The Atrocities of the Vietnam War The many decisions made by the policymakers in Washington regarding the War in Vietnam, perhaps America’s greatest foreign policy failure, had many consequences that, though unforeseen, could have been avoided. The main policymakers include: John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Richard M. Nixon. These men and their advisors created a "policy of atrocity" in Vietnam. The decisions that created the most widespread destruction, besides the bombing escalation’s by Johnson and Nixon, was Robert McNamara’s proposal to JFK for a "quantified war". A "quantified war" is a war where the enemy body count, not territory, is the measure of