With Tet, Vietnam finally got America's attention. Millions of Americans watched the battle for Saigon on the evening news, and many who were not personally involved took notice for the first time. In the winter dusk of American as 1968 proceeded, dreadful sights were broadcast. The cameras recorded burnings, executions, even the sight of American soldiers falling in battle. MACV was powerless to control news media that no longer trusted him. He had sincerely believed there would be nothing to hide.
Lyndon Johnson tried to explain it away and his own credibility suffered. On February 27, the avuncular Walter Cronkite, a public surrogate, pondered the question of whether "the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in stalemate." The decade that had opened in the winter sunshine of Kennedy's inaugural was flickering out in a confusion of shadows and unwholesome light.