Al Chang/Associated Press

January 3: Dr. Tran Van Ðo, South Vietnam’s foreign minister, accepts Britain’s offer to hold a peace conference, a conference the United States agrees to attend. Hanoi radio denounces the proposal as an attempt to “deceive world opinion.”

January 10: Viet Cong gunners mine and sink the Haustrum, a Shell Oil tanker, 13 miles south of Saigon. The Johnson administration temporarily rescinds permission for a raid on the Yenevien railroad yard near Hanoi because of the controversy over whether U.S. bombs had fallen on the North Vietnamese capital during attacks on Dec. 4, 13, and 14.

January 17: The South Vietnamese government offers to meet with representatives of North Vietnam to arrange “on a properly agreed and supervised basis” an extension of the truce proposed for the Lunar New Year celebration. Premier Nguyen Cao Ky suggests the truce might be canceled because of enemy violations of the 48-hour Christmas and New Year’s ceasefires.

January 25: The Johnson administration bars U.S. planes from venturing withing five miles of Hanoi’s center. The Air Force and Navy must receive permission for each bombing raid within 30 miles of Hanoi and permission must be renewed for each strike, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says.

January 27: The number of U.S. troops in Vietnam reaches 400,000.

February 2: A 1st Infantry Division platoon suffers heavy casualties after being attacked before dawn by an enemy force in the Iron Triangle area.

February 8: The Tet truce begins for South Vietnam. A cease-fire is declared, to end February 11.

February 9: Seventeen “significant incidents” are reported during the first 24-hour period of the truce, from both Viet Cong and American units.

February 12: Hanoi states it will seriously consider peace negotiations if the U.S. terminates bombing raids unilaterally and unconditionally over North Vietnam.

February 27: U.S. warships begin dropping mines into rivers in North Vietnam to stop the movement of sampans and junks. U.S. destroyers and cruisers are instructed to fire on the routes on a continuing basis. The Viet Cong shell the U.S. air base at Danang before dawn; eleven troops are killed.

February 28: U.S. and allied soldiers continue to search for VC headquarters in the South.

March 2: Secretary of State Dean Rusk rejects, on behalf of the administration, a proposal put forward by Sen. Robert Kennedy for a suspension of the U.S. bombing in North Vietnam. The House rejects all attempts to attach a statement of policy on the Vietnam War to an administration bill authorizing $4.5 billion in additional military spending for the year.

March 6: President Johnson announces he will establish a lottery to determine which young men will be drafted for military service. The lottery will begin on January 1, 1969.

March 9: Viet Cong guerrillas maul a platoon of U.S. infantrymen in the hill country 200 miles northeast of Saigon; 10 are killed, 25 wounded. The U.S. command announces casualties for the last week of February are the highest of the war, with 232 Americans killed, 1,381 wounded, and four reported missing. The military says the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese suffered 1,738 killed during the same period.

March 22: U.S. officials announce plans to base B-52s in Thailand to speed the response to bombing requests from commanders in South Vietnam. In Washington, officials confused by North Vietnam’s rejection of peace proposals, say the only way to end the war is to try to break the will and spirit of North Vietnam.

April 1: United Nations Secretary General U Thant makes a public appeal to the U.S. to declare a unilateral cease-fire in Vietnam with the hope that North Vietnam and the Vietcong “would thereafter fire only if fired upon.”

April 2: Peasants in more than 200 of South Vietnam’s 2,500 villages go to the polls to take part in the first local elections since 1964. The government reports a large turnout.

April 8: South Vietnamese government official Nguyen Van Thieu threatens to bomb Hanoi and invade North Vietnam in retaliation for a North Vietnamese raid.

April 15: Between 100,000 and 125,000 people march in Manhattan and mass in front of the United Nations building in an antiwar protest. The march is led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Dr. Benjamin Spock, and Harry Belafonte.

April 19: The U.S. proposes that each side pull back its troops 10 miles from the DMZ as a first step toward peace talks.

April 29: The U.S. Air Force rushes a supply of component parts of bombs to South Vietnam in an attempt to relieve shortage of munitions.

May 2: Two U.S. battalions inch forward in the fight for Hill 881 on a ridgeline five miles from the Laos border. The air war intensifies after three Soviet MiG fighters are shot down in the North while 577 sorties, a record, are flown in the south.

May 3: Gen. William Westmoreland asks President Johnson to increase U.S. fighting strength to at least 600,000. President Johnson reports a day later that he has no “imminent” plans to increase fighting forces in Vietnam despite the request.

May 8: Johnson orders U.S. bombers away from Hanoi from mid-December to late April in an effort to determine if President Ho Chí Minh of North Vietnam is willing to open secret peace talks or take steps to scale down the war.

May 12: Premier Nguyen Cao Ky tells his cabinet at a private meeting that he will run for president in the election on Sept. 3.

June 1: American military personnel suffer the highest weekly casualty rate of the war with 2,929 dead, wounded, or missing. Most of the casualties are in or near the demilitarized zone.

June 2: The Soviet government charges that U.S. planes bombed a Soviet merchant ship in a North Vietnamese port.

June 15: Ky states that 600,000 US troops would be needed to counter the increasing number of North Vietnamese forces deployed in the South. The current ground force totals 462,000.

June 18: U.S. fighter-bombers attack railroad yards and lines north and northwest of Hanoi.

