On foreign policy issues, Ford kept Henry Kissinger as secretary of state. Kissinger had won much praise for his service to Richard Nixon, including in the opening of diplomatic ties with Communist China.
But Kissinger had also received much criticism. Critics accused him of interfering with civil liberties in the name of national security. They also accused him of supporting the overthrow of the Marxist government of Salvador Allende in Chile.
By the time Ford became president, the United States and the Soviet Union had taken steps to try to limit the spread of nuclear weapons. Nixon and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev had signed two such agreements as part of the détente policy to ease Cold War tensions. Relations with China were also less tense than before.
U.S. Marine helicopter crewmen carry Vietnamese civilians to safety aboard the U.S.S. Blue Ridge on April 29, 1975. Their evacuation helicopter crashed on the deck of the amphibious command ship.
American policy in Southeast Asia, however, had failed. Involvement in the Vietnam War had officially ended the year before Gerald Ford became president. But fighting continued between South Vietnam and communist forces from the North.
The peace agreement signed by the United States and North Vietnam in nineteen seventy-three left South Vietnam to defend itself. By nineteen seventy-five, South Vietnamese forces were clearly in danger of defeat.
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2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25
2013-11-25