Zilch Memo
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Zilch Memo
The Zilch memo was an American government document sent by National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger to President Richard Nixon on January 3, 1972, about the military situation in Laos during the Vietnam War. On the memo, in his own handwriting, Nixon described the decade-long bombing campaign by the United States in Southeast Asia as a "failure", having achieved "zilch", despite public comments to the contrary. Just the day before, January 2, Nixon told CBS News reporter Dan Rather in an interview that the bombing was "very, very effective". Previously missing from the Richard Nixon Library, the memo was discovered in the possession of Alexander Butterfield, who served as the Deputy Assistant to President Nixon from 1969 to 1973, by ''Washington Post'' reporter Bob Woodward Robert Upshur Woodward (born March 26, 1943) is an American investigative journalist. He started working for '' The Washington Post'' as a reporter in 1971 and now holds the title of associate editor. ...
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Zilch Memo (Richard Nixon Library)
The Zilch memo was an American government document sent by National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger to President Richard Nixon on January 3, 1972, about the military situation in Laos during the Vietnam War. On the memo, in his own handwriting, Nixon described the decade-long bombing campaign by the United States in Southeast Asia as a "failure", having achieved "zilch", despite public comments to the contrary. Just the day before, January 2, Nixon told CBS News reporter Dan Rather in an interview that the bombing was "very, very effective". Previously missing from the Richard Nixon Library, the memo was discovered in the possession of Alexander Butterfield, who served as the Deputy Assistant to President Nixon from 1969 to 1973, by ''Washington Post'' reporter Bob Woodward Robert Upshur Woodward (born March 26, 1943) is an American investigative journalist. He started working for '' The Washington Post'' as a reporter in 1971 and now holds the title of associate editor. ...
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Henry Kissinger
Henry Alfred Kissinger (; ; born Heinz Alfred Kissinger, May 27, 1923) is a German-born American politician, diplomat, and geopolitical consultant who served as United States Secretary of State and National Security Advisor under the presidential administrations of Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. A Jewish refugee who fled Nazi Germany with his family in 1938, Kissinger excelled academically, receiving his BA degree '' summa cum laude'' from Harvard College in 1950, studying under William Yandell Elliott. He received his MA and PhD degrees at Harvard University in 1951 and 1954, respectively. For his actions negotiating a ceasefire in Vietnam, Kissinger received the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize under controversial circumstances. A practitioner of ''Realpolitik'', Kissinger played a prominent role in United States foreign policy between 1969 and 1977, pioneering the policy of détente with the Soviet Union, orchestrating an opening of relations with the People's Republic o ...
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Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was the 36th vice president from 1953 to 1961 under President Dwight D. Eisenhower. His five years in the White House saw reduction of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, détente with the Soviet Union and China, the first manned Moon landings, and the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Nixon's second term ended early, when he became the only president to resign from office, as a result of the Watergate scandal. Nixon was born into a poor family of Quakers in a small town in Southern California. He graduated from Duke Law School in 1937, practiced law in California, then moved with his wife Pat to Washington in 1942 to work for the federal government. After active duty ...
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Laos
Laos (, ''Lāo'' )), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic ( Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, French: République démocratique populaire lao), is a socialist state and the only landlocked country in Southeast Asia. At the heart of the Indochinese Peninsula, Laos is bordered by Myanmar and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the southeast, and Thailand to the west and southwest. Its capital and largest city is Vientiane. Present-day Laos traces its historic and cultural identity to Lan Xang, which existed from the 14th century to the 18th century as one of the largest kingdoms in Southeast Asia. Because of its central geographical location in Southeast Asia, the kingdom became a hub for overland trade and became wealthy economically and culturally. After a period of internal conflict, Lan Xang broke into three separate kingdoms: Luang Phrabang, Vientiane and Champasak. In ...
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Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam. The north was supported by the Soviet Union, China, and other communist states, while the south was supported by the United States and other anti-communist allies. The war is widely considered to be a Cold War-era proxy war. It lasted almost 20 years, with direct U.S. involvement ending in 1973. The conflict also spilled over into neighboring states, exacerbating the Laotian Civil War and the Cambodian Civil War, which ended with all three countries becoming communist states by 1975. After the French military withdrawal from Indochina in 1954 – following their defeat in the First Indochina War – the Viet Minh took control of North Vietnam, and the U.S. assumed financial and military support for the South Vietnames ...
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CBS News
CBS News is the news division of the American television and radio service CBS. CBS News television programs include the '' CBS Evening News'', '' CBS Mornings'', news magazine programs '' CBS News Sunday Morning'', '' 60 Minutes'', and '' 48 Hours'', and Sunday morning political affairs program '' Face the Nation''. CBS News Radio produces hourly newscasts for hundreds of radio stations, and also oversees CBS News podcasts like '' The Takeout Podcast''. CBS News also operates a 24-hour digital news network. Up until April 2021, the president and senior executive producer of CBS News was Susan Zirinsky, who assumed the role on March 1, 2019. Zirinsky, the first female president of the network's news division, was announced as the choice to replace David Rhodes on January 6, 2019. The announcement came amid news that Rhodes would step down as president of CBS News "amid falling ratings and the fallout from revelations from an investigation into sexual misconduct allegatio ...
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Dan Rather
Daniel Irvin Rather Jr. (; born October 31, 1931) is an American journalist, commentator, and former national evening news anchor. Rather began his career in Texas, becoming a national name after his reporting saved thousands of lives during Hurricane Carla in September 1961. Rather spontaneously created the first radar weather report by overlaying a transparent map over a radar image of Hurricane Carla. In his first national broadcast, he helped initiate the successful evacuation of 350,000 people. He reported on some of the most significant events of the modern age, such as the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Gulf war, 9/11, the second Iraq war, and the war on terror. Rather also famously reported from Dallas in November 1963 at the time that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Based on such impactful reporting, he was promoted at CBS News, where he served as White House correspondent beginning in 1964. He served as foreign correspondent in London and Vietnam over the nex ...
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Richard Nixon Presidential Library And Museum
The Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum is the presidential library and burial site of Richard Milhous Nixon, the 37th president of the United States (1969–1974), and his wife Pat Nixon. Located in Yorba Linda, California, on land that President Nixon's family once owned, the library is one of 13 administered by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The campus is located at 18001 Yorba Linda Boulevard in Yorba Linda and incorporates the Richard Nixon Birthplace, a National Historic Landmark where Nixon was born in 1913 and spent his childhood. From its dedication on July 19, 1990, until July 11, 2007, the library and museum was operated by the private Richard Nixon Foundation and was known as the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace. The facility underwent an extensive renovation in 2016 and now features updated, multimedia museum exhibits; the complex is jointly operated by NARA and the Richard Nixon Foundation. Background prior to dedication H ...
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Alexander Butterfield
Alexander Porter Butterfield (born April 6, 1926) is a retired United States Air Force officer, public servant, and businessman. He served as the deputy assistant to President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973. He revealed the White House taping system's existence on July 13, 1973, during the Watergate investigation but had no other involvement in the scandal. From 1973 to 1975, he served as administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration. Early life and Air Force career Butterfield was born April 6, 1926, in Pensacola, Florida, to Susan Armistead Alexander Butterfield and United States Navy pilot (later rear admiral) Horace B. Butterfield. He grew up in Coronado, California, and left home in 1943. Butterfield enrolled in college at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he became a friend of H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman. He left the university to join the United States Air Force in 1948. Initially, Butterfield was stationed at Las Vegas Air Force Base ...
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