
The Road Not Taken
Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam
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Narrated by:
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Henry Strozier
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By:
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Max Boot
In chronicling the adventurous life of legendary CIA operative Edward Lansdale, The Road Not Taken definitively reframes our understanding of the Vietnam War. In this epic biography of Edward Lansdale (1908-1987), the man said to be the fictional model for Graham Greene's The Quiet American, best-selling historian Max Boot demonstrates how Lansdale pioneered a "hearts and mind" diplomacy, first in the Philippines, then in Vietnam. It was a visionary policy that, as Boot reveals, was ultimately crushed by America's giant military bureaucracy, steered by elitist generals and blueblood diplomats who favored troop build-ups and napalm bombs over winning the trust of the people.
Through dozens of interviews and access to never before-seen documents - including long-hidden love letters - Boot recasts this cautionary American story, tracing the bold rise and the crashing fall of the roguish "T. E. Lawrence of Asia" from the battle of Dien Bien Phu to the humiliating American evacuation in 1975.
Bringing a tragic complexity to this so-called "ugly American", this "engrossing biography" (Karl Marlantes) rescues Lansdale from historical ignominy and suggests that Vietnam could have been different had we only listened. With reverberations that continue to play out in Iraq and Afghanistan, The Road Not Taken is a biography of profound historical consequence.
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Highly recommended for historians and practitioners in the intel, diplomacy, and military agencies.
Fascinating subject
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The narrator is slowwwww. I ended up running the book at 1.25x to avoid nodding off. Worse, the reader mispronounces acumen, patina and forte. Each of these words are used several times in the narrative and mispronounced words are a distraction.
A Disappointment on Several Counts
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Lansdale is now my forgotten hero.
piecing it together
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Text is somewhat redundant with a lot of back and forth on events. The early boo gets the book off to a slow start.
Hearts and Minds
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Excellent and detailed work
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Learn, Like, Listen. what could go wrong?
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What I really enjoyed was that at least 6 hours of the book surprisingly dealt with the Philippines and not only Vietnam and I was very interested in learning the history I thought I knew from letting it pass through the story of this one man and along the way, picking up mini biographies on countless names, known and lesser known, who have created the world we live in.
Slow start. The rest is an amazing tale.
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A truly great statesman
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Nobody is Perfect
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What made the experience of listening to The Road Not Taken the most enjoyable?
The story is very interesting and really holds your attention.What was one of the most memorable moments of The Road Not Taken?
The eye-opening factsWhat didn’t you like about Henry Strozier’s performance?
Wow - talk about bad pronunciations just terribleWas there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
all of itGreat book, awesome author, terrible pronunciation
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