Cooper was the quiet man at many of the most significant events in the postwar era, including the vastly misunderstood 1954 Geneva Conference, but the crucial story in his book is his inside account of Johnson’s refusal to respond to many offers for peace talks with Hanoi. Simply put, there were far more serious than publicly known offers of talks put forth by North Vietnam in the later Johnson years when bombing by US B-52s was at its peak.

Hanoi’s only condition, Cooper explains, was that America halt its bombing before the talks began, but Johnson believed any cessation would be a sign of weakness.