[l](c)

JDD

J. D. Diffenbaugh, inc.

ENGINEERING, MECHANICAL
AND BUILDING CONTRACTOR

2375 CHICAGO AVENUE ☐ P.O. BOX 5436 ☐ RIVERSIDE, CALIFORNIA 92507 ☐ TELEPHONE (714) 684-2820

29 December 1972

Senator John V. Tunney
Senate Office Building
Washington, D. C. 20510

Dear John:

In the name of Humanity, I beg you to do everything in your power to stop this terrible, brutal bombing and killing in Vietnam. The agony and distress that this action is causing people here in the United States and all over the world, in addition to the unimaginable suffering of the Vietnamese people, is a loss greater than any possible gain in so called "honor" or prestige.

We cannot forge an honorable peace by dishonorable means. History certainly will not treat the most powerful nation in the world kindly who repeatedly bombs and destroys a small peasant nation, no matter what the self-righteous and/or paranoid reasons of its elected leader. Nor will history absolve any man from the responsibility or guilt if he does not stand up against this wanton crime to the fullest of his ability and energy.

I implore you in the name of Reason, Christianity, and Humanity to cutoff funds and take all other possible action within your power to stop this bombing and the bloody slaughter of human beings by the United States of America.

cc: (attached)

INDUSTRIAL PLANTS ☐

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SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY

THE MAXWELL SCHOOL OF CITIZENSHIP AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS | SYRACUSE, NEW YORK 13210

DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE

January 6, 1973

My dear Professor Kissinger:

I wish you well for the latest round of negotiations
with the representatives of the Democratic Republic of
Vietnam. This time bring home the bacon; no more war,
no more violence. Those of us who have followed the fate of
Indochina since 1940 are well aware of how satisfactory
are the October terms you negotiated, second best to the
1954 Geneva settlement, but a remarkable achievement indeed.
You personally have a great opportunity to vindicate yourself
in view of the terrible suspicions aroused by the events from
your "peace at hand" statement to the destruction of the
Hanoi hospital. Your own vindication is, it seems to me,
critical for the vindication of the entire academic world
which is encountering a terrible deepening of apathy and
cynicism among the young.

Professor Henry Kissinger
White House
Washington, D. C.

Departments: ANTHROPOLOGY • ECONOMICS • GEOGRAPHY • HISTORY • POLITICAL SCIENCE • SOCIOLOGY
Programs: EAST AFRICA • INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS • LATIN AMERICAN METROPOLITAN STUDIES • PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION
PUBLIC AFFAIRS • RUSSIAN STUDIES • SOCIAL SCIENCE • SOUTH ASIA

December 30, 1972

2028 Cedar Lake Blvd.,
Minneapolis, Minn. 55416
(Permanent address)

Sir:

You with your blonde at the Redskin-Packers game while the bombs launched by you and your monstrous commander-in-chief destroy thousands of innocent and helpless people make Nero with his fiddle look like an amiable clown by contrast. Granted, it can make no difference to your victims whether you are at home praying or dancing in the streets while they die, but one feels -- quite irrationally, to be sure -- that at the present time Nixon and you would prefer to confine your diversions to private settings. But of course, as I say, it is irrational to suppose that you feel any shame at your barbaric conduct.

I am an American citizen, and because of Nixon and you I am ashamed of it. I am a Harvard graduate, and because of you I am ashamed of that too. But who the hell cares about how I feel? What matters to all of us is that a pair of power-crazed men, utterly inhuman, and proud beyond imagining, are destroying the United States morally and intellectually just as surely as they are destroying Vietnam physically.

Well, enjoy your football. I do not believe that God, if He exists, intervenes in human affairs, yet I find myself believing again (again, no doubt, irrationally) that some kind of providence will punish you some day, perhaps with daylight nightmares that will make it impossible for you to enjoy football or anything else.

[LC]

HENRY C. GOPPELT

711 El Bosque Road
Santa Barbara, Calif. 93103

December 21, 1972

Dr. Henry Kissinger
The White House
Washington, D. C.

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

You and Nixon think you have all kinds of options
in Vietnam. Wrong. You have two. You can reduce
North Vietnam to a parking lot, so that not even a
bug is alive; or you can get out. Recent actions
indicate that Nixon is enamored of the first option,
but doesn't quite have the stamina to see it through,
although he is sorely tempted. As for the second
option, you and Nixon are constantly encrusting it
with innumerable conditions and stipulations, which
make it unworkable also.

Instead of a generation of peace, you and Nixon
will be remembered as the men who gave us a generation
of war, and had neither the sense nor the moral courage
to end an unspeakable tragedy.

