On this day in 1971 the United States Senate, in an amendment to a bill to continue conscription, voted 57 to 42 to pull American troops out of Vietnam provided that North Vietnam release American prisoners of war in that country. In effect, the Senate voted to more or less abandon the Republic of Vietnam.
As much with this late stage of the war, Congress was behind the curve in any event as the US was already withdrawing under the program of "Vietnamization". While there had been heavy fighting in the war in 1971, it had been largely undertaken by the Army of the Republic of Vietnam with US support. Having said that, the ARVN had not done wall, although part of that was due to grossly over optimistic South Vietnamese offensive deployments that year.
The House of Representatives rejected the amendment six days later.\
Joni Mitchell, whom I feel so so about, released her well know album "Blue" on this day as well.
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