government has followed, the policies its followed, the objectives its had in vietnam are wise. i don't, by any means, suggest that we haven't made mistakes over the many, many years that we have been pursuing those objectives. >> you seem to say none of us really appreciated what we were getting into. >> i don't think any of us predicted seven years ago or 15 years ago the deployment of 50,000 men to vietnam. i know i didn't. >> general william westmoreland requested an additional 206,000 troops from lyndon johnson, and that request was denied as they reassessed the policy in an effort to deescalate the war. still, the last u.s. military unit would not leave vietnam until march of 1973. all told, the u.s. lost more than 58,000 troops during the war. we'll talk more about the parallels between vietnam and afghanistan and hear from bob