Kissingers wars in the indochina. I call it a bigger game because that is exactly what nixon called it. Over and over again. He viewed this war in Southeast Asia as one element in this much bigger game of International Diplomacy he was playing in that time. It is all reflected in your readings, all the evolution in the International System. The chaos that was in america at the time. All these things shaped nixons presidency. They enabled it in the first place. They shape it through his entire time in office. Prettysin it is a complicated story, i thought i would start by making sure we understand the objectives and themes we will be looking at today. The objectives are, what we have in this case are two nations, both decisively engaged in an epic war. North vietnam and the United States. Both sides have committed all of their resources, which are very different. But each powerful in its own way. Both of those nations need to find an exit from the war. The North Vietnamese have been fighting for 20 years. There are changes in the International System again, this final soviet split. They are afraid they will lose the support of their superpower allies in moscow and beijing if this war continues. Nixon has two problems. He has an impatient domestic political base. Hes got a larger International Game hes playing. He, like the North Vietnamese, is looking for a way out. Each of them will build strategies to achieve their objectives. Our strategies will interact with those of the North Vietnamese. We need to understand what each side was trying to do, how that interaction worked, and how it played out. Especially with you guys, and all of us here at the u. S. Air force academy, its very important that we understand the role of military action in this overall strategy. There are themes up here that we will find pronounced in this narrative today. That will occur over and over again through this time that im talking about. First there is the interplay of diplomacy and warfare. This is not original with me, obviously. His is carl clausen i war is a continuation of policy. Its also true that diplomacy in this case becomes an extension of war by another means. This is about as clear an example of the interplay of talking and fighting as you will ever find. Warfare, an in all action and reaction cycle. We have the wealthiest nation on earth, the most technologically advanced against a peasant economy. They try to counter each others capabilities through an action reaction cycle. Continually adapting to the adversaries moves. It is pretty interesting. I think i may be the only one to have ever identified this. This war was so unpopulated, people tended not to notice this is the dawn of a technological era in warfare. We go into this war with no avionics. We have no precision capability. There wasbased capability. Arrives, we have precision weaponry. We have computerbased mission planning. We have spacedbased intel and weather. We have taken a huge step towards evolving into the air force of today. We get to see in this case the loops in action. The observe, orient, decide, and act. As we know from other courses and our earlier discussions in this course, if you have that capability to go through that process quicker than your adversary, you have an inherent advantage in warfare. What we can see is that the advantage plays out over and over again in different ways through this narrative. This one is really important for you guys. Anywhere you go in your career, you are likely to be in a more technologically advanced force. You will probably have more resources than your adversary. You will face an adversary that could be viewed as weaker. In some ways, they are. Its important to understand how our adversaries go about compensating for those advantages that we have. Ok . That will be a consistent story through this narrative. To talk about the versatility of air power is not novel here at the United States air force academy. It is interesting to look at the huge range of options and capabilities that airpower provides National Command authoritys throughout the narrative. We will talk about the principal actors and we will do that because we talk about these events as obstructions. You know . Things created by policy community. This is real people, real experiences making hard decisions. We will talk about the context of the battle, combat, its outcome, the lessons that are available to be learned. Once you have been around as long as i have, you get skeptical about lessons learned. There are things available to be learned in this conversation. Here are the principal actors of the american policy community in this period. The interesting thing is that we have studied world war ii from various perspectives in this class. These were the guys playing there. This is the greatest generation growing up. Richard nixon elected in 1968. On a basis of basically stabilizing the domestic situation of the nation, and ensuring an honorable and to the war. Started out ii he as a waging price attorney, enforcing the prices on tires. He and his wife decided that was no way to spend the war. He signed up for the navy