The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam

The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam

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Editorial Reviews

Twice a winner of the Pulitzer Prize, author Barbara Tuchman now tackles the pervasive presence of folly in governments through the ages. Defining folly as the pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own interersts, despite the availability of feasible alternatives, Tuchman details four decisive turning points in history that illustrate the very heights of folly in government: the Trojan War, the breakup of the Holy See provoked by the Renaissance Popes, the loss of the American colonies by Britain's George III, and the United States' persistent folly in Vietnam. THE MARCH OF FOLLY brings the people, places, and events of history magnificently alive for today's reader.

Customer Reviews

Barbara Tuchman's Viet Nam book

Reviewed by Solomon, 2009-12-30

About the book:
This is Barbara Tuchman's book on the Viet Nam book, although this is only hinted at in the title. The book begins with an interesting chapter that defines folly, as a policy in that is contrary to self-interest. The next chapter is on the wooden horse of the Trojan War, and why the Trojan's, contrary to their self- interest and with many warnings, took it into the city and precipitated their doom. This chapter is meant to focus on the idea that to be truly folly there must be a rational different choice (in this case not to take the horse into the city or at least to see what was inside of it). It also focuses on another idea that true folly is something that is clearly warned against, but that these warnings are unheeded.

The book then has two multi-chapter sections; one on the Renaissance Popes and the other on the British loss of America. The Renaissance chapter shows the papacy as an organization that was not focused on Christianity; rather these Popes were more focused on gaining power, personal aggrandizement and the use of the papacy to promote family interests. There was a sense that the church was too strong to fail so no changes were made in spite if many calls for change. The American Revolution section focused on the folly of British policy towards America. Again many voices were raised in opposition to these policies, but they were not heeded because of a complete lack of understanding of the colonists and the situation existing in the colonies, the feeling that victory was inevitable, and finally a complete lack of understanding that it was impossible to sustain what were shown to be misguided policies.

The preceding is, in my opinion, mostly supporting material for the last section (occupying about 40% of the book), which deals with the American involvement in Viet Nam. (I am using involvement instead of war because the section starts before America started fighting and ended after almost all the American troops had left.) Being written in 1985, only 12 years after the end of this involvement, it is largely colored by the passion that this conflict generated. History has become somewhat more nuanced since then, but the overwhelming opinion still supports her contention that American policy was one of folly, as defined by the preceding chapters of the book.

My opinion:
This is not Barbara Tuchman's best book. I do not think that it is on the same level as "The Guns of August", but few book are. In my opinion, while interesting, the Renaissance and American Revolution sections suffer because they provide a lot of detail, but do not provide a complete picture of these events. They were not meant to be comprehensive, but were only to highlight aspects of folly. Unfortunately, in my opinion, much more detail was provided than was necessary. I feel that this was a case where more was definitely less in that the concentration on details, some of which I felt were extraneous and detracted from the overall thesis of the book. Instead of being about 100 pages each, I think that these sections would have been better, more focused, if they were only about 20 pages. As it is, I felt that things were a bit repetitive and after a while I found myself racing through these sections, and this caused me to give the book four stars instead of five. I would have preferred more examples relating to different events. More importantly, the detail provided in these sections tended to focus me onto the specifics of events, rather than on the general question of folly. The same is true, only more so, of the Viet Nam chapters.

This book has a lot to teach us about folly and why governments and people support folly, but I would have liked more examples and more general discussion. I fear that focusing on only a few examples and mostly on one in particular, gives one the false impression that folly is limited and can be avoided. Folly did not end with Viet Nam, nor is it limited to the policies of any one nation; it is endemic to all and must be guarded against by all. Unfortunately, as noted in the Epilogue this plea has never been headed, so nations are condemned to fall in step with the march of folly.

a review by a former Navy officer

Reviewed by Bert L. Metzger, Jr., 2009-11-24

Though written before 1989, what this book, by a recognised and outstanding author, shows by its description of the facts leading to America's war in Vietnam is far more relevant today to the major issues of our Iraq and Afghanistan wars. It should be read by every American over 17 years old, if America is going to stop its suicidal march towards folly.

"when incapacity is joined by complacency, the result is the worst possible combination."

