Read Online Fly Until You Die An Oral History of Hmong Pilots in the Vietnam War Oxford Oral History Series Chia Youyee Vang 9780190622145 Books

Product details Series Oxford Oral History Series Hardcover 232 pages Publisher Oxford University Press (April 2, 2019) Language English ISBN-10 0190622148

Fly Until You Die An Oral History of Hmong Pilots in the Vietnam War Oxford Oral History Series Chia Youyee Vang 9780190622145 Books Reviews

• I had been excited to read Fly Until You Die ever since I saw it as “coming soon” on . This is just not the sort of topic you see in publication all that often. Overwhelmingly, military history these days seems to deal with big battles and Americans in direct action. World War II literature is obsessed with D-day, Vietnam literature with the Tet Offensive and Khe Sanh, Afghanistan and Iraq with Navy SEALs kicking in doors. But big battles and direct action are such a small part of war. And too often, the popular historical narrative leaves out important peoples and actors. In this book, Chia Youyee Vang writes about U.S. and Thai-trained Hmong pilots who flew in Laos during the “American War.” It more than lived up to my expectations of shining a light into a little-known corner of history; Dr. Vang’s approach to oral history gives the participants a clear and compelling voice. Rather than dealing with the subject chronologically, she organizes it thematically, and so we learn about how they trained, how they fought, how their families dealt with war and stress and loss, and about their lives as refugees after the war. Organizing the book in this way gives it a much more experiential feel. Ending it with a discussion of the pilots leaving Laos as refugees and eventually making their way to the United States is a powerful reminder of the long-lasting unintentional consequences of war. Overall, Fly Until You Die is well worth the read.