1
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No more war! No more war!

2
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No more war!
No more war!

3
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No more war! No more war!

4
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No more war! No more war!

5
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No more war!
No more war!

6
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No more war!

7
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U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

8
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My brother picked me up

9
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at Travis Air Force Base.

10
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And I remember he had a Valiant,

11
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an old beat-up Valiant.

12
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And we met inside the terminal.

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And I was so happy to see him.

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I just love my brother.

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He said, "Now, I don't
want you to get upset,

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"but we're probably
gonna get some trouble

17
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when we go outside."

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And I went, "Trouble?
I just got back from Vietnam.

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What are you talking about?"

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I mean, I knew
that there was unrest.

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But when we got in his car
to drive away from the terminal,

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we had to wind our way
through protesters

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that were pounding on the car
with the ends of their signs

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and were snarling at me

25
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and pounding on the window
and shouting obscenities at me.

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That was my welcome home
to America.

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I was just stunned.

28
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I have never felt...

29
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any anger toward people
that were war protesters.

30
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It's a legitimate
political stance.

31
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For people that
descended into that, I...

32
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I-I think that
they were really wrong.

33
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It was this-this heartbreak
of why are you doing this?

34
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I mean, you don't know who I am.

35
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And it happened over and over.

36
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In the spring of 1970,

37
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despite the uproar
over the invasion of Cambodia

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and the killing of four students
at Kent State,

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President Nixon's hold
on what he called

40
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"the great silent majority"
seemed secure.

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A Gallup poll showed
that most Americans

42
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blamed the students,
not the national guardsmen,

43
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for what had happened.

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At an antiwar demonstration
in Manhattan,

45
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hundreds of construction
workers in hard hats

46
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attacked protesters,

47
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sending 70 to the hospital.

48
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And when workers
marched on City Hall

49
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a few days later,

50
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Nixon wrote
the president of their union

51
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to say how pleased he was

52
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"to see the tremendous
outpouring

53
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"of support for our country

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demonstrated in your orderly
and most heartening rally."

55
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How do you feel about
the construction workers

56
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who attacked the, uh,
demonstrators last Friday?

57
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Don't say attacked.
Don't say attacked.

58
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They were provoked.

59
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They were provoked, man.

60
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We work for a living.

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Every day we get up,
we're out there in the cold,

62
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the rain, the snow, right?

63
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We got to have these dirty s...

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Forget about it, I don't
want to talk about it, man.

65
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Anybody that can take
a Viet Cong flag and fly it

66
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and wave it and bring it
up this avenue

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and get away with it...
and get away with it...

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that's unpatriotic to me.

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When American
troops withdrew from Cambodia

70
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at the end of June,

71
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the White House reported
that they had killed

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11,349 enemy troops,

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captured 22,000 weapons

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and had destroyed 11,688
bunkers and buildings.

75
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But after so many years
of fighting,

76
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more and more Americans
were tired of the war,

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wanted to get out
of Southeast Asia,

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and did not want the president
to expand the conflict further.

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Among their representatives
in Congress,

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antiwar sentiment
had steadily grown.

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As the president searched
for a face-saving way

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to end the war, he continued
to withdraw troops.

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U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

84
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But even as American
casualty figures fell,

85
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the gulf between Americans
at home widened,

86
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tearing communities,
neighborhoods,

87
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even families apart.

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No more war! No more war!

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Nixon was convinced...

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just as Lyndon Johnson
had been...

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that the antiwar movement
was somehow

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being directed from Hanoi,

93
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Beijing and Moscow.

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"Within the iron gates
of the White House

95
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a siege mentality
was settling in,"

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a Nixon aide remembered.

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"It was now us against them.

98
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"Gradually, as we drew
the circle closer around us,

99
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the ranks of them
began to swell."

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I think the
Vietnam War drove a stake

101
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right into the heart of America.

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It polarized the country

103
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as it had probably
never been polarized

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since before the Civil War.

105
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And unfortunately,
we've never moved

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really far away from that.

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And we never recovered.

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No more war! No more war!

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U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

110
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No more war! No more war!

111
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No more war! No more war!
U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

112
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No more war! No more war!
No more war!

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Thank you very much, indeed,

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and welcome to this,
uh, special,

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very special edition
of The David Frost Show.

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The vice president himself
wanted to debate with students,

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and we suggested a format
in which he might like to do so.

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Welcome Eva Jefferson
from Northwestern,

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who testified
before the Scranton Commission

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on Campus Unrest and is majoring
in political science.

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Is that right?
Right.

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Eva Jefferson,

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whose father
had served in Vietnam,

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was now the student body
president

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at Northwestern University.

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After Kent State,

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she had forcefully stopped
angry protestors

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from burning down the ROTC
building at her school,

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and later testified before
a presidential commission

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looking into the causes
of student unrest.

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She had warned then
that some students

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were becoming so frustrated

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that they felt
they had no choice

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but to engage in violence.

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And right now
it's a privilege to welcome

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the vice president
of the United States,

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Spiro T. Agnew.

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Let me

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take brief exception
to one thing you've said,

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that the only way
to get the attention

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of the society
is to bomb buildings.

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What I attempted to do

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before the Scranton Committee
was to explain

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what could motivate someone
to blow up a building.

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I did not say I endorse this,
and if you read my testimony

146
00:08:01,498 --> 00:08:03,967
quite carefully,
you'll know that I didn't.

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And it's this type of-of just
picking up on what,

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allegedly, I said instead
of really studying what I said

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that-that really disturbs me.

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May I respond?
Because you're making people

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afraid of their own children.

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Yet they're your children,
they're my parents' children,

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they're the children
of this country.

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Yet you're making people
afraid of them.

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And I think this
is the greatest disservice.

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There's an honest difference
of agreement on issues,

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but-but when you make people
afraid of each other,

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you-you isolate people,
and maybe this is your goal,

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but I think this is...

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this could only have
a disastrous effect

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on the country.

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Let me say first
that isolating people

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is not my goal.

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If that were true I wouldn't be
here tonight.

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And let me take exception
to that

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oft-repeated rationale
that, uh,

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violence is the only way
to get results.

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I was trying to explain to you
the rationale of some students

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who are openly revolutionary.

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You're not listening
to what I'm saying.

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I'm-I'm really distressed. Just what are...
what are you advocating?

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They were trying to politically

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00:09:01,933 --> 00:09:04,231
benefit from making us out to be

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these scary, horrible,
violent people.

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We weren't.
We were against the war.

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We thought the war was wrong.

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We thought we were lied to.

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And we were in the streets.

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America has always had
a rich tradition of protests.

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We were founded
by protesting England.

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So to make people
afraid of their kids,

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I think, was wrong,
but that's what they were about.

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They were fearmongers.

184
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It was fratricide.

185
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You can say, "Well, but-but
they are communist."

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Okay, they're communist.

187
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"They are the worst Vietnamese
in the entire world.

188
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We were the good Vietnamese."

189
00:10:23,932 --> 00:10:26,651
But let's face
Vietnamese killing Vietnamese.

190
00:10:26,809 --> 00:10:28,903
How-how do you deny that?

191
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If you don't
call that fratricide,

192
00:10:33,816 --> 00:10:37,411
what do you call that?

193
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What do you... how do we...

194
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I explain that
to-to my children?

195
00:10:45,912 --> 00:10:47,789
The Cambodian incursion had

196
00:10:47,914 --> 00:10:51,168
at least temporarily reduced
the flow of North Vietnamese

197
00:10:51,292 --> 00:10:55,013
men and supplies
through that country,

198
00:10:55,129 --> 00:10:57,052
but they were still
streaming down

199
00:10:57,173 --> 00:10:59,892
the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos.

200
00:11:00,009 --> 00:11:02,728
The White House
wanted them stopped.

201
00:11:02,845 --> 00:11:06,395
But this time,
South Vietnamese troops

202
00:11:06,516 --> 00:11:09,110
would have to try
to do the job alone.

203
00:11:09,227 --> 00:11:14,074
By the end of 1970,
both houses of Congress

204
00:11:14,190 --> 00:11:16,943
had barred
all U.S. ground personnel,

205
00:11:17,068 --> 00:11:20,117
even advisors
and special forces,

206
00:11:20,238 --> 00:11:22,115
from crossing the border.

207
00:11:22,240 --> 00:11:26,040
On February 8, 1971,

208
00:11:26,160 --> 00:11:30,461
17,000 ARVN troops
began moving into Laos

209
00:11:30,581 --> 00:11:33,334
to destroy
the enemy's jungle bases

210
00:11:33,459 --> 00:11:37,089
and to cut off
the Ho Chi Minh trail.

211
00:11:37,213 --> 00:11:41,593
The Americans
could only provide air support.

212
00:11:41,718 --> 00:11:45,689
Nixon and his
National Security Advisor,

213
00:11:45,805 --> 00:11:48,900
Henry Kissinger, believed that
a successful operation

214
00:11:49,017 --> 00:11:51,111
would boost morale in Saigon

215
00:11:51,227 --> 00:11:54,606
and prove to Hanoi
and the American public

216
00:11:54,731 --> 00:11:58,611
that the ARVN could fight
and win on their own,

217
00:11:58,735 --> 00:12:02,706
that Vietnamization could work.

218
00:12:02,822 --> 00:12:06,918
Their target was the
North Vietnamese logistics hub,

219
00:12:07,035 --> 00:12:10,255
the abandoned town of Tchepone.

220
00:12:10,413 --> 00:12:12,415
U.S. intelligence

221
00:12:12,582 --> 00:12:14,255
believed there were no more

222
00:12:14,417 --> 00:12:18,797
than 22,000 North Vietnamese
troops in the area.

223
00:12:18,921 --> 00:12:22,926
But there would eventually turn
out to be 60,000,

224
00:12:23,092 --> 00:12:26,767
and their commanders knew
there was only one route

225
00:12:26,929 --> 00:12:29,978
the ARVN was likely to take.

226
00:12:30,099 --> 00:12:32,978
Harry Hue, who had been fighting
the communists

227
00:12:33,102 --> 00:12:36,606
for eight years,
was in the invasion force.

228
00:13:06,969 --> 00:13:10,564
Although individual
ARVN units fought bravely,

229
00:13:10,681 --> 00:13:13,150
the invasion was a failure.

230
00:13:30,785 --> 00:13:34,415
Almost half
of the 17,000 South Vietnamese

231
00:13:34,539 --> 00:13:35,961
who entered Laos

232
00:13:36,082 --> 00:13:39,177
would be killed,
wounded or captured.

233
00:14:40,396 --> 00:14:41,989
In late March,

234
00:14:42,106 --> 00:14:43,824
as the surviving ARVN forces

235
00:14:43,941 --> 00:14:45,488
straggled back across the border

236
00:14:45,610 --> 00:14:47,738
into South Vietnam,

237
00:14:47,904 --> 00:14:51,704
crowds of weeping women,
children and old men...

238
00:14:51,824 --> 00:14:54,828
dressed in white,
the color of mourning...

239
00:14:54,952 --> 00:14:58,422
begged for news of the soldiers
who were missing.

240
00:14:58,581 --> 00:15:02,836
In Vietnam, the dead
must receive proper burial

241
00:15:02,960 --> 00:15:06,760
so that their restless souls
can have peace,

242
00:15:06,923 --> 00:15:08,891
and their families
needed to know

243
00:15:09,008 --> 00:15:10,555
the time of their deaths

244
00:15:10,676 --> 00:15:13,600
so that they could honor them
each year.

245
00:15:16,182 --> 00:15:18,150
Even before
the invasion was over,

246
00:15:18,267 --> 00:15:20,690
President Nixon
had told an aide,

247
00:15:20,811 --> 00:15:22,859
"We must claim victory,

248
00:15:22,980 --> 00:15:25,449
whatever the outcome."

249
00:15:59,892 --> 00:16:01,986
Consequently, tonight,

250
00:16:02,144 --> 00:16:06,320
I can report that Vietnamization
has succeeded.

251
00:16:06,440 --> 00:16:08,613
Because of
the increased strength

252
00:16:08,734 --> 00:16:10,077
of the South Vietnamese,

253
00:16:10,194 --> 00:16:12,697
because of the success
of the Cambodian operation,

254
00:16:12,822 --> 00:16:13,994
because of the achievements

255
00:16:14,156 --> 00:16:17,035
of the South Vietnamese
operation in Laos,

256
00:16:17,159 --> 00:16:18,661
I am announcing an increase

257
00:16:18,828 --> 00:16:21,047
in the rate
of American withdrawals.

258
00:16:21,163 --> 00:16:23,541
We have it in our power
to leave Vietnam

259
00:16:23,666 --> 00:16:25,794
in a way
that offers a brave people

260
00:16:25,918 --> 00:16:28,546
a realistic hope of freedom.

261
00:16:28,671 --> 00:16:29,968
We have it in our power

262
00:16:30,089 --> 00:16:32,217
to prove to our friends
in the world

263
00:16:32,341 --> 00:16:35,094
that America's
sense of responsibility

264
00:16:35,219 --> 00:16:38,564
remains the world's
greatest single hope of peace.

265
00:16:38,681 --> 00:16:43,027
And generations in the future

266
00:16:43,185 --> 00:16:46,530
will look back
at this difficult,

267
00:16:46,689 --> 00:16:50,319
trying time
in America's history,

268
00:16:50,443 --> 00:16:52,912
and they will be proud

269
00:16:53,029 --> 00:16:56,203
that we demonstrated

270
00:16:56,365 --> 00:16:58,868
that we had the courage

271
00:16:59,035 --> 00:17:02,335
and the character
of a great people.

272
00:17:02,455 --> 00:17:03,297
Dr. Kissinger, sir.

273
00:17:03,414 --> 00:17:04,882
Yeah.

274
00:17:05,041 --> 00:17:05,883
Mr. President?

275
00:17:06,042 --> 00:17:07,042
Yeah. Hi, Henry.

276
00:17:07,126 --> 00:17:08,645
This was the best
speech you've delivered

277
00:17:08,669 --> 00:17:09,789
since you've been in office.

278
00:17:09,879 --> 00:17:10,879
Yeah.

279
00:17:10,963 --> 00:17:13,307
I'll tell you one thing,
this was, uh...

280
00:17:13,424 --> 00:17:15,426
This little speech
was a work of art.

281
00:17:15,551 --> 00:17:18,179
I mean, I-I know a little
something about speechwriting.

282
00:17:18,304 --> 00:17:20,477
And it was no act,
because no actor could do it.

283
00:17:20,598 --> 00:17:22,618
No actor in Hollywood
could have done that that well.

284
00:17:22,642 --> 00:17:23,894
It's the best...

285
00:17:24,060 --> 00:17:25,329
I thought that was
clone well, didn't you think?

286
00:17:25,353 --> 00:17:26,705
First of all, no
actor could have written it,

287
00:17:26,729 --> 00:17:27,901
to begin with.

288
00:17:28,064 --> 00:17:29,750
You couldn't have done it
unless you had meant it.

289
00:17:29,774 --> 00:17:30,991
Yeah.

290
00:17:31,108 --> 00:17:33,361
And if it doesn't work,
I don't care.

291
00:17:33,486 --> 00:17:35,614
I mean, right now,
if it doesn't work...

292
00:17:35,738 --> 00:17:36,739
Then let me say, though,

293
00:17:36,864 --> 00:17:38,081
I'm going to find out soon,

294
00:17:38,240 --> 00:17:39,520
and then I'm going to turn right

295
00:17:39,575 --> 00:17:41,215
so goddamn hard
it'll make your head spin.

296
00:17:41,243 --> 00:17:42,888
We'll bomb those bastards
right out of the...

297
00:17:42,912 --> 00:17:45,756
off the earth.
I really mean it.

298
00:18:09,939 --> 00:18:11,612
Do you belong
to the same generation

299
00:18:11,732 --> 00:18:12,858
that is protesting at home?

300
00:18:12,983 --> 00:18:14,109
Do you feel as if you belong

301
00:18:14,276 --> 00:18:15,823
to those people?
Very much.

302
00:18:15,945 --> 00:18:17,117
You do?
Very much.

303
00:18:17,279 --> 00:18:19,498
I wish they'd get us
out of here, I really do.

304
00:18:31,794 --> 00:18:34,923
Almost all of us were draftees.

305
00:18:35,047 --> 00:18:37,926
None of us cared a damn
about the war.

306
00:18:38,050 --> 00:18:40,644
We just didn't want
to get blown up.

307
00:18:40,761 --> 00:18:42,809
We just didn't want to die
in the jungle,

308
00:18:42,972 --> 00:18:45,316
holding your guts in.

309
00:18:45,474 --> 00:18:50,901
So the idea is do six months,
maybe eight months,

310
00:18:51,021 --> 00:18:56,243
get an R&R, take a deep breath
and try to finish up,

311
00:18:56,360 --> 00:19:00,081
try to do something that would
get you sent to base camp.

