Nixon, Kissinger and

Vietnam, 1969-1973
The Limits of American Power
 Campaign ads, 1968
„ The Living Room Candidate - Commercials
- 1968 - The First Civil Right

„ Nixon – “a secret plan to end the war”

„ An “honorable peace”
„ Uniting the Nation
„ Law and Order
 Broader Themes of the Nixon
Years
„ 1.) Transformation of the Cold War/ Ending the
First Cold War?
„ 2.) Loss of American Global Dominance –
Politically, Economically, Militarily – Perceptions
of American Decline
„ 3.) Domestic Crisis of Legitimacy – Protests at
Home, Watergate, Congress and the end of the
Imperial Presidency
„ 4.) New Centers of Power – Europe and Japan
„ 5.) Soviet Expansionism – Successes in the Third
World
Richard Nixon
 Pre-Presidential Career
1.) Born in Yorba Linda, California, January 9, 1913 –
Quaker parents
2.) Educated at Whittier College and Duke Law School –
served in the Navy during World War II
3.) Elected to Congress in November 1946 – strong anti-
communist platform
4.) Elected to Senate in 1950 – defeated Helen Gahagan
Douglas
5.) Nominated for Vice president in 1952 – survived
scandal with “Checkers speech”
6.) Active Vice President – widely traveled; Kitchen
debate with Khrushchev, mob attack in Venezuela
 Career in the 1960s
• 7.) Narrow loss to Kennedy in 1960 –
0.3% difference in popular vote
• 8.) Lost Governor’s race in California in
1962 – anger at the media - You won’t
have Nixon to kick around any more.”
• 9.) Rehabilitation efforts 1962-1968 –
endless campaigning; support for the war
but criticism of tactics
Nixon and Kissinger
 Kissinger’s Background
ƒ 1.) born in Fuerth, Germany, during the
Weimar Republic; Orthodox Jewish
upbringing; intense love for soccer
ƒ 2.) Ten years old in 1933 when Hitler and
the Nazis came to power
ƒ 3.) Came to the United States in 1938 as
an immigrant/refugee; settled in
Washington Heights in New York, a
German-Jewish enclave “Fourth Reich”
 Kissinger’s career
ƒ 1.) Army Service – in German occupation
ƒ 2.) Harvard, 1947-1968
ƒ 3.) Connection to Nelson Rockefeller
 Nixon, Kissinger, and the NSC
• 1.) Appointment of
Kissinger as NSC Deputy
– no Congressional
oversight, outside of
public view till 1971
• 2.) Centralization of
Power in the NSC
• 3.) Secrecy
• 4.) Undermining the State
Department and William
Rogers
Kissinger in 1969 – age 45
Power is the ultimate Aphrodisiac
Nixon, Kissinger and
Realism/Realpolitik

z 1.) Perception of the international system as

anarchic
z 2.) States as dominant actors – (some disdain for
domestic politics)
z 3.) Statesmen act to promote the “national interest” –
maximizing power/ issue of morality
z 4.) Contrast with idealism, Wilsonianism, Kennedy’s
inaugural, more ideologically-driven American
policies
 Nixon’s Priorities
„ 1.) Vietnam – how to end the war?
„ 2.) Relations with the Soviet Union – the
nuclear arms race
„ 3.) An opening to China?
„ 4.) Dealing with the Limits of Power – the
Nixon Doctrine and the maintenance of
the status quo (i.e. Chile, the Middle East)
„ 5.) Concept of linkage – cooperation and
the regulation of competition
The Frustrations of Vietnam, 1969-
1970
„ 1.) Failure of linkage with Soviets, slow
progress with China – the Korea parallel
„ 2.) Secret bombing of Cambodia – “madman
theory”
„ 3.) Failure of negotiations with Hanoi
„ Midway conference, Nixon Doctrine,
Vietnamization, beginning of troop withdrawals
„ 4.) Plans for Operation Duck Hook – “savage,
punishing blows”
Kissinger and Vietnam
„ 1.) Hope for “linkage” – Soviet help in
securing a settlement
„ 2.) Planning for Operation Duck Hook,
escalation of the war
„ 3.) Opposition to Vietnamization – the “salted
peanuts” memo
„ http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/news/2006100
1/peanuts.pdf
The Frustrations of Vietnam, 1969
„ 5.) Growth in antiwar sentiment – moratoriums of
October and November 1969 – radicalization of part
of the movement (Weather Underground, “Bring the
War Home”) – Government response –
COINTELPRO – covert efforts to infiltrate and
discredit the movement
„ 6.) Nixon’s - Silent Majority Speech -
„ 7.) Revelations of My Lai massacre – Nov. 1969
„ 8.) First draft lottery – December 1969
The Frustrations of Vietnam, 1970
„ 1.) Controversies over war in Laos, Feb. 1970
„ 2.) Overthrow of Sihanouk, March 1970
„ 3.) Announcement of withdrawal of 150,000 men,
April 20, 1970
„ 4.) “Incursion” into Cambodia – May 1970 – the
search for COSVN
„ 5.) Intense domestic reaction – Kent State
„ 6.) US troop withdrawal from Cambodia, June 1970,
but war continues
„ 7.) 1970 midterm elections – Nixon’s defeat, fear of
being one-term president
Nixon and Elvis – December 1970
The Agony of Vietnam - 1971
„ 1.) Failure of Lam Son 371 – February 1971 –
US supported – ARVN (South Vietnamese)
invasion of Laos
„ 2.) April 1971 – Vietnam Veterans Against the
War in Washington – John Kerry
„ 3.) Verdict in the Calley Trial – Public Outrage
„ 4.) The Pentagon Papers and Daniel Ellsberg
– June 1971, Supreme Court Case against
prior censorship
South Vietnamese Forces in Laos
 Nixon and Kissinger – A Complex
Relationship
„ 1.) Kissinger as National Security Adviser – a constituency of one
„ (Decent Interval -
http://web1.millercenter.org/dci/1970_1221_nixonwithdrawal.html
„ 2.) Reassurances to Nixon – conversation April 1971 Nixon Tapes Transcript
• Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger • 4/7/1971 • 001-010
„ Nixon on Jews
„ http://whitehousetapes.net/clips/1971_0705_jews/
„ Nixon on Diem
„ http://tapes.millercenter.virginia.edu/clips/1971_0407_billygraham/main.sw
f
„ 3.) Nixon as Strategist, Kissinger as Tactician? (April 14 conversation)
„ China: http://nixontapes.org/hak.html
„ 4.) Nixon on young people -
http://tapes.millercenter.virginia.edu/clips/nixon_students_1971_03_25.swf
Vietnam Veterans Against the War:
Operation Dewey Canyon III
My Lai Massacre – March 1968
William Calley and Daniel Ellsberg
 Nixon’s Change of Fortune
„ 1.) Breakthrough with
China – Kissinger in China
July 1971

