75-07-A1
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Indochina # 1
TranscriptShould baseball players be the only ones judged on their batting average? I'll be right back. We're being treated to a barrage of column and commentary ridiculing those who urge aid to South Vietnam because failure to support an ally would have a domino effect on other allies. Elsewhere James Reston of the New York Times a week before easter discounted the domino theory as having no validity; He says the two small Asian nations can have no bearing on the real international problems confronting us he says "the Domino Theory is almost as obsolete as the game of dominoes itself." Strange that so many members of the press who insist that every statement ever made by an office holder be brought forth whenever they think he's guilty of inconsistency have never thought of making the record public where their own pontifications are concerned. These men and women write with presumed authority on any and all subjects and influence public thinking to a great degree but would their influence be so great if like ball players their updated batting averages were published with their columns and editorials. Those familiar voices we hear telling us after a Presidential address what it was we really heard those who told us Castro was no communist, Ho Chi Minh was another George Washington and Mao Zedong and the Red Chinese were just agrarian reformers never remind us of how often their pronouncements were wrong. For example a few years ago President Nixon made the hard decision to mine Haiphong Harbor and stop the flow of ammunition from Russia to the North Vietnamese. He made it on the very eve of the summit meeting in Moscow. All arrangements had been made for the trip and most of the better known news analysts who had accompanied him to Peking were all packed for the trip to Russia. His announcement of the action he planned against an enemy who'd been killing American fighting men for several years stunned these analysts and brought from them a flood of criticism. Eric Severide: "I would suspect that the summit will not come off."-that was the mildest although it was delivered with an arched eyebrow. Charles Collingwood: "Certainly the Moscow summit meeting from which so much had been expected is now in jeopardy." Marvin Kalb: "One casualty of the president's mining and blockade may well be his upcoming summit to Moscow. Those who began packing and dreaming of caviar are beginning to unpack and are returning to dry cereal." Well that was cuter than the bare announcements of John Chancellor: "The summit is in jeopardy today." then there was Richard Valeriani's shocked question: "How can they receive him now." Well Ted Koppel answered him: "I don't see how he can go." Edward Stevens said: "The president's announcement will be pretty hard for them to swallow. It practically killed the prospects of a summit." So spoke the great modern day pundits most of whom then dutifully accompanied the President to Moscow a few days later to report on the very successful summit which all agreed did much to lessen world tensions. To my knowledge none has ever acknowledged the President had been right and they were wrong nor have they given credit to the mining and the bombing of Hanoi for finally bringing an end to our participation in the war and the freeing of our prisoners. Ironically the Russians were so afraid the President wouldn't come that Henry Kissinger at their invitation was already in Moscow to calm their fears and assure them he would really be there. Tomorrow I'll get back to the domino theory and whether it's real or imaginary. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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