Truman ignored letter after letter from Ho Chi Minh asking for help. He then financed the French with arms and tactical support to fight the guerrillas. Congress knew nothing.
Eisenhower agreed to split Vietnam in two, helped to install a hopelessly corrupt regime in the South, rig elections, and then send the first U.S. advisers to support it. Congress was in the dark.
Kennedy made plans for our large scale involvement as early as 1961. He authorized the overthrow of President Diem's regime, and sat by while Diem was assassinated in the streets of Saigon.
And then came Johnson, who used the attack in the Gulf of Tonkin which, according to these documents never even took place, to get us into the war without a formal declaration from congress.
The experience of reading those pages altered my anatomy. With each word my faith, my trust, and my allegiance burned away.
Eisenhower agreed to split Vietnam in two, helped to install a hopelessly corrupt regime in the South, rig elections, and then send the first U.S. advisers to support it. Congress was in the dark.
Kennedy made plans for our large scale involvement as early as 1961. He authorized the overthrow of President Diem's regime, and sat by while Diem was assassinated in the streets of Saigon.
And then came Johnson, who used the attack in the Gulf of Tonkin which, according to these documents never even took place, to get us into the war without a formal declaration from congress.
The experience of reading those pages altered my anatomy. With each word my faith, my trust, and my allegiance burned away.
from: The Pentagon Papers
(2003)
(2003)James Spader acted as Daniel Ellsberg
This quote is a voiceover from the 2003 film: "The Pentagon Papers." The Pentagon Papers were top-secret United States Department of Defense documents that described the United States involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967. The film portrays the events that led Daniel Ellsberg to leak these documents to the New York Times in 1971.
Daniel Ellsberg
James Spader
The Pentagon Papers
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