The March of Folly (54 page)

In describing South Vietnam’s military performance as “disappointing,” and making the routine acknowledgment that “Only the Vietnamese can defeat the Viet-Cong,” Taylor stated his belief that Americans “as friends and partners can show them how the job might be done.” This was the elemental delusion that underwrote the whole endeavor.

The pattern that military intervention was bound to follow was thus laid out by the chosen adviser. No one advised against it, as Ridgway unequivocally had in the past. State Department members of the mission in their annexes described the situation as “deteriorating” with increasing Viet-Cong successes, and pointed out that the Communist effort started at the lowest social level, in the villages. That was where “The battle must be lost and won”; the fact that foreign troops, though they could assist, could not win that battle should rule out “any full United States commitment to eliminate the Viet-Cong threat.” Nevertheless, the author of this report, Sterling Cottrell, chairman of the inter-departmental Vietnam Task Force, fully supported the Taylor-Rostow forward march. Rather than admit the inference that is knocking at the gate, a second-level official will generally prefer to associate himself with superior opinion.

Secretary Rusk too, despite his total commitment to stopping Communism, felt it was inadvisable to commit American prestige too deeply for the sake of what he called “a losing horse.” This flaw in the client bothered him, for on another occasion, testifying in camera
before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he brooded aloud about consistently finding the United States tied to weak allies of the old regime and the need to determine in what circumstances “can you or should you invest in a regime when you know in your heart that that regime is not viable.” American foreign policy was never asked a more significant question and it was left, as might be expected, unanswered.

Departmental reactions to Taylor’s report, starting with McNamara’s, were muddled. Training and mental habits had formed in McNamara a man of the implicit belief that, given the necessary material resources and equipment and the correct statistical analysis of relative factors, the job—any job—could be accomplished. In response, he and the Joint Chiefs made a fundamental point in stating that military intervention required a clear commitment to an objective, in this case, preventing the fall of South Vietnam to Communism. They estimated that the necessary forces, taking into consideration possible Soviet and Chinese reactions, would reach a probable limit of six divisions, or 205,000 men, who should be reinforced by a warning to Hanoi that continued support of Viet-Cong insurgency in the South “will lead to punitive retaliation against North Vietnam.”

Kennedy was wary of the military option, and may have orally asked for modified advice. Obligingly, McNamara had second thoughts and, jointly with Rusk, forwarded a second memorandum suggesting that for the time being the deployment of combat forces could be deferred but should be prepared for introduction at any time. Warning both ways, the two Secretaries, who did not think alike, said that without a strong effort by South Vietnam, “United States forces could not accomplish their mission in the midst of an apathetic or hostile population.” On the other hand, the fall of South Vietnam would “undermine the credibility of American commitments elsewhere” and “stimulate domestic controversies.” Offering a little bit of everything, and avoiding a strong yes or no, this suited Kennedy’s uncertainty. Doubting the efficacy of “a white man’s war,” and warned by Taylor of the inevitable pressure to reinforce, he did not want his Administration to be saddled by this distant and unpromising entanglement. Yet the alternative of disengagement was always seen to be worse—loss of faith in the American shield abroad and accusations at home of weakness and infirmity against Communism.

Kennedy’s instinct was caution, subject to ambivalence. At first he accepted deferral of a combat force, carefully avoiding an explicit negative which might open the gates of wrath on the right. He informed
Diem that additional advisory and technical troops would be sent in the hope that they would “galvanize and supplement” Vietnamese effort, for which “no amount of extra aid can substitute.” The option of combat troops was being held in abeyance. In the regular reference to political and administrative reforms, the President asked for a “concrete demonstration” of progress, and added a reminder that advisory duties were more suitable for “white foreign troops than … missions involving the seeking out of Viet-Cong personnel submerged in the Vietnamese population”—which was true but disingenuous, since this was what the Special Forces in counter-insurgency were supposed to do. In language that was vague but not vague enough, Kennedy boxed himself in by assuring Diem that “We are prepared to help the Republic of Vietnam to protect its people and preserve its independence.” In effect, he held to the objective while taking no action.

