Michael Peck
How could America lose the Vietnam War?
Even now, 50 years after the last American helicopters left Saigon, the answer is elusive. Despite pouring immense resources into Vietnam — including nearly 3 million military personnel, and suffering 58,000 dead — the world’s most powerful nation was unable to defeat an enemy that seemed hopelessly inferior in military power.
Accusations still fly at a long list of alleged culprits: “pinkos,” war hawks, hippies, the China Lobby, Jane Fonda, John Wayne, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon. But can a tabletop wargame — that began life as a college student’s project — offer insight?
“Vietnam 1965-1975” was conceived in the early 1980s when Nick Karp, a Princeton University student, needed to complete his senior thesis. So Karp designed a board game that was published as a hobby game in 1984, and is still available today from GMT Games.
A game of firepower
As befitting such a massive struggle, “Vietnam 1965-1975” is a massive game. The GMT edition includes a 44-page manual, a 5-foot-by-3-foot map and 1,328 small cardboard pieces that depict combat battalions and regiments, as well as various informational markers.
The order of battle alone illustrates the polyglot nature of the conflict. On the Allied side are more than a dozen U.S. Army and Marine divisions and brigades that fought in Vietnam, or could have been sent, plus numerous independent artillery and mechanized battalions. Alongside them is the Army of the Republic of Vietnam, plus contingents of Australian, South Korean, Thai and Philippines troops. Opposing this coalition is the National Liberation Front and North Vietnamese Army divisions — mostly infantry, backed by some artillery and mechanized units — and a plethora of Viet Cong battalions.
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