312
00:19:00,197 --> 00:19:03,952
Just don't die
because you're not gonna win.

313
00:19:09,749 --> 00:19:11,877
Chess is the
most serious contest

314
00:19:12,001 --> 00:19:13,674
Glen Hindley will engage in,

315
00:19:13,836 --> 00:19:16,589
for he has not fired a shot
in his nine months

316
00:19:16,714 --> 00:19:18,182
in the field
with Charlie Company.

317
00:19:18,340 --> 00:19:19,980
Well, I haven't
shot anybody yet.

318
00:19:20,092 --> 00:19:21,765
I don't plan on it.

319
00:19:21,886 --> 00:19:23,854
I haven't fired my gun
since I been here,

320
00:19:23,971 --> 00:19:25,973
and I like it that way.

321
00:19:26,098 --> 00:19:28,192
How can you get away with that?

322
00:19:28,309 --> 00:19:29,777
Just don't fire it.

323
00:19:29,894 --> 00:19:31,191
I plan to go across the...

324
00:19:31,312 --> 00:19:32,529
across country when I get back

325
00:19:32,688 --> 00:19:34,531
because I'll see
the people I know over here,

326
00:19:34,648 --> 00:19:36,821
plus I'll be able to talk
to a lot of other people,

327
00:19:36,942 --> 00:19:38,990
maybe convince them
that killing for peace

328
00:19:39,111 --> 00:19:40,283
just doesn't make sense.

329
00:19:50,664 --> 00:19:52,809
"The morale,
discipline, and battleworthiness

330
00:19:52,833 --> 00:19:56,713
of the U.S. Armed Forces,"
a retired Marine colonel wrote

331
00:19:56,837 --> 00:19:59,090
in the spring of 1971,

332
00:19:59,215 --> 00:20:02,435
"are lower and worse
than at any time,

333
00:20:02,551 --> 00:20:06,727
possibly in the history
of the United States."

334
00:20:06,889 --> 00:20:08,983
An official report had found

335
00:20:09,099 --> 00:20:12,069
that one out of four
enlisted men in Vietnam

336
00:20:12,228 --> 00:20:14,981
had used marijuana regularly...

337
00:20:15,105 --> 00:20:17,699
but almost never in combat.

338
00:20:17,817 --> 00:20:20,070
There's, uh, drugs everywhere.

339
00:20:20,194 --> 00:20:21,411
Really, you could, uh...

340
00:20:21,529 --> 00:20:23,952
Well, within...
within ten minutes in country,

341
00:20:24,073 --> 00:20:26,246
I-I had people approaching me
selling scag.

342
00:20:26,367 --> 00:20:27,584
What's scag?

343
00:20:27,701 --> 00:20:28,793
It's heroin.

344
00:20:28,911 --> 00:20:31,835
Heroin was cheap,

345
00:20:31,956 --> 00:20:34,505
pure, and everywhere.

346
00:20:34,625 --> 00:20:37,174
The Pentagon
would eventually acknowledge

347
00:20:37,294 --> 00:20:40,969
that 40,000 American troops
had been addicted to it.

348
00:20:59,483 --> 00:21:03,283
"The rearguard
of a once 500,000-man army,"

349
00:21:03,404 --> 00:21:04,621
an officer wrote,

350
00:21:04,780 --> 00:21:08,501
"is numbly extricating itself
from a nightmare war

351
00:21:08,617 --> 00:21:11,746
"the armed forces feel
they had foisted on them

352
00:21:11,871 --> 00:21:15,250
"by bright civilians
who are now back on campus

353
00:21:15,374 --> 00:21:19,971
writing books
about the folly of it all."

354
00:21:20,129 --> 00:21:22,723
Even General Creighton Abrams,

355
00:21:22,840 --> 00:21:25,969
commander of military operations
in Vietnam,

356
00:21:26,093 --> 00:21:27,891
now admitted privately,

357
00:21:28,012 --> 00:21:31,232
"1 need to get this army home
to save it."

358
00:21:42,818 --> 00:21:45,241
The telegrams and letters
coming into this courthouse

359
00:21:45,362 --> 00:21:47,490
are from all parts
of the country.

360
00:21:47,656 --> 00:21:50,455
From Baton Rouge, Louisiana,
a man writes,

361
00:21:50,576 --> 00:21:53,079
"Congratulations
to the Calley jurors.

362
00:21:53,203 --> 00:21:55,376
"A courageous and fair decision.

363
00:21:55,497 --> 00:21:57,499
Justice still exists."

364
00:21:57,666 --> 00:22:02,513
On March 29, 1971,

365
00:22:02,630 --> 00:22:04,428
at Fort Benning, Georgia,

366
00:22:04,548 --> 00:22:07,552
a military court found
Lieutenant William Calley...

367
00:22:07,676 --> 00:22:09,895
and only Lieutenant Calley...

368
00:22:10,012 --> 00:22:12,561
guilty of murdering
Vietnamese civilians

369
00:22:12,681 --> 00:22:15,605
at My Lai back in 1968.

370
00:22:18,562 --> 00:22:22,863
He was sentenced to life
imprisonment at hard labor.

371
00:22:22,983 --> 00:22:25,577
The commander
of Calley's division,

372
00:22:25,694 --> 00:22:27,742
General Samuel Koster,

373
00:22:27,863 --> 00:22:30,662
who had watched some of
the slaughter from a helicopter

374
00:22:30,783 --> 00:22:33,662
and done nothing to stop it,
was now the superintendent

375
00:22:33,786 --> 00:22:37,006
of the U.S. Military Academy
at West Point.

376
00:22:37,122 --> 00:22:40,877
He was forced to resign.

377
00:22:41,043 --> 00:22:44,047
The other 23 officers and men

378
00:22:44,213 --> 00:22:46,432
who had been indicted
were either acquitted

379
00:22:46,548 --> 00:22:49,222
or had their cases dismissed.

380
00:22:49,343 --> 00:22:52,722
The Calley verdict
proved as controversial

381
00:22:52,888 --> 00:22:55,061
as the war itself.

382
00:22:55,182 --> 00:22:57,230
A lady in
Cheyenne, Wyoming, says,

383
00:22:57,351 --> 00:22:59,570
"What the jury has
done to Lieutenant Calley

384
00:22:59,728 --> 00:23:01,730
"is a disgrace to this nation.

385
00:23:01,855 --> 00:23:03,698
"The enemy is the enemy,

386
00:23:03,816 --> 00:23:06,490
the enemy is the enemy."

387
00:23:06,610 --> 00:23:08,863
From Bellefontaine, Ohio,
a doctor says,

388
00:23:08,988 --> 00:23:11,616
"Let us not condemn
Lieutenant Calley

389
00:23:11,740 --> 00:23:13,959
"when it is the character
of the war

390
00:23:14,076 --> 00:23:16,704
which is at fault
for such slaughters as My Lai."

391
00:23:16,829 --> 00:23:20,049
What is your initial reaction
to this verdict, sir?

392
00:23:20,165 --> 00:23:22,293
I thought he would be found
not guilty.

393
00:23:22,418 --> 00:23:24,261
'Cause you send in a man
into combat,

394
00:23:24,420 --> 00:23:26,673
you train him
to be a... a killer,

395
00:23:26,797 --> 00:23:28,925
and then, when he does,
why then,

396
00:23:29,091 --> 00:23:30,889
uh, you prosecute him?

397
00:23:32,803 --> 00:23:36,433
Some believed everyone
involved should have gone to jail;

398
00:23:36,598 --> 00:23:39,602
others believed that Calley
had been made a scapegoat

399
00:23:39,768 --> 00:23:43,614
for the criminal misdeeds
of his superiors.

400
00:23:43,731 --> 00:23:47,577
And still others felt a systemic
failure of leadership

401
00:23:47,693 --> 00:23:49,946
had occurred
in a chain of command

402
00:23:50,070 --> 00:23:54,667
that stretched all the way up
to the commander in chief.

403
00:23:57,286 --> 00:23:59,004
According to a Gallup poll,

404
00:23:59,121 --> 00:24:04,252
79% of the American public
disagreed with the verdict.

405
00:24:04,376 --> 00:24:07,755
Nixon decided to intervene.

406
00:24:10,132 --> 00:24:13,477
Calley spent just
three days behind bars.

407
00:24:14,803 --> 00:24:17,352
The president
ordered him transferred

408
00:24:17,473 --> 00:24:19,601
from federal prison
to house arrest

409
00:24:19,725 --> 00:24:21,853
at Fort Benning, pending appeal.

410
00:24:21,977 --> 00:24:23,979
Okay, I'm gonna walk
back from each side.

411
00:24:24,104 --> 00:24:26,152
Captain Aubrey Daniel,

412
00:24:26,315 --> 00:24:28,818
who had successfully
prosecuted Calley,

413
00:24:28,942 --> 00:24:32,071
wrote Nixon,
accusing him of compromising

414
00:24:32,196 --> 00:24:34,745
"such a fundamental
moral principle

415
00:24:34,865 --> 00:24:37,243
"as the inherent unlawfulness

416
00:24:37,367 --> 00:24:40,462
of the murder
of innocent persons."

417
00:24:40,579 --> 00:24:42,957
A military appeals court

418
00:24:43,082 --> 00:24:46,837
eventually reduced
Calley's term to 20 years,

419
00:24:47,002 --> 00:24:49,846
the secretary of the army
cut it to ten,

420
00:24:50,005 --> 00:24:52,428
and after just
three-and-a-half years

421
00:24:52,549 --> 00:24:55,473
under house arrest,
he was paroled.

422
00:24:59,723 --> 00:25:02,021
Who's responsible?

423
00:25:04,353 --> 00:25:08,608
The human beings who did this...

424
00:25:08,732 --> 00:25:12,157
These are war crimes.

425
00:25:12,277 --> 00:25:16,123
The individual human beings
who put a rifle muzzle

426
00:25:16,240 --> 00:25:17,287
up against a baby's head

427
00:25:17,407 --> 00:25:20,707
and shot the brains
out of that baby...

428
00:25:20,869 --> 00:25:23,622
nothing happened to them.

429
00:25:23,747 --> 00:25:26,000
Nothing!

430
00:25:33,423 --> 00:25:37,223
And we walked
up the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

431
00:25:39,388 --> 00:25:42,141
And they said we walked
900 kilometers...

432
00:25:42,266 --> 00:25:47,944
540 miles in 57 days.

433
00:25:48,063 --> 00:25:51,818
And we met all these people
going both ways.

434
00:25:51,942 --> 00:25:55,412
We met civilians coming south.

435
00:25:55,571 --> 00:25:58,245
We met soldiers
going north and south.

436
00:25:58,407 --> 00:26:01,502
We met people humping
artillery rounds.

437
00:26:01,618 --> 00:26:02,870
We met a...

438
00:26:02,995 --> 00:26:04,838
I remember a whole unit,

439
00:26:04,955 --> 00:26:06,878
a company-size unit,
of women.

440
00:26:09,293 --> 00:26:12,263
On the way,
in one of these villages,

441
00:26:12,379 --> 00:26:15,758
I stole a uniform.

442
00:26:17,384 --> 00:26:19,102
Just khaki pants
and khaki shirt.

443
00:26:19,219 --> 00:26:20,436
And I stole it.

444
00:26:20,554 --> 00:26:23,933
And I folded it up
and I put it in my pack.

445
00:26:24,057 --> 00:26:27,277
By early 1971,

446
00:26:27,394 --> 00:26:29,271
army doctor Hal Kushner

447
00:26:29,396 --> 00:26:31,114
had been a prisoner
of the Viet Cong

448
00:26:31,273 --> 00:26:34,573
in South Vietnam
for more than three years.

449
00:26:36,570 --> 00:26:40,245
He had survived ill treatment
and a host of illnesses,

450
00:26:40,365 --> 00:26:43,710
and he had buried
13 of his fellow captives,

451
00:26:43,827 --> 00:26:45,625
who had died of starvation

452
00:26:45,787 --> 00:26:49,291
and sickness and despair.

453
00:26:49,416 --> 00:26:53,171
Now, he and the other survivors
from his camp

454
00:26:53,295 --> 00:26:56,925
were being moved
all the way to North Vietnam.

455
00:26:59,384 --> 00:27:00,977
Kushner and his companions

456
00:27:01,094 --> 00:27:03,392
eventually reached
the city of Vinh,

457
00:27:03,513 --> 00:27:06,187
where they boarded
a train to Hanoi.

458
00:27:06,308 --> 00:27:08,310
And I put on this fresh uniform,

459
00:27:08,477 --> 00:27:10,195
and when I got off the train

460
00:27:10,312 --> 00:27:13,942
I was met with this officer
in a jeep.

461
00:27:14,066 --> 00:27:15,659
And he just looked at me
and he said,

462
00:27:15,776 --> 00:27:16,961
"You're an officer, aren't you?

463
00:27:16,985 --> 00:27:19,079
You come here."

464
00:27:19,196 --> 00:27:21,449
And he just... I felt very proud
that I looked good

465
00:27:21,573 --> 00:27:23,450
when I came off that train.

466
00:27:29,873 --> 00:27:33,173
Kushner joined
hundreds of American captives

467
00:27:33,293 --> 00:27:35,796
who were scattered
among five prisons

468
00:27:35,921 --> 00:27:39,016
in and around Hanoi.

469
00:27:39,132 --> 00:27:41,681
We hadn't been there
long when the word came down

470
00:27:41,802 --> 00:27:44,555
from the American
senior ranking officer

471
00:27:44,680 --> 00:27:48,981
that nobody would go home
unless everybody went home.

472
00:27:49,101 --> 00:27:52,025
That nobody would cooperate
with the Vietnamese.

473
00:27:57,484 --> 00:28:00,954
But we heard him
on the camp radio once...

474
00:28:03,073 --> 00:28:05,997
telling us that
we should cooperate.

475
00:28:08,287 --> 00:28:11,040
And it was obvious, from
his voice and his inflection,

476
00:28:11,206 --> 00:28:13,208
that he had been
tortured and beaten

477
00:28:13,333 --> 00:28:16,212
and was being made to say that.

478
00:28:16,336 --> 00:28:18,384
And that's what they did.

479
00:28:18,505 --> 00:28:22,885
Eventually, Kushner,
like most of the prisoners,

480
00:28:23,010 --> 00:28:25,684
would be forced
to record a statement

481
00:28:25,804 --> 00:28:27,727
against the war.

482
00:29:02,132 --> 00:29:03,772
They wanted
propaganda statements

483
00:29:03,800 --> 00:29:05,347
to say the war was criminal,

484
00:29:05,469 --> 00:29:07,938
to say that we were criminals.

485
00:29:08,096 --> 00:29:10,269
And they used our weakness
against us.

486
00:29:14,895 --> 00:29:18,695
No more war!
No more war! No more war!

487
00:29:18,815 --> 00:29:22,570
No more war!
No more war!

488
00:29:22,694 --> 00:29:24,662
The first time in our history

489
00:29:24,780 --> 00:29:27,249
that veterans came home
from a war and said...

490
00:29:27,366 --> 00:29:28,788
while the war
is still going on...

491
00:29:28,909 --> 00:29:31,879
and said,
"This war's got to stop."

492
00:29:31,995 --> 00:29:34,839
And the American people

493
00:29:34,956 --> 00:29:37,300
might not listen to a bunch
of long-haired hippie kids.

494
00:29:37,417 --> 00:29:39,215
What do they know?

495
00:29:39,336 --> 00:29:42,089
But the working class,
the great "silent majority"...

496
00:29:42,214 --> 00:29:44,637
Richard Nixon always talked
about his "silent majority"

497
00:29:44,758 --> 00:29:47,227
that would back him
by being silent...

498
00:29:47,344 --> 00:29:49,813
we were their kids.

499
00:29:49,971 --> 00:29:52,565
And it finally dawned on me...

500
00:29:52,682 --> 00:29:54,730
and this was a long,
painful process...

501
00:29:54,851 --> 00:29:57,695
that... that I wasn't
helping anybody

502
00:29:57,813 --> 00:30:00,908
by keeping my mouth shut.

503
00:30:01,024 --> 00:30:04,153
Less than three
weeks after Lieutenant Calley

504
00:30:04,319 --> 00:30:06,947
was found guilty,
some 2,000 members

505
00:30:07,072 --> 00:30:08,995
of an organization called

506
00:30:09,116 --> 00:30:11,539
Vietnam Veterans Against the War

507
00:30:11,660 --> 00:30:16,336
and their followers descended
upon Washington, D.C.

508
00:30:50,031 --> 00:30:53,410
VVAW was a-a...
it was great therapy.

509
00:30:53,535 --> 00:30:55,629
We were working it out
ourselves.