Diem reacted badly and “seemed to wonder,” according to the American Ambassador, “whether the United States was getting ready to back out on Vietnam as, he suggested, we had done in Laos.” Credibility had to be maintained and deterioration halted. Without any clear-cut decision or plan of mission, the troops began to go. United States instruction teams required combat support units, air reconnaissance required fighter escorts and helicopter teams, counter-insurgency required 600 Green Berets to train the Vietnamese in operations against the Viet-Cong. Equipment kept pace—assault craft and naval patrol boats, armored personnel carriers, short-take-off and transport planes, trucks, radar installations, Quonset huts, airfields. Employed in support of ARVN (South Vietnamese Army) combat operations, all these required manning by United States personnel, who willy-nilly entered a shooting war. When Special Forces units directed ARVN units against the guerrillas and met fire, they returned it. Helicopter gunships, when fired on, did the same.

Increased activity required more than a training command. In February 1962 a full field command under the acronym MACV (Military Assistance Command Vietnam) superseded MAAG with a three-star general, Paul D. Harkins, former Chief of Staff to Maxwell Taylor in Korea, in command. If a date is needed for the beginning of the American war in Vietnam, the establishment of Mac-Vee, as it became known, will serve.

By mid-1962 American forces in Vietnam numbered 8000, by the end of the year over 11,000, ten months later, 17,000. United States soldiers served alongside ARVN units at every level from battalion to division and general staff. They planned operations and accompanied
Vietnamese units into the field from six to eight weeks at a time. They airlifted troops and supplies, built jungle airstrips, flew helicopter rescue and medical evacuation teams, trained Vietnamese pilots, coordinated artillery fire and air support, introduced defoliation flights north of Saigon. They also took casualties: 14 killed or wounded in 1961, 109 in 1962, 489 in 1963.

This was war by the Executive, without Congressional authorization, and in the face of evasions or denials by the President, war virtually without public knowledge, though not without notice. Accused by the Republican National Committee of being “less than candid with the American people” about the involvement in Vietnam, and asked if it were not time to “drop the pretense” about “advisers,” Kennedy, evidently stung, replied at a news conference in February 1962, “We have not sent combat troops there—in the generally understood sense of the word. We have increased our training mission and our logistics support …” and this was “as frank as he could be” consistent with that unfailing refuge, “our security needs in the area.” It did not satisfy. “The United States is now involved in an undeclared war in South Vietnam,” wrote James Reston on the same day. “This is well known to the Russians, the Chinese Communists and everyone else concerned except the American people.”

The American infusion succeeded for a while in strengthening the Vietnamese effort. Operations began going well. The “strategic hamlet” program, most acclaimed and favored project of the year, sponsored by Diem’s brother Nhu and highly regarded by the Americans, succeeded in actually turning back the Viet-Cong in many places, if it did not endear the Diem government to the rural population. Designed to isolate the guerrillas from the people, depriving them of food and recruits, the program forcibly relocated villagers from their own communities to fortified “agrovilles” of approximately 300 families, often with little but the clothes on their backs, while their former villages were burned behind them to deprive the Viet-Cong of shelter. Besides ignoring the peasant’s attachment to his ancestral land and his reluctance to leave it for any reason, the program levied forced labor to construct the “agrovilles.” With elaborate effort invested in and hopes attached to them, the “strategic hamlets” cost as much in alienation as they gained in security.

With ARVN under American tutelage, increasing its missions, with the Viet-Cong defection rate rising and many of its bases abandoned, confidence recovered. Nineteen sixty-two was Saigon’s year, unsuspected to be its last. American optimism swelled. Army and
Embassy spokesmen issued positive pronouncements. The war was said to be “turning the corner.” The body count of VC against ARVN was estimated at five to three. General Harkins was consistently bullish. Secretary McNamara, on an inspection trip in July, declared characteristically, “Every quantitative measurement we have shows we are winning this war.” At a military conference at CINCPAC (Commander in Chief, Pacific) headquarters in Honolulu on his way home, he initiated planning for a gradual phase-out of United States military involvement in 1965.

