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Nixon sabotaged Vietnam peace talks to get elected.

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I

ItWasMeantToBe19

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http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/12/3...phone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=0&referer=

Richard M. Nixon always denied it: to David Frost, to historians and to Lyndon B. Johnson, who had the strongest suspicions and the most cause for outrage at his successor’s rumored treachery. To them all, Nixon insisted that he had not sabotaged Johnson’s 1968 peace initiative to bring the war in Vietnam to an early conclusion. “My God. I would never do anything to encourage” South Vietnam “not to come to the table,” Nixon told Johnson, in a conversation captured on the White House taping system.

Now we know Nixon lied. A newfound cache of notes left by H. R. Haldeman, his closest aide, shows that Nixon directed his campaign’s efforts to scuttle the peace talks, which he feared could give his opponent, Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, an edge in the 1968 election. On Oct. 22, 1968, he ordered Haldeman to “monkey wrench” the initiative
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If peace talks had succeeded, millions of lives would have been saved. That doesn't mean peace talks would have succeeded without Nixon's fuckery, but he still sabotaged a process to save millions of lives to get elected.
 
D

dabig2

Member
I honestly thought this was open knowledge because 1+1 = 2. Is this one of those "we didn't have hard copy knowledge until decades later but everyone knew about it anyways and accepted it."
 
F

foppy79

Member
nixon.jpg
 
T

truly101

I got grudge sucked!
This is not surprising considering he told South Vietnam's president that the US would still support the country while negotiating a withdrawal with the North Vietnamese behind his back.
 
F

Foffy

Banned
LCGeek said:
This is what nixon did, I fear for us under trump even putin will regret it at some point.
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Imagine what the Orange Con Man will say he's doing with reason and accountability, only to perpetuate misery for masses and profits for a few.
 
S

Sir Abacus

Member
Foffy said:
Imagine what the Orange Con Man will say he's doing with reason and accountability, only to perpetuate misery for masses and profits for a few.
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And just think. Because political parties are now effectively football teams they sure as hell won't hold El Cheeto accountable.
 
SenjutsuSage

SenjutsuSage

Banned
Republicans were secretly sabotaging the Iran deal by reaching out to Iran while Obama was still working on the deal, and they were trying to delay a release of hostages.

Also, I fully expect Donald Trump to be exactly like this and do similarly outrageous things.
 
I

ItWasMeantToBe19

Banned
SenjutsuSage said:
Republicans were secretly sabotaging the Iran deal by reaching out to Iran while Obama was still working on the deal, and they were trying to delay a release of hostages.

Also, I fully expect Donald Trump to be exactly like this and do similarly outrageous things.
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Tbf, they were not being secretive. They were very open about sabotaging the deal.
 
A

A Link to the Past

Banned
It's like

I can't even get mad. I mean obviously I can because many lives were lost, but it's like, Nixon is already one of my least favorite Presidents of all time, so I'm already used to hating him this much.
 
V

Vyer

Member
I'll never understand when people try to downplay election results or try to hand wave away concerns about what one person with a big enough role could do.

This one con man may have helped to stop the saving of so many lives.
 
B

Bronx-Man

Banned
Vietnam is honestly one of the most fascinating periods of history to me. Easily the greatest foreign policy failure in American history.
 
E

emag

Member
Wasn't this common knowledge, like Reagan having Iran hold American hostages until after he won the 1980 election and was inaugurated?
 
H

HP_Wuvcraft

Banned
When people say Trump won't get us into a war, I just point to shit like this.

Fabricating evidence for a war and removing our leaders we don't like are national passtimes in Washington.
 
M

Mimosa97

Member
This is what the hunger for power makes you do : sacrifice the lives of millions of people just so you could taste real power.

He wasn't the first one and he won't be the last. As long as we keep electing the people who are the most power hungry, we'll keep getting sociopaths with no respect for the sanctitify of human life as leaders. Millions and millions will die again and again and again but eh at least we get to vote amirite ?
 
