Below are excerpts of the latest tapes of White House discussions to be released to public (April 2003). I thought that this group may find some  parallels  between the United States policies in Vietnam and the current crisis in the  Middle East.

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April 25, 1972

Nixon: We've got to quit thinking in terms of a three-day strike [in the
Hanoi-Haiphong area]. We've got to be thinking in terms of an all-out
bombing attack, I am thinking about things that go far beyond... I'm
thinking of the dikes, I'm thinking of the railroad, I'm thinking ...

Kissinger: ... I agree with you.

Nixon: ... We've got to use massive force....

Two hours later Haldeman and Ziegler joined Kissinger and Nixon.

Nixon: How many did we kill in Laos?

Ziegler: May be ten thousand - fifteen?

Kissinger: In the Laotian thing, we killed about ten, fifteen....

Nixon: See, the attack in the North that we have in mind...power plants,
whatever's left - petroleum, the docks... And, I still think we ought to
take the dikes out now. Will that drown people?

Kissinger: About two hundred thousand people.

Nixon: No, no, no...I'd rather use the nuclear bomb. Have you got that
Henry?

Kissinger: That, I think, wouldjust be too much.

Nixon: The nuclear bomb, does that bother you?...I just want you to think
big, Henry, for Christsakes.

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May 4 1972

Discussing his decision with Kissinger, Al Haig, and John Connally, Nixon
put the confrontation with Vietnam in perspective. Heard on the Oval
Office tape, he thumped his desk as he pointed to an imaginary or perhaps
real map on it:

Vietnam: Here's those little cocksuckers right in there, here they are.
(Thump) Here's the United Stes (thump). Here's Western (thump) Europe,
that cocky little place that's caused so much devastation... Here's the
Soviet Union (thump), here's the (thump) Mid-East... Here's the (thump)
silly Africans.... And (thump) the not-quite-so-silly Latin Americans.
Here we are. They are taking on the United States. Now, Goddamit, we're
gonna do it.  We are going to cream them. This is not in anger or
anything. This old business, that I'm "petulant," that's bullshit. I
should have done it long ago, I just didn't follow instincts.

..I'll see that the United States does not lose. I'm putting it quite
bluntly. I'll be quite precise. South Vietnam may lose. But the United
States cannot lose. Which means, basically, I have made the decision.
Whatever happens to South Vietnam, we are going to cream North Vietnam.

..For once, we've got to use the maximum power of this country... against
this shit-ass little country: to win the war. We can't use the word,
"win." But others can.

In a later exchange Nixon observed to Kissinger: "The only place where you
and I disagree..is with regard to the bombing. You're so goddamned
concerned about the civilians and I don't give a damn. I don't care."

Kissinger: I'm concerned about the civilians because I don't want the
world to be mobilized against you as a butcher...."

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In the current crisis with Iraq, both the United States and Israel are on
the record that they WILL use the bomb "if provoked!" In view of what we
read above it is then not surprising that the Little Bush has
brought Kissinger and the rest of the gang back!

Ramin Vakilian

"Those who do not remember the past are condemned to relive it."
(Santayana)