reserve, went out to the southwest pacific as a supply officer and became known as the best poker player in the theater. What we will find of interest is that he tends to find Strategic Affairs in these poker terms. I mentioned the bigger game. He talks about moves and games all the time. His National Security advisor, dr. Henry kissinger, has an even more dramatic story. He was born in germany in 1920. His family escaped in 1938 from the third reich. He was drafted in the army in 1943. Went over to europe as an enlisted person in the intel community. He was so valued an asset because he knew the community and the language. They moved him into what we would now call civil affairs. He ended up becoming the mayor mayor of a nice town in germany. Even today. Secretary of defense miller, hes enlisted man in world war ii. He is on the uss maddox, which took a, causey strike. Zi strike. He was injured. It is one of those eerie coincidences. That ship was later involved in the gulf of tonkin incident that triggered americas immediate engagement in the war. President nixon the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. During the war, he was a pilot. He was flying a patrol aircraft that got shot down by japanese aircraft. He got rescued by a passing ship which got torpedoed by a japanese submarine. Its at that point, you know you are having a really bad day. He survived that. He played a central role in this administration. Down here, we have Creighton Abrams who had the most luminary of any of these careers. He was with general pattons army, going across france and germany. He was considered by patton to best tanky the commander in pattons army, but the best tank commander that there was. Patton was not what one would call a modest man. He found that abrams was the finest tank commander in the American Forces. At this point in the war, in indochina, he was a commander of u. S. Forces for the military assistance command in saigon. General john vote over here, in that photograph he is serving in a role on the joint staff. He was a director of the joint staff, and in that role, he worked a really close relationship with nixon and kissinger in the white house through events like the cambodian coalition. We will talk about that in a moment. This is him giving a briefing on the progress of one of those events as the secretary of defense looks on. In world war ii, he was an ace and Squadron Commander by the age of 26. He was a Squadron Commander of p47 unit that took off as a 12 ship to patrol to provide combat air patrol over the normandy landings. That is something that would change a persons life, to see something that majestic out there. A few months later, his squadron was tasked to defend a bridgehead against the German Division that were coming after the paratroopers. Half of the squadron got shot down. General vote had basically combat fatigue. He had a nervous breakdown. Thats basically what happened. He completely lost his ability to make decisions, even to get out of a chair. They evacuated him back to the United States, put him on an active status. He came back a couple years he came back into the air force a couple years later. By being a wonderful staff officer, he rose to the rank of three and four stars when nixon promoted him at the outset of this invasion. A remarkable set of stories tracking the lives of these men. And weve gone through the war in indochina a few times. To refresh everybodys memory, we have French Indochina which is broken into four states by geneva in 1954. North vietnam, South Vietnam, with its really, really long indefensible borders. Cambodia which had been neutral for much of the war, dragged into it in 1970. And laos which is mostly of , interest in the war for the supply routes running through southern laos. That was a perennial concern of the United States air force to try to block. North vietnam is bordered by china on the north. That is where North Vietnams military equipment comes from, all of it. They manufacture nothing. Even through the port of haiphong or rail networks, the biggest going up towards the northeast. Theres a second one to the northwest. Rolling thunder, the chinese had deployed about 300,000 road workers and antiaircraft crewmen to support North Vietnam. They anticipated a Campaign Like linebacker. They had created more Road Networks through this area. The key to any attempt to isolate North Vietnam would have to start with closing the ports and shutting down those transportation routes. The a that came down from there was primarily the Technology Material that the North Vietnamese needed. That would be aircraft, surfacetoair missile batteries, a lot of tanks. The chinese tended to provide a complementary type of support to the North Vietnamese. Uniforms, small arms, infantry weapons, that kind of thing. Any questions on the general layout here . Ok. I think we all got that. This is a fairly consultative complicated story. We start with president nixon coming into office on january 20, 1969. From the moment that he takes the oath of office, hes a war president. This is the most important thing on his mind every day of his administration. We