S2E25 Gregory A. Daddis - San Diego State University

Welcome to the final episode of Season 2 and our 50th overall episode! We can’t thank all of you enough for listening to, sharing, subscribing to, and supporting Military Historians are People, Too! As we often say, we’ll keep doing it if you keep listening. Season 3 is coming at the end of January!

Our special 50th-episode guest is Gregory A. Daddis, who has been bugging us for months to be on the show. Greg is the USS Midway Chair in Modern US Military History and the Director of the Center for War and Society at San Diego State University. Before taking the position at Sand Diego State, he spent five years just north up the California coast at Chapman University, where he was Professor of History and Director of the MA Program in War & Society. Greg earned a BS from the United States Military Academy at West Point, where he commissioned armor. While in uniform, Greg earned his MA in History from Villanova University and his PhD from UNC-Chapel Hill, working under the expert guidance of Prof. Dick Kohn. While at UNC, he was also Professor of Military Science and led UNC’s ROTC program.

Greg served for 26 years in the Army, retiring as a colonel. He is a veteran of Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom and was awarded the Bronze Star, the Legion of Merit, and the Meritorious Service Medal during his time in uniform. Greg wrapped up his Army career serving as the Chief of the American History Division in the Department of History at West Point.

Since leaving West Point, Greg has positioned himself as one of the leading historians of the Vietnam War. He is the author of five books, including most recently Pulp Vietnam: War and Gender in Cold War Men’s Adventure Magazines (Cambridge). He authored a trilogy on the American war in Vietnam with Oxford University Press: No Sure Victory: Measuring U.S. Army Effectiveness and Progress in the Vietnam War, Westmoreland’s War: Reassessing American Strategy in Vietnam, and Withdrawal: Reassessing America’s Final Years in Vietnam. His first book was Fighting in the Great Crusade: An 8th Infantry Artillery Officer in World War II (Louisiana State University Press). Greg’s articles have been published in the major journals in the field, including The Journal of Strategic Studies, The Journal of Cold War Studies, and The Journal of Military History. He has also written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times, among other media outlets. Greg was also an adviser to Florentine Films for Ken Burns-Lynn Novick’s documentary, The Vietnam War, which appeared in 2017.

We could go on, and on, and on, and even mention Greg’s upcoming research Fulbright to Oxford University in Spring 2023, but we won’t. You’ll not find a more generous, affable, California-Hipster-dressed scholar in the military history community. We’ll talk New Jersey, a grandfather’s WW2 footlocker, the Beatles, gender theory, Batman (the 1966 TV series!), and much more in between. Also - special 50th-episode guest appearances! Join us for a delightful and thoughtful chat with Greg Daddis!

Rec.: 12/09/2022