A LOST CHANCE FOR PEACE IN VIETNAM?

Fifty years after the fall of Saigon, remembering an episode that might have ended the war a decade earlier

Apr 30, 2025

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Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson meets with Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem at Independence Palace in Saigon in May, 1961. / Photo by PhotoQuest/Getty Images.

Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the fall of Saigon, so it’s worth recalling a fleeting moment in the fall of 1963 when a rapprochement seemed possible between North and South Vietnam. Th…

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