On November 17, 1970, U.S. Army Lt. William Calley went on court-martial trial for the My Lai Massacre during the Vietnam War. He was one of 14 officers charged for the crime. In March 1971, Lt. Calley was the only officer found guilty of murdering 22 villagers and was handed down a life sentence. He was also the only one of 26 men (officers and men) who was convicted. In August 1971, his sentence was reduced to twenty years. In September 1974, he was paroled by the U.S. Army after having served three and one-half years under house arrest in a military base.
The My Lai Massacre occurred on March 16, 1968 when a U.S. Army Company descended on the hamlets of My Lai and My Khe (located in Son My Village in Quang Ngai Province) and killed some 350 to 500 civilians (men, women, children, and infants). The incident has been described as “the most shocking episode of the Vietnam War”.
(Taken from Vietnam War – Wars of the 20th Century – Twenty Wars in Asia)
Before the Cambodian Campaign began, President Nixon had announced in a nationwide broadcast that he had committed U.S. ground troops to the operation. Within days, large demonstrations of up to 100,000 to 150,000 protesters broke out in the United States, with the unrest again centered in universities and colleges. On May 4, 1970, at Kent State University, Ohio, National Guardsmen opened fire on a crowd of protesters, killing four people and wounding eight others. This incident sparked even wider, increasingly militant and violent protests across the country. Anti-war sentiment already was intense in the United States following news reports in November 1969 of what became known as the My Lai Massacre, where U.S. troops on a search and destroy mission descended on My Lai and My Khe villages and killed between 347 and 504 civilians, including women and children.
American public outrage further was fueled when in June 1971, the New York Times began publishing the “Pentagon Papers” (officially titled: United States – Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense), a highly classified study by the U.S. Department of Defense that was leaked to the press. The Pentagon Papers showed that successive past administrations, including those of Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy, but especially of President Johnson, had many times misled the American people regarding U.S. involvement in Vietnam. President Nixon sought legal grounds to stop the document’s publication for national security reasons, but the U.S. Supreme Court subsequently decided in favor of the New York Times and publication continued, and which was also later taken up by the Washington Post and other newspapers.
As in Cambodia, the U.S. high command had long desired to launch an offensive into Laos to cut off the logistical portion of the Ho Chi Minh Trail system located there. But restrained by Laos’ official neutrality, the U.S. military instead carried out secret bombing campaigns in eastern Laos and intelligence gathering operations (the latter conducted by the top-secret Military Assistance Command, Vietnam – Studies and Observations Group, MACV-SOG that involved units from Special Forces, Navy SEALS, U.S. Marines, U.S. Air Force, and CIA) there.
The success of the Cambodian Campaign encouraged President Nixon to authorize a similar ground operation into Laos. But as U.S. Congress had prohibited American ground troops from entering Laos, South Vietnamese forces would launch the offensive into Laos with the objective of destroying the Ho Chi Minh Trail, with U.S. forces only playing a supporting role (and remaining within the confines of South Vietnam). The operation also would gauge the combat capability of the South Vietnamese Army in the ongoing Vietnamization program.
In February-March 1971, about 17,000 troops of the South Vietnamese Army, (some of whom were transported by U.S. helicopters in the largest air assault operation of the war), and supported by U.S. air and artillery firepower, launched Operation Lam Son 719 into southeastern Laos. At their furthest extent, the South Vietnamese seized and briefly held Tchepone village, a strategic logistical hub of the Ho Chi Minh Trail located 25 miles west of the South Vietnamese border. The main South Vietnamese column was stopped by heavy enemy resistance and poor road conditions at A Luoi, some 15 miles from the border. North Vietnamese forces, initially distracted by U.S. diversionary attacks elsewhere, soon assembled 50,000 troops against the South Vietnamese, and counterattacked. North Vietnamese artillery particularly was devastating, knocking out several South Vietnamese firebases, while intense anti-aircraft fire disrupted U.S. air transport operations. By early March 1971, the attack was called off, and with the North Vietnamese intensifying their artillery bombardment, the South Vietnamese withdrawal turned into a chaotic retreat and a desperate struggle for survival. The operation was a debacle, with the South Vietnamese losing up to 8,000 soldiers killed, 60% of their tanks, 50% of their armored carriers, and dozens of artillery pieces; North Vietnamese casualties were 2,000 killed. American planes were sent to destroy abandoned South Vietnamese armor, transports, and equipment to prevent their capture by the enemy. U.S. air losses were substantial: 84 planes destroyed and 430 damaged and 168 helicopters destroyed and 618 damaged.
Buoyed by this success, in March 1972, North Vietnam launched the Nguyen Hue Offensive (called the Easter Offensive in the West), its first full-scale offensive into South Vietnam, using 300,000 troops and 300 tanks and armored vehicles. By this time, South Vietnamese forces carried practically all of the fighting, as fewer than 10,000 U.S. troops remained in South Vietnam, and who were soon scheduled to leave. North Vietnamese forces advanced along three fronts. In the northern front, the North Vietnamese attacked through the DMZ, and captured the northern provinces, and threatened Hue and Da Nang. In late June 1972, a South Vietnamese counterattack, supported by U.S. air firepower, including B-52 bombers, recaptured most of the occupied territory, including Quang Tri, near the northern border. In the Central Highlands front, the North Vietnamese objective to advance right through to coastal Qui Nhon and split South Vietnam in two, failed to break through to Kontum and was pushed back. In the southern front, North Vietnamese forces that advanced from the Cambodian border took Tay Ninh and Loc Ninh, but were repulsed at An Loc because of strong South Vietnamese resistance and massive U.S. air firepower.
To further break up the North Vietnamese offensive, in April 1972, U.S. planes including B-52 bombers under Operation Freedom Train, launched bombing attacks mostly between the 17th and 19th parallels in North Vietnam, targeting military installations, air defense systems, power plants and industrial sites, supply depots, fuel storage facilities, and roads, bridges, and railroad tracks. In May 1972, the bombing attack was stepped up with Operation Linebacker, where American planes now attacked targets across North Vietnam. A few days earlier, U.S. planes air-dropped thousands of naval mines off the North Vietnamese coast, sealing off North Vietnam from sea traffic.
At the end of the Easter Offensive in October 1972, North Vietnamese losses included up to 130,000 soldiers killed, missing, or wounded and 700 tanks destroyed. However, North Vietnamese forces succeeded in capturing and holding about 50% of the territories of South Vietnam’s northern provinces of Quang Tri, Thua Thien, Quang Nam, and Quang Tin, as well as the western edges of II Corps and III Corps. But the immense destruction caused by U.S. bombing in North Vietnam forced the latter to agree to make concessions at the Paris peace talks.
At the height of North Vietnam’s Easter Offensive, the Cold War took a dramatic turn when in February 1972, President Nixon visited China and met with Chairman Mao Zedong. Then in May 1972, President Nixon also visited the Soviet Union and met with General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev and other Soviet leaders. A period of superpower détente followed. China and the Soviet Union, desiring to maintain their newly established friendly relations with the United States, aside from issuing diplomatic protests, were not overly provoked by the massive U.S. bombing of North Vietnam. Even then, the two communist powers stood by their North Vietnamese ally and continued to send large amounts of military support.