“Let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that." - Former President Richard Nixon, 1969. The Vietnam War was the central issue of the 1972 US presidential elections. Nixon's opponent, George McGovern, campaigned on a platform of withdrawal from Vietnam. Nixon's National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger continued secret negotiations with North Vietnam's Le Duc Tho. In October 1972, they reached an agreement. However, South Vietnamese President Thieu demanded massive changes to the peace accord. When North Vietnam went public with the agreement's details, the Nixon administration claimed that the North was attempting to embarrass him. The negotiations became deadlocked. Hanoi demanded new changes. To show his support for South Vietnam and force Hanoi back to the negotiating table, Nixon ordered Operation Linebacker II, a massive bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong December 18-29, 1972. The offensive destroyed much of the remaining economic and industrial capacity of North Vietnam. Simultaneously, Nixon pressured Thieu to accept the terms of the agreement, threatening to conclude a bilateral peace deal and cut off American aid. On January 15, 1973, Nixon announced the suspension of offensive action against North Vietnam. The Paris Peace Accords on "Ending the War and Restoring Peace in Vietnam" were signed on January 27, 1973, officially ending direct US involvement in the Vietnam War. A cease-fire was declared across North and South Vietnam. US prisoners of war (POWs) were released. The agreement guaranteed the territorial integrity of Vietnam and, like the Geneva Conference of 1954, called for national elections in the North and South. The Paris Peace Accords stipulated a sixty-day period for the total withdrawal of US forces. "This article," noted Peter Church (a lawyer/author with great interest in Asian affairs), "proved... to be the only one of the Paris Agreements, which was fully carried out." Some advocates within the peace movement urged a unilateral withdrawal of US forces from Vietnam. One reason given for the withdrawal was that it would contribute to a lessening of tensions in the region and thus less human bloodshed. Another, contrasting reason was that the Vietnamese should work out their problems independent of foreign influence. Early opposition to America's involvement in Vietnam was centered around the Geneva conference of 1954 and its mandate that elections be held to unite the country. America's refusal to sign the Accords, and its support of Diem, was considered to be thwarting the very democracy that America claimed to be supporting. John Kennedy, while Senator, opposed involvement in Vietnam. Opposition to the Vietnam War tended to unite groups opposed to US anti-communism, imperialism and colonialism and, for those involved with the New Left, capitalism itself, such as the Catholic Worker Movement. Others, such as Stephen Spiro opposed the war based on the theory of Just War. Some critics of US withdrawal predicted that it would not contribute to peace but rather vastly increased bloodshed. These critics advocated US forces remain until all threats from the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army had been eliminated. Advocates of US withdrawal were generally known as "doves", and they called their opponents "hawks", following nomenclature dating back to the War of 1812. High-profile opposition to the Vietnam War turned to street protests in an effort to turn US political opinion against the war. The protests gained momentum from the Civil Rights Movement that had organised to oppose segregation laws, which had laid a foundation of theory and infrastructure on which the anti-war movement grew. Protests were fuelled by a growing network of independently published newspapers (known as "underground papers") and the timely advent of large venue rock'n'roll festivals such as Woodstock and Grateful Dead shows, attracting younger people in search of generational togetherness. On October 15 1969, the Vietnam Moratorium peace demonstration was held in Washington DC and other US cities. Millions of Americans, throughout the country, participated. Dear Egyptian Mail readers, your contributions to and/or comments on articles published in this corner are welcome. We promise to publish whatever is deemed publishable at the end of this series. [email protected]
