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REVIEW
Topical Review
The surface naval actions off the coast Vietnam beginning in April 1972 and lasting until the cease-fire in January 1973 are virtually nonexistent in histories of the Indochina War. The best of the recent histories written about the Easter Offensive, America’s Last Vietnam Battle: Halting Hanoi’s 1972 Easter Offensive by Dale Andrade <http://www.kansaspress.ku.edu/andame.html>, contains no material on the naval surface actions against the North. Even the U.S. Navy’s own history of naval combat in Vietnam, By Sea, Air, and Land: An Illustrated History of the U.S. Navy and the War in Southeast Asia by Edward J. Marolda, has only passing references to the surface actions with most of the emphasis going to the mining and air battles <http://www.history.navy.mil/seairland/chap4.htm>. A search by the specific operation names for strikes north of the DMZ during this period (Operation Freedom Train, April 1972, Linebacker I, May – November 1972, and Linebacker II, December 1972) only turns up references to the air campaign. Most of the on-line sources available are essays and monographs held by the U.S. Air Forces’ Air University in Montgomery, Alabama <http://www.au.af.mil/au/aul/school/sncoa/line.htm>. The only documents in the Vietnam Archive at Texas Tech, <http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/>, is a declassified operational history of the mining prepared for the naval staff.
I believe the principle reason for the lack of open source material on the naval actions is that the operational archives have yet to be completely declassified. This can hamper the efforts of the professional historian since it leaves only those sections of the oral history collections maintained by the U.S. Naval Institute and the Navy Historical Center that deal with this period. The only other source available is the recollections of the individuals who participated in the events. This is not the most popular source for military historians. They prefer to deal with battle history from the viewpoint of the decision makers and leaders not from that of the private in the foxhole. While the bottom up approach was pioneered by Brigadier General Marshall of the U.S. Army History Branch during World War Two, it has only recently become an approach adopted by military historians at large.
Web Review
There exists a sizable group of naval enthusiasts who use the web for various purposes. In my first assignment for this class I used one of these sites <http://www.combinedfleet.com/kaigun.htm>. This is an example of amateur historians collaborating to arrive at answers to technical questions, i.e. which of four Japanese carriers sunk during the Battle of Midway was found by the U.S. Navy Oceanographic expedition in 1999. These sites also serve as on-line technical references for the ships, aircraft and weapons used by navies during various time periods.
Another similar site is the Haze Gray and Underway site <http://www.hazegray.org/>. This site operates as an adjunct to the sci.military.naval discussion group. Its main concern is with archiving photographs of navies and with shipbuilding. While this and other similar sites focus on technical issues it should be remembered that navies are the most technical of military services. The engineers build a homing torpedo and deliver it to the fleet. If the officers in the fleet are going to use that weapon to its maximum effectiveness they need to know every technical detail about its guidance and propulsion. Similarly you want to know as much as possible about the opposition’s weapons to identify weaknesses that can be exploited to keep them from working correctly. The people who run and frequent these sites will be of use to this project.
A different type of enthusiasts are interested in historic battles and have put up sites dedicated to this fights. An excellent example of this type is the Battle off Samar Island site <http://www.bosamar.com/home.html>. This site was started in 1996 as a remembrance site for the Webmaster’s great-uncle who served on one of the escort carriers sunk in the battle. His experience with this site is that shortly after he put it on the web he began receiving correspondence from survivors of the battle several of whom sent pictures from private collections of the battle. Over the years this site has become a focal point for the several survivor associations. This site is funded solely by the Webmaster augmented by any contributions he can collect. He has move servers three times so far but is committed to keeping the site up and with it the photographic archive it contains. What this site demonstrates is that “if you build it they will come.”
A second category of web site of interest here is the ship association site. These sites are very active and are serving to preserve the sense of community that members of a ship’s company develop from serving together in close quarters for months on end. Earlier in this proposal I presented two first hand accounts of the Battle off Dong Hoi here now are the ships sites for the four ships present at that battle: USS Oklahoma City (CLG-5) <http://www.ussokcity.com/>; USS Sterret (DLG-31) <http://www.sterett.org/>; USS Higbee (DD-806) <http://www.usshigbee.com/>; and USS Lloyd Thomas (DD-764) <http://www.angelfire.com/hi2/DD764/>.
These ship association sites are have an active membership. Note that with the Oklahoma City site the association includes crew members from the World War Two ear light cruiser, the Cold War Era guided missile cruiser, and the current day attack submarine. A major activity of these associations is periodic reunions as well as the age old nautical tradition of swapping lies and sea stories. These association sites are where many of the first hand accounts of these actions that currently exist reside. They are the ideal place to advertise this proposed site and solicit new narratives.