Hi Everyone, I'm That President Guy, and I'm Here to Talk to You About Vietnam
- Nixon starts off the speech by telling the country that they "need to talk."
- And it ain't good—the subject of "the talk" is Vietnam.
- Nixon acknowledges that Vietnam is, at this stage of the conflict, pretty much a dirty word.
- In other words, Nixon knows there's a problem with Vietnam, and he's telling the country that he's here to clear the air, answer some questions, and give some seriously good answers to those questions.
- Nixon asks a number of questions—but these are the three most important.
- First question: why is the United States even in Vietnam?
- Second question: what has Nixon done about this whole Vietnam situation?
- Third question: how do we get out without embarrassing ourselves?
Whose Fault Is It? Well, It's Definitely Not Mine.
- Before he gets into answering these questions, Nixon tells those watching that he inherited one hot mess when he came into office, but he's working his pants off to fix it.
- He wants everyone to know that the war started way before he got into office. Like way before.
- He also wants everyone to know that those who hate the war hated it well before he got into office. IOW, the haters were hating before he even showed up.
- Now, Nixon points out, he could've just ended the war to appease all those haters. But, you know, haters gonna hate.
- But, Nixon acknowledges, even the haters want peace. Everyone wants peace.
- So, to answer the first question, Nixon claims that communists in North Vietnam started the war.
- Americans just tried to help out the South, according to Nixon. President Eisenhower sent money and guns to help. President John F. Kennedy sent some seriously smart military peeps to help out. Then President Lyndon B. Johnson sent the troops.
- Nixon wants to be clear here. He did not support Johnson's plan; he's just dealing with the mess.