The Nixon Administration: 1969-1972

Nixon and his national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, followed a complex strategy for ending the Vietnam War:

(1) attempt to bluff the NVN into believing Nixon was capable of using nuclear weapons
(2) Slow but steady withdrawal of U.S. forces begins in November 1969
(3) Massive efforts to increase the military capabilities of the GVN and turn the war over to them - Vietnamization
(4) pressure the GVN to make an accommodation with the NLF
(5) Insert the U.S. into the conflict between the Soviets and the Chinese and use that leverage to put pressure on NVN - Chinese have traditional interest in keeping Vietnam divided and weak; to avoid isolation, Soviets pressure NVN to accept U.S. terms
(6) Rapid but short escalations of the war to punish the NVN: Cambodia invasion (April 1970); mining of Haiphong harbor in May 1972; Christmas bombing (December 1972)

Nixon and Kissinger's most important goal was to extricate the U.S. from Vietnam while minimizing or even increasing the credibility of U.S. power

Some argue that Kissinger saw the weakness of GVN and wanted a "decent interval" between U.S. withdrawal and eventual communist victory

The expansion of the war on a large scale to Cambodia (NVN had used Cambodian sanctuaries from the beginning) resulted in a big strengthening of Khmer Rouge and eventual victory in 1975