Phoenix and the Birds of Prey

Counterinsurgency and Counterterrorism in Vietnam

Mark Moyar

Foreword by Harry G. Summers Jr.

With a new preface and chapter by the author

496 pages
36 photos, 3 maps, 2 tables

Paperback

December 2007

978-0-8032-1602-0

$27.95 Add to Cart

eBook (EPUB)

Ebook purchases delivered via Leaf e-Reader

January 2022

978-1-4962-0389-2

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about author bio praise table of contents media awards

About the Book

This study explodes prevailing myths about the Phoenix Program, the CIA's top-secret effort to destroy the Viet Cong by neutralizing its “civilian” leaders. Drawing on recently declassified documents and interviews with American, South Vietnamese, and North Vietnamese sources, Mark Moyar examines the attempts to eradicate the Viet Cong infrastructure and analyzes their effectiveness. He addresses misconceptions about these efforts and provides an accurate, complete picture of the allies’ decapitation of the Viet Cong shadow government.

Combining social and political history with a study of military operations, Moyar offers a fresh interpretation of the crucial role the shadow government played in the Viet Cong's ascent. Detailed accounts of intelligence operations provide an insider’s view of their development and reveal what really happened in the safe havens of the Viet Cong. Filled with new information, Moyar’s study sets the record straight about one of the last secrets of the Vietnam War and offers poignant lessons for dealing with future Third World insurgencies. This Bison Books edition includes a new preface and chapter by the author.

Author Bio

Mark Moyar is an associate professor at the U.S. Marine Corps University in Quantico, Virginia, and the author of Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War, 1954–1965. Harry G. Summers Jr. (1932–99) served in both the Korean War and the Vietnam War and was an instructor and distinguished fellow at the Strategic Studies Institute at the U.S. Army War College.

Praise

“A groundbreaking piece of revisionist history on the war.”—Senator James Webb, Wall Street Journal

“Phoenix and the Birds of Prey is the definitive work on the Phoenix program to date, and will remain so for a long time.”—Periscope

“There are as yet only a few nonfiction works dealing with the Vietnam War that are worth the reader’s time. . . . We can happily add Mark Moyar's Phoenix and the Birds of Prey to this short list of ‘required reading.’”— John D. Waghelstein, Journal of Political and Military Sociology

“[Moyar] succeeds admirably. His work could be a textbook for the do's and don'ts of counterinsurgency warfare.”—William Nester, Asian Thought and Society

"At last! An intellectually and academically honest overview of the Phoenix Program. Moyar has balanced both the military and social historical perspectives and dealt fairly with all factions—American and Vietnamese, non-Communist and Communist, northern and southern—to give the reader the first full and sensible accounting of the Phoenix."—John M. Del Vecchio, author of The 13th Valley

"A fascinating, readable, long overdue exposition of the war in the shadows behind the big unit war in Vietnam."—Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore, author of We Were Soldiers Once..and Young

"Mark Moyar's well-researched book will likely become a frequently cited reference. He addresses one of the least understood and least documented aspects of the Vietnam conflict with clarity and objectivity. Unlike the plethora of 'I was there' narratives and the histories that end with Tet of 1968, Moyar's book follows the conflict from beginning to end pointing out how changes in strategy, operations, and tactics impacted upon the campaign against the Viet Cong infrastructure."—Lt. Gen. James Terry Scott, Director, National Security Program

"Phoenix and the Birds of Prey elevates Mark Moyar to the ranks of the rare scholars who truly understand the Vietnam War and its warriors."—Lt. Col. Michael Lee Lanning, author of Inside the LRRPs

"Moyar's examination and assessments of the struggle against the Communist shadow government in South Vietnam are fresh and, in my view, right on the mark. His book warrants serious consideration by all scholars of the Vietnam War, as well as those who would apply the 'lessons' of that war to future American involvements."—Prof. James R. Reckner, Director Study of Vietnam Conference, Texas Tech University

Preface to the Bison Books Edition

Foreword, by Col. Harry G. Summers, Jr., USA (Ret.)

Preface

Acknowledgments

PART ONE ORIGINS

1 Vietnam at War: Before Phoenix

2 The Shadow Government and the Viet Cong

3 The Shadow Government and the People

4 The War against the Shadow Government: Before Phoenix

5 The New Attack on the Shadow Government

PART TWO INTELLIGENCE

6 Targets

7 Informants and Agents

8 Prisoners: Interrogation, Torture, and Execution

9 Ralliers, Documents, and Photographs

10 Misinformation

PART THREE COORDINATION

11 The Challenge: Phoenix Centers

12 Attempts to Make Phoenix and Phung Hoang Work

13 Other Intelligence and Operations Coordination

PART FOUR OPERATIONS

14 The Nature of Operations

15 The Birds of Prey

16 The South Vietnamese

17 The Americans

18 Neutralization of Non-Communist Civilians

19 Assassinations

PART FIVE DAMAGE INFLICTED ON THE SHADOW GOVERNMENT

20 Neutralization Statistics

21 Actual Viet Cong Cadre Losses

22 Additional Setbacks for the Shadow Government

23 The Shadow Government in Decline

PART SIX VILLAGER ATTITUDES

24 Abuse of the Population

25 Changing Attitudes

26 The Impact of the New Attitudes

PART SEVEN POSTLUDE

27 Theories of Revolutionary Warfare

28 Reflections

29 Lessons Learned

Glossary

Notes

Selected Bibliography

Index

Phoenix and the Birds of Prey

Counterinsurgency and Counterterrorism in Vietnam

About the Book

Author Bio

Praise

Table of Contents

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