THE UGLY AMERICAN

The Ugly American

The Ugly American

Introduction

He was a US Naval Academy graduate in 1936. His first designation was as the juvenile agent of a stream gunboat on the Yangtze River.

His best trading work, 1958's The Ugly American, was one of some books co-written with Eugene Burdick. Disillusioned with the method and matter of America's diplomatic efforts in Southeast Asia, Lederer and Burdick in an open way searched to demonstrate their conviction that American agents and civilians could make a considerable distinction in Southeast Asian government if they were willing to discover localized languages, pursue localized culture and provide work regional infantry tactics. However, if American policy manufacturers continued to disregard the logic behind these courses, Southeast Asia would drop under Soviet or Chinese Communist influence.

In A territory of Sheep, Lederer recognised understanding flops in Asia. In "Government by Misinformation" he investigates the causes he believes lead to American foreign policy:

Trusted local officials.

Local (foreign) bulletins, publications, books, wireless broadcasts, etc.

Paid local informers.

Personal observations by U.S. officials.

American journalists.

Other works were proposed to be light-hearted and funny fantasies. His early work, Ensign O'Toole and Me is both. Achildren's publication, Timothy's Song, with illustrations by Edward Ardizzone, appeared in 1965.

William Lederer increased to the rank of Navy Captain. The source for this is his own statement in Our Own Worst Enemy considering being allotted as a exceptional Assistant to Commander in head, Pacific Fleet. (pg 54, W.W. Norton & business, Inc, 1968).

Apart of annals associated in Our Own inferior Enemy is the article of Lederer as a young Navy Lieutenant, Junior Grade, having a possibility gathering in 1940 with a Jesuit cleric, dad Pierre Cogny, and his Vietnamese aide, "Mr. Nguyen", while waiting out a Japanese bombing raid in China. Father Pierre asked Lederer if he had a exact replicate of the joined States Declaration of self-reliance on his gunboat, and Lederer said that he did and provided them with a copy. "Mr. Nguyen" subsequent became better renowned as Ho Chi Minh, the Vietnamese Communist revolutionary and statesman who assisted as prime minister (1946-1955) and leader (1945-1969) of the popular Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam). The 1945 Proclamation of self-reliance of the popular Republic of Vietnam, written by Ho Chi Minh, starts by citing from the American document. Lederer died December 5, 2009, of respiratory malfunction at the age of 97.

The Ugly American

The unattractive American is the name of a 1958 political innovative by Eugene Burdick and William Lederer. The novel became a bestseller, was influential at the time, and is still in print. The book is a quasi-roman à clef; that is, it presents, in a fictionalized guise, the know-how of Americans in Southeast Asia (Vietnam) and supposedly portrays some genuine persons who are comprised by pseudonyms.

The novel, taking place in a fictional nation called Sarkhan (an imaginary homeland in Southeast Asia that somewhat resembles Burma or Thailand, but which is meant to allude to Vietnam) as its setting and includes some genuine people, most of whose titles have been ...