Analogies at War: Korea, Munich, Dien Bien Phu, and the Vietnam Decisions of 1965 / Edition 1

by Yuen Foong Khong

Overview

From World War I to Operation Desert Storm, American policymakers have repeatedly invoked the "lessons of history" as they contemplated taking their nation to war. Do these historical analogies actually shape policy, or are they primarily tools of political justification? Yuen Foong Khong argues that leaders use analogies not merely to justify policies but also to perform specific cognitive and information-processing tasks essential to political decision-making. Khong identifies what these tasks are and shows how they can be used to explain the U.S. decision to intervene in Vietnam. Relying on interviews with senior officials and on recently declassified documents, the author demonstrates with a precision not attained by previous studies that the three most important analogies of the Vietnam era—Korea, Munich, and Dien Bien Phu—can account for America's Vietnam choices. A special contribution is the author's use of cognitive social psychology to support his argument about how humans analogize and to explain why policymakers often use analogies poorly.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691025353
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	05/05/1992
Series:	Princeton Paperbacks Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Tables
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Pt. I	The Argument
Ch. 1	Analogical Reasoning in Foreign Affairs: Two Views	3
Ch. 2	The AE Framework	19
Ch. 3	America's Vietnam Options	47
Pt. II	The Cases
Ch. 4	Containment, Analogies, and the Pre-1965 Vietnam Decisions	71
Ch. 5	Korea	97
Ch. 6	Dien Bien Phu	148
Ch. 7	Munich and the 1930s	174
Pt. III	The Implications
Ch. 8	The Psychology of Analogical Reasoning	209
Ch. 9	Conclusion	251
Bibliography	265
Index	279

Editorial Reviews

Khong's interviews and newly declassified documents make a compelling case the American decision-makers in 1965 used historical analogies not only to justify decisions but to make them, most notably in the process of rejecting options.

Foreign Affairs

One of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 1993

From the Publisher