MACV

The Joint Command

in the

Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Front_Matter 575.indd i 
Front_Matter 575.indd ii 
Center of Military History

United States Army

Washington, D.C., 2006

United States Army in Vietnam

MACV

The Joint Command

in the

Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

by

Graham A. Cosmas

Front_Matter 575.indd iii 
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cosmas, Graham A.

 MACV : the joint command in the years of escalation, 1962–1967 /

by Graham A. Cosmas.

 p. cm. — (United States Army in Vietnam)

 Includes bibliographical references and index.

 1. Vietnamese Confl ict, 1961–1975—United States. 2. United States.

Military Assistance Command, Vietnam—History. I. Title. II. Series. 

 DS558.C68 2006

 959.704’340973—dc22

 2005025726

CMH Pub 91–6–1

First Printing

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v

United States Army in Vietnam

Jeffrey J. Clarke, General Editor

Jeffrey J. Clarke

Richard W. Stewart

Keith R. Tidman

Chief Historian

Chief, Histories Division

Acting Editor in Chief

Advisory Committee

(As of August 2005)

Jon T. Sumida

University of Maryland

Eric M. Bergerud

Lincoln University

Lt. Gen. Anthony R. Jones

U.S. Army Training and Doctrine

Command

Brig. Gen. Daniel J. Kaufman

U.S. Military Academy

Adrian R. Lewis

University of North Texas

Brian M. Linn

Texas A&M University

Howard P. Lowell

National Archives and Records 

Administration

Col. Craig Madden

U.S. Army War College

John H. Morrow, Jr.

University of Georgia

Reina J. Pennington

Norwich University

Sandy R. Riley

Administrative Assistant to the

Secretary of the Army

Ronald H. Spector

George Washington University

U.S. Army Center of Military History

Brig. Gen. (Ret.) John S. Brown, Chief of Military History

Brig. Gen. Volney Warner

U.S. Army Command and General Staff College

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. . . to Those Who Served

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ix

Foreword

MACV: The Joint Command in the Years of Escalation, 1962–1967, is the 

fi rst of two volumes that examine the Vietnam confl ict from the 

perspective of the theater commander and his headquarters. It traces 

the story of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), from 

its establishment in February 1962 to the climax of American escalation 

at the end of 1967. It deals with theater-level command relationships, 

strategy, and operations and supplements detailed studies in the Center 

of Military History’s United States Army in Vietnam series covering 

combat operations, the advisory effort, and relations with the media.

MACV: The Joint Command recounts how the MACV commander and 

his staff viewed the war at various periods and how and why they arrived 

at their decisions. It analyzes the interservice politics of organizing 

and managing a joint command; MACV’s relationships with Pacifi c 

Command, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the secretary of defense; and 

the evolution of the command’s dealings with its South Vietnamese and 

third country allies. Perhaps most important, it traces the commander’s 

role in developing and executing U.S. policy in Vietnam, a role that 

extended beyond military operations to encompass diplomacy and 

pacifi cation. As an experiment—not entirely successful—in nationbuilding, the story of the Military Assistance Command contains many 

parallels to more recent Army engagements and so serves as a potential 

source of important lessons.

This is the ninth volume published in the Unites States Army 

in Vietnam series. Its appearance constitutes another step in the 

fulfi llment of the Center of Military History’s commitment to produce 

an authoritative history of Army participation in the Vietnam War. 

Washington, D.C. JOHN S. BROWN

30 September 2005 Brigadier General, USA (Ret.)

Chief of Military History

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The Author

Graham A. Cosmas was born in Weehawken, New Jersey, an

received his education from the schools of Leonia, New Jerse

and from Columbia University, Oberlin College, and the University o

Wisconsin. After teaching at the University of Texas (Austin) and th

University of Guam, he joined the staff of the U.S. Marine Corps Histor

and Museums Division in December 1973. Dr. Cosmas moved to th

U.S. Army Center of Military History in 1979 and remained there unt

2001, when he became deputy director of the Joint History Offi ce o

the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Dr. Cosmas is the author of An Army for Empir

The U.S. Army in the Spanish-American War, 1898–1899, and coautho

of U.S. Marines in Vietnam: Vietnamization and Redeployment, 1970–197

and The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater o

Operations, a volume in the United States Army in World War II serie

He served in 1984–85 as the Harold K. Johnson Visiting Professor o

Military History at the U.S. Army Military History Institute, Carlisl

Barracks, Pennsylvania. He has published numerous articles and boo

reviews.

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xi

Preface

MACV: The Joint Command in the Years of Escalation describes the 

evolution of the command during the period of gradual expansion 

of the American effort in South Vietnam. From its establishment in 

February 1962 as a small, temporary organization to administer an 

assistance program, the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, grew 

by late 1967 into a large, permanent headquarters that directed more 

than half a million American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines in 

a wide range of combat and pacifi cation operations. 

This volume tells the story of MACV’s development as an organization 

and of the command’s role in making and implementing American 

national policy in Southeast Asia. Hence, it treats both national-level 

decisions and military operations from the perspective of the theater 

joint commander. In relation to the United States Army in Vietnam 

series, this volume and its sequel, dealing with the later period of the 

confl ict, will provide a general overview of aspects of the war that are 

covered in much greater detail in the other works. The inclusion of 

this study of a joint command in a series devoted principally to the 

activities of a single service results from two circumstances: that MACV 

throughout its existence was an Army-dominated headquarters and 

that upon the command’s disestablishment its records were placed in 

the custody of the Army’s Offi ce of the Adjutant General. 

The preparation of a work of this scope was possible only with the 

assistance and support of a great many other people. Throughout the 

years, my colleagues in the Southeast Asia Branch of Histories Division at 

the Center of Military History guided me through the sources, read and 

critiqued drafts of chapters, and through many hours of conversation 

broadened and deepened my understanding of the war. Vincent H. 

Demma helped me get started through his encyclopedic knowledge 

of the Center of Military History’s documents on the Vietnam War. 

Charles R. Anderson, Dale W. Andrade, William M. Hammond, Richard 

A. Hunt, George L. MacGarrigle, Joel D. Meyerson, and Adrian G. Traas 

generously permitted me to draw upon their work, which made an 

imprint on mine.

Others at the Center of Military History contributed to this 

book. The Historical Resources and Organizational History Branches 

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xii

were always responsive to my requests for books, documents, an

information, and members of the Production Services Division edite

and proofread the manuscript, designed the maps and charts, an

chose the illustrations.

As chief of the Southeast Asia Branch, John Schlight guided m

early steps on this volume and ensured that I gave due attention t

the role of air power in MACV’s war. I am grateful to a succession o

division chiefs who supervised this project over its lengthy gestation—

Lt. Col. Richard O. Perry; Cols. Robert H. Sholly, William T. Bower

and Clyde L. Jonas; and Richard W. Stewart. Several Chiefs of Militar

History supervised and supported this work. Brig. Gen. Douglas Kinnar

initiated the project and set its direction. Brig. Gens. William A. Stoff

Harold W. Nelson, John W. Mountcastle, and John S. Brown all helpe

it on its way. I owe a special debt of thanks to my current superviso

Brig. Gen. David A. Armstrong (U.S. Army, Ret.), director of the Join

History Offi ce, Joint Chiefs of Staff, for allowing me time after leavin

the Center’s employ to fi nish this volume.

The review panel, chaired by Jeffrey J. Clarke, the Center’s chie

historian, provided useful comments and recommendations. I am 

grateful to panel members—General William A. Knowlton (U.S. Army

Ret.), Brig. Gen. Douglas Kinnard, Larry Berman, Robert Buzzanco, Pau

Miles, William Hammond, John Elsberg, and Cody Phillips. My specia

thanks go to General William B. Rosson, who provided detailed writte

comments on the manuscript.

As appropriate for a volume on a joint command, members of othe

service historical offi ces helped me with advice and access to source

They include William Heimdahl and Wayne Thompson of the Offi c

of Air Force History; Edward J. Marolda of the U.S. Naval Historica

Center; and Jack Shulimson, formerly of the History and Museum

Division, U.S. Marine Corps. Walter Poole of the Joint History Offi c

Joint Chiefs of Staff, read and criticized a draft of the manuscript. 

Like all historians, I could have accomplished little without th

assistance of the staffs of records repositories. David C. Humphrey an

Gary Gallagher, both of whom have since moved on to other position

were of great help at the Lyndon B. Johnson Library. At the U.S. Arm

Military History Institute, Richard J. Sommers, David A. Keogh, Rand

Rakers, and John J. Slonaker guided me through the institute’s extensiv

Vietnam collections. Members of the National Defense Universit

Library staff provided me with access to the papers of Maxwell D

Taylor. Richard L. Boylan and the staff of the National Archives an

Records Administration were responsive to all my requests.

Three participants in the events described in this volume graciousl

consented to be interviewed on their experiences. Paul E. Suplizio

formerly of the MACV J3 offi ce, discussed with me the transition from 

the guerrilla to the big-unit war. George Allen of the Central Intelligenc

Agency provided insight into the order of battle controversy and othe

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aspects of intelligence in Vietnam and also shared with me his teaching 

notes on the subject. James M. Loome recounted his experiences in the 

Analysis Division of CORDS.

Finally, I would like to thank Daniel and Lindy Mings of Austin, 

Texas, for their hospitality during my two visits to the Lyndon B. 

Johnson Library.

It remains only to note that the conclusions and interpretations 

in this book are mine alone and that I am solely responsible for any 

errors.

Washington, D.C. GRAHAM A. COSMAS

30 September 2005

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Contents

Chapter Page

1. A Deepening Commitment and a New Command . . . . . . 3

Beginnings of United States Involvement . . . . . . . . . . 5

Toward the Second Indochina War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

The United States Responds to the New Threat . . . . . . . 15

Creating the Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

2. A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts,

 1962–1963 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

MACV and the Pacifi c Chain of Command . . . . . . . . . 36

MACV and the MAAG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Formation of MACV Headquarters . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

The Component Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

The Debate over Control of Air Power . . . . . . . . . . . 56

A Small But Complicated Command . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

3. From Hope to Frustration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

The Enemy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Developing an Allied Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

The Campaign Falls Apart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

MACV and the Coup Against Diem . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

4. Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation . . . . . . . . . . 117

United States Policy: Picking Up the Pieces . . . . . . . . . 117

Hanoi Prepares for a Larger War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

A New MACV Commander . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

Headquarters Reorganization and Expansion . . . . . . . . 125

MACV: Executive Agent for Pacifi cation? . . . . . . . . . . 139

Struggling for Stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

5. The Beginning of Escalation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

Widening the War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

OPLAN 34A . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Air and Ground Operations in Laos . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Early Planning for the Air War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

After Tonkin Gulf: Reinforcing the South . . . . . . . . . . 167

Air War in the North: Planning and Command . . . . . . 172

The Marines Land at Da Nang . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

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Chapter Pag

6. Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment,

 January–June l965 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187

Plans and Proposals, 1954–1964 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187

Collapse of the CHIEN THANG Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

A Limited Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Three Proposals for Sending Troops . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

Edging into the Ground War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206

Questions of Command and the Concept of Operations . . 212

Where the Question Stood, June 1965 . . . . . . . . . . . 218

7. The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966 . . . . . 227

South Vietnam in Peril . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

Air Power Holds Back the Enemy 230

Decisions for an American Ground War . . . . . . . . . . 232

Implementing Phase I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245

Planning Phase II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252

Decisions at Honolulu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256

8. MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion,

 1965–1967 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

Enlarging the Headquarters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

Planning and Control of Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . 275

Combined Intelligence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 284

The Advisory Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288

Reporting, Research, and Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290

How Joint the Command? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295

9. Controlling U.S. Forces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

Military Assistance Command, Pacifi c Command,

 and the JCS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307

Naval Forces, Vietnam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 310

U.S. Army, Vietnam: A Question of Roles . . . . . . . . . . 314

The Seventh Air Force: A Multiplicity of Masters . . . . . . 320

The Air War in the South: A Single Manager? . . . . . . . 323

The Field Forces and the III Marine Amphibious Force . . . 331

10. The Allies and Pacifi cation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343

The Allies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343

The South Vietnamese: Cooperation and Coordination . . 348

Pacifi cation and Saigon Politics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353

CORDS: A Single Manager at Last . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

11. The Wider Theater . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

Fragmentation of Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

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Chapter Page

The Ho Chi Minh Trail and the Plain of Jars . . . . . . . . 373

Cambodia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379

MACV and ROLLING THUNDER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 382

A Tangled Chain of Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 389

12. An Evolving Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395

Basic Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395

The Initial Concept . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 397

Problems of Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405

More Troops or a New Strategy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 411

Incremental Adjustments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 420

13. An Autumn of Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439

The Public Relations War . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 441

The Order of Battle Controversy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 446

President Johnson Moves To Level Off the War . . . . . . 461

The Enemy Plans an Offensive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 466

14. Conclusion: The Years of Escalation . . . . . . . . . . . . 477

Bibliographical Note . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 495

Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509

Military Map Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 512

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 513

Table

MACV Principal Offi cers at Activation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Charts

No. 

 1. U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, 1964 . . . . . 61

 2. U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam,

 31 December 1964 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

 3. Organization of MACV Headquarters, May 1967 . . . . . . . 276

 4. Pacifi c Command Relationships, 1967. . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

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Maps

No. Pag

 1. Indochina, 1961 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

 2. South Vietnam Corps Areas, 1963 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

 3. Major U.S. and Allied Forces, South Vietnam, 1966 . . . . . 235

 4. Saigon, 1967 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269

 5. Interdiction Areas, Laos, 1965–1967. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 384

 6. ROLLING THUNDER Route Packages, North Vietnam, 1967 . . . 387

 7. Strong Point Obstacle System, 1967 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 424

Illustrations

General Paul D. Harkins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Ho Chi Minh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Prime Minister Ngo Dinh Diem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Walt W. Rostow. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Lt. Gen. Lionel C. McGarr with U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam

 Frederick E. Nolting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Generals Lyman L. Lemnitzer and Maxwell D. Taylor, Secretary

 of Defense Robert S. McNamara, and President

 John F. Kennedy, 1961 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

General Harkins, Admiral Harry D. Felt, and

 Ambassador Nolting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Secretary of Defense McNamara . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Admiral Felt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

MACV Headquarters, 137 Pasteur Street . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Maj. Gen. Richard G. Weede, USMC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

The MACV Staff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Brig. Gen. Rollen H. Anthis, USAF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Vietnamese T–28 Fighter-Bombers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

U.S. B–26 Light Bomber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

H–21 “Flying Banana” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Viet Cong Patrol a Canal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Self-immolation of a Buddhist Priest. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Brig. Gen. Robert H. York, Lt. Col. John P. Vann,

 and Capt. William R. Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Maj. Gen. Duong Van Minh and Nguyen Ngoc . . . . . . . . . . 96

Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge with President Diem . . . . . . 99

Secretary McNamara with South Vietnamese Premier

 Nguyen Khanh and General Taylor . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

General William C. Westmoreland. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

PACAF Chief, General Hunter Harris, USAF, with General

 Westmoreland and Lt. Gen. Joseph Moore, USAF . . . . . 132

Admiral Ulysses S. G. Sharp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Ambassador Maxwell D. Taylor with Secretary McNamara . . . . 142

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Page

U.S. Adviser with a Montagnard Strike Force . . . . . . . . . . . 147

Aftermath of a Mortar Attack at Bien Hoa Air Base . . . . . . . . 159

U.S. Ambassador to Laos William H. Sullivan . . . . . . . . . . . 163

President Lyndon B. Johnson with Secretary of Defense

 McNamara and Ambassador Taylor. . . . . . . . . . . . . 166

McGeorge Bundy with General Westmoreland . . . . . . . . . . 173

Military Dependents Depart South Vietnam. . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Marines in Defensive Positions After Landing at Da Nang . . . . 180

A Viet Cong Soldier Wielding an AK–47 Rifl e . . . . . . . . . . . 193

U.S. Army Helicopters Cover South Vietnamese Marines

 near Binh Gia, December 1964 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194

F–4B Phantom II Aircraft . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

General Harold K. Johnson. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

The Joint Chiefs of Staff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

Secretary of Defense McNamara with Nguyen Van Thieu,

 South Vietnamese Chief of State . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212

Marines Wading Across a River. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

Chief of State Thieu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

Air Vice Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

A B–52 ARC LIGHT Bombing Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232

General Earle G. Wheeler. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

Ambassdor-Designate Henry Cabot Lodge, Secretary of Defense

 McNamara, Chief of State Thieu, and Premier Ky . . . . . 242

1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) Soldiers Arrive at Qui Nhon . . 246

Aerial View of the Cam Ranh Bay Complex . . . . . . . . . . . . 247

Maj. Gen. Stanley R. Larsen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248

General Wheeler, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, and President

 Johnson at the February 1966 Honolulu Conference . . . 257

MACV Headquarters at Tan Son Nhut . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270

General Westmoreland receives the Boy Scout Silver Buffalo

 Award for Distinguished Service as Generals Harold

 Johnson and Creighton W. Abrams, Jr., Look On . . . . . 274

General Abrams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

Lt. Gen. John R. Chaisson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279

Maj. Gen. Joseph A. McChristian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

Admiral Ulysses S. G. Sharp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309

Rear Adm. Norvell G. Ward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311

A Vessel of the Riverine Force Patrols the Mekong Delta Waters . 313

Brig. Gen. John Norton. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 316

USARV Headquarters at Long Binh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317

General John P. McConnell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322

Lt. Gen. William W. Momyer Receives His Fourth Star from 

 Generals Westmoreland and Abrams . . . . . . . . . . . . 326

Maj. Gen. Lewis W. Walt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333

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Pag

Brig. Gen. Edward H. de Saussure, with Korean Maj. Gen.

 Chae Myung Shin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346

South Korean Troops Inspect a Dead Viet Cong Guerrilla . . . . 347

Lt. Gen. Le Nghen Khan, General Cao Van Vien, and Lt. 

 Col. Ted Gordiner. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350

Lt. Gen. Nguyen Chanh Thi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355

Generals Westmoreland and Wheeler with Ambassador

 Ellsworth Bunker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360

Brig. Gen. Donald D. Blackburn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 376

Prince Souvanna Phouma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 377

Prince Norodom Sihanouk with President Kennedy. . . . . . . . 380

Ambassador Bunker and General Westmoreland Greet

 Secretary of Defense McNamara on Arrival in Saigon . . . 388

Lt. Gen. Victor H. Krulak . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403

General Westmoreland Tours III Marine Amphibious Force 

 Headquarters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409

Dr. Alain Enthoven . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 418

Armored Vehicles of the 11th Armored Cavalry Advance During 

 Operation JUNCTION CITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421

General Westmoreland with Barry Zorthian . . . . . . . . . . . . 440

Antiwar Protesters at the Pentagon, October 1967 . . . . . . . . 442

General Westmoreland Addresses a Joint Session of Congress,

 April 1967 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 444

CIA Director Richard Helms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451

Maj. Gen. Phillip B. Davidson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453

Col. Daniel O. Graham. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453

Front_Matter 575.indd xx 
MACV

The Joint Command

in the

Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Front_Matter 575.indd Sec1:1 
Front_Matter 575.indd Sec1:2 
1

A Deepening Commitment and a New 

Command

On 13 February 1962, a tall, gray-haired, 

athletic-looking United States Army offi cer stepped off an airplane at Saigon’s Tan 

Son Nhut Air Base. He was General Paul Donal 

Harkins, commander of the United States 

Military Assistance Command, Vietnam 

(MACV), the headquarters newly organized 

to direct expanding American participation 

in the war between the Republic of Vietnam 

and its Communist-led insurgent adversaries, popularly known as the Viet Cong. Harkins, a principal staff offi cer under General 

George S. Patton in World War II and most 

recently deputy commander in chief of the 

U.S. Army, Pacifi c (USARPAC), came to Vietnam with a solid record as a military planner 

and administrator and with a reputation for 

tact and diplomatic fi nesse. In a brief arrival 

statement, he expressed “admiration” for 

the Vietnamese people and declared that he 

regarded his Vietnam assignment as “a great challenge,” which he accepted with “determination and humility.”1

As General Harkins prepared to assume his duties, his command already included almost 5,000 American military personnel. Some were 

engaged in advising and assisting the Armed Forces of the Republic 

of Vietnam (RVNAF); others, in increasing numbers, served in Army, 

Air Force, Navy, and Marine units providing direct combat and logistical support to the Vietnamese or, in the case of the Navy, patrolling 

Indochinese coastal waters. These Americans, especially advisers and 

helicopter crews, were beginning to come under, and return, Viet Cong 

fi re. Back in the United States, there was talk of an undeclared war 

in Southeast Asia, coupled with public demands that the administraGeneral Harkins (NARA)

Chap 1.indd 3 
Ho Chi Minh Trail

Tonle Sap

GULF

O F

TONKIN

GULF

O F

THAILAND

SOUTH

CHINA

SEA

Red River

Black River

Mekong River

Meko n g River

HAINAN

Con Son

Phu Quoc

DEMARCATION LINE

BURMA

NORTH

VIETNAM

CHINA

CHINA

THAILAND

LAOS

CAMBODIA

SOUTH

VIETNAM

Lao Cai

Lang Son

HANOI

Haiphong

Dien Bien Phu

Luang Prabang

Vinh

Dong Hoi

VIENTIANE

Udon Thani

(Udorn)

Savannakhet

Quang Tri

Hue

Da Nang

Paksé

Nakhon Ratchasima

(Korat)

BANGKOK

Kratie

Pleiku

Kontum

Qui Nhon

Da Lat

Ban Me Thuot

Loc Ninh

Snuol

PHNOM PENH

Sihanoukville

Svay Rieng

Can Tho

SAIGON

INDOCHINA

1961

0 150

Miles

MAP 1

Ho Chi Minh Trail

Tonle Sap

GULF

O F

TONKIN

GULF

O F

THAILAND

SOUTH

CHINA

SEA

Red River

Black River

Mekong River

Meko n g River

HAINAN

Con Son

Phu Quoc

DEMARCATION LINE

BURMA

NORTH

VIETNAM

CHINA

CHINA

THAILAND

LAOS

CAMBODIA

SOUTH

VIETNAM

Lao Cai

Lang Son

HANOI

Haiphong

Dien Bien Phu

Luang Prabang

Vinh

Dong Hoi

VIENTIANE

Udon Thani

(Udorn)

Savannakhet

Quang Tri

Hue

Da Nang

Paksé

Nakhon Ratchasima

(Korat)

BANGKOK

Kratie

Pleiku

Kontum

Qui Nhon

Da Lat

Ban Me Thuot

Loc Ninh

Snuol

PHNOM PENH

Sihanoukville

Svay Rieng

Can Tho

SAIGON

INDOCHINA

1961

0 150

Miles

Chap 1.indd 4 
5

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

tion of President John F. Kennedy 

explain candidly to the American 

people its plans and purposes in intensifying U.S. involvement in the 

Vietnamese confl ict.2

Beginnings of United States 

Involvement

The struggle in which General 

Harkins and his command were 

engaged had been in progress since 

the end of World War II. Its initial 

antagonists were France and the 

Communist-controlled Viet Minh 

(more formally, the Vietnamese 

Independence League, or Viet Nam 

Doc Lap Dong Minh Hoi).

3 As the 

principal Vietnamese nationalist 

organization, the Viet Minh owed 

its survival and success in large part 

to the skill and determination of its 

founder and principal leader, Ho 

Chi Minh. (Map 1) Ho, a dedicated 

Vietnamese nationalist, became a 

Communist while living in France 

in the early 1920s and was trained 

in Moscow as an agent of the Comintern (the Communist International whose aim was to overthrow 

the “international bourgeoisie”).

By the outbreak of World War 

II, he had recruited a party cadre of 

young intellectuals and had outlined a revolutionary strategy calling for an alliance of urban workers, peasants, and bourgeois nationalists in a broad patriotic front covertly dominated by a Communist 

hard core. The front’s mission was to employ guerrilla warfare in the 

countryside and propaganda and subversion in the cities to destroy 

French authority in a protracted confl ict and to establish an independent Vietnam governed according to Marxist-Leninist principles.

Ho and the Viet Minh exploited to the full the near-anarchy created in much of Vietnam by the Japanese occupation, which coexisted 

with a weakened, discredited French colonial administration. By V-J 

Day, the Viet Minh possessed signifi cant military forces equipped with 

captured Japanese and French weapons. Their clandestine village and 

Ho Chi Minh 

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 1.indd 5 
6

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

hamlet People’s Revolutionary Committees exercised effective politica

control of much of the countryside, especially in northern and centra

Vietnam. In August 1945, as the Japanese surrendered and the Nation

alist Chinese prepared to occupy northern Indochina (with the Britis

in the south), the Viet Minh assumed political authority over most o

northern Vietnam, including the capital city of Hanoi. There, early i

September, Ho proclaimed Vietnamese independence and establishe

the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). Meanwhile the French

with British assistance, took control of most of southern Vietnam, in

cluding the southern capital, Saigon.4

During 1946 war broke out between France and the Viet Minh. Th

French enjoyed initial military success. They drove the Viet Minh ou

of Hanoi and most other towns in northern and central Vietnam an

infl icted heavy casualties. But the Viet Minh proved resilient. Exploi

ing popular nationalism and their own organizational and propagand

skills, they kept clandestine control of most of the rural population

Their local guerrillas continually harassed French troops and terro

ized pro-French Vietnamese; and their regular forces, who increase

steadily in numbers, evaded French offensives and counterattacke

where they had the advantage. In a belated effort to counter Viet Min

political appeal, the French in March 1949 created a client Vietnames

state under Emperor Bao Dai, a surviving member of Vietnam’s preco

lonial imperial dynasty. The regime was intended as a rallying point fo

the considerable number of Vietnamese nationalists who opposed Ho

Communists, but the French granted it so little real sovereignty that 

never became a viable political alternative to the Viet Minh.

By mid-1950 the war was going badly for the French. The Viet Minh

with advisers and heavy weapons provided by the newly victoriou

Chinese Communists, fi elded a regular force of about 120,000 men

organized into divisions. With at least an equal number of guerrilla

and village militia at their disposal, they began winning victories ove

French forces. The government in Paris, with military and fi nancia

exhaustion looming and with home public opinion turning against a

apparently futile colonial struggle, directed increasingly urgent appea

for aid to the United States.

The administration of President Harry S. Truman initially kep

its distance from the Indochina war, which many American offi cia

viewed as a losing French effort to preserve outmoded colonialism

However, the U.S. association with France under the North Atlant

Treaty, coupled with mounting concern over Viet Minh ties to the So

viet Union and to the Communist People’s Republic of China, both o

which recognized the DRV in January 1950, led the administration t

extend to French Indochina a policy of containment. The State Depar

ment and the Joint Chiefs of Staff both concluded that the fall of Indo

china to the Viet Minh would open all Southeast Asia to Communi

aggression and subversion.

Chap 1.indd 6 
7

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

Accepting this assessment, President Truman, on 4 February 1950, 

formally recognized pro-French regimes in Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam, known collectively as the Associated States of Indochina. A month 

later, he approved $15 million in military aid for the French forces there. 

The outbreak of the Korean War in June merely added urgency to a commitment already made and induced a doubling of the amount of aid. 

At the end of the year, after the French signed a treaty increasing the 

Associated States’ control over their own affairs, and after they agreed 

with Bao Dai to form a Vietnamese National Army to fi ght alongside 

the French expeditionary force, the United States joined with France 

and the Associated States in a mutual assistance pact. Under it, the 

United States promised aid to the other signatories, to be administered 

by an American military assistance advisory group (MAAG). By these 

decisions, the Truman administration committed the United States to a 

long, tortuous struggle against Vietnamese communism.

In August 1950, even before the assistance pact was signed, the Indochina MAAG began work in Saigon, the seat of the Bao Dai government and the French military headquarters. Gradually expanded from 

its initial 128 offi cers and enlisted men to over 300, the group spent 

most of its time attempting to validate French aid requests and monitoring the turnover and use of American-supplied equipment, standard 

tasks of such U.S. advisory groups around the world.5

During the ensuing three years, a massive infusion of American aircraft, artillery, vehicles, infantry weapons, and munitions enabled the 

French to stave off defeat—but not much more. In a grim attritional 

struggle, the Viet Minh bled the French expeditionary force in largeunit battles in northern and central Vietnam and kept up guerrilla activity and subversion everywhere. To the frustration of the Americans, 

the French refused to accept tactical advice and obstructed U.S. efforts to develop the indigenous anti-Communist political and military 

forces. As 1953 came to an end, a war-weary French government was 

edging toward a negotiated settlement. The Viet Minh also were feeling the strain of the long, increasingly violent struggle. Their principal 

foreign backers, the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China, 

for their own reasons, wanted an early end to hostilities—the Soviets 

to gain a respite to deal with the aftermath of Joseph Stalin’s death; the 

Chinese Communists to recover from the Korean War and consolidate 

their newly won control of their country.6

Early in 1954 the United States, the Soviet Union, and their principal allies agreed to hold an Indochina peace conference at Geneva in 

May. To strengthen their negotiating position, the Viet Minh launched 

a fi nal offensive. In March 1954, 35,000 Communist regulars, well 

equipped with artillery, laid siege to 15,000 French Union troops at 

Dien Bien Phu in western Tonkin. During the ensuing weeks, they 

slowly but surely overcame the French defenders. The garrison surrendered on 7 May, the opening day of the Geneva Conference. After 

Chap 1.indd 7 
8

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

considering and rejecting proposals for U.S. military intervention t

save Dien Bien Phu, President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Secretary o

State John Foster Dulles resigned themselves to a distasteful negotiate

settlement. They set in motion efforts to supplant France in shoring u

whatever was left of the anti-Communist position in Indochina an

began planning for a Southeast Asia collective defense organization.7

In July, after prolonged negotiations, the contending parties in In

dochina and the concerned outside powers—the United States, Bri

ain, the Soviet Union, and the People’s Republic of China—arrived at 

compromise settlement. The French and Viet Minh agreed to a cease

fi re under international supervision and to a temporary partition o

Vietnam along the 17th Parallel, which was to be a demilitarized zon

French forces were to regroup south of the parallel and the Viet Min

to its north. Neither side was to introduce new troops or equipmen

except as replacements. Separate from the cease-fi re agreement, a

participants in the conference except the United States and Bao Dai

government signed a declaration calling for nationwide elections i

1956 to choose a government for a unifi ed Vietnam. Under still othe

agreements, Laos and Cambodia became independent, neutral state

under non-Communist regimes. In Laos, the Viet Minh–sponsored in

surgents, the Pathet Lao, received a regroupment zone of two prov

inces. The United States made no secret of its disgust at the surrende

of half of Vietnam but pledged not to disrupt the agreements.

Far from establishing peace, the diplomats at Geneva drew th

lines for the next stage of the confl ict. In effect, the Viet Minh ha

accepted half a loaf at the insistence of their Russian and Chines

comrades. Their revolution was politically and militarily well deve

oped and had made itself a state in the northern half of Vietnam. I

the south, a strong political underground and guerrilla forces wer

poised to resume the liberation struggle when circumstances permi

ted. By contrast, the Vietnamese anti-Communists, grouped aroun

Bao Dai’s regime, were fragmented and discredited by their associatio

with France. For their part, the Americans had no intention of writin

off Indochina. U.S. civilian and military leaders believed that Frenc

mistakes, in particular failure to support Indochina’s anti-Communi

nationalists, had caused the defeat of 1954. Confi dent that they coul

do better, the Americans were bent on trying to save at least Sout

Vietnam from communism.

Toward the Second Indochina War

Although the Geneva declaration implied only a temporary part

tion of Vietnam, both sides organized their halves of the country a

separate states. In the north, the Viet Minh established a thorough

going Marxist-Leninist regime, with the title Democratic Republic o

Vietnam. In the south, the French, the Americans, and the anti-Com

Chap 1.indd 8 
9

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

munist regime that the French had set up under Emperor Bao Dai also 

tried to organize a functioning state. They faced an almost impossible task. The Bao Dai government exercised little political authority 

outside Saigon, the southern capital; its 170,000-man army was an 

aggregation of poorly armed and trained small units rather than an integrated, cohesive force. Saigon’s police were controlled by a gangster 

syndicate, the Binh Xuyen, which had its own private army and was 

a longtime ally of the French. Outside the capital, two political-religious sects, the Hoa Hao and Cao Dai, also with armies of their own, 

dominated portions of the countryside. The Viet Minh underground 

was still present in much of the rest. As if these adversities were not 

enough, South Vietnam faced the problem of resettling over 800,000 

Catholic refugees from the north who had fl ed the prospect of life 

under communism. Bao Dai’s prime minister, Ngo Dinh Diem, who 

took offi ce in June 1954, was a proud, reclusive Catholic intellectual, 

disliked about equally by the French, the Vietnamese army commander, the Binh Xuyen, and the sects.8

In spite of these unpromising circumstances, President Dwight D. 

Eisenhower committed his administration to preserving South Vietnam and the other non-Communist Indochinese states. The administration in mid-August 1954 expanded the mission of the Indochina 

Military Assistance Advisory Group, which had supported the French 

military effort, to include reorganizing and training the armed forces 

Prime Minister Diem (NARA)

Chap 1.indd 9 
10

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

of South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Besides assigning the train

ing mission to the advisory group, President Eisenhower on 20 Augu

approved a National Security Council policy statement pledging th

United States to “make every possible effort, not openly inconsisten

with . . . the [Geneva] armistice agreements, to defeat Communist sub

version and infl uence and to maintain and support friendly non-Com

munist governments” in Indochina. The following month, the Unite

States joined Great Britain, France, New Zealand, Australia, Pakistan

the Philippines, and Thailand in signing a collective security pact fo

Southeast Asia and forming a loose regional defense organization, th

Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). Its members pledged uni

ed action if any of them was attacked; in a separate protocol they ex

tended their protection to the Indochinese states.

The year following these decisions witnessed what seemed at th

time to be a political near miracle in South Vietnam. Prime Ministe

Diem, whose chances of survival most observers had rated minima

at best, displayed unexpected determination and staying power. Wit

American help (and money), Diem fi rst secured control of the Sout

Vietnamese armed forces. He then defeated or bought off the Bin

Xuyen, Cao Dai, and Hoa Hao. In October 1955 he staged a referen

dum in which South Vietnamese voters deposed Bao Dai as head o

state and elected Diem president of a new Republic of Vietnam. Th

following year the French withdrew their last military advisers, the

remaining expeditionary troops, and their high commissioner from 

South Vietnam. They left the United States with a clear fi eld for its a

tempt to create an anti-Communist bastion in Indochina.

For three or four years after the tumultuous events of 1955, 

seemed that the United States, through Diem, was achieving its goa

Bolstered by some $190 million a year in American military and eco

nomic aid, Diem enforced at least a degree of governmental authorit

throughout South Vietnam. His regime resettled the refugees, achieve

a measure of economic prosperity, and promulgated what was, o

paper, a progressive land reform policy. By means of a series of hars

and indiscriminate but effective anti-Communist “denunciation” cam

paigns, Diem made progress in destroying the remaining Viet Min

organization in the countryside. His troops kept the surviving sect an

Communist guerrillas on the run, and his government attempted t

establish mass organizations of its own to control and indoctrinate th

people. 9 In1956 Diem refused to hold, or even discuss, the all-Vietnam 

elections called for in the Geneva declaration. The Communist blo

acquiesced with only minimal protest. Diem’s regime received diplo

matic recognition from most non-Communist nations.

With the departure of the French and the consolidation of Diem

power, the U.S. Military Assistance Advisory Group took on the task o

organizing, training, and advising the armed forces of the Republic o

Vietnam. In November 1955 the Indochina MAAG became the Mil

Chap 1.indd 10 
11

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

tary Assistance Advisory Group, Vietnam, in acknowledgment of the 

separation of Vietnam from the other independent Associated States. 

The United States subsequently set up separate military assistance organizations for Cambodia and Laos.

In South Vietnam, the MAAG constituted a component of the United States country team headed by the American ambassador. Militarily, 

it was a joint entity under the commander in chief of U.S. forces in 

the Pacifi c (CINCPAC). The advisory group, which grew from an initial strength of 342 offi cers and enlisted men in 1954 to 685 in 1960, 

included sections in charge of support for the Vietnamese Army, Navy, 

Marine Corps, and Air Force, as well as small general and special staffs. 

It assigned advisers to Vietnamese corps and division headquarters, the 

armed forces schools and training centers, and major logistic installations. MAAG offi cers also worked with the Ministry of Defense and 

with the Joint General Staff (JGS), South Vietnam’s highest military 

command element.10

Both MAAG chiefs of the early Diem era, Lt. Gen. John W. (“Iron 

Mike”) O’Daniel (April 1954–November 1955) and Lt. Gen. Samuel T. 

(“Hanging Sam”) Williams (November 1955–August 1960), concentrated on preparing South Vietnam to resist a conventional invasion 

across the 17th Parallel. Their objective was to build a lightly equipped 

regular ground force that, supported by a small air force and a coastal 

navy, could delay a North Vietnamese or Chinese incursion until U.S. 

or SEATO reinforcements arrived. Both commanders assumed the same 

units could readily counter any guerrilla challenge to the regime. Neither O’Daniel nor Williams envisioned that internal rebellion alone 

would bring South Vietnam to the verge of collapse.

By 1959 the advisory group, through hard, persistent work, had 

brought the South Vietnamese armed forces a long way from the ragtag collection of disparate units that the French had left behind three 

years before. The Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the largest 

component of the 150,000-man force, consisted of seven infantry divisions patterned on those of the U.S. Army in World War II: four separate armored battalions, an airborne brigade, a marine group, and a 

helicopter squadron. Its chain of command ran from the Joint General 

Staff through corps and military regions to the divisions. South Vietnam possessed a modest air force of fi ghter-bombers, transports, and 

light observation planes and a small navy of subchasers, minesweepers, and amphibious craft. With American assistance, the armed forces 

had developed a well-conceived system of schools and training centers; 

many South Vietnamese offi cers had undergone additional military 

schooling in the United States. On the surface, the RVNAF seemed to 

be the “crack, combat-ready force” described by one optimistic American journalist. Most U.S. offi cials considered it more than adequate 

to ensure internal security and to hold back any drive from the north 

pending U.S. and SEATO intervention.

Chap 1.indd 11 
12

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Sadly, the truth was different. The Vietnamese armed forces ha

severe weaknesses rooted in their nation’s politics and society. Jea

ous of his power and determined not to allow a rival to concentrat

armed force against him, President Diem divided military authorit

wherever possible, totally disrupting the formal chain of command

The entire offi cer corps was riddled with corruption and political fa

voritism; promotion went to men subservient to Diem rather than t

those of proven professional competence, who were few enough i

any case. Weak leadership, the social gulf between urban upper- an

middle-class offi cers and peasant soldiers, and the absence of basi

amenities and services for the enlisted men undermined morale. Op

erational commitments, especially as the Communist insurgency re

vived, forced curtailment of individual and unit training—even basi

training. 

MAAG advisers tried to remedy these failings—with at best limite

success. The Vietnamese simply ignored American advice that did no

suit them. Advisers, serving eleven-month tours, usually lacked pro

fi ciency in the Vietnamese language and familiarity with Vietnames

politics and culture; most had diffi culty fi nding out what was going o

in their units, not to mention infl uencing their counterparts. Makin

matters worse were an inadequate readiness reporting system and 

tendency—especially under General Williams—to discourage advers

adviser reports on Vietnamese units that might refl ect unfavorably o

MAAG leadership and work to the detriment of the allies’ morale. Thu

for a long time, the advisory group headquarters remained unaware o

the extent of the dry rot.11

The armed forces refl ected the state of Diem’s regime as a whol

an impressive facade with fundamental weaknesses behind it. The re

gime’s defi ciencies grew worse with time. At the top President Diem

suspicious of everyone including the Americans, increasingly concen

trated all political power in his own hands and in those of a shrinkin

circle of family members and sycophantic retainers. The closed, auto

cratic nature of the regime, and its ruthless suppression of all dissen

alienated a widening spectrum of non-Communist Vietnamese. In th

countryside, the remnants of the Cao Dai and Hoa Hao were hostil

to Diem. His anti-Communist campaigns, while gravely damaging th

party organization in the villages, also infl icted injury and injustice o

innocent peasants, making more enemies for the government. Diem

land reform program became bogged down in administrative ineffi 

ciency and corruption; in practice, it did little to improve the lot of th

rural poor. In the Central Highlands, Diem’s policy of settling ethn

Vietnamese on the land of the indigenous tribes, the so-called Montag

nards, further turned those people—ever suspicious of the Vietnames

—against Saigon. By the late 1950s, the Diem regime owed its contin

ued survival more to inaction by its enemies than to its own successe

—and enemy inaction was coming to an end. 

Chap 1.indd 12 
13

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

Ho Chi Minh and his colleagues accepted the Geneva settlement as 

a temporary necessity but never abandoned their ultimate objective: a 

unifi ed, Communist-ruled Vietnam dominating the rest of Indochina. 

Under the cease-fi re agreement, they withdrew from South Vietnam to 

the north perhaps 100,000 troops and political cadres while leaving another 10,000 in the south to maintain the core of their movement. Initially, a number of constraints prevented their use of these forces, and 

of the battle-hardened DRV regular army, to fi nish off the shaky southern state. In the immediate post-Geneva years, Hanoi had all it could 

do to rebuild the war-shattered economy of North Vietnam while at 

the same time restructuring society along Marxist-Leninist lines. North 

Vietnam’s international sponsors, the Soviet Union and China, were 

not disposed to support an assault on the south, especially at the risk of 

a direct military confrontation with the United States. In addition, the 

Hanoi leaders and their allies with good reason doubted the political 

viability of South Vietnam and probably expected it to collapse of its 

own accord. Hence, North Vietnam and its allies let pass Diem’s refusal 

to hold the 1956 elections. Under instructions from the party in Hanoi, 

the Viet Minh cadres in the south confi ned their activities to political 

agitation and party and front-group organization. In the main, they 

adhered to these directives even as Diem’s army and police uprooted 

their organizations and arrested and killed their members.12

Between 1957 and 1961 Hanoi, with the acquiescence and limited 

support of the Soviet Union and China, launched a new revolutionary war in the south, aimed at overthrowing the Diem regime. Ostensibly, the uprising was an indigenous southern response to an oppressive government, without visible connection to North Vietnam, 

Vietnamese communism, or the Viet Minh. In fact, it was organized 

and directed by a unifi ed national Communist party headquartered in 

Hanoi that received a clandestine and unacknowledged but growing 

amount of manpower and materiel assistance from North Vietnam. 

Early in 1957, responding to Diem’s inroads against the southern infrastructure, the northern party endorsed a campaign of assassination 

and terrorism against local offi cials of the Saigon regime, already begun 

by activists in parts of the south. Additionally, it directed accelerated 

party organization and the formation of small military units. Two years 

later, in January 1959, the Fifteenth Plenum of the Communist Party 

Central Committee, meeting in Hanoi, secretly ordered the launching 

of an armed struggle aimed at using the “political force of the masses” 

in concert with military action to bring down Diem. In the same year 

the North Vietnamese began sending back south the trained military 

and political functionaries who had regrouped north of the 17th Parallel in 1954, along with a growing amount of specialized equipment. 

These infi ltrators, some 2,000 per year during 1959 and 1960, traveled 

by junk down the coast or by a land route through eastern Laos that 

became known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail. In May 1959, North Vietnam 

Chap 1.indd 13 
14

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

set up a special military command to improve the trail and manag

traffi c along it.

