Morally, politically, militarily, diplomatically--and almost literally--the U.S. just ran out of gas

THE last images of the war: U.S. Marines with rifle butts pounding the fingers of Vietnamese who tried to claw their way into the embassy compound to escape from their homeland. An apocalyptic carnival air--some looters wildly driving abandoned embassy cars around the city until they ran out of gas; others ransacking Saigon's Newport PX, that transplanted dream of American suburbia, with one woman bearing off two cases of maraschino cherries, another a case of Wrigley's Spearmint gum. Out in the South China Sea, millions of dollars worth of helicopters tossed overboard from U.S. rescue ships to make room for later-arriving choppers. For many Americans, it was like a death--long been expected but shocking when it finally happened.

There was something surrealist in the swiftness of the last catastrophe--a drama made doubly bitter by the fact that most Americans had made their emotional peace with Viet Nam. The P.O.W.s had come home, the last soldiers had withdrawn. The nation turned, not happily, to other preoccupations--to Watergate and to coping with recession and inflation. But since Viet Nam had deceived Americans so many times before, it was perhaps fitting that it should be the only war they would have to lose twice.

--May 12, 1975

AN EDITORIAL
The President Should Resign

Richard Nixon and the nation have passed a tragic point of no return. It now seems likely that the President will have to give up his office: he has irredeemably lost his moral authority, the confidence of most of the country, and therefore his ability to govern effectively.

The nightmare of uncertainty must be ended. A fresh start must be made. Some at home and abroad might see in the President's resignation a sign of American weakness and failure. It would be a sign of the very opposite. It would show strength and health. It would show the ability of a badly infected political system to cleanse itself. It would show the true power of popular government under law in America.

--BY MANAGING EDITOR HENRY GRUNWALD
Nov. 12, 1973