• Director(s):

    ROUSSEL (DANIEL)

  • Producer(s):

    GOYAVE PRODUCTION, ARTE FRANCE, AL DI SOPRA PRODUCTION

  • Territories:

    Worldwide.

  • Production year:

    2014

  • Language(s):

    German, English, French

  • Rights:

    TV, DVD, NON-THEATRICAL, INTERNET, VOD

 January 27, 1973. After five years of negotiations in Paris, the Americans and the Vietnamese made peace, in what had been a difficult process. Three months earlier, a preliminary agreement had been secretly signed in France between Henry Kissinger and Le Duc Tho.

In Saigon, the Americans' ally Nguyen Van Thieu, refused to sign it. On President Nixon's orders, Kissinger was to resume his secret negotiations in October 1972 with his North Vietnamese counterpart, offering him amendments he could not accept. In mid-December, negotiations were suspended and Le Duc Tho returned to Hanoi. Two hours later, North Vietnam and its capital Hanoi suffered a spate of bombings. The air strikes, including bombings from around a hundred B-52s, lasted twelve days. Nixon had warned: “We must punish the enemy in ways that he will really hurt”.
 
Why this final act of “cruelty”, this massive and destructive air offensive, when peace was signed just three weeks later?
 
Supported by unaired archival footage, this film takes us into the heart of the secret negotiations, finally shedding light on the obscure logic of US action, and reveals the extent of this tragedy: even when peace had become the main objective of all players, each player had to show they were determined to continue the war. 

2014: Jury's Prize - Pessac Historical Film Festival (Pessac - France)