IN HIS OWN WORDS

General Vo Nguyen Giap leading a council of war during the planning phase of the Dien Bien Phu campaign, 1953.


The most relevant statement I could find that is actually attributable to General Giap was uttered in a 1989 interview with Morley Safer, as excerpted in The Vietnam War: An Encyclopedia of Quotations by Howard Langer (Greenwood Press, 2005, p. 318):


"We paid a high price (during the Tet offensive) but so did you [Americans) . . . not only in lives and materiel . . . Do not forget the war was brought into the living rooms of the American people . . . The most important result of the Tet offensive was it made you de-escalate the bombing, and it brought you to the negotiation table. It was, therefore, a victory . . ."


The war was fought on many fronts. At that time the most important one was American public opinion.

. . . and that's about the last word I want to dedicate to the matter - we've already given more than enough free publicity to a guy whose uniform features red stars, sickles and hammers - S.L.



Friday Bird HERE


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