Other decisions and organizational steps followed. In Septembe

1960 a national congress of the Vietnam Workers’ Party (the offi cia

name of the Communist Party) declared liberation of the south an

national reunifi cation to be of equal importance with completing th

socialist revolution in the north. Three months later, repeating th

broad-front tactics of the Viet Minh, the party created the Nationa

Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam (NLF), a coalition of south

ern social, religious, and political groups that ostensibly directed th

growing resistance to Diem and that in turn was run by a Communi

inner core. To strengthen its own political and military command an

control in the south, early in 1961 Hanoi reactivated the Central O

fi ce for South Vietnam (COSVN), a southern branch of the party Cen

tral Committee that had directed operations in the region during th

French war and had been disbanded in 1954. About the same time th

party issued orders for still greater intensifi cation of the struggle, em

phasizing expansion of the military effort.13

In the south, the insurrection, once unleashed, made rapid prog

ress. The stay-behind Viet Minh cadres, soon reinforced from th

north, put in motion a threefold campaign of terrorism, rural an

urban political agitation, and military action. To break down Diem

grass-roots authority, agents and guerrilla squads kidnapped or kille

village, hamlet, and district offi cials; the number of victims increase

each year, amounting to over 2,000 in 1960 alone. Armed propagand

teams moved into the villages. They recruited adherents by exploitin

the many popular grievances against Diem and where possible set u

local shadow governments.

Starting as early as 1957–1958 in a few places, and more generall

after 1959, the insurgents raised military forces on the pattern of th

war with the French: hamlet militia, local guerrillas, and mobile mai

force units, all formally known as the People’s Liberation Armed Force

(PLAF). The Diem regime quickly coined another name for them: “Vie

Cong,” a derogatory term for Vietnamese Communists, which becam

their common designation among South Vietnamese and American

In platoon, company, and occasionally battalion strength, and in esca

lating intensity year by year, the PLAF ambushed government units an

raided small, isolated outposts, often to capture arms and ammunition

Under the test of combat, weak ARVN leadership, training defi ciencie

and lackluster morale produced an embarrassingly high rate of weapo

losses in small engagements and an all too common failure by larg

units even to fi nd the Viet Cong, let alone engage and destroy them. B

the end of 1960, the PLAF, counting all categories of its forces, had a

estimated 15,000 men under arms; the Saigon government’s authorit

in portions of rural South Vietnam had all but ceased to exist. Wha

came to be called the Second Indochina War was well under way.14

Chap 1.indd 14 
15

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

The United States Responds to the New Threat

In its early stages, the revived insurgency largely escaped the attention of both the United States country team and the Diem regime. The 

Americans had no intelligence network of their own in rural Vietnam, 

where most of the enemy activity occurred. Both they and the South 

Vietnamese government relied on the fragmented, poorly managed 

intelligence services. Those agencies, run by people mainly interested 

in keeping in favor with Diem, were slow to report bad news, thereby 

denying the allies early warning of the developing threat. Only in late 

1959 and early 1960, as Viet Cong military activity intensifi ed, did both 

the country team and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) begin reporting that a nationwide insurgency was under way and receiving 

signifi cant support from North Vietnam. They also called attention to 

increasing disaffection with the Diem regime among otherwise antiCommunist elements. An abortive military coup against Diem in November 1960 demonstrated that discontent existed even within the 

armed forces themselves.15

As early as 1955 a CIA estimate had declared that “should the Viet 

Minh initiate large-scale guerrilla operations supported by substantial 

infi ltration from the north, the South Vietnamese government would 

be hard-pressed” and probably would require outside military assistance to survive. Nevertheless, during the late 1950s American contingency plans for Southeast Asia, prepared by the U.S. Pacifi c Command 

(PACOM), concentrated on deployment of American and SEATO forces 

to counter a conventional North Vietnamese and Chinese offensive 

across the Demilitarized Zone and down the Mekong valley. MAAG defense plans, supporting those of the Pacifi c Command, also were directed toward a Korea-style confl ict. The advisory group did recognize the 

need for local paramilitary forces to keep order in rural districts. However, it and the U.S. Operations Mission (USOM), the civilian foreign 

economic aid agency, engaged in a prolonged jurisdictional wrangle 

over responsibility for training and assisting the Diem government’s 

several overlapping rural militias. This dispute, which also involved 

disagreements over the organization and missions of the local units, 

prevented development of what should have been the government’s 

fi rst line of defense against the Viet Cong.16

During 1960, as the new threat became apparent, the United States 

began increasing its assistance to South Vietnam. It sent additional arms 

and equipment to Saigon’s forces, including more modern fi eld radios 

and helicopters. When President Diem decided to organize counterguerrilla ranger units, the United States provided Army Special Forces 

offi cers and enlisted men to help train the new companies. Various 

agencies, including the MAAG, began making comprehensive civilmilitary counterinsurgency plans for South Vietnam. Late in the year, 

at joint State and Defense Department direction, the Saigon country 

Chap 1.indd 15 
16

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

team assembled an overall plan for U.S. support of a South Vietnames

“national emergency effort” to defeat the Viet Cong and pacify th

country. This Counterinsurgency Plan, which the team dispatched t

Washington in January 1961, called for a U.S.-fi nanced increase o

20,000 men in the RVNAF and for additional American military an

training aid to the paramilitary forces. Partly resolving the MAAG

USOM jurisdictional dispute, the plan recommended transfer of on

paramilitary component, the Civil Guard, from the USOM-advised In

terior Ministry to the MAAG-advised Defense Ministry. In return fo

this increased American assistance, President Diem was to broade

the political base of his regime, reduce corruption, restore a coheren

military chain of command, unify his intelligence effort, and improv

civic action and psychological warfare programs.

The Counterinsurgency Plan fi t in well with the thinking of newl

inaugurated President John F. Kennedy. Much impressed by the threa

to fragile developing countries of Communist-supported insurgen

cies, Kennedy and his national security advisers from their fi rst day

in offi ce began prodding the government to develop a comprehen

sive response to this new challenge. Under White House urging, in

teragency coordinating bodies and study groups proliferated, as di

new civilian and military staffs and training programs concerne

with preventing or defeating insurgencies. The Offi ce of the Secre

tary of Defense, for example, created an Offi ce of Special Assistant fo

Counterinsurgency and Special Activities (SACSA) within the Join

Staff. Similarly, the Army appointed a special assistant to the chie

of staff for special warfare activities. The other armed services too

comparable steps. Counterinsurgency-oriented Army elements, nota

bly the green beret–wearing Special Forces, enjoyed increased offi cia

interest, resources, and public visibility. The long-term effectivenes

of the Kennedy team in redirecting the government toward meetin

the unique requirements of counterinsurgency is debatable; but th

president’s interest in the subject generated much activity and mad

all but inevitable a deeper U.S. commitment to beleaguered Sout

Vietnam.17

The administration’s counterinsurgency theorists, most notabl

White House Deputy Special Assistant for National Security Affai

Walt W. Rostow, approached the challenge of Communist-infl uence

uprisings in Asia, Africa, and Latin America on the assumption tha

those movements were rooted in social injustice and economic un

derdevelopment. Local Communists exploited the resulting legitimat

grievances, especially those of the peasants, to build revolutionar

movements aimed at the seizure by force of national power. To defea

these efforts, the United States, while providing military assistance an

advice to threatened allies, also had to persuade established regimes t

promote economic growth and to regain the allegiance of their peopl

by making necessary political and social changes. This combination o

Chap 1.indd 16 
17

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

military action with development and reform was the essence of what 

Kennedy and his advisers called counterinsurgency.

Where armed revolt was in progress, as in South Vietnam, counterinsurgency received practical implementation in the process known 

as pacifi cation. A term that originated in nineteenth century French 

wars of conquest in North Africa, pacifi cation denoted efforts both to 

recapture territory from insurgents and to win the allegiance of the 

territory’s inhabitants. Pacifi cation began with military operations to 

expel rebel armed forces from selected areas. In the wake of the soldiers would come government police to uproot the insurgent political 

underground and offi cials to reestablish local administration and public services. Then would follow measures to improve the lives of the 

people: new schools, clinics, and roads, as well as redistribution of land 

to the poor. These good works sought to win the peasants’ allegiance 

to the central government. As a fi nal step, participating local governments would be established at the hamlet and village levels, organized 

for self-government and armed to prevent the return of the insurgents. 

Critical to the success of pacifi cation was the closest possible coordination of military and civilian activity at every level from the national 

capital to the rural hamlet.18

At the outset, Vietnam’s neighboring state, Laos, posed a more urgent problem for Kennedy than did Vietnam, and one that seemed 

more like a civil war between conventional armies than a true guerrilla 

insurgency. The Geneva settlement had established in Laos a three-way 

balance of power between the Communist Pathet Lao, which controlled 

territory bordering on North Vietnam; a neutralist government under 

Prince Souvanna Phouma; and a military-based anti-Communist faction led by Prince Boun Oum and General Phoumi Nosavan. Since the 

Geneva Agreements permitted Laos to accept foreign military assistance 

for its own defense, the United States fi nanced, equipped, and trained 

the 25,000-man Royal Laotian Army by means of a thinly disguised advisory group called the Programs Evaluation Offi ce. It also conducted a 

variety of covert anti-Communist paramilitary activities. As a result, by 

the end of the Eisenhower administration the United States had secured 

the overthrow of Souvanna Phouma and the installation of a more 

overtly pro-American regime under Boun Oum and Phoumi Nosavan. 

Fighting broke out between the Royal Laotian Army and the Pathet Lao, 

whose forces received arms and equipment from the Soviet Union and 

troops and advisers from the North Vietnamese. With this backing, the 

Pathet Lao soon gained the advantage over the government.

After a careful review of the situation in Laos, Kennedy decided 

that U.S. armed intervention was neither militarily nor politically feasible. Instead he sought a cease-fi re and return to neutralization. In 

March 1961 he accepted a British proposal for a new Geneva conference to reneutralize Laos. The following year, after lengthy negotiations and a major U.S. force deployment to Thailand to deter the Pathet 

Chap 1.indd 17 
18

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Lao from continuing their offensive, the interested powers agreed t

restore Souvanna as head of a nonaligned coalition regime withou

American military assistance. In practice, the settlement turned into 

de facto partitioning of Laos, especially after fi ghting resumed betwee

a new coalition of Souvanna and the Phoumi forces on one side an

the Pathet Lao and North Vietnamese on the other. The Communis

gained control of eastern Laos, thereby securing the Ho Chi Minh Tra

infi ltration route, and the neutralists and anti-Communists held th

western region and the Mekong valley cities. Kennedy’s retreat in Lao

both increased the vulnerability of South Vietnam and intensifi ed th

administration’s determination to hold the line there as a demonstra

tion of will and of its ability to contain an externally assisted Commu

nist insurgency.19

South Vietnam became perforce the testing ground for the Ken

nedy administration’s counterinsurgency doctrines and program

During the fi rst half of 1961, the new president received a series o

discouraging reports on the country from special emissaries and from 

the Military Assistance Advisory Group, describing continuing polit

cal and military deterioration. The cumulative weight of this informa

tion led Kennedy to remark to an aide, “This is the worst one we’ve go

isn’t it?” Nevertheless, South Vietnam—if only because it was mor

accessible geographically than land-locked Laos and seemed to have 

functioning government—looked like the place to make a stand.

Kennedy therefore endorsed most of the recommendations in th

country team’s counterinsurgency plan, including American suppo

for a 20,000-man increase in Diem’s armed forces. He also sought ad

ditional measures to reinforce and revitalize the campaign against th

Viet Cong. In April 1961 he established a special interagency task forc

to evaluate the Communist threat and to recommend actions to com

bat it. The following month, he approved National Security Actio

Memorandum (NSAM) 52, which reaffi rmed that the U.S. objectiv

was to “prevent communist domination of South Vietnam; to create i

that country a viable and increasingly democratic society; and to init

ate, on an accelerated basis, a series of mutually supporting actions t

achieve this objective.” These actions included dispatch of 400 Specia

Forces troops to South Vietnam and authorization of covert sabotag

and harassment missions against the DRV. In October, after Presiden

Diem formally requested American assistance in adding 100,000 me

to his armed forces to meet the increasing Viet Cong threat, Kenned

sent General Maxwell D. Taylor, his special military representative, an

Walt Rostow, his deputy special assistant for national security affair

to South Vietnam. He instructed them to evaluate the entire militar

and political situation and to recommend a comprehensive course o

American remedial action.20

Both Taylor and Rostow were active proponents of the administra

tion’s emphasis on counterinsurgency. Accompanied by a large civi

Chap 1.indd 18 
19

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

ian-military entourage, they spent 

the last half of October 1961 touring South Vietnam and consulting 

with offi cials of the American mission and the Diem government. 

Early on, the group concluded that 

South Vietnam was in serious trouble. Viet Cong military strength 

and activity were increasing steadily, and the enemy seemed to be 

assembling large reserve striking 

forces northwest of Saigon and in 

the Central Highlands. South Vietnamese forces operated with little 

effectiveness due to lack of mobility, poor intelligence, and Diem’s 

constant disruption of the chain 

of command. In the society as a 

whole, the Taylor mission found 

a crisis of confi dence driven by 

alienation from Diem, despair at 

continued Viet Cong successes, 

and doubts about U.S. steadfastness stemming from Kennedy’s compromise in Laos. The heavily populated Mekong Delta south of Saigon 

also had been devastated by the worst fl ood in decades. Taylor and his 

colleagues, nevertheless, believed that South Vietnam possessed underlying advantages, including a large armed force and a “surprisingly 

resiliant” economy, which would enable it to prevail if they could be 

mobilized. On the assumption, as Taylor later put it, that the “question was how to change a losing game and begin to win, not how to 

call it off,” the group concentrated its deliberations on what additional 

American support was needed to save South Vietnam.

On 1 November, Taylor cabled to Washington the unanimous recommendations of his group. After summarizing the threat to South 

Vietnam and relating it to general Communist-bloc efforts to outfl ank 

containment by means of revolutionary wars-by-proxy, he proposed 

that the United States and South Vietnam enter into a “massive joint 

effort” to defeat the Viet Cong. Taylor recommended that the United 

States move beyond its advisory role to active participation in government administration, military planning and operations, and intelligence activities. This would entail sending more advisers and deploying them down to the lowest levels of civil and military organization. 

Taylor further advocated that the United States send military units of 

its own to perform needed tasks beyond South Vietnamese capabilities, 

such as provision of helicopter lift, aerial reconnaissance, coordination 

of air and ground operations, and coastal and river surveillance.

Walt Rostow (NARA)

Chap 1.indd 19 
20

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

In what became his most controversial proposal, Taylor called fo

insertion into the Mekong Delta of an American ground force of abou

8,000 troops, predominately engineers and logistic personnel but in

cluding some combat elements. This force, he said, could assist in fl oo

relief, provide various kinds of support to the RVNAF, and act as a fi na

reserve in the event of a major Viet Cong offensive. Most importan

its presence would constitute tangible evidence of American determ

nation to see through the struggle alongside the Vietnamese. Goin

further, the military members of Taylor’s group declared that only ful

scale intervention by major U.S. and SEATO combat forces could sav

South Vietnam.21

In mid-November, after considerable discussion within the admin

istration (most of it concerning the question of a ground troop com

mitment), President Kennedy adopted the bulk of Taylor’s recommen

dations. He directed that the advisory effort be reinforced substantially

and he ordered deployment of fi xed- and rotary-wing air units and 

variety of other specialized American military elements. In return, Ken

nedy expected President Diem to give “concrete demonstrations” o

willingness to work in an orderly way with subordinates and to broad

en his political base. Kennedy by omission rejected Taylor’s proposa

for an 8,000-man American ground force. He was concerned that direc

U.S. intervention on that scale might upset the Laos negotiations the

in progress. Also, he accepted the opinion of Secretary of State Dea

Rusk and Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara that such a contin

gent was too small to affect the situation decisively but large enoug

to draw the United States into serious diffi culties. The president di

not entirely foreclose the possibility of sending American troops; h

instructed the Defense Department to plan for such a contingenc

Nevertheless, he clearly hoped that the more limited measures he ha

authorized would suffi ce to save South Vietnam.22

Kennedy’s November decisions entailed a drastic enlargement o

the number of American military people in South Vietnam and an ex

pansion of their range of activities. The enhanced American participa

tion in the war far exceeded both the normal mission and the com

mand capabilities of a military assistance advisory group. Recognizin

this fact, the Taylor mission called for “a change in the charter, th

spirit, and the organization of the MAAG in South Vietnam . . . from 

an advisory group to something nearer—but not quite—an operationa

headquarters in a theater of war.” As part of his acceptance of Taylor

recommendations, Kennedy announced that the United States woul

provide “such new terms of reference, reorganization and additiona

personnel” for its command in Vietnam as were required for increase

military assistance, “operational collaboration” with the Vietnames

and “operational direction” of U.S. forces. A new American headqua

ters would be needed to conduct what was rapidly becoming a new 

American war.23

Chap 1.indd 20 
21

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

Creating the Command

The Defense Department, with Secretary McNamara taking personal charge of the details of the effort, rapidly put into effect the military 

part of President Kennedy’s Vietnam program. Before the end of 1961, 

an Air Force counterinsurgency tactical air unit was establishing itself 

in South Vietnam, as were two Army helicopter companies. Navy minesweepers meanwhile took up coastal patrol stations just below the 17th 

Parallel. Army and Air Force specialists began building and manning 

communications and tactical air control systems. Still other Americans 

arrived to improve and expand South Vietnamese government military 

intelligence. The Military Assistance Advisory Group enlarged its intelligence activities and, following a mid-December directive from McNamara, prepared to deploy battalion and province advisers to help the 

Vietnamese plan and conduct combat and pacifi cation operations.24

Formation of a new headquarters to control these forces took longer than expected and required extended negotiations between the 

State and Defense Departments. At issue was the relationship of the 

proposed military command to the U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam 

and to the other agencies of his country team. Was the commander to be subordinate to or independent of the ambassador, and how 

much authority was he to have over the counterinsurgency activities 

of agencies such as the CIA, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the U.S. Information Agency (USIA)? Beyond 

these issues loomed the fundamental question of the balance between 

military and nonmilitary elements in counterinsurgency. Was the 

struggle against the Viet Cong an essentially military enterprise with 

other programs in an auxiliary role, or was the military to be only one 

element, and not necessarily the dominant one, in a comprehensive 

effort—the view held in principle by President Kennedy and his counterinsurgency advisers?25

During the long era of the Military Assistance Advisory Group, 

American civilian-military relations in Saigon had been less than harmonious. General Williams, the advisory group chief during the late 

1950s, had conducted the MAAG’s affairs largely independently of Ambassador Elbridge Durbrow, with whom Williams had occasional loud 

arguments in country team meetings. Williams’ successor as MAAG 

chief, Lt. Gen. Lionel C. McGarr, did little better. A reclusive man, preoccupied with drafting lengthy treatises on counterinsurgency doctrine, McGarr managed to alienate not only the country team but also 

President Diem and Admiral Harry D. Felt, the PACOM commander. 

Coordination of the Vietnam effort also had been lacking in Washington. The State and Defense Departments competed for overall control 

and the Central Intelligence Agency, the Agency for International Development, and the U.S. Information Agency independently made and 

executed policy in their own fi elds.26

Chap 1.indd 21 
22

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

 Early in his administration, President Kennedy unintentionall

compounded his own diffi culties in resolving the civil-military con

fl ict in Saigon. On 29 May 1961, in a letter of instructions to America

ambassadors around the world, Kennedy reaffi rmed their authority, a

heads of their respective country teams, over all U.S. government agen

cies represented in their missions, including military assistance and ad

visory groups. The president, however, exempted from ambassadoria

control “United States military forces operating in the fi eld . . . unde

the command of a United States area commander.” This category ap

peared to include the proposed new headquarters in South Vietnam

which would have operating units under it and perform at least som

functions of a fi eld command. The commander of such a force, unde

Kennedy’s instructions, was to keep the ambassador informed abou

military activities and consult with him on policy matters, but he wa

not under the ambassador’s orders; the two were to refer any persisten

disagreements through their respective chains of command to Wash

ington for adjudication.27

Such a collegial arrangement, intended for countries where larg

American conventional forces were deployed, seemed unlikely to pro

duce the close civilian-military coordination required for effective d

rection of counterinsurgency operations. Nevertheless, Secretary McNa

mara and the Joint Chiefs of Staff used it as guidance in developing the

plan for the new Vietnam command. On 13 November, as preparation

for expansion of the American effort were just getting under way, Mc

Namara directed the Joint Chiefs of Staff to develop a proposal for 

U.S. military command in South Vietnam. Following instructions from 

President Kennedy, McNamara went beyond the Taylor mission’s recom

mendation for a simple enlargement of the MAAG’s strength, authorit

and functions. Instead, he called for establishment of an entirely new 

headquarters. The Kennedy administration believed that such actio

would demonstrate forcefully to both friends and enemies the America

commitment to victory over the Viet Cong. In addition, a full-fl edge

military command would be better suited than an advisory group t

control major ground combat units in Vietnam, and perhaps Laos, 

the United States should decide to commit them. McNamara told th

Joint Chiefs that the projected headquarters should be responsible for a

counterinsurgency military activities in South Vietnam. Further empha

sizing the importance of the organization, the defense secretary wante

its commander to report directly to him through the JCS, bypassing th

Pacifi c Command.28

The Joint Chiefs expressed doubt that a fundamental change i

the U.S. command in South Vietnam was necessary or desirable i

the absence of a major combat troop commitment. Nevertheless, the

complied with McNamara’s directive. On 22 November they propose

creation within the existing Pacifi c Command structure of a subo

dinate unifi ed (multiservice) command, to be entitled United State

Chap 1.indd 22 
23

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

Forces, Vietnam (USFV). 

The new command’s objective would be to increase American economic 

and military assistance to 

the Republic of Vietnam, 

“short of introduction of 

combat forces,” and to 

participate in the direction and control of South 

Vietnamese counterinsurgency operations. To this 

end, the command was 

to “draw together, under 

single command and control, all those U.S. activities in Vietnam, including 

intelligence operations, 

MAAG . . . , and economic 

aid, which are related to 

the counter insurgency 

effort.” The Joint Chiefs 

proposed to give the USFV 

commander, in addition 

to command over all U.S. 

military forces in South 

Vietnam, “full control” of 

all American intelligence 

efforts and the right to “supervise and direct” counterinsurgencyrelated civilian economic aid programs. The commander was to act 

as “principal US military advisor” to the commander in chief of the 

South Vietnamese armed forces. He was to be “co-equal” with the 

American ambassador and was to possess the independent military 

authority spelled out in Kennedy’s 29 May 1961 letter, to which the 

Joint Chiefs explicitly referred and which they attached as an annex 

to their memorandum.29

McNamara promptly approved the Joint Chiefs’ proposal in principle, but the State Department and other agencies registered objections. 

Secretary of State Rusk, supported by General Taylor, argued that retitling the U.S. military commander was unnecessary and would convey to the world a degree of commitment to South Vietnam that the 

administration had not yet made. Rusk and Taylor favored instead a 

simple enlargement of the mission and authority of the MAAG chief. 

Signifi cantly, however, Rusk did not object to the commander’s coequal status with the ambassador. Predictably, AID and the CIA both 

sought to keep their own programs out of the military commander’s 

General McGarr with Ambassador Nolting 

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 1.indd 23 
24

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

control, preferring the existing system of coordination through th

country team.30

In response, on 7 December McNamara and the Joint Chiefs mod

fi ed their proposal to eliminate the USFV commander’s authority ove

intelligence and economic aid activities. Although acknowledging th

ambassador’s primacy in “political and basic policy matters,” McNa

mara declared that enhancement of the status of the senior U.S. mil

tary leader in Saigon was essential “if we are to give full impact t

the increased efforts we are now making” and if the commander wa

to “move into a new and more active role.” The State Department i

effect bowed to McNamara’s wishes. It held out only for acknowledg

ment of the ambassador’s preeminence in general policy matters an

urged that the title of the command be changed to “Military Assistanc

Command, Vietnam,” to denote the continued advice-and-suppo

character of American military activity in South Vietnam.31

After a mid-December meeting in Honolulu attended by Rusk

McNamara, Ambassador to South Vietnam Frederick E. Nolting, an

General McGarr, the two departments reached agreement on the mai

issues. Defense accepted State’s proposed title for the headquarter

which henceforth was to be known as Military Assistance Command

Vietnam (MACV). The commander of the Military Assistance Com

mand (COMUSMACV) was to direct U.S. military activities and advis

the Saigon government on internal security and on the organization

deployment, and operations of the armed forces. For this purpose, h

could hold discussions with President Diem and “the leaders of h

government.” On the commander’s relationship to the ambassado

the departments repeated the principles of Kennedy’s letter. The gene

al was to keep the ambassador fully informed about his high-level con

tacts with Diem’s government and to “consult” with him on “politica

and basic policy matters,” for which the ambassador had fi nal respon

sibility. In case of irreconcilable disagreements, each was free to reque

a decision from Washington through his department’s channels. Th

departments thus envisioned something approaching a coequal rela

tionship between the ambassador and the MACV commander, wit

the ambassador implicitly primus inter pares on questions of high polic

Secretary McNamara transmitted this agreement to President Kenned

on 22 December, along with his nomination of General Paul Harkins a

MACV commander. Kennedy early in January approved both the term

of reference and the selection of Harkins.32

This agreement met with strong protests from the senior America

military and political offi cials in Saigon, General McGarr and Ambassa

dor Nolting. McGarr objected bitterly to General Lyman W. Lemnitze

chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at the proposal to disregard h

and the MAAG’s experience and achievements and to supersede them 

with a new headquarters and presumably a new commander. Howeve

as noted previously, McGarr had made himself thoroughly unpopula

Chap 1.indd 24 
25

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

in Saigon and Washington. The Taylor mission had snubbed the advisory group chief during its pivotal tour of South Vietnam, and many of 

President Kennedy’s advisers believed that he was not the man to lead 

the expanded counterinsurgency effort. Indeed, it appears that getting 

rid of McGarr was, for some in the administration, a secondary reason 

for establishing a new U.S. command in Vietnam. Lemnitzer, therefore, 

could do little but commiserate with McGarr, reassure him of the Joint 

Chiefs’ esteem for him and appreciation of his efforts, and urge him to 

accept the situation like the good soldier he was.33

Ambassador Nolting, an experienced foreign service offi cer and the 

administration’s choice to head the Saigon mission, was not so easily dismissed. From the start, Nolting opposed the enlargement of the 

military command on two main grounds. He argued that giving the 

military commander nearly equal status with the ambassador would 

weaken the mission in dealing with the South Vietnamese, who would 

Generals Lemnitzer and Taylor, Secretary McNamara, 

and President Kennedy, 1961 (© Bettman/CORBIS)

Chap 1.indd 25 
26

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

play off the two heads of the American team against each other. “Ther

should clearly be one US spokesman in V[iet] N[am],” he said, “oth

erwise we shall get the run-around.” Nolting had no objection to th

commander’s dealing directly with Diem on strictly military matter

but he urged that, however the command was reorganized, the to

military man should remain subordinate to the ambassador as head o

the country team. From a broader perspective, Nolting argued that en

largement of the command in Saigon would overbalance the anti–Vie

Cong campaign in favor of the military. “I am profoundly convinced

he told Secretary Rusk, “that the problem cannot be solved on a mil

tary basis (although military force is an indispensable element).” Ye

enhancement of the Saigon command would “almost inevitably buil

into our effort a disproportionate emphasis, in resources and plannin

as well as appearance, on a military solution” and would encourag

the Diem regime’s already pronounced tendency to do the same. “Ou

counterinsurgency effort,” Nolting emphasized, must be “well ba

anced and fl exible otherwise we are likely either to lose the fi ght or t

throw this country into another Korean-type war.”34

With support from Rusk, Nolting urged that language be added t

Harkins’ directive to the effect that the ambassador remained the senio

American representative in Saigon with the military commander a sub

ordinate member of the country team. Nolting received support on th

point from President Diem, who declared his preference for dealing wit

a single American team, headed by a civilian, to reduce the credibilit

of Viet Cong charges that the Americans were taking over direction o

the war. But while willing to acknowledge the ambassador’s primac

McNamara would not agree to formal subordination of the commande

to the country team, for fear of diluting responsibility for the militar

program. In addition, he told Nolting, the Joint Chiefs insisted that “n

four-star general is going to be under an Ambassador.”35

In the end, Secretaries Rusk and McNamara settled the issue b

informal agreement. McNamara directed General Harkins to defer t

Nolting on all policy matters and, for practical purposes, to conside

himself subordinate to the ambassador. The defense secretary went s

far as to tell the prospective MACV commander to treat his writte

terms of reference as modifi ed to that effect, even though the two sec

retaries decided to attempt no change in the formal wording. A face-to

face meeting between Nolting and Harkins at another of the period

Honolulu policy conferences in January further cleared the air. On 2

February Rusk reassured Nolting that “if actual problems arise whic

require more formal general statement of relationships than those yo

now have, I will of course go into it.” Publicly, administration spoke

men emphasized to the press that the ambassador remained in sol

charge of American programs in South Vietnam.36

Even before these fi nal understandings were completed, the Militar

Assistance Command, Vietnam, went into operation. At the peremp

Chap 1.indd 26 
27

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

tory direction of the State Department, Ambassador Nolting obtained 

President Diem’s consent to the American military reorganization on 

3 February 1962. Five days later, Admiral Felt, commander in chief, Pacifi c (CINCPAC), formally activated the command. Within less than a 

week, General Harkins arrived in Saigon to take up his duties. Harkins’ 

formal statement of authority from the Joint Chiefs of Staff reiterated 

the terms of the earlier State-Defense agreement. As COMUSMACV, 

he was to work directly with President Diem and his commanders on 

military affairs, consult with the ambassador on “US political and basic 

policy matters,” keep the ambassador fully informed on his contacts 

with the South Vietnamese, and refer unresolved disagreements to 

Washington through the military chain of command.37

Harkins’ instructions appeared to place him, as he later said, “practically . . . on the same level as the Ambassador” in dealing with President Diem; President Kennedy gave the general the same impression 

during a brief, perfunctory interview before the MACV commander left 

for Saigon. Nevertheless, due partly to the informal accord between 

McNamara and Rusk and perhaps more to personal rapport between 

Nolting and Harkins, the division of authority did not disrupt the 

General Harkins, Admiral Felt, and Ambassador Nolting, Saigon, 1962 (NARA)

Chap 1.indd 27 
28

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

country team. Harkins followed Nolting’s lead on overall policy towar

Diem, and the two men maintained full communication and a goo

working relationship. Harkins’ participation in country team mee

ings was a potentially contentious issue, since McNamara had wante

the MACV commander to maintain his separation from the team. In

tially, General Lemnitzer, the JCS chairman, had expected Harkins t

stay away. In practice, McGarr’s successor as MAAG chief, Maj. Gen

Charles Timmes, sat in as the full military country team member. Gen

eral Harkins, or his representative, took part as an invited additiona

participant, a legalistic distinction that maintained the formality of th

MACV commander’s independence of the ambassador but had littl

practical signifi cance.38

The State and Defense Departments, through an unwritten agree

ment between their secretaries and through cordial personal relation

between their senior representatives in Saigon, seemed to have ensure

subordination of the military to the political element in the directio

of the counterinsurgency struggle. Yet coordination rested on fragil

foundations. Unity of effort within the American mission depende

fi nally on personal rapport between the ambassador and the MAC

commander and on “treaty arrangements . . . arrived at in the Countr

Team meetings.” In the making of those arrangements, the militar

command predominated through sheer weight of resources and ad

ministrative vigor, however much General Harkins formally deferred t

Ambassador Nolting. Nolting, with comparatively weak backing from 

his own department and lacking any political constituency of his own

would have found it diffi cult to impose constraints on the militar

even if he had desired to do so; on most day-to-day policy issues, h

appeared disinclined to challenge the soldiers. The result, however, wa

not a unifi ed effort under the military. Harkins possessed neither au

thority over the civilian elements of the country team nor responsibi

ity for their counterinsurgency programs. Hence, he and they tende

to go their separate ways in combating the Viet Cong, although wit

unequal resources and therefore unequal and at times mutually fru

trating effect.39

The same lack of a single directing authority and imbalance o

power in favor of the military prevailed in Washington. President Ken

nedy neglected to provide for continuing, authoritative interagenc

oversight of the expanded effort in Vietnam, and what direction wa

provided came largely from the Department of Defense. When he too

offi ce, Kennedy abolished the elaborate national security policy-mak

ing machinery he had inherited from Eisenhower and instead relie

on informal groups of trusted associates and ad hoc task forces to dea

with particular problems. The system depended heavily on Kennedy

personal interest and intervention. But preoccupied as he was durin

these years with full-blown crises in Berlin and Cuba, the presiden

gave relatively little attention to Vietnam and took only the most pe

Chap 1.indd 28 
29

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

functory part in the deliberations over the creation of MACV. He never 

acted upon the suggestion of several of his counterinsurgency experts 

that he establish a superdepartmental agency in Washington, with a 

parallel organization in Saigon, to direct the entire anti–Viet Cong effort. A Defense-chaired Vietnam task force during 1961 and a highlevel interdepartmental Special Group (Counterinsurgency) the following year proved to be inadequate substitutes for such a superagency.

In the event, Vietnam policy-making fell largely to Secretary of State 

Rusk and Secretary of Defense McNamara, who worked together on this 

issue, as on most others, in a partnership based on mutual confi dence 

and respect. In the case of Vietnam, however, Defense clearly predominated. McNamara commanded more resources than did Rusk and from 

the beginning of the Kennedy administration pushed himself to the 

forefront of the Vietnam effort. The defense secretary, for example, instituted and largely controlled the periodic Honolulu strategy conferences. Rusk seemed content to let leadership on Vietnam go to Defense 

by default. Ambassador Nolting later complained that “I never could 

get him [Rusk] to focus on our problems while I was in Vietnam.”40

The Kennedy administration, in creating the Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam, thus committed itself to solving, in General 

McGarr’s words, a “very unconventional situation in a basically conventional manner.”41 It set up an ambassador–fi eld commander coalition of a standardized type that was related only tangentially to the 

requirements of counterinsurgency warfare. In the interdepartmental compromises that established the Military Assistance Command’s 

charter of responsibility and relationship to the rest of the country 

team, Defense gained more than it gave up, but the result still left 

MACV short of control of the entire counterinsurgency effort. If this 

handicap were not enough, in its purely military sphere MACV labored under complex command relationships and had to thread its 

way through intractable interservice confl icts over fi ne points of organization, staffi ng, and doctrine.

Chap 1.indd 29 
30

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Notes

1 New York Times, 14 Feb 62, p. 6. 2 Ibid., pp. 1, 6, 34; see also ibid.,10 Feb 62, p. 3. 

3 Unless otherwise indicated, this section is based on Ronald H. Spector, Advi

and Support: The Early Years, 1941–1960, United States Army in Vietnam (Washingto

D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1983), chs. 1–11. 4 For a summary of the rise of Vietnamese nationalism and communism, see W

liam J. Duiker, The Communist Road to Power in Vietnam (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Pres

1981), esp. chs. 2–4. The postwar occupation of Indochina is covered in Duiker, Roa

to Power; Spector, Early Years; and George C. Herring, America’s Longest War: The Unit

States and Vietnam, 1950–1975 (New York: Wiley, 1979), pp. 3–7. 5 For formation of the MAAG, see Maj. Gen. George S. Eckhardt, Command and Co

trol. Vietnam Studies (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1974), pp. 7–20. 

6 The Communist maneuvers surrounding Geneva and Soviet assessments that th

Viet Minh were close to military exhaustion are discussed in Douglas Pike, Vietna

and the Soviet Union: Anatomy of an Alliance (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987

pp. 39–42. See also Janos Radvanyi, “Dien Bien Phu: Thirty Years After,” Parameters 1

(Summer 1985):63–97. 7 Spector, Early Years, ch. 11, gives details of the intervention debate. See als

Herring, Longest War, pp. 28–36; and George C. Herring and Richard H. Immerma

“Eisenhower, Dulles and Dien Bien Phu: ‘The Day We Didn’t Go to War’ Revisited

Journal of American History 71 (September 1984), passim. 8 Unless otherwise noted, this section is based on Spector, Early Years, chs. 12–18

9 On the effectiveness of Diem’s campaigns, see William J. Duiker, The Communi

Road to Power in Vietnam (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1981), pp. 174–78. 10 For organization and evolution of MAAGV, see Spector, Early Years, ch.15 and p

360–61; and Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 7–21. 11 Spector, Early Years, pp. 294–95. 12 Duiker, Road to Power, pp. 169–74. For the international Communist maneuve

ing after Geneva, see R. B. Smith, An International History of the Vietnam War, vol. 

Revolution versus Containment, 1955–1961 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1983), chs. 

and 4. 13 For the evolution of Hanoi policy and strategy, see Duiker, Road to Power, ch. 

and Smith, Revolution versus Containment, chs. 6–10 and 12–13. 14 The early development of the insurgency is well covered in Spector, Early Year

chs.16–18; Duiker, Road to Power, chs. 8 and 9; and Admiral U. S. G. Sharp and Gener

W. C. Westmoreland, Report on the War in Vietnam (as of 30 June 1968) (hereafter cited 

Report on the War) (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1968), pp. 78–79. 15 Unless otherwise noted, this section is based on Spector, Early Years, chs. 16–1

On the intelligence problem, see Maxwell D. Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares (Ne

York: Norton, 1972), pp. 237–38. 16 For discussion of the impasse over internal security forces, see General Willia

B. Rosson, USA (Ret.), “Four Periods of American Involvement in Vietnam: Develo

ment and Implementation of Policy, Strategy and Programs, Described and Analyze

on the Basis of Service Experience at Progressively Senior Levels” (Ph.D. diss., New Co

lege, Oxford, England, 1979), pp. 244–47. 17 For an overview of Kennedy administration counterinsurgency activity, se

Douglas S. Blaufarb, The Counterinsurgency Era: U.S. Doctrine and Performance, 1950 

the Present (New York: Free Press, 1977), ch. 3. Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” p

Chap 1.indd 30 
31

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

98–115, 137; and Interv, Senior Offi cer Oral History Program with Gen William B. 

Rosson, 1981, pp. 270–88, U.S. Army Military History Institute, (MHI), Carlisle, Pa., 

describe Army Staff efforts at counterinsurgency planning. 18 For a convenient summary of counterinsurgency and pacifi cation theory, see Andrew J. Birtle, “U.S. Army Counterinsurgency and Contingency Operations Doctrine, 

1942–1976” (MS, U.S. Army Center of Military History), ch. 6. 19 For the Laotian crisis, see Spector, Early Years, pp. 357–58; Taylor, Swords and 

Ploughshares, pp. 216–19; and Smith, Revolution versus Containment, pp. 244–52. Kennedy’s policy is analyzed and defended in Roger Hilsman, To Move a Nation: The Politics 

of Foreign Policy in the Administration of John F. Kennedy (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 

1967), chs. 10–12. 20 For a sampling of the many analyses of Kennedy’s Vietnam policy, see: Herring, 

Longest War, pp. 73–80; Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, pp. 220–24; Smith, Revolution 

versus Containment, pp. 252–61; Larry Berman, Planning a Tragedy: The Americanization 

of the War in Vietnam (New York: Norton, 1982), pp. 18–20; and Leslie H. Gelb and 

Richard K. Betts, The Irony of Vietnam: The System Worked (Washington, D.C.: Brookings 

Institution, 1979), pp. 69–73. 21 Taylor-Rostow Mission, Oct–Nov 61, Taylor Report, 1 Nov 61, Historians fi les, 

CMH. For accounts of the mission and its recommendations, see Taylor, Swords and 

Ploughshares, pp. 224–44; and Berman, Planning, pp. 20–21. 22 National Security Action Memo (NSAM) 111, 22 Nov 61, in Gareth Porter, ed., 

Vietnam: The Defi nitive Documentation of Human Decisions, 2 vols. (Stanfordville, N.Y.: 

Earl M. Coleman Enterprises, 1979), 2:146–48; Msg, SecState to Amb Nolting, 15 Nov 

61, Historians fi les, CMH. For comment and interpretation, see Berman, Planning a 

Tragedy, pp. 21–23, 29; Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, pp. 245–48; Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 107–08; and Gelb and Betts, Irony of Vietnam, pp. 75–79. 23 The fi rst quote is from Taylor, tab C. The second is from Porter, Vietnam Documentation, 2:147. See also Eckhardt, Command and Control, p. 22. 24 For details of the Vietnam buildup, see United States–Vietnam Relations 1954–

1967. Study Prepared by the Department of Defense, 12 vols. (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1971), sec. 4.B.1, pp. 147–48; ibid., sec. 5 B.4, pp. 428–39; MS, 

Charles von Luttichau, “The U.S. Army Role in the Confl ict in Vietnam,” 1964, ch. 6, 

pp. 19–20, 22–24, CMH fi les; Robert F. Futrell, The United States Air Force in Southeast 

Asia The Advisory Years to 1965, (Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of Air Force History, 1981), 

pp. 79–84; and Edward J. Marolda and Oscar P. Fitzgerald, From Military Assistance to 

Combat, 1959–1965,United States Navy and the Vietnam Confl ict (Washington, D.C: 

Naval Historical Center, 1986), 2:169–171. 25 Kennedy administration counterinsurgency doctrine is summarized in Blaufarb, 

Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 66–67. 26 Spector, Early Years, pp. 276–78, 316–20, describes Williams’ diffi culties. For 

McGarr’s troubles, see Memo, Col Thomas A. Ware, sub: Political/Military Situation 

in South Vietnam, 11 Jan 62, Historians fi les, CMH; and Ltrs, Ernest J. Murray to Lt 

Gen Samuel T. Williams, 28 July 62 and 28 Sep 62, Samuel T. Williams Papers, Hoover 

Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, Palo Alto, Calif. 27 The Kennedy letter is summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 19–

20. This instruction grew in part from a State Department–CIA dispute; see Hilsman, 

To Move a Nation, pp. 77, 81. 28 Memo, SecDef for Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS), 13 Nov 61, sub: Command Structure for South Vietnam, in U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the 

United States, 1961–1963, vol. 1, Vietnam 1961 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1988), pp. 589–590 hereafter cited as State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam 1961. 

