. >> professor richard faulkner teaches a class on the vietnam war, focusing on the tet offensive in 1968 through the u.s. withdraw in the early 1970's. he describes how military objectives, domestic politics, and public opinion changed because of the tet campaign. he talks about richard nixon's victory in the 1960 presidential

. >> next, on lectures in history, professor richard faulkner teaches a class on the vietnam war, focusingn the tet offensive in 1968 through the u.s. withdrawal in the early 1970's. he describes how military objectives, domestic politics, and public opinion changed because of the tet campaign. he talks about richard nixon's victory in the 1960 presidential election and how this resulted in a gradual removal of u.s. troops and a shift in responsibility to the south vietnamese government for fighting the war. this class is about one hour and 45 minutes. prof. faulker: ok, heroes. hey, last class -- again, this is the second part of our vietnam class. last class, we talked about the escalation and how the u.s. got into the ground war and how both sides escalated the conflict. today we will focus on the tet offensive, political results, the military results after the we get to the nixon administration, extradition, how we try to extradite ourselves from vietnam. let's start out where we left last time. we now have american ground troops in vietnam. william westmoreland is the commander on the

. >> professor richard faulkner teaches a class on the vietnam war, focusing on the tet offensive in 1968 through the u.s. withdraw in the early 1970's. he describes how military objectives, domestic politics, and public opinion changed because of the tet campaign. he talks about richard nixon's victory in the 1960 presidential election and how this resulted in a gradual removal of u.s. troops and a shift in responsibility to the south vietnamese government for fighting the war. this class is about one hour and 45 minutes. prof. faulker: ok, heroes. hey, last class -- again, this is the second part of our vietnam class. last class, we talked about the escalation and how the u.s. got into the ground war and how both sides escalated the conflict. today we will focus on the tet offensive, political results, and how we try to extradite ourselves from vietnam. let's start out where we left last time. we have american ground troops in vietnam. william westmoreland is the commander on the scene. what is your problem with westmoreland? >> you are facing threats, two different threats. prof.

faulkner: what do you know if your richard nixon when it comes to us? >> we needed to let the south vietnamese handle the business and put that face on it. prof. faulkner: any problem with that? >> it still will take a lot of thought to help them out. prof. faulkner: to think will take a lot of us? >> they still need some of our support, they need some of the resources in order to be successful. >> they would still have to face what west moreland face, -- west moreland face. prof. faulkner: ah. you still have a lot of very strong forces at play. what else? wewhat was said earlier, if took the front stage of defeating the forces much like we did in iraq and tried to put the face on it, they are not ready, they cannot hold their own. prof. faulkner: the president has some issues. nobody is agreeing to the way forward. the dod puts a happy face on says everything is terrible, i'm going to drown myself. you have everything in between. what they agree on is if these guys are going to take over the fight, they are not ready for it. what ultimately becomes nixo

faulkner: easy. how do you do that? >> if you are richard nixon, you want to bring something new when you get into position. you need to bring new strategies, new ideas, new things to implement so that you don't end up like lbj. prof. faulkner: a-ha. looking overhat your shoulder, if i don't do something, i will end up like lbj, a one-term president, and that would be bad. now, you have sort of hinted to the american people, or led the american people to believe during the campaign that you have a secret plan for ending the war. thus, if you elect me, i got a solution. the problem is -- >> [indiscernible] prof. faulkner: we don't have a solution, we need to come up with one quick. you know that you have an expiration date. , but now youbig have to find a way out of this mess. economics is driving it, politics is driving it, american society is driving it, and you need to find a solution. well, that is easy. what are the problems if you say to hell with it? we tried our best, we gave it our best shot, and now, the free society we need to pat