On Oct. 19, 1972, a subdued Henry Kissinger walked up to the White House podium to announce history. After fits and starts, more than three grueling years of diplomatic haggling, and a whole lot of violence on the ground, an accord between the United States and the Vietcong was within reach. “We believe peace is at hand,” Kissinger told the assembled reporters in the White House briefing room. “It is inevitable that in a war of such complexity that there should be occasional difficulties in reaching a final solution. But we believe that by far the longest part of the road has been traversed and what stands in the way of an agreement now are issues that are relatively less important than those that have already been settled.”

In turned out that Kissinger jumped the gun. A few more months of combat and a decision by then-President Richard Nixon to increase the bombing were required before a final agreement was signed in January 1973. In March, the last U.S. combat troops would leave Vietnam after eight years of voracious fighting in the jungles and tens of thousands of fatalities.