"The people of Vietnam, North and South, have endured an unspeakable weight of suffering for a generation. And they deserve a better future." Richard Nixon (UN General Assembly 18 September 1969)

When the North Vietnamese armoured columns rolled south across the Demilitarised Zone in April, there began for the generals of Vietnam a new kind of war. For the people, it was more suffering, more death.
This film looks at these weeks of escalation in detail, considering the battles stage by stage and the successive diplomatic manoeuvres that accompanied them. Through the eyes of the camera-men, reporters and correspondents who were there, a perspective emerges - and a sad portrait of the Vietnamese predicament.
(Unspeakable suffering: page 3)