talked about the state of the nation, the extreme turmoil that is out there. And the state of the conflict. At that point, the tet offensive had happened about a year earlier. They drained Domestic Support for the war. It became imperative for america to end the war. Nixon was determined he had to do that but it had to be done honorably, not just by packing up and leaving. Theres no real clear plan in his mind how to go about that. He is aware of the different elements of the strategy that could work. Those elements include, you have to build up the South Vietnamese military so that they can assume the roles that have been taken by American Forces up to that point. That is a difficult, complicated , slow process. That is what has to be done. Them as vietnam is ization vietnam continues, with of american troops proceeds. This began in the first half of 1969. They knew what this point that be an all out military victory in this conflict. They opened up public negotiations with the North Vietnamese in paris. Nixon and kissinger knew that would never be a pathway to success. It was basically a propaganda theater. In august of 69, dr. Kissinger went to paris, met with the North Vietnamese, and begin a series of secret negotiations that would continue for the next couple years. We have this triangular diplomacy that we have talked about in this class before. We have nixon working gradually to build a relationship with the soviet union to get away from the kind of dangerous confrontations that we had had earlier in the cold war. He also worked very subtly and gradually over time to create the opportunity for an opening with communist china. Those were both critical moves in this bigger game that he had in mind for the shape of the International System. But with respect to the vietnam war, these are critical. What nixon is intent on doing, a phrase he loved to use, to give the soviets and chinese bigger fish to fry than their support for North Vietnam. If they cut their support, if they were to back off on their support for North Vietnam, nixon could offer them technological advantages. He could sell them wheat. He could recognize them as equals in the family of nations, which is something that brezhnev was always interested in. These were the tradeoffs that jeopardized North Vietnams war. This was a critical part of nixons program. The problem with this set of strategies. There were actually two. One is that some of the elements are mutually contradictory. You have a very slow process of vietnamization. Rapid withdrawal of american troops. In addition to being a good secretary of defense, he had seen the Johnson Administration get crippled by this war. He wanted us out as quickly as he could make that happen. He was always pushing, using every tool of his disposal. Budgetary tools, running his own policy to accelerate the withdrawal of u. S. Troops. You have this inherent contradiction. The quicker you withdraw, the faster you lose your negotiating position and your talks with the North Vietnamese. The other problem is, it will take time. It takes time to build up an allied military and to execute all of these processes. Hes not sure he has the time. During that first year in office, 1969, using the Nixon White House orchestrating three you see the Nixon White House orchestrating three major studies on the war. The third of them is the one that is a most unknown. Its a really important turning point. You have nixon trying to find some strategy by which they can execute coercive airstrikes on the North Vietnamese in a way and at a pace that doesnt bring the Antiwar Movement back out into the streets. But is Strong Enough to coerce them into honest negotiations. They have a working group in saigon. The fly guys from the joint staff and the services out there to look at military options. They have a Planning Group and washington, d. C. That is run by the nsa. Basically, the civilian Planning Group gets mad at the military. The military gets mad at the civilians. They cant find a pathway forward. Thats when nixon gives his silent majority speech on of on november 3, 1969. It commits them to this long, gradual program of withdrawal. During the program, nixon directs a South Vietnamese u. S. Army force into cambodia in 1970 to disrupt the North Vietnamese Logistics Base camp that is over there. A few months later, and even larger offensive into laos. These two are linked conceptually. They are also linked practically. What happens is, when we send those troops into laos, the North Vietnamese public bureau, which always prides itself on protecting our assets, is taken by surprise. There is a certain amount of Tactical Response but they are taken by surprise by the fact that nixon could send his forces into cambodia. They convene a Planning Committee to figure out if nixon is going to go into cambodia to disrupt logistics there, what is his next logical move . The next logical move is to do it again but this time up in laos. Closer to the source of supply. A bigger threat to the North Vietnamese forces than cambodia had been. Having conducted the strategic estimate, the North Vietnamese actually act