510
00:30:55,745 --> 00:30:57,998
Vets taking care of vets.

511
00:30:58,123 --> 00:30:59,796
We were generals
in our own right.

512
00:30:59,916 --> 00:31:01,384
And we didn't join anything.

513
00:31:01,501 --> 00:31:03,048
We became something.

514
00:31:03,170 --> 00:31:05,218
And that, yes, I was a Marine,

515
00:31:05,380 --> 00:31:07,053
but I was first and foremost

516
00:31:07,215 --> 00:31:09,434
a citizen
of the United States of America.

517
00:31:09,551 --> 00:31:13,306
And being a citizen,
I had certain responsibilities.

518
00:31:13,430 --> 00:31:16,400
And the largest
of those responsibilities

519
00:31:16,558 --> 00:31:19,812
is standing up to your
government and saying "no"

520
00:31:19,936 --> 00:31:21,938
when it's doing something
that you think

521
00:31:22,063 --> 00:31:24,737
is not in this nation's
best interest.

522
00:31:24,900 --> 00:31:30,077
That is the most important job
that every citizen has.

523
00:31:33,992 --> 00:31:37,087
I served my
country as honorably,

524
00:31:37,245 --> 00:31:40,294
when I was in Vietnam Veterans
Against the War,

525
00:31:40,415 --> 00:31:44,010
as I did
as a United States Marine.

526
00:31:44,127 --> 00:31:47,427
And, in fact,
I conducted myself as a Marine

527
00:31:47,589 --> 00:31:50,263
the whole time I was in VVAW:

528
00:31:50,383 --> 00:31:51,885
I... My-my whole life,

529
00:31:52,010 --> 00:31:54,729
I conduct myself as a Marine.

530
00:31:54,846 --> 00:31:58,146
Navy Lieutenant John Kerry,

531
00:31:58,266 --> 00:32:01,486
who had commanded a swift boat
in the Mekong Delta

532
00:32:01,603 --> 00:32:04,106
and was one of
the organization's leaders,

533
00:32:04,272 --> 00:32:05,569
was invited to address

534
00:32:05,690 --> 00:32:07,784
the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee,

535
00:32:07,943 --> 00:32:10,867
still chaired
by J. William Fulbright.

536
00:32:10,987 --> 00:32:12,364
Thank you.

537
00:32:12,489 --> 00:32:15,834
I went up for the presentation.

538
00:32:15,951 --> 00:32:18,124
And it was standing room only.

539
00:32:18,286 --> 00:32:22,041
And I was crammed up against
the wall in the very back.

540
00:32:22,165 --> 00:32:25,169
And when John...

541
00:32:25,293 --> 00:32:28,092
gave that presentation...

542
00:32:28,213 --> 00:32:30,682
I felt like
he was speaking for all of us.

543
00:32:30,799 --> 00:32:34,144
We could come back to this
country and we could be quiet.

544
00:32:34,302 --> 00:32:35,804
We could hold our silence.

545
00:32:35,929 --> 00:32:39,354
We could not tell what
went on in Vietnam, but we feel,

546
00:32:39,474 --> 00:32:42,318
because of what threatens
this country,

547
00:32:42,435 --> 00:32:44,233
we have to speak out.

548
00:32:44,354 --> 00:32:46,152
Millions of men who have been

549
00:32:46,314 --> 00:32:49,318
taught to deal
and to trade in violence

550
00:32:49,484 --> 00:32:51,737
and who were given
the chance to die

551
00:32:51,861 --> 00:32:54,034
for the biggest nothing
in history,

552
00:32:54,155 --> 00:32:57,785
men who have returned
with a sense of anger

553
00:32:57,909 --> 00:32:59,286
and a sense of betrayal

554
00:32:59,411 --> 00:33:01,664
which no one has yet grasped.

555
00:33:01,830 --> 00:33:04,424
We rationalized
destroying villages

556
00:33:04,541 --> 00:33:06,043
in order to save them.

557
00:33:06,167 --> 00:33:08,215
We saw America lose
her sense of morality,

558
00:33:08,336 --> 00:33:11,306
as she accepted very coolly
a My Lai

559
00:33:11,423 --> 00:33:13,801
and refused to give up
the image of American soldiers

560
00:33:13,925 --> 00:33:16,519
that hand out chocolate bars
and chewing gum.

561
00:33:16,678 --> 00:33:19,181
We learnt the meaning
of free-fire zones,

562
00:33:19,347 --> 00:33:21,816
shoot anything that moves,

563
00:33:21,933 --> 00:33:24,061
and we watched while America
placed a cheapness

564
00:33:24,185 --> 00:33:26,358
on the lives of Orientals.

565
00:33:26,479 --> 00:33:30,359
We watched the United States'
falsification of body counts...

566
00:33:30,483 --> 00:33:33,862
in fact, the glorification
of body counts.

567
00:33:34,029 --> 00:33:36,532
We watched
while men charged up hills

568
00:33:36,698 --> 00:33:39,793
because a general said
that hill has to be taken.

569
00:33:39,909 --> 00:33:42,628
And after losing one platoon
or two platoons,

570
00:33:42,746 --> 00:33:44,089
they marched away

571
00:33:44,205 --> 00:33:46,082
to leave the hill
for the reoccupation

572
00:33:46,207 --> 00:33:49,051
of the North Vietnamese.

573
00:33:49,210 --> 00:33:51,713
And we are asking Americans
to think about that.

574
00:33:51,880 --> 00:33:54,008
Because how do you ask a man

575
00:33:54,132 --> 00:33:56,851
to be the last man to die
in Vietnam?

576
00:33:56,968 --> 00:34:01,519
How do you ask a man to be the
last man to die for a mistake?

577
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:04,644
And so, when, 30 years from now,

578
00:34:04,768 --> 00:34:07,442
our brothers go down the street
without a leg,

579
00:34:07,562 --> 00:34:10,111
without an arm or a face,

580
00:34:10,231 --> 00:34:12,859
and small boys ask why,

581
00:34:12,984 --> 00:34:15,703
we will be able to say "Vietnam"

582
00:34:15,820 --> 00:34:19,370
and not mean
a filthy, obscene memory

583
00:34:19,491 --> 00:34:24,748
but mean instead the place
where America finally turned

584
00:34:24,913 --> 00:34:29,589
and where soldiers like us
helped it in the turning.

585
00:34:29,709 --> 00:34:31,427
Thank you.

586
00:34:37,967 --> 00:34:40,846
I thought, "I have never heard

587
00:34:40,970 --> 00:34:43,849
"so... such an incredible speech

588
00:34:43,973 --> 00:34:46,396
that says exactly what
I'm feeling."

589
00:34:46,518 --> 00:34:49,897
You know?
It was extraordinary.

590
00:34:50,021 --> 00:34:52,365
Extraordinary.

591
00:34:52,482 --> 00:34:56,032
But some veterans
remembered a different part

592
00:34:56,152 --> 00:34:57,950
of Kerry's testimony,

593
00:34:58,113 --> 00:35:01,617
testimony in which he repeated
accounts of atrocities

594
00:35:01,783 --> 00:35:05,538
he had heard
from other American veterans.

595
00:35:05,662 --> 00:35:08,791
They told the stories of times

596
00:35:08,957 --> 00:35:13,884
that they had personally raped,
cut off ears, cut off heads,

597
00:35:14,003 --> 00:35:17,678
taped wires from portable
telephones to human genitals

598
00:35:17,799 --> 00:35:19,472
and turned up the power,

599
00:35:19,634 --> 00:35:22,979
cut off limbs, blown up bodies,

600
00:35:23,096 --> 00:35:25,645
randomly shot at civilians,

601
00:35:25,765 --> 00:35:29,986
razed villages in fashion
reminiscent of Genghis Khan...

602
00:35:30,103 --> 00:35:32,481
What I saw in Vietnam
was not the soldier

603
00:35:32,647 --> 00:35:34,490
that Mr. Kerry
or his colleagues

604
00:35:34,649 --> 00:35:36,651
were describing at that time.

605
00:35:36,776 --> 00:35:39,154
There was
no widespread atrocity.

606
00:35:39,320 --> 00:35:40,920
There was...
there were a couple of units

607
00:35:40,989 --> 00:35:43,458
that went right off the rails,
and we can talk about that.

608
00:35:43,575 --> 00:35:46,249
But they were not
out-of-control animals,

609
00:35:46,369 --> 00:35:48,371
which was the way
they were portrayed.

610
00:35:48,496 --> 00:35:52,046
And what was even worse was
they were alluding to the fact

611
00:35:52,167 --> 00:35:53,464
that you would take
ordinary kids

612
00:35:53,585 --> 00:35:56,054
and turn them
into these savages,

613
00:35:56,171 --> 00:35:57,673
war criminals, and the...

614
00:35:57,797 --> 00:35:59,140
that the military
was doing that.

615
00:35:59,257 --> 00:36:01,726
And it didn't.
Didn't happen that way.

616
00:36:01,843 --> 00:36:04,187
I'm still very angry about that.

617
00:36:06,264 --> 00:36:07,686
The next day,

618
00:36:07,807 --> 00:36:10,936
700 Vietnam Veterans
Against the War

619
00:36:11,060 --> 00:36:13,188
gathered at the Capitol.

620
00:36:13,354 --> 00:36:16,198
We originally intended
to put our medals in a body bag

621
00:36:16,357 --> 00:36:19,201
and have them delivered
to Congress.

622
00:36:19,319 --> 00:36:22,573
But the Nixon
administration erected

623
00:36:22,697 --> 00:36:28,204
this big wire and wood fence
on the steps of our Capitol

624
00:36:28,328 --> 00:36:31,878
to keep us out.

625
00:36:31,998 --> 00:36:33,875
To keep out
the young men and women

626
00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:36,549
who were fighting that war.

627
00:36:36,669 --> 00:36:39,013
And all that did was piss us off

628
00:36:39,130 --> 00:36:43,010
and give us
the greatest photo opportunity

629
00:36:43,134 --> 00:36:45,853
that we could ever have.

630
00:36:45,970 --> 00:36:47,114
- Silver Star.
- Purple Heart.

631
00:36:47,138 --> 00:36:49,232
Bronze Star.

632
00:36:49,390 --> 00:36:51,202
Cross of Gallantry.
Distinguished Flying Cross.

633
00:36:51,226 --> 00:36:52,569
And everything else!

634
00:36:52,685 --> 00:36:54,455
I don't want
these fucking medals, man!

635
00:36:54,479 --> 00:36:57,699
The Silver Star, the third
highest medal in the country,

636
00:36:57,816 --> 00:36:59,284
it doesn't mean anything!

637
00:36:59,400 --> 00:37:01,619
Bob Smeal died for these medals!

638
00:37:01,736 --> 00:37:04,159
Lieutenant Panamaroff died
so I got a medal!

639
00:37:04,280 --> 00:37:06,578
Sergeant Johns died
so I got a medal!

640
00:37:06,741 --> 00:37:08,584
I got a Silver Star,
a Purple Heart,

641
00:37:08,743 --> 00:37:10,996
Army Commendation Medal,
eight Air Medals,

642
00:37:11,120 --> 00:37:12,463
National Defense,

643
00:37:12,580 --> 00:37:13,724
and the rest of this garbage!

644
00:37:13,748 --> 00:37:15,500
It doesn't mean a thing!

645
00:37:22,340 --> 00:37:24,434
Throwing my medals
back was probably harder

646
00:37:24,551 --> 00:37:25,803
than going to the war.

647
00:37:25,927 --> 00:37:28,476
Was actually harder than going
and serving in Vietnam.

648
00:37:33,142 --> 00:37:35,621
If this medal is so
important, let's make it important.

649
00:37:35,645 --> 00:37:37,272
Here it is.
You can have it back.

650
00:37:37,397 --> 00:37:39,399
End the war in Vietnam.

651
00:37:39,524 --> 00:37:41,026
What else is there?

652
00:37:41,150 --> 00:37:42,402
I... There was nothing else.

653
00:37:42,527 --> 00:37:44,046
I wouldn't put em on my wall
for my son.

654
00:37:44,070 --> 00:37:46,198
I never want... that was
the last thing in the world

655
00:37:46,322 --> 00:37:48,916
I would ever want my son
to revere.

656
00:37:51,369 --> 00:37:54,168
It was a
difficult decision for me.

657
00:37:54,289 --> 00:37:59,170
I did it out
of a disrespectful loyalty.

658
00:37:59,294 --> 00:38:03,140
I was proud
of my military service.

659
00:38:03,298 --> 00:38:05,471
And I wanted to say,
"You know, I don't think

660
00:38:05,633 --> 00:38:08,307
you guys know that much,"
the American military.

661
00:38:08,428 --> 00:38:11,432
"You know,
I think you should think again

662
00:38:11,556 --> 00:38:12,899
"about this enterprise.

663
00:38:13,016 --> 00:38:15,360
And here you go, pal."

664
00:38:15,476 --> 00:38:17,228
Tim Bagwell
from Sacramento, California,

665
00:38:17,353 --> 00:38:20,232
still on active duty,
and I say get the hell out.

666
00:38:33,661 --> 00:38:36,005
When we threw our medals away,

667
00:38:36,122 --> 00:38:37,590
that got their attention,

668
00:38:37,707 --> 00:38:40,256
because America values
those things.

669
00:38:40,376 --> 00:38:41,673
So do we.

670
00:38:41,836 --> 00:38:44,089
That's why it was so important.

671
00:38:44,213 --> 00:38:47,217
The police had
been ordered not to arrest

672
00:38:47,342 --> 00:38:49,845
any of the veterans, because,

673
00:38:49,969 --> 00:38:52,438
Pat Buchanan,
a White House aide, wrote,

674
00:38:52,555 --> 00:38:55,900
they were "being received in
a far more sympathetic fashion

675
00:38:56,017 --> 00:38:58,111
"than other demonstrators.

676
00:38:58,227 --> 00:39:01,777
The 'crazies' will be in town
soon enough," he continued,

677
00:39:01,898 --> 00:39:03,946
"and if we want a confrontation,

678
00:39:04,067 --> 00:39:06,035
let's have it with them."

679
00:39:06,152 --> 00:39:08,405
He was right.

680
00:39:08,529 --> 00:39:10,748
In the days
immediately following

681
00:39:10,865 --> 00:39:12,208
the veterans' protest,

682
00:39:12,367 --> 00:39:14,290
other groups
of antiwar activists

683
00:39:14,410 --> 00:39:17,414
moved into the capital.

684
00:39:17,538 --> 00:39:21,213
The most radical called itself
the May Day Tribe

685
00:39:21,334 --> 00:39:24,258
and threatened
to close the city down.

686
00:39:24,379 --> 00:39:27,599
For three days,
they staged hit-and-run raids

687
00:39:27,715 --> 00:39:29,467
throughout Washington...

688
00:39:29,592 --> 00:39:32,015
blocking bridges
and traffic circles,

689
00:39:32,136 --> 00:39:33,433
smashing windows,

690
00:39:33,554 --> 00:39:35,932
hurling rocks, burning cars.

691
00:39:37,141 --> 00:39:38,535
If Richard Nixon thought

692
00:39:38,559 --> 00:39:41,813
that this week was something,
wait until the next round.

693
00:39:41,938 --> 00:39:44,487
This is only a warm-up
of what is going to come.

694
00:39:44,607 --> 00:39:47,326
This is going to continue
until the war ends.

695
00:39:47,443 --> 00:39:49,662
Some 12,000 were arrested...

696
00:39:49,779 --> 00:39:52,248
7,000 on a single day,

697
00:39:52,365 --> 00:39:55,790
the largest number of arrests
in 24 hours

698
00:39:55,910 --> 00:39:58,288
in United States history.

699
00:39:58,413 --> 00:40:01,758
I realized,
coming away from Washington,

700
00:40:01,916 --> 00:40:04,169
that our whole strategy
was wrong

701
00:40:04,293 --> 00:40:07,923
and that we were becoming
more and more militant

702
00:40:08,047 --> 00:40:10,766
at a time
when more and more Americans

703
00:40:10,925 --> 00:40:12,393
were opposing the war

704
00:40:12,510 --> 00:40:14,933
but were turned off
by our militancy.

705
00:40:15,054 --> 00:40:17,933
So we were doing
exactly the wrong thing.

706
00:40:18,057 --> 00:40:21,482
The White House
was initially pleased.

707
00:40:21,602 --> 00:40:24,697
Public sympathy for the veterans
was largely forgotten

708
00:40:24,814 --> 00:40:28,739
in the face of days of battle
in the streets.

709
00:40:28,860 --> 00:40:31,864
Polls showed
that most Americans approved

710
00:40:31,988 --> 00:40:33,786
of the arrests.