„ 2.) New Economic Policy,

August 1971 – US off
gold, wage and price
controls, 10 percent tariff

„ 3.) Soviets agree to

summit
 A conversation: Nixon and LBJ
ƒ http://tapes.millercenter.virginia.edu/clips/19
71_0917_nixon_lbj/
The Trifecta – Nixon’s Successes in 1972 –
Determination to be the Peace Candidate
„ 1.) Opening to China – July 1971 – Trip
February 1972
„ 2.) Summit with Soviets – SALT I
Agreement – May 1972
„ 3.) Vietnam Peace Accords – announced
October 1972, signed January 1973
„ Result: Overwhelming Re-election,
November 1972
Nixon and Kissinger in China –
February 1972
Easter Offensive – March-April
1972
Nixon vs. Kissinger on the Summit

z Nixon:..Then I suppose we can go to the summit.

z Kissinger: Well if you bomb enough, they’ll break off the
summit. There’s no question about it.
z Nixon: Well, then, that perhaps is the mess we’re in because
we can’t bomb unless we bomb now. We can’t bomb and then
have –you can’t bomb and then have them kicking us around
while we’re in Moscow. You see that’s point Thieu made which
is tremendously compelling. I cannot be in Moscow at a time
when the North Vietnamese are rampaging through the streets
of Hue or for that matter through the streets of Kontum
US Response

z 1.) B 52 bombings in the South and North

z 2.) Mining Haiphong Harbor
z 3.) Announced in May 8 speech – only two
weeks before scheduled summit with USSR
z 4.) Nixon believed it was key to his election
victory
z http://web1.millercenter.org/dci/1972_1016_li
nebacker.html
Nixon and Brezhnev in Moscow,
May 1972
 The War Remains an Issue
ƒ Jane Fonda in North Vietnam
The Decent Interval

z http://tapes.millercenter.virginia.edu/clips/197
2_0803_vietnam/

z http://web1.millercenter.org/dci/1972_1006_t
hieu.html
McGovern’s Campaign – Come
Home, America
 October Surprise – “Peace is at
Hand” (Kissinger and Le Duc Tho)
 Impact on the election
ƒ Chapter II - Memoirs V. Tapes: President
Nixon & the December Bombings

ƒ “wiped McGovern out now”

South Vietnamese refusal - Thieu
Nixon Landslide – 1968 vs. 1972
Christmas Bombing of 1972
 Paris Peace Accords of January
1973
ƒ 1.) North Vietnamese troops allowed to
remain in the South
ƒ 2.) US troops withdrawn
ƒ 3.) US POWs returned
ƒ 4.) Thieu remains in power
ƒ (Nixon’s secret/public assurances)
 Assessing Nixon on Vietnam
„ 1.) Could the US have had the same
agreement in 1969?
„ 2.) Why the Christmas bombing? Nixon’s
secret assurances?
„ 3.) Was this a “decent interval” strategy?
„ 4.) Flaws in the Paris Accords – North
Vietnamese troops in South Vietnam
„ 5.) Impact of Triangular Diplomacy
Watergate
War Powers Act – November 1973
„ 1.) President must obtain Congressional
approval within 60 days of deployment
Nixon’s Resignation – August 1974
Gerald Ford, 38 th President
Ford, Rockefeller, Kissinger
Fall of Saigon – April 1975
Killing Fields of Cambodia
 Kissinger’s Lessons of Vietnam
„ “Today we find that -like most other nations in
history - we can neither escape from the world
nor dominate it. Today we must conduct
diplomacy with subtlety, flexibility, maneuver,
and imagination in the pursuit of our interests.
We must be thoughtful in defining our interests.
We must prepare against the worst contingency
and not only plan for the best. We must pursue
limited objectives and many objectives
simultaneously.”
 The Limits of Power
„ “For Americans, then, the question is not
whether our values should affect our
foreign policy but how. The issue is
whether we have the courage to face
complexity and the inner conviction to
deal with ambiguity, whether we look
behind easy slogans and recognize that
great goals can only be reached by
patience and in imperfect stages.”