began in relationships to the war in vietnam. >> normally, for the previous week, a release on thursday. 340 americans and 527 south vietnamese were killed last week. enemy deaths were reported to be more than 5,0 0. >> there was some grumbling among numbers of young gis questioning whether the objective is worth the bloods d bloodshed. >> out here in this difficult war, i think this may have been one of america's finest hours. because we took a difficult task and we succeeded. you're doing your job and i'm going to show you we're going to try to do ours. >> nixon did not want to be the first president of the united states to lose a war.