711
00:40:36,617 --> 00:40:39,621
But those same polls also showed

712
00:40:39,787 --> 00:40:42,461
that most Americans
no longer believed

713
00:40:42,582 --> 00:40:46,303
they were being told the truth
about Vietnam.

714
00:40:51,299 --> 00:40:53,973
When I got home, my...
so my dad's pissed off.

715
00:40:54,135 --> 00:40:57,810
'Cause he's-he's
a true believer, you know?

716
00:40:59,432 --> 00:41:01,560
He was already receiving threats

717
00:41:01,684 --> 00:41:04,813
because I'd thrown away
their medals.

718
00:41:06,606 --> 00:41:09,530
And that pissed my dad off then.

719
00:41:09,650 --> 00:41:12,278
And you would've thought
I hadn't done anything wrong.

720
00:41:12,403 --> 00:41:15,327
Because then somebody outside
the family was messing with me.

721
00:41:15,490 --> 00:41:17,492
And he said, "Son, don't worry.

722
00:41:17,617 --> 00:41:19,494
"Those were your medals.
You paid for 'em.

723
00:41:19,619 --> 00:41:20,971
"You can do anything
you want with 'em.

724
00:41:20,995 --> 00:41:23,043
"They want to jack with us,
they'll face us both.

725
00:41:23,164 --> 00:41:24,791
We'll-we'll take 'em on
in the driveway."

726
00:41:24,916 --> 00:41:27,544
You know?
"Yo, Dad."

727
00:41:35,051 --> 00:41:37,930
On June 12, 1971,

728
00:41:38,054 --> 00:41:40,273
Richard Nixon's daughter,
Tricia,

729
00:41:40,389 --> 00:41:44,986
married Edward Cox
in the White House Rose Garden.

730
00:41:45,103 --> 00:41:48,698
The country watched it all
on television.

731
00:41:52,151 --> 00:41:55,280
The wedding was still news
the next day.

732
00:41:55,404 --> 00:41:58,874
But another story on the front
page of the New York Times

733
00:41:59,033 --> 00:42:01,707
caught
the president's attention.

734
00:42:01,869 --> 00:42:04,918
The article, by Neil Sheehan,

735
00:42:05,039 --> 00:42:07,713
was the first report
of what came to be called

736
00:42:07,875 --> 00:42:09,593
the Pentagon Papers,

737
00:42:09,710 --> 00:42:13,214
7,000 pages
of highly classified documents

738
00:42:13,339 --> 00:42:15,262
and historical narrative,

739
00:42:15,383 --> 00:42:17,602
compiled secretly at the orders

740
00:42:17,718 --> 00:42:21,473
of former Secretary of Defense
Robert McNamara.

741
00:42:21,597 --> 00:42:24,817
He had hoped a study
of the decision-making process

742
00:42:24,934 --> 00:42:28,404
that had led the United States
to become so deeply involved

743
00:42:28,563 --> 00:42:31,737
in Vietnam would help
future policymakers

744
00:42:31,899 --> 00:42:34,448
avoid similar errors.

745
00:42:36,112 --> 00:42:38,114
I thought I knew a great deal.

746
00:42:38,239 --> 00:42:40,241
I thought I knew most
of what was worth knowing

747
00:42:40,408 --> 00:42:41,580
about the war.

748
00:42:41,742 --> 00:42:45,463
And, suddenly, I didn't.

749
00:42:45,580 --> 00:42:48,550
It wasn't a reporter's version
of an event.

750
00:42:48,666 --> 00:42:50,464
It was their version
of an event.

751
00:42:50,585 --> 00:42:52,804
It was their telegrams,
their orders,

752
00:42:52,920 --> 00:42:54,763
their memoranda, eh cetera.

753
00:43:09,187 --> 00:43:12,282
The documents proved
that American presidents

754
00:43:12,398 --> 00:43:14,116
and their closest advisors

755
00:43:14,275 --> 00:43:16,198
had steered the United States

756
00:43:16,319 --> 00:43:18,993
toward deeper involvement
in Vietnam,

757
00:43:19,113 --> 00:43:23,493
despite their own grave doubts
about the chances for victory.

758
00:43:32,418 --> 00:43:34,887
They had known
that the Saigon government

759
00:43:35,004 --> 00:43:37,382
was weak and incompetent...

760
00:43:44,889 --> 00:43:48,814
that the enemy was
disciplined and resilient...

761
00:43:54,941 --> 00:43:58,662
and that the bombing
of the North wasn't working.

762
00:44:06,202 --> 00:44:10,252
Yet, they had routinely lied
about all these things

763
00:44:10,373 --> 00:44:12,842
to Congress
and the American people.

764
00:44:38,859 --> 00:44:41,738
I certainly don't endorse

765
00:44:41,862 --> 00:44:46,834
anyone releasing top-secret
material to the press.

766
00:44:48,536 --> 00:44:52,461
Um, on the other hand, uh...

767
00:44:52,581 --> 00:44:55,710
I was very concerned

768
00:44:55,835 --> 00:44:58,213
about the fact that the, uh,

769
00:44:58,379 --> 00:45:03,556
government was not being up
front with the American people

770
00:45:03,676 --> 00:45:07,306
in certain respects
with the Vietnam War.

771
00:45:07,430 --> 00:45:10,559
Two copies of the
report had been stored

772
00:45:10,725 --> 00:45:13,945
at the RAND Corporation,
a California think tank,

773
00:45:14,061 --> 00:45:16,029
where Daniel Ellsberg,

774
00:45:16,147 --> 00:45:20,823
one of the study's 36 authors,
worked as an analyst.

775
00:45:20,943 --> 00:45:23,913
Ellsberg had once
supported the war.

776
00:45:24,030 --> 00:45:25,907
He'd served in the Pentagon,

777
00:45:26,032 --> 00:45:28,410
and spent two years working
for the State Department

778
00:45:28,534 --> 00:45:30,628
in Vietnam.

779
00:45:30,745 --> 00:45:35,125
But he had come to see the war
as profoundly immoral,

780
00:45:35,249 --> 00:45:37,752
and hoped
that if Americans understood

781
00:45:37,877 --> 00:45:42,178
how administration after
administration had misled them

782
00:45:42,298 --> 00:45:44,801
about what was being
done in their name,

783
00:45:44,925 --> 00:45:47,428
they might help
bring it to an end.

784
00:45:47,595 --> 00:45:51,270
He and Anthony Russo,
another RAND employee,

785
00:45:51,432 --> 00:45:54,777
secretly copied
most of the report.

786
00:45:54,935 --> 00:45:59,031
Ellsberg offered it to three
leading antiwar senators,

787
00:45:59,148 --> 00:46:02,948
hoping they would be willing
to reveal its contents.

788
00:46:03,110 --> 00:46:05,704
None dared do it.

789
00:46:05,821 --> 00:46:09,291
Meanwhile, Neil Sheehan
of the New York Times,

790
00:46:09,450 --> 00:46:13,455
who had been reporting
on Vietnam since 1962,

791
00:46:13,579 --> 00:46:17,254
and had already secretly read
some of the documents,

792
00:46:17,375 --> 00:46:21,300
asked Ellsberg
to show him the whole report.

793
00:46:21,462 --> 00:46:24,466
At that point, I was
very passionate about the war.

794
00:46:24,590 --> 00:46:27,969
I felt that it was really wrong,

795
00:46:28,135 --> 00:46:29,978
because we were getting
a lot of Americans

796
00:46:30,137 --> 00:46:32,310
and a lot of Vietnamese killed
for no purpose.

797
00:46:32,473 --> 00:46:36,148
We were gonna lose this war.

798
00:46:36,310 --> 00:46:40,486
And so I vowed to myself
when I saw this material

799
00:46:40,606 --> 00:46:42,324
that this is never gonna go back

800
00:46:42,483 --> 00:46:43,985
into a government safe again.

801
00:46:44,151 --> 00:46:45,824
The American public
had paid for it

802
00:46:45,986 --> 00:46:48,614
with the lives of their sons
and with their treasure,

803
00:46:48,739 --> 00:46:50,412
and it's gonna be published.

804
00:46:50,533 --> 00:46:52,080
That piece in the Times

805
00:46:52,201 --> 00:46:53,373
is, of course,

806
00:46:53,494 --> 00:46:56,543
a massive security leak
from the Pentagon, you know.

807
00:46:56,664 --> 00:46:58,337
Yeah.

808
00:46:58,499 --> 00:47:01,423
It all relates, of course,
to everything up until we came in.

809
00:47:01,544 --> 00:47:03,171
Yeah.

810
00:47:03,295 --> 00:47:05,673
And it's, uh, it's ver...
it's hard on Johnson,

811
00:47:05,840 --> 00:47:09,140
it's hard on Kennedy,
it's hard on Lodge.

812
00:47:09,260 --> 00:47:12,639
At first, Nixon
was not unduly disturbed

813
00:47:12,763 --> 00:47:15,061
by the newspaper's revelations.

814
00:47:15,182 --> 00:47:18,686
They reflected badly
on his Democratic predecessors,

815
00:47:18,853 --> 00:47:21,197
not on him.

816
00:47:21,313 --> 00:47:24,487
But Henry Kissinger
quickly convinced Nixon

817
00:47:24,608 --> 00:47:26,360
that if the Times were permitted

818
00:47:26,527 --> 00:47:30,202
to reveal the classified secrets
of earlier presidents,

819
00:47:30,364 --> 00:47:35,336
it was only a matter of time
until someone leaked his own.

820
00:47:35,453 --> 00:47:39,299
The Justice Department obtained
a temporary court order

821
00:47:39,415 --> 00:47:42,965
forbidding the Times from
publishing further installments

822
00:47:43,085 --> 00:47:46,180
on the grounds
of national security.

823
00:47:46,297 --> 00:47:49,972
But soon, both the Boston Globe

824
00:47:50,092 --> 00:47:53,938
and the Washington Post were
also printing excerpts.

825
00:47:55,598 --> 00:47:58,101
On June 30, 1971,

826
00:47:58,225 --> 00:48:00,819
the United States Supreme Court,

827
00:48:00,936 --> 00:48:03,064
citing the First Amendment,

828
00:48:03,230 --> 00:48:06,734
ruled six to three
that the Times had the right

829
00:48:06,901 --> 00:48:10,371
to publish the stolen documents.

830
00:48:10,488 --> 00:48:12,582
And I went
down into the basement

831
00:48:12,698 --> 00:48:14,951
to wait for the presses
to start to roll,

832
00:48:15,075 --> 00:48:17,669
and they had these huge
round reams of paper.

833
00:48:18,996 --> 00:48:20,557
And, finally,
the presses started to roll.

834
00:48:20,581 --> 00:48:25,007
And it was just an exquisite
moment of vindication

835
00:48:25,127 --> 00:48:27,255
of the freedom
of the press in this country

836
00:48:27,379 --> 00:48:28,926
and how important it is.

837
00:48:31,133 --> 00:48:33,761
That changed

838
00:48:33,928 --> 00:48:35,771
our whole attitude
toward government.

839
00:48:35,930 --> 00:48:38,274
Up until then,
the president wouldn't lie.

840
00:48:38,390 --> 00:48:40,484
After then, they always lie.

841
00:48:40,601 --> 00:48:43,070
The clay the
presses began to roll again,

842
00:48:43,187 --> 00:48:46,487
Nixon ordered
attorney general John Mitchell

843
00:48:46,607 --> 00:48:50,157
to try to discredit
Daniel Ellsberg, who had just

844
00:48:50,277 --> 00:48:52,450
been indicted
by a federal grand jury

845
00:48:52,613 --> 00:48:54,741
for theft and conspiracy

846
00:48:54,865 --> 00:48:58,790
under the Espionage Act of 1917.

847
00:49:33,737 --> 00:49:37,913
Nixon feared Ellsberg
possessed more classified documents

848
00:49:38,033 --> 00:49:40,456
that would show
that he himself had lied

849
00:49:40,578 --> 00:49:44,333
about the secret bombing
of Cambodia and Laos,

850
00:49:44,456 --> 00:49:47,175
and he believed
that Ellsberg had had help

851
00:49:47,293 --> 00:49:50,718
and wanted to know the names
of his co-conspirators.

852
00:49:50,838 --> 00:49:53,182
The president created a private,

853
00:49:53,299 --> 00:49:56,553
clandestine investigative unit
within the White House.

854
00:49:56,677 --> 00:49:59,556
It came to be called
"The Plumbers."

855
00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:03,184
John Ehrlichman,
one of Nixon's closest aides,

856
00:50:03,350 --> 00:50:06,695
eventually ordered them
to burglarize the office

857
00:50:06,812 --> 00:50:09,691
of Ellsberg's
Los Angeles psychiatrist

858
00:50:09,857 --> 00:50:11,780
in search of material

859
00:50:11,900 --> 00:50:15,530
with which he could be
blackmailed into silence.

860
00:50:15,654 --> 00:50:19,830
Nixon may have privately feared
something else as well.

861
00:50:19,950 --> 00:50:22,703
He was told that the safe
at another think tank,

862
00:50:22,870 --> 00:50:26,465
the Brookings Institution
in Washington, D.C.,

863
00:50:26,582 --> 00:50:30,632
contained files that might
reveal the secret role

864
00:50:30,753 --> 00:50:34,599
his campaign had played
in torpedoing the peace talks

865
00:50:34,715 --> 00:50:37,889
on the eve of his election
three years earlier,

866
00:50:38,052 --> 00:50:42,603
which President Johnson
had then considered treason.

867
00:50:42,723 --> 00:50:46,478
Nixon wanted his "plumbers"
to break into Brookings,

868
00:50:46,602 --> 00:50:50,903
crack the safe,
and remove the files.

869
00:50:51,065 --> 00:50:53,238
None of it was legal.

870
00:50:53,359 --> 00:50:56,454
Nixon did not care.

871
00:51:27,142 --> 00:51:31,397
The Brookings break-in
would never take place.

872
00:51:31,522 --> 00:51:33,945
The burglars would be unable

873
00:51:34,108 --> 00:51:37,157
to find Ellsberg's file
in his doctor's office.

874
00:51:37,277 --> 00:51:40,702
But Nixon's obsession
with his enemies

875
00:51:40,823 --> 00:51:44,544
would be the undoing
of his presidency.

876
00:52:05,222 --> 00:52:07,475
Once a month, I have a dream

877
00:52:07,599 --> 00:52:12,105
that I'm... I'm back...
I'm back in basic training.

878
00:52:12,229 --> 00:52:13,651
But I'm the age I am now,

879
00:52:13,772 --> 00:52:15,945
which is way too old
to be in the military.

880
00:52:16,066 --> 00:52:18,410
But, you know,
somehow I've gotten a waiver,

881
00:52:18,527 --> 00:52:20,120
and I'm going
through all the training,

882
00:52:20,237 --> 00:52:22,285
and there's some major war
going on.

883
00:52:22,406 --> 00:52:25,501
And I'm going to get there,
and I'm going to be a hero

884
00:52:25,659 --> 00:52:30,916
and vindicate myself
and be taken back by my country.

885
00:52:33,000 --> 00:52:37,221
Jack Todd had crossed
into Canada in early 1970,

886
00:52:37,337 --> 00:52:39,055
rather than take part

887
00:52:39,173 --> 00:52:41,801
in what he believed
to be a dishonorable war.

888
00:52:44,219 --> 00:52:48,019
He found himself living
in a strange underground world

889
00:52:48,182 --> 00:52:50,184
of deserters and draft evaders

890
00:52:50,350 --> 00:52:54,605
and the disaffected Canadians
who gathered around them.

891
00:52:54,730 --> 00:52:58,780
In 1971,
he was living in Montreal,

892
00:52:58,901 --> 00:53:00,903
restless and often depressed,

893
00:53:01,028 --> 00:53:04,532
increasingly alienated
from his country,

894
00:53:04,698 --> 00:53:07,793
but also anxious always
for news from home,

895
00:53:07,910 --> 00:53:10,709
and eager to know
how his boyhood friends

896
00:53:10,829 --> 00:53:13,753
from Scottsbluff, Nebraska,
were doing.

897
00:53:13,874 --> 00:53:16,468
One, named Ron Bales,

898
00:53:16,585 --> 00:53:19,634
had lived just down the street.

899
00:53:19,755 --> 00:53:24,511
And, uh...
my mother sent me a letter, um,

900
00:53:24,635 --> 00:53:26,763
and I remember taking
the clipping out of it.

901
00:53:26,887 --> 00:53:30,391
I had walked up to Mount Royal
in Montreal to read the letter.

902
00:53:30,516 --> 00:53:33,360
And the clipping was from
the Scottsbluff Star-Herald,

903
00:53:33,477 --> 00:53:36,230
and it was about Ron
being killed in Vietnam.

904
00:53:39,483 --> 00:53:42,407
Why?
Why?

