President Fears this Man

 By Mortz C. Ortigoza

How a President threatened by the pronouncement of a major TV anchor on the boobtube's screen and thought he could lose his reelection.

Walter Cronkite ( photo grabs from the internet)

Richard S. Salant , President of the powerful U S TV's CBS News in the late 1960's had a policy that his reporters assigned during the Vietnam War should report "as is" to the American households how the war, the battles, the senseless killings of civilians by American bombs and the guns of the Commie's Vietcongs and the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) ensue.

Salant did not want his reporters to "editorialized" (making side comments) on their reports.

But when the NVA simultaneously attacked the U.S Embassy and 39 other locations in South Vietnam in the famous Tet (New Year) Offensive to pierce and embarrass the invincible American armor painted by President Lyndon B. Johnson, his top military adviser Robert McNamara, and top Army General William Westmoreland, Salant sent Cronkite, his top gun at CBS, according to CBS renowned reporter Dan Rather who was already in that hell hole in Southeast Asia.

Cronkite, Rather added, had a very high trust rating among the Yanks in the mainland.

Upon his return to the States , Salant asked Cronkite to make an "editorial" of his coverages of the Tet battles where the province of Hue saw 200 US Marines, 400 South Vietnamese Army, and 5,100 NVA and Vietcongs dead, and 1,200 provincial officials, South Vietnam police, and high school students massacred by the communist on that 32 days of urban warfare -- similar to the Marawi Siege in the Philippines that President Rodrigo Duterte ordered to smithereens from the might of his state security.

In his commentary, Cronkite told his listeners that the long war in Vietnam participated by the almost a hundred U S military advisers in 1959 to the more than 549,500 young American soldiers in 1968 could not result into a U S victory but a stalemate despite the limitless fundings of Washington and the military juggernaut of the Pentagon against the Commies.

In that year alone Uncle Sam -- of course bankrolled by the U S taxpayers -- spent US$77.4 billion (US$ 699 billion in 2025) on the war.

"The only rational thing for this reporter was to negotiate (wth North Vietnam), not as a victor, as honorable men," the tall pipe chomping Cronkite said before the boobtube for all and sundry to hear.

Upon hearing what the top CBS top reporter opined, Johnson - an alumnus of a lowly Texas's college that taught bachelor in education, was anxious and saw the painting on the wall.

"If I lost Cronkite, I lost the middle class Americans (voters)," he lamented.

Remember dear readers that during that time there were already massive demonstration by the Yanquees against the Vietnam War that even iconic singer John Lennon and legendary heavyweight boxer champ Muhammad Ali joined. One of the famous chants there was: "Hey, hey LBJ (President Johnson's monicker) how many (Vietnamese) kids you killed today?!" as dozens of the giant long - range heavy bomber jets' B-52 Stratofortresses from Clark, Philippines and Guam mercilessly dropped their lethal munitions to villages there

The U.S withdrew in Vietnam in March 29, 1973 under U S President Richard Nixon. It marked a significant turning point in both American and Vietnamese history, culminating in the signing of peace accords.

Vietnam now is a fastest growing economy in the Asian Region that even eclipsed the Philippines in drawing foreign tourists whose dollars and Euro go to the public coffer in Hanoi.

My comments above were a spur of the moment while watching a documentary at Netflix's TURNING POINT: THE VIETNAM WAR at the wee hour of Thursday.