- MS-2-232, Box 1, Folder 25
- File
- 1972-1973
Part of Kenneth Leslie fonds
File contains fourteen draft typed manuscripts columns and handwritten letters, written by Brigadier-General Hugh B. Hester, a noted critic of American foreign policy, written in 1972 and 1973, submitted to numerous newspapers with copies (as well as a couple of personal handwritten letters) sent to Kenneth Leslie. The topics of the letters include the ongoing "disastrous mistake" of the Vietnam War, the "most ballyhooed" nuclear agreements between Nixon and Brezhnev, the 1972 Presidential Election (declaring that Americans "could not psychologically bring themselves to vote for McGovern because his election would have proven true all those crimes committed by Washington [against the Vietnamese people]" and the developing Watergate scandal.
File contains correspondence sent to the Charlotte Observer, the New York Times, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Senator Michael Mansfield (D-MT), The Nation Magazine, the Asheville Citizen, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Greenville News, and Meyer Robert Field.
The letter written to Leslie, dated July 4, 1973, expresses regret at not yet discussing Hester's recent trip to China, as well as demanding that Nixon should "be dismissed and tried" for his actions regarding the escalating Watergate scandal. The file also includes a draft manuscript of a letter "to the Editor" of Leslie's "New Man Magazine", dated November 27, 1972, responding to newspaper magnate John S. Knight proclamation that the "two-party system will continue to be strong and stable" being incorrect following McGovern's defeat, suggesting that "there were no 1972 presidential elections in any meaningful sense".