In retrospect, we got involved in Vietnam because we thought that the tragedy in Vietnam was a part of a vast communist system and that the way to resist global penetration of communism was to fight it wherever it occurred. That was sort of the accepted view and it was done in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. I think in retrospect it was a mistake. It was an honorable mistake by people carrying out the traditions of previous American foreign policy. The question of how do you get out when you have 500,000 troops in place and you have a million allied troops and about the same number of hostile troops, how you can get out without producing a catastrophe, and secondly, how you can get out without undermining the face of the United States. That was the problem the administration which I served faced, which had inherited 550,000 troops in place. We thought the honor of the United States required a gradual extrication. There was no dispute about getting out. The dispute was how to get out, and under what conditions. It was easy to take heroic stances, carrying placards around. Those were not the people who had to implement the decisions.