Ending the Vietnam War by Henry Kissinger

Author:Henry Kissinger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2003-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

We were, in fact, in the strongest bargaining position of the war. September 15 was the day that South Vietnamese forces recaptured Quang Tri, the one provincial capital taken by Hanoi in its offensive. It was the week of polls showing growing public support for Nixon’s handling of the war and the widest Nixon lead over McGovern ever. And it was the time (we learned a few weeks later) that COSVN Directive 06 informed Communist cadres that an effort would be made to “force” Nixon to settle the war before election day—which was Hanoi’s way of preparing its people for an agreement on terms that had heretofore been publicly rejected.

I left the September 15 meeting convinced that Hanoi, having come this far, would sooner or later table its rock-bottom position. This same prospect filled Thieu with renewed dismay. Bunker was unable to obtain an appointment with Thieu to report on the meeting. But Bunker gave me his own assessment that our “patience and persistence seems to be paying off.” He added: “I think we have been understanding and very forbearing in deferring to his [Thieu’s] views and I believe that we should now be firm in making clear that we also have imperatives.”

Bunker was given no opportunity to implement his recommendation. Thieu would not see Bunker on September 16 to receive a report on the meeting with Tho. Instead he was handed a letter from Thieu to Nixon ostensibly in reply to Nixon’s letter of August 31. Characteristically, it voiced no appreciation for our having held the line on the key issues of coalition government, supervised cease-fire, and no further infiltration; rather, it warned that no further concessions should be made.

The next day, September 17, Thieu finally deigned to receive Bunker’s briefing on the meeting with Le Duc Tho. Thieu saw two possibilities: The North Vietnamese might be preparing to reach an agreement in principle prior to the American elections or else they were uncertain about our strategy. Still half believing that Thieu’s lack of cooperation must reflect a misunderstanding, I sent Bunker an even more detailed report of the September 15 session. But Thieu’s intransigence was heightened not so much by the fear of failure as by the prospect of success. On September 20 in a speech in Hue, he pointedly declared: “No one has a right to negotiate for or accept any solution” except the people of South Vietnam. On September 23, I made one more effort to heal the breach, wiring Bunker:

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.