A Study in Disunity
† by RALPH SMITH
Lecturer in History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University
War is not new to Vietnam; nor is the attempt by some Vietnamese to create a nation that is both stable and unified. One of Vietnam's problems is that the very concept ' nation '—which, in the West, has usually implied a rough coincidence of cultural, political, racial, and even religious boundaries-has been taken to mean a variety of different things to the Vietnamese.