Chap 1.indd 31 
32

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Memo, SecDef for Gen Lyman L. Lemnitzer, 14 Nov 61, sub: Command Structure f

South Vietnam, copy in William P. Bundy Chronological Files —1961, John F. Kenned

Library (JFKL), Boston, Mass. 29 Memo, Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) JCSM–812–61 to SecDef, 22 Nov 61, sub: Sout

Vietnam, in State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam 1961, pp. 652–55. 30 Memo, William P. Bundy for SecDef, 25 Nov 61, sub: Command Arrangemen

for Vietnam; Memo, Bundy for U. A. Johnson, et al., 28 Nov 61, sub: Command A

rangements for Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, Taylor for President, 27 No

61, sub: Possible Command Relationships in South Vietnam; Memo, Bundy for SecDe

1 Dec 61, sub: Vietnam Command Arrangements. Both in State, Foreign Relations: Vie

nam 1961, pp. 673–74, 702–03. 31 Ltr, Robert S. McNamara to Dean Rusk, 7 Dec 61; Msg, George W. Ball to SecStat

12 Dec 61; both in State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam 1961, pp. 720–21, 728–30. McN

mara quotes are in fi rst document cited. 32 State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam 1961, pp. 742–46, 756. Language quoted is fro

Paper, 19 Dec 61, sub: State-Defense Agreement, Maxwell D. Taylor Papers, Nation

Defense University (NDU), Washington, D.C.; Memorandum for Record (MFR), De

SecDef, sub: President’s Meeting with JCS on January 3, 1962, box 55, 65A3501, Recor

Group (RG) 330, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Washingto

D.C.33 McGarr protests are in Msgs to CJCS, 20 and 27 Dec 61, State, Foreign Relation

Vietnam 1961, pp. 749–50, 765. In same volume, see pp. 687–89, 719, 758–60. Oth

comments on McGarr’s diffi culties: Memo, Col T. A. Ware, 11 Jan 62, sub: Politica

Military Situation in South Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH; Ltrs, Ernest J. Murray 

Williams, 28 July 62 and 28 Sep 62, Williams Papers, Hoover Institution. 34 Quotes are from Msgs, Frederick Nolting to Dept of State, 13 and 19 Dec 6

in State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam, 1961, pp. 731–732, 747–49. In same volume, se

Ltr, Political Adviser (POLAD) to CINCPAC to Dir, Vietnam Task Force, 18 Dec 61, p

742–44. 35 Hilsman, To Move a Nation, p.442. Msg, Nolting to SecState, 20 Jan 62; Msg

Nolting Saigon 980 to SecState, 27 Jan 62 and Saigon 1008 to SecState, 3 Feb 62; Hist

rians fi les, CMH. Nolting quote is from 20 Jan 62 message. Memo, Rusk for McNamar

19 Jan 62; Memo, Taylor, 13 Jan 62, sub: Points at Issue with Regard to the Comman

Structure in South Vietnam; and Nolting Draft, sub: Terms of Reference for the Seni

U.S. Military Commander in South Vietnam, 8J and 62, attached to copy of Mem

McNamara for President, 22 Dec 61. All in Taylor Papers, NDU. Frederick Noltin

From Trust to Tragedy: The Political Memoirs of Frederick Nolting, Kennedy’s Ambassad

to Diem’s Vietnam (New York: Praeger, 1988), pp. 50–52. Quote concerning the Join

Chiefs is from p. 52. 36 Quote is from Msg, SecState 1015 to Nolting, 23 Feb 62, Historians fi les, CMH

New York Times, 11 Feb 62, p. 16, is an example of administration press statement

Nolting, Trust to Tragedy, p. 52, describes his meeting with Harkins. 37 Memo, Taylor for McNamara,1 Feb 62, Taylor Papers, NDU. Msg, JCS to CINCPAC

7 Feb 62; Msg, CINCPAC to Pacifi c Commands, 8 Feb 62. Both in Table of Distributio

Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. For Diem’s consent see Msg, Amb Noltin

Saigon 1008 to SecState, 3 Feb 62, Historians fi les, CMH. On Harkins’ arrival see Ne

York Times, 14 Feb 62, p. 6. 38 Quote is from Ltr, Harkins to Lt Gen Don H. Cowles, 29 Aug 79, Historians fi le

CMH. The account of his meeting with Kennedy is from Interv, USAF Project CORON

HARVEST with Harkins, 23 Feb 72, p. 17, AFCHO; see also p. 24. Interv, Senior Offi ce

Debriefi ng Program with Harkins, Apr 74, p. 49, MHI; see also p. 62. For Nolting’s view

Chap 1.indd 32 
33

A Deepening Commitment and a New Command

see Trust to Tragedy, pp. 52–53, and Interv, USAF Project CORONA HARVEST with Nolting, 

9 Nov 71, pp. 28–29, 43–44, 54–56, AFCHO. Memo, Bundy for SecDef, 12 Feb 62, sub: 

State-Defense Relationships re Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. Interv, USAF Project 

CORONA HARVEST with Lt Col Franklin L. Smith, USMC, 1 Feb 64, pp. 25–28, AFCHO. 39 Quote is from Memo, Roger Hilsman and Michael Forrestal for the President, 25 

Jan 63, sub: A Report on South Vietnam, Historian’s fi les, CMH. Memo, W. H. Sullivan, 

ca. late 1963, sub: Divergent Attitudes in U.S. Offi cial Community, Historians fi les, 

CMH, discusses civilian complaints that Nolting deferred excessively to Harkins’ policy 

views. Nolting, a former Navy offi cer, had joined the Foreign Service immediately after 

World War II. Most of his previous assignments had been in Europe, most recently as 

deputy chief of the U.S. Mission to NATO; see Nolting, Trust to Tragedy, pp. 11–12. 40 This discussion is based on: Blaufarb, Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 66–75, 86; Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 21–22; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 18–19; 

Hilsman, To Move a Nation, pp. 23–60; Jeffrey G. Barlow, “President John F. Kennedy 

and His Joint Chiefs of Staff” (Ph.D. diss., University of South Carolina, 1981), pp. 

127–32; and Robert W. Komer, Bureaucracy Does Its Thing: Institutional Constraints on 

U.S.–GVN Performance in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: Rand Corporation, 1973), pp. 

79–81. Nolting quote is from Trust to Tragedy, p. 129; see also pp. 12–13. 41 Msg, McGarr to Lemnitzer, 27 Dec 61, in State, Foreign Relations: Vietnam 1961, 

p. 765.

Chap 1.indd 33 
Chap 1.indd 34 
2

A Joint Command: Complications and 

Confl icts, 1962–1963

As the Military Assistance Command went into operation, General Harkins’ task, as defi ned in terms of reference issued by the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff and in a mission statement from Admiral Felt, 

his immediate superior, was twofold. As senior United States military 

commander in South Vietnam, he had “direct responsibility for all US 

military policy, operations and assistance in that country.” In that capacity, he was to exercise “operational command” of all U.S. military 

forces and agencies assigned to him, including the military assistance 

group. He was to plan and conduct American military operations, coordinate American military intelligence in South Vietnam, and serve as 

“CINCPAC’s single U.S. spokesman in South Vietnam for U.S. military 

policy, planning and contemplated force employment.” At the same 

time, as head of an assistance command, Harkins was to advise the 

Saigon government on “all matters relative to . . . maintaining internal 

security in South Vietnam and to the organization and employment of 

the RVNAF and of counterinsurgency and other paramilitary forces.” 

He was to “assist and support the Government of Vietnam in its efforts 

to provide for its internal security, defeat Communist insurgency, and 

resist overt aggression.” 1

The Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, thus functioned in 

two separate but interrelated capacities. First, as a U.S. military headquarters and a subordinate unifi ed command under CINCPAC, it controlled units and personnel in South Vietnam as part of a complex, 

worldwide command structure. Second, MACV existed to advise and 

assist the government and the armed forces of its host country and to 

cooperate with the rest of the American country team in formulating, 

and persuading the Vietnamese to carry out, a comprehensive program aimed simultaneously at rooting out the Viet Cong insurgents 

and reforming and modernizing the nation. In each of these roles, 

the headquarters, from the planning stage, was enmeshed in complex 

institutional relationships and confl icts.

Chap 2.indd 35 
36

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Many of the controversies that 

affected MACV in its capacity as 

an American military headquarters 

originated in the upheavals created in the defense establishment by 

the Kennedy administration’s reorientation of U.S. military strategy and the aggressive management 

style of Secretary McNamara. During the period of MACV’s creation, 

the Kennedy administration discarded the so-called Massive Retaliation strategy, based on air power 

and nuclear weapons in favor of 

a posture of Flexible Response, 

which accorded increased importance (and funding) to nonnuclear 

forces, limited war, and counterinsurgency. At the same time, McNamara dramatically enlarged his 

offi ce’s infl uence over all aspects of 

military policy, planning, and budgeting. In the process, he invaded 

realms formerly the exclusive preserve of the uniformed services and of the Joint Chiefs, whose judg

ment the secretary’s civilian “whiz kids” from industry and the un

versities frequently challenged. In this changing political and strateg

context, the services struggled with McNamara and with each othe

over a wide range of issues. Under these circumstances, few question

of military organization and command in Vietnam could be decide

solely on their merits in relation to the confl ict at hand.2

MACV and the Pacifi c Chain of Command

Since the establishment of the Department of Defense in the lat

1940s, most U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps units ha

been assigned to the operational control of unifi ed commands staffe

by offi cers of all services and responsible for particular geographica

theaters of operations. Under each such headquarters, componen

commanders exercised tactical and administrative control over the a

signed units of their respective services. As the system had evolved b

the early 1960s, deployed forces had a dual chain of command: for op

erations from their component commander to their unifi ed command

er, who then reported via the secretary of defense to the president; an

for administration from their component commander to their servic

department and thence to the secretary of defense and the presiden

Secretary of Defense McNamara 

(NARA)

Chap 2.indd 36 
37

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

A unifi ed command might have 

under it subordinate unifi ed commands, each with its own component commanders who in turn 

were subordinate to the overall 

theater component commanders.3

Interservice politics affected 

the JCS deliberations over MACV’s 

place in the existing joint command structure in the Pacifi c. From 

the start, the Joint Chiefs looked 

askance at McNamara’s proposal 

that the assistance command report directly to him. That arrangement would encroach upon the 

jurisdiction of Pacifi c Command 

(PACOM), the unifi ed headquarters 

that directed American military 

operations throughout the vast 

expanse of land and water stretching from the Aleutians to the Indian Ocean. The offi cer in charge of 

that region, Commander in Chief, Pacifi c (CINCPAC), Admiral Harry 

D. Felt, had all of mainland Southeast Asia within his domain. Headquartered in Honolulu, he controlled U.S. forces operating in that area 

and oversaw contingency planning for both conventional defense and 

counterinsurgency. During the recurring Laotian crises, Felt directed 

American preparations for military intervention. The Military Assistance Advisory Group in South Vietnam constituted a subordinate unifi ed command under Admiral Felt.4

McNamara’s proposal for a headquarters in South Vietnam outside 

CINCPAC’s control would upset this entire command arrangement and 

require revision of a long list of American unilateral and allied Southeast 

Asia Treaty Organization contingency plans. In addition, Navy leaders 

feared that it might provide an opening wedge for establishment of a 

new version of the Army-dominated Far East Command that had directed joint operations in Japan, Korea, north China, and the Ryukyus 

during and immediately after the Korean confl ict. Existence of that 

unifi ed command had caused an awkward division of control over the 

Pacifi c Fleet. Hence, the Navy had welcomed its disestablishment on 1 

July 1957 and its replacement with a unifi ed air and naval theater in 

the form of the Pacifi c Command. Army leaders, on the other hand, 

had opposed disestablishment of the Far East Command and favored 

a separate command for operations on the Asian mainland, at least in 

situations involving limited wars.5

Not surprisingly, then, Admiral Felt and the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral George W. Anderson, Jr., strongly objected to McNamaAdmiral Felt (NARA)

Chap 2.indd 37 
38

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ra’s plan. They instead advocated establishment of a subordinate unifi e

command for Vietnam under CINCPAC. Anderson and Felt pointed ou

that the American forces to be deployed in South Vietnam were no

large enough to justify a separate theater command and that Vietnam 

was geographically and strategically inseparable from the rest of main

land Southeast Asia, which would remain a CINCPAC responsibility.

The Joint Chiefs deferred to the Navy argument. In their initial pro

posal to McNamara on 22 November 1961, they recommended that th

“Commander, United States Forces in Vietnam” (his original workin

title), should head a subordinate unifi ed headquarters under CINCPAC

complete with joint staff and service component commands. Beside

reiterating the Navy arguments for such a command structure, th

Joint Chiefs added that it would conform to those for American force

in Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan. Secretary McNamara accepted th

chiefs’ recommendation, choosing not to make an issue of the com

mand relationship. In practice, he intended to exercise close persona

control of activities in Vietnam through periodic face-to-face confe

ences with both the PACOM and MACV commanders.6

By nominating Lt. Gen. Paul D. Harkins to head MACV, the Join

Chiefs reinforced that headquarters’ close relationship with Pacifi 

Command. Harkins, an affable 57-year-old West Pointer who receive

his fourth star when President Kennedy confi rmed his new assignmen

had made his career as a staff offi cer, operational planner, and militar

diplomat. At the time of his selection, he was serving as deputy com

mander of U.S. Army, Pacifi c (USARPAC), PACOM’s Army componen

headquarters. Harkins possessed neither formal training nor operation

al experience in counterinsurgency. However, as an Army planner i

the Pentagon, he had worked with the State Department and becom

familiar with America’s worldwide military assistance programs. Com

manding North Atlantic Treaty Organization land forces in southeaster

Europe, his last assignment before joining USARPAC, he had acquire

experience in dealing with sometimes fractious allies. Having serve

under General Taylor in a succession of important assignments, Harkin

enjoyed the confi dence of Taylor, who would soon become chairma

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Taylor evidently had the USARPAC deput

commander in mind for the Vietnam position from the time of his Oc

tober 1961 trip to Saigon. During a Honolulu stopover on his way bac

to report to Kennedy, Taylor told Harkins: “Paul, you better be ready t

get your fi st in the dike, there is going to be a fl ood over there.”7

Whatever his career background and infl uential support, Harkin

principal qualifi cation for the Military Assistance Command assign

ment was his extensive involvement, as deputy U.S. Army, Pacifi 

commander, with Southeast Asia operations and contingency plan

ning. During the 1961 Laotian crisis, Harkins, on additional duty a

commander of SEATO Field Forces, spent several months on Okinaw

and in the Philippines directing preparations for allied military inte

Chap 2.indd 38 
39

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

vention. In the capacity of commander-designate of both U.S. and 

SEATO ground forces, he continued working on regional contingency 

plans after inactivation of the Field Force headquarters. On various assignments, Harkins had studied South Vietnam and its problems; and 

he had paid several visits to the country, the earliest while the French 

still were fi ghting there. In sum, Harkins, while not a counterinsurgency specialist, had a broad general knowledge of regional conditions 

and the diplomatic skills to get along with the Diem regime. He could 

be counted on to incorporate his new headquarters smoothly into the 

Pacifi c Command.8

General Harkins’ position in the Pacifi c Command structure underwent further elaboration within three months of the activation of 

MACV. The occasion was a new high point in the persistent Laotian 

crisis. In May 1962, with negotiations for a tripartite coalition government temporarily deadlocked, President Kennedy marshaled U.S. air, 

naval, and land forces to deter the Lao Communists from further military advances and to reassure Thailand, Laos’ neighbor, of continued 

United States defense support. To this end, he deployed to northern 

Thailand brigade-size Army and Marine ground units, plus air and supporting elements, and ordered contingency planning for American occupation and defense of portions of southern and western Laos.9

To command the deployed American forces in whatever action 

became necessary, Kennedy ordered creation of a new headquarters 

in Thailand, designated U.S. Military Assistance Command, Thailand 

(USMACTHAI), and appointed General Harkins its commander in addition to his duties as COMUSMACV. Activated on 15 May 1962, Harkins’ Thai command consisted of the existing Joint U.S. Military Assistance Group (JUSMAG) in that country, plus the American air and 

ground units. Harkins directed the latter forces through an intermediate headquarters, Joint Task Force (JTF) 116, which Pacifi c Command 

maintained for the contingency of major troop deployments to Southeast Asia.10

With the agreement on a coalition government in June and the 

signing of the new Geneva Accords the following month, the Laotian 

crisis soon passed. However, American command arrangements for 

Southeast Asia remained the subject of debate even as the forces in 

Thailand prepared to leave. On 30 May, Admiral Felt proposed that 

the Defense Department consolidate the positions of COMUSMACV 

and COMUSMACTHAI into a single offi ce named Commander, U.S. 

Military Assistance Command, Thailand/Vietnam. Presumably, General Harkins would fi ll the job, with a deputy commander, staff, and 

component commands under him in each country. This would make 

Harkins, in effect, a Southeast Asia regional military commander. The 

Joint Chiefs of Staff endorsed Felt’s recommendation, but political objections from the State Department blocked its implementation. Argument then continued over the fate of MACTHAI and over the respecChap 2.indd 39 
40

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

tive roles of that headquarters, Joint Task Force 116, and MACV i

contingency planning and command arrangements. General Harkin

favored enlargement of his regional role, whereas Admiral Felt pre

ferred to keep MACV’s jurisdiction limited to South Vietnam.11

Secretary McNamara resolved the question. At a conference i

Honolulu on 8 October, he directed Harkins to retain his position a

COMUSMACTHAI and in fact changed the general’s title to COMUS

MAC, Vietnam/Thailand. The chief of the Military Assistance Grou

in Thailand was to serve as Harkins’ deputy for advice and support i

that country and for control of any American troops deployed ther

MACV’s Air Force component command was to exercise operationa

control over all activities of its service in Southeast Asia, but the othe

service components were to confi ne their attention to South Vietnam

The Pacifi c Command, through its component headquarters, was t

support American forces in Thailand. McNamara vested in Harkin

planning responsibility for Southeast Asia and gave him a small staff i

Bangkok for that purpose. From then on, Harkins, as COMUSMACV

THAI and commander-designate of U.S. and SEATO fi eld forces, su

pervised the drafting and periodic revision of Pacifi c Command an

SEATO plans for resisting North Vietnamese and Chinese attacks o

Laos, South Vietnam, and Thailand, in contingencies ranging from 

intensifi ed insurgency to a full-scale onslaught by massed Chines

armies. In addition, Harkins participated in preparations for America

military operations in Thailand as the fragile Laotian peace began t

disintegrate.12

The Military Assistance Command’s place in the chain of comman

between Washington and Saigon came under periodic but inconclusiv

scrutiny. The chain was a complicated one which allowed many di

ferent agencies and individuals to dabble in MACV’s affairs. Secretar

McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff—both in their collective capacit

and as chiefs of their respective services—and Admiral Felt all watche

MACV’s activities closely and intervened to promote particular policie

or service interests. Members of the JCS regularly visited General Ha

kins in Saigon. All the Defense Department principals, and often th

ambassador to South Vietnam and other State Department and Whit

House offi cials, assembled in Hawaii roughly once a month for confe

ences convened by McNamara. Harkins found these conferences an

visits helpful in resolving disputes and securing support for his endeav

ors; but he also later complained that “the personal feelings of man

senior U.S. offi cials found their way into directives received in Saigon

. . . The whole setup of command and control,” he concluded, “was to

complicated.”13

As a side effect of the complicated chain of command, General Ha

kins and his staff were at times all but overrun by visitors from both th

executive branch and Congress. Most came to assess the progress of th

counterinsurgency campaign, but many had ulterior political purpose

Chap 2.indd 40 
41

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

as well. Within a single month in the fall of 1962, the Military Assistance Command accommodated over 200 guests from the Defense Department alone. Each delegation had to be housed, briefed, entertained, 

and—usually—escorted into the countryside to observe the “real” war 

at the cost of lost working time to the MACV staff and the diversion of 

vehicles and helicopters from their assigned tasks. Trying to ease the 

burden on the command, General Taylor, now chairman of the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff, in October 1962 directed Defense Department agencies 

to “reduce the number of visitors to South Vietnam and Thailand to 

those having actual business of pressing interest.” His directive, the fi rst 

of many on this subject, only temporarily checked the infl ux.14

Throughout the Military Assistance Command’s fi rst two years of 

operation, Admiral Felt kept the Saigon headquarters on a tight rein. 

He lost no opportunity to demonstrate that MACV, however unique 

its mission and circumstances, was merely another subordinate unifi ed command under CINCPAC. For example, when Harkins requested 

authority to convene general courts-martial in Vietnam to speed up 

the administration of justice among his widely dispersed troops, Felt 

turned him down and left the task to the PACOM service component 

commanders. The admiral also interjected himself repeatedly into questions of internal Military Assistance Command organization, including 

the relationship between MACV and the military advisory group. He 

intervened as well in operational planning, at one point pressing General Harkins to give high priority to clearing out the Viet Cong’s War 

Zone D base area north of Saigon and suggesting tactics for doing so.15

Admiral Felt’s constant interventions led several presidential advisers early in 1963 to reopen the question of whether Harkins should 

report directly to Secretary McNamara and the Joint Chiefs. President 

Kennedy himself raised the issue with the chiefs at a meeting on 28 

February 1963, requesting their views on whether Felt had Harkins “on 

a leash” so tight that the commander found it diffi cult to cooperate 

effectively with the rest of the country team. General Taylor and the 

other chiefs defended the existing arrangement. Taylor did so, he recalled later, “because I felt at that stage [that] Saigon as a headquarters 

had a very limited capacity” and that a great deal of support was available from Honolulu to reinforce “this small theater of operations which 

was just starting to emerge.” When queried by his military superiors, 

General Harkins made no request for a change in his chain of command. He pointed out in retrospect that he had to rely on CINCPAC 

for “supply and support” regardless of whether or not he had a direct 

line to the JCS. Deferring to military opinion, the administration early 

in April accepted a recommendation from Taylor that the existing arrangement continue. It did so, however, only after Taylor, in a personal 

conference with Admiral Felt, informally instructed the Pacifi c commander to allow more latitude where Harkins and his area of responsibility were concerned.16

Chap 2.indd 41 
42

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

MACV and the MAAG

If the Military Assistance Command’s relationships up the chain o

command to CINCPAC and beyond were at issue, so were its relation

ships downward, in particular those with its predecessor in Saigon, th

Military Assistance Advisory Group. Early in the planning for MACV

the Joint Chiefs of Staff had decided that the MAAG should remain i

existence as a separate subordinate command under the new headqua

ters. The group, under the MACV commander’s direction, was to con

tinue its advisory and training missions and its management of the Mi

itary Assistance Program (MAP) under which the United States fi nance

and equipped its ally’s armed forces. By retaining these functions, th

Joint Chiefs and Admiral Felt believed, the group could give MACV th

benefi t of its years of experience and its established contacts in Vie

nam while relieving the assistance command of burdensome, comple

administrative tasks. In practice, however, this division of labor soo

began to break down. Thus, within a year of MACV’s activation, Gen

eral Harkins would recommend dissolution of the MAAG and reassign

ment of its functions to the MACV staff and component commands.1

At the time of MACV’s activation, the 200-man MAAG headqua

ters consisted of a small joint staff, a Military Assistance Program Div

sion, a development and testing center, and Army, Navy, and Air Forc

sections that oversaw and supported American advisers with the Vie

namese services. Largest in size, the Army section played the key role i

guiding the Vietnamese armed forces by assigning advisers to the Join

General Staff (JGS), the ARVN high command, and the corps, division

training centers, schools, and territorial force headquarters under them

By early 1962 this modest establishment was reaching the limit of i

command and control capabilities. After eight years of stability, th

group’s manpower had grown in a few months from 685 offi cers an

enlisted men to almost 3,000 advisers deployed down to the provinc

and battalion levels. Until MACV went into operation, the group too

operational control of arriving American units and furnished them ad

ministrative and logistical support. It also assumed what were for it th

new tasks of directly assisting the South Vietnamese in intelligence an

operational planning. In the end, a Joint Staff offi cer could report afte

a visit to Vietnam in February 1962 only that the MAAG “appears t

lack organizational purpose and direction.”18

The Military Assistance Command was supposed to relieve the ad

visory group of the additional tasks it had assumed during the Ken

nedy buildup; but Admiral Felt was determined to keep the new head

quarters away from those aspects of the advisory, training, and militar

assistance programs that were the MAAG’s established areas of respon

sibility. MACV’s fi nal terms of reference, which Felt promulgated on 

April 1962, fi rmly placed the MAAG chief under General Harkins for a

matters but emphasized that the nuts and bolts of Military Assistanc

Chap 2.indd 42 
43

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

Program budgeting, planning, and accounting should be left to the 

MAAG with only “minimal” supervisory involvement by the MACV 

staff. In substance, the MAAG chief was to be COMUSMACV’s representative and agent for managing military assistance to the South Vietnamese and administering routine aspects of his advisory and training 

role. The admiral summed up his view of the relationship between the 

two American headquarters in a personal letter to Harkins:

ChMAAG is your representative with respect to MAP. . . . Specifi c responsibilities and 

functions in regard to MAP include making recommendations and submitting Military 

Assistance plans and programs to CINCPAC. We tried to spell this out quite carefully 

in order to relieve you of the administrative burden of actually performing voluminous 

chores related to MAP, while at the same time recognizing that the MAAG has been in 

operation for a long time and is best equipped to absorb the policies dictated by DOD 

and CINCPAC and such other directives that may be issued by SECDEF, the Military 

Departments and you. . . . The key to the problem is for you to provide strategic guidance in respect to defense problems of SVN and for the ChMAAG to do the laborious 

work of carrying out MAP administrative procedures.19

As the Military Assistance Command went into full operation during 

1962, Admiral Felt and General Harkins during that year reorganized 

the MAAG headquarters to refl ect the group’s more circumscribed functions. They eliminated the MAAG general staff sections and reduced the 

rank structure—the most visible change being the MAAG chief’s position, when Maj. Gen. Charles J. Timmes replaced General McGarr in 

July 1962. General Harkins considered reducing overall MAAG strength 

by about 160 headquarters people supposedly rendered surplus by the 

shift of functions to MACV, but General Timmes persuaded Harkins 

that a modest increase in the advisory group was long overdue. Timmes 

pointed out that the group’s fi eld advisory activities and reporting responsibilities were expanding and that the MAAG headquarters never 

had been adequately manned for the tasks MACV had assumed. In the 

end, both commanders agreed to recommend a modest increase in the 

MAAG to 3,250 offi cers and enlisted men, the approximate strength of 

the group through 1963. In a limited consolidation of activities, the 

MAAG’s Army section handled all Army personnel actions for both 

headquarters while MACV assumed responsibility for all intelligence 

and legal functions.20

Although Admiral Felt was constrained to respect Harkins’ areas of 

responsibility, the division of labor between the MACV and the MAAG 

headquarters evolved along some of the lines he desired. The Military 

Assistance Command took over the drafting and revision of PACOM 

contingency plans; in cooperation with the South Vietnamese Joint 

General Staff, it drew up the annual government plan of campaign; 

it prepared estimates of South Vietnamese force increases required by 

that plan; and it assumed the increasingly heavy burden of reporting 

to CINCPAC, the Joint Chiefs, and the secretary of defense on the progChap 2.indd 43 
44

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ress of the American effort. Liaison offi cers from MACV staff section

replaced those from the MAAG as advisers to the Joint General Sta

and other top-level South Vietnamese defense agencies. MACV also i

sued orders to the MAAG fi eld advisers on matters of intelligence an

operational planning and advice. For its part, the Military Assistanc

Advisory Group worked out the detailed training, construction, an

materiel requirements of the Vietnamese forces specifi ed by MACV; e

tablished unit activation schedules; and drafted requests and justifi ca

tions for MAP funding and equipment. The MAAG also continued t

administer and support the fi eld advisers and to direct their work wit

the Vietnamese on training and logistics.

Despite these arrangements, the spheres of interest of MACV an

the MAAG inevitably overlapped in practice, creating confusion an

duplication of effort for both. In Saigon, the MACV staff intervened i

the MAAG’s detailed planning of the Vietnamese force structure an

also became involved in other aspects of the Military Assistance Pro

gram’s administration, such as ammunition procurement, which d

rectly affected fi eld operations. In the fi eld, meanwhile, advisers serve

two masters. The line between MACV’s area of concern—intelligenc

and operations—and the training and logistical interests of the MAA

was often faint at best. Both the advisory group and the developin

MACV service commands became involved in the administration an

supply of the advisory teams.21

General Harkins lost little time in concluding that the advisor

group constituted an unnecessary complication in his command struc

ture. As early as September 1962, he proposed that all MAAG function

except administration of the Military Assistance Program should com

under the MACV component commands and that the remainder of th

advisory group’s headquarters should become a staff division withi

MACV. A JCS delegation that visited Vietnam in January 1963 suppor

ed Harkins’ recommendation, on the grounds that the assistance com

mand and the advisory group were using the same personnel in th

fi eld to perform overlapping tasks. Admiral Felt, however, continue

to argue against eliminating the MAAG. He insisted that MACV mu

avoid becoming “bogged down” in advisory and military assistanc

details. The question remained unresolved through the end of 1963

with General Harkins continuing to press for consolidation of the tw

headquarters.22

Formation of MACV Headquarters

If MACV command relationships were infl uenced by interservic

politics, even more so was the formation of its headquarters and sub

ordinate elements. Battles over distribution of staff billets, assignmen

of important functions, and command and control of American force

punctuated the fl eshing out of the command’s structure.

Chap 2.indd 44 
45

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

MACV headquarters had a small, improvised beginning. After a 

brief meeting with President Kennedy and the Joint Chiefs at Palm 

Beach, Florida, on 6 January, General Harkins traveled to Saigon to 

confer with General McGarr, who was less than enthusiastic at being 

supplanted by the new commander and headquarters. Both offi cers 

then attended McNamara’s January Honolulu conference. Harkins returned to Saigon to take over his command on 13 February and began 

work in earnest a week later, after a fi nal Honolulu planning session. 

At that time, the Military Assistance Command headquarters consisted 

of Harkins, his aide, his chief of staff, the chief of staff’s assistant, and 

two enlisted clerks on loan from the MAAG, which also provided offi ce 

space, communications, and staff support. The MACV staff expanded 

slowly at fi rst, through arrivals from outside the country and more numerous transfers of people from functions within the advisory group to 

equivalent MACV slots. To avoid disruption of group operations, most 

of the latter personnel remained temporarily at their MAAG desks, 

doing their MACV jobs as an additional duty. A member of the early 

MACV staff described the resulting diffi culties:

You had a mixed-up situation of certain offi cers and enlisted men in the J–3 at MAAG 

who would get a task given to them by the Chief of Staff at MACV, at the same time 

having to work for their own boss . . . , who was the J-3 of MAAG. This existed throughout the MAAG staff and it made a very diffi cult time for both MACV and for MAAG. 

. . . We were ultimately able to segregate portions of our staff from the MAAG staff 

in the old MAAG conference building. But that building just wasn’t large enough to 

take them all and make any kind of operating staff divisions. . . . The MAAG classifi ed 

mail and records section was attempting to fi le MACV traffi c and letters separate from 

MAAG, some of which were addressed to both. As a result some of this traffi c-correspondence is missing from one or the other fi les. I really think they did a real fi ne job 

in an awkward situation.23

The new headquarters grew rapidly. In mid-May, it separated physically from the MAAG, occupying its own leased offi ce building at 137 

Pasteur Street in downtown Saigon and subsequently at other locations 

as well. The staff quickly attained its authorized strength of 216 offi cers 

and enlisted men, nearly two-thirds of them transfers from the MAAG. 

General Harkins soon found this complement insuffi cient to perform 

all the tasks his offi ce had assumed from the advisory group and in August he asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff for an increase in headquarters 

strength to 352. The JCS approved the request in early1963.24

As the size of its staff expanded, the Military Assistance Command 

early standardized its people’s tours of duty. Initially, the personnel of 

each military service served in Vietnam for different lengths of time, 

depending on whether or not they were accompanied by their families and whether they were stationed in Saigon or in the provinces. 

By early 1963, after much negotiation, the services had agreed upon 

and were implementing a common tour of twelve months unaccompanied and twenty-four months accompanied for all personnel in Vietnam, regardless of whether they served in the capital or outside it. For 

Chap 2.indd 45 
46

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

MACV headquarters people, man

of whom had their families wit

them, living conditions in Saigo

were far from austere. Quartered i

villas and hotels, they could tak

advantage of the amenities of a cit

that offered a mixture of Europea

elegance and Oriental exoticism 

as yet largely unscarred by the wa

and its attendant affl ictions.25

The command’s headquarte

organization followed conven

tional military lines. The joint sta

included the traditional numbere

general sections for personnel (J1

intelligence (J2), operations (J3

logistics (J4), planning (J5), an

communications/electronics (J6

as well as special sections for pro

tocol, the comptroller, the judg

advocate, public information, inspector general, surgeon, chaplain

provost marshal, and civil affairs. An additional special staff elemen

combining an Advanced Research Projects Agency fi eld unit and 

Joint Operational Evaluation Group, conducted counterinsurgency re

search and development as well as fi eld tests of equipment and tactica

concepts. These headquarters subdivisions for the most part performe

their standard tasks, but with variations arising from the command

special mission. Each general and special staff offi ce, for example, ad

vised and assisted a counterpart agency within the South Vietnames

Joint General Staff. Many also participated in MACV’s Southeast Asi

contingency planning, and the J5 offi ce included an entire branch fo

that purpose. The command maintained its own small combat opera

tions center in the operations section and a message center staffed b

the communications/electronics offi ce. 26

From the beginning, the services engaged in a tug-of-war over di

tribution of the senior MACV staff positions. Maneuvering got unde

way in November 1961, when Admiral Felt prepared an organizatio

and staffi ng plan, or Joint Table of Distribution (JTD), for the projecte

headquarters. Felt’s plan called for a joint staff with an Army genera

in command and Army personnel predominant in numbers, but wit

strong balancing representation from the other services. Air Force o

fi cers, in particular, would occupy the positions of chief of staff and o

the assistant chiefs of staff for intelligence (J2) and plans (J5). At Gen

eral Harkins’ request, the JCS switched the chief of staff billet from th

Air Force to the Marine Corps to accommodate Harkins’ personal choic

for the job, Maj. Gen. Richard G. Weede, USMC. In return, the Air Forc

MACV Headquarters, 137 Pasteur 

Street (NARA)

Chap 2.indd 46 
47

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

received the assistant chief of staff 

for operations (J3) slot. Harkins 

accepted this arrangement—even 

though it would give an aviator responsibility for directing what was 

primarily a ground war—because 

he expected to “guide the G-3 [sic] 

business” himself. 27

The Chief of Staff of the Army, 

General George W. Decker, objected to Air Force control of the 

intelligence and operations offi ces. 

While expressing confi dence in 

the Air Force’s ability to provide 

competent high-level staff offi cers, 

Decker declared that “it seems inappropriate to put them . . . where 

they will exert so much infl uence 

on what is basically a ground operation, and where the great preponderance of U.S. personnel involved will be Army.” Privately, Decker 

told Harkins that the Army, more than any other service, was “on the 

spot” in South Vietnam and that “any failure will be placed directly on 

our doorstep.” Hence, he wanted Army offi cers in the positions that 

could determine success or failure. Decker wanted Harkins, whose preferences as commander-designate carried great weight in determining 

the composition of the staff, to press the Army’s case with Admiral Felt 

and Secretary McNamara.28

How strongly Harkins advocated the Army position in discussions 

of the MACV organizational structure is not recorded. However, General Decker did receive support from Secretary McNamara, who also 

viewed the Vietnam confl ict as essentially a ground war. In February 

1962, over the objections of Air Force Chief of Staff General Curtis E. 

LeMay, McNamara awarded the operations, logistics, and communications billets to the Army. The Marine Corps kept the chief of staff position, while the Air Force had to settle for the intelligence and planning 

offi ces and the Navy for the chief of personnel. All the special staff section heads were from the Army except the comptroller (Navy) and the 

public information offi cer (Air Force). (Table)

Of the initial headquarters complement of 216 offi cers and enlisted 

men, 113 came from the Army, 35 from the Navy, 18 from the Marine Corps, and 50 from the Air Force. This distribution of senior staff 

positions and proportional manpower strength remained largely unchanged as MACV headquarters expanded.29

The outcome of this maneuvering left Air Force leaders convinced 

that their service had been shortchanged—in rank, offi ces, and numGeneral Weede (NARA)

Chap 2.indd 47 
48

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

bers—at MACV headquarters, to the detriment of the effective use of a

power in Vietnam. They had grounds for their frustration. The MAC

J3, an Army offi cer, quickly edged the Air Force J5 out of the plannin

for operations within South Vietnam. To make matters worse, as th

headquarters expanded, the J5 offi ce was shunted aside into a sepa

rate building away from the rest of the senior staff. The commande

of MACV’s Air Force component, whose headquarters came into bein

late in 1962, also reported that he had diffi culty in obtaining regula

timely access to General Harkins.

TABLE—MACV PRINCIPAL OFFICERS AT ACTIVATION

Commander General Paul D. Harkins, USA

Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Richard G. Weede, USMC

AC/S, J1 Capt. Joseph A. Tvedt, USN

AC/S, J2 Col. James M. Winterbottom, USAF

AC/S, J3 Brig. Gen. Gerald C. Kelleher, USA

AC/S, J4 Brig. Gen. Frank A. Osmanski, USA

AC/S, J5 Brig. Gen. John A. Dunning, USAF

AC/S, J6 Col. Philip S. Pomeroy, Jr., USA

Source: CINCPAC Command History, l962

Seeking to remedy what he considered an injustice to his servic

and a hindrance to effective prosecution of the war, LeMay campaigne

forcefully, and not always tactfully, for a larger, higher-ranking Air Forc

contingent at MACV headquarters. After a visit to Saigon early in 1962

LeMay angered General Harkins by alleging before the Joint Chiefs o

Staff that MACV was ignorant of and unconcerned with proper air sup

port. Harkins responded with a strong defense of his own and of Gen

eral Weede’s expertise in air matters. In an effort to gain more infl uenc

at the top level of the Military Assistance Command, Air Force leade

at various times during the next two years urged creation of a depu

ty MACV commander’s position, to be fi lled by a three-star Air Forc

general. They also pushed for transfer of the chief of staff billet from 

the Marine Corps to the Air Force at the end of General Weede’s tou

of duty. Neither campaign achieved its goal, in good measure becaus

Secretary McNamara persisted in regarding the Vietnam confl ict as 

ground war over which the Army should properly have charge.30

Aside from the persistent arguments over Air Force representation

which originated as much outside Vietnam as within it, the Military A

sistance Command’s senior staff formed a relatively harmonious team

“We were all acquainted with each other,” General Weede, the chief o

staff, recalled, “and were used to working together.” General Harkin

Chap 2.indd 48 
49

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

and most of his principal subordinates came to MACV from previous 

assignments in the Pacifi c Command. General Weede, for example, 

had commanded the 1st Marine Brigade at Kaneohe, Hawaii, for three 

years before joining MACV. His chief assistant had been a Pacifi c Command staff member in charge of “monitoring, then taking the actions 

necessary to execute” PACOM contingency plans for Southeast Asia. 

The chief of staff, along with the J4, Brig. Gen. Frank A. Osmanski, and 

the J6, Col. Philip S. Pomeroy, Jr., as well as other members of the staff, 

had served under Harkins the year before in the SEATO Field Forces 

headquarters activated for the Laotian crisis. Weede had been Harkins’ 

chief of staff in that command. He, Osmanski, and Pomeroy all were 

personal selections of Harkins for the MACV staff.31

Harkins maintained a rather distant relationship with his staff section chiefs. He spent much of his time traveling outside Saigon and 

held only brief daily staff meetings, relying largely on Weede for communication with the rest of the headquarters. For his part, Weede jealously guarded his position as principal channel to and from the commander. According to the secretary of the MACV Joint Staff, he “didn’t 

like anybody to deal directly with Gen H[arkins]. He was a great one for 

wanting the C[hief] of S[taff] to be the way of getting through to the 

commander.”32

MACV staff members 

(Photo courtesy of Maj. Gen. Carl A. Youngdale, USMC (Ret.))

Chap 2.indd 49 
50

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

One comparatively small element of the Military Assistance Com

mand headquarters, concerned with counterinsurgency research

development, and testing, absorbed a disproportionate amount o

command attention from General Harkins and his superiors. For th

Kennedy administration and its armed forces, South Vietnam afforde

a potential laboratory for trying out counterinsurgency technologie

and techniques in active warfare. Unfortunately, this effort became a

interagency, interservice battleground. At issue, the MACV Air Forc

component commander declared, was “who was going to control [th

program] and who was going to end up with whatever was develope

as . . . a part of their service’s roles and missions.”33

Testing and evaluation agencies proliferated in Vietnam. Befor

MACV was organized, the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA

of Secretary McNamara’s offi ce in August 1961 established a fi eld un

to advise and cooperate with a Combat Development and Test Cente

(CDTC) formed by the Vietnamese Joint General Staff. 34 Charged wit

aiding the Vietnamese in developing new devices and techniques fo

combating the Viet Cong, the ARPA unit was responsible neither t

CINCPAC nor to his subordinate unifi ed commanders. Instead, it re

ported directly to the director of defense for research and engineerin

and obtained experimental equipment through its own procuremen

channels. To secure a testing agency more closely controlled by the un

formed services, the Joint Chiefs of Staff in July 1962 set up the Join

Operational Evaluation Group–Vietnam (JOEG-V). This group, unde

General Harkins’ control, was to coordinate service testing of concept

tactics, techniques, and materiel. It also was to ensure that such tria

did not interfere with operations against the Viet Cong and to make i

own evaluations of tests that were likely to have results of interest t

more than one service. To carry out its own counterinsurgency exper

ments, the Army lost no time in establishing an Army Concept Team 

in Vietnam (ACTIV) under the joint evaluation group. This unit ha

as its initial mission the trial in combat of Army aircraft and airmobil

tactics. Not to be left behind by its rival, the Air Force early in 196

formed a twelve-man test unit of its own within its Vietnam compo

nent command, the 2d Air Division.35

Admiral Felt viewed this multiplication of testing agencies wit

displeasure. He worked continuously to limit their size and to en

sure that their activities supported rather than interfered with pro

ecution of the counterinsurgency campaign. In February 1962 h

secured agreement from ARPA representatives that all projects un

dertaken by their agency in Southeast Asia would require concurrenc

from the host government, the appropriate military commands, an

the ARPA fi eld unit. Similarly, Felt postponed deployment of half of th

Army Concept Team in Vietnam, with its ninety-nine personnel an

its aircraft test units, until the Army reduced the team’s permanentl

assigned manpower by one-third. The admiral also insisted that th

Chap 2.indd 50 
51

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

Army permit him and General Harkins to review and amend proposals 

for new tests at an early stage in their development and to rewrite the 

test plans as necessary to bring them into line with operational needs 

in Vietnam.36

In spite these efforts, in November 1962 Felt told the Joint Chiefs 

that he was “becoming concerned that desire to use [South Vietnam] 

as a US test bed is beclouding CINCPAC and COMUSMACV primary 

objective of advising [the government of Vietnam] how to fi ght and 

assisting them to win their war.” Organizations and tests continued to 

proliferate. The Combat Development Test Center and the ARPA fi eld 

unit alone soon had some fi fty projects under way, including experiments with chemical defoliation of Viet Cong hideouts and food-growing areas, employment of patrol dogs and ground surveillance radar, 

and the use of special grenades to splash fl uorescent paint on guerrillas 

during engagements. Duplication of effort inevitably followed, especially between the ARPA unit and the service agencies, which regarded 

the ARPA unit with distrust. “ARPA has shown tendency to get into 

combat developments fi eld (doctrine, troop tests) which is service responsibility,” an Army information brief declared early in 1963. “ARPA 

also jealously guards its responsibility for [South Vietnamese testing 

activities]” and “may try to block R&D or perhaps troop testing Army 

may want to do in VN. . . . ARPA is in infl uential position to block 

Army if it desires.”37

The Joint Chiefs of Staff, seconded by Admiral Felt and General 

Harkins, campaigned for placement of all testing and research agencies 

in Vietnam under the Military Assistance Command, to ensure unity of 

effort and to keep the activities subordinate to the prosecution of the 

war. However, Dr. Harold Brown, the director of defense research and 

engineering, and his staff insisted on keeping the ARPA fi eld unit out 

of the military chain of command and procurement system. Secretary 

McNamara supported them. In a partial concession to the Joint Chiefs, 

McNamara in August 1962 appointed a single director, Brig. Gen. Robert H. York, a member of Dr. Brown’s Pentagon staff, for both the ARPA 

fi eld unit and the Joint Operational Evaluation Group. Under the terms 

of reference issued by Admiral Felt in December, General York was to 

oversee and evaluate all military research, development, and testing in 

South Vietnam. He was to report to ARPA on matters of research and 

development and tests of equipment and systems and to the MACV 

commander, CINCPAC, and the Joint Chiefs on the evaluation of military operations and tests of materiel by troops in the fi eld.38

York’s appointment satisfi ed neither General Harkins nor the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff. Harkins complained to Admiral Felt that the “entire 

subject of Research Development Test and Evaluation structure, scope 

of authority and relationship of the numerous agencies becomes more 

confusing as time passes.” Early in 1963, the same JCS inspection team 

that recommended the merger of MACV and the MAAG also concludChap 2.indd 51 
52

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ed that Harkins should have authority over all U.S. military researc

and development within his command, so that he could review eac

project’s usefulness to the war effort and eliminate those he deeme

superfl uous.39

Armed with this recommendation, the Joint Chiefs secured Secre

tary McNamara’s agreement, at least in principle, to MACV control o

all testing. At JCS direction, Admiral Felt and General Harkins drafte

a plan for a Research and Evaluation Division of the MACV staff tha

would incorporate all the testing organizations, including the ARP

fi eld unit, as separate branches. Harkins then would supervise all mil

tary testing within South Vietnam, assigning responsibility for trials o

interest to more than one service and recommending to the secretar

of defense discontinuation of any projects that he deemed would inte

fere with operations or that could be done outside Vietnam. This pla

became mired in disputes within the defense establishment. The A

Force demanded that the position of MACV director of research an

evaluation rotate among the services; the Army claimed permanen

possession of the slot because of the predominance in Vietnam of tes

of concern to it. Both the Advanced Research Projects Agency and th

Army wanted to retain a measure of autonomy for their respective tes

ing units. These issues remained unresolved through the end of 1963

In the meantime, the various testing and development agencies wen

their separate ways, loosely coordinated by General York, with frequen

intervention by Admiral Felt.40

In contrast to the command attention devoted to research and tes

ing, a more important element of MACV headquarters—its intelligenc

section—suffered from neglect. As a result of he interservice jockeyin

for key staff positions, the fi rst two assistant chiefs of staff for inte

ligence were Air Force colonels, specialists in strategic reconnaissanc

and Soviet missiles rather than in counterinsurgency. With a limite

staff and few American resources in South Vietnam upon which t

draw, the MACV J2 concentrated on providing technical advice to i

Saigon government counterparts and relied on them for most of th

data on which it based its own reports. The South Vietnamese inte

ligence services were ill trained, organizationally fragmented, and in

clined to shape their output to please President Diem. They furnishe

MACV with what was at best incomplete, inaccurate, and biased info

mation on such vital matters as the enemy order of battle, condition

in the countryside, and the internal politics of the regime. Since effec

tive intelligence is an indispensable element in a counterinsurgenc

campaign, MACV was thus handicapped from the outset. The weak

ness of its intelligence arm was to have damaging effects as the militar

and political situation in South Vietnam began to deteriorate.41

As the Military Assistance Command and other American head

quarters grew, their requirements for supplies, facilities, and medica

and other support overwhelmed the MAAG’s rudimentary logistica

Chap 2.indd 52 
53

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

arrangements. Creation of a new support agency, however, involved 

considerations of interservice politics as well as military effi ciency. Under a Department of Defense directive dating back to the late 

1950s, the Navy Department was to provide administrative and logistical support for unifi ed commands in the Pacifi c even when, as with 

MACV, they consisted largely of non-Navy forces. With the formation 

of MACV in prospect, Admiral John H. Sides, Commander in Chief, 

Pacifi c Fleet (CINCPACFLT), whose forces would perform the support 

mission, objected to Navy personnel’s having to act as “janitors” for 

a predominantly Army command, especially since the Navy was not 

then supporting the Army in Japan, Korea, and Okinawa. The Chief of 

Naval Operations, Admiral George W. Anderson, Jr., and Admiral Felt 

overruled Sides on the bluntly stated grounds that “command implications” were involved, specifi cally strengthening the Navy’s case for 

subordination of MACV to Pacifi c Command and forestalling an Army 

bid to take the position of CINCPAC away from the Navy. The fl eet 

must support MACV, Anderson told Felt, “despite the price we must 

pay in personnel and Navy dollars.”