December 22nd.

209 Archway Rd.,
London N.6.

Dear Mr Kissinger,

If you have any decent feelings, which I'm sure you have, then
you must be feeling terrible.

You've made a terrible mistake- that, I'm sure, you must admit
to yourself.

One way, in which you could stop the mass indiscriminate bombing,
would be to resign. Then Mr Nixon would lose all credibility, and
support for his bombing would finally vanish altogether.

Paradoxically, far from gathering opprobrium by the admission
of your error, people in their gratitude and relief would be
more inclined to overlook it or forgive it.

Certainly, the last thing to bind you to your policy-or silence-
and position- should be any feeling of loyalty to Mr Nixon. That
he does not deserve, and has no right to command.

MRS. ARTHUR F. GREER
BOX 6, ROUTE 1
MOUNT KISCO, NEW YORK 10549

January 2, 1973

Dr. Henry Kissinger
The White House
Washington, D.C., 20500

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

I urge you to bring all the pressure you
can on the President to put an end to the war
in Vietnam. But, most especially, I implore
you to see that the recent devastating bomb-
ing is not renewed.

## Race Went off the Rails

Kissinger got the impression that Thieu would accede, and so advised Nixon.

**OCT. 21.** Acting on that assurance, Nixon sent a message to Hanoi asserting that though a few matters needed clarification, "the text of the agreement could be considered complete" and an Oct. 31 signing seemed feasible. The plan was for a bombing and mining halt on Oct. 23; Kissinger would go to Hanoi on Oct. 24 to wrap up the loose ends in a final two-day negotiating session and initial the agreement. Formal signing would take place a week later in Paris.

**OCT. 23.** At the fifth and last meeting in Saigon, only Kissinger, U.S. Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker, Thieu and Nha were present. At last Thieu rendered judgment, and it was devastating. He violently denounced the nine-point plan. He insisted on a total withdrawal of North Vietnamese forces and the establishment of the DMZ as a political frontier. He cornered the proposed interim political body, the National Council of Reconciliation and Concord, as a coalition government in disguise.

Nixon, who was already beginning to worry that the Communists might be planning an offensive timed to begin just before the cease-fire, sent a second message to Hanoi. It said that the Oct. 31 signing was not possible because of difficulties in Saigon and asked for a new round of talks. The Hanoi trip was off; Kissinger, startled by the depth of Saigon's apprehensions, left for Washington in a somber mood, conceding to Thieu: "We go along with you."

**OCT. 24.** Taking his case to the Vietnamese people, Thieu went on TV to emphasize the sovereignty issue, which was to become the core of his objections to the plan. "North Viet Nam is North Viet Nam and South Viet Nam is South Viet Nam," he said. "For the time being one must accept the two Viet Nams, and neither side can invade the other."

**OCT. 25.** Apparently alarmed by Nixon's pullback from

Rural Route 3
North Manchester
Indiana 46962

January 7, 1973

President Richard M. Nixon
The White House
Washington D.C. 20500

Mr. President,

I cannot contain my frustrations with your childish acts and with the childish acts of other government officials during the recent bombings of North Vietnam.

I do not believe that the New Testament is the "universal truth", but I do believe it to be very close. Have you missed the essence of the New Testament? Okay, let us not base it on religion. Base it on Humanism. Have you not heard of Erasmus?

What good is life if we do not seek the truth and then live by it? There is a lot of truth floating around. America seems to be incapable of the perception of truth. Yet, our potential is so great, but truth is incompatible with the American Way so we turn our heads.

For God's sake take a look at yourselves, not as Americans, but as members of the community of man. As long as America follows her present course I hope to never earn enough money to pay taxes. I shall never be proud to say that I was born in America.

Give up your childish ways, please . . .

With deeply ingrained frustration,

cc. Henry Kissinger
Elliot Richardson
William Rogers
Birch Bayh
Vance Hartke
William Fulbright

126 Joralemon Street
Brooklyn, New York 11201

January 6, 1973

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
Assistant to the President
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

Out of desperation I write to you, knowing that your position as one
of the President's most respected advisors offers you a unique oppor-
tunity to shape our nation's policies. I implore you to recognize that
there is nothing worth defending in South Vietnam that justifies the
wanton slaughter our bombers have committed. And the good name we are
losing in the eyes of the civilized world is infinitely more precious.

We are in this world as members of a human community. When our interests
collide, outbreaks of hostility must be expected. But their resolution
must involve some decent respect for our common humanity, not a resort
to the primitive doctrine that might makes right.

