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Summary Of Indomitable Will Lbj In The Presidency

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The decision of Lyndon B Johnson in refusing to call his troops during the Vietnam war even though he certainly has the power to do so was really controversial. Different scholars have different opinions and theories on why president Johnson decided to let the war continued and escalated it. The two scholarly sources that will be evaluated and examined during this paper is Indomitable Will: LBJ In The Presidency by Mark K. Updegrove (2012) and Dereliction of Duty by H. R. McMaster (1997). The origin of Indomitable Will: LBJ In The Presidency is 2012 and its author Mark K. Updegrove is an historian, an American author and the Lyndon Baines Johnson library and museum director. The purpose of his book is to redefine Lyndon B Johnson’s personality …show more content…

R. McMaster is an American soldier and a career officer in the U.S army. The purpose of McMaster’s book is to analyze how and why the United States becomes involved in the Vietnam War. During this, the author also explains on what he thinks why the president decided to keep the war going instead and escalate it. McMaster came to a conclusion that Johnson made the mess himself and he chose to escalate the war. The author presents the war as a consequence of specific decisions made by specific men, Lyndon B. Johnson. McMaster also talked about how president Johnson believed that he would be able to control the U.S involvement in vietnam and part of that belief is based of of McNamara's confident assurance. (McMaster 333) Because of Lyndon B John secret decision made in Washington between November 1963 to July 1965, he got the United States deeper and deeper into the war. President Johnson also believed that it would be possible to preserve American credibility even if the U.S armed force withdrew from Vietnam (McMaster 332). He was totally wrong. “After the United States become committed to the war, however, more American soldiers, airmen,... had died in the conflict, it would become impossible simply to disengage and declare America’s credibility intact…” (McMaster 332). So in the end, LBJ couldn’t just recall his troops so he just followed his personal interests and escalated the war. The value of this book is that it is based on recently released transcripts and personal accounts of crucial meetings, confrontations and decisions. Dereliction of Duty is one of the few book that fully re-creates what happened and why it happened. The background of the author also enhances the value of this book ( H. R. McMaster served in the U.S military). The limits of this book is that it does not provide much information on why LBJ decided to escalate the war since this book is mainly about specific

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