So directed, the Navy took on the support mission. Under plans 

developed by Pacifi c Fleet, Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon 

(HSAS), went into operation on 1 July 1962 with a joint complement 

that eventually included over 400 personnel, most of them Navy with 

a sprinkling from the Army and Air Force. Under interservice agreements, HSAS furnished common supply, fi scal, public works, medical, 

commissary, exchange, and special services support to the MACV and 

MAAG headquarters and to U.S. Army and Air Force commands in 

the vicinity of the Vietnamese capital. By early 1963, at General Harkins’ request, the activity was preparing to expand its cargo-handling 

and storage operations to outlying ports as well, the better to support 

American units and advisers in the fi eld. However, HSAS did not begin 

upcountry port operations until mid-1964, due to unresolved disagreements between the services about their respective contributions to the 

effort of manpower, funds, and materiel.42

The Component Commands

General Harkins was to direct his American forces in South Vietnam 

through Army, Navy, and Air Force service component commands. 

Those commands developed only slowly and unevenly, however, during MACV’s fi rst two years in operation. Their halting growth resulted 

from the small size of the American forces committed, the peculiarities 

of their mission, and diplomatic and political complications.

The Navy in fact got along at fi rst without a service component 

command headquarters. Its section of the Military Assistance Advisory 

Group administered its modest contingent advising the Vietnamese 

Navy. Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon, was under MACV’s operaChap 2.indd 53 
54

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

tional control and for all other purposes answered to the commande

U.S. Naval Forces, Philippines.43

With the largest number of men and units deployed, the Army de

veloped its component command most fully. In December 1961, Gen

eral James F. Collins, Commanding General, U.S. Army, Pacifi c, estab

lished a provisional logistical group to support the Army helicopte

companies then arriving in Vietnam. This 300-man group constitute

an advance element of U.S. Army, Ryukyu Islands (USARYIS), on Ok

nawa, from which it drew personnel and supplies. In March 1962, a

Admiral Felt’s direction, Collins redesignated this provisional elemen

as U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam (USASGV). He assigned mo

Army units in Vietnam to its operational control and made the grou

responsible for the units’ administrative and logistical support. At th

same time, he placed USASGV under the operational command of Gen

eral Harkins, giving it at least the implied status of a MACV Army com

ponent command. Further to clarify command relationships betwee

USARPAC, USARYIS, MACV, USASGV, and the Army forces in Sout

Vietnam, General Collins on 20 April designated the commander o

USASGV as Army component commander under COMUSMACV. Th

support group, however, remained under the administrative control o

the Army command on Okinawa.

In practice, the U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam, performed th

logistical and administrative—but not tactical—functions of a compo

nent command. General Harkins exercised direct operational contro

over most Army units in Vietnam, delegating command of the hel

copter companies to the MAAG and its corps senior advisers. In effec

Harkins acted as his own Army component commander and employe

the USASGV commander as his deputy for Army logistical and admin

istrative matters. In August 1963, U.S. Army, Pacifi c, formally acknow

edged this practice by designating Harkins as Army component com

mander in Vietnam and the U.S. Army Support Group commander a

his deputy. This dual role of the military assistance commander me

with criticism, especially from the Air Force, as violating the custom

ary prohibition against a unifi ed commander personally commandin

a component force and as imposing too much purely Army busine

on the MACV joint staff. However, the arrangement conformed to th

practice in other unifi ed commands in which Army elements predom

nated, and Pacifi c Command contingency plans for Southeast Asi

called for such a command structure there if major American comba

forces were committed. In Vietnam, the arrangement permitted MAC

headquarters to parallel in functions the South Vietnamese Joint Gen

eral Staff, which had direct operational control over that nation’s army

For those reasons, COMUSMACV was to retain his Army componen

“hat” throughout the life of his command.44

Creation of an Air Force component command was delayed unt

October 1962. The delay was due in large measure to the Kenned

Chap 2.indd 54 
55

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

administration’s desire to avoid 

acknowledging publicly the fact 

that the FARM GATE counterinsurgency unit of piston-engine fi ghters, light bombers, and transports 

was fl ying combat missions in 

South Vietnam, under Vietnamese 

insignia and carrying Vietnamese 

crewmen, ostensibly for training. 

As early as 20 November 1961, Pacifi c Air Forces, with Admiral Felt’s 

permission, established a headquarters in Saigon, the 2d Advance 

Echelon (2d ADVON), Thirteenth 

Air Force, under Brig. Gen. Rollen 

H. Anthis, USAF, to direct FARM

GATE’s combat operations. At the 

same time, the MAAG’s Air Force 

section, also under General Anthis, 

oversaw the unit in its other mission 

of training the South Vietnamese Air Force. However, in deference to the 

wishes of Ambassador Nolting, the 2d ADVON’s real title and functions 

remained covert. Known simply as Detachment 7, Anthis and his tiny staff 

of temporary duty personnel were hidden in the MAAG offi ces.45

This was an unsatisfactory arrangement for the Air Force, especially from the logistics standpoint. Therefore, as soon as the Military 

Assistance Command went into operation, Pacifi c Air Forces, supported by General LeMay, launched a campaign for reorganization 

of the 2d ADVON into a full-fl edged air division. Admiral Felt agreed 

in principle to this action on 21 March 1962, but he stipulated that 

the change would take place only “at such time as COMUSMACV organization and operations become regularized and attention of news 

media to U.S. military operations in S[outh] V[ietnam] slackens.” Although media attention to American operations did not in fact lessen, 

the advance unit gradually evolved into a true component command. 

During May and June the Air Force secured open designation of the 

section as a command to which people could be assigned and formed 

regular base squadrons at Tan Son Nhut, Bien Hoa, Nha Trang, and Da 

Nang air bases. In July, Ambassador Nolting withdrew his objection 

to creation of an Air Force headquarters, although he continued to 

urge minimum publicity for the change.46

Final action on the Air Force component command accompanied 

the designation of General Harkins as U.S. commander for both South 

Vietnam and Thailand. On 8 October, Pacifi c Air Forces discontinued 

the 2d ADVON and activated the 2d Air Division under General Anthis, 

with headquarters at Tan Son Nhut. Under the agreements reached at 

General Anthis (U.S. Air Force)

Chap 2.indd 55 
56

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

the 8 October Honolulu conference, the division, under a chain of com

mand running from CINCPAC through COMUSMACV and COMUS

MACTHAI, exercised operational control over all Air Force activitie

in Southeast Asia except those advisory groups in South Vietnam an

Thailand. Its commander was responsible to Harkins for operationa

matters and to Pacifi c Air Forces through the Thirteenth Air Force fo

administration and logistics.47

The Debate over Control of Air Power

As commander of the 2d Air Division, General Anthis also func

tioned as the commander of MACV’s Air Force component and prin

cipal air adviser to General Harkins. In those capacities, backed b

his Air Force superiors, he became embroiled with Harkins in a bi

ter, unresolved dispute over the command and control of aviation i

Vietnam. Stemming from fundamental Army–Air Force disagreemen

over air doctrine, the argument took place against the background o

the Army’s acquisition in the late fi fties of its own helicopters and ai

planes and its development of a concept of airmobile operations tha

employed Army infantry and artillery units with their own organi

aviation. In this context, both sides assumed that the outcome of th

argument in Vietnam would set vital precedents for the future of the

services and of American air power in general. “It may be improper t

say we are at war with the Army,” the air staff director of plans avowe

at the time. “However, we believe that if the Army efforts are suc

cessful, they may have a long term adverse effect in the U.S. militar

posture that could be more important than the battle presently bein

waged with the Viet Cong.”48

Both services built up their aviation strength in South Vietnam du

ing the Military Assistance Command’s fi rst two years. Besides addin

aircraft to its FARM GATE unit, the Air Force introduced squadrons o

short takeoff and landing transports and light observation planes. Th

Army brought in troop-carrying and gunship helicopters, as well as i

own fi xed-wing transports and reconnaissance craft, and the marine

established their presence with a helicopter squadron. By the end o

1963, 325 Army, 117 Air Force, and 20 Marine aircraft were operatin

in South Vietnam, alongside the 219 airplanes and helicopters of th

Vietnamese Air Force (VNAF). The functions of many of these aircra

overlapped, leading to competition for roles and missions and som

duplication of services, a circumstance not unwelcome to ground com

manders who could then select the air support provider most respon

sive to their needs.49

At Military Assistance Command headquarters, service partisanshi

became intense and at times disruptive. Maj. Gen. Edward L. Rowney

fi rst chief of the Army Concept Team in Vietnam, used the team’s tes

ing programs to introduce Army aircraft into combat under the mo

Chap 2.indd 56 
57

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

favorable circumstances for validating his service’s airmobility doctrine. ACTIV, he boasted at the end of his tour, had allowed

air mobile operations to function without being fettered by Air Force controls. While 

we seem slow to adopt new methods for fi ghting guerrillas, the Army is nonetheless 

considerably ahead of the Air Force. They insist on applying the wrong tools in the 

wrong way. It is my conviction that by providing the assets and protecting them from 

being hampered we can squeeze many of the Air Force artifi cialities and anomalies out 

of the fi eld of counterinsurgency.50

General Anthis was equally zealous in upholding the Air Force’s 

position. He referred privately to the Army as “a customer that is also 

a competitor” and suggested that it would be desirable for “the Army 

concept of close air support” to be discredited early by minor reverses in Vietnam rather than by “the ultimate catastrophe their concept 

must lead us to at a time and place where we will not have the elasticity we presently enjoy.” Observing the infi ghting between Anthis and 

Rowney at MACV headquarters and the general “dirty work of selling 

our service product at the expense of others,” the J5, Maj. Gen. Milton 

B. Adams, himself an Air Force general, wondered for a while “who the 

principal enemy was, the VC or the Army or the Air Force.”51

The competition for missions largely resolved itself, because the 

intensifying war created more than enough work for aircraft of every 

type and service. The Army–Air Force doctrinal dispute over command and control, on the other hand, proved intractable. Each service set up a version of its preferred control system. Pacifi c Air Forces, 

even before MACV went into operation, obtained authorization from 

Secretary McNamara to establish an Air Force–type tactical air control 

system (TACS) in South Vietnam. By late 1962 that system, although 

plagued by equipment shortages and communications problems, was 

in place and operating. It consisted of a Joint Air Operations Center 

(JAOC) at Tan Son Nhut with a subordinate operations center at each 

ARVN corps headquarters. Manned by American and South Vietnamese personnel, this system assigned missions to and controlled the 

fl ights of both American and South Vietnamese Air Force aircraft, although each service remained under the command of its own national authorities. A separate Southeast Asia Airlift System, built around a 

combat cargo group under the 2d Air Division and a Joint Airlift Allocation Board in the MACV J4 section, controlled operations of U.S. 

Air Force and VNAF transport planes and set priorities for fulfi lling 

airlift requests.52

General Harkins took the Army’s side on most aviation issues, 

including command and control. He had sought to promote the interests of Army aviation while deputy commander of USARPAC, and 

he continued doing so as MACV commander. Accordingly, Harkins 

pressed for introduction into Vietnam of the maximum number of 

Army aircraft, so that, in the Air Force view, he much too readily acChap 2.indd 57 
58

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

quiesced in Army encroachment on Air Force missions. Worst of all i

Air Force eyes, he kept all the Army and Marine helicopters and mo

Army fi xed-wing aircraft (except for a few token CV–2 Caribou tran

ports assigned to the Southeast Asia Airlift System) out of the centra

ized control structure. He gave operational control of the Army an

Marine craft to his corps senior advisers, who dispatched them on mi

sions with little reference to the Joint Air Operations Center, and h

advised the Joint General Staff members to follow suit by distributin

their own helicopters and observation planes rather than employin

them within the Air Force system.53

Harkins thus had under him two separate air command and contro

systems which, between them, controlled four separate air organiza

tions. His Air Force component commander, in conjunction with th

Joint General Staff and using a common tactical air control system

managed the U.S. and Vietnamese Air Forces as a pool of centrally a

located air power. The Army corps senior advisers, working with th

ARVN corps headquarters, disposed of a much larger force of U.S. Arm

and Marine aircraft over which, for practical purposes, General Anth

had no authority and which advisers and ground commanders pre

ferred for its greater responsiveness to their requirements. This bifurca

tion of control seemingly violated a CINCPAC instruction of 6 Jun

1962, which gave the Air Force component commander coordinatin

authority over all air organizations operating within his area of respon

sibility. However, General Harkins chose to interpret “coordinating au

thority” his own way, as little more than air traffi c control. He als

made the most of the fact that the instruction did nothing to requir

assignment of non–Air Force aircraft to the operational control of th

Air Force component commander. In day-to-day operations, the me

in the fi eld meshed the two systems after a fashion, but Air Force lead

ers objected bitterly to what they felt was subversion by MACV of th

principles of unifi ed command and warned that MACV’s divided tact

cal air control system would sooner or later lead to disaster. 54

FARM GATE aircraft: left, South Vietnamese T–28 fi ghter-bombers;

right, U.S. Air Force B–26 light bomber (NARA)

Chap 2.indd 58 
59

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

Harkins, who considered himself an expert on close air support as a 

result of his World War II experience on General Patton’s staff, argued 

uncompromisingly for decentralized control. He claimed that “there 

is no air battle in Vietnam, and there are no indications that one will 

develop. There is an extensive utilization of air power in support of 

the ground battle.” The “geographical extent” of South Vietnam and 

limited communications facilities “unequivocally” ruled out centralized management of air support by the Joint Air Operations Center, 

which should confi ne its functions to redistributing of aircraft among 

the corps and to following and controlling missions once they were 

airborne. The air units themselves, Harkins affi rmed, must fl y from 

fi elds close to the areas of ground operations; they must be assigned 

“the mission of direct support of the Corps”; and they must be “under 

the direct control of the A[ir] S[upport] O[perations] C[enters] . . . and 

in direct response to the requirements established by the supported 

commander.” So as to leave no doubt where he stood, Harkins issued 

a MACV directive on 8 July that placed his Army J3 in charge of allocating Army and Marine Corps aircraft. He also set up an aviation 

headquarters in each corps, through which the senior adviser as his 

representative could command the aircraft that fl ew in support of that 

corps’ units and operations. In practice these included all but a handful of the Army and Marine aircraft in Vietnam. General Anthis argued 

against adoption of this plan, but to no avail.55

Admiral Felt deplored the service partisanship on both sides of the 

air controversy and attempted to mediate the dispute. He leaned, however, toward the Army side by agreeing that Harkins had the authority 

to withhold from his Air Force component commander operational 

control of Army and Marine aviation units. In that event, Felt said, 

the units withheld were to receive mission assignments from the commanders they supported, but should report to the tactical air control 

system for control of their fl ight operations. Felt repeatedly urged Harkins to place his Army helicopters and light observation planes under 

the TACS and his Caribous under the Southeast Asia airlift system, but 

he took no action when Harkins responded with only temporary token 

compliance. The Pacifi c commander accepted on a “provisional” basis 

Harkins’ establishment of separate corps-level headquarters for Army 

and Marine aviation. Late in 1963 he convened a special interservice 

board to attempt to resolve the aviation command dispute, but the 

board’s report drew fi re from Pacifi c Air Forces as overly diluting the 

authority of the Air Force component commander.56

At the end of 1963, as an Air Force study aptly summed up, “resolution of the unfortunate doctrinal controversy seemed as remote as the 

successful culmination of the struggle against communist insurgency 

in Vietnam.” General Harkins still commanded two separate air arms, 

one centrally directed by his Air Force component commander, the 

other parceled out among and controlled by the corps senior advisers. 

Chap 2.indd 59 
60

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

At that stage of the war, this probably was an acceptable compromis

The MACV Joint Operational Evaluation Group, reviewing the resul

of tests of Army aircraft and airmobile tactics, concluded in mid-196

that a “fl exible” system with some aircraft under central control an

others distributed among the corps and divisions best met the require

ments of the counterinsurgency campaign. General York, the evalu

ation group’s director, vainly urged the services to adapt doctrine t

Vietnam rather than Vietnam to doctrine and to “maintain an ope

mind and a willingness to consider new concepts.” The soldiers an

airmen fi ghting the battle acted in the spirit of York’s words; but the

superiors, driven by service considerations reaching far beyond Vie

nam, frequently did not. The struggle over command and control o

air power was to continue throughout most of the Military Assistanc

Command’s existence, increasing in complexity in step with air opera

tions in Southeast Asia.57

A Small But Complicated Command

Secretary of Defense McNamara’s late 1961 initiative to create 

new military organization to assist the South Vietnamese governmen

brought into being a small unifi ed headquarters carrying a heavy bu

den of command relationships, a growing load of additional mission

and interservice confl icts. (Chart 1) The Military Assistance Command, Vie

nam, from the start was enmeshed in a complex, unifi ed command structur

H–21 “Flying Banana” (U.S. Army)

Chap 2.indd 60 
CHART 1—U.S. MILITARY ASSISTANCE COMMAND, VIETNAM, 1964

SAIGON, VIETNAM

COMUSMACV—MACJOO

OFFICE OF INFORMATION—

MACO1

COMMAND INFORMATION

BR

DEPCOMUSMACV—

MACJO1

DODSPECREP

CHIEF OF STAFF—

MACJO2

SECRETARY,

JOINT STAFF—MACJO3

INSPECTOR GENERAL

MACIG

COMBINED STUDIES

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR PERSONNEL—MACJ 1

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR INTEL—MACJ 2

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR OPERATIONS—MACJ 3

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR LOGISTICS—MACJ 4

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR PLANS—MACJ 5

ASST. CHIEF OF STAFF

FOR COMM—ELECT—MACJ 6

ADJUTANT GENERAL—

MACAG

HEADQUARTERS

COMMANDANT—MACHC COMPTROLLER— MACCO SURGEON—MACMD STAFF JUDGE ADVOCATE— MACJA

PROVOST MARSHAL—

MACPM

CHAPLAIN—MACCH

JOINT RESEARCH & TEST

ACT—JRATA

MAP DIRECTORATE—

MACMAP

DIR OF ARMY MAP

LOGISTICS—MACLOG OFFICE OF SECTOR— MACSA AFFAIRS

DIR FOR ORG.

AND TRAINING

MACOT

STUDIES AND

OBSERVATIONS GROUP—

MACSOG

ARMY ADV GP—

I CORPS

ARMY ADV GP—

II CORPS

ARMY ADV GP—

III CORPS

ARMY ADV GP—

IV CORPS

AIRBORNE BRIGADE

ADV DET

PR—PF ADVISORY

DETACHMENT

CAPITAL MILITARY

DISTRICT

HOP TAC

SECRETARIAT

US ARMY SUPPORT

COMMAND—USASCV

NAVAL ADVISORY

GROUP

COMMANDER TASK

ELEMENT 79.3.3.6

HEADQUARTERS

SUPPORT ACTIVITY,

SAIGON—HEDSUPPACT

SECOND AIR

DIVISION

AIR FORCE ADVISORY

GROUP

MIL ADV GP REPUBLIC

OF CHINA TO RVN

KOREA MIL ASST.

GP. VN.

RAILWAY SECURITY

ADV DET

AUSTRALIAN ARMY

TRAINING TEAM

VIETNAM (AATTV)

NEW ZELAND

ARMY DETACHMEN

VIETNAM (NEW Z ADV)

PHILIPPINE CONTINGENT

VIETNAM

(PHILCON)

Chap 2.indd 61 
62

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

oriented primarily toward theater- and regional-wide conventiona

warfare. Besides its task in Vietnam, MACV acquired responsibility fo

U.S. forces and military assistance in Thailand, for military activity i

support of American policy in Laos, and for contingency planning fo

most of mainland Southeast Asia. Its commander and principal sta

offi cers at the outset were far better prepared by experience for the

missions outside Vietnam than for their primary task.

Unresolved issues of American military organization—the overlap

ping of functions with the Military Assistance Advisory Group; the in

ability to unify multiple research, development, and combat testin

agencies; and the Army–Air Force deadlock over command and contro

of aviation—persisted throughout the command’s fi rst two years of ex

istence. As the air power dispute demonstrated, the command at time

served as a battleground for doctrinal and policy confl icts which orig

nated outside its area of responsibility and in which the contendin

parties were only partially, if at all, concerned with the immediate situ

ation in Vietnam. Its commander’s initiative and independence in ca

rying out his missions seemed likely to be quite circumscribed, give

the penchant of his superiors for interfering in every detail of MAC

organization and activity.

Simply as an American military command, then, the Military A

sistance Command labored from the outset under complicated, di

fi cult conditions. At the same time, in its advisory and assistanc

capacity, the headquarters struggled with another set of tangled rela

tionships and intractable confl icts. The Military Assistance Comman

had to cooperate with other American agencies and with the regim

of President Ngo Dinh Diem in a politico-military campaign again

a tenacious, resourceful enemy of steadily increasing strength. In tha

campaign, progress was to prove diffi cult to measure and even mor

diffi cult to achieve.

Chap 2.indd 62 
63

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

Notes

1 Msgs, JCS to CINCPAC, 7 Feb 62; CINCPAC to Pacifi c Cmds, 8 Feb 62; both in fi le 

204–58 (205–19), Table of Distribution Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 2 For a summary of McNamara’s effect on the DOD, see Douglas Kinnard, The Secretary of Defense (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1980), ch. 3. A convenient 

precis of the change in defense strategy can be found in Allen R. Millett and Peter 

Maslowski, For the Common Defense: A Military History of the United States of America

(New York: The Free Press, 1984), ch. 16. On the general evolution of U.S. Cold War 

strategy, see John L. Gaddis, Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar 

American National Security Policy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982). 3 For a summary of this system, see Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 3–5; and 

JCS Publication 2: United Action Armed Forces. “Operational control” was defi ned as those 

command functions involving the composition of subordinate forces, the assignment of 

tasks, the designation of objectives, and “the authoritative direction necessary to accomplish the mission.” “Administrative control” denoted authority in respect to such matters 

as personnel management, supply, internal organization, and unit training. JCS Publication 1: Dictionary of United States Military Terms for Joint Usage, 1 Feb 62, pp. 3, 160. 4 For Felt’s and PACOM’s role in the Laos crises and in early counterinsurgency 

planning for Southeast Asia, see Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 6–7, 

59–76, 88–95. See also Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 94. 5 Edwin B. Hooper, Dean C. Allard, and Oscar P. Fitzgerald, The Setting of the Stage 

to 1959, The United States Navy and the Vietnam Confl ict, (Washington, D.C.: Naval 

History Division, 1976), 1: 274, 355; hereafter cited as Hooper et al., Setting of the Stage. 

Ronald H. Cole, Walter S. Poole, James F. Schnabel, Robert J. Watson, and Willard J. 

Webb, The History of the Unifi ed Command Plan, 1946–1993 (Washington, D.C.: Joint 

History Offi ce, Offi ce of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Feb 95), pp. 25–27. 

General Bruce Palmer, Jr., The 25-Year War: America’s Military Role in Vietnam (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1984), pp. 29–30. 6 Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 219–20, 252–53. Eckhardt, 

Command and Control, pp. 26–27, 30–31. Memo, Ch, Plans Div, G–3 USARPAC, for Ch, 

MH Div, G–3 USARPAC, sub: History of Development of SEA Contingency Command 

Structure for PACOM with Encl., Study, Lt Col Adrian St. John, 21 Nov 63, sub: Command Structure, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, William P. Bundy for SecDef, 14 Nov 

61, File I–19319/61; Note, Bundy for SecDef, 17 Nov 61, sub: Re the Vietnam Command Problem, File I–19334/61; JCSM 812–61, 22 Nov 61, sub: South Vietnam, File 

I–19358/61; memo, Bundy for SecDef, 25 Nov 61, sub: Command Arrangements for 

Vietnam, File I–19366/61; and memo, Bundy for U. Alexis Johnson et al., 28 Nov 61, 

sub: Command Arrangements for Vietnam, File I–19381/61. All in box 54, 64A2382, 

RG 330, NARA. 7 MFR, Dep SecDef, sub: President’s Meeting with JCS on January 3, 1962, File 

25048/62, ISA 337, box 55, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. Taylor Interv, sess. 4, p. 41. Harkins’ career and relationship with Taylor are related in U.S. Army Military History Institute (USAMHI) Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Program, Conversation between Gen Paul D. 

Harkins and Maj Jacob B. Couch, Jr., transcript, passim.; Taylor quote is on pp. 32–34 

of this transcript. See also Interv, USAF Oral History Program with Gen Paul D. Harkins, 

23 Feb 72, (AFCHO), pp. 21–23. 8 For history of SEATO Field Force headquarters, see CINCPAC Command History, 

1961, pt. 1, pp. 138–224; pt. 2, pp. 135, 141; and Interv, Marine Corps Historical Center 

(MCHC) with Lt Gen Richard G. Weede, USMC, 23 Jul 73, pp. 1–3, MCHC. Harkins’ selecChap 2.indd 63 
64

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

tion came under much retrospective criticism because of his lack of counterinsurgenc

background. See, for example, David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest (New Yor

Random House, 1969), pp. 183–88 (a portrait etched in vitriol); and Hilsman, To Mo

a Nation, pp. 426–27, 580. Hilsman’s view of Harkins in 1962 was more favorable; se

MFR, Hilsman, 19 Mar 62, sub: Visit with Gen Paul Harkins and Amb Nolting . . . ; an

Memo, Hilsman for Gen Taylor, 31 Mar 62, sub: (1) Report on Meeting with Gen Ha

kins. . . . Both in Box 3, VN 3/1/62–7/27/62, Folder 8, Roger Hilsman Papers, JFKL. 9 Msg, JCS 4551 to CINCPAC, 15 May 62, National Security File (NSF) 134 Lao

Cables 5/14/62, JFKL. For an overview of U.S. military actions, see Marolda and Fitzge

ald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 76–83. Kennedy’s orders on contingency planning are 

NSAM 157, 29 May 62, sub: Presidential Meeting on Laos, May 24, 1962, in U.S.–Vie

nam Relations, sec. 5.B.4, pp. 467–68. 10 Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, p. 79. Eckhardt, Command an

Control, p. 30. Msg, SecState 2575 to AmEmb Bangkok, 12 May 62; NSF Laos Cabl

5/12/62, JFKL. Msg, JCS 4528 to CINCPAC, 12 May 62, NSF134 Laos Cables 5/12/6

JFKL. Msg, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV et al., 15 May 62, File 204–58 (201–45) Or

Planning Files—Functions, Missions and Command Relationships (1963), box 

69A702, RG 334, NARA. Harkins’ formal terms of reference as COMUSMACTHAI, n

issued until early March 1963, were identical to those he worked under as COMU

MACV; see Ltr, Cmdr, US Military Assistance Command, to Distribution, 7 Mar 63, su

Command Relationships in Thailand, loc. cit. 11 The command argument is summarized in USARPAC, CINC’s Booklet for 8 O

SecDef Meeting, 5 Oct 62, item IV–A, Historians fi les, CMH. JCSM 444–62, sub: Com

mand Arrangements—Southeast Asia; Memo, William P. Bundy for SecDef, 26 Jun 6

sub: JCS Proposal for Change in Command Arrangements in Thailand and Vietnam, 

Jul 62. Both in File I–25670/62, ISA 323.3 SEA, box 59, 65A3501 RG 330, NARA. Ec

hardt, Command and Control, pp. 33–35. 12 Msgs, Taylor to JCS, 9 Oct 62; CINCPAC to COMUSMACTHAI, 14 Oct 6

CINCPAC to JCS, 19 Oct 62; JCS 7332 to CINCPAC, 9 Nov 62. All in Taylor Papers, N

tional Defense University (NDU), Washington, D.C. Eckhardt, Command and Contro

pp. 28–29, 34–35. JCSM 825–62, 30 Oct 62, sub: Command Arrangements—Southea

Asia, File I–21091/62, ISA 320.2 SEA, box 36, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. An 85-ma

COMUSMACTHAI headquarters in Bangkok was authorized in August 1962; see Ms

Bangkok 192 to SecState, 3 Aug 62, NSF 104 Thai Vol. IV 8/1/62–8/15/62, JFKL. Ha

kins’ responsibilities are summarized in USARPAC Notebook, Jun–Jul 63, tabs 4, 5, an

6, Historians fi les, CMH. 13 Quote is from Ltr, Harkins to Cowles, 29 Aug 79, Historians fi les, CMH. Harkin

Interv, 23 Feb 72, pp. 25, 77–78. For details of McNamara’s intervention in Vietnam

see Hist Div, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–68, ch. 3, p. 12. For Honolulu conferences, se

Rpt, McGarr, Ch, MAAG, Vietnam, for Period 2 September 1961 to 8 February 1962, 

Feb 62, p. 3, Historians fi les, CMH. For typical list of attendees, see MFR, sub: Trip 

Hawaii—Third Secretary of Defense Conference on Vietnam, 19 February 1962, HQ

CINCPAC, Historians fi les, CMH. 14 Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, p. 78. Memo, Taylor for Joint Chiefs of Staff and Join

Commanders, 9 Oct 62, sub: Reduction in the Number of Visitors to South Vietna

and Thailand, Historians fi les, CMH. 15 Ltrs, Harkins to SecDef via CINCPAC, sub: General Court-Martial Jurisdiction f

COMUSMACV; CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, sub: General Court-Martial Jurisdictio

for COMUSMACV, 26 Apr 62. Both in box 2, 72A6939, RG 334, NARA. Msg, CINCPA

to COMUSMACV, 12 Sep 62, Historians fi les, CMH. MFR, n.d., sub: Conversation wit

Maj Gen Edward J. Rowney. VN Hilsman Trip File, Box 3, Hilsman Papers, JFKL.

Chap 2.indd 64 
65

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

16 Memos, Forrestal for the President, 28 Jan 63, sub: South Vietnam; Forrestal for 

the President, 1 Feb 63; Forrestal for the President, 4 Feb 63. All in NSF 197/VN Jan 63 

and Feb–Mar 63, JFKL. Memo of Conference with the President, February 28, 1963—

5:25 to 6:45 pm., NSF 345; Chester V. Clifton, Conf with the Pres: 1/63–11/63, JFKL.

Taylor quote is from Interv, Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Program with General Maxwell 

D. Taylor, 16 Feb 73, sess. 4, pp. 46–47, MHI. Copy in CMH. Report of Visit by JCS Team 

to South Vietnam, Jan 63, pp. 17–18, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo of Conversation, 

Taylor and W. Averell Harriman, 2 Apr 63, sub: Command Relationships, Pacifi c, Historians fi les, CMH. Harkins’ retrospective view is in Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, p. 25. 17 For planning for the MAAG’s role, see USARPAC Command Study, 21 Nov 63. 

See also Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 30–31. 18 Memo, Maj Gen Charles J. Timmes for CINCPAC via COMUSMACV, 9 Aug 62, 

sub: Reorganization Military Assistance Advisory Group, Vietnam, File 204–58 (201–

45) Organization Planning Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Ltr, McGarr 

to Adm Harry D. Felt, 8 Aug 61; and Chart, 3 Aug 61, Organization MAAG–V, Aug 61, 

Historians fi les, CMH. On expansion, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 29–32; 

Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 6, pp. 24–25, 47–48; Eckhardt, Command and Control, 

pp. 23, 25. Msg, CINCPAC to ChMAAG Vietnam, 20 Jan 62, Historians fi les, CMH. Quote 

is from memo, Col H. F. Queenin for Dir of Ops, DCSOPS, 26 Feb 62, sub: Joint Staff Visit to 

CINCPAC, and MAAGs and JUSMAG Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand, box 82, 66A3138, RG 

319, NARA. 19 Ltr, Felt to Harkins, 27 Nov 62, box 1, 72A6939, RG 334, NARA. Memo, CINCPAC 

for COMUSMACV and ChMAAG, 7 Apr 62, sub: Terms of Reference for U.S. Military 

Assistance Advisory Group, Vietnam, File 204–58 (201–45) Org. Planning Files—Functions, Missions and Command Relationships (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 20 JCSM 262–62, 6 Apr 62, sub: Grade of Chief, MAAG, Vietnam; Memo, Palmer for 

CJCS, 11 Apr 62, sub: Grade of Chief, MAAG, Vietnam, File I–16258/62, ISA 200 VN, 

box 51, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. Memos, Timmes for CINCPAC via COMUSMACV, 

9 Aug 62, sub: Reorganization Military Assistance Advisory Group Vietnam; Maj Gen 

Richard G. Weede for ChMAAGV, 25 Aug 62, same sub; Harkins for CINCPAC, 30 Aug 

62, same sub; Msg, CINCPAC to JCS, 25 Apr 63. All in File 204–58 (201–45) Organization Planning Files (1963), box 1, 69A702; Memo, MACV J4 to Distribution, 19 Jan 63, 

sub: Projected Buildup of U.S. Forces in SVN, box 2, 69A702; RG 334, NARA. 21 MACV Summary 62–63, p. 1. Smith Interv, 1 Feb 64, pp. 20–21, 30–31. Colonel Smith 

was administrative assistant to the fi rst MACV chief of staff. Ltr, Harkins to ChMAAGV, 8 

Sep 62, sub: Comprehensive Plan for SVN, File 204–58 (1418–03) MAP Files (1963), box 2, 

69A702; Msg, PACAF to CINCPAC, 17 Apr 63 and 4 May 63, File 204–58 (201–45) Organization Planning Files (1963), box 1, 69A702; RG 334, NARA. Memo, CINCPAC for COMUSMACV and ChMAAGV, 27 Aug 63, sub: CINCPAC MAP Inspection of Military Assistance 

to the Republic of Vietnam; Report of PACOM MAAG Chiefs’ Conference, 1963, 13 Jun 63, 

pp. 8, 14. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 7, pp. 10–11. 

Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 33, 38–39. 22 Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 39–41. Report of Visit by JCS Team to South 

Vietnam, Jan 63, pp. 16–17, 25, 28, Historians fi les, CMH. Talking Paper, 30 Nov 63, 

sub: Additional Actions Which Could Be Taken to Facilitate Attainment of U.S. Objectives in SVN, in tab 1–E, Westmoreland Historical (Hist) File 2 (Jan 64–4 Feb 64), William C. Westmoreland Papers, CMH. 23 Quote is from Smith Interv, 1 Feb 64, pp. 10–13. Harkins describes his meeting 

with Kennedy in Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, p. 17. McGarr’s reception of Harkins is 

recounted in Ltr, Ernest J. Murray to Lt Gen Samuel T. Williams, 28 Jul 62, Williams 

Papers, Hoover Institution.

Chap 2.indd 65 
66

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

24 MACV Summary 62–63, p. 5. Smith Interv, 1 Feb 64, p. 12. Von Luttichau, “U.

Army Role,” ch. 7, p. 8. Memo, MACV J4 for Distribution, 19 Jan 63, sub: Projecte

Buildup of U.S. Forces in SVN, box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Ltrs, Harkins to JCS v

CINCPAC, 29 Aug 62, sub: Joint Table of Distribution . . . for Military Assistance Com

mand, Vietnam; CINCPAC to JCS, 29 Oct 62, sub: Proposed 10 August 1962 JTD f

USMAC Vietnam; Memo, CINCPAC for JCS, 15 Feb 63, sub: Proposed 1 July 1963 JT

for USMAC Vietnam. All in box 1, 72A6939, RG 334, NARA. Ltr, Murray to William

28 Jul 62, Williams Papers, Hoover Institution. 25 On duty tours, see MACV Summary 62–63, p. 6. Memo, Dir of Manpower, ODC

SPER, sub: Personnel Support of MAAG Vietnam and MACV, Historians fi les, CMH

On facilities and housing see Memo, Weede for CINCPAC, 22 Aug 62, sub: Physic

Security of U.S. Personnel, SVN, File 204–58 (510–02) Physical Security Instructio

Files (1963), box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. CINCPAC Command History, 1962, p

159–60. For an impression of Saigon at this time, see David Halberstam, The Making 

a Quagmire (New York: Random House, 1964), pp. 125–35. 26 This description is based on Joint Table of Distribution, U.S. Military Assistanc

Command, Vietnam, 1 Jul 63, Historians fi les, CMH. For advice to JGS, see MACV Sum

mary 62–63, p. 1. 27 Msgs, JCS 2964 to CINCPAC, 19 Jan 62; JCS 3110 to CINCPAC, 31 Jan 62; Ha

kins to Gen G. H. Decker, 15 Feb 62. All in File 204–58 (205–19) Table of Distrib

tion Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, pp.28–2

Weede Interv, 23 Jul 73, pp. 3–4. Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 94. 28 Decker quote is from Msg, Decker WDC 1669 to Harkins, 14 Feb 62; Harkin

quote is from Msg, Harkins to Decker, 15 Feb 62; see also Msg, Decker WDC 1004, 

Harkins, 19 Feb 62. All in File 204–58 (205–19) Table of Distribution Files (1963), bo

1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 29 CINCPAC Command History, 1962, p. 154. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role

ch. 7, pp. 5–8. USAF Project CHECO Southeast Asia Report, pt. 4, Command Structur

Relationships, Oct 61–Dec 63, May 64, pp. 38–39, copy in CMH fi les. Futrell, Adviso

Years, p. 97. Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, p. 220. 30 Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 101–02. Robert F. Futrell, “The United States Air Forc

in Southeast Asia: The Advisory Years, 1950–1965” (Comment Edition. Washingto

D.C.: AFCHO, 1971), p. 183; USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 21–23, 42–4

Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, pp. 26–28. For component commander’s view, see Inter

Project CORONA HARVEST with Maj Gen Rollen Anthis, USAF, 17 Nov 69, AFCHO, p

41–43, 46, AFCHO. 31 First quote is from Weede Interv, 23 Jul 73, pp. 5–6; see also pp. 4–5. Secon

is from Smith Interv, 1 Feb 64, p. 1. On Osmanski and Pomeroy, see Msgs, Harkin

to Decker, 15 Feb 62; Decker WDC 1004 to Harkins, 19 Feb 62. Both in File 204–5

(205–19) Table of Distribution Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 32 Quote is from Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, pp. 24–25; see also pp. 1–2, 9–11, 22–2

Harkins comments on his frequent fi eld trips in Interv, 23 Feb 72, p. 64. See also Inter

MACV Historian’s Offi ce with Maj Gen Richard G. Stilwell, 11 Jul 65, p. 2, Historian

fi les, CMH. 33 Anthis Interv, 17 Nov 69, pp. 149–50.

34 The ARPA was a division of the Offi ce of the Deputy for Defense Research an

Engineering (DDR&E). Headed by a civilian scientist or engineer who worked direct

for the secretary of defense, the director’s offi ce was created by the 1958 DOD r

organization act to provide central management for all research and engineering 

the department, with the aim of reducing interservice rivalry and duplication of e

fort. Under DDR&E, ARPA conducted basic and applied research using facilities an

Chap 2.indd 66 
67

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

resources of the military services, other government agencies, and private fi rms and 

institutions as appropriate. See C. W. Borklund, The Department of Defense (New York: 

Praeger, 1968), pp. 74–75, 83–84. 35 CINCPAC Command History, 1961, p. 183; ibid., 1962, pp. 167–70; ibid.,1963, 

p. 223. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 6, pp. 64–65; ch. 10, pp. 34–36. Msg, 

CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 25 Jul 62, File 204–58 (201–47) Activation and Deactivation Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Memos, SecArmy Cyrus R. Vance for 

Chief of Staff, 11 Aug 62, sub: Field Testing in Vietnam, and Decker for Vance, sub: 

Field Testing in Vietnam, 23 Aug 62. Both in File Ops 250/10 VN, box 1, 65A3314, RG 

335, NARA. 36 Memo, CINCPAC for COMUSMACV, CHMAAGV, and CHJUSMAG Thailand, 

19 Feb 62, sub: Memo of Understanding for the Implementation of Project AGILE 

in PACOM Area, Historians fi les, CMH. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 10, pp. 

36–38. Ltr, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 1 Sep 62, sub: Army Tests to be Conducted 

in South Vietnam, box 2, 72A6935, RG 334, NARA; Memo, ODCSOPS for Chief of 

Staff, 30 Nov 62, sub: Theater Clearance for ACTIV Personnel, box 1, 65A3314, RG 

319; NARA. Msgs, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 12 Dec 62; CINCPAC to DA, 22 Dec 

62; CINCPAC to DA, 7 Jan 63; Info Brief, Dir, Combat Developments, ODCSOPS, 11 

Jan 63, sub: Rowney Group (ACTIV) TD and Test Processing Procedure Changes; Msg, 

CINCPAC to DA, 20 Jan 63. All in Historians fi les, CMH. 37 Felt quote is from USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, p. 55. Second is from 

Info Brief, Special Warfare Offi ce, OCRD, 9 Jan 63, sub: Research and Development 

Activities in Vietnam; see also Memo, Col E. H. Almquist for Lt Gen Theodore W. 

