The American newspaper The New York Times publishes an article, which presents data on the plans of the United States to obtain strategic advantage during the Vietnam War. The American military command was looking for opportunities to achieve a quick victory over the socialist North and believed, that all means are good for this.
One of these means was seen as nuclear weapons.
The New York Times пишет, what in 1968 year, General William Childs Westmoreland, who at that time commanded the American military contingent in South Vietnam, made a proposal to transfer nuclear weapons to Vietnam for the purpose of their further use against the “northerners”. Westmoreland noted, that the use of nuclear weapons against the forces of North Vietnam will protect the US military contingent and at the same time help prevent the victory of the “communist North”.
About three years before this proposal, the American military leader was recognized by Time magazine as Person of the Year..
General Westmoreland is also famous for, that he proposed to the American military command to support the initiative for a military invasion of Laos. This man explained his proposal by the need to block the “Ho Chi Minh Trail”.
General Westmoreland proposed calling the operation to place nuclear weapons in Vietnam with the subsequent use of nuclear weapons Fracture Jaw ("Jaw fracture").
The NYT article states, that the Pentagon has already begun preparations to transfer nuclear bombs to Vietnam, but the then American President Lyndon Johnson categorically rejected the idea of such an operation.
In the summer 1968 году генерала Уэстморленда отозвали с поста командующего американскими войсками во Вьетнаме.
reference: Война во Вьетнаме стала самым кровопролитным конфликтом второй половины XX века. И сегодня нет точных данных об общем числе погибших. Большинство историков представляют такие цифры: no less 1,2 млн погибших с обеих сторон, причём большинство из них с вьетнамской стороны – мирные жители, ставшие жертвами военных преступлений американской армии. И за эти преступления ни один из американских военачальников так и не понёс заслуженного наказания.
