Nixon's Methods To End The Vietnam War

Nixon was concerned about the growing risk of a nuclear war and wanted to ease the tension of the Cold War. To do this, he decided to improve the relations between the US and China and the USSR. In 1970, the USA and USSR met to discuss the reduction of nuclear weapons and Nixon asked the Soviets to put extra pressure on North Vietnam to end the war. In 1971, the US table tennis team visited China for a friendly game of table tennis and were followed by Nixon himself in 1972 where he asked China to persuade North Vietnam to end the war. After this, trade between the US and China became easier and tensions loosend.  

His plan of 'Vietnamisation' was announced on the 3rd of November 1969. It consisted of vast sums of money being spent on the best planes, helicopters, tanks, machine guns and rifles to equip the ARVN against the Vietcong. This means that the ARVN would be skilled and trained enough to fight against the North Vietnamese army and Vietcong with the need of the US forces, meaning that US troops could start to be withdrawed. 85,000 troops out of the 540,000 had been withdrawed by the end of 1969.

Eventhough it is seen that Nixon escalated the war, he had good reasons. He wanted to destroy as many Vietcong bases as possible before the majority of US troops had left but this meant bombing parts of Laos and Cambodia as this was where the main 'Ho Chi Minh Trail' was located.