Parker, 15 Jan 63, sub: Coordination between DA and ARPA. Both in Historians fi les, 

CMH. USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 18–19. For number and types of test, 

see CINCPAC Command History, 1961, p. 183; ibid., 1963, pp. 226–27; ARPA hamlet 

defense proposal is in ibid., pp. 225–26. For another ARPA intrusion into tactics, see 

Draft MS, Futrell, “Advisory Years,” pp. 230–31. 38. CINCPAC Command History, 1962, pp. 168–69. Ltr, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, sub: Terms of Reference, 12 Dec 62, Historians fi les, CMH. USAF, CHECO Rpt, 

Command Structure, p. 18. For arguments against putting the ARPA unit under MACV, 

see memo, Lt Col E. T. Sage for A. P. Tower, 9 Mar 62, sub: Proposal to Put CDTCV under 

COMUSMACV, and Defense Development Exchange Program Survey Team, Report of 

Visit to Far East (11 Feb–11 Apr 62), 13 Jun 62. Both in File I–18421/62, ISA333FE, box 

40, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. 39 Harkins quote is from USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 55–56. Report 

of Visit by JCS Team to South Vietnam, Jan 63, pp. 26–28, Historians fi les, CMH. 40. CINCPAC Command History, 1962, p. 170; ibid., 1963, pp. 223–24. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 10, p. 38. Msgs, JCS to CINCPAC, 7 Mar 63; COMUSMACV 

to CINCPAC, 13 Mar 63. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, JCS 9743 to CINCPAC, 3 

May 63; Telecon, Rear Adm Henry L. Miller, J5 CINCPAC, et al., with Brig Gen Robert 

H. York et al., 27 May 63, sub: R and D Command Relationships; File 204–58 (201–

45) Organization Planning Files—Functions, Missions, and Command Relationships 

1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334; Memo, Lt Gen Ben Harrell, 2 Jul 63, sub: A Single Organization for All CD and RDT&E Activities in RVN, File 201–45 VN ODCSOPS 63, box 

4, 66A3140, 319, NARA. 41 George Allen, Course Notes on Intelligence in Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. 

Memo, Capt J. B. Drachnik, USN, for Vice Chief of Naval Operations, 13 Mar 64, sub: 

Experiences as Chief of Navy Section, MAAG Vietnam, Dec 61–Jan 64, Box 575, COMNAVFORV Records, Navy Historical Center (NHC), Washington, D.C. 42 Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 252–55, 259–61. Memo, Cmdr, 

Chap 2.indd 67 
68

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

US Naval Forces Philippines, for CINCPACFLT, USARPAC, and CINCPACAF, 9 May 6

sub: Proposed Agreement for Logistics Support of U.S. Forces in the Republic of Vie

nam, File 204–58 (201–45) Org. Planning File—Functions, Missions and Comman

Relationships (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 43 Eckhardt, Command and Control, p. 29. Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Comba

pp. 253–54. 44 Msgs, CINCPAC to CINCUSARPAC, PACAF, CINCPACFLT, and COMUSMACV, 2

Mar 62; CINCPAC to CG USARYIS et al., 31 Mar 62; COMUSMACV to CINCPAC, 6 Apr 6

Ltr, CINCUSARPAC to CG USARYIS and CG USASGV, 20 Apr 62, sub: Letter of Instruction

(LOI). All in File 204–58 (201–45) Org. Planning Files—Functions, Missions and Comman

Relationships (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. USARPAC LOI, 16 Aug 63, sub: Cu

rent Roles and Missions of USASGV, Historians fi les, CMH. Eckhardt, Command and Contro

pp. 26–27, 31–33, 36, 48–49. Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 98. 45 Quote is from Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 95–96. Draft MS, Futrell, “Adviso

Years” p. 182. Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with Maj Gen Rollen H. Anthis, 30 Au

63, Transcript in AFCHO, describes early facilities of 2d ADVON. Anthis had been vic

commander of Thirteenth Air Force before taking over 2d ADVON. 46 Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 98–101. Eckhardt, Command and Control, p. 35. Pacifi c A

Forces, History of the Thirteenth Air Force, 1 January – 31 December 1962, ch. 1, pp. 23–2

AFCHO. Quote is from Msg, CINCPAC to CINCUSARPAC, CINCPACAF, CINCPACFLT, an

COMUSMACV, 21 Mar 62, File 204–58 (201–45) Org. Planning Files—Functions, Mission

and Command Relationships (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 47 Msgs Taylor to JCS, 9 Oct 62; JCS 7332 to CINCPAC, 9 Nov 62. Both in Taylor Paper

NDU.48 Quote is from Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 148. The airmobility issue came to a head 

April 1962, when an Army board headed by Lt Gen Hamilton H. Howze, working und

Secretary McNamara’s direction, produced a proposal for an airmobile division with its ow

aviation for both combat and logistical support. An Air Force board, chaired by Lt Gen G

briel P. Disosway, responded with a critique and alternative recommendations, in particul

challenging both the capacity of Army aviation to sustain airmobile operations and th

validity of the Army practice of apportioning aircraft among ground commands. Vietna

was to be the fi rst testing ground for many Army airmobility concepts. For accounts 

the development of the airmobility concept and controversy, see: Lt Gen John J. Tolso

Airmobility, 1961–1971,Vietnam Studies (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1973

ch. 1. See also Ray L. Bowers, Tactical Airlift, The United States Air Force in Southeast As

(Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of Air Force History, 1983), 108–09. 49 As one example of duplication, the Army CV–2 Caribou and the Air Force C

123 Provider twin–engine transports both were designed to haul men and supplies 

and out of underdeveloped airfi elds with short runways. Figures are from CHECO Rp

Command Structure, pp. 9–10; see also pp. 6, 47–49, 51–52. For buildup and roles an

missions rivalries, see Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 148, 167, 171–72; Bowers, Airlift, p

91–92, 95–103, 109–11, 128–37; Tolson, Airmobility, pp. 11–13, 29–32, 40–44, 46–47; an

Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 8, pp. 10–12, 17–19; ch. 10, p. 13. 50 Quote is from Memo, Rowney for CSA via AC/S FD, sub: ACTIV Progress as of 

June 1963, Historians fi les, CMH. For an Air Force objection to Rowney’s actions an

attitudes, see Ltr, Gen Emmett O’Donnell, Jr., USAF, to Harkins, 8 Mar 63, Historian

fi les, CMH. See also MFR, sub: Conversation with Maj Gen Edward L. Rowney, in V

Hilsman Trip File, Hilsman Papers, box 3, JFKL; and Info Brief by Dir, Combat Develo

ments, ODCSOPS, 11 Jan 63, sub: Rowney Group (ACTIV) Testing . . . , Historians fi le

CMH. Rowney had been a member of the Howze Board. 51 First quote is from Ltr, Anthis to Gen Jacob E. Smart, 25 Nov 63, in Futre

Chap 2.indd 68 
69

A Joint Command: Complications and Confl icts, 19621963

Advisory Years, p. 160. Second is from Interv, MACV Historian’s Offi ce with Maj Gen 

Milton B. Adams, USAF, pp. 10, 24–25, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, Queenin for Dir 

Ops, DCSOPS, 26 Feb 62, sub: Joint Staff Visit to CINCPAC and MAAGs and JUSMAG 

Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand, box 82, 66A3138, RG 319, NARA, warns of Air Force and 

Marine intrigues against the Army in Southeast Asia. 52 Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 105–12. Bowers, Airlift, pp. 86, 103–08. USAF, CHECO 

Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 11–14. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 8, p. 58; ch. 

10, pp. 18–21. 53 For Harkins’ interest in aviation as deputy USARPAC commander, see Ltrs, Harkins to Lt Gen Barksdale Hamlett, 8 Nov 61; and Hamlett to Harkins, 27 Nov 61, Historians fi les, CMH. For Harkins’ air policies as COMUSMACV, see Von Luttichau, “U.S. 

Army Role,” ch. 8, pp. 19–20; ch. 10, pp. 18–21. Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 107, 110–11, 

155–56, 167, 181–82. Bowers, Airlift, pp. 121–22, 150–53. USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command 

Structure, pp. 35–37, 44–45, 52–54, 58–64. Ltr, Weede to Sr Adviser, IV Corps Advisory 

Detachment, 13 May 63, sub: Request for Additional Aviation Support; memo, Weede 

for Cmdr, 2d Air Div, 16 Aug 63, sub: US Army Armed UH–1B Helicopter Incidents. 

Both in File 204–58 (201–45) Organization Planning Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 

334, NARA. 54 Draft MS, Futrell, “Advisory Years,” pp. 210–11; USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command 

Structure, pp. 4–5, 45. Anthis Interv, 17 Nov 69, pp. 46–49, 113–14, recalls the frustrations of MACV’s Air Force component commander. Admiral Felt attempts to clarify his 

6 Jun 62 instruction in Ltr, Felt to Harkins, 20 May 63, Historians fi les, CMH. 55 Harkins quotes are from Ltr to O’Donnell, 22 Mar 63; see also Ltrs, Harkins to 

Felt, 20 Mar 63 and 21 Jun 63, Historians fi les, CMH. On 8 July directive, see USAF, 

CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 37–38; Draft MS, Futrell, “Advisory Years,” pp. 

316–17. Harkins discusses his own close air support coordination qualifi cations in Harkins Interv, 23 Feb 72, pp. 27, 29–30. 56 Msg, Felt to Harkins, 11 Mar 63; Ltr, Felt to Harkins and O’Donnell, 20 May 

63; Msgs, CINCPAC to CINCPACAF, 30 Mar 63, and Felt to Harkins, 21 Jul 63. USAF, 

CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, pp. 35, 46, 98–99, 102–05. 57 First quote is from USAF, CHECO Rpt, Command Structure, p. 105; see also pp. 

97–98. The JOEG–V conclusions are in Memo, CINCPAC for JCS, 26 Aug 63, sub: Evaluation of Test Results of the Employment of OV–1 (Mohawk) Aircraft in Support of 

Counterinsurgency Operations, Historians fi les, CMH.

Chap 2.indd 69 
Chap 2.indd 70 
3

From Hope to Frustration

The Military Assistance Command played a major part in the intensifi ed American–South Vietnamese campaign against the Viet 

Cong that accompanied its founding in 1962. Responsible for training, equipping, supporting, and advising the South Vietnamese armed 

forces, MACV sought in every way to mesh its activities with the nonmilitary portion of the allied effort while participating in the development of an effective counterinsurgency strategy. Despite its best efforts, however, and those of General Harkins—who pressed President 

Diem to make the sort of changes in the nation’s military effort that 

would lead to success against the Viet Cong—the performance of the 

South Vietnamese government and armed forces fell far short of what 

was needed for victory. 

The Enemy

By the time of the Military Assistance Command’s establishment, 

the Viet Cong insurgency was highly organized and had attained formidable military and political proportions.1 The National Liberation 

Front (NLF) and its Communist directing inner core, the People’s Revolutionary Party (PRP), the renamed southern branch of the ruling Lao 

Dong (Communist) Party of North Vietnam, conducted the insurgency 

in South Vietnam through a hierarchy of front and party committees. 

At the top was the Central Offi ce for South Vietnam (COSVN), its existence not yet confi rmed by the allies in early 1962. That headquarters transmitted to the southern forces the policy directives of the Lao 

Dong Central Committee and Politburo in Hanoi, of which COSVN’s 

senior civilian and military offi cials were members. Under COSVN’s 

direction but exercising considerable local tactical initiative, regional, 

provincial, district, and village committees carried on the day-to-day 

work of political agitation and guerrilla warfare. They used NLF mass 

organizations for farmers, youth, women, students, and other groups 

to mobilize rural and urban Vietnamese for the struggle.

The Communists were committed in principle to the “people’s 

war” strategy articulated in China by Mao Tse Tung and in Vietnam by 

Vo Nguyen Giap. However, in early 1962 they were still in the initial 

Chap 3EI.indd 71 4
72

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

guerrilla warfare stage of the struggle’s progression toward large-scal

military campaigns and widespread popular uprisings. They were pre

occupied with building their political and military strength in Sout

Vietnam. While Viet Cong strategy directives continually stressed th

equal importance of the political and military struggles, the militar

side by early 1962 was receiving increased emphasis. The Lao Dong po

litburo in Hanoi proclaimed in February the necessity of “consolida

ing and expanding the base areas and strengthening the people’s force

in all respects . . . in order to advance to building a large, strong arme

force which can, along with all the people, defeat the enemy troop

and win ultimate victory.” 2

Thanks to effective village- and hamlet-level organization, skillfu

appeals to peasant aspirations and grievances, and selective use of a

sassination and terrorism, by early 1962 the insurgency had gaine

a worrisome, if diffi cult-to-measure, degree of control over much o

South Vietnam’s rural population, especially in the fl at, wet, fertil

and thickly settled Mekong Delta south of Saigon. The U.S. Defens

Intelligence Agency (DIA) estimated in February that the Viet Con

openly ruled about 10 percent of Vietnam’s hamlets and exercised in

fl uence or partial control over another 60 percent, and that they ha

access to at least a quarter of the nation’s men of military age. In th

cities, however, the Viet Cong organization remained underdeveloped

Most of the growing urban opposition to Diem persistently eluded th

National Liberation Front’s control. In the countryside, Catholic, Ca

Dai, and Hoa Hao villages resisted the NLF. The Montagnard tribes o

the Central Highlands, long oppressed by the Vietnamese, held them

selves aloof from both Saigon and the Viet Cong. The Viet Cong devo

ed much effort to enlarging their military establishment, which the

had formally unifi ed in February 1961 under the title People’s Liberatio

Armed Forces (PLAF). Those forces grew rapidly, from about 4,000 ful

time fi ghters in early 1960 to over 20,000 two years later, organize

into as many as 20 battalions, 80 separate companies, and perhaps 10

platoons of widely varying personnel strength. As of early 1962, a ma

jority of the units and the bulk of the manpower were concentrated i

the Mekong Delta and the area immediately surrounding Saigon; bu

the Communists were forming new units, and increasing their militar

activity, in the northern two-thirds of South Vietnam. 

Following the military doctrine established during the French wa

the Viet Cong forces consisted of three elements. The main forces—

full-time soldiers well armed with light infantry weapons brough

from the north or, more often, captured from the South Vietnames

Army—operated under the command of COSVN and its subordinat

regional headquarters and were carefully conserved for major attack

Next down in the hierarchy came the provincial and district units, 

mixture of guerrillas and organized companies and battalions. At th

bottom, not part of the estimated 20,000 combat troops counted b

Chap 3EI.indd 72 4
73

From Hope to Frustration

the allies, were the part-time village and hamlet guerrillas and militiamen. Usually operating in platoons or smaller formations under the 

orders of district and village front committees, these forces, armed with 

primitive, frequently homemade, weapons, guarded leaders and cadres, enforced revolutionary authority among the people, and engaged 

in assassinations and small-scale raids and ambushes. They also furnished intelligence, logistic support, and partially trained recruits and 

replacements for the provincial and main forces.

All three categories of troops drew upon the countryside and the 

civilian economy for food, clothing, and medical supplies. Weapons 

and equipment came from captures, infi ltration, and the insurgents’ 

own small workshops. In early 1962 the Viet Cong were building up 

their base areas, sections of rough, remote country rarely penetrated by 

government forces; the areas contained headquarters, supply dumps, 

arms workshops, medical facilities, training areas, and semi-permanent 

camps. The most important of these were the U Minh Forest and the 

Plain of Reeds, both located in the western part of the Mekong Delta 

along the Cambodian border, and War Zones C and D in the heavily 

forested region north of Saigon. The enemy had also begun establishing similar bases in the Central Highlands and elsewhere in northern 

South Vietnam. 

The revolutionary organizations, both political and military, owed 

their capacity for rapid expansion in good part to a steady fl ow of infi ltrators from North Vietnam. As early as May 1959, the Hanoi government had created an organization, Group 559, to shuttle people and 

supplies through western Laos down the network of mountain paths 

that the allies had nicknamed the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a route safeguarded by Pathet Lao troops and by the de facto partition of Laos under the 

1962 Geneva Agreement. While Group 559 handled primarily personnel reinforcements, another organization, Group 759, also created in 

1959, was establishing a coastal route for bulky cargo to be carried in 

small vessels. Its fi rst ship would sail in September 1962.

The reinforcements who made the arduous trek down the Ho Chi 

Minh Trail during Group 559‘s fi rst three years of existence were mostly 

southerners by birth, selected from among the 100,000 or so Viet Minh 

soldiers and civilians who had moved north after the 1954 armistice 

and found places in North Vietnam’s armed forces and civil service. 

Including a large proportion of full Lao Dong Party members, the infi ltrators underwent intensive political and military training and indoctrination at special centers. Then they were organized into temporary 

detachments for the march down the trail to base areas in South Vietnam, from which they dispersed to assignments with the Viet Cong. 

According to later MACV estimates, they entered South Vietnam at a 

rate of 500–1,000 men a month during most of 1961 and early 1962. 

The infi ltrators provided the expanding southern revolution with an 

indispensable hard core of skilled, ideologically reliable military comChap 3EI.indd 73 4
74

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

manders, technical specialists, and party and front committee mem

bers. At the highest ranks, they constituted the military command an

staff of COSVN; and they may have furnished one-fourth or more o

the lower-ranking PLAF offi cers. With such men as leavening, the Na

tional Liberation Front could readily expand into new areas, and 

could organize and indoctrinate rapidly its large mass of politically un

sophisticated southern recruits.

As MACV went into operation, the Military Assistance Advisor

Group, the country team, CINCPAC, and U.S. national intelligenc

agencies all shared a common assessment of the situation, capabil

ties, and probable intentions of the enemy. They noted that through

out South Vietnam, combat of all sorts was increasing in intensity

as indicated by a doubling of government casualties in 1961 ove

1960. Ominously, Communist losses, while larger, were increasing a

a lower rate. The agencies agreed that the Viet Cong, while retainin

and expanding their areas of control in the Mekong Delta and the

war zones just north of Saigon, now were building up forces and in

tensifying both political and military activity in the northern coasta

provinces and the Central Highlands; they expected the enemy t

make those areas, especially the highlands, the theater of their even

tual big-unit campaign of annihilation against the South Vietnames

Army.

A Viet Cong patrol moves along a canal in sampans. (AP photo)

Chap 3EI.indd 74 4
75

From Hope to Frustration

Although American analysts credited the Viet Cong with the ability 

to launch multiple 1,000-man attacks simultaneously at widely separated places and took note of a temporary upsurge of such actions during the early fall of 1961, they doubted that the insurgents were yet 

ready to move from the guerrilla stage of the confl ict to the stage of 

sustained major engagements. Instead, the Americans expected that the 

Viet Cong during 1962, while continuing to enlarge and improve their 

main forces, would concentrate on “intensive but relatively small-scale” 

warfare aimed at wearing down Saigon’s local administration and territorial forces through ambushes and hit-and-run attacks on small units, 

outposts, and progovernment hamlets. This pattern of action, a MAAG 

briefer declared, “has the advantage to the Communists of hitting President Diem’s government at its weakest points while avoiding damaging 

confl ict between a limited VC offensive force and a much more numerous ARVN.” The Americans believed that the South Vietnamese forces 

were doing little more than holding their own and that the key to eventual allied success lay in weaning the peasants away from the Viet Cong 

by political and social, as well as security, measures. Admiral Felt stated 

the matter bluntly: “VC cannot be defeated by purely military means. 

. . . Final success will come only when people can be alienated away 

from Viet Cong and given adequate protection/security.”3

Developing an Allied Strategy

When the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, went into operation, it inherited a strategic concept that had evolved during 1961 

out of two sets of plans, one developed by the American country team 

and the Military Assistance Advisory Group and the other advanced by 

British advisers and favored by Diem. The American contribution took 

the form of two documents: the country team’s Counterinsurgency 

Plan, issued in January 1961, and the MAAG’s Geographically Phased 

National Level Operation Plan for Counterinsurgency, promulgated 

nine months later. Both plans emphasized the necessity of a coordinated military-political attack on both the enemy’s armed forces and 

his administrative and political bases in the villages.

The more detailed of the two, the MAAG plan called for a threephase offensive involving the military and all government ministries 

and coordinated by President Diem through a National Internal Security Council and subordinate regional, province, district, and village 

security committees. Under the plan, government forces were to concentrate on clearing and holding areas according to geographical priorities, beginning with six provinces around Saigon and a section of 

the Central Highlands. In each area, a preparatory phase of intelligence 

gathering, training, and preliminary operations was to be followed by 

a military phase, in which South Vietnamese Army regulars expelled 

the organized insurgent forces; territorials, police, and civilian agencies 

Chap 3EI.indd 75 4
76

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

would then uproot the Viet Cong rural administration and substitute 

progovernment one. Last would come a security phase, during which

in the plan’s words, “the populace is reoriented, civilian political con

trol established, social and economic programs initiated, law and orde

established, [and] intelligence net perfected.” Meanwhile, governmen

forces outside the priority areas were to attack enemy units, so as to wea

down the Viet Cong forces and keep them off balance. The MAAG plan

ners wanted to begin the entire campaign with such a spoiling attack

a large-scale sweep of the War Zone D base area north of Saigon, aime

both at protecting the capital and enhancing ARVN self-confi dence.4

The author of the second source of early allied counterinsurgenc

strategy, Sir Robert G. K. Thompson of the British Advisory Mission

had come to South Vietnam with fi ve other offi cials, all veterans o

the Malayan “emergency,” at President Diem’s invitation to give th

president the benefi t of their country’s experience in defeating a rura

Communist rebellion. In agreement with the MAAG, Thompson urge

the government to employ combined military and civil operations t

clear the enemy’s armed forces and political underground from selecte

areas, beginning where Diem’s regime already was strong and graduall

working outward into Viet Cong–controlled territory. Thompson’s pa

ticular contribution was his proposal to consolidate government con

trol by regrouping the peasants into what came to be called strateg

hamlets, an expedient the British had used successfully in Malaya. E

sentially, these hamlets would be the same communities in which th

people already lived, but they would be surrounded with simple fort

fi cations that the inhabitants, won to the government side by socia

and economic benefi ts and organized and armed for their own defens

would man themselves. In this way, the countryside could be close

progressively to Viet Cong political and military penetration, and th

insurgency would wither and die for lack of peasant manpower, food

and intelligence. In late 1961 Thompson urged Diem to begin imple

menting this plan in the Mekong Delta, South Vietnam’s most heavil

populated and Viet Cong–infested region.5

The British adviser’s plan, especially its strategic hamlet elemen

won rapid acceptance from President Diem and his brother and principa

adviser, Ngo Dinh Nhu, who had been experimenting since 1959 (no

very successfully) with similar programs for protecting and controllin

the rural population. With an eye to suppressing Communist subve

sion, creating a new agrarian power base for his regime, and displayin

independence from the Americans by adopting a British scheme, Diem 

declared early in February 1962 that the delta plan should be execute

without delay. He created an Interministerial Committee for Strateg

Hamlets overseen by Nhu to direct the plan’s implementation.

Thompson’s approach also won favor with General Taylor, wh

learned of it during his October 1961 visit to Saigon. It impressed Pres

dent Kennedy and his counterinsurgency-minded advisers as well. I

Chap 3EI.indd 76 4
77

From Hope to Frustration

Saigon, after initial objections to Thompson’s independent dealings 

with Diem and to details of his proposal, the U.S. Mission worked out 

what amounted to a merger of the British and American plans that 

drew upon their fundamental similarity in principle. Secretary McNamara, for his part, rejected General McGarr’s recommendation for 

an early offensive against War Zone D and instead approved a plan 

for a pilot project featuring strategic hamlets in Binh Duong Province 

northwest of Saigon. The South Vietnamese had already begun a major 

pacifi cation campaign in that province, and General McGarr favored 

operations there because they would protect an important highway 

and sever communications between two Viet Cong base areas.6

As a result of these decisions, the Military Assistance Command, 

Vietnam, when activated in February, had the task of refi ning and implementing a strategy already decided upon. General Harkins participated in McNamara’s Honolulu conferences of January and February, 

but he allowed the MAAG representative to brief the conferees on the 

Binh Duong plan, code named Operation SUNRISE. Harkins and other 

American offi cials had doubts about the suitability of Binh Duong as 

an initial strategic hamlet project, since the province lay between concentrations of Viet Cong strength and would require constant commitment of regular troops to prevent enemy main forces from overrunning and destroying the hamlets. Nevertheless, the MACV commander 

felt compelled to continue with the operation because his predecessor, 

General McGarr, had helped develop it and the South Vietnamese were 

committed to it.7

The Military Assistance Command and the rest of the country team 

spent much of 1962 struggling to impose order on the burgeoning strategic hamlet program. Operation SUNRISE, which began in late March 

with a sweep by elements of the ARVN 5th Division followed by construction of several strategic hamlets, got off to a slow start, with few Viet 

Cong killed or captured and many sullen peasants forcibly herded from 

their homes into the new settlements. Notwithstanding this unpromising beginning, Diem and Nhu, apparently hoping to preempt the Viet 

Cong organization throughout the countryside, pushed the province 

chiefs to form strategic hamlets wherever possible, using primarily their 

local resources and without regard to geographical priorities or coordination with military operations. The resulting nationwide burst of activity produced much progress on paper but few strategic hamlets really 

capable of the military and civil roles Thompson intended for them. 

While this hit-or-miss effort went on, the country team employed persuasion—and the selective provision of U.S. military and civilian aid 

money and supplies—to secure concentration of effort in accord with 

the priorities of the MAAG’s geographically phased plan. Representatives from both MACV and the MAAG sat on the mission’s Interagency 

Committee on Province Rehabilitation, the American counterpart to 

Nhu’s Interministerial Committee; and General Harkins directed his 

Chap 3EI.indd 77 4
78

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

military advisers throughout the South Vietnamese chain of comman

to promote orderly planning and development of hamlets. 

American persuasion and pressure gradually achieved results. Du

ing July and August, Diem instituted division tactical area and provinc

strategic hamlet committees to promote unifi ed planning and actio

by ARVN commanders and province chiefs. He also issued a nationa

strategic hamlet plan that called for concentration of military and c

vilian resources successively in four priority areas, beginning with elev

en provinces around Saigon, then moving to the central coast and th

border regions. Within this overall plan, the division and province au

thorities, working closely with American military and civilian adviser

prepared comprehensive province pacifi cation plans integrating offen

sives against Viet Cong units with the expansion outward from secur

areas of the strategic hamlet system. The U.S. Mission channeled Militar

Assistance Program and U.S. Operations Mission resources as well as a sp

cial piaster fund to those province projects highest on the national priorit

list and to well-planned and -executed lower priority efforts. By late 196

the Vietnamese had completed, and the American province rehabilitatio

committee had approved for U.S. support, plans for 27 of South Vietnam

40 provinces. At that point, operations were under way, on varying scale

in 16 provinces with approved plans.8

Besides working with the rest of the mission on the strategic ham

let program, the Military Assistance Command during 1962 and 196

devoted much command and staff attention to three subjects: transfe

of the CIA’s Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) program to mil

tary control; preparation of a long-range plan for completing the Sout

Vietnamese force buildup and concurrently reducing American force

and assistance; and development of a comprehensive South Vietnam

ese national counterinsurgency campaign plan. 

During late 1961, the Central Intelligence Agency had begun em

ploying U.S. Army Special Forces teams to organize and train Mon

tagnard tribesmen in the Central Highlands and Catholic and othe

minorities in the Mekong Delta and elsewhere for defense of their ow

villages and also for offensive antiguerrilla operations and border su

veillance. The operation was controlled, funded, and supplied by th

agency separately from the Military Assistance Program and conducte

on the Saigon government side by Diem’s Presidential Survey Offi c

his personal clandestine-activity agency, which commanded the Sout

Vietnamese Special Forces. After initial experiments showed promis

early in 1962 the CIA proposed to enlarge the U.S. Special Forces con

tingent to thirty-nine detachments and a group headquarters and t

train, arm, and equip a projected 100,000 irregulars. Both the Militar

Assistance and Pacifi c Commands expressed interest in bringing th

expanding, militarily signifi cant program under their control. Such ac

tion would conform to a ruling President Kennedy made after the Ba

of Pigs debacle that large-scale, overt paramilitary operations should b

Chap 3EI.indd 78 4
79

From Hope to Frustration

conducted by the Defense Department rather than the CIA. At the outset, under a May 1962 agreement with MACV, the CIA’s Saigon station 

nevertheless retained both operational control and logistical support 

responsibility for the civilian irregulars, while the Military Assistance 

Command supervised their activities through a Special Warfare Branch 

of its operations staff section.9

Secretary McNamara, however, lost no time in bringing the CIDG 

program under the Defense Department. After obtaining agreement 

from CIA Director John A. McCone, McNamara announced at a July 

conference in Honolulu that the Defense Department, with the Army 

as its agent, would assume the task of training and supporting the Civilian Irregular Defense Groups. Following an outline plan, code-named 

Operation SWITCHBACK, and proposed by the Department of the Army, 

representatives of the Army staff, the Army Special Warfare Center, the 

CIA, and the interested Pacifi c commands, the group then worked out 

the complicated administrative and logistical details of the transfer. 

Execution of the program took until 1 July 1963 to complete, in part 

because congressional action was required to authorize Army use of 

covert CIA budget procedures and funds. At the end of the transition, 

the Military Assistance Command exercised operational control of the 

Special Forces teams through Headquarters, U.S. Army Special Forces 

(Provisional), Vietnam, a subordinate element of its Army component 

command. MACV now had under its purview all the major armed 

elements fi ghting the Viet Cong and, it was hoped, would be able to 

integrate their efforts into a concerted national campaign.10

In addition to ordering the transfer of the Civilian Irregular Defense 

Program to MACV, McNamara at the July 1962 conference also instructed the Military Assistance Command to prepare plans for working itself 

out of a job. The defense secretary was impressed by General Harkins’ 

optimistic reports on the progress of the expanded assistance program. 

At the same time, he knew that the administration faced more urgent 

crises in Berlin and Cuba and that the American public’s tolerance for 

this Asian combat involvement had its limits. Therefore, he was determined to restrict the scale and duration of American engagement in 

Vietnam. To that end, he asked his subordinates to stop “concentrating on short-term crash-type actions” and “look ahead to a carefully 

conceived long-range program for training and equipping RVNAF and 

phase out of major US combat, advisory and logistics support activities.” He ordered development of a schedule for preparing South Vietnamese forces to replace the American helicopter, communications, 

and other units then operating in Vietnam and for withdrawing those 

units as rapidly as the Vietnamese could take over their tasks. This 

process was to run concurrently with an intensifi ed American–South 

Vietnamese campaign against the Viet Cong and should take no more 

than three years to complete, an allowance of time that McNamara 

considered “conservative.” At the end of it, the South Vietnamese on 

Chap 3EI.indd 79 4
80

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

their own, assisted only by an advisory group, should be able to fi nis

off the remnants of the insurgency.11

Elaborating on this guidance, the Joint Chiefs of Staff on 26 July d

rected Harkins to develop a Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam de

signed to bring that country’s armed forces, by the end of calendar yea

1965, to “the strength necessary to exercise permanent and continue

sovereignty over that part of Vietnam which lies below the demarca

tion line without the need for continued US special military assistance

Specifi cally, Felt told Harkins a month later, the Military Assistanc

Command’s plan should cover such subjects as the recommended siz

and structure of the Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces by the end o

1965, including additional units, manpower, and equipment needed t

replace the withdrawing Americans; a schedule for removing America

forces; and a summary of Military Assistance Program costs by year.12

During the remainder of 1962, the Military Assistance Comman

worked out the complex details of the Comprehensive Plan. The fi na

version, which Harkins issued on 19 January 1963 and which Fe

promptly endorsed, was aimed at giving the South Vietnamese arme

forces “the capability to defeat the current insurgency with US specia

military assistance; defeat any new insurgency threat which may aris

after phase down and withdrawal of US special assistance; and provid

an initial defense against overt invasion until outside forces can b

introduced.”

To achieve this objective, the Military Assistance Command’s plan

ners wanted to expand South Vietnamese forces to a peak strength o

458,500 men by mid-1964, including a regular establishment of almo

240,000, the bulk of them in a 9-division army. Thereafter, with th

Viet Cong presumably going down in defeat, the RVNAF was to de

cline gradually to 368,400 men in mid-1968, primarily through demo

bilizing the territorials and Civilian Irregular Defense Groups. MAC

envisioned that the regular force would level off at 224,400, that 

would possess such sophisticated weapons as jet fi ghters, and that 

would remain at that strength indefi nitely to deter conventional Nort

Vietnamese attacks. This force would cost the United States a total o

$978 million in Military Assistance Program (MAP) funds during fi sca

years 1963 through 1968 (mid-1963 through mid-1968), a substantia

increase over previous MAP projections for those years, but one tha

MACV considered justifi ed to obtain more rapid RVNAF expansio

and, until 1965, to support an intensifi ed counterinsurgency campaign

As the South Vietnamese buildup progressed, the Military Assistanc

Command and its service components were to reduce strength from 

12,200 personnel in mid-1965 to 1,500 in mid-1968. MACV headqua

ters itself was to go out of existence by 1 July 1966, leaving the MAA

again in charge of the remaining advisory and training effort.13

The Joint Chiefs of Staff promptly accepted MACV’s Comprehen

sive Plan, but Secretary McNamara rejected it. At his Honolulu confe

Chap 3EI.indd 80 4
81

From Hope to Frustration

ence in May 1963, McNamara declared the plan unsatisfactory in that 

it called for a post-1965 South Vietnamese force too large and too lavishly equipped for a small, poor nation to support. Its MAP spending 

levels for the entire period were at least $270 million too high, and its 

projected pace for the American withdrawal was too slow. Upon his 

return from Honolulu, the defense secretary put his own offi ce, the 

Joint Chiefs, CINCPAC, and MACV to work on reducing the post-1965 

projected size and MAP cost of the South Vietnamese forces and developing a more rapid American withdrawal schedule, to include removal 

of 1,000 troops before the end of 1963.14

Working within McNamara’s guidelines, the Military Assistance 

Command, in late July, produced its own “Model M” version of the 

Comprehensive Plan. By such expedients as replacing the territorials 

with a civilian National Police Force funded by foreign aid and by reducing regular force manpower to 80 percent of authorized strength 

after the end of the insurgency, the command was able to project a 

postwar RVNAF of 120,000 at a MAP cost of $400 million during fi scal 

years 1965–1969. The force included an army of four divisions and four 

“mobile brigades” which General Harkins deemed suffi cient for guarding the Demilitarized Zone and cleaning up the last Viet Cong units and 

base areas. McNamara accepted the model M plan. Then, after a lateSeptember visit to Saigon and more optimistic progress reports from 

Harkins, he ordered further modifi cation of the plan to reduce South 

Vietnamese forces more rapidly in the northern part of the country, 

where government operations seemed to be going well, and to reinforce 

them in the Mekong Delta, where the strategic hamlet program was in 

severe diffi culty. Harkins submitted the “Accelerated Model Plan” on 

8 November, barely a week after the overthrow of President Diem rendered invalid most of the assumptions upon which it was based.15

Concurrently with work on the Comprehensive Plan, the Pacifi c and 

Military Assistance Commands prepared plans for the fi rst 1,000-man 

American withdrawal. McNamara and his staff initially demanded that 

the personnel involved be withdrawn from operating units that could 

be replaced by the improving South Vietnamese forces. They settled, 

however, for a withdrawal composed largely of those individuals most 

easily spared from throughout the assistance command. In the end, 

the required number of Americans, almost all from the Army and Air 

Force, left the country in four increments during the last two months 

of 1963. In the light of the collapse of the Diem regime, their departure seemed more like an empty public relations gesture than the start of 

a genuine American disengagement. General Weede, the MACV chief of 

staff, later called the withdrawal “a political gimmick” and declared that 

“the situation wasn’t such that this was a wise move at that time.”16

The Military Assistance Command’s third major planning effort 

was the most ambitious: development in conjunction with the South 

Vietnamese of a comprehensive National Campaign Plan. During the 

Chap 3EI.indd 81 4
82

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fall of 1962, Harkins and his staff proposed plans to President Diem fo

strengthening the South Vietnamese military chain of command an

for launching a “nationwide offensive campaign” that would unite th

armed forces and “all . . . loyal citizens” in an “integrated campaign t

destroy the VC and restore control of the country to the duly const

tuted government.” In General Harkins’ view, the Vietnamese neede

such a plan to tie together all the various anti–Viet Cong efforts the

getting under way. In addition, the plan would stimulate the Saigo

government to make maximum use of the forces being trained an

equipped by the United States. At the outset, Harkins grandiloquentl

labeled his proposal the Explosion Plan, implying an eruption of gov

ernment offensive activity. Later he toned down his rhetoric, declarin

that he had really meant a “hotter fi re” rather than a “great detonation

and envisioned essentially a more systematic and intensive implemen

tation of existing programs. Both he and Ambassador Nolting saw th

national plan above all as a device for pushing the South Vietnames

into continuous, concerted offensive action.17

In the view of General Harkins and the rest of the U.S. Mission, ra

tionalization of the South Vietnamese military chain of command wa

a prerequisite for the preparation and execution of a national coun

terinsurgency plan. Under American pressure, Diem in April 1961 ha

established a ground forces chain of command that ran in theory from 

the Joint General Staff, which functioned as the supreme command o

both the armed forces and the army, through an Army Field Comman

to three regional corps headquarters, each of which controlled severa

divisions. Each division was responsible for a tactical zone that encom

passed one or more provinces, the chiefs of which, themselves usuall

soldiers, were to be subordinate to the divisions for counterinsurgenc

operations.

In practice, concerned with keeping his armed men divided lest the

ovethrow him, Diem subverted this structure as he had earlier ones. H

ignored the Field Command because he considered its commander, th

able and popular Maj. Gen. Duong Van Minh, politically unreliable an

sent orders to the army directly through the Joint General Staff. Diem 

kept the Vietnamese Special Forces outside the army command stru

ture. He left control of the Civil Guard and Self-Defense Corps, whic

conducted most day-to-day antiguerrilla operations, in the hands o

the province chiefs who also commanded ARVN units operating withi

their boundaries; and he upheld the province chiefs in their frequen

disregard of orders from the divisions. Further to disrupt the chain o

command, Diem often issued orders directly from Saigon to provinc

chiefs and regimental and battalion commanders in the fi eld.18

Late in 1962, MACV and the mission persuaded Diem to endors

another American-drafted reform of the chain of command, designe

to unify all government military components in support of a nationa

campaign. The rearrangement, which Diem set in motion on 26 No

Chap 3EI.indd 82 4
83

From Hope to Frustration

vember, served one of his political purposes by placing the Joint General Staff in direct charge of the ARVN corps and abolishing General 

Minh’s Field Command. Minh received the honorifi c post of special 

military adviser to the president, with few duties and no command of 

troops. At that time also, Diem established a new IV Corps to control 

forces in the Mekong Delta south of Saigon, thereby allowing III Corps 

to concentrate on the diffi cult areas immediately around and north of 

the capital, and adjusted the boundaries of the other corps areas for better control of operations in the Central Highlands. (Map 2) In an effort 

to unify direction of all armed elements, Diem created new commands 

for the army, navy, air force, Special Forces, and Civil Guard/Self-Defense Corps, each directly subordinate to the Joint General Staff. He 

also reaffi rmed that province chiefs were to be subordinate for military 

operations to the division tactical zones, a clarifi cation of authority 

that, Americans hoped, would end divided command at the level most 

crucial to the conduct of the counterinsurgency campaign. In connection with this reorganization, the Military Assistance Command in December helped the Joint General Staff set up a Joint Operations Center 

to monitor and direct nationwide military activity. This 130-man agency, located in the JGS compound, included a contingent of twenty-fi ve 

MACV advisers, through whom General Harkins hoped to strengthen 

his infl uence upon South Vietnamese plans and operations.19

The Joint General Staff’s General Offensive Campaign Plan, promulgated late in February 1963 and based on a concept developed by 

MACV and approved by Diem, bore more than a passing family resemblance to the MAAG’s geographically phased plan. It called for South 

Vietnamese military and civil agencies to cooperate in a nationwide 

attack upon both the Viet Cong’s organized armed forces and its village infrastructure, with the objective of restoring government control 

over the people and reestablishing popular allegiance to the government. The offensive was to have three phases, each made up of many 

small local actions and conducted according to geographical priorities. 

Besides continuing military operations and strategic hamlet programs 

already under way, the fi rst included reorganization and training of the 

forces, collection of intelligence, and preparation of national, corps, division, and province plans. This phase was supposed to end with completion of two-thirds of the already-planned strategic hamlets, putting 

the greater part of the population under government control. During 

the second phase, the actual offensive, government forces throughout 

the country would attack enemy troops and base areas in a multitude 

of operations that would continue until the enemy had been “killed, 

pacifi ed, or driven from the Republic of Vietnam.” The third phase, 

which could run concurrently with the second in areas free of organized Viet Cong units, was to be one of consolidation, during which 

civilian agencies would follow up military success with good works 

aimed at cementing the loyalty of the people to the government.

Chap 3EI.indd 83 4
X X

1 ARVN

X X

2 ARVN

X X

22 ARVN

X X

23 ARVN

X X

9 ARVN

X X

25 ARVN

X X

21 ARVN

X X

7 ARVN

X X

5 ARVN

SOUTH CHINA SEA

SOUTH CHINA SEA

Mekong Riv e r

Mekong River

LAOS

THAILAND

CAMBODIA

NORTH VIETNAM

DEMARCATION LINE

I Corps

III Corps

II Corps

IV Corps

Hoi An

Da Nang

Kontum

Qui Nhon

Tuy Hoa

Nha Trang

Ban Me Thuot

Pleiku

Da Lat Cam Ranh

Xuan Loc

Vung Tau

Tay Ninh

My Tho

Sa Dec

Rach Gia Can Tho

Ca Mau

Bac Lieu

Soc Trang

Hue

An Loc

Quang Ngai

SAIGON

PHNOM PENH

Attopeu

Saravane

Paksé

Stung Treng

Tchepone

Savannakhet

Snuol

Svay Rieng

0

0

100 Miles

100 Kilometers

SOUTH VIETNAM CORPS AREAS

Corps Boundary

1963

MA P 2

Chap 3EI.indd 84 4
85

From Hope to Frustration

The plan prescribed basic missions for the armed forces, to be executed as appropriate during the different stages of the offensive. In 

government-dominated regions, territorial troops, under the province 

and district chiefs, were to concentrate on protecting the people and 

eliminating the Viet Cong underground. In contested areas, regular 

units were to drive out organized enemy forces, paving the way for 

the formation of strategic hamlets, then gradually to transfer security 

responsibilities to the territorials and eventually to hamlet militias. 

