Word: grim
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Deceptive as that signal might yet prove to be, it relieved the grim tension that had enveloped Washington. For the moment, at least, a showdown between the two superpowers had been averted. Not since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 had the possibility of armed conflict between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. loomed so large. This time the arena of conflict was half a world away in the Gulf of Tonkin, rather than 90 miles from the U.S. mainland, and this time, fortunately, there was no deadline ultimatum requiring immediate response. The feeling that the worst was past was reinforced...
...grim mood in Washington thus centered upon the military options open to the President. For a leader bent on pulling out his forces, Nixon was still talking pugnaciously. At a political outing on Treasury Secretary John Connally's Texas ranch (see page 15), Nixon warned: "The North Vietnamese are taking a very great risk if they continue their offensive in the South." There seemed little doubt that the offensive would continue and that the military choices up to Nixon are limited-and dangerous. Among them...
...South China Sea. With its sizable population and its symbolic importance as the seat of the 19th century Vietnamese empire. Hué is coveted by the Communists as the putative site for an insurgent government with national pretensions. For President Thieu, the loss of the city would have grim consequences both in Paris and at home. Coming on top of ARVN's other recent reverses, a major setback at Hué could precipitate a rapid collapse of army and civilian morale, and might even lead to the fall of his regime...
...suggest that infinitely more suffering has been inflicted--and continues to be inflicted today--on people in both Vietnams and in Laos and Cambodia by our intervention than would have occurred if we hadn't interveneo. Those who have warned for years of the impending "bloodbath" must face the grim reality of the daily bloodbath we have imposed on Indochina. Here, indeed, is one of the most striking cases in modern history of a cure far worse than the disease...
Faced with that grim prospect, Nixon went on TV to talk tough. "All that we have risked and all that we have gained over the years now hangs in the balance," he said. "We will not be defeated and we will never surrender our friends to Communist aggression." He repeated the familiar threat that "a bloodbath" would follow if North Viet Nam took over in Saigon. He reiterated a theme employed by every Administration that has been involved in the war: "If one country armed with the most modern weapons can invade another nation and succeed in conquering it, other...