If our country was so close to the achievement of a formula for peace
in October, surely we can return to the spirit of that moment, stop the
folly of a further build up in the number of dead and prisoners of war,
and "go the extra mile" that is the mark of enlightened leadership.

I can scarcely convey to you how deeply the prolongation of our involve-
ment in Vietnam tortures the conscience of myself and so many of the
people I speak to, patriotic citizens who care deeply about our country's
role in the world.

Erich Hyman

2722 North Pine Grove Ave.
Chicago, Illinois 60614

December 24, 1972.

Dr. Henry Kissinger
White House
Washington, D.C.

Dear Dr. Kissinger,

Having the same background as you have, I quite naturally should like to be very proud of you. Until recently I was. Now I am ashamed and appalled. The beautiful dream of "Peace at Hand" has turned into a nightmare.

The President's attempt to bomb our adversary into submission with a brutality and savagery unequalled in the annals of civilized history is unworthy of a great power and repulsive to any human being who has retained even a trace of compassion.

Thousands of innocent people who have not seen peace for a generation are being killed and the lives of countless Americans are being sacrificed or at least jeopardized. Not to speak of the revulsion that has gripped the civilized world and the harm it does to our morality.

Although I cannot conceive of a more dishonorable action, all this is done to achieve "Peace with Honor". I am fully aware of the fact that this letter will in all probability wind up in the waste basket. Nevertheless my conscience will not permit me to sit idly by without at least writing this letter.

And so I implore you in the name of humanity to use your considerable influence to stop this slaughter. If even you cannot persuade the President to end his indiscriminating bombing and massmurder, there is only one honorable way left - your resignation, since I cannot believe, in view of our mutual cultural heritage, that you acquiesce.

I fervently hope that my plea will not be in vain.

[10]

RICHARD D. JACHNEY

102 BELLEVUE ROAD
SWAMPSCOTT, MASS. 01907

January 3, 1973

Dr. Henry Kissinger
Aide to President Nixon
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.C.

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

We wish to register by this letter our horror at the
continued massive bombing below the 20th parallel in
Viet Nam.

The United States and Viet Nam were so close to peace
at the time of your announcement last October that
we find the bombing impossible to believe and with
no justification.

We are heartily in favor of immediate cessation of
the bombing of North Viet Nam.

We are also very much in favor of renewed public
appearances by the President in the form of question
and answer press conferences and television statements,
as well as his appearance in front of Congress for an
explanation of the reasons for the Decmeber renewal
of intensive bombing.

We pray for peace.

EMBOSOGRAPH DISPLAY MFG. CO.

EMBOSOGRAPH BUILDING • CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60614 • 312 GRACELAND 2-6660

January 11, 1973

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

This letter is most likely a waste of time, both yours and mine, but please accept it as an indication of my concern over the situation in Viet-Nam.

It is my opinion that our current approach to the situation can only serve to force North Viet-Nam into a position where it will commit desperate actions for its survival.

Outside of that, it is my feeling that we are losing more in America than we gaining in Viet Nam as a result of our saturation bombing, and which must appear to many people as an indication of our ruthless attitude toward human life outside our own country.

EJ:gh

MRS. FRANK H. JOHNSON
115 CENTRAL PARK WEST
NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10023

22 Dec.

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

Can't you stop the President from this ghastly bombing? Surely this is not the road to peace.

I protest. I protest. As an ordinary American citizen, feeling helpless while her beloved country engages in this Guernica-like madness, I weep and I protest.

December 29, 1972

Dr. Henry Kissinger
The White House
Washington, D. C. 20500

Dear Sir:

On October 26 you told the nation that "Peace is at hand." Were you, as does Mr. Nixon, deceiving the people?

It is difficult to believe, but all actions following
your statement indicate a definite determination on the
part of Mr. Nixon to have "Peace with honor", that is, a
military victory.

Dr. Kissinger, it is too late for our great country to
talk about honor in the conduct of this genocidal war.
The great imperative is to end the war now, without further
equivocations.

The president is taking upon himself powers the consti-
tution does not grant him, such as the news blackout, and
the conduct of the war without consulting congress.

What is happening to our vaunted freedoms? This terrible,
dirty war is causing most of the evils rampant in our
nation. Our young people are destroying their lives with
drugs. There is an increase in crime, inflation, higher
and higher prices and taxes, unemployment and a general
disruption of our economy.

This criminal, savage war must end, and the people believe
you can influence the mad bomber to abandon his ambition
for glory and will instead go down in history as the
"emperor" of the world.

End the war now!

Mrs. May G. Johnson
9036 Luna Avenue
Morton Grove, Illinois 60053