on it. I want you to remember this. There are a lot of strategic assessments you guys will take part of in your career that have little effect on the course of events. When the North Vietnamese decide what the americans will be up to next, they build a campaign road network in the area where they expect this campaign to happen. They build a command structure so that they will be ready to go and get organized and respond. They deployed antiaircraft troops, road engineers, they build up logistic stockpiles. All of this before we have started considering to go there. This is one of the weapons of the week. If we are predictable, we will be predicted and they will be ready. Remember that. What happens is that the United States instead of supporting the , South Vietnam force, the North Vietnamese basically set an operational level trap. An ambush. Like lincoln after gettysburg. He didnt want to put the confederates out of the country. He wanted to destroy them. Thats how the North Vietnamese felt. They didnt want to push the South Vietnamese force back. They wanted to destroy them. They didnt succeed because of the airpower that was brought to bear to keep them off of the back of the South Vietnamese. It was a major defeat of the South Vietnamese. Proving that the North Vietnamese had recovered from their losses in the tet offensive. It has a couple of very important events. I think this is what puts us on the back straight in the war. This is what shapes all the events that follow. A couple things happen. First, president and and dr. Kissinger lose all faith in general abrams and the u. S. Military. Because of the sluggish reaction to this operation in laos. Probably of more importance, based on that, the North Vietnamese bureau gathered to project their actions for the next campaign season. They decided that if the South Vietnamese, with all of this american support, cannot do better than this, what are they going to do once the americans are gone . It seems unthinkable that they could offer significant resistance to a North Vietnamese operation. Based on that, they decide to risk a go for broke offensive the following year, 1972. Their strategic estimate includes the fact that our withdrawal will almost be complete by then. We will have very little combat capability there. Like all of our adversaries do and will, they know that we have a president ial election coming up, they expect that nixon will be constrained by the domestic politics that will be in play. They expect their sponsors in moscow and beijing to restrain nixon as well, which is also a mistake. But they actually put a paragraph. We have their strategic plan. They put in a paragraph that says, they have made all these calculations. The one thing we cannot calculate with certainty is the reaction of president nixon. It says he is unpredictable and likely to use powerful and brutal weapons against our offensive. The other remarkable thing in this whole process, i think we as military people will have a special appreciation for this. The North Vietnamese enter into this period with an infantry army, peasant warfare background. What they plan to do is to do in this offensive is to transform their army into a smaller scale replica of a soviet style tank, artillery, infantry force. They will do that in the course of a few months of training at the end of a supply chain that reaches all away from hanoi back to moscow, back to beijing. They have to do all of these things in the midst of an ongoing war. Its a remarkable a compliment. It left them with some weaknesses that will show up in the events that follow. You can train people that quickly to do things this complicated. A combined arms attack is not something you dream up overnight. The other is, the planning cycle they borrowed from the soviets as well. Its a very deliberate planning cycle. In part because their communications are so bad, they cannot make adjustments on the battlefield. Over and over again in this offense that will follow soon, we will see them stagnate. That gives the defenses a chance to resolidifies and counter their offenses. I want to point out here, this is the president of South Vietnam. Hes a general who had survived and prospered through all of the chaos in the late 1960s. He emerged as the leader of the nation. Over here, we have the communist side of this equation. We have this one who is the successor to ho chi minh. We have an avid supporter of the North Vietnamese war effort. Hanoi goes all in. This is all theyve got. They rolled the dice with a three fund offensive. Their plan is to start with conventional warfare. They send tanks, heavy artillery masses of infantry. Force against the Demilitarized Zone and a second front north of saigon threatening the nations capital. Theres a slower rising offensive in the Central Highlands. They end up driving the South Vietnamese back, setting siege to the provincial capital in the Central Highlands and down south. It looks like this whole plan is going to succeed. What they expect to happen is to achieve this conventional success and disrupt the South Vietnamese military, once the South Vietnamese move out of