Vietnamization

are lifting the arms embargo.

This is not a Vietnamization program.

The Vietnamese in South Vietnam weren't sure where they wanted to be, north or south.

That's why it never worked.

Confidence and morale in the South Vietnamese Army has been greatly bolstered.

This operation has clearly demonstrated that our Vietnamization program is succeeding.

And third, we have ensured the continuance and success of our troop withdrawal program.

On April twenty, I announced an additional one hundred and fifty thousand Americans will be home within a year.

The 17 million people of South Vietnam have the right to choose their own government without outside interference.

And because of our program of Vietnamization, they have the strength to defend that right.

We have prevented the imposition of a communist government by force on South Vietnam.

But President Nixon speaks too soon.

NGOs are bringing down our wonderful nation."

You know, you, you, you, you made a good point about Conrad on the Catholic issue, but, and you've made it before about he's also a revisionist about Nixon, and trying to show people that when you look at opening up China or, uh, trying to have a missile treaty with Russia to eliminate the vast arsenal somewhat, or Vietnamization, getting out of Vietnam, and we were out until pretty much with a s- with a viable Vietnam until Watergate, and they cut off air support.

But he did a lot of very good things, and Conrad's been very eloquent in, you know, reminding people about that.

And so, um, he, he's a-

And finally, negotiations to extract concessions from Hanoi.

Now, this strategy was based on Kissinger's underestimation of Hanoi's determination when he said, quote, "I can't believe that a fourth-rate power like North Vietnam doesn't have a breaking point." As millions of anti-war protesters filled the nation's streets in the fall of nineteen sixty-nine, President Nixon devised his so-called Vietnamization strategy of replacing US combat forces on the battlefield with South Vietnamese soldiers, thereby reducing the high casualties that were sparking massive protests, and Nixon was doing this to buy time for a negotiated settlement.

So while US troops were drawing down, Nixon tried to buy time for South Vietnam, uh, by disrupting the Ho Chi Minh Trail's supply route from North Vietnam through Laos into South Vietnam.

First, by attacking communist sanctuaries inside Cambodia in early nineteen sixty-nine, and next by sending ARVN into Laos in nineteen seventy-one.

That is, they might make a deal.

But would they keep it? And would they just try to wait me out? Or should we just singe them? But of course, that would involve what I like to call Vietnamization.

we would have to send in.

That didn't work out as well as actually we had hoped.