June 26: One-hundred-and-six Viet Cong are reported killed in the battle in the Central Highlands in which a U.S. paratrooper company is virtually wiped out.

July 1: Ky withdraws from the presidential race but says he will run as vice present on his rival’s ticket headed by Nguyen Van Thieu. Ky says he will make the move “for the good of the nation.”

July 3: In Washington, the JCS warns the Johnson administration that if Westmoreland’s minimum request for 70,000 more troops is not met, the U.S. will run a high risk of losing the initiative in the ground war.

July 7: Westmoreland renews his appeal for more troops, stating that now is the time “to step up the pressure on the enemy by reinforcing our mounting successes. The war is not a stalemate. We are winning slowly but steadily. North Vietnam is paying a tremendous price with nothing to show for it in return.”

July 18: U.S. Marines kill 16 Viet Cong in 10 hours of nonstop fighting near Danang. Twenty-one enemy troops are killed in two running battles near Saigon.

August 3: The South Vietnamese presidential election season opens with pledges from two civilian tickets that they will try to open immediate negotiations with North Vietnam if they are elected.

August 10: Two Army helicopters kill 40 Vietnamese civilians and wound 36 on August 2 when they return fire from a group of Viet Cong mixed with villagers 60 miles south of Saigon. Seven of ten civilian nominees in South Vietnam’s presidential election announce that they will halt their campaigning and will resume only if assured by the government of “an end to harassment.”

August 12: Johnson authorizes air attacks against a group of targets in North Vietnam. The move brings the first significant intensification of the air war since May.

August 29: VC guerrillas blow up nine bridges in South Vietnam in what appears to be an intensified campaign of sabotage and terror before the national elections.

September 1: A Viet Cong irregular throws a grenade into a crowded restaurant in Ben Cát, 24 miles north of Saigon.

September 3: National elections in Vietnam start with a heavy turnout. Fifty-four incidents of terrorism are reported during the voting with three villages in Quang Tri Province prevented from voting by the Viet Cong. The most serious incidents are reported in or near Saigon, where bombs explode in several polling places. A grenade is thrown into a voting area next to a U.S. Army enlisted men’s billet in Cho Lon, wounding 25 civilians.

September 4: The South Vietnamese government announces that Thieu has won a four-year term as the nation’s president. Ky is elected vice president. Civilian candidates in South Vietnam lodge an official protest over voting irregularities.

September 7: Defense Secretary Robert McNamara announces a plan to impede the flow of troops and arms from North Vietnam. The plan is to construct a barrier of barbed wire, mines, and electronic devices (“The McNamara Line”) along the northern border of South Vietnam.

September 28: U.S. planes intercept MiG fighters near Hanoi. Navy pilots attack the Haiphong highway and bridge, the sixth strike against the bridge this month.

September 29: The last intact bridge in Haiphong is attacked in the effort to isolate North Vietnam’s major port.

October 3: The South Vietnamese Constituent Assembly votes by a narrow margin to confirm the results of the disputed presidential election. North Vietnam rejects the Johnson administration’s offer of peace talks and vows to continue combat in the South.

October 8: In an effort to cut supply links to China and to hit them before the monsoon rains begin, U.S. pilots attack several petroleum storage areas in North Vietnam.

October 10: President-elect Thieu promises to search for peace but adds that if he fails, his government will intensify the war.

October 21: In Washington D.C., thousands of demonstrators storm the Pentagon after a calm rally and march by some 50,000 people. At least 128 people are arrested.

October 23: The two-day protest at the Pentagon ends when federal marshals and troops arrest some 208.

October 31: Thieu takes the oath of office as the first president of South Vietnam.

November 1: During a reception for 2,000 guests, VC mortarmen shell the lawn of Independence Palace in Saigon. Guests include Vice President Humphrey, Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker, and Gen. Westmoreland. No one is injured.

November 2: VC guerrillas seize Ðai Loc in South Vietnam’s coastal lowlands and burn down more than 400 homes.

November 10: A special Gallup poll indicates that 59 percent of the American people favor continuing the U.S. military effort in Vietnam. Four percent would go on fighting at “the present level,” while 55 percent would “increase our military effort and involvement” in South Vietnam. Of those polled, 34 percent said the U.S. should decrease the military effort, and 10 percent said they would pull out of Vietnam immediately.

November 12: Thailand agrees in principle to send 10,000 more troops to South Vietnam.

November 18: The Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam announces it will honor a three-day holiday truce at Christmas and a seven-day ceasefire at Tet.

December 2: China charges that the U.S. “dive-bombed” a Chinese freighter at a port in North Vietnam, wounding eight crew members and damaging the ship.

December 12: New U.S. paratrooper units arrive in South Vietnam as fighting flares up in the Central Highlands near Ðak Tô. American troops conduct a new operation, Saratoga, aimed at depriving enemy troops of their food supplies.

December 19: The White House relaxes restrictions governing the air war against North Vietnam. This is done to permit U.S. pilots to fly with relative freedom through the so-called buffer strip along the Chinese border and the outer 20-mile circle around Hanoi.

December 24: A Christmas truce begins as American troops prepare for a battle lull that is expected to last until the New Year. It is generally believed that there will be scattered contact throughout the day.

December 31: The U.S. ends its “Year of Decision” in Vietnam— without a decision.

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