-Plasma Reus-

-Plasma Reus-

Service guarantees member status
I feel like becoming the leader of a country should mean you abandon all wealth you have and your family is also removed from all wealth, you work on minimum wage.

Lets see how many people would run for leadership then.
 
T

TAJ

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
A

A Serious Man

Member
This was fairly obvious but it's nice to have more confirmation. I can only imagine what details of the Trump administration will be dribbling out 50 years from now.
 
B

Blader

Member
emag said:
Wasn't this common knowledge, like Reagan having Iran hold American hostages until after he won the 1980 election and was inaugurated?
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Reagan didn't do shit. The Iranians held the hostages until the day of Reagan's inauguration just to spite Carter.
 
M

Machina

Banned
Nixon, Kissinger and the rest of their thug admin were the beginning of what we have today. They wrote the book for corrupt politics in America and partisan warfare and bloodletting at any cost.
 
M

Mr. Blonde

Member
the article only says he tried to sabotage them. it's debatable if Nixon had any effect on the outcome of the talks. it seems to me that he did not.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ar...nixon_for_scuttled_peace_overture_127667.html

Nixon did not sabotage a peace agreement in 1968 for one simple reason: There was no chance for peace in 1968 on any terms that would have been acceptable to any American president, be it Johnson, Nixon, or Humphrey.
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It is true Nixon's people urged Thieu to stand firm and resist Johnson's pressure to join the proposed talks in Paris. But that is because they saw Johnson's bombing halt not as a serious peace plan but as a cynical 11th-hour move to tip the election to Humphrey.
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Those contacts, while improper, were hardly treason and not much different than George McGovern secretly sending Pierre Salinger to Paris in 1972 to meet with Hanoi's negotiators at a time when Nixon and White House National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger were trying to negotiate an end to the war with Hanoi.

But even a cursory examination of the now declassified cables from U.S. Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker in Saigon throughout the middle of October and early November 1968 make clear Thieu and his advisers harbored deep reservations about Johnson's plant. As early as October 18, Bunker warned the State Department that Saigon's foreign minister made clear his government would not take part in the talks if they included the NLF ”as a separate entity."
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N

nampad

Member
Nixon was bad but even if there would have been a peace, it would have been a fragile one at best and the conflict probably would have started again after 1-2 years.
 
W

Wanace

Member
Electric Eye said:
Is actually correct. W. promised he would avenge a supposed attempt on his fathers life by Saddam and although the other neocons intentions were more about oil and money W's was purely revenge.
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No, it's not correct.

It's correct he wanted to avenge an attempt on his life, but that's not what the poster said, which is a humiliating defeat of his father.
 
I

Imperfected

Member
nampad said:
Nixon was bad but even if there would have been a peace, it would have been a fragile one at best and the conflict probably would have started again after 1-2 years.
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That doesn't really make a single bit of difference to how disgusting the intent was, though.

Like, if I try to launch a nuclear weapon to Russia in an attempt to kickstart a nuclear holocaust, but it turns out I'm a moron and thought Russia was in South America, that doesn't really change the fact that I'm an unconscionable monster.
 
B

Balphon

Member
I feel like this has been relatively common knowledge for some time, but I guess the proof is irrefutable now.
 
A

acheron_xl

Member
Bronx-Man said:
Vietnam is honestly one of the most fascinating periods of history to me. Easily the greatest foreign policy failure in American history.
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I think Bush's Iraq misadventure is far worse because of the repercussions. Vietnam was a clusterfuck, and much deadlier for American soldiers, but the long term effects from Iraq are much larger.

I can't wait to see what Trump does like this, considering he has every bit of Nixon's paranoia, with none of his wits.
 
A

A Link to the Past

Banned
acheron_xl said:
I think Bush's Iraq misadventure is far worse because of the repercussions. Vietnam was a clusterfuck, and much deadlier for American soldiers, but the long term effects from Iraq are much larger.

I can't wait to see what Trump does like this, considering he has every bit of Nixon's paranoia, with none of his wits.
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Seriously. Nixon was GLaDOS evil, Trump is Wheatley evil.

(sorry about video game references in a thread about a war crime)
 
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