position, they can reclaim territory in the populated areas. They can reestablish their hold on the population. Once that happens, they expect the government will be so weak that they can encourage Political Action in the streets, overthrow the government, and join a coalition. That they expected to follow. That is their own version of the bigger game. Everybody with me so far . Ok. What happens . How do we think nixon will react based on what we know about him . The technical phrase is, he went nuts. He is not having it. He is totally not having it. He views this as a direct threat to his domestic position, to his chances of being elected again, to his relations all around the world. With the europeans, the soviets, the chinese. He orders and all that response. Thats important. He has lost his confidence in the secretary of defense. He has lost his confidence in general abrams. He has no feelings that they will interject into this operation the energy and power and creativity that he wants to see. He says, this one is on you. You have been complaining about these restrictions for years. Now its a put up or shut up moment. We sent carriers. Theres the saratoga on the east coast getting ready to go to the mediterranean. Nope. You are headed west. You have the midway, they send it across the pacific. Massive rapid deployments across the pacific. B52s across the pacific. This is not often noted. Its the first time in our history as a nation that we have had the capability for that kind of strategic mobility. You have forces deployed, ready to go on arrival. Personnel changes. Again, he had no faith in general abrams. He called general of into his office and gave him a charge. Basically what he says will go. General a general abrams had a long career, he is tired and old. He cant do this. He places diplomatic pressure on russia and china. They send five b52 strikes into the panhandle of North Vietnam as a warning, saying, if you guys dont back off, theres no links length to which i will not go to stop this offensive. When those dont work, kissinger is in moscow. Nixon is determined that kissinger be there in a position of strength. He sends a force of b52 against typhon harbor. Into the North Vietnamese heartland. Devastating attack, its the only one in the b52 range where there is civilian casualties. For the North Vietnamese, it is more serious because the spoofingescorts and was so powerful that they did not even know until the next day that there were b52s in the strikeforce. They knew they had a big problem. Airn personally directs an campaign against North Vietnam, up to 20 degrees north. This is kind of forgotten by history. It is probably the most effective of any of these operations against north korea North Vietnam. We need to remember with all of this activity, what really matters is what happens on the ground. They fled South Vietnam with their power. The assaults on and lock assaults on can tune. The North Vietnamese are able to advance to the south and take thepreventable capital, only one they captured at that point in the war. Is a huge symbolic and diplomatic value to them. No real practical value. Theyhile it looked as if could fall at any time. Crisis init as a theater, but also as something that is going to damage his upcoming summit with the soviet union. He is perfectly willing to lose that summit if going means the loss of South Vietnam. He said we can afford not to have a summit, we cannot afford to lose the war. This is another one of the meetings recorded on the nixon tapes, which is such a godsend to the historians. You can listen the nixon and John Connolly talk to their options and finally they all decide that we need to escalate escalate at this point. That does no good if you dont shut down that Road Rail Network from china. You also have to open a sustained air campaign to isolate North Vietnam from sponsors. Nixon. A quote from its where i got the title for my dissertation. Bigger game, aa russia game, china game, and election game and we will not have South Vietnam collapsed. Thats on the third of april. Immediately he gets the word of the offensive. Nixon escalates. Linebacker. Peration pocket money keeps the ports closed through the remainder of the war. So he istrates this, announcing all of these things at the very moment that the navy is dropping these mines into the water. Vietnam is not famous for its elegant operations. Elegant operation. Shut the harbor for the rest of the war. The objectives, strategically what you are trying to do is course the North Vietnamese into negotiations and isolate them from their sponsors. To do that at the operational level, you have to close the means of transport. You have to shut down the roads and the rail. Technically, you have a real challenge in trying to do that, because the same factors that made Rolling Thunder difficult will also be there. The wideopen geography and the weather patterns of indochina. With linebacker is everything that Rolling Thunder had not been. He wanted a rapid cataclysmic assault. Nonstop attack, on North Vietnam that would shock them in addition to bringing down this damage on them. What he got