In both contested and Viet Cong–controlled regions, the South Vietnamese Amy was to seek out and destroy insurgent armed elements, 

headquarters, supplies, and equipment so as to weaken the opposing 

armed forces and forestall enemy interference with pacifi cation. For 

each corps, the plan established relative priorities between pursuing 

Viet Cong forces and clearing and holding territory, and it specifi ed for 

each the most important provinces to be cleared and held. The Military 

Assistance Command and the Joint General Staff assumed that Phase I 

of the plan was already being implemented, in the form of the operations and province strategic-hamlet planning then going on. General 

Harkins initially spoke of a D-day for Phase II late in February 1963; 

but as that date approached, with implementing arrangements for the 

general offensive campaign still not completed, he ceased predicting 

when the climactic phase would start.20

By late 1963, the allies had seemingly assembled a comprehensive 

program for prosecuting the war and ultimately reducing American 

involvement in it. They had defi ned their military and political objectives and had committed themselves to general strategy and tactics for 

their attainment. At least on paper, they had reorganized South Vietnam’s military command so as to ensure unifi ed action by all the armed 

forces under the national campaign plan. The Military Assistance Command possessed fi rm goals for its own effort to develop the South Vietnamese forces, as well as a deadline for fi nishing the job. Ambassador 

Nolting and General Harkins appreciated that Vietnamese plans had to 

be taken at less than face value. Nevertheless, they believed that they 

had prevailed upon their ally to begin moving, however haltingly, in 

a direction that would lead toward victory. Unfortunately, even as the 

allies completed their planning, both the extent of the achievements 

already made and the prospects for further advancement became increasingly uncertain.

The Campaign Falls Apart

During 1962 and early 1963, the South Vietnamese armed forces 

showed the benefi cial effects of expanded American advice and assistance. Regular and paramilitary strength grew by more than 100,000 

men, including two new army divisions. Under the Military Assistance 

Command’s supervision, U.S. advisers and an expanding cadre of 

Chap 3EI.indd 85 4
86

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

trained Vietnamese specialists dramatically improved the government

collection and use of military intelligence. Other Americans installe

and manned new radio, teletype, and telephone systems, giving Sout

Vietnam for the fi rst time a modern, reliable, nationwide military com

munications network. Additional weapons and armored personn

carriers enhanced ARVN mobility and fi repower even as intensifi e

training, the participation of American advisers at all echelons, an

the availability of American helicopter and fi xed-wing air support im

proved the army’s tactical effectiveness. ARVN units launched airmo

bile assaults on hitherto untouched Viet Cong base areas and increase

the frequency of both large- and small-unit offensive operations i

all regions. Viet Cong casualties rose, the number of their battalion

size attacks declined, and captured documents spoke of territorial an

manpower losses and unit demoralization.21

Yet these improvements, as the American senior adviser to IV Corp

pointed out, had to be “measured against an armed force that was poo

ly organized, poorly trained, poorly equipped and poorly led.” Majo

defi ciencies persisted. Diem still selected and promoted commande

for political loyalty and reliability rather than military competenc

and he continued to disregard the chain of command. To avoid con

tributing to the rise of a battlefi eld hero who might challenge his re

gime, Diem pressed his generals to minimize casualties. Under tha

infl uence, ARVN commanders often maneuvered to avoid contact wit

the enemy. When combat did occur, they relied excessively on artiller

and air support and hesitated to use their infantry to close with an

destroy the Viet Cong. Many regular army battalions remained idl

on static defensive missions while the ill-trained and poorly equippe

Civil Guard and Self-Defense Corps, frequently scattered in small, vu

nerable outposts, tried to carry on the battle in the countryside an

suffered the majority of government casualties.22

The engagement at Ap Bac in the Mekong Delta on 2 January 196

epitomized the military inadequacies that persisted. On that occasion

elements of the 7th ARVN Division and provincial troops, acting o

good intelligence in a well-planned operation, trapped a small Vie

Cong main-force battalion and several lesser formations. Then, in 

monumental display of command-level cowardice and incompetenc

these forces allowed the enemy to slip away after a day of confused

desultory fi ghting during which the Viet Cong killed 63 governmen

troops and 3 American advisers, wounded over 100 government so

diers, and shot down 5 American helicopters.23

As 1963 went on, the South Vietnamese had better fortune in othe

small engagements. Nevertheless, the great preponderance of their o

fensive operations produced no enemy contact; and when governmen

troops did encounter the Viet Cong, they often faced stubborn, effec

tive resistance by units better trained and armed than in the past. Ra

tios between government and Viet Cong casualties and weapons losse

Chap 3EI.indd 86 4
87

From Hope to Frustration

gradually shifted in favor of the insurgents. Viet Cong military strength 

inexorably increased in spite of ARVN claims of heavy enemy casualties. By mid-June, when the Joint General Staff proclaimed the start of 

Phase II of the National Campaign Plan, the Military Assistance Command estimated that the enemy’s full-time fi ghting force had grown to 

22,000–25,000 men.24

Like the military half of the effort, the strategic hamlet program 

also fell short of its objectives. The effort, under both its scatter-shot 

South Vietnamese version and its concentrated American-supported 

one, produced much activity and impressive results on paper. By April 

1963, according to Ambassador Nolting, the South Vietnamese had established about 6,000 hamlets out of a planned 11,000, incorporating 

perhaps 60 percent of the rural population. The Viet Cong’s Central 

Offi ce for South Vietnam, in assessments captured much later by U.S. 

forces, acknowledged that the program was “shrewder, bolder, and 

more widespread” than previous government pacifi cation efforts; had 

cost them people and territory; and constituted a major threat to their 

political and military control of rural South Vietnam.25

Nevertheless, the South Vietnamese government lacked the administrative talent to carry out the program effectively on the scale contemplated. Many province chiefs, under pressure from Diem and Nhu to 

show progress, did little more than build fences around hamlets, often 

using labor and materials extorted from the peasants. By American assessment, in fact, only a small proportion of the hamlets reported as 

organized met the military, political, and social criteria for completion. 

These defi ciencies were less prevalent in the central coastal provinces 

of I and II Corps, where ARVN commanders and province chiefs, cooperating closely with American advisers, combined strategic hamlet 

construction in relatively secure areas with well-conceived military operations to clear and hold additional territory. In the Mekong Delta, 

however, the program fl oundered, due to greater population dispersal 

(which forced much unpopular relocation of farmers), obstructionism 

and maladministration by local commanders and province chiefs, and 

the military and political strength of the Viet Cong. By late 1963, the 

delta’s strategic hamlets, strung out along major highways and waterways because organization was easier there, had become little more 

than vulnerable targets for the guerrilla and main-force enemy units 

that maneuvered freely through the rest of the countryside.26

In the view of an increasing number of Americans, the source of 

most of these failures lay in the governing methods of President Ngo 

Dinh Diem. Increasingly under the infl uence of his arrogant, abrasive 

brother, Ngo Dinh Nhu and disregarding American pressure and persuasion, Diem persisted in all his bad administrative and military practices, which he considered essential to his own and his regime’s survival, and he stubbornly tried to confi ne power, position, and privilege 

in government and society to his family and to a favored and loyal 

Chap 3EI.indd 87 4
88

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Catholic minority. In a February 1963 assessment, the United States in

telligence community summed up the effect of Diem’s method of rul

on the counterinsurgency effort:

Although there is no doubt that President Diem and his family are dedicated to Vie

namese independence, they are also deeply committed to maintaining themselves 

power. In order to prevent the rise of serious contenders for political power, they hav

conducted the business of government in a fashion which has reduced its effectiv

ness. They have driven into the opposition or into exile many whose talents are sore

needed. Above all, they have been insensitive to popular interests, needs, and grie

ances, and have therefore failed to win the positive loyalty of the people. We believ

it unlikely that US involvement can be substantially curtailed or that there will be 

material and lasting reduction in the Communist threat so long as present politic

conditions persist.27

To his critics, Diem’s confrontation with his country’s Buddhis

exemplifi ed his inability to unify his nation. The Buddhists long ha

resented Diem’s legal and political discrimination in favor of his ow

coreligionists, and a group of radical young monks sought dominan

political infl uence for their own faith. Open confl ict erupted in Ma

1963, after nine people were killed by military gunfi re during a Buddhi

protest demonstration in Hue. Buddhist demonstrations then sprea

to most major South Vietnamese cities, coordinated by the Buddhist

General Association. Skilled propagandists, the Buddhists early won th

sympathetic attention of resident American journalists, who kept the

cause before the eyes of the world, especially after monks and nun

began burning themselves to death in public places to protest allege

government religious persecution. Other anti-Diem elements graduall

rallied around the Buddhists, whose demands escalated from religiou

issues toward drastic modifi cation or overthrow of the regime.

From the beginning, Diem viewed the Buddhist movement as 

political attack on his government. Under American pressure, he mad

some conciliatory gestures and, on paper at least, granted many Bud

dhist demands. However, Nhu at the same time kept up harsh polic

repression and strident anti-Buddhist propaganda. The confrontatio

dragged on into the summer, with more demonstrations, riots, an

self-immolations, and with younger, politically ambitious monks, no

tably the skilled agitator Thich Tri Quang, assuming leadership of th

movement. The regime responded with more repression. On 21 Au

gust, police and Special Forces units under Nhu’s personal comman

made a violent assault on Buddhist pagodas in Saigon, Hue, and othe

major cities. This action, taken under a martial-law decree issued b

Diem at the instigation of a group of senior generals, resulted only i

more demonstrations, for the fi rst time involving thousands of un

versity and high school students, children of South Vietnam’s urba

upper and middle classes. High government offi cials, including the fo

eign minister, resigned in protest, and Diem’s relations with the Unite

States deteriorated further.28

Chap 3EI.indd 88 4
89

From Hope to Frustration

The American side of the allied effort also did not go altogether 

smoothly. In spite of counterinsurgency plans calling for unifi ed civilian and military action and in spite of Ambassador Nolting’s efforts at 

coordination, each American agency had its own interpretation of the 

common strategy and too often went its own way in implementing it. 

An Australian adviser in Vietnam declared that the Americans seemed 

to be trying to wage three campaigns at once—a MACV military one; 

a U.S. Operations Mission (USOM) civilian foreign-aid one; and a CIA 

paramilitary one. Notwithstanding General Harkins’ harmonious relationship with Ambassador Nolting, and perhaps because of it, the 

military campaign overwhelmed the others. As the ambassador had 

warned it would, the Military Assistance Command, by sheer size and 

wealth of resources and by virtue of the fact that it controlled more 

pieces of the pacifi cation program than any other agency, dominated 

the advisory and support effort and often the counsels of the country 

team—in the civilian view often to the detriment of the effort to win 

the people’s allegiance for the government.29

For example, over State Department objections, and over the dissent of some Army advisers, Nolting and Harkins persistently endorsed 

FARM GATE and Vietnamese Air Force bombing and napalm strikes in 

populated areas, both in aid of ground operations and in “interdiction” raids on targets identifi ed only by questionable South Vietnamese intelligence. The ambassador and the MACV commander, although 

A Buddhist self-immolation (©Bettman/CORBIS)

Chap 3EI.indd 89 4
90

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

strictly controlling air operations in order to minimize civilian casua

ties, insisted that the military advantages of these tactics outweighe

the political and propaganda use the Viet Cong might make of the in

evitable bombing errors. Similarly, the military view prevailed, withi

the mission and in Washington, on experimental use of commercia

weed killers to clear fi elds of fi re and destroy Viet Cong food supplie

again overriding civilian concern that the tactic would alienate pea

ants whose crops were damaged and allow the Communists to charg

the United States with employing chemical warfare. Military-civilia

cooperation in the fi eld continued in spite of these high-level disagree

ments. However, as a State Department offi cial put it, there persiste

within the civilian agencies “a number of nagging doubts about th

qualitative effect of the effort in which they were engaged”; and “

certain head of emotional pressure built up in the Embassy.” In Wash

ington, members of President Kennedy’s staff began urging him t

strengthen the civilian leadership of the Saigon mission.30

Throughout these months, General Harkins, in common with Am

bassador Nolting, continued to express confi dence in Diem and con

viction that the war effort was moving forward. While fully aware o

the regime’s many defi ciencies, Nolting and Harkins considered Diem 

the only leader who had any real chance of holding South Vietnam 

together and eventually defeating the Viet Cong. Both were commi

ted to the Kennedy administration’s policy of trying to reform Diem 

through friendly persuasion and patient encouragement. They wer

convinced that, by tactful, persistent effort, they were moving Diem

albeit slowly, toward the correct policies and that American advice an

assistance gradually were improving his regime’s execution of them. I

July, as the Buddhist crisis intensifi ed, Nolting insisted that “our be

bet still lies in encouraging and prodding and helping [Diem] to accep

and follow through on policies that look reasonably good.”31

In dealing with President Diem and other high Vietnamese offi 

cials, General Harkins maintained a consistent tone of encouragemen

He told Diem in February 1963 that “we have taken the military, psy

chological, economical and political initiative away from the enemy

Yet he also was cognizant, from advisers’ reports and from his ow

frequent visits to the fi eld, of the military inadequacies of the govern

ment forces. That awareness was refl ected in his advice to the Vietnam

ese leaders.32

Repeatedly, often at the price of enduring the president’s interminab

chain-smoking monologues until he could break in for a word, Harkin

urged Diem to release the South Vietnamese Army from static defens

and deploy it into the countryside against the Viet Cong. He advocate

the conduct of many company- and battalion-size operations, both da

and night, rather than the usually futile multibattalion sweeps muc

favored by the Vietnamese. Harkins continually urged Diem to respec

his own chain of command. He exhorted the president and his senio

Chap 3EI.indd 90 4
91

From Hope to Frustration

defense aides on such subjects as elimination of small, vulnerable outposts, improved offi cer and NCO training and promotion, more effective employment of Rangers and Special Forces in border surveillance, 

more rapid reinforcement and rehabilitation of strategic hamlets attacked by the Viet Cong, and removal of incompetent or insubordinate 

local commanders. The MACV commander used his control of Military 

Assistance Program funding to dissuade the Vietnamese from creating 

units such as additional artillery and anti-aircraft elements that were 

not needed for fi ghting guerrillas. Aware early in 1963 that the strategic 

hamlet program in the Mekong Delta was being mismanaged, Harkins 

tried to persuade Diem and his commanders to coordinate military offensives there more closely with hamlet construction and to consolidate areas already partially under government control before extending operations into additional territory. He also prevailed upon Diem, 

during the last weeks of his regime, to reinforce IV Corps with another 

division and to rearrange its boundary with III Corps for better control 

of operations around Saigon and in the delta.33

At the same time, in offi cial reports and public statements, Harkins 

emphasized the positive, to the point where he rewrote or played down 

assessments from the fi eld that contradicted the MACV line. Within six 

months of taking command in Saigon, he had committed himself to 

an optimistic estimate of the probable duration of American involvement in the struggle. From then on, he held stubbornly to the view 

that the war was being won, albeit more rapidly in some parts of South 

Vietnam than in others. Harkins’ optimism had various sources. Impressed with the apparent success of his own command in its specifi c 

mission of improving the equipment, training, and operations of the 

South Vietnamese armed forces, he rationalized away contrary reports 

as refl ecting only localized failures rather than the big picture, and he 

largely discounted civilian reservations about the political and social 

effects of military activity. An optimist by temperament (he later admitted, “I always think of the bright side of things”), he also felt compelled by policy to maintain publicly that the campaign was going 

well. Harkins, according to his executive assistant, “always used to say, 

if I am not optimistic, and I don’t go around saying that we can win, 

we are going ahead, and it comes out in the press, a stat[e]ment of Gen 

Harkins saying that we are losing . . . and the [South Vietnamese] can’t 

fi ght, it would have a disastrous effect.”34

As setbacks multiplied, Harkins attempted to put the best possible 

face on them. After the ARVN failure at Ap Bac, Harkins was on the 

ground early, heard a full briefi ng on the action from indignant American advisers, and reported to Admiral Felt that South Vietnamese commanders had let slip away a chance to destroy an enemy main-force 

unit. Publicly, however, he vehemently denied American news media 

claims that the South Vietnamese had been defeated and denounced 

those who questioned the fi ghting quality of Saigon’s forces as “doing 

Chap 3EI.indd 91 4
92

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

a disservice to thousands of gallant and courageous men who are fi gh

ing so well in defense of their country.” When American reporte

publicized the diffi culties of the strategic hamlet program in the delt

Harkins in response admitted the setbacks but insisted that overall th

situation was improving and that the government and the America

mission were correcting the mistakes that had been made. In the fac

of offi cial and media skepticism, he affi rmed that the National Cam

paign Plan was proceeding on schedule into its second phase, althoug

he acknowledged that the campaign would develop at a different rat

in different areas, depending on the local balance of forces. Even afte

the pagoda raids, Harkins reported that the urban confl ict between th

regime and the Buddhists was not affecting counterinsurgency opera

tions in the countryside. He told General Taylor late in August: “Ou

programs are completed. We have accomplished our part of everythin

we set out to do after your visit in the fall of ‘61—all except ending th

war, and that is not far off if things continue at present pace.” Amer

can programs, he continued, “at least the military,” were “paying of

. . . All that is needed to end the confl ict is the will and determinatio

of the Vietnamese to win.”35

In retrospect, Harkins’ optimistic reports appeared to be at best th

products of self-delusion and at worst deliberate efforts to deceive th

U.S. government and the American public concerning the state of th

war. At the time, however, the facts were not so clear-cut. In a wa

without fronts and decisive battles, success and failure were diffi cu

to defi ne and measure, especially when political and social intangible

played so large a part. The Military Assistance Command, like othe

American agencies, relied heavily on statistical indicators to measur

progress—numbers of troops equipped and trained, strategic hamle

organized, sacks of fertilizer and rolls of barbed wire distributed, Vie

Cong killed, weapons lost and captured, the size and frequency of Vie

Cong attacks, and many others. Most of the statistics were of Vietnam

ese origin and doubtful reliability, since the offi cials who furnishe

them commonly adjusted the fi gures to please and placate their supe

riors. Then, too, the numbers’ meanings were often ambiguous. Fo

example, fewer Viet Cong attacks on strategic hamlets could indicat

success in pacifi cation, but they also could mean that the Viet Con

had subverted the hamlets so completely that they had no need t

attack them. Harkins, Nolting, and their subordinates all realized tha

Vietnamese reports and statistics had to be discounted, but they di

fered over which information to discount and by how much. From 

this plethora of amorphous data, one could select evidence to docu

ment General Harkins’ and Ambassador Nolting’s belief in progres

one could build a case equally well for the other side, and an increasin

number of Americans began to do so.36

Until mid-1963, most U.S. agencies in Saigon and Washington con

curred, although with qualifi cations and reservations in some case

Chap 3EI.indd 92 4
93

From Hope to Frustration

in their general assessment of the situation 

in South Vietnam. They 

agreed that the American 

buildup had produced 

improvements in South 

Vietnamese performance, 

especially in military operations. A consensus also 

existed that the government had stopped losing 

the war and, in the northern provinces, actually 

might be gaining ground 

against the Viet Cong. As 

the Buddhist crisis intensifi ed, the consensus broke 

down, with the civilians 

taking the occasion to 

express their long-held 

doubts about the effectiveness of the American 

effort. Although with exceptions, representatives 

of the State Department, 

the CIA, the Operations 

Mission, and the U.S. Information Agency—both 

in South Vietnam and in 

the United States—began 

to take the view that 

whatever military and 

pacifi cation progress had 

been made was being nullifi ed by Diem’s failure to conciliate his nonCommunist opposition and in particular by his inability to reach terms 

with the Buddhists. Taking its cue from General Harkins, the Defense 

Department countered that the Buddhist upheaval was having little impact on civilian and military attitudes in the countryside, where the 

war was being fought; that the army still was carrying the fi ght to the 

Viet Cong; and that, except possibly in the Mekong Delta, the strategic 

hamlet program was continuing to move forward. President Kennedy, 

disturbed by these confl icting assessments, dispatched a succession of 

high-level fact-fi nding missions to Vietnam. Those missions returned 

with reports that refl ected, rather than resolved, the dispute.37

In Vietnam, the civilian and military sides were not monolithic. 

Among the civilians, Ambassador Nolting and CIA station chief John 

Colonel Vann, center, with Brig. Gen. Robert H. 

York and Capt. William R. Johnson (NARA)

Chap 3EI.indd 93 4
94

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Richardson shared General Harkins’ optimism and sympathy for Diem

to the frustration of many of their subordinates. On the military sid

advisers in the fi eld, notably Lt. Col. John P. Vann, senior adviser t

the 7th ARVN Division in the Ap Bac engagement, minced no word

in detailing South Vietnamese defi ciencies. Vann insisted that the gov

ernment forces possessed the men and equipment to destroy the o

ganized Viet Cong units throughout the country in six months to 

year, but were being prevented from doing so by corrupt, incompeten

leadership at the higher levels. His outspokenness, especially withi

earshot of reporters, displeased General Harkins, and Vann left Vie

nam under a cloud. He resigned from the Army late in 1963 after th

Joint Chiefs of Staff, at the last moment, canceled a briefi ng at whic

he was to air his views.38

Lacking the ear of their superiors, lower-ranking members of th

American mission, whether civilian or military, found a ready audienc

for their complaints among the American newsmen in Saigon. Young

able, and ambitious, the resident reporters generally agreed with U.

goals in Vietnam. However, they resented the mission’s lack of cando

about many aspects of the American role in the war, for example, th

combat involvement of advisers and airmen, and they considered th

embassy insuffi ciently vigorous in defending press freedom against th

Diem regime, which treated foreign newsmen with unremitting hosti

ity. The journalists sympathized with the Buddhists in their confl ic

with Diem. Increasingly, they sided with those Americans who believe

the war was going badly and favored either drastic changes in the gov

ernment or its overthrow. The correspondents cultivated outspoke

fi eld advisers like Colonel Vann, from whom they drew much of the

view of military operations. For the reporters, Vann and others like him 

were the heroes of a morality play in which Harkins was the villain

the embodiment of self-delusion and dishonesty. The MACV staff, a

State and Defense Department direction, devoted much time and e

fort to attempting to refute adverse media stories about the course an

conduct of the war. General Harkins himself in retrospect bitterly de

nounced the Saigon reporters, claiming they were to blame for the fa

of Diem. On the other side, David Halberstam of the New York Time

allegedly drove past Harkins’ quarters, shook his fi st, and vowed, “I’

get you, Paul Harkins.” Whatever the excesses on both sides, by lat

1963 print and television journalists were becoming major actors i

the Vietnam drama. In spite of the best efforts of Harkins and othe

defenders of U.S. friendship toward Diem, the newsmen’s view of th

situation—which refl ected that of many offi cial participants—was be

ginning to dominate both American public opinion and Kennedy ad

ministration policy-making.39

Chap 3EI.indd 94 4
95

From Hope to Frustration

MACV and the Coup Against Diem

A military conspiracy against Diem brought the internal American 

policy confl ict to a head. South Vietnam’s offi cer corps had long resented Diem’s favoritism in promotions and his meddling in operations, 

and a growing number of commanders also feared that the president 

was leading them to defeat at the hands of the Viet Cong. As early as 

November 1960, a military-civilian conspiracy backed by several battalions of paratroopers came near to overthrowing the regime. Again, 

in February 1962, under the eyes of newly arrived General Harkins, dissident Vietnamese Air Force pilots bombed the presidential palace in 

Saigon in an attempt to assassinate Diem and Nhu.40

The conspiracy that fi nally succeeded began taking shape in mid1963 under the leadership of Maj. Gens. Duong Van Minh, Tran Van 

Don, and several other senior generals, all located at the Joint General 

Staff and other Saigon headquarters. These offi cers wanted Nhu out of 

the government at minimum and were willing to oust Diem as well if 

he remained adamant against reform of his regime. The inner group 

gradually added other commanders, including those of three of the 

four corps, to their conspiracy. Knowing that non-Communist South 

Vietnam could not survive prolonged internecine fi ghting, they delayed action until they were sure of the virtually unanimous support 

of the armed forces and enough civilian backing to make their action 

appear to represent the will of the nation. To strengthen their position, 

the conspirators persuaded Diem to issue his martial law decree of 20 

August, only to have Nhu turn it to his advantage with the pagoda raids, 

for which the army initially took the blame. Minh and his group, in 

self-defense and because they needed American support in any event, 

then contacted the U.S. Mission, using a CIA offi cer and other intermediaries. They informed the Americans that the armed forces had not 

conducted the attack on the Buddhists and asked what the American 

reaction would be to a forcible change of government.41

The generals’ feeler reached the U.S. Mission during a change of 

ambassadors. Nolting had requested relief for family reasons, and Kennedy had selected Henry Cabot Lodge to replace him. Kennedy appointed Lodge, a former senator who had run for vice president on the 

Republican ticket in 1960 and had served as chief U.S. representative at 

the United Nations, both to strengthen civilian leadership in the Saigon embassy and to give the administration’s Vietnam policy an aura 

of bipartisanship.42

Arriving in Saigon immediately after the August pagoda raids, 

Lodge received the generals’ overture and reported it to Washington 

with a request for instructions. His report precipitated a hasty administration policy decision followed by an increasingly bitter internal 

debate. As early as 1960, American offi cials, notably Nolting’s predecessor, Elbridge Durbrow, had raised the possibility of U.S. action to 

Chap 3EI.indd 95 4
96

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

replace Diem if he persisted in his self-destructive policies. For lack o

an obvious alternative, Kennedy had continued trying to work wit

Diem; but a growing faction among his advisers, centered in the Stat

Department, became convinced that Diem’s removal was essential t

allied victory. The Buddhist crisis solidifi ed this group’s resolve an

intensifi ed its sense of urgency. Lodge’s request for guidance gave th

anti-Diem faction its occasion for action.

On 24 August, while Kennedy, Rusk, McNamara, and CIA Chie

McCone all were out of Washington, a group of mid-level State Depar

ment and White House offi cials led by Assistant Secretary of State fo

Far Eastern Affairs Roger Hilsman and Under Secretary for Political A

fairs W. Averell Harriman took action. Harriman and Hilsman drafte

a cable to Lodge, secured the president’s clearance for it with the aid o

Michael Forrestal, a member of the White House staff, and dispatche

it without concurrence of the Defense Department, the Joint Chiefs o

Staff, or the CIA. Establishing what amounted to a new American po

icy toward Diem, the instructions declared that the United States n

longer could tolerate Nhu’s dominance of Diem’s government. Diem

the cable declared, “must be given chance to rid himself of Nhu an

his coterie and replace them with best military and political personal

ties available.” If Diem failed to do so, “then we must face the possibi

ity that Diem himself cannot be preserved.” Lodge was to issue publ

Maj. Gen. Duong Van “Big” Minh with Nguyen Ngoc (AP photo)

Chap 3EI.indd 96 4
97

From Hope to Frustration

statements absolving the armed forces from complicity in the pagoda 

raids and placing blame on Nhu, and he was to demand that Diem free 

the monks and nuns arrested in the raids. The ambassador was to inform the generals that American military and economic aid could continue only if the government ended its anti-Buddhist campaign, which 

would require removal of Nhu, and that the United States would furnish 

the armed forces “direct support in any interim period of breakdown 

[of] central government.” Concurrently with these actions, “Ambassador and country team should urgently examine all possible alternative 

leadership and make detailed plans as to how we might bring about 

Diem’s replacement if this should become necessary.”43

This cable went out over a weekend. When President Kennedy and 

his senior offi cials returned to work on Monday, many were dismayed 

by the implications of the action taken in their absence. For the better part of the week, Kennedy and his senior national security advisers, with Ambassador Nolting also sitting in, argued over the merits of 

promoting Diem’s overthrow. The State Department people, except for 

Nolting, who passionately took the opposing side, defended the policy 

set by the cable. McNamara, General Taylor (now chairman of the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff), and McCone expressed outrage that the policy change 

had been initiated behind their backs and pointed out that the government was proposing to support an alternative leadership, the composition and even the existence of which were at best highly uncertain. 

Nevertheless, when directly polled by Kennedy, none of the senior offi cials favored countermanding Lodge’s instructions. The policy set in 

the 24 August cable remained in effect.44

The instructions affected the Military Assistance Command as well 

as the embassy. Harkins’ command already had dissociated itself from 

Diem’s anti-Buddhist activities. On 5 June, MACV had ordered its personnel to “stand aloof” from the controversy and avoid statements and 

actions supporting either side. American advisers were not to accompany Vietnamese units operating against demonstrators or rioters, and 

the command was to withhold equipment and American air transport 

from such units. After the 24 August cable, the command moved beyond neutrality. On 25 August, Admiral Felt, who had been in telephone communication with the drafters of the controversial cable and 

agreed with their views, directed General Harkins to assist Ambassador 

Lodge in carrying out the new policy. Harkins was to help Lodge especially in contacts with the generals, with whom Harkins was well 

acquainted and Lodge as yet was not.45 

The ambassador and the MACV commander began implementing 

the new policy in general harmony of views. Both men favored American repudiation of the pagoda raids. They agreed that Nhu must leave 

the government and that the United States should assure the generals 

of support in the event they moved against the regime. They differed 

only on whether to deliver a fi nal ultimatum to Diem before approachChap 3EI.indd 97 4
98

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ing the generals. Harkins favored such a demarche while Lodge argue

that it would accomplish nothing and might demoralize the cou

planners. Harkins contributed a generally accurate lineup of pro- an

anti-regime commanders, on the basis of which he expressed doub

that the conspirators yet controlled enough troops in the Saigon are

to give them a chance for quick victory. He added that, in the event o

prolonged fi ghting between pro- and anti-Diem forces, his comman

could assist the rebels with military advice and could furnish unarme

American aircraft for troop transport, supply, reconnaissance, and l

aison while withholding such aid from the loyalists. Initially, he an

Lodge left contacts with the generals to the CIA so that the “America

offi cial hand should not show.” However, as the days passed and th

generals showed no signs of acting, under Lodge’s instructions, Harkin

on 31 August sought a direct conference with General Minh so as t

add his voice to American reassurance of the plotters. Harkins learne

from intermediaries that Minh’s group was suspending activities be

cause it still lacked the necessary preponderance of military force. H

and Lodge then concurrently reported that no military move again

Diem and Nhu was in immediate prospect.46

During the tense last week of August and over the following tw

months, the Military Assistance Command prepared for the possibl

consequences of governmental overthrow and civil strife. In conjunc

tion with the embassy, the command reviewed long-standing plan

for evacuating the approximately 4,500 American noncombatan

from South Vietnam, modifying its procedures to allow for the con

tingency that a friendly regime might not be in control. To suppo

the evacuation and to protect American forces and installations, th

Pacifi c Command on 26 August dispatched an amphibious task grou

with an embarked Marine battalion, as well as a carrier task group

from the Philippines to cruise in the South China Sea within sho

steaming distance of Saigon. If needed, the marines could be fl ow

by helicopter directly from their ships to Tan Son Nhut Air Base an

be reinforced by two additional battalions airlifted from Okinaw

where they were on alert. These forces dispersed early in Septembe

but deployed again in late October when a coup once more seeme

imminent. Also in October, as rumors spread in Saigon that pro-Diem 

mobs might attack the American embassy, MACV prepared plan

for dispatching military police and a provisional infantry battalio

formed from personnel of U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam, to pro

tect American facilities. It also arranged for helicopter evacuation o

people from the embassy roof, a precaution that foreshadowed wha

was to happen twelve years later.47

In the wake of the seeming failure of the coup, a divided Kenned

administration struggled to develop an alternative policy. The debat

over the wisdom of trying to oust Diem, which had begun after th

24 August telegram, continued with ever greater intensity in the pre

Chap 3EI.indd 98 4
99

From Hope to Frustration

ident’s councils in Washington, in the mission 

in Saigon, and in the 

American press, which 

enthusiastically broadcast the Kennedy administration’s internal differences. The argument 

became entwined with 

the civilian-military dispute over how the war 

was going. Civilian pessimists generally favored a 

forceful anti-Diem policy 

while military optimists 

insisted that the political 

crisis had not yet damaged a winning war effort and that the United 

States should not scrap a 

functioning government, 

no matter how objectionable some of its policies might be. 

After a major fact-fi nding mission to Vietnam in late September led 

by Secretary McNamara and General Taylor and including representatives of all the contending departments, the administration at last chose 

a course of action. In public statements, President Kennedy reaffi rmed 

that the military campaign was making progress and announced plans 

gradually to reduce American forces in accord with the Comprehensive 

Plan. At the same time, Kennedy publicly deplored Diem’s treatment 

of the Buddhists and declared that political reconciliation between the 

regime and its foes was essential to fi nal victory over the Viet Cong. 

Privately, the president authorized Lodge to suspend most nonmilitary 

aid to the regime, as well as American support to the Vietnamese Special Forces, which Nhu had used in attacking the pagodas. In a separate 

action, early in October, the administration recalled Saigon CIA Station Chief John Richardson, a long-time friend of Nhu. Kennedy and 

his advisers made these moves with mixed motives. Some members of 

the administration hoped that the diplomatic and economic pressure 

would elicit concessions from Diem; others expected that this show 

of American fi rmness would revive South Vietnamese efforts to overthrow the government.48

In the event, the initiatives had the latter effect. On 2 October, 

General Don, chief of the Joint General Staff and a leading member 

of Minh’s conspiracy, reestablished communication with the mission 

through a CIA offi cer who also had fi gured in the maneuvering that 

had accompanied the abortive August coup. In subsequent clandestine 

Ambassador Lodge with President Diem 

(©Bettman/CORBIS)

Chap 3EI.indd 99 4
100

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

meetings, Don and Minh indicated that they now possessed enoug

military support to guarantee success but wanted assurances from th

United States that it would not oppose them and that it would con

tinue military and economic aid to a new regime. After hearing of th

new feeler from the generals, the administration instructed Lodge to d

nothing to thwart a revolt and promised that the United States woul

continue to aid a new regime that appeared capable of accelerating th

military campaign, winning popular support, and improving workin

relations with its allies. By then a vigorous proponent of a change o

government, Lodge kept in touch with the plotters through the CI

contact. Perturbed by Lodge’s inability to learn details of the coup pla

and fearing entanglement in another Bay of Pigs fi asco, Kennedy an

his advisers reluctantly drifted along with events while urging Lodg

to minimize overt American involvement and to dissuade the genera

from moving if he thought they might fail. Their reluctance, howeve

did nothing to halt the unfolding of the fi nal act of Diem’s tragedy

Neither did conciliatory overtures to Lodge from Diem during the la

days of October.49

As they had in August, Lodge and Harkins initially worked togethe

to implement the administration’s October policy of pressure on Diem

The Military Assistance Command pressed ahead with drafting an a

celerated Comprehensive Plan for reduction of American forces, con

tinued preparing for the fi rst 1,000-man withdrawal, and arranged fo

South Vietnamese reinforcement of the Mekong Delta. As part of the ad

ministration’s punitive reduction of economic and military assistanc

Harkins in mid-October notifi ed Diem that MACV, in coordination wit

the Central Intelligence Agency, was cutting off funds to the ten Sout

Vietnamese Special Forces companies stationed in Saigon that had con

ducted the pagoda raids. The Americans would resume support of thes

units only when Diem placed them under command of the Joint Gen

eral Staff, in accord with the 1962 RVNAF reorganization decrees, an

committed them to the counterinsurgency operations for which the

had been organized and trained. On 26 October, Harkins learned from 

General Don that the Joint General Staff was preparing to dispatch th

Special Forces companies from Saigon to I and II Corps. Neither Harkin

nor the Vietnamese Special Forces commander, a Diem loyalist, knew 

that this was a preliminary to an imminent military coup.50

The ambassador and the MACV commander also were in conce

in their initial response to Don’s renewed coup overtures. Lodge in

formed Harkins of Don’s approach to the CIA offi cer, and the tw

men concurred in recommending that the United States refrain from 

thwarting the revived conspiracy and guarantee aid to a new regime—

the policy soon embodied in administration instructions to Lodg

From that point, however, communication between the two men con

cerning the coup, and indeed their entire working relationship, bega

to break down.51

Chap 3EI.indd 100 4
101

From Hope to Frustration

 Lodge and Harkins, both natives of Massachusetts, had been acquainted for many years and in Saigon maintained outwardly cordial 

social and offi cial relations. Nevertheless, as General Taylor later put 

it, “they just didn’t click as a team.” Kennedy had appointed Lodge in 

the hope that he would possess the reputation and force of personality to dominate the Vietnam country team. Lodge in fact did so. He 

also established good relations with the American reporters in Saigon, 

who welcomed his accessibility and candor. With these advantages, 

Lodge shifted the balance of power in the mission against General Harkins. Unlike Nolting, Lodge treated Harkins more as an adviser and 

subordinate than as a colleague, rarely consulting or informing the 

general on major policy matters outside the purely military sphere and 

often sending his own military assessments to Washington without 

fi rst showing them to Harkins. The latter practice especially annoyed 

Harkins because Lodge, in contrast to his predecessor, agreed with the 

civilian pessimists in the mission that the war was going against South 

Vietnam and so reported to the State Department.52

Most important, Lodge and Harkins disagreed about the desirability of Diem’s overthrow. Soon after his selection to replace Nolting, 

Lodge allied himself with the anti-Diem faction in the State Department and the White House. He maintained regular communication 

with them after his arrival in Saigon. The ambassador early concluded 

that Diem could not reform and strongly favored promoting any likely Vietnamese effort to oust him. Harkins agreed that Nhu should be 

removed from power and supported U.S. pressure on Diem, including 

aid reductions or cutoffs, to bring about that and other needed changes in the regime. However, to the end, he insisted that the United 

States should seek to save the president, whom Harkins regarded as a 

dedicated patriot, who “knew more about his country than anybody I 

knew and . . . was doing a lot of good.” On the basis of his experience 

in dealing with the Vietnamese generals, Harkins doubted that they 

possessed the character and ability to head a successful government. 

He declared of General Minh, for example, that “he has contributed 

nothing to the war effort. In fact, he has done nothing but complain 

to me about the government and the way it is handled ever since I 

have been here.” Summing up his position, on 30 October Harkins 

urged that the United States “not try to change horses too quickly,” 

but instead “continue to take persuasive actions that will make the 

horses change their course and methods of action.” “After all,” he 

concluded, “rightly or wrongly we have backed Diem for eight long, 

hard years. To me it seems incongruous now to get him down, kick 

him around, and get rid of him.”53

In support of his position, General Harkins and the Defense Department offi cials he briefed claimed persistently that the Buddhist protests and the declaration of martial law in August had done nothing to 

damage the morale of the South Vietnamese armed forces or to weaken 

Chap 3EI.indd 101 4
102

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

their loyalty to the regime. This questionable assessment was the prod

uct of a lack of information, which the Military Assistance Comman

had brought upon itself. A year before the Buddhist crisis began, MAC

had directed its advisers and other military personnel to avoid discus

ing U.S. and Vietnamese politics with their counterparts because th

Vietnamese tended to confuse individual Americans’ opinions wit

statements of offi cial U.S. policy. Aware of these strictures and ofte

under similar directives from their own commanders, Vietnamese o

fi cers in turn all but ceased communicating with their counterparts o

political matters as the governmental crisis approached its climax. A

a result, when American advisers received instructions to assess Vie

namese military attitudes toward the regime, they could furnish littl

solid information beyond noting that sentiment seemed to be runnin

against the Nhus and in favor of some sort of change in governmen

At the highest levels of command, the conspiring generals and the

civilian allies distrusted Harkins for his known friendliness to Diem

They either did not confi de in him at all or dissembled. The Militar

Assistance Command’s effort to remain outside Vietnamese politic

thus had ensured only that when the command unavoidably did be

come involved, it would operate half blind and partially deaf.54

During the fi nal phase of the generals’ coup preparations, coordina

tion between Ambassador Lodge and General Harkins all but collapsed

to the embarrassment of both men, the distress of the Vietnamese con

spirators, and the annoyance of President Kennedy. Lodge exclude

Harkins from his contacts with the plotters, conducted almost entirel

through the CIA offi cer; and, under State Department instructions, th

ambassador reported on them to Washington through Central Inte

ligence Agency channels. Uninformed about Lodge’s relations with th

generals, Harkins interpreted the “not thwart” principle of the admin

istration’s instructions more negatively than did the ambassador. A

one point, he nearly scotched the plot. On 22 October he told Genera

Don privately that this was no time for a coup because the war wa

going well. Concluding that the U.S. government had turned against 

coup, a disconcerted Don sought reassurance from Lodge through th

CIA contact. Harkins, for his part, claimed that until this point he ha

no idea the generals still were planning action against Diem. Refl ec

ing continuing administration policy disagreements, the Joint Chie

of Staff retrospectively endorsed Harkins’ posture of noninvolvemen

with the coup. Indicative of Lodge’s tenuous communications wit

Harkins, at the height of this mini-crisis the ambassador thought th

general had left Saigon for Bangkok when in fact Harkins was on a fi el

trip to the Mekong Delta.55

This incident led to temporary reestablishment of coordination be

tween the ambassador and the MACV commander, but the improve

ment was short-lived. During the fi nal days before the coup, in th

interests of “maximum security,” Lodge restricted all information o

Chap 3EI.indd 102 4
103

From Hope to Frustration

contacts with the plotters to the minimum number of Americans, a 

group that did not include Harkins. Accordingly, on 30 October, Admiral Felt’s precautionary deployment of amphibious and carrier task 

groups came as a surprise to the MACV commander, who had not realized the crisis was imminent. In response to a cue from General Taylor, 

who had become concerned over the lack of MACV content in Lodge’s 

cables, Harkins forwarded a list of important messages from Washington that had not been passed to him when they were received and 

declared that Lodge had been submitting estimates of the military situation without consulting him. He professed ignorance of the most recent Don-CIA contacts and declared that he and Lodge were “certainly 

in touch with each other but whether the communications between us 

are effective is something else.”56

President Kennedy was irritated at the lack of concerted action by 

the two principal offi cials of his Vietnam country team. On 29 and 

30 October, he instructed Lodge to include Harkins as well as the CIA 

station chief in supervision of the American agent’s contacts with the 

rebels. Since Lodge was scheduled to return to Washington for consultations at the end of October, Kennedy ruled that, in the ambassador’s 

absence from Saigon, Deputy Chief of Mission William Trueheart was to 

head the country team and issue all instructions to the CIA operative, 

but only after consultation with Harkins and the CIA chief, “so that all 

three know what is said to [the operative].” If the three men could not 

agree on what to say, they should refer the matter to Washington for 

resolution “when time permits.” Over Lodge’s objections, the president 

specifi ed further that, if the uprising occurred while the ambassador was 

away, General Harkins, the “most senior offi cer with experience of military decisions” on the scene, was to assume leadership of the mission. 

Whoever was in charge when the coup began, all U.S. agencies were to 

maintain strict neutrality, although the mission could offer good offi ces 

if the fi ghting was indecisive and asylum to the perpetrators if the coup 

failed. These restrictions notwithstanding, the president emphasized, 

once a revolt under “responsible leadership” began, “it is in the interest 

of the US Government that it should succeed.”57

Lodge was still in Saigon on 1 November, when the generals fi nally 

acted. Hence, during the coup, the Military Assistance Command was 

largely a spectator. General Harkins spent the morning of the fatal day 

accompanying Admiral Felt, who was making a previously planned 

visit to Saigon, and Ambassador Lodge in a courtesy call on President 

Diem. Around midday, he saw the admiral off at Tan Son Nhut Air Base. 

General Don, who was with the Americans throughout the morning, 

seemed nervous; he declined Harkins’ invitation to lunch, claiming 

he had to attend to other business. At 1345, Don telephoned the Military Assistance Command J3, Brig. Gen. Richard G. Stilwell. He asked 

Stilwell to inform General Harkins at once that the South Vietnamese 

generals were assembled at Joint General Staff headquarters, next door 

Chap 3EI.indd 103 4
104

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

to Tan Son Nhut, and were initiating a coup. By that time, the con

spirators had arrested the senior offi cers still loyal to Diem. Meanwhil

troops of the marine and airborne brigades, the Quang Trung Trainin

Center, and the 5th Infantry Division had seized largely unoppose

key military and civil installations throughout Saigon and had close

in on Gia Long Palace, where Diem’s 1,500-man Presidential Guar

brigade offered the only serious resistance.

