Path to War Page #15

If McCarthy has a good showing

in New Hampshire,

I think Bobby'll throw his hat in.

But he can't beat you

if you're sitting at the peace table.

Peace table! Sell out South Vietnam.

This is your advice!?

If I could lay a plan to win

the war before...

I gotta go on TV in three weeks

and explain all this

to the American people!

Huh? And you're tellin me to cut

and run admit defeat that

for nothin !

That 20,000 American mothers weep

for nothin !

The situation has changed since Tet.

Yes, it has! Tet was a failure!

The enemy has failed to overrun us

and we are poised to win

and now it's only you and your people

who are advising against

the extra effort

it'll take to turn three years

of miserable war into victory!

And I'm telling you there is

no victory to be had!

Not without measures that'll tear

this country apart

and bring down this administration!

I told you to get out of

Vietnam three years ago

Lyndon when you...

What about two years ago, and one!

Hey? You shot down

every bombing pause,

backed every troop increase!

Don't you dare!

Mr. President,

my counsel has not deviated one whit!

My every word, then as now has been

informed solely by my commitment

to preserve your Presidency

and establish your place

in this country's history!

I shoulda cleaned house November 63,

got rid of all of

em, McNamara, Bundy, Connally,

wooin me those f***in Kennedy lovers

would be disloyal to me!

All of em!

They only advised you, Mr. President.

You decided.

Against all your natural instincts

against the whole of

your life experience... you decided.

Senator Eugene McCarthy,

dove of Vietnam,

who was virtually unknown to voters

of this state two months ago,

has finished in a virtual tie

with the sitting President of

the United States, Lyndon Johnson.

Since poles taken only a week ago,

predicted Johnson would win two-thirds

of the vote and McCarthy

only eleven percent,

the Senator's surprisingly

high turn-out

has shocked the country.

I run because

it is now unmistakably clear

that we can change these disastrous,

divisive policies only

by changing the men

who are now making them.

I run because I am convinced

that this country

is on a perilous course

and because

I have such strong feelings

about what must be done

and I feel that I am obliged

to do all that I can.

Oh, I was there,

I was there when you told your brother

to go into that place. I was there.

And now I'm payin for it day

after day after day while you

cut me to pieces!

There's blood on your hands,

you traitor!

...prolong that war.

Our troops are being killed

by the bullets and the mines

of the South.

If by ending the bombing of the North

we can bring peace to South Vietnam,

then we will save the lives

of thousands of our young men,

and thousands of Vietnamese.

Yes, Mr. President?

I talked to Mills.

He won't back a war surtax unless

we go on TV

and announce deep cuts.

I want you to go up there

and talk to everybody

at Ways and Means.

I'm meeting with five of them in

the morning, sir.

Take Ackley up with ya, to back up

the numbers,

cause they wont believe anything

outta the White House anymore.

That's a good idea. Anything else,

Mr. President?

I....

Are you all right, Mr. President?

Yeah, Joe, I'm all right.

Joe...Senator Kennedy's speech

who wrote it for him?

This guy Walinsky on his staff's

been writing a lot of his stuff.

I don't know, maybe Schlesinger,

Sorensen.

Goodwin?

I think he was involved... yes.

All right, Joe. Thanks.

Sir.

I could never again raise

my voice against

the violence of the oppressed

in the ghettos

without having

first spoken clearly to

the greatest purveyor of violence

in the world today

my own government.

Hey-hey-LBJ,

how many kids you kill today?

Hey-hey-LBJ,

how many kids you kill today?

Hey-hey-LBJ,

how many kids you kill today?

The largest antiwar demonstration

yet brought hundreds

of thousands of protesters into

the streets of American cities.

The radicals say that

since peaceful demonstrations

won't end the war,

they're ready to move

from protest to resistance.

With talk of full-scale rebellion

is sweeping the country from college

campus's to the inner cities

the mood is turning ugly

and there's a dangerous sense

that the Nation's political

is spinning out of control.

For it seems now more certain than

ever that the bloody

experience of Vietnam is to end

in a stalemate.

This summer's almost certain

stand-off

will either end in real give

and take negotiations

or terrible escalation.

But it is increasingly clear

to this reporter,

that the only rational way out

then will be to negotiate

not as victors

but as an honorable people

who lived up to their pledge

to defend democracy

and did the best they could.

This is Walter Cronkite, goodnight.

Well, say what you think.

All right.

It's tough. And effective.

But the music in it is sad

and sour to the ear.

And I don't know that any speechwriter

could have made it sing.

I got a hundred bills in committee

and they'll never see

the light of day.

But I think I could

pass a thousand bills

more education, more health care,

more rights but it wouldn't matter

cause it seems nothin I say,

no matter how I say

it could ever bring

this country together again.

Then perhaps eloquence of speech

is no longer the answer...

but eloquence of action.

Mr. Secretary...

Would you be kind enough

to make sure that the

President sees that this evening?

Clark?

Lady Bird

I promised

to have these budget figures

by the end of the day.

Oh, he's right inside.

No, no, I won't disturb him.

Thank you, goodnight.

Clark?

Uh, Clark. I've got the speech here.

I need your help with it.

You know that I'm at your service,

Mr. President.

I know, old friend.

Good evening, my fellow Americans.

Tonight,

I want to speak to you of peace

in Vietnam and Southeast Asia.

We are prepared to move immediately

towards peace

through negotiations.

We are reducing,

substantially reducing

the present level of hostilities

and we are doing so unilaterally,

and at once.

Tonight, I have ordered our aircraft

and our naval vessels

to make no more attacks

on North Vietnam

except in the area north

of the demilitarized zone

where the continuing

enemy buildup directly threatens

allied forward positions.

The area in which we are stopping

our attacks includes

almost 90%

of North Vietnam's population

and most of its territory.

Our purpose in this action is

to bring

about a reduction in the level

of violence that now exists.

It is to save the lives of brave men

and to save the lives of innocent

women and children.

Now, as in the past,

the United States is ready to send

its representatives,

in any forum, any time to discuss

the means of bringing

this ugly war to an end.

There is a division

in the American house now.

There is divisiveness among us

all tonight.

With America's sons

in the fields far away,

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