The Tet Offensive

by William Thomas Allison

With Americans turning against the war in ever greater numbers, struggles for power between the government and the military, and no end in sight to the fighting, the Tet Offensive of 1968 proved to be the turning point of the Vietnam War. In The Tet Offensive , historian William Thomas Allison provides a clear, concise overview of the major events and issues surrounding the Tet Offensive, and compiles carefully selected primary sources to illustrate the complex military, political, and public decisions that made up Tet. The Tet Offensive is composed of two an accessible, well-illustrated narrative overview, and a collection of core primary source documents. Throughout the narrative, historiographic questions are addressed within the text to highlight discussion among historians over pivotal points of debate. The objectively selected documents provide students with raw material from which to gain insight into these events through their own analysis, and to improve their ability to discuss and understand the importance of historical scholarship. Approachable and insightful, The Tet Offensive is not only a great introduction to reading history through primary sources, it is an essential tool for understanding what made the Tet Offensive such an important turning point of the Vietnam War.

288 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2008

About the author

William Thomas "Bill" Allison is Professor of Military History at Georgia Southern University, joining the faculty there in 2008 and serving as Chair of the Department of History from 2008 to 2010. He earned his Ph.D. in history at Bowling Green State University in 1995, then taught at the University of Saint Francis before joining the History Department at Weber State University from 1999-2008. During the 2002-2003 academic year, he was Visiting Professor in the Department Strategy and International Security at the USAF Air War College and he was Visiting Professor of Military History at the USAF School for Advanced Air and Space Studies from 2010-2011. He is currently the General Harold K. Johnson Visiting Chair in Military History at the US Army War College.

He is author of The Gulf War (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), My Lai: An American Atrocity in the Vietnam War (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), Military Justice in Vietnam: The Rule of Law in an American War (University Press of Kansas, 2007), The Tet Offensive (Routledge, 2008), among other works. He has presented papers and lectured at numerous conferences and universities, including Oxford, Cambridge, and the Australian Defence Force Academy. He is active in the Society for Military History and has served on the editorial board of the Journal of Military History. He has also served as a member of the Department of the Army Historical Advisory Committee.

A native of Texas, he lives in Spartanburg, South Carolina, with his wife Jennifer and black lab Moose.