was somewhat better air warfare. What are the advantages now of linebacker over Rolling Thunder . These are pretty wellknown. This is the point where laserguided bombs become widely used in combat. If you are going to try to drop bridges and put holes in the road, that is a good way to do it. You can save hundreds. But what you cannot do is shut down all of the roads. The North Vietnamese prepared for the air campaign. They had back upon soon bridges. Populationmobilized ready to repair roads at a moment notice. Rolling thunder was famous again. You will have heard of this with Lyndon Johnson sitting with his advisors and picking targets. Things, buta lot of one of the things he really hated was to do anything compared to johnson as a war leader. Targeting was delegated to commanders with fewer restrictions on the air campaign. The most important thing out of all of this is that youve got, where johnson was a really hisctant war president , heart was in his domestic program. Nixon loved being a war president , at least being able to pump energy into the operation. There is a sense of urgency that is more important than the tactical changes. Will watch this every morning and every night and he does. He gets updates every morning and night. When he goes to moscow in may he leaves a long letter about giving directions about what he wants done when he is away. It is not to back up on the bombing for diplomatic purposes, it is to intensify it during that time because he wanted to be strong in that meeting with gorbachev. Not gorbachev, sorry, russian of breshnev. You have all of these advantages in the air campaign. You had this wonderful advance and weaponry, but it brings complications into it. These laserguided weapons are more sensitive than to weather. Seeker headset can be drawn off by bad weather. The general tried to shape his entire air Campaign Around precision weapons. He had a lot of laserguided bombs. What he did not have was a lot of guidance pods. Heonly had six of them and needed to protect them for the whole duration of the air operation. He built the strategy for these air operations that were built around the strike package of a laser designator, and if you aircraft carrying bombs with air, suppression, tankers, and it became a really complicated, complex mode of operation. To fragility on the field of battle. These guys did not have a chance to talk on the phone to say, this is the plan. They are in indochina, there are no phones. They have to figure it out through what they can piece together airborne. Once you find something that works, you do not want to change it. Its like almost everything in life. Except, if you do that and a military environment, you become predictable. The North Vietnamese took advantage of that. The North Vietnamese countermeasures mobilized society. Nothing more important than keeping the roads open. Down south there is a cascade of air power that stagnates eastern. The vietnamese recapture the city. And this interplay of war and diplomacy, they gather and acai that and decide that they have gotten all they have gotten out of it. Its time to turn to diplomacy. They enter into serious negotiations for the first time. Kissinger and his North Vietnamese counterpart conduct talks in july, august and september. It want to settle this before the election. Each for their own reason. Towards converging now the last negotiating session before the election in october. There is a quiet conversation captured on the nixon tapes with a talk about their view of the war. It is really fascinating. Is basically making sure that he and kissinger at the same vision of the type of settlement that the nation needs. What they need is to be out of that war. So they expect to fully withdraw from the war. Expect to leave the North Vietnamese in place and a leopard spot arrangement within South Vietnam. They basically take count of what they need to do, given that that is the outcome of what they seek. They need to do everything conceivable to support South Vietnam to the point where we withdraw. Ask him a, maximum logistic support, political support, all of that. We cannot be seen to be Holding Anything back. In the end, we need to withdraw and we cannot afford to go back. Nixon gives his reasons. He is back to his bigger game analogy. This time it has to do with the russians, the chinese, the europeans, and he even wants to try to settle the middle east. All of these things are in play. End with, right after their conversation kissinger reaches an agreement with the North Vietnamese, actually has a ratified by president nixon, goes off to saigon and has it rejected, because it leaves the North Vietnamese in place and gives them a role in the South Vietnamese political system. It is the most bitter three months i think any president could have in the midst of this electrical triumph on november 7. Lettersnixon exchanging to oppose the settlement. Nixon and kissinger are unwilling to give any fundamental change to the settlement, to the South Vietnamese settlement to the South Vietnamese. Finally they had a stepbystep approach towards a negotiated december 14. There are two