Monday, April 3, 1972
More Pullouts From Viet Hinted For This Summer
KEY BISCAYNE, Fla. (AP) --The Florida White House implied Thursday that President Nixon plans to continue withdrawing U.S. troops from Vietnam after the level of 49,000 men is reached July 1 -a point the President skirted in his report to the nation Wednesday night.Presidential press secretary, Ronald L. Ziegler also voiced concern over the fact that the North Vietnamese "launched another offensive" in South Vietnam just before returning to the Paris peace talks Thursday. This, he said, "doesn't augur well for the intentions of the enemy."Ziegler declined under questioning by newsmen to state specifically that Nixon planned withdrawals beyond the 20,000-man cut he announced in his address Wednesday night."We will assess the situation and the developments in South Vietnam prior to further decisions on withdrawals," he said. But he told newsmen, "You should by no means draw the conclusion that this is the final withdrawal."Nixon flew to Florida early Thursday, leaving the White House by helicopter 12 minutes after concluding the nationally televised address in which he warned Hanoi that U.S. air and sea bombardment of North Vietnam would continue until it ends its "massive invasion" of the South.At a White House briefing shortly before Nixon's Wednesday speech, presidential adviser Henry A. Kissinger said the new withdrawal rate "is exactly the rate which we projected last November, and the figure we will reach on July 1 is exactly the figure on which we had been planning."Ziegler was asked whether this meant the President's new announcement was simply public disclosure of a schedule he decided upon last year. He responded that Kissinger was saying only that "the general pattern" was developed then, but that the President didn't reach a decision on the latest cut until early last week."More Pullouts From Viet Hinted for This Summer", by (AP) published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes on Sunday, April 30, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Strips