On April 26, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at an unknown time between 7:37 pm and 8:20 pm. The Old Executive Office Building taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 333-043 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
During the past three weeks, you have been reading and hearing about the massive invasion of South Vietnam by the Communist armies of North Vietnam.
Tonight, I want to give you a first-hand report on the military situation in Vietnam, the decisions I have made with regard to the role of the United States in the conflict, and the efforts we are making to bring peace to the negotiating table.
Let me begin by briefly reviewing what the situation was in my first office, what we have done since then to end American involvement in the war,
to bring peace to the long-suffering people of Southeast Asia.
On January 29, 1969, the American crew sailing in Vietnam was 549,000.
Our casualties were running as high as 300 a week.
30,000 Americans were being drafted every month.
Today, 39 months later, through our program of Vietnamization, helping the South Vietnamese develop the capability of defending themselves, the number of Americans in Vietnam by Monday, May 1,
will have been reduced to 69,000.
Our casualties even greater than the present all-out enemy events have been reduced by 95%.
Draft calls now average fewer than 5,000 a month, and we expect to bring them to zero next year.
As I reported in my television address to the nation on January 25, we have offered the most generous peace terms in both public and private negotiating sessions.
Our most recent proposal provided for an immediate ceasefire, the exchange of all prisoners of war
to withdraw all of our forces within six months, and new elections in Vietnam, which would be internationally supervised with all political elements, including the Communists, participating in and helping to run the elections.
One month before such elections, President Nhu and Vice President Wong would resign.
Hanoi's answer to this offer was a refusal even to discuss our proposals, and at the same time, a huge escalation of their military affiliates on the battlefield.
Last October, the same month when we made this peace offer to Hanoi and Zika, our intelligence reports began to indicate that the enemy was building up for a major attack.
Yet we deliberately refrained from responding militarily.
Instead, we patiently continued with the Paris promise, because we wanted to give the enemy every chance to reach an unnegotiated settlement and fire at the people, rather than to seek a military victory in the battlefield of a three-week war, which they cannot be allowed to win.
rather than seek a military victory, a battlefield of victory, they cannot be allowed to win.
Finally, three weeks ago, on Easter weekend, they modeled their massive invasion of South Vietnam.
Three North Vietnamese divisions swept across the demilitarized zone into South Vietnam in violation of the treaties they had signed in 1954, and in violation of the understanding they had reached with President Johnson in 1968, when he stopped the bombing of North Vietnam and returned for arrangements which included their pledge
not to violate the demilitarized zone.
Shortly after the invasion across the DMZ, another three North Vietnamese divisions invaded South Vietnam further south.
As the offensive progressed, the enemy indiscriminately shoved civilian population centers in clear violation of the 1968 bombing, all understand.
The facts are clear.
More than 120,000 North Vietnamese are now fighting in South Vietnam.
There are no South Vietnamese fighting any place in North Vietnam.
Twelve of North Vietnam's thirteen regular combat divisions have now left their own soil in order to carry aggressive war into the territory of their neighbors.
Whatever pretext there was of a civil war, South Vietnam has no answer to it.
What we are witnessing here, what is being brutally inflicted upon the people of South Vietnam, is a clear case of naked and unprovoked aggression across an international border.
There is only one word for it, invasion.
This attack has been resisted in the ground, targeted by South Vietnamese forces.
No United States ground troops have been hit, gone, none will be involved.
To support this defensive effort for the South Vietnamese, I have ordered attacks on enemy military targets in both North and South Vietnam by the air and naval forces of the United States.
I have before me a report.
A report which I have received, I have it on my desk.
My desk.
I have here at my desk a report.
I received this report this morning from General Abrams.
He gives the following evaluation of the situation.
The South Vietnamese are fighting courageously and well in their self-defense.
They are inflicting very heavy casualties on the invading force, which has not gained easy victories unpredicted more than three years ago.
Our airstrikes have been essential.
in protecting our own remaining forces, and in assisting the South Vietnamese in their efforts to protect their homes and their country from a communist state.
General Abrams predicts that there will be several more weeks of very hard fighting, in which some battles will be lost and some will be won by the South Vietnamese.
But he is convinced that if we continue to provide air and sea support, the enemy will fail in its desperate gamble to impose a communist regime on South Vietnam.
and that the South Vietnamese will then have demonstrated their ability to defend themselves on the ground against future enemy attacks.
Based on this realistic assessment from Colonel Abrams, and after consultation with President Chu, Ambassador Bunker, Ambassador Porter, and my senior advisors in Washington, I have three decisions to announce tonight.
First, I have decided that the Vietnamization has proved itself sufficient that we can continue our program.
and withdrawing American forces without detriment to our overall goal of ensuring South Vietnamese, South Vietnam survival, and an independent country.
Consequently, I have announced that tonight, and over the next two months, 20,000 more Americans will be brought home to Vietnam.
This decision is the full approval of President Kieu and General Lee.
It will bring our coup ceiling down to 49,000 by July 1st, a reduction of half a million, and this is since a time
that the Citizens' Administration can do on its own.