At the ground level, colonels and non-coms and press reporters were more doubtful. The most cogent doubter was J. K. Galbraith, who, on his way to India as Ambassador at the time of the Taylor report in November 1961, was asked by Kennedy to stop off at Saigon for yet another assessment. Galbraith received the impression that Kennedy wanted a negative one, and gave it unsparingly. The situation was “certainly a can of snakes.” Diem’s battalions were “unmotivated malingerers.” Provincial army chiefs combined military command with local government and political graft; intelligence on insurgent operations was “non-existent.” The political reality was “total stasis” arising from Diem’s greater need to protect himself from a coup than to protect the country from the Viet-Cong. The ineffectuality and unpopularity of his government conditioned the effectiveness of American aid. When Diem drove through Saigon, his movement, reminiscent of the Japanese Emperor’s, “requires the taking in of all laundry along the route, the closing of all windows, an order to the populace to keep their heads in, the clearing of all streets, and a vast bevy of motorcycle outriders to protect him on his dash.” The effort to bargain for reform with promises of aid was useless because Diem “will not reform either administratively or politically in any effective way. That is because he cannot. It is politically naive to expect it. He senses that he cannot let power go because he would be thrown out.”

Galbraith advised resisting any pressure for introducing American troops because “Our soldiers would not deal with the vital weakness.” He had as yet no solution to “the box we are now in,” except to dispute the argument that there was no alternative to Diem. He thought a change and a new start were essential, and though no one could promise a safe transition, “We are now married to failure.”

Again in March 1962 he wrote to urge that the United States should keep the door wide open for any kind of political settlement with Hanoi and “jump at the chance” if any appeared. He believed Jawaharlal Nehru would help and the Russians could be approached by
Harriman to find out if Hanoi would call off the Viet-Cong in return for American withdrawal and an agreement to talk about ultimate unification. Returning home in April, he proposed to Kennedy an internationally negotiated settlement for a non-aligned government on the Laos model. By continuing to support an ineffectual government, he predicted, “We shall replace the French as the colonial force in the area and bleed as the French did.” In the meantime all steps to commit American soldiers to combat should be resisted, and it would be well to disassociate ourselves from such unpopular actions as defoliation and the “strategic hamlets.”

Galbraith’s proposal, put in writing, was squelched by the Joint Chiefs, who saw it as an effort to disengage from “what is now a well-known commitment to take a forthright stand against Communism in Southeast Asia.” They cited in evidence the President’s ill-advised promise to Diem to preserve the Republic’s independence. They advocated no change in American policy, but rather that it be “pursued vigorously to a successful conclusion.” This was the general consensus; Kennedy did not contest it; Galbraith’s suggestion died.

A successful conclusion was already fading. Discontent was rising around Diem like mist from a marsh. Peasants were further alienated by Saigon’s full-time draft for military service in place of the traditional six months’ service each year allowing a man to return to his home for labor in his fields. In February 1962 two dissident air force officers bombed and strafed the Presidential Palace in a vain attempt to assassinate Diem. American reporters were probing the chinks and finding the short-falls and falsehoods in the compulsive optimism of official briefings. In increasing frustration, they wrote increasingly scornful reports. As one of them wrote long afterward, “Much of what the newsmen took to be lies was exactly what the Mission genuinely believed and was reporting back to Washington,” on the basis of what it was told by Diem’s commanders. Since American intelligence agents swarmed through the country, taking Diem’s commanders on faith was hardly an excuse, but having committed American policy to Diem, as once to Chiang Kai-shek, officials felt the same reluctance to admit his inadequacy.

The result was a press war: the angrier the newsmen became, the more “undesirable stories” they wrote. The government sent Robert Manning, the Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, to Saigon for an on-the-spot survey of the situation. In a candid memorandum prepared upon his return, Manning reported that one cause of the press war was that government policy had been to “see the American involvement in Vietnam minimized, even represented as
something less than in reality it is,” and he urged a reversal of that policy. Although the public paid little attention, a few became aware that something was going wrong in this far-off endeavor. Dissent began to sprout here and there, small, scattered and of no great significance. The public as a whole knew vaguely that Communism was being combatted somewhere in Asia and in general approved of the effort. Vietnam was a distant unvisualized place, no more than a name in the newspapers.