symbolic differences between the u. S. And the North Vietnamese. Kissinger and the leader go back to their capitals. It was just a break to consult with the capitals. Again, there is a meeting on the nixon tapes. There is a whole discussion that , theers linebacker christmas bombing. On december the 14th of 1972, linebacker to would be that cold war sit measure against the North Vietnamese. Less visible. You have threats of cut off of military and economic sport support. Nixon feels like he is forced to turn against both sides in the endgame of this process. Now we move into the final climactic military action of the war. This is nixon going up as high as he can. Linebacker planning began on december 14 and extended for four days. Anr days to put together operation for this highly defended area. With the North Vietnamese, and this is another for you to remember, remember the comments i made about the raid where they were not aware b52s were in the strikeforce . The North Vietnamese knew that if they sent b52s once, they would do it again. Basically they turned the entire country into a Research Institute to try to figure out how to penetrate the missiles being fired. They deployed their radar guys down south. They actually get a visual look at b52 formations. You have to understand the tactics, out the two, how to work the radar. They spent months doing that. They had defensive campaign plans to defend the heartland. They did a version in july. October, and finally in november. The objectives for the air campaign, as nixon and the National Security council to course thes North Vietnamese into accepting any change in the proposed settlement that will enable nixon to end the war. There is a draft that explicitly states that we are not to use strictly military considerations in drying up the plan. Our objective is maximum psychological shock. That is what they are out to get. Goingional means downtown. That means taking b52s downtown. Tactically it means trying to integrate this incredibly complicated series of air force and navy capabilities. The sequence is in many books. They delegate the tasking authority to the Strategic Air command in nebraska. No feel for the battlefield. They have a very strict of orders and lack of flexibility at the field levels. They come up with a concept of ops that in 53 large waves of b52s each night. At about 40 b52s per wave going in at the same ground track, the same out to two, everything. Everything. This is absolutely an by any concept of operations. B52s the first night, none the second, but their night we lose six the 52s the third night we lose six b52s. This is the first briefing where they announce we are going to hanoi. People expected one of those world war ii movies were they say, we are going to berlin and everybody chairs. They said we are going to prof. Randolph and they have we are going to hanoi and they have a somber look. This was the b52 destroyed at altitude. They had the initial phase. The extreme stereo typical, predictable tactics. The next few days they basically reduced the size of the strikeforce and they hit targets that are outside the heartland. Basically just trying to reduce casualties. They then have a day off. It is really entertaining Christmas Holiday to watch both sides take advantage. They are both blaming each other. The North Vietnamese have done a bit of a job planning. Are built up and ready for launch. The essay to is a very old system. It takes a lot of feeding. There is a whole literature as aresNorth Vietnamese missile are ready to get missiles. They spend the Christmas Holiday building up their stocks, getting ready for the attack they knew would come after the holiday. The americans completely recast their operations. Instead of these widely separated waves and stereo typical attacks, they come up that North Vietnamese from multiple directions simultaneously get away with two losses. A fundamental change in the campaign. I think North Vietnam vietnam and the u. S. Knew that negotiations were about to pick up again. There are three more days of the campaign. Onotiations do pick up again january 8. They come up with a negotiated until only several days of the formal signing in late january. Eventually he comes along as well. Kissinger at the moment of success, signing the october agreement, going into the street and greeting the press. So, in a couple minutes that we have left, how do we summarize all of this . Do you have any thoughts . I think one of the big things is how much change we saw over the course of the war. There is one question i had. There is the iconic picture of looking at the numbers. Did nixon ever have one of those moments in his presidency during the war . Prof. Randolph i had never seen any evidence of nixon having that kind of, i am so miserable and there is no way out, look. Nixon had that constant look of irritability. There is a conversation where he talks about a decent interval. He says, basically when we leave we aint coming back. 25 chance of survival in South Vietnam. He and kissinger would have conversations like that. Part of it was exploring options and part of it was letting off