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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Halberstam say was Robert McNamara's role in the White House policy discussions?

2. Which issue was NOT confronting the nation when the Kennedy administration took office?

3. What issue did Joseph McCarthy use to energize voters?

4. Whose input did the French and Americans ignore about Vietnam, in Halberstam's account?

5. What rule does Halberstam say Kennedy was following in trying to appoint a Secretary of State?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why did Diem and the U.S. end up working together?

2. Who was Frederick Nolting, and what was his role in Vietnam?

3. Who was Robert McNamara and what was his role in the formation of Vietnam policy?

4. Who was McGeorge Bundy, and what was his role in the Kennedy administration?

5. Why didn't the U.S. gain the loyalty of the Vietnamese peasants?

6. What was the Kennedy administration's stance with regard to Russia?

7. How did the situation in Vietnam unfold?

8. What three plans does Halberstam say the U.S. was considering in Vietnam in 1961?

9. How did the White House eventually try to limit the military?

10. Describe the confrontation in Laos.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Argue for the appropriateness or the inappropriateness of executive secrecy as it was used during the Johnson administration. What factors and evidence mitigates the need for executive transparency? What factors and evidence makes transparency an absolute requirement?

Essay Topic 2

Describe Halberstam as a biographer and historian. What are his preoccupations? What does he not consider? What are his narrative techniques, and what literary techniques does he use to describe the people and actions that comprise "The Best and the Brightest"?

Essay Topic 3

What lessons did the U.S. learn from the Bay of Pigs invasion, and how were these lessons visible in the planning for military campaigns in Vietnam? Did the Bay of Pigs invasion sour the U.S. war planners on relying on local forces? Did it foster the argument for bombing instead of troops on the ground?

(see the answer keys)

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