The Remains of War: Bodies, Politics, and the Search for American Soldiers Unaccounted for in Southeast Asia. By Thomas M. Hawley. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005. 282p. $22.95.

The central thesis of this book is that the unresolved issue fueling the continued divisiveness of the Vietnam War is the key legacy of the unaccounted-for remains of America's missing in action (MIAs) in Indochina. It is a thesis that Thomas Hawley propounds at several levels. His argument is empirical in its depiction of the investigative processes and results of the actual searches for these men. It is semiotic in its focus on the symbol of their bodies as “signing” for the larger issues still surrounding the war. It is an investigation into the impact on the American popular and political culture of these bodies—those of the visible veterans and of the invisible, fragmented missing soldiers—in terms of how they are depicted in the arts (Hollywood mostly) and in memorials. Finally, it aspires to a more profound philosophical level in assessing the moral and political implications of this thesis for our larger understanding of the Vietnam War itself. Although this book is well worth reading, its success at all these levels is only intermittent.