The Military Assistance Command broadcast over the Armed Force

Radio station orders to all American military personnel and civilians t

stay off the streets and to avoid any action in support of either side. 

also alerted American forces against possible Viet Cong efforts to explo

the situation, but none occurred. From then on, the command simpl

observed events, drawing much information from the Americans wh

remained on the job at the Joint Operations Center and reporting it t

Pacifi c Command and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. By late afternoon o

the fi rst, MACV had determined that all division and corps command

ers throughout the country had declared for the coup and that Diem 

and Nhu were isolated and under siege in Gia Long Palace. The com

mand also reported that, in spite of the collapse of Diem’s police an

the presence of thousands of jubilant, riotous citizens in the street

no Americans were in danger. However, a few MACV offi cers’ familie

endured tense hours when their homes came under cross-fi re or the

children were away on school outings when the coup began.

The end of the Diem regime came early on the 2d, with the su

render of the palace garrison, the attempted fl ight and arrest of Diem 

and Nhu, and their murder by their military escort, most probably a

the order of General Minh and the leading plotters. Besides the pres

dent of the republic and his brother, some 20 Vietnamese, includin

4 civilians, died in the fi ghting in Saigon and 248 were wounded. Th

conspirators had achieved their purpose: a swift, relatively bloodle

overthrow of the regime, carried out with overwhelming military forc

and popular support and with American acquiescence.58

During the week following the coup, the generals dissolved Diem

cabinet and National Assembly and suspended the 1956 constitution

On 4 November they formally established a provisional regime consis

ing of a Military Revolutionary Council of generals headed by Minh a

chief of state and a mixed civilian-military cabinet with Diem’s forme

vice president, Nguyen Ngoc Tho, as premier and General Don as min

ister of defense. The Revolutionary Council in fact held the real powe

since it had charge of government fi nance and national security. Th

Kennedy administration recognized the new government on 8 No

vember, notwithstanding the revulsion of the American president an

public at the executions of Diem and Nhu. The Viet Cong reacted t

the coup with a fl urry of minor attacks, which accomplished little an

soon abated. By the 8th, most of the troops brought into Saigon for th

coup were returning to their regular stations and government force

Chap 3EI.indd 104 4
105

From Hope to Frustration

throughout the country were resuming their normal pattern of operations. The military regime shook up the offi cer corps with a wave of 

promotions and command changes and began systematically purging 

Diem’s province chiefs and other local offi cials. Americans, both civilian and military, enjoyed the applause of celebrating crowds in Saigon 

and other cities. General Harkins reported a “surge of cooperativeness” 

toward MACV personnel at Joint General Staff headquarters and in the 

fi eld, with Vietnamese counterparts associating more freely with advisers and providing “increased spontaneity of information.”59

General Harkins quickly established relations with the new military 

leaders. He planned to press the new regime for the same reforms he 

had urged on Diem: adherence to the chain of command; an end to 

the division of military authority between province chiefs and division commanders; improved troop training, especially of hamlet militia; and more effi cient, aggressive employment of all elements of the 

armed forces. General Don called on Harkins the morning of the 5th, 

their fi rst meeting since the coup, to bring him up to date on RVNAF 

command changes and reorganizations. Don promised that the new 

government would be ready soon for more vigorous prosecution of 

the war. Harkins, in reply, pointedly “reminded Don that the courage 

and determination showed by the coup’s battalions in overcoming the 

Presidential Brigade of 1,500 men, if displayed in fi ghting a VC battalion of three to four hundred men, would make short order of the 

remaining VC” in South Vietnam.60

Yet even in the period of good feeling following the coup, the 

discord of the previous months persisted within the American mission. Ambassador Lodge exuded optimism about the prospects of the 

new government. Harkins, on the other hand, on 13 November in his 

fi rst press interview after the coup, declared that “the Diem government had a good national campaign plan,” that the war was “moving along,” and that it would take the new government some time to 

establish the same degree of momentum. The American reporters in 

Saigon were quick to interpret the coup as a defeat for General Harkins. 

They claimed Harkins had disregarded timely warnings of the coup 

from his staff and that the ruling generals lacked confi dence in the 

MACV commander, whom they considered “a left-over symbol of the 

former American policy of all-out support for the Diem family.” These 

reports, which the administration suspected of originating within the 

Saigon mission, led Secretary Rusk to enjoin Lodge to take “corrective 

measures” to “stop this kind of talk with newsmen which only creates 

internal diffi culties within U.S. Government and friction with GVN.” 

The talk and the stories continued, however, as did the personal and 

policy confl icts underlying them.61

Following the war, General Harkins would harshly criticize the 

American offi cials who helped bring down Diem. “It was a shame,” he 

declared in 1974, “to have Diem go when things were going so well. 

Chap 3EI.indd 105 4
106

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

. . . It wasn’t worth the price, period.” Whether the war had been goin

as well before Diem’s overthrow as Harkins claimed was debatable, bu

his adverse judgment of the consequences of the coup of 1 Novembe

1963 proved to be all too accurate. Initial American optimism notwith

standing, the elimination of Diem did nothing to remedy the funda

mental political, social, and institutional defi ciencies of South Vietnam

Instead, the fall of the government simply swept away most of wha

administrative machinery the nation had. At the same time, the Ken

nedy administration, by associating itself publicly with the anti-Diem 

forces, left the U.S. government deeply implicated in both the murde

of Diem and Nhu and the failings of subsequent regimes. The Militar

Assistance Command and the rest of the country team at the end o

1963 had to pick up the pieces of the counterinsurgency struggle an

start over again. They were to do so in the aftermath of the assassina

tion of an American president, as well as a Vietnamese one, and in th

context of important strategic decisions by both North Vietnam an

the United States.62

Chap 3EI.indd 106 4
107

From Hope to Frustration

Notes

1 Unless otherwise noted, the rest of this section is based on U.S.–Vietnam Relations, 

sec. 4.A.5, tabs 2, 3, and 4; sec. 5.B.4, pp. 428–39, 487–521; Duiker, Road to Power, pp. 

193–99, 204–14; War Experiences Recapitulation Committee of the High-Level Military 

Institute, Vietnam, The Anti-U.S. Resistance War for National Salvation 1954–1975: Military Events (hereafter cited as Resistance War) (Hanoi: People’s Army Publishing House, 

1980) trans. Joint Publications Research Service (JPRS), doc. 80968, 3 Jun 82. All citations are from the JPRS translation, pp. 30–32, 45–52; “A Party Account of the Revolutionary Movement in South Vietnam from 1954 to 1963, and a Summary of the 

Situation in the South from 1962 to mid–1963” (Document captured by allied forces 

in Operation CRIMP, early 1966, copy in Historians fi les, CMH), pp. 8–9, 12–28. 2 Quoted in Resistance War, pp. 48–49. 3 Quotes from MFR, HQ MAAGV, sub: Briefi ng for Mr Bundy . . . , 1 Mar 62; and 

Msg, CINCPAC to JCS, 23 Feb 62. Threat is summarized in HQ USARPAC, USARPAC 

Intelligence Bulletin, Jan 62, p. 17; and USARYIS Intelligence Digest, 2–62, 29 Jan 62. 

All in Historians fi les, CMH. 4 MAAG, Vietnam, Geographically Phased National Level Operation Plan for 

Counterinsurgency, 15 Sep 61, Historians fi les, CMH; quotes from pp. A–1, A–4. McGarr, Report of Chief, MAAG, Vietnam, for Period 2 September 1961 to 8 February 

1962, 8 Feb 62, pp. 5–6, Historians fi les, CMH; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.A.5, tab 

4, pp. 83–94; sec. 4.B.2, pp. 7–9. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 5, pp. 15–18. 

Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 119–20. Blaufarb, Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 

101–03. 5 Thompson’s proposals are summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.2, pp. i, 

11–12; and Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 116–17. Blaufarb, Counterinsurgency 

Era, pp. 44–49, points out that the strategic hamlets were far from the most important 

ingredient in British success in Malaya; see also his evaluation of the Thompson plan, 

pp. 103–04. For a later succinct, idealized description of a strategic hamlet, see State Research Memo, George C. Denny, Jr., for Actg SecState, 1 Jul 63, sub: Strategic Hamlets, 

in box 23: SEA: VN 1963 General, 4/63–9/63, Thompson Papers, JFKL. 6 For mission criticism of Thompson plan, see: Msgs, Nolting to SecState, 5 and 30 

Nov 61; and Ltr, McGarr to McNamara, 27 Nov 61. All in Historians fi les, CMH. The 

process of U.S. assimilation of Thompson’s ideas can be traced in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.2, pp. 1–19; Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 6, pp. 20–22, 26–28; 

McGarr Rpt, Feb 62, pp. 3–5; MFR, HQ MAAGV, 1 Mar 62, sub: Briefi ng for Mr. Bundy 

. . ., Historians fi les, CMH; Blaufarb, Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 104–07; Hilsman, To 

Move a Nation, pp. 438–39; and Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 118–21, 135. 7 MFR, Brig Gen William B. Rosson, 23 Feb 62, sub: Trip to Hawaii—Third Secretary 

of Defense Conference on Vietnam, 19 February 1962, HQ CINCPAC, Historians fi les, 

CMH; McGarr Rpt, Feb 62, pp. 6–7; Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 104–05. 

For doubts about Operation SUNRISE, see MFR, Hilsman, 19 Mar 62, sub: Visit with General Paul Harkins and Ambassador Nolting, 17 March 1962, and Memo, Hilsman for 

Taylor, sub: (1) Report on Meeting with General Harkins . . . , (2) Doubts on Operation 

SUNRISE, 31 Mar 62. Both in VN 3/1/62–7/27/62, Fldr 8, Box 3, Hilsman Papers, JFKL. 

For results of Operation SUNRISE, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.2, pp. 22–24. 8 CM 117–62, sub: Viet Cong Attacks on Strategic Hamlets, 17 Nov 62, File I–

21605/62, ISA 092 VN, box 51, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. USMACV, Summary of Highlights, 8 Feb 62–7 Feb 63, pp. 97–98; Msgs, Nolting Saigon 84 to SecState, 20 Jul 62; 

COMUSMACV MAC J–3 2495 to AIG 924, 8 Sep 62. Record of Sixth SecDef Conference, 

Chap 3EI.indd 107 4
108

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

23 July 1962, HQ CINCPAC . . . , 26 Jul 62, p. 3–1. All in Historians fi les, CMH. U.S

Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.2, pp. 20–21, 24; sec. 4.B.4, pp. 469–80, 503–04. Diem giv

his rationale for a scattergun program in Ltr, Frederick W. Flott to Harkins, 2 Oct 6

with att. Memo of Conversation with Diem, 29 Sep 63, File 204–58, Policy and Pre

edent Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 9 Supply for the Special Forces and CIDGs came through U.S. Army Suppo

Group, Vietnam, and U.S. Army, Ryukyus. For origins of the CIDG program an

its initial relationship to MACV, see Col Francis J. Kelly, U.S. Army Special Force

1961–1971, Vietnam Studies (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1973), p

19–28. For Kennedy decisions on paramilitary activities, see Hilsman, To Move a N

tion, pp. 78–79; NSAM 57, Jun 61, quoted in Memo, S. A. Loftus, Jr., for Gen Woo

7 Dec 62, sub: Operation SWITCHBACK, File I–26540/62, ISA 354.2 SWITCHBACK, box 5

65A350, RG 330, NARA. 10 SecDef Conf, 23 Jul 62, pp. 7–1, 7–2. Memo, Sec Army Cyrus R. Vance for SecDe

19 Jul 62, sub: DOD/CIA Responsibilities in South Vietnam, File I–25751/62, ISA 09

VN, box 62, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. Info Brief, Dir, Special Warfare, ODCSOPS, 1

Jan 63, sub: Special Forces Operations in South Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. Ro

son, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 124–26, 150–55. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role

ch. 7, pp. 41–49; ch. 10, p. 28. 11 SecDef Conf, 23 Jul 62, sec. 1, pp. 1–2, and sec. 2, pp. 1, 4; quotes are from th

latter section. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. i–iii, 1–4. For comment on th

origins of the plan and its relationship to McNamara’s management style, see Rosso

“Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 139–44, 179. 12 Quote is from USMACV Summary 62–63, p. 102. Msg, CINCPAC to COMU

MACV, 29 Aug 62, Historians fi les, CMH; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 3–5. 13 Quote is from Memo, Harkins for CINCPAC, 19 Jan 63, sub: Comprehensive Pla

for South Vietnam; Memo, Adams, USAF, for Distribution, 22 Jun 63, sub: Phaseout 

U.S. Forces, File 204–58 (201–45) Organization Planning File (1963), box 1; Ltr, Harkin

to ChMAAGV, 8 Sep 62, sub: Comprehensive Plan for SVN, File 204–58 (1418–03) MA

Files (1963), box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. USMACV Summary 62–63, pp. 102–0

Memo, CINCPAC for JCS, 25 Jan 63, sub: Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam. Bot

in Historians fi les, CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 6–10. 14 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 11–15; Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam

pp. 144–50. 15 Memo, CINCPAC for JCS, 18 Jul 63, sub: Transmittal of FY65–69 Alternate M

Plans for Republic of Vietnam, box 2, 71A226; Memo, Weede for ChMAAGV, 30 Se

63, sub: Revision of MAP Model Plan, 1965–1969, File 204–58 (201–10) Joint Strateg

Objectives Plans Files (1963), box 1, 69A702; Ltr, Harkins to CINCPAC, 8 Nov 63, su

Transmittal of FY 65–69 Accelerated Model Plan (CPSVN) for RVN, File 204–58 (1418

03) MAP Files (1963), box 2, 69A702; all in RG 334, NARA. Memo, JCS JCSM–640–6

for SecDef, 27 Aug 63, sub: Comparison and Analysis of FY 1965–69 Alternate MA

Plans for the Republic of Vietnam, USARPAC Notebook, Jun–Jul 63, tab 33, Historians fi le

CMH. 16 Quote is from Weede Interv, 23 Jul 73, p. 37. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.

pp. 13, 15–16; Msg, COMUSMACV MACJ–1–8667 to ChMAAG and Cmdr, 2d Air Di

7 Nov 63, File 204–58 (201–45) Organization Planning Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, R

334, NARA; Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 9, p. 38. 17 Quotes are from Chairman, JCS memo (CM) 178–62, 4 Jan 63, sub: Honolu

Conference, with att.: Discussions on Vietnam at Pacifi c Command Headquarters, 17–1

December 1962, File I–20722/63, ISA 337 Hawaii, box 7, 67A4564, RG 330, NARA; and U

MACV Summary 62–63, p. 94. Msg, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 19 Sep 62, Historians fi le

Chap 3EI.indd 108 4
109

From Hope to Frustration

CMH, indicates Admiral Felt’s belief the Vietnamese needed a national plan. Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” p. 167; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, 4.B.4, pp. 5–6. Nolting gives his 

view in Msg Saigon 604 to SecState, 19 Dec 62. Harkins’ view of the plan’s purpose is in 

Memo for CINCPAC, 19 Jan 63, sub: Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam; and MACV 

briefi ng, untitled. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 18 The South Vietnamese command problem is summarized in: U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec 4.A.5, tab 4, p. 82, and sec. 4.B.2, pp. 3–4; Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, 

p. 234; Memo, Maj Gen Andrew J. Boyle for CofS, USARPAC, 24 Jan 63, sub: USARPAC Analysis of Counterinsurgency Operations in Vietnam, pt. 2, pp. 1–2; and Memo, 

Col Hugh F. Queenin, for Dir of Ops, ODCSOPS, 26 Feb 62, sub: Joint Staff Visit to 

CINCPAC, and MAAGs and JUSMAG Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand; both in Historians 

fi les, CMH. 19 USMACV Summary 62–63, pp. 95–96, 114–15. Msgs, CINCUSARPAC to AIG 731, 

ACSI DA, et al., 29 Nov 62 and 14 Dec 62; PACAF to Distribution, 1 Dec 62; OUSARMY 

Saigon to DEPTAR, Washington, 10 Dec 62; Nolting Saigon 597 and 648 to SecState, 15 

Dec 62 and 5 Jan 63. All in Historians fi les, CMH. National Campaign Plan–Briefi ng, 

box 1, 67A4604, RG 334, NARA. 20 USMACV Summary 62–63, pp. 94–96. National Campaign Plan–Briefi ng; MACV 

Briefi ng, untitled, box 1, 67A4604, RG 334, NARA; ODCSOPS Fact Sheet for CSA, 9 Jan 

63, sub: National Campaign Plan for South Vietnam, USARPAC Notebook, Jun–Jul 63, 

tab 34, Historians fi les, CMH. Harkins’ unwillingness to specify a D-day is recounted 

in HQ, CINCPAC, Verbatim Transcript of JCS Team (Wheeler Group) Debrief of Trip to 

South Vietnam, 28 Jan 63, copy in Historians fi les, CMH. 21 For a general summary of progress during 1962, see USMACV Summary 62–63, 

passim, and Ltr, Harkins to Diem, 15 May 63, File 204–58 (206–05) Command Reporting Files 2 (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. See also (CM 178–62, 4 Jan 63, sub: 

Honolulu Conference, with att: Discussions on Vietnam at Pacifi c Command Headquarters, 17–18 December 1962, I–20722/63, ISA 337 Hawaii, box 7, 67A4564, RG 330, 

NARA. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 7, p. 17; ch. 8, pp. 38–41. For Viet Cong 

views, see “Party Account of the Revolutionary Movement,” pp. 29–33 and Msg, Nolting Saigon 668 to SecState, 12 Jan 63, MACV J–2, Translation of VC Document on Ap 

Bac Battle 2 Jan 63 (hereafter cited as VC Ap Bac AAR). Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 22 Quote is from CofS, MAAGV, info CSA, 21 Jan 63, encl. 5, U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, p. 34; MFR, sub: Conversation with Maj Gen Edward J. Rowny, in 

VN Hilsman Trip File, Box 3, Hilsman Papers, JFKL; Memo, Col F. P. Serong, 14 Mar 

63, sub: Strategic Review, File 1 (30 Mar 62–Nov 63), tab 29, CMH. Memo, CIA, 25 

Feb 63, sub: NIE 53–63, Prospects in South Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, Lt 

Col John P. Vann for Ch, US Army Sec, MAAGV, 1 Apr 63, sub: Senior Adviser’s Final 

Report; Interv, Charles V. P. von Luttichau with Lt Col John P. Vann, 22 Jul 63, pp. 

1–18, 35, 39–40, 53; and Vann, JCS Briefi ng, 8 Jul 63, sub: Observations of the Senior 

Adviser to the Vietnamese Seventh Infantry Division, pp. 4–6. All in Historians fi les, 

CMH. 23 Ltr, Sr Adviser, 7th Inf Div, to Ch, US Army Sec, MAAGV, 9 Jan 63, sub: After 

Action Report, Opn Duc Thang 1/TC; Msg, Sr Adviser, 7th Inf Div, to Sr Adviser, IV 

CTZ, 8 Jan 63; Memo, Sr Adviser, IV Corps for Ch, US Army Sec, MAAGV, 16 Jan 63, 

sub: After Action Report . . . ; VC Ap Bac AAR. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Vann Interv, 22 Jul 63, pp. 11–13, 44–51. For a detailed account of this battle, and the meanings that both sides attached to it, see David M. Toczek, The Battle of Ap Bac, Vietnam: 

They Did Everything but Learn from It (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2001). 24 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 38–39. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” 

ch. 9, pp. 13–14, 21–25. Msg, Nolting Saigon 174 to SecState, 4 Aug 63; National CamChap 3EI.indd 109 4
110

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

paign Plan–Briefi ng. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, PACAF to Distribution, 4 Ap

63; DIA Intell Bull Supp, Republic of Vietnam,18 Jul 63; CIA Info Rpt, 1 Aug 63, su

Assessment of the Progress of the War against the Viet Cong . . . during the First Half 

1963; All in Historians fi les, CMH. Enemy assessment: “A Party Account of the Revol

tionary Movement,” p. 36; COSVN Standing Committee Directive Discussing the Tas

for the Last Six Months of 1963, Sep 63 (Trans. of doc captured in Phuoc Long Prov, 2

Apr 69), pp. 1–4, copy in Historians fi les, CMH. 25 Msg, Nolting Saigon 981 to SecState, 4 May 63; CofS, MAAGV, Info Paper, 21 Ja

62, encl. 5. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. MFR, Rufus C. Phillips, 30 Apr 63, sub: F

nancing and the Future of the Counterinsurgency Effort in Vietnam, Lansdale-Phillip

Correspondence, Hoover Institution. For Communist view, see “Party Account of th

Revolutionary Movement,” pp. 33–35, 45–46; and COSVN Directive, Sep 63. 26 For samples of the extensive documentation on the diffi culties of the strateg

hamlet program, see the following, all in Historians fi les, CMH: Memo, CIA, 25 Fe

63, sub: NIE 53–63, Prospects in South Vietnam; Msg, Nolting Saigon 981 to SecState, 

May 63; CIA Info Rpt, 1 Aug 63; Msgs, Lodge Saigon 510 and 572 to SecState,14 Sep 6

and 21 Sep 63. Memo, Col F. P. Serong, 14 Mar 63, sub: Strategic Review, Westmorelan

Hist File 1 (30 Mar 62–Nov 63), tab 29; and Memo, Phillips for Joseph L. Brent, 1 Ma

63, sub: An Evaluation of Progress in the Strategic Hamlet-Provincial Rehabilitatio

Program, in Lansdale-Phillips Correspondence, Hoover Institution. For an example 

success in II Corps, see Progress Rpt, 25th Inf Div, Operation TRUNG NGHIA . . . ,16 J

63, Historians fi les, CMH. 27 Quote is from CIA Memo, 25 Feb 63, Historians fi les, CMH. Spector, Early Year

pp. 224–25, sketches Diem’s character. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.A.5, tab 2, p

13–45, describes Diem’s regime; see also sec. 4.B.1, pp. i–ii, sec. 4.B.2, p. 19, sec. 4.B.

pp. 469–80, 487–21. Douglas Pike, Viet Cong: The Organization and Techniques of the N

tional Liberation Front of South Vietnam (Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Techno

ogy Press, 1966), pp. 71–73, presents a chronology of Diem’s alienation of Vietname

society. Memo, Thomas L. Hughes for SecState, sub: The Problem of Nhu, 15 Sep 6

Historians fi les, CMH. 28 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 4–17, outlines the course of the crisis. Elle

J. Hammer, A Death in November: America in Vietnam (New York: Dutton, 1987), p

83–84, 103–16, 138–43, 146, 154–55, 165–68, takes Diem’s side of the story. William M

Hammond, Public Affairs: The Military and the Media, 1962–1968, United States Arm

in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1988), chs. 1 an

2, describes the important role of the American press. The August crisis is refl ected 

Msgs, Trueheart CRITIC to DA, Washington, DC, 20 Aug 63 and PACAF to Distributio

22 Aug 63. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 29 Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 249–50, comments on the differing milita

and civilian buildup rates. On weak civilian–military operational coordination, se

Blaufarb, Counterinsurgency Era, pp. 64–65, 116–19; Memo, William H. Sullivan, su

Divergent Attitudes in U.S. Offi cial Community, Historians fi les, CMH; Hilsman, T

Move a Nation, p. 442; Memo, Hilsman and Forrestal for the President 25 Jan 63, sub: 

Report on South Vietnam, NSF VN Hilsman File, LBJL; and Msg, CIA to White Hou

Situation Room, 15 Jan 63, NSF 320, NSC Staff Memoranda, Mr. Forrestal 12/62–11/6

JFKL. Australian comment: Memo, Col F. P. Serong, 14 Mar 63, sub: Strategic Review

Westmoreland Hist File 1 (30 Mar 62–Nov 63), tab 29, CMH. 30 Quote is from Memo, Sullivan, sub: Divergent Attitudes in U.S. Offi cial Com

munity, Historians fi les, CMH. State Department doubts about air strikes, napalm, an

defoliants are summed up in Hilsman, To Move a Nation, pp. 442–44, 453–54, 578; an

Futrell, “Advisory Years” (comment edition), pp. 198–200, 202–08; Msg, CINCPAC to JC

Chap 3EI.indd 110 4
111

From Hope to Frustration

9 Mar 63, Hilsman, Box 3, VN: Hilsman Trip 12/62–1/63, Fldr 12, JFKL. Msg, State to 

AmEmb Saigon, 22 Mar 63; Msg, Nolting to Harriman and Hilsman, 25 Apr 63. Both 

in Historians fi les, CMH. For White House staff discontent with civilian leadership in 

Saigon, see Memo, Forrestal for the President,10 May 63, NSF 197/Apr–May 63, JFKL. 31 Quote is from Msg, Nolting Saigon 117 to SecState, 20 Jul 63, NSF 198 VN 7/1–

7/20/63, JFKL. Nolting outlines his approach to Diem in Msg to SecState, 7 Nov 61, 

Historians fi les, CMH. In same fi les, see Msg, Nolting Saigon 1036 to SecState, 17 May 

63. Overviews of administration policy are in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.1, pp. 

138–48, sec. 4.B.2, p. 35, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 7–8. Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 

133–34. Hilsman, To Move a Nation, p. 453. 32 Quote is from Ltr, Harkins to Diem, 23 Feb 63, fi le 204–58 (206–05), Command 

Reporting Files 1 (1963). An example of advisers’ reports reaching Harkins is Memo, Lt 

Col Bryce F. Denno for Harkins, 25 Apr 63, sub: Morale in I Corps, fi le 204–58 (206–05) 

Command Reporting Files 2 (1963); both in box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. For Harkins’ retrospective views of the South Vietnamese, see Harkins Intervs, Apr 74, pp. 50–

51, 58–59; and, 23 Feb 72, pp. 36–37; and Ltr, Harkins to Cowles, 29 Aug 79, Historians 

fi les, CMH. HQ,CINCPAC, Verbatim Transcript of JCS Team (Wheeler Group) Debrief 

of Trip to South Vietnam, 28 Jan 63, pp. 13–14, contains observations on Harkins’ relationship to the South Vietnamese leaders. Copy in Historians fi les, CMH. 33 An early example of Harkins’ advice to Diem is in MFR, 31 Jul 62, sub: Conversation between COMUSMACV and President Diem . . . , 18 July 1962, OASD/ISA Files 

092 Vietnam, box 51, 65A3501, RG 330, NARA. Other examples are in MACV Agenda 

Items for Conference with President Diem, 1–2 Aug 63, Historians fi les, CMH. See also 

correspondence fi les in boxes 1 and 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. For delta reorganization, in addition to material in the above, see Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 9, 

pp. 11–12. 34 Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 179–80; see also pp. 155–60. First quote 

is from Harkins Interv, Apr 74, pp. 60–61; see also pp. 50, 52–53. Second is from Greene 

Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 17. Hilsman, To Move a Nation, p. 453, considers Harkins’ optimism 

at least partially justifi ed. 35 For an overview of MACV optimism, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 

11–12; and sec. 4.B.5, p. 10. Ap Bac: Sr Adviser, Ap Bac AAR, ann. B, p. 9. Telecon, 

CINCPAC and MACV, 2 Jan 63, box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Msgs, Harkins to Gen 

Charles G. Dodge, 4 Jan 63 and Harkins MAC J74 0188 to Taylor, 10 Jan 63. Both in 

Historians fi les, CMH. First quote is from last msg. Delta: Msg, Trueheart Saigon 261 

to SecState, 19 Aug 63, Historians fi les, CMH. National Campaign: Memo, Harkins for 

Trueheart, 6 Jul 63, sub: TF Saigon Monthly Wrap-Up Report for June 1963, File 204–58 

(201–29) Special Warfare Planning File (1963), box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Final 

quote: Msg, Harkins to Taylor, 23 Aug 63, NSF 198 VN 8/21–23/63, JFKL 36 The delusion-deception view is advocated in Halberstam, Best and Brightest, pp. 

183–88. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.A.5, tab 4, p. 52; sec. 4.B.2, pp. i–ii, 20, 30–35; 

sec. 4.B.3, p. 35; sec. 4.C.1, pp. 10–12, analyzes the diffi culty of assessing the course of 

the war. Memo, Sullivan, sub: Divergent Attitudes in U.S. Offi cial Community, Historians fi les, CMH, outlines the different perspectives from which civilians and military 

usually approached the “facts.” Msg, Nolting Saigon 376 to SecState, 3 Oct 62, Historians fi les, CMH, gives the ambassador’s view on the reliability of Vietnamese statistics. 37 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 17–18, 24; sec. 4.B.5, pp. 25–26; and sec. 

5.B.4, pp. 554–73, 579–89, summarize the shifting assessments. CIA Memo, 25 Feb 63; 

CIA Info Rpt, 1 Aug 63; Historians Files, CMH. Memo, Forrestal for SecDef, sub: Vietnam, 20 Sep 63, with att.: USOM RA, Second Informal Appreciation of the Status of 

the Strategic Hamlet Program,1 Sep 63, box 18, 67A4564, RG 330, NARA. Msg, Lodge 

Chap 3EI.indd 111 4
112

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Saigon 447 to SecState, 9 Sep 63, NSF 199 VN, vol. 15, 1–10 Sep 63, State Cables (B

JFKL. Memo to Sr Adviser I Corps, 30 Sep 63, sub: Special Evaluation Team Report, Fi

204–08 (206–05) Command Reporting File 2 (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 38 For Vann’s views, see Vann Final, Apr 63; Rpt, von Luttichau-Vann Interv, 2

Jul 63; and Vann Briefi ng, Jul 63 (the text of his abortive briefi ng to the JCS); see als

Interv, U.S. News and World Report with Lt Col John P. Vann, 16 Sep 63, copy in Wes

moreland Hist File 2 (Jan 64–4 Feb 64), tab B–2, CMH. Palmer, The 25-Year War, p

21–23; and Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 165–66, discuss Vann’s confl i

with Harkins and the abortive JCS briefi ng, generally in terms sympathetic to Van

Rosson, pp. 123–24, 161–66, 177–78, and 180, notes other instances of fi eld dissen

from MACV assessments. 39 Hammond, Military and Media, 1962–1968, chs. 1 and 2, details the deterior

tion of government-press relations; Halberstam quote is from p. 37. Taylor, Swor

and Plowshares, pp. 257–58, 300, comments unfavorably on the U.S. press in Saigo

See also U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 9–10. Halberstam’s views are expresse

in Best and Brightest, passim; see especially p. 183. A MACV staff offi cer criticizes th

press in Adams Interv, pp. 13–14. On Harkins’ views, see Greene Interv, 6 Jun 6

p. 17; Harkins Interv, Apr 74, pp. 53, 60–61; and Ltr, Harkins to Cowles, 29 Aug 7

Historians fi les, CMH. 40 Harkins’ description of the palace bombing is quoted in Memo, Taylor for th

President, 8 Mar 62, Taylor Papers, NDU. See also Msg, COMUSMACV to CINCPAC

27 Feb 62, Historians fi les, CMH. William J. Rust and the Editors of U.S. News Book

Kennedy in Vietnam (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1985), ch. 1 describes th

November 1960 coup attempt. 41 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 6–7, 13–14, 52–55. Hammer, Death 

November, pp. 124–26, 133. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 109–11. Tran Van Don, O

Endless War: Inside Vietnam (San Rafael, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1978), pp. 84–91, d

scribes events from the viewpoint of a key conspirator. For initial contacts with th

CIA, see Chronology, sub: Contacts with Vietnamese Generals, 23 August throug

23 October 1963, 23 Oct 63, DSDOF/Hilsman (VN–Diem 63/2), LBJL. Msg, no send

or addressee, 24 Aug 63, NSF VN vol. 14, 24–31 Aug 63, M & Misc, box 198, JFKL. 42 Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 108–09; Hilsman, To Move a Nation, pp. 478–7

514–15; Hammer, Death in November, pp. 169–71; and Memo of Conv, 4 July 63, Hil

man, Memos and Correspondence, Jul 63, box 6, Hilsman Papers, JFKL. 43 Kennedy cleared the cable by telephone from his vacation home in Hyanni

port, Massachusetts. The drafting of the cable is recounted in U.S.–Vietnam Relation

sec. 4.B.5, pp. 10–16; Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 111–16; Hilsman, To Move a N

tion, ch. 31; and Barlow, “JFK and JCS,” pp. 139–43. See also Taylor, Swords and Plow

shares, pp. 289–93. Text of the cable is quoted from Msg, State 243 to AmEmb Saigo

24 Aug 63, in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 5.B.4, pp. 536–37; see ibid., sec. 4.A.5, ta

4, pp. 57–58, 64–65, for Durbrow’s earlier warnings about Diem. 44 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 19–21. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, p

119–21. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 291–95. 45 MACV and Buddhist controversy: Msg, COMUSMACV to CINCPAC, 6 Ju

63, Historians files, CMH. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 9, p. 8. Felt’s o

ders to Harkins are quoted in Msg, JCS to SecState, 28 Aug 63, NSF/CO/VN/19

JFKL.46 Lodge’s and Harkins’ views and actions can be traced in the following, all in JFK

Msgs, Lodge to Rusk and Hilsman, 25 Aug 63; Saigon to Washington, 26 Aug 63; CI

to Dept of State, 27 Aug 63; Harkins to Taylor, 27 Aug 63; in NSF VN 8/24–31/63, bo

198. Msgs, Taylor JCS 3385–63 to Harkins, 29 Aug 63; Lodge Saigon 375 to SecStat

Chap 3EI.indd 112 4
113

From Hope to Frustration

29 Aug 63; Harkins MAC 1566 to Taylor, 29 Aug 63; Harkins MAC 1583 to Taylor, 

31 Aug 63; Lodge Saigon 391 to SecState, 31 Aug 63; NSF/CO/VN/198. Also Msg, Lodge 

Saigon 364 to SecState, 28 Aug 63, Historians fi les, CMH. Harkins Interv, Apr 74, pp. 

62–64. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 16–21; and Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 

118–27, give a general narrative of events. 47 Msg, Harkins to Taylor, 27 Aug 63, NSF 198 VN 8/24–31/63; Msg, CINCPAC to 

SecState, 26 Aug 63, NSF 198 VN 8/24–31/63; Msg, CINCPAC to SecState, 2 Sep 63, NSF 

199 VN vol. 9/1–10/63 Def Cables; Msg, Lodge Saigon 692 to SecState,12 Oct 63, NSF 

200 VN vol. 19 6–14 Oct 63, State Cables. All in JFKL. Msg, JCS 3301 to CINCPAC, 29 

Oct 63, Historians fi les, CMH. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 9, pp. 9–11. For 

naval preparations, see Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 269–72. 48 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 18–24; sec. 4.B.5, pp. 21–40; sec. 5.B.4, pp. 

54–73. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 140–41. Hammer, Death in November, pp. 158–59, 

204, 230–32, 252–60, 268–70. Hilsman, To Move a Nation, pp. 496–99, 511–12, 515. 

Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 295–301. Examples of administration disagreements 

on facts and policy are in Ltrs, Paul M. Kattenburg to Lodge, 7 and 16 Sep 63; Memo 

of Conversation, Dept of State, 10 Sep 63, 10:30 AM, sub: Vietnam; Ltr, Hilsman to 

Lodge, 23 Sep 63; all in Hilsman Papers, box 4, JFKL. Memo, Forrestal for Bundy, 16 

Sep 63, sub: South Vietnam; NSF 199 VN, vols. 15 1–10 Sep 63 and 16 11–17 Sep 63, 

JFKL. 49 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 5.B.4, p. 574; see also sec. 4.B.5, pp. 45–49, and sec. 

5.B.4, p. 590. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 146–52. Msg, CIA Saigon to White House, 

3 Oct 63, NSF VN, Oct 63, box 204, tab C, JFKL. Msgs, McGeorge Bundy CAP 63590 

to Lodge and Harkins via CIA Channel, 25 Oct 63; Lodge Saigon 1964 to McGeorge 

Bundy, 25 Oct 63. Both in Porter, Vietnam Documentation, 2:210–12. Hammer, Death in 

November, pp. 266–68, 278–79, 282–84, sympathetically describes Diem’s last-minute 

efforts to resume discussions with Lodge. 50 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, pp. 21–22; sec. 4.B.5, p. 38; sec. 5.B.4, pp. 554–

73. Msg, CJCS JCS 279 to CINCPAC, 5 Oct 63; Msgs, State 570 to AmEmb Saigon,12 Oct 

63; AmEmb Saigon 731 to State, 18 Oct 63; COMUSMACV MAC J–3 8399 to CINCPAC, 

26 Oct 63; Harkins MAC 2006 to Taylor, 26 Oct 63. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Ltr, 

Harkins to Diem, 19 Oct 63, File 004–58 (201–45) Organization Planning File (1963), 

box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Msg, Harkins MAC 8250 to Taylor and Felt, 19 Oct 63, 

NSF 201 VN, vol. 20 15–26 Oct 63, Defense Cables, JFKL. 51 Msg, Lodge CIA cable to SecState, 5 Oct 63, Porter, Vietnam Documentation, 2: 

205–06. 52 Quote is from Taylor Interv, sess. 5, pp. 2–3. Memo, Sullivan, [late Sep 63], sub: 

Divergent Attitudes in U.S. Offi cial Community, Historians fi les, CMH. For other comments on Lodge-Harkins relations, see Harkins Interv, Apr 74, pp. 62–64; ibid., 23 Feb 

72, p. 46. Ltr, Harkins to Cowles, 29 Aug 79, Historians fi les, CMH. Greene Interv, 6 Jun 

65, p. 3. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 299–300. For Lodge’s military assessments, 

see: Msgs, Lodge Saigon 478 to SecState, 11 Sep 63, NSF 199 VN vol. 16 11–17 Sep 63, 

State Cables; Lodge Saigon 768 to SecState, 23 Oct 63, NSF 201 VN, vol. 20 15–28 Oct 

63, State Cables; Harkins MAC 2033 to Taylor, 30 Oct 63, NSF 201 VN, vol. 21 State/Def 

Cables 29–31 Oct 63. All in JFKL. 53 For general views of the Lodge-Harkins disagreement, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, 

sec. 4.B.5, pp. 28, 47–48. Hammer, Death in November, pp. 170–71. Taylor, Swords and 

Plowshares, p. 294. For an example of Lodge’s contacts with mid-level State Department 

offi cials, see Ltr, Paul. M. Kattenburg to Lodge, 16 Sep 63, RH/4/VN 11–20 Sep 63, vol. 

3, JFKL. First Harkins quote is from Harkins Interv, Apr 1974, p. 52; see also p. 54. Second is in Msg, Harkins MAC 7585 to Felt and Taylor, 20 Sep 63, NSF VN, Box 200, VN 

Chap 3EI.indd 113 4
114

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

vol. 17 18–22 Sep 63, Defense Cables, JFKL. Third is from Msg, Harkins MAC 2028 

Taylor, 30 Oct 63, in Porter, Vietnam Documentation, 2:216–18. 54 Ltr, Weede to ChMAAGV; Cmdr, 2d ADVON; Cmdr, USASGV; CO, HSAS; an

CO, USMC Helicopter Unit, 27 Jun 62 sub: Discussions and Statements by US Person

nel, File 204–58 (403–03) Public Info Instruction Files (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 33

NARA. Dept of State, Memo of Conversation, 10 Sep 63 sub: Vietnam, 10:30 AM, Hil

man, box 4; Msg, State 445 to AmEmb Saigon, 20 Sep 63, NSF 200 VN vol. 17. Bot

in JFKL. Memo, Brig Gen Delk M. Oden for COMUSMACV, 9 Sep 63, sub: Evaluatio

of Attitudes of Selected Vietnamese Offi cials; Memo, Lt Col R. L. Powell for COMU

MACV, 9 Sep 63, sub: Evaluation of Attitudes. Both in File 204–58 (501–08) Intel Rp

File no. 2 (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 55 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 44–45. Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 152

53. Gen Don gives his version of this incident in Endless War, pp. 96–98. Msgs, Harkin

MAC 1991 and 1993 to Taylor, 24 Oct 63; Taylor JCS 4137–63 to Harkins, 24 Oct 6

All in Historians fi les, CMH. Msgs, Lodge Saigon 1896 and 1906 to SecState, 23 O

63; and CIA Saigon to CIA, 25 Oct 63. All in NSF 204 VN TS Cables (A), tab C, O

63, JFKL. 56 Quote is from Msg, Harkins MAC 2028 to Taylor, 30 Oct 63, in Porter, Vietna

Documentation, 2:216–18. Msg, Taylor JCS 4188–63 to Harkins, 29 Oct 63, Historian

fi les, CMH. Msgs, Lodge Saigon 2003 to SecState, 28 Oct 63, NSF 204 VN, TS Cabl

(A), tab C, Oct 63; and Harkins MAC 2034 to Taylor, 30 Oct 63, NSF 201 VN vol. 2

State/Def Cables 29–31 Oct 63. Both in JFKL. 57 Quotes are from Msg, Bundy CIA cable to Lodge, [31 Oct 63], in Porter, Vie

nam Documentation, 2:218–19; in same source, 2:212–16, see Msg, Bundy CIA cable 

Lodge, 30 Oct 63, with draft, 29 Oct 63; and Msg, Lodge CIA cable to SecState, 30 O

63. Memo of Conference with the President October 29, 1963, 4:20 PM, sub: Vietnam

NSF 317, Mtngs on VN, 29 Oct 63, JFKL. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 47–5

sec. 5.B.4, p. 604. 58 Narrative of events is based on U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 55–5

Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, ch. 10; and Von Luttichau, “U.S. Army Role,” ch. 11, pp. 5–

MACV’s fi rst report of the coup is Msg, MACV CRITIC to DIRNSA, 1 Nov 63, box 6

66A3106, RG 319, NARA. All other information on MACV’s actions is drawn from th

MACV Coup Notebook and from Coup d’Etat, November 1963–MACV File, in Hist

rians fi les, CMH. Msg, Harkins MAC 8512 to Taylor, 1 Nov 63, NSFVN box 201, V

1–2 Nov 63, Defense Cables, JFKL. Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, pp. 32–33. Coup casualtie

Msg, COMUSMACV MAC J3 8632 to JCS, 5 Nov 63, Historians fi les, CMH. 59 Harkins quotes are from Msg, COMUSMACV MAC J3 8607 to JCS, 4 Nov 6

see also Msg, COMUSMACV MAC J3 8587 to JCS, 03 Nov 63. Both in NSF VN box 20

VN 3–5 Nov 63, Defense Cables, JFKL. On the post-coup military situation, see Msg

COMUSMACV MAC J3 8632 and 8681 to JCS, 5 and 8 Nov 63; and Lodge Saigon 98

to SecState, 9 Nov 63. All in Historians fi les, CMH. A general description of new go

ernment is in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, pp. 59–62. Von Luttichau, “U.S. Arm

Role,” ch. 11, pp. 8–9. 60 Msg, Harkins MAC 8556 to Taylor and Felt, 2 Nov 63, NSF VN 201, Defen

Cables, 1–2 Nov 63, JFKL. Quote is from Msg, Harkins MAC 8625 to Taylor, 5 Nov 6

see also Msg, Harkins MAC 2081 to Taylor, 3 Nov 63. Both in NSF 201 VN vol. 23, D

fense Cables, 3–5 Nov 63, JFKL. 61 Lodge optimism: Msg, Lodge Saigon 949 to SecState, 6 Nov 63, NSF VN 202, vo

24, 6–15 Nov 63, State Cables, JFKL. Harkins interview is summarized in Msg, COMU

MACV MAC J74 8807 to OASD/PA, 14 Nov 63, MACV Coup Notebook, Historian

fi les, CMH. Adverse reports: Msg, PIO MACV to PIO CINCPAC, 13 Nov 63; Ms

Chap 3EI.indd 114 4
115

From Hope to Frustration

COMUSMACV MAC J74 87764 to OASD/PA, CINCPAC, 12 Nov 63. Both in MACV 

Coup Notebook, Historians fi les, CMH. See also UPI Dispatch, 13 Nov 63, copy in Coup 

d’Etat, November 1963–MACV File, Historians fi les, CMH. Rusk quote is from Msg, 

State 784 to Lodge, 13 Nov 63, NSF 202 VN vol. 24, 6–15 Nov 63, State Cables, JFKL. 62 Harkins quotation is from Interv, Apr 74, p. 58. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, 

pp. 301–02, 407, retrospectively regrets the U.S. role. For typical historical assessments, 

see: U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.5, p. 60; Rust, Kennedy in Vietnam, pp. 179–82; and 

Gelb and Betts, Irony of Vietnam, pp. 91–92.

