252 e lusive v ictories
the U.S. Senate, but not with determined revolutionaries. Th e only
way to persuade such a foe to negotiate the kind of peace Johnson
wanted would be to threaten to undo what the communists had already
accomplished in their part of Vietnam. Th e president, though, had
ruled out an invasion of the DRV and the threat of regime change and
refused to revisit the option. In the end, he left himself no way to
achieve his war goals unless Hanoi’s determination faltered. The
domestic response to the Tet Off ensive revealed the exhaustion of John-
son’s diplomatic quest. He would leave offi ce seeking talks on terms
closer to Hanoi’s minimal conditions than on those he had fi rst enun-
ciated at Johns Hopkins.
“Peace with Honor”: Nixon (Briefl y) Reclaims Flexibility
A president elected during an ongoing war, at least one that appears
stalled, stands to regain signifi cant freedom of action. Assuming that he
refrained from making fi rm commitments while seeking the White
House, he can pursue options not available to his predecessor. He is
also not weighed down with the psychological and political burden of
past choices. Eisenhower broke the Korean stalemate in part by threat-
ening publicly to unleash a massive bombing campaign. Vice president
at the time, Richard Nixon had witnessed this, and he had absorbed the
lesson. The window of opportunity for changing course, however,
opens only briefl y. Once the new president begins to make choices, the
wartime pattern resumes—his decisions draw him down an ever-
narrowing path.
Campaigning in 1968, Nixon made sure not to tie his hands on
Vietnam. He understood that the next president would have to end the
war, though he left open exactly how he might do so. As a candidate, he
promised to secure “peace with honor.” It was a clever political phrase
that ruled out only three possibilities an incoming president might have
considered. First, he could not continue Johnson’s course, which had
been an obvious failure. Second, he would not end the war immediately
through a unilateral American withdrawal or anything that looked too
much like defeat: “honor” was a code word for “no capitulation.”
Immediate unilateral withdrawal, in fact, was the one option removed
from a list of possible policies drafted during the transition period.