President Richard Nixon During a Vietnam War Press Conference

During the Vietnam War, in a coup strongly encouraged by the United States, a U.S.-friendly government came to power in Cambodia. The Vietnamese Communists had long used neutral Cambodia as a place to regroup and store weapons. The 12,000 miles of roads and paths built by Communists to connect North and South Vietnam through Cambodia and Laos was known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It was a critical supply route that the Communists credited with much of their success in the war.

President Nixon planned to send ground groups to Cambodia to attack Communist sanctuaries and central headquarters. One historical interpretation of Nixon’s strategy is that he hoped to destabilize the enemy in order to provide a “decent interval” in which South Vietnam could fend for itself while American troops pulled out.

Nixon televised his decision to initiate the Cambodian campaign. In this photograph he points out the locations of suspected Communist sanctuaries in Cambodia. The public was unaware that Nixon had been secretly bombing Cambodia since mid-March 1969—an escalation of a covert bombing campaign started by President Johnson in 1965.