In the mid-1960s, it became clear to Lyndon B. Johnson that the escalating war in Vietnam threatened to imperil his presidency. In 1965, he attempted a diplomatic approach. Accustomed to dispensing patronage to recalcitrant Congressmen, he was confident that the tactic would work with North Vietnam's rebel leader (and Viet Mihh founder) Ho Chi Minh: "Old Ho can't turn me down," he declared.
Needless to say, he was wrong.
[Ho, a seasoned revolutionary and passionate nationalist, was obsessed by a single goal: independence for his country. "You can kill 10 of my men for every one I kill of yours," he told the French in 1946, "yet even at those odds, you will lose and I will win."]
Sources
Time 100