905
00:53:42,569 --> 00:53:46,574
It was long after we knew
how wrong the war was,

906
00:53:46,740 --> 00:53:50,745
and guys like Ron were
still dying, you know.

907
00:53:52,621 --> 00:53:54,544
Why?

908
00:53:55,874 --> 00:53:58,172
The government today
restricted the use

909
00:53:58,293 --> 00:54:00,762
of the weed killer 2,4,5-T
on the ground

910
00:54:00,921 --> 00:54:02,719
that the chemical has caused
birth defects

911
00:54:02,840 --> 00:54:05,343
in some laboratory animals.

912
00:54:07,261 --> 00:54:11,937
Since 1962, American
and South Vietnamese forces

913
00:54:12,099 --> 00:54:15,353
had sprayed some 2O million
gallons of herbicides

914
00:54:15,477 --> 00:54:19,698
over roughly one quarter
of South Vietnam.

915
00:54:19,815 --> 00:54:22,944
The idea had been
to reduce casualties

916
00:54:23,110 --> 00:54:26,535
by clearing areas
around U.S. installations,

917
00:54:26,655 --> 00:54:30,831
and to deny the enemy crops
and forest cover.

918
00:54:30,951 --> 00:54:35,001
The most frequently used
defoliant was Agent Orange,

919
00:54:35,122 --> 00:54:38,001
which contained 2,4,5-T.

920
00:54:38,125 --> 00:54:40,173
When environmentalists convinced

921
00:54:40,294 --> 00:54:43,343
the Nixon administration
to ban the weed killer

922
00:54:43,463 --> 00:54:45,090
on American farms,

923
00:54:45,215 --> 00:54:47,968
the Pentagon
had reluctantly agreed

924
00:54:48,135 --> 00:54:51,765
to stop using Agent Orange
in Vietnam.

925
00:54:51,889 --> 00:54:56,611
The ecological damage defoliants
did was obvious.

926
00:54:56,727 --> 00:55:00,698
The damage done to soldiers
and civilians

927
00:55:00,814 --> 00:55:04,944
would be the subject
of angry debate for decades.

928
00:55:11,283 --> 00:55:13,911
Opposition
to the Saigon government

929
00:55:14,036 --> 00:55:16,334
is not just Viet Cong.

930
00:55:16,496 --> 00:55:17,964
How many governments

931
00:55:18,081 --> 00:55:21,051
actually care
for the Vietnamese people?

932
00:55:21,168 --> 00:55:24,923
The student antiwar,
anti-American movement

933
00:55:25,047 --> 00:55:27,470
is larger than its small
demonstrations indicate.

934
00:55:27,591 --> 00:55:30,344
You don't need military aid...

935
00:55:32,429 --> 00:55:34,807
to promote democracy
in Vietnam.

936
00:55:34,932 --> 00:55:38,186
To return
to the Vietnamese people

937
00:55:38,310 --> 00:55:40,608
their right that...

938
00:55:40,729 --> 00:55:42,857
their right to speak freely.

939
00:55:43,023 --> 00:55:45,697
You don't need even one penny.

940
00:55:45,859 --> 00:55:48,908
You don't need
to consult the White House,

941
00:55:49,029 --> 00:55:51,953
you don't need to care
about the American media,

942
00:55:52,074 --> 00:55:54,543
you don't need French,
you don't need Chinese,

943
00:55:54,701 --> 00:55:56,203
you don't need Americans.

944
00:55:56,370 --> 00:56:00,796
If you really care for Vietnam
then you turn back inside.

945
00:56:00,916 --> 00:56:04,386
South Vietnamese
president Nguyen Van Thieu

946
00:56:04,503 --> 00:56:06,426
was campaigning for reelection.

947
00:56:06,546 --> 00:56:08,890
The Americans had insisted on it

948
00:56:09,007 --> 00:56:11,635
and urged him
not to rig the race,

949
00:56:11,760 --> 00:56:14,684
for fear it would
resemble too closely

950
00:56:14,805 --> 00:56:17,228
the fraudulent
communist "elections"

951
00:56:17,349 --> 00:56:20,728
routinely denounced
by the United States.

952
00:56:20,852 --> 00:56:22,399
But Thieu made sure

953
00:56:22,521 --> 00:56:25,400
no serious candidates
ran against him,

954
00:56:25,524 --> 00:56:29,245
and claimed to have won
94% of the vote.

955
00:56:29,403 --> 00:56:33,078
It became known
as "the one-man election,"

956
00:56:33,240 --> 00:56:34,366
and added to the ranks

957
00:56:34,491 --> 00:56:37,461
of what was called
the "Third Force":

958
00:56:37,577 --> 00:56:41,332
South Vietnamese hoping
for a negotiated settlement

959
00:56:41,456 --> 00:56:43,584
and an end to the bloodshed.

960
00:57:00,434 --> 00:57:02,482
By the middle of 1971,

961
00:57:02,602 --> 00:57:05,526
Nixon and Kissinger
were looking for a way

962
00:57:05,647 --> 00:57:09,026
to get all U.S. troops
out of Vietnam

963
00:57:09,151 --> 00:57:11,620
before his
re-election campaign began

964
00:57:11,778 --> 00:57:13,621
the following year,

965
00:57:13,780 --> 00:57:16,078
but to do so without causing

966
00:57:16,199 --> 00:57:19,123
Saigon to fall too soon.

967
00:57:56,073 --> 00:57:58,451
At the secret talks in Paris,

968
00:57:58,575 --> 00:58:01,545
Kissinger had offered his
North Vietnamese counterpart,

969
00:58:01,661 --> 00:58:04,835
Le Duc Tho, the most significant
concessions

970
00:58:04,998 --> 00:58:07,922
the United States had yet made:

971
00:58:08,043 --> 00:58:11,547
North Vietnam could
keep its troops in the South-

972
00:58:11,671 --> 00:58:13,548
tens of thousands of them.

973
00:58:13,673 --> 00:58:18,053
And in exchange for the release
of American prisoners of war,

974
00:58:18,178 --> 00:58:19,771
all American troops

975
00:58:19,888 --> 00:58:23,142
would be withdrawn
within seven months.

976
00:58:25,352 --> 00:58:28,697
Le Duc Tho countered
with a new offer of his own:

977
00:58:28,855 --> 00:58:31,028
Hanoi would
release the prisoners

978
00:58:31,149 --> 00:58:34,904
simultaneously with
the departure of U.S. forces.

979
00:58:35,028 --> 00:58:38,202
But he still insisted
that Washington remove

980
00:58:38,323 --> 00:58:41,748
President Thieu from power.

981
00:58:41,868 --> 00:58:44,667
Kissinger was encouraged
that the North Vietnamese

982
00:58:44,788 --> 00:58:48,588
seemed, for the first time,
to be negotiating seriously.

983
00:58:48,708 --> 00:58:53,464
He could almost "taste peace,"
he told a friend.

984
00:58:53,588 --> 00:58:55,135
Thieu knew nothing

985
00:58:55,257 --> 00:58:58,386
about the new American
concessions to Hanoi.

986
00:58:58,510 --> 00:59:02,265
He was worried
about something else.

987
00:59:05,433 --> 00:59:07,393
NBC News interrupts
regular programming

988
00:59:07,477 --> 00:59:09,229
to bring you a special report.

989
00:59:09,396 --> 00:59:11,819
The announcement I shall
now read is being issued

990
00:59:11,940 --> 00:59:16,537
simultaneously in Peking
and in the United States.

991
00:59:16,653 --> 00:59:18,326
Richard Nixon,

992
00:59:18,446 --> 00:59:21,541
famous for the ferocity
of his anticommunism,

993
00:59:21,658 --> 00:59:24,161
astonished the world
by announcing

994
00:59:24,286 --> 00:59:27,790
that he was planning to restore
relations with China

995
00:59:27,914 --> 00:59:31,259
that had been severed
for more than two decades.

996
00:59:31,418 --> 00:59:35,013
The United States
had gone to war in Vietnam

997
00:59:35,130 --> 00:59:38,134
in part to block
Chinese expansionism.

998
00:59:38,258 --> 00:59:42,388
What would Nixon's visit mean
for Thieu's future

999
00:59:42,512 --> 00:59:44,731
or for that of his country?

1000
00:59:44,848 --> 00:59:47,977
Thieu was afraid he knew.

1001
00:59:48,101 --> 00:59:50,775
"America has been
looking for a new mistress,"

1002
00:59:50,896 --> 00:59:52,148
he told an aide,

1003
00:59:52,272 --> 00:59:54,991
"and now Nixon
has discovered China.

1004
00:59:55,108 --> 00:59:58,829
"He does not want to have
the old mistress around.

1005
00:59:58,945 --> 01:00:02,666
Vietnam has become
old and ugly."

1006
01:00:14,336 --> 01:00:17,931
I believe it was
in the fall of 1971.

1007
01:00:20,550 --> 01:00:24,646
And they called us out
and they hung a bed sheet

1008
01:00:24,804 --> 01:00:29,435
and they had a projector
and they showed us

1009
01:00:29,559 --> 01:00:32,984
color and black and white movies

1010
01:00:33,146 --> 01:00:36,400
of these protests in Washington.

1011
01:00:41,238 --> 01:00:43,161
And in the same film

1012
01:00:43,281 --> 01:00:45,500
it showed John Kerry.

1013
01:00:45,617 --> 01:00:47,711
And I remember
he was very articulate,

1014
01:00:47,827 --> 01:00:50,000
very, very well spoken,

1015
01:00:50,121 --> 01:00:53,045
very fluent

1016
01:00:53,166 --> 01:00:55,760
and a good spokesman

1017
01:00:55,877 --> 01:00:57,254
for his cause.

1018
01:00:57,379 --> 01:00:59,473
Someone has to die
so that President Nixon

1019
01:00:59,589 --> 01:01:02,092
won't be...
and these are his words...

1020
01:01:02,217 --> 01:01:05,938
"the first president
to lose a war."

1021
01:01:06,054 --> 01:01:07,180
And I remember very well,

1022
01:01:07,347 --> 01:01:09,850
he's sitting
with his fatigue jacket

1023
01:01:09,975 --> 01:01:11,522
and long hair

1024
01:01:11,685 --> 01:01:13,687
and testifying about atrocities

1025
01:01:13,853 --> 01:01:15,730
and war crimes that...

1026
01:01:15,855 --> 01:01:17,857
we perpetrated.

1027
01:01:17,983 --> 01:01:20,907
Cut off limbs, blown up bodies,

1028
01:01:21,027 --> 01:01:23,280
randomly shot at civilians...

1029
01:01:23,405 --> 01:01:25,373
But I was
shocked by what he said.

1030
01:01:25,490 --> 01:01:27,208
And I didn't believe it.

1031
01:01:27,325 --> 01:01:30,670
I didn't believe it at all.

1032
01:01:32,455 --> 01:01:35,299
I mean, I'm sophisticated
to know, and I knew then,

1033
01:01:35,417 --> 01:01:37,886
that bad things happen in war
and they happen on both sides,

1034
01:01:38,044 --> 01:01:41,639
and I had seen the evidence
of the other side too, also.

1035
01:01:41,756 --> 01:01:43,053
And I knew it.

1036
01:01:43,174 --> 01:01:45,393
And... but still,
to hear the testimony

1037
01:01:45,552 --> 01:01:50,479
and to hear it used as a weapon

1038
01:01:50,598 --> 01:01:53,101
against our further prosecution
of this war

1039
01:01:53,226 --> 01:01:58,073
that we were suffering for
was very powerful indeed.

1040
01:01:58,189 --> 01:02:00,783
A few months later

1041
01:02:00,900 --> 01:02:03,995
Kushner got
an even bigger shock.

1042
01:02:04,112 --> 01:02:06,410
My son has no father.

1043
01:02:06,531 --> 01:02:10,081
This Christmas Day we celebrate
the birth of a son to Mary

1044
01:02:10,243 --> 01:02:12,746
and this Christmas Day
some other mother's son

1045
01:02:12,912 --> 01:02:15,131
will die in Vietnam.

1046
01:02:15,248 --> 01:02:17,797
That death takes away
all that was taught to us

1047
01:02:17,917 --> 01:02:20,466
by Christ's birth.

1048
01:02:20,587 --> 01:02:22,885
The whole time
I was in the South

1049
01:02:23,006 --> 01:02:25,304
I never got one letter,
one bit of information.

1050
01:02:25,425 --> 01:02:27,427
When I got to North Vietnam
I got no letter,

1051
01:02:27,594 --> 01:02:29,972
no bit of information, nothing.

1052
01:02:30,096 --> 01:02:35,728
Then, I think it may have been
Christmas of '71,

1053
01:02:35,852 --> 01:02:40,278
my wife wrote an op-ed piece
in the New York Times.

1054
01:02:40,440 --> 01:02:43,865
She had become
politically active.

1055
01:02:43,985 --> 01:02:46,283
The families of POWs

1056
01:02:46,404 --> 01:02:50,034
overwhelmingly supported
the Nixon administration.

1057
01:02:50,158 --> 01:02:53,037
Valerie Kushner did not,

1058
01:02:53,161 --> 01:02:54,788
and the North Vietnamese
were quick

1059
01:02:54,913 --> 01:02:58,133
to exploit her antiwar views.

1060
01:02:58,249 --> 01:03:00,047
They broadcast a message

1061
01:03:00,168 --> 01:03:03,012
they had permitted her husband
to record for her.

1062
01:03:03,129 --> 01:03:05,803
It was the first time
she had heard his voice

1063
01:03:05,965 --> 01:03:07,842
in four years.

1064
01:03:10,220 --> 01:03:12,973
I received the glasses, Val,

1065
01:03:13,098 --> 01:03:15,772
and my eyes
have improved considerably.

1066
01:03:15,892 --> 01:03:18,486
Please let me know
about Brother John.

1067
01:03:18,645 --> 01:03:21,068
He or she is almost four now,

1068
01:03:21,189 --> 01:03:23,738
and he or she is old enough
to understand

1069
01:03:23,858 --> 01:03:27,283
where Daddy is
and that I love him or her

1070
01:03:27,404 --> 01:03:30,658
immeasurably
despite our never meeting.

1071
01:03:30,782 --> 01:03:34,377
I calculate that T-Bird
is now in second grade,

1072
01:03:34,494 --> 01:03:36,496
and I know she is doing well.

1073
01:03:36,663 --> 01:03:38,415
She is a grown-up lady now

1074
01:03:38,540 --> 01:03:42,340
and I hope you have plans for
piano or ballet lessons soon.

1075
01:03:42,502 --> 01:03:45,005
Happy eighth birthday,
dear T-Bird,

1076
01:03:45,130 --> 01:03:46,632
and Merry Christmas.

1077
01:03:46,756 --> 01:03:48,975
When I left you
I promised to come home

1078
01:03:49,092 --> 01:03:50,594
before you were five.

1079
01:03:50,718 --> 01:03:54,439
I didn't fulfill that promise,
but when I do return,

1080
01:03:54,556 --> 01:03:57,105
I will never leave you again.

1081
01:03:57,225 --> 01:03:59,899
His optimism about the whole
situation amazes me.

1082
01:04:00,019 --> 01:04:01,316
I'm just very happy

1083
01:04:01,438 --> 01:04:03,782
that he can't see
this morning's newspaper.

1084
01:04:03,898 --> 01:04:06,868
Because I-I don't
have the same optimism

1085
01:04:06,985 --> 01:04:08,612
or the same confidence
in this government

1086
01:04:08,736 --> 01:04:11,535
that he seems to have.

1087
01:04:15,452 --> 01:04:20,925
President Nixon's visit
to China in February of 1972

1088
01:04:21,040 --> 01:04:23,543
not only alarmed
President Thieu,

1089
01:04:23,710 --> 01:04:26,554
it worried Hanoi as well.

1090
01:04:26,671 --> 01:04:29,766
The North Vietnamese
remembered how Ho Chi Minh

1091
01:04:29,883 --> 01:04:32,762
had felt betrayed in 1954

1092
01:04:32,886 --> 01:04:35,480
when Moscow and Beijing
had compelled them

1093
01:04:35,597 --> 01:04:39,727
to sign the Geneva Accords,
dividing Vietnam in two.

1094
01:04:39,851 --> 01:04:42,900
Now, they were concerned
that warmer relations

1095
01:04:43,062 --> 01:04:45,281
between the United States
and China

1096
01:04:45,398 --> 01:04:49,244
might soon mean
less support from Beijing.

1097
01:04:49,402 --> 01:04:53,248
Nixon was also planning
to travel to Moscow

1098
01:04:53,364 --> 01:04:56,789
to meet with Soviet premier
Leonid Brezhnev,

1099
01:04:56,910 --> 01:04:58,708
seeking to ease tensions

1100
01:04:58,828 --> 01:05:02,549
with North Vietnam's
other communist patron.

