Secretary Laird, having served in the Senate for 17 years, was well prepared for the hearing. Laird was able to keep the hearing focused on the emotional issue of the POWs. He provided long answers to the committee's questions and always started with or returned to the POW/MIA issue. This tactic also demonstrated how unfamiliar and ill-prepared the Senators were on this issue (contributing to the belief that the hearing was nothing more than a political and media-hyped sideshow). In his testimony, Laird perfectly articulated and defended the President's policy on Vietnam and focused the nation's attention on a highly explosive and emotional issue that even the staunchest anti-war activist would support. Nevertheless, the committee (predominantly Fulbright) still believed a major escalation had occurred and this might jeopardize any possibility of a quick end to the war. Moreover, the committee believed that no POWs were rescued due to an intelligence failure. Laird did not agree with these perceptions. Furthermore, of all the questions asked of Laird, perhaps the ones asked by Senator Al Gore did hit at the center of the intelligence issue. First, Gore asked about the authorization and execution order. Who gave them and when? Secondly, he inquired about the quality and type of intelligence used to determine which camp to hit and when to hit it? Gore's first question was easy to answer. The President authorized the raid in the summer of 1970 and gave the execution order on 18 November 1970. The answer to the second question was not provided because the response was classified. However, the committee later received the answer in a classified supplement to the hearing. If Gore had pursued his questions more forcefully, maybe information provided to the legislators would have been more forthright and less confusing, perhaps resulting in less political turmoil over this issue. However, the political activity on this issue was far from over as the following day saw a heated debate on this topic on the Senate floor between "pro" Senators Bob Dole, John Stennis, and Henry Jackson while Senators Edmund Muskie, Edward Kennedy, and Robert Leggett disagreed with the rescue attempt and Nixon's policy towards Hanoi.
As a final and rather amusing note on the political reaction to the raid, Senator Fulbright gave a complete explanation in his own words as to why he called the hearing on Son Tay. In the Congressional Record of 4 December 1970, Fulbright explained that he believed the raid would only escalate the war and jeopardize a negotiated settlement as the withdrawal from Vietnam continued. He further stated his resolve on the POW/MIA issue by reviewing several letters he had written to highlight his personal concern to Ho Chi Minh, Pham Van Dong (Premier of North Vietnam), The International Red Cross, and finally to The National League of Families of POWs and MIAs in Southeast Asia. Following the hearing, Fulbright received hundreds of letters criticizing his actions. Several of the letters sent to Fulbright read like this: As citizens of the State of Arkansas, we are writing to inform you of the shame we now feel that you have brought upon us. Your socialistic views which have been flaunted before the entire country have not reflected the beliefs which are basic to all of us Arkansans. Your recent actions and public expressions against the POW campaign were humiliating to us as U.S. citizens, and especially as residents of the great State which you so poorly represent. Be assured that our votes, though they went to you in the last Senatorial election, will not be cast for you in the future.
Still another said: Since you are such a hack for negotiation I have a suggestion which you might pass on to the negotiating "team" in Paris. Let's offer one Senator from Arkansas for just one of our prisoners of war. I'll bet after 30 minutes you'd be happy for someone to send in a rescue mission. In fact, I'll bet you won't even follow my suggestion, even though you seem to think the commies are just a nice little peace loving group.
Fulbright could not understand why he had gotten so much "hate-mail" over the hearing and his actions therein. He was truly miffed that most Americans did not share his opinion on this issue. Therefore, he felt compelled to fill the Congressional Record with six pages of his "explanation." Fulbright had to explain (a political apology) himself again since the televised hearing had shown him and the committee "playing politics" with an emotional and humanitarian issue where politics had no business. The raid had proven to be an explosive issue and a mission overdue in its execution. Considering all of the previously discussed information, did the President make the right decision by selecting Son Tay as the next milestone in his policy of Vietnamization? In other words, what political and military risks did Nixon take in conducting the raid?
