ABSTRACT
On March 31, 1971, a military court convicted Lieutenant William Calley of mass murder for his role in the My Lai massacre and sentenced him to dismissal from the Army and life imprisonment at hard labor. While Calley was on trial, the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, meeting in Detroit, sponsored “Winter Soldier,” a forum of 109 veterans testified that they had committed, witnessed, or heard of My Lai-type war crimes. Meeting secretly with Xuan Thuy in Paris on May 31, 1971, Henry Kissinger offered a new seven-point peace plan. Although confident of impending victory over George McGovern, the inept Democratic challenger, Richard Nixon wanted to fulfill the promise he had made four years ago to achieve a peaceful settlement of the Indochina War before the November election took place. The American and Vietnamese people paid a painfully high price for the illusory peace that Nixon and Kissinger achieved after four more years of war.
