Word: westmorelands
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...Westmoreland's address was a sober, thoughtful review of the war. He offered no simplistic solutions. "I foresee, in the months ahead, some of the bitterest fighting of the war," he warned. In response to a question, he said that he did not see "any end of the war in sight. It's going to be a question of putting maximum pressure on the enemy anywhere and everywhere that we can. We will have to grind him down. In effect, we are fighting a war of attrition...
...this message was all but obscured by press and political reaction to four sentences in the speech. As 50 protesters picketed outside the Waldorf with signs reading HELL, NO, WE WON'T GO! and tried to burn him in effigy, Westmoreland confessed that his troops "are dismayed, and so am I, by recent unpatriotic acts here at home." He pointed out that the enemy hopes to "win politically that which he cannot accomplish militarily." Noting that North Viet Nam is waging war both on the battlefield and on the propaganda front, he said that the enemy "does not understand...
...Charlie McCarthy. Westmoreland was not urging that dissent be stifled. He was, to be sure, suggesting that some forms of protest might have a demoralizing effect on U.S. troops in Viet Nam and encourage Hanoi to prolong the war. Though that observation may have been politically risky, it was a legitimate expression of concern on the part of the U.S. commander in Viet Nam. Yet, judging from the reaction, he might just as well have called for a suspension of the Bill of Rights...
...Senate, the long-quiescent Democratic doves mounted a joint attack against Westmoreland and the Administration's recent moves aimed at hitting the North harder. "The new level of escalation marked by our bombing of the North Vietnamese airfields has brought us one step closer to World War III involving the limitless legions of China backed by the enormous firepower of Soviet Russia," declared South Dakota's George McGovern. "I do not intend to remain silent in the face of what I regard as a policy of madness which sooner or later will envelop my son and American youth...
Complaining that the Administration was "trying to silence its critics," McGovern patronizingly absolved Westmoreland of blame, "because he is obviously doing exactly what he is told to do by his Commander in Chief." Florida Democrat Spessard Holland, one of the few non-doves on the floor during McGovern's tirade, took exception to that remark. "The Senator from Florida," said Holland, "does not think that General Westmoreland is a Charlie McCarthy, to come over here and tell the people of this country what someone else wants them to hear...