On Thu, 31 Aug 2017 06:16:49 -0700 (PDT), True North
wrote:

Just finished watching 'Last Days in Vietnam: American Experience" (first shown in 2014?) on PBS Maine.
Great that so many got out but watching those 410 left sitting in the Embassy Compound still hoping to be flown out..... heart wrenching.

To me, it seemed that the slowness of the American Ambassador to fully grasp the situation and refusal of Ford to do something to at least slow down the advance of the northern army contributed to the situation.
On the other hand, I suppose at least half of South Vietnam would have left if possible.

The VN war was a cluster **** from JFK on although JFK did want to
keep it small but he did take it away from the CIA and gave it to the
Green Berets and hence the US Army.
From then on, the escalations without a plan for winning, guided our
policy. George Carlin may have summed it up best. "Pull out, doesn't
seem manly to me" and we just kept throwing kids into a war we had no
plan of winning through LBJ and Nixon. Nixon did commit to a
withdrawal but Ford should get the credit for actually doing it.
No matter how it would happen, the last hours of any retreat are not
going to be pretty.