The Father of All Things

In April 1975, as Saigon fell to the North Vietnamese Army, former Marine officer John Bissell was glued to his television, racked with anguish and horror as his country abandoned a cause for which so many of his friends had died. This book is his son Tom's reckoning with the Vietnam War and its impact on his father, his country, and Vietnam itself. Bissell also explores the many debates about the war, and shows how the war has continued to influence American views on foreign policy more than thirty years later. At the heart of the book is John and Tom Bissell's journey back to Vietnam. As they travel the country and talk to Vietnamese veterans, we relive the war as John Bissell experienced it, visit the site of his near-fatal wounding, and hear him explain how Vietnam shaped him and so many of his generation.--From publisher description.