Young Diplomat goes to War
- Author:
- Allen Keiswetter
- Publication Date:
- 01-2017
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- American Diplomacy
- Institution:
- American Diplomacy
- Abstract:
- I knew Vietnam would be my first tour when I joined the US Foreign Service fifty years ago this coming June at age 23. I served there for 18 months (April 1968 to October 1969) as part of Civilian Operations for Revolutionary Development Support. Known as CORDS, it was a US civilian military organization assisting South Vietnamese pacification programs.I had an uneasy beginning; things both at home and in Vietnam seemed to be unravelling. The Tet offensive in early 1968 delayed my departure from Washington for two months. En route, I transited Honolulu where I saw LBJ on TV in the airport lounge announcing that he was not going to run for reelection. On arrival in Saigon, I learned that Martin Luther King had been assassinated and that rioting was rocking Washington D.C.
- Topic:
- Diplomacy, War, and Memoir
- Political Geography:
- South Asia, Vietnam, and United States of America