For a variety of undergraduate-level history courses covering recent U.S. history and the U.S. experience in Vietnam, including courses in military history, modern U.S. diplomatic history, and courses on the Cold War and on Southeast Asia. This text provides a comprehensive narrative history of U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia, from 1942 to 1975with a concluding section that traces U.S.-Vietnam relations from the end of the war in 1975 to the present. Unlike most general histories of U.S. involvement in Vietnamwhich are either conventional diplomatic or military historiesthis text synthesizes the perspectives to explore both dimensions of the struggle in greater depth, elucidating more of the complexities of the U.S.-Vietnam entanglement. It explains why Americans tried so hard for so long to stop the spread of Communism in Indochina, and why they ultimately failed.