Cornell University historian Fredrik Logevall discusses the origins of America’s least popular war, beginning with the 1919 Versailles Peace Conference that ended World War I, continuing through a half century of French rule, and on to America’s involvement in Vietnam. It’s a story of political, military, and diplomatic maneuvering and miscalculation.
Logevall is John S. Knight professor of international studies at Cornell University. Among his books are America’s Cold War: The Politics of Insecurity, and Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived.