Remember who is saying this.

on strategy: "If Johnson had granted Westmoreland's requests to enter Laos and block the Ho Chi Minh trail, Hanoi could not have won the war....

But Johnson folded in the face of radicals in the US and the Demos started playing politics and the enemy was emboldened...

In a recent interview published in The Wall Street Journal, former colonel Bui Tin who served on the general staff of the North Vietnamese Army and received the unconditional surrender of South Vietnam

Obviously a nobody who had no insight or knowledge of what went on. And that rag, the WSJ...

et al - When I bring up the numbers who died because of our pull out from South Vietnam, and the numbers to died after Tet because the North understood that they would be given a political victory by the radical Left in the US, no one wants to believe the sources.

And no one wants to compare what is happening now, to what is happening now.

By 1968, NVA morale was at it's lowest point ever. The plans for "Tet" '68 was their last desperate attempt to achieve a success, in an effort to boost the NVA morale. When it was over, General Giap and the NVA viewed the Tet '68 offensive as a failure, they were on their knees and had prepared to negotiate a surrender.

At that time, there were fewer than 10,000 U.S. casualties, the Vietnam War was about to end, as the NVA was prepared to accept their defeat. Then, they heard Walter Cronkite (former CBS News anchor and correspondent) on TV proclaiming the success of the Tet '68 offensive by the communist NVA. They were completely and totally amazed at hearing that the US Embassy had been overrun. In reality, The NVA had not gained access to the Embassy--there were some VC who had been killed on the grassy lawn, but they hadn't gained access. Further reports indicated the riots and protesting on the streets of America.

According to Giap, these distorted reports were inspirational to the NVA. They changed their plans from a negotiated surrender and decided instead, they only needed to persevere for one more hour, day, week, month, eventually the protesters in American would help them to achieve a victory they knew they could not win on the battlefield. Remember, this decision was made at a time when the U.S. casualties were fewer than 10,000, at the end of 1967, beginning of 1968.

Link

It was with Tet '68 that the American media first knew sin. Anyone seeking to understand the character of consistently negative media coverage of the Global War on Terror must understand Tet.

It was the first time in history that the news media overturned a victory won by forces on the ground.

One observer struck by the dichotomy between what occurred and how it was reported was a journalist named Peter Braestrup, chief of the Washington Post's Saigon bureau. Braestrup had also worked for Time Magazine and The New York Times. In later years he became a fellow of the Smithsonian's Woodrow Wilson International Center and editor of The Wilson Quarterly. Not the CV of any sort of conservative, and in fact Braestrup was an establishment liberal of the type that scarcely exists any longer.

Link

It's highly doubtful that the NVA/VC expected to hold all or even some of the cities and towns they attacked, but the NLF apparently did expect large sections of the urban populace to rise up in revolt. With a few exceptions, this didn't happen. South Vietnam's city dwellers were generally indifferent to both the NLF and the Saigon Government but the VC clearly expected more support than it actually got.

Link

Hanoi was perfectly aware of the growing US peace movement and of the deep divisions the war was causing in American society. What Giap needed was a body-blow that would break Washington's will to carry on and at the same time would undermine the growing legitimacy of the Saigon Government once and for all. In one sense, time was not on Giap's side. While Hanoi was sure that the Americans would tire of the war as the French had before them, the longer it took, the stronger the Saigon Government might become. Another year or so of American involvement could seriously damage the NLF and leave the ARVN capable of dealing with its enemies on its own. Giap opted for a quick and decisive victory that would be well in time for the 1968 US Presidential campaign.  

Of course he didn't get what he wanted... until Cronkite gave it to him.