Vietnam: Peasant Land, Peasant Revolution : Patriarchy and Collectivity in the Rural Economy

On the tenth anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War, the US Secretary of State George Shultz stated, 'Our goals in Central America are like those we had in Vietnam.' Others have also noticed the many similarities between the US political, economic and military interventions in Vietnam in the 1960s and in Central America in the 1980s. Even some of the details of interventionary policy are the same. Roy Prosterman from Washington State University, for example, wrote the land-to-the-tiller laws for both Vietnam and El Salvador. Because of the current US involvement in Central America, there is renewed interest in understanding issues raised by American intervention in Vietnam in the 1960s and 1970s. Americans are continuing to be concerned about what happened in Vietnam, why we failed (probably because the USA failed) and what has happened there since the US involvement.