Reviewed by frumiousb, 2009-11-01

Before I even opened the book, I agreed with Tuchman's major thesis about folly. "Don't ascribe to conspiracy what can be explained by incompetence" is a motto that I frequently find myself repeating as I consider either business or politics. I also like Tuchman quite a bit as a writer, would probably describe her as one of my favorite historians.

Unfortunately, I found this book less satisfying than the other books that I have read by her. This may, in part, be because it is a book that she wrote much later in her life than, say, The Guns of August (my personal favorite so far of her works). It may just be that working with this kind of approach was more difficult than she thought before she began the project. It seems to me that the other books that I have read by her focused more on an event or period, and drew ideas and themes from her reflections on the same. This book begins with the idea, and draws from historical examples to support the thought. Harder, I think. And unfortunately less satisfying for this particular reader.

Which is not to say that the book fails to be worth reading. It breaks down into chapters on the Trojan War, the Renaissance Popes, The British loss of America, and US participation in Vietnam. Of these, I found the Renaissance Popes the most interesting. By this I mean that I learned the most from the chapter. The section on the British in North America would make an interesting counterpoint to Gordon Wood, but seemed at times to lose itself in detail. I had the feeling that the point of the book was to culminate with the chapter on Vietnam and it probably most hurt my experience that this section was the least compelling for me-- both in terms of its ideas and its prose.

If you haven't read any Tuchman before this, and are primarily interested in her as a writer, then I would start with The Guns of August before picking this up. If you're interested in the thesis, then this is probably a good acquisition, even if it is not the strongest of her works.

Drowned in Notes Lost in Meaning

Reviewed by Paul M. Murphy, 2009-10-13


I am sure you are familiar with the accusation on journalists where the editor says to the reporter here are the head lines go write the story and surround them with facts. The opening paragraph of this book introduces the headline thesis and then goes on to tell you how the story is about to unfold. I like that in an author. She goes on to provide a beautiful back drop in history as a collection of events where the common theme is a march of folly, that being irrational decisions made by leaders that goes against the better interest of their constituencies. The book is entertaining and a great summary of certain historical subjects, but her thesis is fraught, errors, omissions and with the same folly she thwarts upon leaders of state. She became wooden headed in her own argument.

In her introductory chapter she provides a general overview of moments in history that she could have chosen from. In her summary of WWI she discusses opportunities to have negotiated peace that were missed. She cites a German surrender when in fact an armistice was signed. This was indeed the Germans saying they were willing to negotiate a peace, only to be stabbed in the back. She also alludes to the Moor's conquering of Spain. She claims that Spain was taken by Africans who happen to be Muslims as opposed to Muslims using African manpower to conquer Span. She claims that Muslims contributed to Western civilization as opposed to conquered Westerners moving this forward. While I will not attempt to take a side in the case of the Moors, I point to the mere fact that Wikipedia has frozen the entries on the subject because of the contentious disagreement on the authors version. With these gross errors in framing her thesis I became a suspect reader.

She chose to speak on Troy, The Renaissance Popes, and The American Revolution from the British perspective, and Vietnam. Upon completion of the book I could not find a solid rationale for knitting these over others, to make her case. In further degradation of her case within each case I find merit in the suspicion I spoke of earlier. While I am not equipped to refute her historical research, in this review I only take an argument for the defense and use her rules of engagement in a post posthumous debate with any to take up her torch. Her rules are to judge the decisions made within the context of the time of the decision making and in context of what the decision makers knew. The consistent thread I found was that Barbara Tuchman provided evidence within her own history that acquits her defendants. Additionally, while she deluges the reader with the history she constructs; she leaves gaps, or errant inferences to construct her argument. In the case of Vietnam she closes with a paragraph citing an actual quote in history, while apparently true it disgraces anyone who gave their last full measure to that cause.

With the Trojan-Greek war after reading one thousand pages of the Iliad and the Odyssey I found it remarkable that of all the folly found with the Greeks in terms of why leaders take their people to war, I take issue with Tuchman's focus on the Trojan Horse...there is much more that I take issue with please to a keword search on cigarroomofbooks, march of folly

Outstanding!

Reviewed by Chris A. Paul, 2009-09-27

Read this along with "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers" - see entry. Tuchman was one of the best writers of history ever. She made prose out of what could have been a recitation of dates and events, but was always objective and revisionist only where revisionism was supported by underlying research that at least pointed to the truth.