1101
01:05:02,665 --> 01:05:07,341
Before that summit took place,
First Secretary Le Duan,

1102
01:05:07,462 --> 01:05:10,306
the man who headed
the Politburo in Hanoi,

1103
01:05:10,423 --> 01:05:13,723
decided to undertake
a new kind of offensive.

1104
01:05:13,843 --> 01:05:17,518
It would be conventional warfare
this time,

1105
01:05:17,639 --> 01:05:21,485
and on a scale
he had never before attempted.

1106
01:05:21,601 --> 01:05:24,445
Le Duan had
several goals in mind:

1107
01:05:24,562 --> 01:05:26,860
to strengthen his hand
at the peace talks

1108
01:05:26,981 --> 01:05:29,404
by altering the military balance
of power

1109
01:05:29,526 --> 01:05:31,073
in South Vietnam,

1110
01:05:31,194 --> 01:05:34,573
to show that the ARVN
could not stand on their own,

1111
01:05:34,697 --> 01:05:38,372
and to convince the Soviets
and the Chinese

1112
01:05:38,493 --> 01:05:42,339
his revolution
was still worth supporting.

1113
01:05:46,584 --> 01:05:50,464
The assault began on March 30,
1972.

1114
01:05:50,630 --> 01:05:54,009
14 North Vietnamese
infantry divisions...

1115
01:05:54,133 --> 01:05:56,761
more than 120,000 men...

1116
01:05:56,886 --> 01:05:59,389
now, for the first time,

1117
01:05:59,514 --> 01:06:03,360
supported by hundreds of
Soviet and Chinese-made tanks

1118
01:06:03,476 --> 01:06:08,528
and other armored vehicles,
attacked on three fronts:

1119
01:06:08,648 --> 01:06:12,323
across the demilitarized zone,

1120
01:06:12,443 --> 01:06:16,744
in the Central Highlands

1121
01:06:16,864 --> 01:06:21,335
and west of Saigon.

1122
01:06:21,452 --> 01:06:26,458
Americans would call it
"The Easter Offensive."

1123
01:06:26,583 --> 01:06:29,336
To the South Vietnamese,

1124
01:06:29,502 --> 01:06:33,006
it would be remembered
as "The Summer of Flames."

1125
01:06:33,172 --> 01:06:36,176
The South Vietnamese
Army knew this day was coming:

1126
01:06:36,342 --> 01:06:37,559
the day without Americans.

1127
01:06:37,677 --> 01:06:39,020
It was to be the big test,

1128
01:06:39,137 --> 01:06:40,354
both for them

1129
01:06:40,471 --> 01:06:43,350
and for President Nixon's
Vietnamization program.

1130
01:06:43,516 --> 01:06:46,395
The results in so far
are not encouraging.

1131
01:06:46,519 --> 01:06:49,489
Whole battalions of
the government's third division

1132
01:06:49,606 --> 01:06:51,859
joined the refugees
on the road south.

1133
01:06:52,025 --> 01:06:55,825
They had been outnumbered,
overpowered, overwhelmed.

1134
01:06:55,945 --> 01:06:58,118
An entire ARVN regiment

1135
01:06:58,239 --> 01:07:00,412
surrendered at Camp Carroll.

1136
01:07:00,533 --> 01:07:02,206
North Vietnamese troops

1137
01:07:02,368 --> 01:07:05,167
then swiftly overran
Quang Tri Province,

1138
01:07:05,288 --> 01:07:10,215
driving tens of thousands of
terrified refugees southward.

1139
01:07:10,376 --> 01:07:13,801
They nearly cut South Vietnam
in half

1140
01:07:13,921 --> 01:07:16,640
through the Central Highlands

1141
01:07:16,758 --> 01:07:20,934
and drove toward Saigon,
hoping to seize large areas

1142
01:07:21,054 --> 01:07:23,978
along the Cambodian border.

1143
01:07:24,098 --> 01:07:26,897
It looked as if
it were going to be

1144
01:07:27,018 --> 01:07:29,646
a total defeat for the ARVN:

1145
01:07:29,771 --> 01:07:33,696
There were only 60,000
U.S. military personnel

1146
01:07:33,816 --> 01:07:35,739
left in South Vietnam,

1147
01:07:35,902 --> 01:07:38,872
and very few of them
were combat troops.

1148
01:07:41,449 --> 01:07:44,544
Suddenly, the survival of
everything Nixon and Kissinger

1149
01:07:44,661 --> 01:07:46,914
had worked for was in peril.

1150
01:07:47,080 --> 01:07:51,381
They had to do something...
and fast.

1151
01:08:13,564 --> 01:08:16,943
Nixon ordered
up Operation Linebacker...

1152
01:08:17,110 --> 01:08:19,579
massive air attacks

1153
01:08:19,696 --> 01:08:21,073
on the advancing
North Vietnamese.

1154
01:08:22,907 --> 01:08:24,955
"The bastards
have never been bombed

1155
01:08:25,118 --> 01:08:27,997
"like they're going to be
this time," he said.

1156
01:08:31,749 --> 01:08:34,923
The most crucial battle
of the Easter Offensive

1157
01:08:35,044 --> 01:08:36,762
was fought at An Loc,

1158
01:08:36,879 --> 01:08:39,428
a city that commanded Route 13,

1159
01:08:39,549 --> 01:08:42,769
a paved highway
that led directly to Saigon,

1160
01:08:42,885 --> 01:08:45,138
just 60 miles away.

1161
01:08:48,141 --> 01:08:50,485
North Vietnamese artillery fire

1162
01:08:50,601 --> 01:08:52,478
and a massive infantry
and armor attack

1163
01:08:52,645 --> 01:08:54,693
drove the city's ARVN defenders

1164
01:08:54,814 --> 01:08:59,115
into an area
less than a mile square.

1165
01:08:59,235 --> 01:09:04,492
Repeated efforts to reinforce
and resupply them failed.

1166
01:09:04,615 --> 01:09:07,869
The ARVN bravely held out.

1167
01:09:07,994 --> 01:09:10,417
The number one thing we did

1168
01:09:10,538 --> 01:09:13,132
was coordinate the air strikes.

1169
01:09:13,249 --> 01:09:15,593
General Hollingsworth
went to General Abrams

1170
01:09:15,710 --> 01:09:17,804
and begged
for all the B-52s he could get,

1171
01:09:17,920 --> 01:09:19,763
and on the 10th and 11th of May,

1172
01:09:19,881 --> 01:09:25,559
he planned a B-52 strike
every 50 minutes for 24 hours.

1173
01:09:36,272 --> 01:09:37,489
In the end,

1174
01:09:37,607 --> 01:09:41,987
American airpower
made the difference.

1175
01:09:47,533 --> 01:09:50,207
The North Vietnamese
and their armored columns,

1176
01:09:50,328 --> 01:09:51,750
massed in the open,

1177
01:09:51,871 --> 01:09:55,717
proved easy targets
for American pilots.

1178
01:09:55,833 --> 01:09:59,758
"This," one American advisor
said,

1179
01:09:59,879 --> 01:10:03,850
"was the kind of war
we came to fight."

1180
01:10:57,687 --> 01:11:00,941
The North Vietnamese
suffered 10,000 casualties

1181
01:11:01,065 --> 01:11:02,783
at An Loc alone

1182
01:11:02,900 --> 01:11:06,996
and lost most of their tanks
and heavy artillery.

1183
01:11:10,449 --> 01:11:12,827
The bottom line
was that all the air power

1184
01:11:12,952 --> 01:11:14,512
in the world would
not make a difference

1185
01:11:14,620 --> 01:11:16,020
if the ARVN hadn't
stood and fought.

1186
01:11:17,582 --> 01:11:20,927
They had held Kon Tum,
they had held An Loc,

1187
01:11:21,043 --> 01:11:22,670
they had re-taken Quang Tri.

1188
01:11:22,795 --> 01:11:24,843
They had taken the best
that the North Vietnamese

1189
01:11:24,964 --> 01:11:26,591
had to throw at them.

1190
01:11:26,716 --> 01:11:29,936
So I thought if we continue
to maintain that support,

1191
01:11:30,052 --> 01:11:31,224
perhaps they had a chance.

1192
01:11:31,345 --> 01:11:35,270
The Easter Offensive, to me,

1193
01:11:35,391 --> 01:11:38,611
showed that the
South Vietnamese could fight,

1194
01:11:38,728 --> 01:11:41,652
but only up to a certain point.

1195
01:11:41,814 --> 01:11:44,442
So, my question would be,

1196
01:11:44,567 --> 01:11:46,490
what would happen when
the Americans left

1197
01:11:46,652 --> 01:11:49,155
with their B-52s, you know?

1198
01:11:50,907 --> 01:11:53,956
Americans may have
approved of the renewed use

1199
01:11:54,076 --> 01:11:57,330
of American air power
to stop the communist advance

1200
01:11:57,455 --> 01:11:58,798
into the South,

1201
01:11:58,915 --> 01:12:03,386
but Nixon had also ordered
American planes to resume

1202
01:12:03,502 --> 01:12:06,722
sustained bombing
of North Vietnam,

1203
01:12:06,839 --> 01:12:10,389
which had been halted since
the Johnson administration.

1204
01:12:10,509 --> 01:12:14,230
Some saw the new bombing,
which vastly exceeded

1205
01:12:14,347 --> 01:12:16,349
all previous campaigns,

1206
01:12:16,474 --> 01:12:21,196
as evidence that a war Nixon had
promised was winding down

1207
01:12:21,312 --> 01:12:24,031
was once again being escalated.

1208
01:12:27,610 --> 01:12:29,032
The bombing campaign

1209
01:12:29,153 --> 01:12:30,575
was much more extensive

1210
01:12:30,696 --> 01:12:35,167
than the bombing campaign
under Lyndon Johnson.

1211
01:12:35,284 --> 01:12:36,331
And from a standpoint

1212
01:12:36,452 --> 01:12:38,955
of pressuring them
to make concessions

1213
01:12:39,080 --> 01:12:40,878
at the negotiating table,

1214
01:12:41,040 --> 01:12:43,384
historically,
that's how you did it.

1215
01:12:43,501 --> 01:12:45,720
Only it didn't work
with these guys.

1216
01:12:47,838 --> 01:12:49,465
They took the pounding.

1217
01:12:56,639 --> 01:13:00,234
Le Minh Khue,
who had served four years

1218
01:13:00,351 --> 01:13:03,605
as a Youth Volunteer
on the Ho Chi Minh trail,

1219
01:13:03,729 --> 01:13:06,357
was now back home
in North Vietnam.

1220
01:13:48,566 --> 01:13:51,445
Among the thousands
of South Vietnamese

1221
01:13:51,569 --> 01:13:54,243
who lost their lives
in the Easter Offensive

1222
01:13:54,363 --> 01:13:57,492
was the brother
of Phan Quang Tue.

1223
01:13:57,616 --> 01:14:00,119
I had a brother, Tuan.

1224
01:14:00,286 --> 01:14:04,291
And we were raised together.

1225
01:14:04,415 --> 01:14:08,090
He would have been now 67.

1226
01:14:08,210 --> 01:14:10,929
When his plane was shot down

1227
01:14:11,047 --> 01:14:15,018
and later on they weren't
able to recover him,

1228
01:14:15,134 --> 01:14:17,683
his body, so he disappeared,

1229
01:14:17,803 --> 01:14:22,183
he was missing in action,
he was 26 years old.

1230
01:14:22,308 --> 01:14:25,653
He has his full life
ahead of him.

1231
01:14:25,811 --> 01:14:28,781
Tuan never
had a chance to live his life.

1232
01:14:30,900 --> 01:14:34,495
And I can never
overcome the feeling,

1233
01:14:34,653 --> 01:14:38,703
as to himself

1234
01:14:38,824 --> 01:14:41,043
and his generation,

1235
01:14:41,160 --> 01:14:44,380
sacrifice their lives for what?

1236
01:14:46,290 --> 01:14:50,636
And the frustrating thing is
that even Vietnamese themself

1237
01:14:50,753 --> 01:14:52,676
do not seem to value that loss.

1238
01:14:59,011 --> 01:15:01,935
There's only one
way to stop the killing.

1239
01:15:02,056 --> 01:15:05,686
That is to keep the weapons
of war out of the hands

1240
01:15:05,810 --> 01:15:11,533
of the international outlaws
of North Vietnam.

1241
01:15:11,649 --> 01:15:12,866
Throughout the war in Vietnam,

1242
01:15:12,983 --> 01:15:15,657
the United States has
exercised a degree of restraint

1243
01:15:15,778 --> 01:15:17,872
unprecedented
in the annals of war...

1244
01:15:19,615 --> 01:15:22,368
Le Duan's Easter
Offensive, like Tet,

1245
01:15:22,535 --> 01:15:24,708
had been a great gamble.

1246
01:15:24,870 --> 01:15:27,589
So was Nixon's next move.

1247
01:15:27,706 --> 01:15:30,710
The massive North Vietnamese
assault had failed,

1248
01:15:30,876 --> 01:15:32,219
the president said,

1249
01:15:32,378 --> 01:15:35,382
but it could never have been
mounted in the first place

1250
01:15:35,506 --> 01:15:37,975
without weapons and supplies
provided by China

1251
01:15:38,092 --> 01:15:40,641
and the Soviet Union.

1252
01:15:40,761 --> 01:15:44,891
Accordingly,
he ordered 11,000 mines laid

1253
01:15:45,057 --> 01:15:48,482
in North Vietnamese waters
to block further access

1254
01:15:48,602 --> 01:15:50,229
to Haiphong harbor.

1255
01:15:50,396 --> 01:15:54,071
It was something the Joint
Chiefs had been asking for

1256
01:15:54,233 --> 01:15:56,031
for years.

1257
01:15:56,152 --> 01:15:58,246
The scheduled summit
with the Soviets

1258
01:15:58,404 --> 01:16:00,077
was just two weeks away,

1259
01:16:00,239 --> 01:16:02,333
and some advisors
had urged the president

1260
01:16:02,449 --> 01:16:05,373
not to take any action
that directly threatened

1261
01:16:05,494 --> 01:16:09,249
Soviet ships,
for fear they would cancel it.

1262
01:16:09,373 --> 01:16:11,922
Nixon thought he had
to take the risk.

1263
01:16:12,084 --> 01:16:16,055
And so he spoke
directly to Moscow.

1264
01:16:16,172 --> 01:16:19,597
Let us not slide back
toward the dark shadows

1265
01:16:19,717 --> 01:16:22,516
of a previous age.

1266
01:16:22,636 --> 01:16:27,267
We do not ask you
to sacrifice your principles

1267
01:16:27,433 --> 01:16:29,401
or your friends,

1268
01:16:29,518 --> 01:16:32,863
but neither should you
permit Hanoi's intransigence

1269
01:16:32,980 --> 01:16:35,574
to blot out the prospects
we together

1270
01:16:35,691 --> 01:16:37,034
have so patiently prepared.

1271
01:16:39,904 --> 01:16:42,623
Nixon's gamble paid off.

1272
01:16:42,740 --> 01:16:44,287
The Soviets and
the Chinese denounced

1273
01:16:44,408 --> 01:16:49,881
the president's action,
but then did nothing.

1274
01:16:49,997 --> 01:16:55,049
On May 26, the United States
and the Soviet Union signed

1275
01:16:55,169 --> 01:16:59,094
an historic Anti-Ballistic
Missile Treaty,

1276
01:16:59,215 --> 01:17:02,310
the first agreement
to limit nuclear armaments

1277
01:17:02,468 --> 01:17:04,812
since the Cold War began.

1278
01:17:04,929 --> 01:17:07,978
For the Soviet Union, for China,

1279
01:17:08,140 --> 01:17:10,484
as well
as for the United States,

1280
01:17:10,601 --> 01:17:14,981
Vietnam's significance
was steadily receding.

1281
01:17:51,767 --> 01:17:53,519
I know.

1282
01:18:21,547 --> 01:18:26,098
On the morning of June 8, 1972,

1283
01:18:26,218 --> 01:18:30,598
Nick Ut, a 21-year-old
South Vietnamese photographer

1284
01:18:30,723 --> 01:18:32,942
working
for the Associated Press,

1285
01:18:33,058 --> 01:18:36,483
was accompanying ARVN troops
on Highway One,

1286
01:18:36,603 --> 01:18:39,072
moving toward a village
called Trang Bang,

1287
01:18:39,189 --> 01:18:41,908
to dislodge
North Vietnamese forces

1288
01:18:42,067 --> 01:18:45,822
that had occupied it
during the Easter Offensive.

