Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War

The Cold War was a period of rivalry and geopolitical tension between the US and the Soviet Union. It lasted for more than 40 years—from the end of World War II in 1945 to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The conflict was rooted in the ideological divide between democratic capitalism, which was championed by the US, and communism, which was promoted by the Soviet Union. This period is called the “cold” war because there was no direct conflict between these two superpowers, but the two countries faced off in a number of so-called proxy wars, such as the Vietnam War, that involved the conflict between democracy and communism.

Communism is a political and economic ideology that seeks to create a classless society in which the means of production—like factories and farms—are publicly owned. Rooted in the works of Karl Marx, it advocates for abolishing profit and private property, believing that they result in inequality and exploitation. Instead, the government controls and distributes all property and wealth. Because of this concentration of power, the system is prone to corruption.

The Domino Theory was a Cold War-era idea that a communist government in one country would lead the surrounding governments to fall to communism, like dominos. The US used this theory to justify the war in Vietnam.

The Espionage Act is a 1917 law in the US that prevents individuals from copying, sharing, or recording information that compromises national security. The law is controversial because some believe it infringes on the right to free speech. In Most Dangerous, the lawyers at The New York Times warned that if the paper published information from the leaked Pentagon Papers, the government could prosecute the paper’s staff under the Espionage Act.

The Viet Cong was the military arm of the organization known as the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Working out of South Vietnam, these guerrilla troops worked under the command of Ho Chi Minh in North Vietnam. Formed in 1960, they fought against South Vietnamese and US forces in the Vietnam War, aiming to unify Vietnam under communist rule.

Vietnamization was President Nixon’s strategy to win the Vietnam War. He planned to gradually withdraw US troops from Vietnam and turn control and responsibility over to the government of South Vietnam.