Internet Resources
- President Nixon announces Vietnam War is endingAt a news conference, President Richard Nixon says that the Vietnam War is coming to a “conclusion as a result of the plan that we have instituted.” Nixon had announced at a conference in Midway in June that the United States would be following a new program he termed “Vietnamization.”
- Nixon Prolonged Vietnam War for Political Gain—And Johnson Knew About It, Newly Unclassified Tapes SuggestNixon ran on a platform that opposed the Vietnam war, but to win the election, he needed the war to continue.
- Ending the Vietnam War, 1969–1973President Richard M. Nixon assumed responsibility for the Vietnam War as he swore the oath of office on January 20, 1969. He knew that ending this war honorably was essential to his success in the presidency. He expected that the American people would give him a year to end U.S. involvement in the war, and he expected to succeed during that time—believing that his experience in foreign relations, his toughness, and his willingness to bring to bear military and political pressure on North Vietnam would yield a settlement in the public negotiations just opening in Paris.
Research & Reference
- Fatal Politics: Nixon's Political Timetable for Withdrawing from Vietnam.The writer examines extracts of conversations from secret White House tapes spanning February 1971 to October 1972 to offer insight into President Richard M. Nixon's timetable for withdrawing American troops from Vietnam. He demonstrates that despite Nixon's public claims that he would withdraw troops only when South Vietnam was ready, Nixon actually contrived the timetable to coincide with the 1972 U.S. presidential election, stretching the withdrawal out so that the last troops would not come home until shortly before or after the election. He argues that Nixon's secret timetable was intended purely for political advancement because it aimed to conceal that Nixon's “Vietnamization” program of training South Vietnam to defend itself had failed, at least long enough to render voters incapable of holding Nixon accountable for it.
Newly released Nixon documents reveal his candid thoughts on Vietnam
Despite his resolute public attitude toward the war, documents detailed in the new book "The Last of the President's Men" reveal that President Richard Nixon had his doubts about America's efforts in the Vietnam war. David Martin has more.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UeUHKt6W2U
Perspectives
Richard Nixon
From a prize-winning biographer comes the defining portrait of a man who led America in a time of turmoil and left us a darker age. We live today, John A. Farrell shows, in a world Richard Nixon made. At the end of WWII, navy lieutenant "Nick" Nixon returned from the Pacific and set his cap at Congress, an idealistic dreamer seeking to build a better world. Yet amid the turns of that now-legendary 1946 campaign, Nixon's finer attributes gave way to unapologetic ruthlessness. The story of that transformation is the stunning overture to John A. Farrell's magisterial biography of the president who came to embody postwar American resentment and division. Within four years of his first victory, Nixon was a U.S. senat∨ in six, the vice president of the United States of America. "Few came so far, so fast, and so alone," Farrell writes. Nixon's sins as a candidate were legion; and in one unlawful secret plot, as Farrell reveals here, Nixon acted to prolong the Vietnam War for his own political purposes. Finally elected president in 1969, Nixon packed his staff with bright young men who devised forward-thinking reforms addressing health care, welfare, civil rights, and protection of the environment. It was a fine legacy, but Nixon cared little for it. He aspired to make his mark on the world stage instead, and his 1972 opening to China was the first great crack in the Cold War. Nixon had another legacy, too: an America divided and polarized. He was elected to end the war in Vietnam, but his bombing of Cambodia and Laos enraged the antiwar movement. It was Nixon who launched the McCarthy era, who played white against black with a "southern strategy," and spurred the Silent Majority to despise and distrust the country's elites. Ever insecure and increasingly paranoid, he persuaded Americans to gnaw, as he did, on grievances--and to look at one another as enemies. Finally, in August 1974, after two years of the mesmerizing intrigue and scandal of Watergate, Nixon became the only president to resign in disgrace. Richard Nixon is a gripping and unsparing portrayal of our darkest president. Meticulously researched, brilliantly crafted, and offering fresh revelations, it will be hailed as a master work.
Sideshow
Although there are many books and films dealing with the Vietnam War, Sideshow tells the truth about America's secret and illegal war with Cambodia from 1969 to 1973. William Shawcross interviewed hundreds of people of all nationalities, including cabinet ministers, military men, and civil servants, and extensively researched U.S. Government documents. This full-scale investigation―with material new to this edition―exposes how Kissinger and Nixon treated Cambodia as a sideshow. Although the president and his assistant claimed that a secret bombing campaign in Cambodia was necessary to eliminate North Vietnamese soldiers who were attacking American troops across the border, Shawcross maintains that the bombings only spread the conflict, but led to the rise of the Khmer Rouge and the subsequent massacre of a third of Cambodia's population.
The Nixon Tapes
The famous -- and infamous -- Nixon White House tapes that reveal President Richard Nixon uncensored, unfiltered, and in his own words President Nixon's voice-activated taping system captured every word spoken in the Oval Office, Cabinet Room, and other key locations in the White House, and at Camp David -- 3,700 hours of recordings between 1971 and 1973. Yet less than 5 percent of those conversations have ever been transcribed and published. Now, thanks to professor Luke Nichter's massive effort to digitize and transcribe the tapes, the world can finally read an unprecedented account of one of the most important and controversial presidencies in U.S. history. The Nixon Tapes, with annotations and commentary by Nichter and Professor Douglas Brinkley, offers a selection of fascinating scenes from the year Nixon opened relations with China, negotiated the SALT I arms agreement with the Soviet Union, and won a landslide reelection victory. All the while, the growing shadow of Watergate and Nixon's political downfall crept ever closer.The Nixon Tapes provides a unique glimpse into a flawed president's hubris, paranoia, and political genius.
Nixon By Nixon: In His Own Words
From 1971-73, Richard Nixon secretly recorded his private conversations in the White House. When the existence of the tapes was exposed during the Watergate scandal, Nixon refused to allow their release, explaining they contained "blunt and candid remarks on many different subjects" that could sully the presidency forever. Only certain conversations pertaining to Watergate ended up being heard at the time, but after Nixon's death in 1994, the government began releasing the tapes. In 2010, hundreds more hours of recordings were released by the Nixon Library.
Source: Kanopy