The Ugly American

by

Eugene Burdick and William J. Lederer

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on The Ugly American makes teaching easy.

The Ugly American: Chapter 12 Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
Tex briefly returns to Hanoi to find a copy of Mao’s book on war. When he returns to Monet and MacWhite, they read it aloud together for hours. Both MacWhite and Tex know that it pains Monet, since he is losing a long-held way of life. However, Monet agrees that the tactics makes sense. The three men discuss the ideas until dawn to determine which they can use to fight the Communists. They decide to use Mao’s idea of retreating over rough terrain to exhaust one’s enemy as they pursue, and his concept of maintaining central command posts during guerilla warfare. Monet recognizes that both are solid strategies, though the French never used them before.
Monet’s pain at considering Communist strategies demonstrates that letting go of one’s long-held ideals and presumptions is a difficult task, and may even cause a person to feel that they are losing a part of their history. However, Monet’s recognition that Mao’s strategies contain several novel concepts confirms that one must learn from their opponents, since their opponents will have totally different ideals and cultural perspectives.
Themes
The Failure of the American Foreign Service Theme Icon
Communism vs. Capitalism Theme Icon
Racism and Cultural Insensitivity Theme Icon
The three men examine a map of the village they’ll next fight in and locate a cluster of bamboo trees, which they expect the Communists will use as their guerilla command post. Tex sets up a truck bed mounted with 20 rocket launchers that will create a single, simultaneous barrage into an area 100 yards across. After a few days of preparation, the Legionnaires make their way to the village, feeling optimistic for the first time in weeks. At night, they bait the Communists into attacking a small contingent of soldiers, which prompts their commanders to head for the command post in the bamboo grove. As the Communists move, the rocket truck blows up the bamboo grove while trucks with mounted heavy machine guns surprise the Communist foot soldiers and shoot them down. With their enemy defeated, the Legionnaires return to Hanoi.
Tex and Monet’s victory through unconventional, Communist-inspired strategies firmly argues that the West can only fight Communism when it understands Communist methods and utilizes them themselves. Although Monet and Tex’s victory is strictly military, this concept arguably applies to diplomacy and politics as well. This is especially true since the Russian diplomats consistently outmaneuver the American diplomats, winning consecutive propaganda victories for Communism.
Themes
The Failure of the American Foreign Service Theme Icon
Communism vs. Capitalism Theme Icon
Tex, Monet, and MacWhite present their success and new theory on warfare to French and American generals, but the leaders refuse to hear them out. Tex asks if any of them has ever bothered to read Mao’s writings, but a French general angrily tells him that the nation that produced Napoleon has no need for “a primitive Chinese” man’s military strategies. An American general is furious. MacWhite angrily tells the generals they refuse to learn, and Monet tells them that Mao’s tactics provided the only real French victory Monet has seen in Vietnam. The three men angrily leave, go to a bar, and drink in silence.
The French and American leadership’s unwillingness to consider Chinese tactics again suggests that their sense of cultural superiority blinds them. The French general’s charge that they don’t need the  words of a “primitive Chinese” man reiterates the particularly racist motivation of their unwillingness. They instinctively consider Eastern ideas to be inferior to their Western minds, and thus will never be able to fight Communism on its own terms.
Themes
The Failure of the American Foreign Service Theme Icon
Communism vs. Capitalism Theme Icon
Racism and Cultural Insensitivity Theme Icon
Shortly after, France surrenders Hanoi to the Communists. Tex, MacWhite, and Monet watch the procession of French soldiers with fancy uniforms and advanced weapons slowly file out of the city. The procession of Communists soldiers enters afterward, and though the vanguard soldiers have nice uniforms and weapons, the foot soldiers are all shoddy peasants, some without shoes, some even without rifles. Monet is stunned that the French lost to this army.
The contrast between the French and Communist soldiers reinforces the unlikelihood of France’s defeat and confirms that they were not beaten by superior soldiers or weapons, but by the Communists’ superior tactics. This underscores the need for the Western Capitalists to understand Communist ideology for themselves so they can understand how it spreads and succeeds.
Themes
The Failure of the American Foreign Service Theme Icon
Communism vs. Capitalism Theme Icon
Get the entire The Ugly American LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Ugly American PDF