steam. He had so much in her anger at the rest of the government, and the military, you kind of name it. That was an integral part of his way of conducting business. There was never despair. I do not think there was frustration a lot and irritation a lot. Since the North Vietnamese knew the u. S. Was planning on withdrawal within the year, was there a reason they decided to go on the offensive rather than wait the u. S. Out . Prof. Randolph it is interesting for a couple of reasons. There is a huge mass of information out on North Vietnamese planning on operations and strategic thinking, but the deliberations, made what arguments, who is on what side, that remains untouchable. There is an account by le . C th . , when he went off to paris with kissinger, he visited the french communist party. He talked about the internal deliberation. He said, why are you doing this . He said, it was a tough decision and it was a move it was a majority vote, which may or may not have been true. Toically, what drove them triggering this offensive while america was still in theater was that they needed to have a negotiated settlement to secure american withdrawal. That is what they needed most of all. Raisethat, you need to the urgency to the americans of concluding a negotiated solution. Been ae had not negotiated solution by the end of 1972, we would have kept the residual force there until there was one that could have extended indefinitely. They needed to bring the american presence in South Vietnam to a close. What they had to do was raise the offensive. Do you think they expected a heavyhanded response, or did they think the u. S. Would back down and try to accelerate negotiations . Prof. Randolph they were shocked that nixons response. Absolutely shocked. With the vigor of it, the style of it and unrelenting nature, they really miss estimated what nixon was capable of doing. They played out through the remainder of this whole time period. One of the things you touched on was the technological aspect of the warfare thatthey played e remainder of this whole nixon brought to linebacker one and linebacker to. Did this set a precedent for future campaigns . Prof. Randolph yes. Changes a whole culture and leadership of the u. S. Air force. When you go into that period it was all ward were to bomber guys world war ii bomber guys. By the time he had been at war for seven years, you had a different view of warfare, the utility of the air fosse air force, and who ought to leave. To quote the title of a book on , and a complete change in the culture on the force. That waspattern playing out 19 years later in desert storm. The pgms as a weapon of choice. This sort of overwhelming assault that we actually did succeed in conducting in desert storm. Time and content, simultaneously, which is always a success. Thank you for your attention. I look forward to seeing you thursday. The paper has been moved back until next tuesday. On thursday lets plan on coming in and talking more about our research program. What we have learned and how we have adapted to what we have found in our resources. Ok, thank you. You can watch lectures in history every weekend on American History tv. We take you inside College Classrooms to learn about topics ranging from the American Revolution to 9 11. That saturday at 8 00 p. M. And midnight eastern on cspan3. This weekend on American History tv. Talks about the longheld tensions among citizens in a democracy to determine what the truth is, rather than relying on an elite class to determine the truth for them. Here is a preview. Thinkore we conclude, i we are really post anything, the democracy itself is. Xceptionally at stake when he to ask more about what came before. If its really hard to figure out what changed, if you dont know what existed at an earlier moment. My subject today, which is the is act of my new book, problem for a historian, its a question of history. I ask, how did we get to this point . How did the marriage of democracy and truth, which looks so good from the outside, go so straight . This sundaye talk at 6 30 and 10 30 p. M. Eastern. You are watching American History tv, only on cspan3. Campaign 2020. Watch our live coverage of the president ial candidates on the campaign trail, and make up your own mind. Cspans campaign 2020. Your unfiltered view of politics. Next on American History tv. The u. S. Capital Historical Society hosts a Constitution Day program celebrating their we education initiative, followed by a Panel Discussion on how schools and institutions can foster Civic Knowledge and engagement. Great tovening, it is see everyone. Happy Constitution Day and welcome to the United States capital. I am the ceo here at the capitol visitor center. We are so pleased to be hosting this event with our good friends the United States capital Historical Society. I cannot think of a better way for us to mark Constitution Day them with a program devoted to fostering informed citizenship. Ourfounders knew that democratic system of government would depend on having an informed citizenry. Our second president said that liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people