1289
01:18:45,946 --> 01:18:49,166
Ut was beginning
to put his cameras away,

1290
01:18:49,283 --> 01:18:51,206
ready to return to Saigon,

1291
01:18:51,327 --> 01:18:56,049
when he saw a South Vietnamese
fighter suddenly dip down

1292
01:18:56,165 --> 01:18:58,167
toward the fleeing refugees,

1293
01:18:58,292 --> 01:19:01,091
whom the pilot mistook
for the enemy.

1294
01:20:24,628 --> 01:20:29,680
Ut drove the badly
burned girl, Kim Phuc,

1295
01:20:29,800 --> 01:20:32,019
and several other
injured children

1296
01:20:32,136 --> 01:20:34,355
to a hospital in Saigon.

1297
01:20:34,471 --> 01:20:38,817
She had been burned
over 30% of her body.

1298
01:20:38,934 --> 01:20:42,154
Then, Ut raced
to the AP darkroom

1299
01:20:42,271 --> 01:20:45,650
to find out
what he had caught on film.

1300
01:21:02,958 --> 01:21:05,802
His photo
editor in Saigon told him

1301
01:21:05,919 --> 01:21:08,889
they could not send the picture
out on the wire,

1302
01:21:09,006 --> 01:21:11,350
because the girl was naked.

1303
01:21:11,467 --> 01:21:13,811
But then Ut's boss,

1304
01:21:13,927 --> 01:21:17,557
the legendary
combat photographer Horst Faas,

1305
01:21:17,723 --> 01:21:19,600
saw the pictures.

1306
01:21:31,570 --> 01:21:35,495
Nick Ut's photograph appeared

1307
01:21:35,616 --> 01:21:38,415
on front pages around the world

1308
01:21:38,535 --> 01:21:42,415
and won the Pulitzer Prize.

1309
01:21:42,581 --> 01:21:45,425
For many Americans,

1310
01:21:45,584 --> 01:21:48,838
even many of those
who had supported the war,

1311
01:21:48,962 --> 01:21:53,559
the image seemed to signal
that enough was enough.

1312
01:21:57,179 --> 01:21:59,523
Kim Phuc would survive.

1313
01:21:59,640 --> 01:22:04,988
She eventually left Vietnam
and settled outside Toronto.

1314
01:22:20,452 --> 01:22:24,423
I introduce
Valerie Kushner of Virginia

1315
01:22:24,540 --> 01:22:27,168
to second the nomination
of George McGovern.

1316
01:22:29,628 --> 01:22:33,178
Mr. Chairman, Democrats,

1317
01:22:33,298 --> 01:22:37,769
my participation
in this convention is a tribute

1318
01:22:37,886 --> 01:22:41,060
to the reforms instituted
by the Democratic Party,

1319
01:22:41,181 --> 01:22:45,106
for I am a woman,
and I am under 30.

1320
01:22:45,227 --> 01:22:48,822
But I also represent
an even smaller minority:

1321
01:22:48,981 --> 01:22:51,655
the wives of Americans
who are missing

1322
01:22:51,817 --> 01:22:54,195
or imprisoned in Southeast Asia.

1323
01:22:57,990 --> 01:23:00,618
Valerie Kushner,

1324
01:23:00,742 --> 01:23:04,121
hoping to get her husband, Hal,
home as soon as possible,

1325
01:23:04,246 --> 01:23:07,170
had become an ardent supporter
of the candidacy

1326
01:23:07,291 --> 01:23:10,841
of Senator George McGovern
of South Dakota.

1327
01:23:11,003 --> 01:23:14,974
A decorated bomber pilot
in World War II,

1328
01:23:15,090 --> 01:23:17,764
McGovern had called
for an early end

1329
01:23:17,884 --> 01:23:19,181
to the bombing of the North,

1330
01:23:19,303 --> 01:23:22,352
a halt to Congressional funding
for the war,

1331
01:23:22,514 --> 01:23:24,357
and immediate withdrawal

1332
01:23:24,516 --> 01:23:29,022
from Vietnam
once the POWs were released.

1333
01:23:29,187 --> 01:23:32,532
I knew that he would bring
my husband home.

1334
01:23:36,862 --> 01:23:41,493
But even more important,
he will bring America home.

1335
01:23:44,703 --> 01:23:47,752
And it is for that reason

1336
01:23:47,873 --> 01:23:50,126
that I am proud
to second the nomination

1337
01:23:50,250 --> 01:23:54,972
of our next president,
Senator George S. McGovern.

1338
01:24:00,552 --> 01:24:02,725
By the time her candidate

1339
01:24:02,846 --> 01:24:05,224
finally accepted the nomination,

1340
01:24:05,349 --> 01:24:07,943
it was 2:48 in the morning.

1341
01:24:08,060 --> 01:24:10,984
Most Americans were asleep.

1342
01:24:11,104 --> 01:24:15,860
During four
administrations of both parties,

1343
01:24:15,984 --> 01:24:20,956
a terrible war has been
charted behind closed doors.

1344
01:24:23,241 --> 01:24:25,585
I want those doors opened,

1345
01:24:25,702 --> 01:24:28,672
and I want that war closed.

1346
01:24:33,126 --> 01:24:36,801
McGovern's
campaign quickly collapsed.

1347
01:24:36,922 --> 01:24:40,096
He botched the selection
of his running mate,

1348
01:24:40,258 --> 01:24:43,478
and secretly asked an aide
in Paris

1349
01:24:43,595 --> 01:24:46,940
to talk with the
North Vietnamese about POWs,

1350
01:24:47,057 --> 01:24:52,109
and then denied he'd meddled
in the peace process.

1351
01:24:52,270 --> 01:24:54,238
Organized labor,

1352
01:24:54,356 --> 01:24:57,405
traditionally the Democrats'
most reliable ally,

1353
01:24:57,526 --> 01:25:00,325
refused to endorse
the party's candidate

1354
01:25:00,445 --> 01:25:03,915
for the first time in 2O years.

1355
01:25:04,032 --> 01:25:09,755
McGovern's poll numbers eroded
steadily over the summer.

1356
01:25:09,871 --> 01:25:12,795
Still, hoping to find material

1357
01:25:12,916 --> 01:25:15,715
that might be used
to smear the opposition,

1358
01:25:15,836 --> 01:25:19,466
Nixon's aides had already
authorized the Plumbers

1359
01:25:19,589 --> 01:25:21,762
to make another break-in,

1360
01:25:21,883 --> 01:25:25,478
this time at Democratic
National Headquarters

1361
01:25:25,637 --> 01:25:28,436
in the Washington, D.C.,
apartment complex

1362
01:25:28,557 --> 01:25:31,481
called the Watergate.

1363
01:25:31,601 --> 01:25:33,569
They had been caught.

1364
01:25:33,687 --> 01:25:36,315
One of the most
fascinating and exotic stories

1365
01:25:36,440 --> 01:25:38,113
ever to come out
of Washington, D.C.,

1366
01:25:38,233 --> 01:25:40,156
is the talk
of the Capitol today.

1367
01:25:40,277 --> 01:25:42,200
Five men were arrested
early Saturday

1368
01:25:42,320 --> 01:25:45,119
while trying to install
eavesdropping equipment

1369
01:25:45,240 --> 01:25:47,368
at the Democratic
National Committee.

1370
01:25:47,492 --> 01:25:49,665
And it turns out
that one of them has an office

1371
01:25:49,828 --> 01:25:52,047
in the headquarters
of the Committee

1372
01:25:52,164 --> 01:25:53,882
for the Re-Election
of the President.

1373
01:26:24,905 --> 01:26:28,375
Barbarella-...
Jane Fonda was...

1374
01:26:28,492 --> 01:26:32,542
was one of our major fantasies.

1375
01:26:32,662 --> 01:26:36,758
You know?
I mean, major fantasies.

1376
01:26:36,875 --> 01:26:40,095
And, uh, we couldn't believe it

1377
01:26:40,212 --> 01:26:44,558
when that fantasy
went to North Vietnam.

1378
01:26:44,674 --> 01:26:47,268
She was held to a different
standard of conduct

1379
01:26:47,385 --> 01:26:51,231
by being our fantasy,
you know, our dream girl.

1380
01:26:51,389 --> 01:26:54,893
It's like our dream girl
betrayed us.

1381
01:27:15,247 --> 01:27:17,750
Over the years, a steady stream

1382
01:27:17,874 --> 01:27:21,344
of Americans opposed to the war
would visit Hanoi,

1383
01:27:21,461 --> 01:27:24,681
including the folk singer
Joan Baez,

1384
01:27:24,798 --> 01:27:28,348
David Dellinger
of the War Resisters League,

1385
01:27:28,468 --> 01:27:31,642
the writer Susan Sontag,

1386
01:27:31,763 --> 01:27:36,109
and Tom Hayden of
the Indochina Peace Campaign.

1387
01:27:36,268 --> 01:27:39,363
But no visitor
made more headlines

1388
01:27:39,479 --> 01:27:41,823
than the actress Jane Fonda.

1389
01:27:41,940 --> 01:27:45,285
During two weeks
in the summer of 1972,

1390
01:27:45,402 --> 01:27:49,657
she broadcast at least
ten times over Radio Hanoi,

1391
01:27:49,781 --> 01:27:52,125
denouncing American POWs

1392
01:27:52,284 --> 01:27:54,628
for having committed war crimes,

1393
01:27:54,744 --> 01:27:57,213
urging the North Vietnamese
to hold out

1394
01:27:57,330 --> 01:28:00,675
against American imperialism.

1395
01:28:00,792 --> 01:28:04,092
Many Americans
would never forgive her

1396
01:28:04,212 --> 01:28:07,466
for what she did and said.

1397
01:28:07,591 --> 01:28:09,969
According to international law,

1398
01:28:10,135 --> 01:28:12,479
these men are war criminals.

1399
01:28:12,637 --> 01:28:14,105
That's according to law,

1400
01:28:14,222 --> 01:28:15,533
according
to the Nuremberg principles,

1401
01:28:15,557 --> 01:28:17,935
according to the Geneva Accord,
and others.

1402
01:28:18,059 --> 01:28:20,938
They should be tried
in front of a court

1403
01:28:21,062 --> 01:28:23,485
and probably executed
for what they did.

1404
01:28:23,607 --> 01:28:27,157
She's taken a lot
of heat for what she did.

1405
01:28:27,277 --> 01:28:29,826
And deservedly so.

1406
01:28:29,946 --> 01:28:33,416
She did some things
that were terrible.

1407
01:28:33,533 --> 01:28:36,082
And-and, YES,

1408
01:28:36,202 --> 01:28:38,671
we have a right
to be pissed off at her.

1409
01:28:38,830 --> 01:28:41,674
But, you know,

1410
01:28:41,833 --> 01:28:44,507
she wasn't the only one.

1411
01:28:44,669 --> 01:28:49,175
She's just the only one
we fantasized about.

1412
01:28:59,476 --> 01:29:01,524
Four more years!

1413
01:29:01,645 --> 01:29:04,444
Four more years!
Four more years!

1414
01:29:04,564 --> 01:29:06,942
We have brought over
half a million men home,

1415
01:29:07,067 --> 01:29:08,944
and more will be coming home.

1416
01:29:09,069 --> 01:29:12,073
We have ended
America's ground combat role.

1417
01:29:12,197 --> 01:29:14,700
No draftees
are being sent to Vietnam.

1418
01:29:14,824 --> 01:29:17,703
We have reduced our casualties
by 98%.

1419
01:29:17,827 --> 01:29:19,625
We've gone the extra mile.

1420
01:29:19,746 --> 01:29:22,420
In fact, we've gone tens
of thousands of miles

1421
01:29:22,540 --> 01:29:24,918
trying to seek a negotiated
settlement of the war.

1422
01:29:26,836 --> 01:29:29,510
There are three things,
however, that we have not

1423
01:29:29,631 --> 01:29:31,633
and that we will not offer.

1424
01:29:31,758 --> 01:29:34,853
We will never abandon
our prisoners of war.

1425
01:29:42,227 --> 01:29:43,854
And, second,

1426
01:29:43,979 --> 01:29:47,529
we will not join our enemies

1427
01:29:47,649 --> 01:29:51,119
in imposing a communist
government on our ally,

1428
01:29:51,236 --> 01:29:53,580
the 17 million people
of South Vietnam.

1429
01:29:59,744 --> 01:30:01,621
And we will never stain
the honor

1430
01:30:01,746 --> 01:30:03,794
of the United States of America.

1431
01:30:46,875 --> 01:30:50,004
Back in Paris, Henry
Kissinger was determined

1432
01:30:50,128 --> 01:30:54,554
to hammer out a peace agreement
before Election Day.

1433
01:30:54,674 --> 01:30:57,928
Now Le Duc Tho
made a key concession.

1434
01:30:58,053 --> 01:31:00,272
Hanoi no longer insisted

1435
01:31:00,388 --> 01:31:03,813
that President Thieu had to go.

1436
01:31:03,975 --> 01:31:06,649
There was
somehow this compulsion

1437
01:31:06,811 --> 01:31:10,281
to come to some kind
of an agreement.

1438
01:31:10,398 --> 01:31:13,277
I remember Le Duc Tho when
he produced the draft agreement

1439
01:31:13,401 --> 01:31:19,534
in October 8 of '72
to Kissinger, saying,

1440
01:31:19,657 --> 01:31:20,954
"You're in a hurry, aren't you?

1441
01:31:21,076 --> 01:31:22,953
You want to do this quickly."

1442
01:31:23,078 --> 01:31:26,628
And-and the response was, "Yes."

1443
01:31:26,748 --> 01:31:30,173
The two sides
soon had a tentative deal,

1444
01:31:30,293 --> 01:31:32,170
a "cease-fire in place"

1445
01:31:32,295 --> 01:31:34,673
to be followed within 60 days

1446
01:31:34,839 --> 01:31:37,683
by a complete withdrawal
of U.S. troops

1447
01:31:37,842 --> 01:31:41,312
and the return
of all American POWs.

1448
01:31:41,429 --> 01:31:45,559
The United States
stopped bombing the North.

1449
01:31:45,683 --> 01:31:51,235
No one had told President Thieu
any of the terms.

1450
01:31:52,899 --> 01:31:56,574
The day before Kissinger was to
arrive in Saigon to brief him,

1451
01:31:56,694 --> 01:32:00,324
Thieu was handed a document
found in an enemy bunker

1452
01:32:00,448 --> 01:32:02,496
in Quang Tin Province.

1453
01:32:02,617 --> 01:32:06,963
It was entitled "General
Instructions for Cease-Fire."

1454
01:32:07,080 --> 01:32:11,711
It meant that communist cadres
in an isolated province

1455
01:32:11,876 --> 01:32:16,097
of his own country already knew
more about what Kissinger

1456
01:32:16,214 --> 01:32:21,141
and Le Duc Tho had agreed to
in Paris than he did.

1457
01:32:21,261 --> 01:32:24,561
And imagine
being given an agreement

1458
01:32:24,722 --> 01:32:30,070
concerning the fate of your own
country and, uh,

1459
01:32:30,186 --> 01:32:31,813
being told that
you really don't have

1460
01:32:31,938 --> 01:32:35,488
any input in the matter.

1461
01:32:35,608 --> 01:32:39,078
And, oh, by the way,
we didn't even yet have

1462
01:32:39,195 --> 01:32:40,993
the Vietnamese translation,

1463
01:32:41,114 --> 01:32:42,832
because that hadn't been
completed.

1464
01:32:42,949 --> 01:32:46,419
And we gave him
the English version.

1465
01:32:46,536 --> 01:32:49,790
So, I mean,
as a professional diplomat,

1466
01:32:49,914 --> 01:32:53,088
somebody who's been in this
business all my life, uh,

1467
01:32:53,209 --> 01:32:55,837
I've got to tell you,
that just an awful lot

1468
01:32:55,962 --> 01:32:58,636
of diplomatic rules
were broken there.

1469
01:32:58,756 --> 01:33:02,511
Thieu refused
to accept the terms.

1470
01:33:02,635 --> 01:33:05,764
Allowing North Vietnamese troops
to remain in the South

1471
01:33:05,930 --> 01:33:08,934
would be the death
of his country.

1472
01:33:09,100 --> 01:33:13,230
Nonetheless,
after Kissinger returned home

1473
01:33:13,354 --> 01:33:15,732
12 days before the election,

1474
01:33:15,857 --> 01:33:19,987
he told the press,
"Peace is at hand."

1475
01:33:25,700 --> 01:33:28,624
On November 7, 1972,

1476
01:33:28,745 --> 01:33:31,794
Richard Nixon won
a stunning victory.

1477
01:33:31,915 --> 01:33:36,637
He was reelected with more
than 60% of the popular vote...

1478
01:33:36,753 --> 01:33:42,635
521 electoral votes
to McGovern's 17.

1479
01:33:42,759 --> 01:33:46,434
He took every single state
except Massachusetts

1480
01:33:46,554 --> 01:33:49,148
and the District of Columbia.

