The Foreign Service Journal, July-August 2015

52 JULY-AUGUST 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Stephen Randolph serves as the historian of the U.S. Department of State. A 1974 graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, he served for 27 years on active duty in the Air Force, retiring as a colonel in 2001. He flew F-4s and F-15s, with a tour in Operation Desert Storm; held senior staff positions on the Joint Staff and the Air Staff; and then joined the faculty at the National Defense University, serving for 15 years before moving to the State Department in 2011. He earned a master’s degree in the history of science fromThe Johns Hopkins University in 1975 and a doctorate in history fromThe George Washington University in 2005. He is the author of Powerful and Brutal Weapons: Nixon, Kissinger, and the Easter Offensive (Harvard University Press, 2007). Efforts in 1975 to capture the lessons of Vietnam as a guide to future policy died in the National Security Council with the seizure of the SS Mayaguez . BY STEPHEN RANDOLPH A merica’s efforts to define the “lessons of Vietnam” started during the war, and have contin- ued ever since, with no apparent progress toward consensus. As the terrible climax of the war arrived in April and May 1975, it seemed a natural moment to capture these lessons as a guide to future policy. Accordingly, Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger directed the National Security Council staff to formulate the lessons from the war, with input from the Depart- ment of State. FEATURE Uncovering the Lessons of Vietnam PAPERBACKGROUND: ISTOCKPHOTO.COM/TOMOGRAF