Second, I directed Ambassador Porter to return to negotiate a table with Paris tomorrow, but with one very specific purpose in mind.
We are not resuming the Paris talks simply in order to hear more empty propaganda and bombastic monarchy in the media via condolences, but to get on with the constructive business of making peace.
We are resuming the Paris talks with the firm expectation
that productive talks leading to rapid progress will follow through all available channels.
As far as we are concerned, the first order of business will be to get the United States to halt its invasion of South Vietnam and to return the American prisoners of war.
Finally, I order that our air and naval attacks on military installations in North Vietnam be continued until the North Vietnamese stop their offensive in South Vietnam.
I am flatly rejected the proposal
that we stopped the bombing of North Vietnam as a condition for returning to the negotiating table.
They sold that package to the United States once before in 1968, and we're not going to buy it again in 1972.
Now let's look at the record.
On July 1, we will have drawn over 90% of our forces from Vietnam in 1969.
Before the enemy's invasion began, we had cut our air service in half.
We have already exceedingly generous peace terms.
The only thing
that we refuse to do is to exceed the enemy's demand to overthrow the lawfully constituted government of South Vietnam and to impose a communistic leadership against us.
As you will recall, I have warned on a number of occasions in the past three years that if the enemy responded to our efforts to bring peace by stepping up the war, I would act to meet that attack for three reasons.
To protect our remaining American forces,
to prevent continuation of our withdrawal, and to prevent the imposition of a communist regime on the people of South Vietnam against their will, with the inevitable bloodbath that would fall for hundreds of thousands who have dared to oppose communist aggression.
The air-table strikes of recent weeks have been carried out to achieve these objectives.
They have been directed only against military targets to support the evasion of South Vietnam,
and they will not stop until that invasion starts.
Communists have bailed in their efforts to win over the people of South Vietnam politically.
General Edelman believes that they will bail in their efforts to conquer South Vietnam militarily.
Their one remaining hope is to win in the Congress of the United States and among the people of the United States the victory they cannot win among the people of South Vietnam and on the battlefield of South Vietnam.
The great question then is how we, the American people,
will respond to that challenge.
Let us look above the space, not just for South Vietnam, but for the United States, because of peace of work.
If one country, armed with the most modern weapons by the major powers, can invade another nation and succeed in conquering it, other countries will be encouraged to do exactly the same thing, in the Middle East, in Europe, and in other international danger zones.
If, on the other hand, communist aggression fails in Vietnam,
it will be discouraged elsewhere, and the chances for peace will be increased.
If the Communists win militarily in Vietnam, the risk of war in other parts of the world will be in our pursuit increased.
If, on the other hand, Communists regress in Vegas in Vietnam, it will be discouraged elsewhere, and the chances for peace will be increased.
Vietnam is not Vietnam, or any other country.
We want no territory.
We seek no bases.
We have offered the most generous peace terms, peace with honor for both sides, to South Vietnam and North Vietnam, each respecting the other's independence.
But we will not be defeated, and we will never surrender our friends to the communist aggression.
We have come a long way in this conflict.
The South Vietnamese have made great progress and are now bringing the drug barrier to the front of the battle.
We can now see the day when no more Americans will be involved there at all.
But as we come to the end of this long and difficult struggle, we must be steadfast and we must not falter.
All that we have risked and all that we have gained over the years now hangs in the balance during the coming weeks and months.
If we now let down our friends, we shall surely be letting down ourselves and our future as well.
If we now resist, future generations will thank our courage and wisdom for her courage and her faith in this day and age.
and we know that future generations will thank America for her courage and her vision at this time in history.
That is why I say, let us bring our men home to Vietnam.
Let us end the war in Vietnam.
And let us end it in such a way that the younger brothers and sons of the brave men who have fought in Vietnam do not have to fight in some other Vietnam that's on the island of Vietnam.
Any man who sits here is awesome.
feels a profound sense of obligation to future generations.
No man who sits here has the right to take any action which would advocate America's great tradition of world peace.
Earlier this year, I traveled to New Guinea on a historic journey for peace.
Next month, I shall travel to Moscow on what I hope will also be a journey for peace.
In the 18 countries I have visited as President of the United States, I have found great respect for the lives of the President of the United States.
I have reason to expect that Dr. Dixon should report that I shall find that same respect for the office I hold when I visit Moscow.
I do not know who will be in his office in a year's time, but I do know that future presidents will travel the nations abroad on journeys to peace in Miami.
If the United States betrays the opinions of people who have relied on us in Vietnam, the President of the United States, whoever he is, will not deserve, nor receive,
which is essential if the United States is to play the great role we are destined to play in helping to build a new structure of peace in the world.
It would amount to a renunciation of our morality, an abdication of our leadership of our nations, and an invitation for the mighty to prey upon the weak all around the world.
It would mean to deny peace the chance peace deserves to have.
This we shall never do.
My fellow learners,
Let us therefore unite as an nation, and affirm and wise policy of peace.
Not the peace of surrender, but the peace of honor.
Not only peace in our country, but peace for generations to come.