1481
01:33:49,265 --> 01:33:52,314
Now, the president resolved
to rid himself

1482
01:33:52,477 --> 01:33:57,984
of Vietnam completely before
his second inauguration.

1483
01:33:58,149 --> 01:34:00,868
To calm Thieu's fears
of what was to come,

1484
01:34:00,985 --> 01:34:03,738
Nixon launched
another massive airlift

1485
01:34:03,863 --> 01:34:06,662
of military equipment
to South Vietnam.

1486
01:34:06,824 --> 01:34:09,794
"If we had given this aid
to the North Vietnamese,"

1487
01:34:09,911 --> 01:34:11,663
one American general said,

1488
01:34:11,829 --> 01:34:16,005
"they could have fought us
for the rest of the century."

1489
01:34:16,167 --> 01:34:20,013
The Paris peace talks resumed.

1490
01:34:20,171 --> 01:34:23,391
But then, Le Duc Tho
suddenly announced

1491
01:34:23,508 --> 01:34:27,684
he needed to return to Hanoi
for consultation.

1492
01:34:27,804 --> 01:34:29,698
We could only
conclude that maybe they were

1493
01:34:29,722 --> 01:34:31,190
having some doubts about whether

1494
01:34:31,307 --> 01:34:33,184
they wanted to go through
with the agreement,

1495
01:34:33,309 --> 01:34:35,858
because we had sent
so many supplies

1496
01:34:36,020 --> 01:34:39,069
to Saigon
in the intervening weeks.

1497
01:34:39,190 --> 01:34:41,784
There turned
out to be dissension

1498
01:34:41,901 --> 01:34:44,404
on the communist side as well.

1499
01:34:44,529 --> 01:34:48,033
Hanoi, like Washington,
had not bothered to consult

1500
01:34:48,199 --> 01:34:50,293
with its southern comrades.

1501
01:34:50,410 --> 01:34:53,084
It had dropped the two demands
that meant the most

1502
01:34:53,204 --> 01:34:57,175
to the Viet Cong... the removal
of Thieu, and the release

1503
01:34:57,292 --> 01:35:00,387
of some 30,000
of their prisoners.

1504
01:35:00,545 --> 01:35:03,389
"Hanoi's message was clear,"

1505
01:35:03,548 --> 01:35:05,892
one bitter
Viet Cong official said.

1506
01:35:06,009 --> 01:35:09,764
"It cared more about
American prisoners of war

1507
01:35:09,887 --> 01:35:12,561
than it did for us."

1508
01:35:12,682 --> 01:35:16,107
Nixon ordered Kissinger
to suspend the talks,

1509
01:35:16,227 --> 01:35:19,151
and then he resumed the bombing
of North Vietnam

1510
01:35:19,272 --> 01:35:21,400
to further punish Hanoi,

1511
01:35:21,566 --> 01:35:24,365
and to signal to both
Hanoi and Saigon

1512
01:35:24,485 --> 01:35:28,080
that the United States
might use its airpower

1513
01:35:28,197 --> 01:35:30,325
to defend South Vietnam

1514
01:35:30,450 --> 01:35:34,830
even after a peace agreement
was signed.

1515
01:35:36,247 --> 01:35:38,090
On December 18,

1516
01:35:38,207 --> 01:35:41,552
Nixon unleashed round-the-clock
air strikes

1517
01:35:41,669 --> 01:35:44,718
that flattened targets
around Hanoi and Haiphong.

1518
01:35:46,674 --> 01:35:49,894
It would be remembered
as the Christmas Bombing.

1519
01:35:53,431 --> 01:35:55,183
And all of a sudden,

1520
01:35:55,308 --> 01:35:57,276
around Christmastime,

1521
01:35:57,435 --> 01:35:59,688
we hear an Arc Light operation,

1522
01:35:59,812 --> 01:36:02,235
B-52s... bom-bom-bom-bom-bom.

1523
01:36:02,357 --> 01:36:04,200
And it's all around,
and it is just exploding.

1524
01:36:04,317 --> 01:36:09,118
And everyone knew
they were B-52s.

1525
01:36:09,238 --> 01:36:11,457
And is... in the two years
that I was there,

1526
01:36:11,574 --> 01:36:14,123
that was the first time
I ever heard a bomb.

1527
01:36:14,285 --> 01:36:15,662
And it was close.

1528
01:36:15,787 --> 01:36:18,040
It was really close.

1529
01:36:18,164 --> 01:36:20,292
It was frightening,
but we were still cheering.

1530
01:36:20,416 --> 01:36:24,046
I mean, we were cheering because
something was happening.

1531
01:36:57,328 --> 01:36:58,671
Around the worm,

1532
01:36:58,788 --> 01:37:01,917
antiwar demonstrators returned
to the streets.

1533
01:37:02,041 --> 01:37:05,136
The prime minister of Sweden
compared the United States

1534
01:37:05,253 --> 01:37:06,846
to Nazi Germany.

1535
01:37:07,004 --> 01:37:09,098
The Pope called the bombing,

1536
01:37:09,215 --> 01:37:11,889
which killed more than
1,600 civilians,

1537
01:37:12,009 --> 01:37:15,013
"the object of daily grief."

1538
01:37:15,179 --> 01:37:19,434
James Reston of the New York
Times pronounced the raids

1539
01:37:19,559 --> 01:37:21,357
"war by tantrum."

1540
01:37:21,477 --> 01:37:25,857
Republican Senator
William Saxbe of Ohio said

1541
01:37:26,023 --> 01:37:30,574
the president had taken leave
of his senses.

1542
01:37:32,363 --> 01:37:36,288
North Vietnam shot down
15 B-52s,

1543
01:37:36,409 --> 01:37:40,710
along with 11 other aircraft.

1544
01:37:40,830 --> 01:37:44,755
93 crewmen were
reported missing.

1545
01:37:44,876 --> 01:37:49,598
45 new prisoners of war
were locked up in Hanoi,

1546
01:37:49,714 --> 01:37:54,311
one of whom died in captivity.

1547
01:37:54,427 --> 01:37:59,308
Meanwhile, both the Chinese
and the Soviets pressed Hanoi

1548
01:37:59,432 --> 01:38:01,855
to resume negotiations.

1549
01:38:01,976 --> 01:38:05,571
"The most important thing is
to let the Americans leave,"

1550
01:38:05,688 --> 01:38:08,817
Zhou Enlai told
a North Vietnamese official.

1551
01:38:08,941 --> 01:38:13,617
"The situation will change
in six months or a year."

1552
01:38:15,740 --> 01:38:19,790
On December 26, Hanoi signaled
its willingness

1553
01:38:19,911 --> 01:38:22,130
to return to Paris.

1554
01:38:22,246 --> 01:38:26,797
It would take just six days
to reach a final agreement.

1555
01:38:26,918 --> 01:38:33,096
We bombed them into
accepting our concessions.

1556
01:38:33,257 --> 01:38:37,307
We bombed them into accepting
our concessions.

1557
01:38:37,428 --> 01:38:41,149
And I stand by that statement,
because, in effect,

1558
01:38:41,265 --> 01:38:47,523
what we did was to carry out
this massive bombing campaign

1559
01:38:47,647 --> 01:38:52,494
in order to basically get back
to pretty much exactly

1560
01:38:52,610 --> 01:38:56,240
where we were at the end
of October in '72.

1561
01:38:58,241 --> 01:39:01,085
President Thieu
still balked at signing on.

1562
01:39:01,202 --> 01:39:03,455
Nixon was adamant.

1563
01:39:03,579 --> 01:39:06,549
Thieu had to go along with
what Washington and Hanoi

1564
01:39:06,666 --> 01:39:08,213
had worked out.

1565
01:39:08,334 --> 01:39:11,008
But without informing Congress,

1566
01:39:11,128 --> 01:39:14,007
the president assured
Thieu in writing

1567
01:39:14,131 --> 01:39:17,806
that the United States would
"respond with full force"

1568
01:39:17,927 --> 01:39:21,522
if the North ever violated
the agreement.

1569
01:39:21,639 --> 01:39:25,143
"The Americans really leave me
no choice," Thieu said.

1570
01:39:25,309 --> 01:39:29,155
"Either sign
or they will cut off aid.

1571
01:39:29,272 --> 01:39:33,322
"On the other hand, we have an
absolute guarantee from Nixon

1572
01:39:33,484 --> 01:39:35,657
"to defend the country.

1573
01:39:35,778 --> 01:39:40,204
"1 am going to agree to sign
and hold him to his word.

1574
01:39:40,324 --> 01:39:43,999
He is an honest man
and I am going to trust him."

1575
01:39:51,711 --> 01:39:55,807
On January 22, 1973,

1576
01:39:55,923 --> 01:39:59,803
at his ranch in the
Hill Country of Texas,

1577
01:39:59,927 --> 01:40:02,851
Lyndon Baines Johnson,

1578
01:40:02,972 --> 01:40:05,521
the president who had committed
the United States

1579
01:40:05,683 --> 01:40:08,527
to a ground war in Vietnam,

1580
01:40:08,644 --> 01:40:12,899
and had seen that war undercut
his domestic social programs

1581
01:40:13,024 --> 01:40:15,948
and end his political career,

1582
01:40:16,068 --> 01:40:18,196
died of congestive
heart failure.

1583
01:40:23,492 --> 01:40:28,293
The following evening, Richard
Nixon spoke to the nation.

1584
01:40:28,414 --> 01:40:31,008
28 years after the United States

1585
01:40:31,125 --> 01:40:33,878
first became involved
in Vietnam,

1586
01:40:34,045 --> 01:40:36,889
it was finally getting out.

1587
01:40:37,006 --> 01:40:38,383
I have asked for this radio

1588
01:40:38,549 --> 01:40:40,768
and television time tonight

1589
01:40:40,885 --> 01:40:44,355
for the purpose
of announcing that we today

1590
01:40:44,472 --> 01:40:47,726
have concluded an agreement
to end the war

1591
01:40:47,850 --> 01:40:51,900
and bring peace with honor in
Vietnam and in Southeast Asia.

1592
01:40:52,021 --> 01:40:55,400
A cease-fire,
internationally supervised,

1593
01:40:55,524 --> 01:40:59,279
will begin at 7:00 p.m.
this Saturday, January 27,

1594
01:40:59,403 --> 01:41:01,076
Washington time.

1595
01:41:01,238 --> 01:41:03,206
Within 60 days
from this Saturday,

1596
01:41:03,324 --> 01:41:07,545
all Americans held prisoners
of war throughout Indochina

1597
01:41:07,662 --> 01:41:10,085
will be released.

1598
01:41:11,874 --> 01:41:16,596
American prisoners
of war, 591 of them,

1599
01:41:16,754 --> 01:41:19,928
were to be released
in batches of 40.

1600
01:41:20,049 --> 01:41:22,928
Those who had been
in captivity the longest

1601
01:41:23,052 --> 01:41:25,601
were to come home first.

1602
01:41:25,721 --> 01:41:29,601
Today the largest contingents of
repatriated prisoners so far,

1603
01:41:29,767 --> 01:41:31,485
60 men, were flown from Clark

1604
01:41:31,602 --> 01:41:33,445
to Travis Air Force Base,
California.

1605
01:41:33,604 --> 01:41:35,524
Today's
most dramatic moment came

1606
01:41:35,564 --> 01:41:38,113
when Everett Alvarez made
his happy trek down the ramp,

1607
01:41:38,275 --> 01:41:39,322
home at last.

1608
01:41:39,443 --> 01:41:40,843
For almost as long
as most Americans

1609
01:41:40,903 --> 01:41:42,325
have been aware of Vietnam,

1610
01:41:42,446 --> 01:41:46,292
Lieutenant Commander Alvarez
has been a prisoner in Hanoi.

1611
01:41:46,409 --> 01:41:49,288
He was shot down August 5, 1964,
during the first raids flown

1612
01:41:49,412 --> 01:41:52,336
in retaliation for
the Tonkin Gulf incident.

1613
01:41:52,456 --> 01:41:54,254
And finally, today, he was home.

1614
01:41:54,375 --> 01:41:56,719
For years and years,

1615
01:41:56,836 --> 01:42:02,969
we dreamed of this day,
and we kept faith.

1616
01:42:03,134 --> 01:42:07,810
Faith in God, in our president,

1617
01:42:07,972 --> 01:42:09,474
and in our country.

1618
01:42:14,478 --> 01:42:18,984
Hal Kushner's
turn came in mid-March.

1619
01:42:32,163 --> 01:42:34,666
And they... then
they called our name.

1620
01:42:34,832 --> 01:42:37,335
And I walked out
in the sunlight.

1621
01:42:37,460 --> 01:42:40,259
And the first thing I saw
was a girl in a miniskirt.

1622
01:42:40,379 --> 01:42:43,053
She was a reporter for one
of the news organizations.

1623
01:42:43,174 --> 01:42:45,097
I'd never seen
a real-life miniskirt.

1624
01:42:51,015 --> 01:42:53,234
And there was a
table with the Vietnamese

1625
01:42:53,350 --> 01:42:55,352
and American authorities
on one side,

1626
01:42:55,519 --> 01:42:57,988
and there was a brigadier
general, Air Force general

1627
01:42:58,105 --> 01:43:00,358
in Class A uniform.

1628
01:43:00,524 --> 01:43:03,573
And he looked magnificent.

1629
01:43:03,694 --> 01:43:06,493
And I looked at him...

1630
01:43:06,614 --> 01:43:08,332
and he had breadth,

1631
01:43:08,449 --> 01:43:12,420
he had thickness
that we didn't have.

1632
01:43:12,536 --> 01:43:15,665
And his hair was...
he had on a garrison cap.

1633
01:43:15,790 --> 01:43:18,794
And his hair was
plump and moist,

1634
01:43:18,918 --> 01:43:21,387
and our hair
was like straw, you know.

1635
01:43:21,545 --> 01:43:23,718
It was dry and we were skinny.

1636
01:43:26,175 --> 01:43:27,848
And I went out and I saluted,

1637
01:43:27,968 --> 01:43:30,596
which was a courtesy
that had been denied us

1638
01:43:30,721 --> 01:43:33,440
for so many years.

1639
01:43:33,557 --> 01:43:35,935
And he saluted me, and he...

1640
01:43:36,060 --> 01:43:38,028
I shook hands
with him and he hugged me,

1641
01:43:38,145 --> 01:43:39,567
he actually hugged me,

1642
01:43:39,688 --> 01:43:43,238
and he said,
"Welcome home, Major.

1643
01:43:43,400 --> 01:43:44,947
We're glad to see you, doctor."

1644
01:43:45,069 --> 01:43:47,868
And the tears were
streaming down his cheeks.

1645
01:43:47,988 --> 01:43:51,083
And it was just
a-a powerful moment.

1646
01:43:57,289 --> 01:43:59,542
And then this
liaison officer they called

1647
01:43:59,667 --> 01:44:03,046
that came out and got me
and escorted me on this C-141.

1648
01:44:03,170 --> 01:44:06,970
It was this beautiful white
airplane with a flag.

1649
01:44:10,511 --> 01:44:15,563
An American flag
on the tail and USAF:

1650
01:44:24,275 --> 01:44:27,779
And they had these real
cute flight nurses on there.

1651
01:44:27,945 --> 01:44:29,822
They were all tall and blonde
and, you know,

1652
01:44:29,947 --> 01:44:31,870
they-they were just gorgeous.

1653
01:44:31,991 --> 01:44:34,289
And we got on this thing
and, and she said,

1654
01:44:34,451 --> 01:44:37,421
this nurse... we sat in these
seats and she said,

1655
01:44:37,538 --> 01:44:39,085
"We have anything you want,
you know.

1656
01:44:39,206 --> 01:44:40,207
"Do... what do you want?"

1657
01:44:40,332 --> 01:44:42,380
And I-I wanted a Coke
with crushed ice

1658
01:44:42,501 --> 01:44:44,629
and some chewing gum.

1659
01:45:46,357 --> 01:45:49,531
Within a few days
of Hal Kushner's release,

1660
01:45:49,652 --> 01:45:54,533
the last American combat troops
would leave Vietnam.

1661
01:45:54,657 --> 01:45:59,379
But they would leave behind
many unanswered questions.

1662
01:45:59,495 --> 01:46:04,126
How long could the South
Vietnamese government survive?

1663
01:46:04,249 --> 01:46:07,423
What was the value
of American promises,

1664
01:46:07,544 --> 01:46:10,388
and American sacrifice?

1665
01:46:10,506 --> 01:46:14,556
And how long would it take
for the wounds of war to heal?

1666
01:48:06,663 --> 01:48:08,711
Hey, man, what's your name?
Whoo!

1667
01:48:46,745 --> 01:48:47,745
Whoo!