The Heroic Leader and the Better War from Vietnam to Afghanistan - War on the Rocks

"While Sorley reflects on the way the war shifted form under Abrams’ command, he never reflects on the way it might have shifted before Abrams arrived. Abrams’ ability to avoid “the big unit war” and focus on small unit patrols was surely aided by the fact that the North Vietnamese were reluctant to engage in big-unit fighting for quite some time after having been decimated in the Tet Offensive. Sorley is in the awkward position of having written a biography of a victorious general in a war the United States lost. Sorley begins his thirteenth chapter – entitled “Victory” – with the claim that, “there came a time when the war was won. The fighting wasn’t over, but the war was won.” For Sorley, there is no causal connection between the eventual loss of the war and the actions of the general who led it for the five years leading up to the end."