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Episode 2803 of the Vietnam Veteran News Podcast will feature a discussion about the book Diplomats at War. The author Charles Trueheart, Andy Pham’s and notable author Mark Selverstone will provide an in depth review of this book about the early days of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.
Charles Trueheart (born September 5, 1951) is an American writer and former newspaper correspondent and non-profit executive. He was a reporter for The Washington Post from 1986 to 2000 and director of the American Library in Paris from 2007 to 2017. His book on Vietnam during the Kennedy years, Diplomats at War, was published in 2024.
Before it spread into a tragic war that defined a generation, the conflict in Vietnam smoldered as a guerrilla insurgency and a diplomatic nightmare. Into this volatile country stepped Frederick “Fritz” Nolting, the US ambassador, and his second-in-command, William “Bill” Trueheart, immortalized in David Halberstam’s landmark work The Best and the Brightest and accidental players in a pivotal juncture in modern US history.
The book embeds the reader at the US embassy and dissects the fateful rift between Nolting and Trueheart over their divergent assessments of the South Vietnamese regime under Ngo Dinh Diem, who would ultimately be assassinated in a coup backed by the United States.
Charles Trueheart retells the story of the United States’ headlong plunge into war from an entirely new vantage point—that of a son piecing together how his father and godfather participated in, and were deeply damaged by, this historic flashpoint. Their critical rupture, which also destroyed their close friendship, served as a dramatic preface to the United States’ disastrous involvement in the Vietnam conflict.
Listen to episode 2803 and discover more about the book Diplomats at War. The author Charles Trueheart , Andy Pham’s and notable author Mark Selverstone will provide an in depth review of this book about the early days of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.
