Historians point to the 1968 Tet Offensive by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong as the turning point in the Vietnam War that ultimately led to the U.S. withdrawal.

A dramatic swing in American public opinion against the war is widely attributed to vaunted CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite's somber conclusion after returning from a reporting trip to Vietnam that the war was unwinnable and the U.S. should negotiate an honorable exit.

But as WND recently reported in a three-part series, only weeks before his February 1968 pronouncement, Cronkite resoundingly declared that the Viet Cong had suffered a massive setback.

Are there details hidden in American archives that explain why America's "most trusted" newsman changed his opinion? Are there secrets waiting to be revealed?

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It may be as soon as July when Americans find out. Daniel Coats, the director of National Intelligence, this week ordered intelligence agencies to "review their holdings to reveal previously classified details to the public."

He said the action is being taken in honor of the 50th anniversary of the campaign on South Vietnamese and American forces.

"In December 2016, former DNI James R. Clapper instructed the intelligence community Senior Historians Panel to identify topics of historical interest for declassification and release, as part of the IC's continuing efforts to enhance public understanding of IC activities," his announcement said.

The panel recommended the Tet Offensive intelligence be reviewed, he said.

The announcement explained the offensive "was a series of surprise attacks launched by the North Vietnamese army and the Viet Cong on January 30, 1968, throughout South Vietnam that targeted multiple prominent sites, including the presidential palace and the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. While the attacks initially took the U.S. and South Vietnamese forces by surprise, they eventually recovered to repel the Viet Cong. The dramatic nature of the Tet Offensive began to turn U.S. public opinion against the war and precipitated the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam."

The documents that are declassified "will be released over a period of 15 months, in three installments, beginning in July 2018. Subsequent releases will take place in January 2019 and April 2019," the announcement said.

Author James Rogan wrote in a WND commentary this week about the politics surrounding the Tet Offensive.

The military campaign "became the first falling domino that led to the destruction of an American presidency, the murder of a leading presidential candidate, over a decade of politicians degrading the U.S. military and a permanent reconfiguration of America," he explained.

From the man who led the effort to oust Bill Clinton from office, Rep. James Rogan's "Catching Our Flag: Behind the Scenes of a Presidential Impeachment"

He wrote that before Tet, President] Johnson and his generals "had been assuring Americans for a year that we were on the verge of victory and peace in Vietnam, and most believed the claim."

"Once the Tet assault began, and for the several weeks that it lasted, the U.S. network news broadcasts aired nightly footage of heavy enemy fire on U.S. and South Vietnamese forces," he said. "Americans watching this on television were shocked that our 'defeated' enemy could launch such widespread attacks – even hitting our embassy. These images produced a rapid public backlash against the war. Although U.S. and South Vietnamese troops defeated the communists militarily, the reds inflicted a psychological wound on the American voter. Public opinion shifted, and many people adopted what a small minority of antiwar activists had been preaching for years: LBJ and the Pentagon were lying about our military prospects in Southeast Asia."

The result was a shift in America's perspective, aided by Cronkite, and the eventual withdrawal.

The North simply re-armed, rebuilt and attacked again.

"The Democratic Republic of South Vietnam collapsed and the communists took control of the nation," Rogan noted.

Cronkite's famous remarks, calling for a negotiated withdrawal, "not as victors, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could," are seen as a major factor leading to that outcome.

"Tonight, back in more familiar surroundings in New York, we'd like to sum up our findings in Vietnam, an analysis that must be speculative, personal, subjective. Who won and who lost in the great Tet Offensive against the cities? I'm not sure. The Viet Cong did not win by a knockout but neither did we," Cronkite

But in a newly unearthed report by Cronkite, he offered an entirely different conclusion.

"First and simplest, the Viet Cong suffered a military defeat," he reported. "Its missions proved suicidal. If they had intended to stay in the cities as a negotiating point, they failed at that. The Vietnamese army reacted better than even its most ardent supporters had anticipated. There were no defections from its rank, as the Viet Cong apparently had expected. And the people did not rise to support the Viet Cong, as they were also believed to have expected."

The video was discovered by Fred Koster, an independent filmmaker who directed the Vietnam film "Ride the Thunder," based on the book of the same name by author-producer Richard Botkin. Since that movie did not deal directly with the events of the Tet Offensive, Koster and Botkin put the Cronkite clip aside, sharing it with WND at the 50th anniversary of the military campaign approached.

WATCH WALTER CRONKITE'S 'LOST' REPORT:

You can read here the entire WND library on the issue:

James Rogan's commentary: "Tet: The domino of freedom's defeat"

Part 1: 'Lost' Cronkite broadcast reveals 180-degree war flip."

Part 2: Cronkite admitted blowing it on his famous commentary.

Part 3: Meet the Real Walter Cronkite

The truth: No matter what Cronkite said immediately after the Tet Offensive or days later in his New York broadcast, it's clear that the massive coordinated attacks by the Viet Cong guerrillas and the North Vietnamese army, though surprising in their magnitude, were not only soundly and convincingly repulsed by U.S. forces and the South Vietnamese army, but actually annihilated in one of the most spectacular military defeats in history.

Nevertheless, in part because of Cronkite's famous broadcast, according to historians and Vietnam veterans, the staggering military defeat proved to be a major propaganda victory for the communist forces.

