Charles Henderson wrote two great books on Carlos Hathcock, the famed Marine sniper. This book is not as well done (in my opinion). Henderson tries to show how both sides lost the Vietnam War (American/Vietnamese & North Vietnamese/Russian) and chronicles the final months before Saigon fell. He tries to focus most attention on the final group of Marines who were almost left behind while guarding the embassy. The lasting overall impression of the book, unfortunately, is that the only ones who knew what they were doing were the North Vietnamese. American political leaders had gone into escape blame mode and all others (CIA assets) just looked after themselves. These are the true aspects of the book and are given voice by the US Marines depicted throughout the chapters. The enlisted and non-com marines are the 'truth-sayers' but they are never consulted. These are the good parts to the book. The bibliography is short, but Henderson it seems spent most of his time on personal interviews. He seems to want to give fair hearing to the NVA but comes off as being led to print their propaganda without any critique or criticism. The only part that I found interesting was his covering the C-5 Galaxy that crashed killing most of the children being airlifted out (Operation Babylift). I had read in other memoirs that it had been shot down by the North Vietnamese. Here in Henderson's book he says that it crashed by mechanical malfunction. I still tend to believe it was shot down. This work is scary to read because it places many of the people who held powerful positions as actors who took no regard for the consequences of what they are doing. On both sides. The fall of Saigon epitomized the sadness of many things still being learned by America. Many writers want to say that they know what the Vietnam War really meant. But they don't really know. The Civil War is a mystery and so is the Vietnam War. We can learn from it if we first face its gigantic sorrow. Few people are willing to do this. This book shows the absolute fear and confusion prevalent during that time, and what was to come before the normalizing of diplomatic relations with Vietnam.