Chap 3EI.indd 115 4
Chap 3EI.indd 116 4
4

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

During the year following the deaths of Presidents Kennedy and 

Diem, the Military Assistance Command’s activities and responsibilities expanded steadily. The command itself underwent reorganization and reinforcement. No longer a temporary headquarters expected 

to work itself out of a job within two years, the Military Assistance 

Command, under a new commander and a new ambassador, settled 

in for the duration of what clearly was to be a prolonged and increasingly severe struggle. MACV, with partial success, sought to become the 

American mission’s lead agency in attempts to revive the pacifi cation 

campaign. Its commander assisted the ambassador in vain efforts to 

promote a stable, effi cient, popular South Vietnamese government and 

shared in the general American frustration when continued instability 

stalled the war against the Viet Cong. By the end of 1964, MACV, like 

the rest of the mission and the administration in Washington, had 

begun to look outside South Vietnam for a solution to the confl ict. 

United States Policy: Picking Up the Pieces

After Diem’s fall, the pessimists within the U.S. government rapidly 

gained the upper hand in assessing the situation in South Vietnam. As 

appointees of the Minh regime replaced those of Diem and took control of operational and pacifi cation reporting, evidence of the mismanagement and failure of the strategic hamlet program, of the ineffectiveness of government military operations, and of Viet Cong gains in 

population control and armed strength became overwhelming. Most 

U.S. agencies had concluded by the end of 1963 that the Saigon government’s position had been deteriorating for at least six months before Diem’s fall and that prospects for early improvement were slim at 

best. Some offi cials foresaw outright allied defeat. After a late December 

visit to South Vietnam, Secretary McNamara declared, “Current trends, 

unless reversed in the next 2–3 months, will lead to neutralization at 

best and more likely to a Communist-controlled state.”1

McNamara’s projection, like many others that envisioned South 

Vietnam’s imminent collapse, proved wrong. The adverse trends were 

not really reversed, but the southern republic neither fell to the ComChap 4.indd 117 
118

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

munists nor went neutralist. Nevertheless, the post-Diem military gov

ernment proved ineffectual and short-lived. General Minh and his co

leagues began encouragingly, with promises to revive the pacifi catio

program and to carry out military actions such as reinforcement o

the delta that MACV had long advocated. The new regime’s purge o

Diem’s appointees, however, temporarily paralyzed civil and militar

administration. Political unrest continued. Buddhists, Catholics, inte

lectuals, labor unions, the non-Communist political parties, and fac

tions within the offi cer corps all jockeyed for position in the new orde

Although patriotic and popular, Chief of State Minh proved an inde

cisive, indolent leader. Like Diem before them, he and his associate

resisted direct American participation in provincial and district affair

Partly from sheer ineffi ciency and partly, perhaps, from desire to see

an accommodation with non-Communist elements of the Nationa

Liberation Front, they delayed the resumption of aggressive militar

and pacifi cation programs. Rumors spread that the Minh governmen

actually was plotting to neutralize South Vietnam along lines recentl

proposed by French President Charles de Gaulle. For all these reason

Minh’s regime rapidly lost the confi dence of the U.S. Mission.2

Whatever the regime’s intentions may have been, it had not long t

pursue them. In the early hours of 30 January 1964, Maj. Gen. Nguye

Khanh, commanding general of II Corps, seized power in a bloodle

coup, which Khanh claimed was necessary to forestall a proneutrali

General Khanh, center, with Secretary of Defense McNamara and General Taylo

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 4.indd 118 
119

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

takeover by other offi cers. An adherent of the anti-Diem coup but an 

outspoken critic of the Minh government, Khanh had the support of 

Maj. Gen. Tran Thien Khiem, commander of III Corps, who furnished 

the troops for the venture, as well as other offi cers disaffected from 

the Minh group. Retaining Minh as fi gurehead chief of state, Khanh 

assumed the offi ces of premier and head of the Military Revolutionary 

Council that dominated the government.3

Khanh acted with at least the acquiescence of Ambassador Lodge 

and General Harkins. Warned in advance of the impending coup, at 

Lodge’s decision, the two delayed notifying Washington until the very 

last moment and never warned Minh at all. The Americans regarded 

the ebullient 33-year-old Khanh as an effective military commander 

and a staunch anti-Communist but were uncertain of his relationship to the various South Vietnamese political factions. Claiming 

that Khanh’s putsch took them by surprise, Lodge, Harkins, and their 

Washington superiors accepted the change of government as an accomplished fact. The administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson 

soon proclaimed its full support of Khanh and, in cooperation with 

him, sought to revive the struggle against the Viet Cong. In spite of 

a promising early demonstration of administrative vigor and political skill, however, Khanh soon became enmeshed in diffi culties of his 

own with the many contending South Vietnamese factions, much to 

the detriment of the Saigon government, which remained essentially 

feeble and disorganized.4

Amid these unpromising circumstances, Johnson and the national 

security team he had inherited from Kennedy adopted essentially a 

two-track approach to Vietnam. The fi rst track concentrated on reviving the pacifi cation effort. The second, at the outset largely a matter of 

contingency planning, involved direct American and South Vietnamese attacks on North Vietnam aimed at compelling the Hanoi regime 

to cease its support of the Viet Cong.

President Johnson’s fi rst major Vietnam policy directive, NSAM 288, 

issued on 17 March 1964, included elements of both approaches. It reiterated the U.S. commitment to help South Vietnam defeat the Viet 

Cong and promised unequivocal support to General Khanh’s regime. 

Endorsing Khanh’s newly announced plan for national mobilization, 

the memorandum promised American subsidies for a 50,000-man expansion of Saigon’s military establishment. It called for provision of 

additional equipment including more powerful aircraft, and for American help to the South Vietnamese in building a civil administration 

corps and in strengthening their paramilitary forces. Edging onto the 

second track, the United States and South Vietnam were to undertake small-scale reconnaissance operations in Laos against the Ho Chi 

Minh Trail and to begin making plans and preparations for both retaliatory actions and “graduated overt military pressures” against North 

Vietnam.5

Chap 4.indd 119 
120

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Of especial importance to the Military Assistance Command, Vie

nam, NSAM 288 effectively put an end to plans for an early withdrawa

of American forces. On 27 March, Secretary McNamara instructed Ad

miral Felt and General Harkins to abandon the Model Plan with its ex

tended projections of American troop reductions. Instead, they were t

plan no farther ahead than the end of fi scal year 1966 and to work o

the assumption that the United States would “furnish assistance an

support of South Vietnam for as long as is required to bring communi

aggression and terrorism under control.” MACV had already begun re

vising its Model Plan to slow the withdrawal of American aviation an

other units. In response to McNamara’s order, the command early i

April adopted new planning assumptions—that its own headquarte

and all U.S. aviation and support units would remain at least throug

FY 1966 and that the American advisory effort would continue at i

existing level through the end of the insurgency. The command adde

a second assumption that would prove incorrect: that the character o

the insurgency and the scope of enemy activity would remain “essen

tially the same” through the next couple of years.6

Hanoi Prepares for a Larger War

Although the Americans and South Vietnamese did not know 

at the time, 1963 was a period of change for the Vietnamese Commu

nists. During the year, the Viet Cong destroyed or took over a grow

ing number of the government’s strategic hamlets, steadily increasin

the proportion of the rural population under their effective control. A

the same time, they continued building up their main forces, whic

reached a strength of 22,000–25,000 men by the end of the year. Th

Military Assistance Command during 1963 confi rmed the existence o

fi fteen new Viet Cong battalions and fi ve regiments. The Viet Con

regulars carried more formidable armament, including Communi

bloc–manufactured recoilless rifl es, mortars, and heavy machine gun

When they chose to engage the South Vietnamese Army, they fough

with greater effectiveness than ever before.7

The Communists, however, also had their diffi culties and shortcom

ings. Their armed forces still could not challenge the South Vietnam

ese on anything approaching even terms. Indeed, possibly in respons

to improved South Vietnamese training and fi repower, the insurgen

reduced the frequency of their company- and larger-size attacks o

government regulars and concentrated on small territorial posts an

strategic hamlets. In some rural areas and in all the cities, party an

front organizations remained underdeveloped, with inadequately mo

tivated and indoctrinated leadership. Diem’s removal from power bot

benefi ted and damaged the insurgency. The collapse of the former re

gime’s political and administrative apparatus in the countryside facil

tated the expansion of Viet Cong control. However, with Diem and h

Chap 4.indd 120 
121

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

hated family gone, the National Liberation Front lost a major source 

of its appeal to non-Communist South Vietnamese, among whom the 

military government initially enjoyed considerable popularity. Some 

groups, notably the Cao Dai and Hoa Hao, which had sided with the 

Viet Cong out of hostility to Diem, sought accommodation with the 

new Saigon regime. With the prospect of fi nishing off South Vietnam 

through political agitation and organization thus becoming more remote, the advocates of intensifi ed armed struggle gained in infl uence 

within the Hanoi government and the Communist Party.8

The promoters of an enlarged military campaign secured the upper 

hand in December 1963, at a general meeting (the Ninth Plenum) of 

the Central Committee of the Vietnam Workers’ (Communist) Party 

in Hanoi. After prolonged debate, the Central Committee adopted a 

secret directive to the party, north and south, calling for an accelerated 

buildup of the PLAF, especially the main forces, in preparation for an 

effort to destroy the South Vietnamese armed forces on the battlefi eld. 

The resolution acknowledged the continued importance of political action and guerrilla operations, especially in breaking up strategic hamlets, but declared that because the South Vietnamese Army was “the 

primary enemy force,” the main objective of the armed struggle must 

be “to attack, destroy, and defeat the army of the lackey administration. Only in this manner can the revolution win decisive victory.” 

Equally important, the party committed the full resources of North 

Vietnam to support of the southern revolution, abandoning its earlier 

position that the north should concentrate on building socialism while 

the south liberated itself primarily through mobilization of its own 

strength. Implicitly at least, the North Vietnamese leaders expressed 

willingness to press ahead with the southern campaign even at the 

risk of direct U.S. military intervention: “If the U.S. imperialists throw 

into South Vietnam an additional 50,000 to 100,000 troops, the total, 

people’s and protracted war must strongly develop and cause them to 

become bogged down and gradually defeated.”9

The resolution of the Ninth Plenum seemed to point toward escalation of the Viet Cong’s military campaign from purely guerrilla operations toward the “big-unit” or “mobile” phase of revolutionary warfare, 

in which units of regimental and larger size would mount sustained attacks aimed at destroying comparable formations of Saigon’s regulars. 

However, the elaboration of its principles and their practical application in South Vietnam took place only gradually. Dissent in Hanoi from 

prominent Communists who continued to favor a primarily political 

campaign in the south, reinforced with guerrilla operations, complicated and perhaps delayed the resolution’s implementation. In addition, Hanoi had to maneuver carefully through the worsening SovietChinese feud within the world Communist movement so as to obtain 

maximum diplomatic and military assistance from both major powers 

at minimum sacrifi ce of freedom of action. By late 1964, especially after 

Chap 4.indd 121 
122

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

the ouster in October of Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khruschev, who ha

been reluctant to intensify the confl ict in Southeast Asia, the Nort

Vietnamese were assured of the economic aid and military materie

especially for air defense, that they deemed essential to their expand

ing war effort. Even before then, North Vietnam had begun organizin

and training its people for defense against both air raids and invasion

In April it started preparing regular regiments of the People’s Army o

Vietnam (PAVN), for dispatch to the south over the Ho Chi Minh Trai

The fi rst regiment began its long march in October, with others soo

to follow. By that time, individual North Vietnamese already had ap

peared, along with regrouped southerners, among infi ltrators capture

by the allies in South Vietnam.10

The full extent of Hanoi’s preparations for escalation, however, re

mained unknown to the Americans and South Vietnamese until earl

1965. MACV and other allied agencies expected the enemy to continu

his guerrilla and subversive campaign with only gradually increasin

intensity and with no fundamental change in tactics. On that assump

tion, the American command during 1964 reorganized itself and trie

to press ahead with the antiguerrilla war.11

A New MACV Commander

General Harkins’ working relationship with Ambassador Lodg

steadily deteriorated after the November 1963 coup. “Lodge has virtu

ally no offi cial contact with Harkins,” Secretary McNamara reported i

December. “Lodge sends in reports with major military implication

without showing them to Harkins, and does not show Harkins impo

tant incoming traffi c.” The two men responded in concert to Khanh

seizure of power, but that episode proved to be only an interlude i

the progressive decline of mutual confi dence. Late in April, Lodge o

dered all U.S. agency heads in Saigon to secure embassy permissio

before arranging conferences with General Khanh and other offi cial

Harkins, who had established friendly working relations with Khanh

at once protested that the order violated his terms of reference, whic

entitled him to confer at will with the Vietnamese so long as he kep

the ambassador informed of his contacts. Secretary of State Rusk, o

behalf of the administration, upheld Lodge’s authority, but he als

vainly urged the ambassador to respect the special character of Ha

kins’ position and to coordinate activities more closely with him. Pr

vately, McGeorge Bundy declared, “the whole business between Lodg

and Harkins is childish.”12

Early in 1964 the president and his advisers began looking for 

way to replace Harkins. Secretary McNamara and other offi cials ha

lost confi dence in the general for his persistent optimism and appa

ent lack of appreciation for the nonmilitary aspects of the confl ic

and it was obvious that Harkins could not work effectively with th

Chap 4.indd 122 
123

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

ambassador. Michael Forrestal of the White House staff declared, “If 

Lodge must remain, the military commander must be changed.” Even 

so, McNamara and the Joint Chiefs of Staff balked at summary relief of 

Harkins, both because they wanted to spare the general a humiliation 

unwarranted by any personal misconduct and because Harkins’ relationship with Khanh might be of value in the fi rst months of the shaky 

new regime. Harkins was due for relief and retirement in late 1964 at 

any event. The administration compromised by dispatching Harkins’ 

intended replacement, Lt. Gen. William C. Westmoreland, to Saigon 

late in January as deputy commander of MACV, a position in which 

Westmoreland could prepare for his coming promotion and help mediate between the Military Assistance Command and the rest of the 

country team. On 25 April, President Johnson announced that Harkins 

would step down and retire on 1 August and that Westmoreland was 

to succeed him.13

Continuing personality confl icts between Lodge and Harkins appear to have hastened the MACV commander’s departure. On 28 May 

the president abruptly ordered Harkins to return to the United States 

in time to receive a decoration at the White House on 24 June. After 

that, he was to remain in Washington for the rest of his active duty to 

“counsel” the president on Vietnam. This order dismayed and embittered Harkins, who viewed it as a thinly disguised dismissal. In late 

June, after several awkward weeks during which Lodge increasingly 

took counsel with Westmoreland rather than Harkins, the retiring 

commander left Saigon. Westmoreland then served as acting COMUSMACV until his predecessor retired. He formally assumed command on 

1 August, at the same time as he received his fourth star.14

A fi fty-year-old West Pointer, Westmoreland had been selected for 

his position in December of the previous year, after extensive deliberations involving the president, Secretary McNamara, General Taylor, 

and other high offi cials. Handsome, impeccable in military appearance, 

affable if somewhat reserved in manner, Westmoreland had seemed 

destined for leadership since his days as First Captain of Cadets at West 

Point. During World War II he distinguished himself as an artillery battalion commander and division chief of staff in North Africa, the Mediterranean, and Northwest Europe. Senior offi cers, including General 

Taylor, marked him as deserving of rapid advancement. Transferring to 

the airborne forces after the war, Westmoreland performed effectively 

in a succession of challenging assignments. He served as secretary of 

the Army General Staff, commander of the 101st Airborne Division, 

superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy, and commander of the 

XVIII Airborne Corps—his fi nal post before going to Saigon. Ambitious 

and politically astute, he associated himself with the fashionable military trends of the 1960s, espousing effi cient, scientifi c management in 

the McNamara style (as a brigadier general, he took an advanced management course at the Harvard Graduate School of Business) and introChap 4.indd 123 
124

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ducing counterinsurgency into th

West Point curriculum.15

According to Maj. Gen. Bruc

Palmer, Jr., of the Army Staff, Wes

moreland was to provide in Saigo

“a senior experienced strong an

tough leader to get behind th

advisory effort while General Ha

kins can devote his main attentio

to the politico-military sphere

In practice, as Harkins’ deput

Westmoreland spent much of h

time mediating between the em

bassy and the military command

Michael Forrestal reported in lat

May that “such coordination be

tween U.S. [military and civilian

agencies as there is takes plac

because of the efforts of Genera

Westmoreland.” To gain Lodge

confi dence, according to Forresta

Westmoreland went out of his wa

to emphasize the essentially political nature of the war and his recep

tivity to political guidance.16

Westmoreland had not long to work with Lodge. The ambassado

resigned in June to take part in the American election campaign. T

replace him, President Johnson selected the recently retired chairma

of the Joint Chiefs, General Maxwell D. Taylor, who assumed his dutie

early in July. Under Taylor, Westmoreland became a full but defi nitel

subordinate member of the ambassador’s country team. Taylor arrive

in Saigon armed with a directive from President Johnson that he woul

exercise “full responsibility” for U.S. activities in South Vietnam, in

cluding “the whole military effort,” over which Taylor was to exe

“the degree of command and control that you consider appropriate

Reinforcing this presidential grant of authority, Taylor, as Westmore

land’s military senior, inevitably elicited a certain deference from th

younger general, the more so since he had been an important sponso

of Westmoreland’s rise in the Army. “There was never a question as t

my relationship with Ambassador Taylor,” Westmoreland would late

recall. “He was the boss.”17

For practical purposes, the MACV commander functioned as Tay

lor’s deputy ambassador for military affairs. At Taylor’s direction, Wes

moreland cleared with the ambassador all signifi cant MACV message

to CINCPAC and the Joint Chiefs. Taylor routinely included Westmo

reland in his negotiations with the Khanh government and before a

suming his post solicited the MACV commander’s views as to whic

General Westmoreland (NARA)

Chap 4.indd 124 
125

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

embassy civilians he should retain or remove. Taylor also employed 

the MACV staff as an extension of his own; he called on it regularly for 

studies, reports, and briefi ngs much as he had upon the Joint Staff in 

the Pentagon.18

Headquarters Reorganization and Expansion

When Westmoreland assumed command, MACV was in the fi nal 

stages of abolishing the Military Assistance Advisory Group and taking over its functions and most of its personnel. General Harkins had 

proposed such action as early as September 1962, to eliminate division 

of authority over the fi eld advisers and duplication of many administrative and logistical activities. However, by mid-February 1964, he 

had changed his mind. When the Joint Chiefs of Staff revived consideration of the issue at that time, he joined Admiral Felt in recommending against any change. The existing arrangement was working satisfactorily, the two argued. Reorganization could only disrupt operations 

and confuse the South Vietnamese in a time of governmental instability. In addition, Harkins assumed that under the Model Plan, then 

still in effect, MACV sooner or later was to go out of existence, leaving 

the Military Assistance Advisory Group as the senior U.S. headquarters 

in South Vietnam. Supporting Harkins, Felt repeated an objection he 

had made earlier that the move would merely burden the MACV commander and his staff with the details of administering the Military Assistance Program.19

Nevertheless, elimination of the MAAG had strong support within 

MACV and Pacifi c Command, particularly among the Army contingent. 

Once he arrived in Saigon, General Westmoreland became an active advocate of the proposal. Most important, Secretary McNamara indicated 

interest in eliminating the MAAG as a means of increasing American 

military effi ciency in South Vietnam. In preparation for a visit by the 

secretary in early March, a MACV staff group began work on a combined 

plan and feasibility study for the reorganization. McNamara received a 

preliminary briefi ng on the results while in Saigon. On the basis of it, he 

directed General Harkins to submit a full reorganization plan for concurrent consideration by CINCPAC and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.20

The fi nal proposal, submitted over General Harkins’ signature on 

12 March, called for abolition of the MAAG headquarters and the 

incorporation of a number of its divisions—notably those for ARVN 

organization and training, MAP administration, and strategic hamlet 

support—within MACV as special staff sections. The group’s Air Force, 

Navy, and Army advisory sections would cease to function. Command 

and control of the advisers, as well as their administrative and logistical 

support, would go to the service components under MACV and in the 

case of the Army advisers to MACV headquarters itself. This rearrangement, according to the study, would simplify command by making 

Chap 4.indd 125 
126

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

advisers responsible for all purposes to a single headquarters and woul

improve effi ciency by eliminating the MAAG’s role in administratio

and supply of the advisory teams. Personnel savings would result from 

consolidation of MACV and MAAG special staff agencies, such as th

adjutant general’s and public information offi ces.21

The plan met with opposition from Admiral Felt and the Navy, A

Force, and Marine service chiefs. Felt and his supporters argued that ab

olition of the MAAG would complicate rather than simplify the existin

command structure by adding to the number of advisory detachmen

and staff agencies under the MACV commander’s direct control an

entangling him and his staff in the intricacies of MAP programmin

and administration. Admiral Felt questioned the wisdom of disrup

ing American organization at a time when the South Vietnamese wer

struggling to restore stable government. In the event of full-scale wa

in Southeast Asia, he added, a reorganized Military Assistance Com

mand would have diffi culty in shifting to its intended role of directin

U.S. and allied forces in conventional combat.22

On 8 April the chief of staff of the Air Force, the chief of naval opera

tions, and the commandant of the Marine Corps recommended again

reorganization. General Taylor, then still chairman, supported by Arm

Chief of Staff General Earle G. Wheeler, upheld COMUSMACV’s pre

rogative to organize his headquarters as he saw fi t. They endorsed th

proposed restructuring as “clean-cut” and eliminating dual channe

of American military authority in South Vietnam. McNamara accepte

the latter view. At his direction, the Joint Chiefs on 10 April authorize

MACV to absorb the MAAG.23

The change took effect on 15 May, as did an amendment to th

MACV commander’s terms of reference to include responsibility fo

all aspects of the Military Assistance Program. Due to thorough plan

ning by the MACV and MAAG staffs, the reorganization caused n

major disruption of headquarters operations. It also, however, did no

solve all the problems it was intended to. The Army advisers still foun

themselves answering to a multitude of masters in the form of the di

ferent MACV staff sections. Two separate MAAG agencies, the MA

Directorate and the Army MAP Logistics Directorate, had to be retaine

to manage the Military Assistance Program. In addition, the MAC

chief of staff, the heads of the general staff sections, and other key o

fi cers became involved in detailed review and approval of the Sout

Vietnamese defense budget.24

Largely as a result of further expansion of the advisory effort an

of other MACV activities during 1964, the reorganized headquarter

far from reducing manpower, required additional personnel. A revise

organization table, submitted the same day the headquarters merged

called for enlargement of the staff by 140 people, to a strength of ove

1,000.25 Another revision, on 1 September, increased the MACV head

quarters complement to 1,128, with further growth sure to come.26

Chap 4.indd 126 
127

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

The reorganized Military Assistance Command headquarters included a Joint Research and Testing Activity, which represented the 

resolution of another long-standing organizational controversy. Although Secretary McNamara had approved consolidation of the various research units into a single agency under MACV, disagreements 

among the services over staffi ng and composition of such an agency 

delayed implementation of the directive. The duplication of efforts 

continued until February 1964, when the Joint Chiefs of Staff ordered 

the establishment of the Joint Research and Testing Activity, a MACV 

staff agency to be headed by an Army brigadier general with an Air 

Force colonel as his deputy. The new agency replaced the Joint Operational Evaluation Group—Vietnam and incorporated the Advanced 

Research Projects Agency (ARPA) fi eld unit, Army Concept Team in 

Vietnam (ACTIV), and the Air Force Test Unit. Its director served as 

the MACV commander’s principal staff adviser on research and development and also advised and assisted the South Vietnamese in those 

fi elds. Under guidance from Admiral Felt, General Harkins directed in 

April that testing in Vietnam should be confi ned to projects that would 

enhance directly the counterinsurgency capability of allied forces, with 

issues of long-term impact on U.S. forces and doctrine and questions of 

service roles and missions to be settled elsewhere.27

As a result of the expansion of American military activity in Southeast Asia and of the merger of the two headquarters, MACV reorganized 

and enlarged some of its general and special staff agencies and added 

new ones. A few staff divisions, notably the personnel and logistics 

sections, changed little. On the other hand, the operations section, primarily responsible for overseeing the advisory effort and pacifi cation 

programs in South Vietnam and for keeping track of operations in Laos 

and North Vietnam, continually enlarged and rearranged its branches. 

Supplementing its Combat Operations Center, which monitored operations within South Vietnam, the section added a War Room concerned 

with activities elsewhere in Southeast Asia. It also created a new Operations Analysis Section and a Pacifi cation Planning and Operations 

Branch. The long-range planning (J5) section, besides planning for operations against North Vietnam, also took on supervision of the MAP 

Directorate and of an International Military Assistance Offi ce (IMAO) 

designed to support forces sent by other non-Communist countries to 

assist South Vietnam. The offi ce also supervised the Studies and Observations Group (SOG), a mixed military-civilian staff established under 

MACV in early 1964 that conducted clandestine operations against the 

Ho Chi Minh Trail and North Vietnam.28

Two MACV headquarters agencies—the intelligence (J2) section and 

the Public Information Offi ce—underwent major enlargement and reorganization. The intelligence buildup resulted from the dissatisfaction 

of President Johnson and his advisers with the inaccurate, confl icting 

information the government had received during Diem’s fi nal crisis. At 

Chap 4.indd 127 
128

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Harkins’ request, the Joint Chiefs of Staff in January 1964 increased th

rank of MACV’s chief of intelligence from colonel to brigadier genera

and shifted the billet from the Air Force to the Marine Corps in orde

to place a ground offi cer in the job. During a visit to Saigon in March

Secretary McNamara then instructed MACV to double the size of i

intelligence directorate and to enhance the capacity of American fi el

advisers to collect, report, and verify military information.29

As a result of McNamara’s decisions, during 1964 the new MACV J2

Brig. Gen. Carl A. Youngdale, presided over the expansion of his sectio

from 76 offi cers and enlisted men to 135. To its existing fi ve branche

(Collection, Counterintelligence and Security, Production, Reconnai

sance and Photo Intelligence, and J2 High Command Advisory), h

added a sixth, the Current Intelligence and Indications Center, to kee

track of events in Southeast Asia outside South Vietnam and to hel

prepare lists of air strike targets in North Vietnam and Laos.30

Youngdale placed increased emphasis on intelligence collection, a

area in which he believed his offi ce had been weak. Through publica

tion of MACV’s fi rst formal Intelligence Collection Plan and issuance o

a new guide and operating procedures, he attempted to involve Amer

can intelligence advisers more regularly in information gathering an

reporting. To exploit more fully data from American technical intell

gence sources and aerial photography and observation, Youngdale lat

in the year began work on a unifi ed MACV nationwide reconnaissanc

program. He also set up a Target Research and Analysis Center, manne

by both Americans and Vietnamese, which was to locate enemy po

sitions in remote areas for ground reconnaissance and air attack. T

unify American counterintelligence planning, operations, and repor

ing, he organized a Counterintelligence Advisory Committee wit

representation from all U.S. agencies in that fi eld. General Youngdal

also established closer cooperation with the U.S. Operations Missio

(USOM) and U.S. Information Service (USIS), both of which had acce

to sources of military information not directly available to MACV.31

In one area, however, MACV during 1964 narrowed the range o

its contacts. The command secured abolition of the separate defens

attaché offi ces in the American embassy and transfer of their duties t

the Collection Branch of J2. The Army’s assistant chief of staff for inte

ligence protested, claiming that during the 1963 crisis the Army staff re

ceived more complete and timely information on the political situatio

and on dissidence within the RVNAF from the attachés than it did from 

the MACV commander. The action was nevertheless implemented, e

fectively eliminating the military’s access to certain diplomatic source

of information and closing down a channel for intelligence reportin

and evaluation independent of the Military Assistance Command.32

However much MACV expanded and systematized its own collec

tion efforts, in the absence of large American forces in the fi eld, th

command still had to rely upon the South Vietnamese for most of i

Chap 4.indd 128 
129

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

data on the war in the countryside and on the enemy. Hence, General 

Youngdale and his section devoted much effort to improving their allies’ collection and use of intelligence. There was much to be done. 

South Vietnamese military intelligence had long lacked effective highlevel direction, unity of effort, and qualifi ed personnel; the administrative upheaval following Diem’s overthrow had exacerbated all these 

defi ciencies. During 1964 MACV prevailed upon the Joint General Staff 

to reorganize its Directorate of Intelligence on an American instead of 

a French pattern, thereby facilitating cooperation between the allied 

counterpart agencies. In the process, it persuaded the Vietnamese to 

issue, if not always follow, basic manuals (drafted by American advisers in most cases) on such matters as processing captured documents 

and treatment and interrogation of prisoners. It also assisted in expansion of Vietnamese military intelligence schools and arranged for more 

Vietnamese intelligence personnel to be trained in the United States. 

Through the network of American intelligence advisers that eventually 

reached down to battalion and district level, Youngdale’s directorate 

worked with some success to expedite the upward fl ow of information from all sources, notably captured enemy documents and prisoner 

interrogation reports. In spite of these efforts, MACV at the end of 

1964 still lacked complete, timely, and reliable operational and tactical 

intelligence. After two years of collating and analyzing every scrap of 

obtainable data, the command’s estimates of the enemy order of battle 

and of the rate of infi ltration through Laos remained imprecise and, 

especially in the latter case, were up to half a year out of date.33

The Military Assistance Command’s relations with the American 

news media had been embittered by the correspondents’ feud with 

Harkins at the same time as the command’s information effort was 

crippled by personnel shortages and the absence, in General Westmoreland’s words, of a “long range, objective, conceptual program.” To 

alleviate these defi ciencies and in hopes of obtaining more favorable 

coverage of U.S. and South Vietnamese activities, Westmoreland, as 

soon as he became acting commander early in June, reorganized and 

enlarged the MACV Public Information Offi ce. Working in cooperation 

with Barry Zorthian, the mission’s chief public affairs offi cer, and with 

Col. Roger Bankson of the Offi ce of the Assistant Secretary of Defense 

for Public Affairs, Westmoreland retitled the agency the MACV Offi ce 

of Information (MACCOI) and enlarged its staff from nineteen offi cers 

and enlisted men to fi fty-nine. 

The restructured offi ce had three divisions. Troop Information oversaw the command newspaper, the Armed Forces Radio station, and orientation of newly arrived personnel. Press Relations, the sole American 

release point in South Vietnam for news on military operations, conducted press briefi ngs, issued releases, answered reporters’ questions, 

and monitored South Vietnamese public information activities. The 

third division, Special Projects and Liaison, was to be the “catalyst” in 

Chap 4.indd 129 
130

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

developing a “vitalized, objective” MACV information program. Th

division, which cooperated closely with the embassy and the U.S. In

formation Service, had the task of fi nding stories that presented allie

efforts in a favorable light and guiding correspondents to them. Wit

Caribou transports and helicopters at its disposal, the division mad

arrangements for reporters’ trips to the fi eld; it supervised the wor

of MACV information offi cers in the corps areas; and it collaborate

with South Vietnamese government information agencies. Its staff als

prepared news stories, radio programs, and fi lm clips for transmissio

to the media. This intensifi cation of MACV’s information effort un

derscored the degree to which the news media had become a majo

and infl uential, participant in the war. In the short run, the comman

improved its public relations; but it nonetheless also became a partic

pant in the Johnson administration’s campaign to manipulate publ

opinion in support of its Vietnam policy.34

By the time General Westmoreland took charge, the Military Assi

tance Command was bearing an increasingly heavy burden of militar

and pacifi cation reporting, both to the embassy and to higher author

ties. MACV since 1962 had been assembling village-by-village estimate

of government and Viet Cong control of the countryside, based on in

formation obtained from the province chiefs by American intelligenc

advisers and, to a limited extent, verifi ed by them. As South Vietnam

situation deteriorated during 1963, the Kennedy administration de

manded more and more information, as though the accumulation o

enough facts would resolve its internal policy disagreements. In respons

MACV in October 1963 established an Information and Reports Work

ing Group under the Operations Directorate’s supervision to recom

mend improvements in the command’s counterinsurgency reporting

The command at the same time began furnishing combat informatio

to the Pacifi c Command for incorporation in its automated Republic o

Vietnam Statistical Data Base, an early effort to employ computers fo

the storage, retrieval, and analysis of data on the war. In November, a

part of the American reassessment of pacifi cation following Diem’s fal

MACV instituted a Province Studies Working Group, coordinated b

the intelligence directorate, to oversee preparation of detailed studie

of every one of South Vietnam’s forty-fi ve provinces. These studies wer

to establish a more accurate picture of what actually was happening i

the countryside and to constitute the basis for measuring subsequen

counterinsurgency progress by the new government.35

During early 1964, a joint Defense, State Department, and CIA team 

reviewed pacifi cation reporting by the entire U.S. Mission. Buildin

on the fi ndings of MACV’s Information and Reports Working Group

the team made recommendations for a series of mission weekly an

monthly reports to Washington that would incorporate submission

from all agencies, including MACV. As a result, by mid-1964 MAC

was producing regular daily and weekly military situation reports, 

Chap 4.indd 130 
131

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

monthly military evaluation, and a quarterly review of counterinsurgency progress. Information from these documents, which contained 

both statistical summaries and more impressionistic evaluations, went 

into corresponding mission reports. Ambassador Lodge used MACV 

as the mission’s principal collecting point for information about the 

provinces. The better to perform that role, General Harkins in May established a Province Reports Center, located in the South Vietnamese 

High Command compound, which was to provide pacifi cation data 

and analyses to all U.S. agencies. At the end of the year, MACV combined this organization and the former MAAG Offi ce of Sector Affairs 

into the Pacifi cation Planning and Operations Branch under its J3 section, constituting what one staff offi cer called “a [combat operations 

center] for pacifi cation.”36

MACV had other reporting responsibilities as well. At Defense Department direction, the command furnished CINCPAC and the Joint 

Chiefs with a Senior Adviser’s Monthly Evaluation Report on the personnel, equipment, and combat effectiveness (as evaluated by American advisers) of every South Vietnamese unit down to battalion size. It 

made still more periodic reports to CINCPAC in connection with the 

Military Assistance Program and psychological warfare operations. In 

September, General Westmoreland began giving Ambassador Taylor his 

personal weekly and monthly military estimates for incorporation into 

similar reports demanded of Taylor by Secretary Rusk. As if that were 

not enough, each visit by Secretary McNamara and each Honolulu policy conference produced calls for comprehensive information—what 

General Stilwell characterized as “impossible (but salute and comply 

dammit) requirements”—on a long list of subjects. This demand by 

higher authority for growing quantities of information, much of it in 

statistical form, as well as a never-resolved debate over the most meaningful indicators of counterinsurgency progress, was to continue as the 

war expanded.37

As the Military Assistance Command headquarters reorganized and 

expanded, the Army gained increased ascendancy within it. Both Harkins and Westmoreland supported greater Army representation in the 

belief that the Vietnam confl ict was “predominantly a land campaign 

and therefore senior commanders should be prepared by experience 

and orientation primarily to deal with problems involving ground operations.” In addition, they argued that because MACV staff procedures 

were those of the Army, only offi cers of that service could work effectively in most billets. Over objections from CINCPAC and the Air 

Force, General Westmoreland selected another Army offi cer, Lt. Gen. 

John L. Throckmorton, as his deputy commander. As the tours of duty 

of other members of the original MACV staff came to an end, the Joint 

Chiefs, at Westmoreland’s recommendation, transferred the positions 

of many of them to the Army. Thus General Weede, the Marine chief 

of staff, was replaced by Army Maj. Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, formerly 

Chap 4.indd 131 
132

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

MACV’s director of operations. The Navy relinquished the personn

directorate to the Army. As part of the public information reorganiza

tion, Westmoreland attempted to obtain an Army colonel to head th

new MACV Offi ce of Information. Air Force opposition, however, de

layed achievement of this goal until early 1965. Under the Joint Tabl

of Distribution of 15 May, adopted immediately after abolition of th

MAAG, only the intelligence and long-range planning sections did no

have Army chiefs, and even then the Army staff was pressing for con

trol of the intelligence slot. At the same time, in the May Joint Tabl

of Distribution and others that followed, an increasing proportion o

deputy and branch chief slots were shifted from the other services t

the Army. By late 1964 as a result, about 80 percent of the personnel i

the general staff sections were from that service. The secretary of th

MACV joint staff declared that the command was really “an Army sta

with some A[ir] F[orce] and Navy offi cers on it. All the paperwork an

procedures are Army procedures.”38 (Chart 2)

The Air Force, especially its chief of staff, General LeMay, vigorousl

resisted the trend, arguing that air power had an important role to pla

in the struggle within South Vietnam and an even more signifi cant on

in the future broader operations that were then coming under consid

General Moore (shown as a Lieutenant General), right, with Pacifi c Air Forces 

Commander, General Hunter Harris, left, and General Westmoreland.

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 4.indd 132 
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CHART 2 —U.S. MILITARY ASSISTANCE COMMAND, VIETNAM, 31 DECEMBER 1964

Chap 4.indd 133 
134

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

eration. In an effort to strengthe

its infl uence, the Air Force assigne

Maj. Gen. Joseph H. Moore in Janu

ary 1964 to replace General Anth

as 2d Air Division commander. 

World War II combat veteran an

former operations director of th

Tactical Air Command, Moore wa

a boyhood friend of General Wes

moreland—a fact that Air Forc

offi cials did not ignore in sendin

him to Vietnam. Westmorelan

and Moore at once established 

warm personal and profession

relationship, and the 2d Air Div

sion commander functioned i

many respects as Westmoreland

air deputy. The two men coopera

ed to make the divided air contro

system in South Vietnam work a

smoothly as possible.39

Nevertheless, Army–Air Forc

arguments persisted, both in Sout

Vietnam and in Washington. Th

Air Force bitterly fought Westmo

reland’s and the Army’s efforts t

expand the missions of armed helicopters and to obtain more powerfu

such craft, complaining that the Army was taking advantage of strict op

erating restrictions on the FARMGATE unit to usurp the role of fi xed-win

tactical aircraft. Discontent among FARMGATE pilots with those same re

strictions and with their obsolescent, at times unsafe, equipment su

faced in the press early in 1964. Picking up on the issue, the infl uentia

Senator John Stennis of Mississippi and his Preparedness Investigatin

Subcommittee held hearings during June that provided a forum for A

Force allegations of neglect and misuse of air power in Vietnam. Thes

were merely surface manifestations of a continuing interservice doctr

nal battle that erupted periodically in deliberations of the Joint Chie

of Staff and regularly threatened to spill over into the Congress. Persi

tent discontent among Air Force offi cers in Vietnam, General Wheele

warned Westmoreland, helped “stoke the fi res” of confl ict in the Pen

tagon; “conversely attitudes and beliefs in the Pentagon and elsewher

in the Air Force continue to supply fuel (or fi re brands!) to the Air Forc

contingent in Vietnam.” Indicating the intensity of service partisan

ship, General LeMay at one point personally scolded General Moore fo

allegedly undermining Air Force interests by too close cooperation wit

the Army.40

Admiral Sharp

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 4.indd 134 
135

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

In an effort to mollify the Air Force, General Earle G. Wheeler, who 

had succeeded Taylor as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on 31 July 

1964, pressed Westmoreland formally during the autumn to establish 

a deputy COMUSMACV for air operations, a position General Moore 

would hold in conjunction with his command of the 2d Air Division. 

Wheeler argued that giving Moore the additional title, along with a 

small staff section within MACV headquarters, would satisfy at least 

partially Air Force demands for continuous high-level participation in 

joint planning and operations.41

Westmoreland initially demurred. He insisted that General Moore 

already was functioning as his deputy for air matters, regularly attending daily MACV staff meetings, and that Air Force offi cers, as well as 

Navy and Marine aviators, occupied appropriate positions throughout 

the joint staff. Hence, redesignating Moore and adding a new headquarters element under him would only “create confusion and perhaps 

further cultivate seeds of dissension that we are trying to destroy.” Admiral Ulysses S. Grant Sharp, who succeeded Admiral Felt as CINCPAC 

on 30 June 1964, also objected. He pointed out that “double-hatting” 

Moore would violate a JCS regulation against service component commanders performing additional staff duties and warned that the plan 

might merely provoke more controversy among the Joint Chiefs. Both 

men withdrew their objections after Wheeler reassured Sharp that the 

Joint Chiefs were prepared to waive the regulation and reiterated the 

political necessity for the action in staving off further interservice, 

congressional, and public controversy over the status of air power in 

Vietnam. In late October, Westmoreland submitted an amendment to 

MACV’s Joint Table of Distribution, creating the position of deputy 

commander for air operations. The Joint Chiefs, however, did not get 

around to approving the change and confi rming General Moore’s new 

title until the following May. In the interim, General LeMay’s retirement as Air Force chief of staff reduced, at least for a time, the stridency 

of the interservice controversy.42

MACV’s forces in the fi eld expanded moderately during 1964. Early 

in the year, the administration decided to increase the number of advisers with the South Vietnamese Army and in the provinces, on the 

largely unexamined assumption that an enhanced American presence 

throughout the chain of command would improve government performance. The Joint Chiefs of Staff during April and May developed ambitious plans for assigning American advisers to the South Vietnamese 

Army down to company level and for creating mobile training teams 

for the Civil Guard and Self-Defense Corps (now being redesignated 

the Regional and Popular Forces). General Westmoreland and Admiral Felt, however, objected that the Joint Chiefs’ proposal would cause 

higher American casualties, offend Vietnamese nationalist sensitivities, 

and overburden MACV’s logistical system. They favored a more modest 

augmentation of battalion advisory teams in the infantry, armor, and 

Chap 4.indd 135 
136

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

artillery, and the assignment of district advisers to work with the terr

torial forces. MACV during the spring deployed two-man experimenta

advisory teams in thirteen districts, with encouraging results in bot

military and civil affairs.43

At a conference in Honolulu early in June, Secretaries McNamar

and Rusk, Ambassador Lodge, General Westmoreland, and Admira

Felt adopted Westmoreland’s plan for additional battalion advisers an

agreed to deploy fi ve-man advisory teams to a total of 113 districts i

the critical provinces. Westmoreland then submitted a formal reque

for about 900 additional advisers—the district and battalion teams an

modest increases in the Navy and Air Force advisory groups. Doublin

helicopter squadrons and support personnel required by the advisor

buildup, brought his total reinforcement request to about 4,600 o

fi cers and men. McNamara approved immediately. These troops de

ployed incrementally to Vietnam during the last half of the year. The

arrival brought Military Assistance Command strength to a total o

over 23,300 by the end of 1964.44

As part of this buildup, MACV expanded and reinforced the Spe

cial Forces while altering their command arrangements and missio

assignment. The command wanted to integrate the Special Forces–ad

vised Civilian Irregular Defense Groups (CIDGs), which it had inhe

ited from the CIA, more fully into the general military campaign. A

part of the reinforcement, the command enlarged its Special Force

contingent from about 500 offi cers and enlisted men on six-mont

temporary assignments to a full group of more than 1,200 on regu

lar twelve-month tours. It also replaced the provisional Headquarter

U.S. Special Forces, Vietnam, with a regular command element, th

5th Special Forces Group (Airborne). At the same time, as the resu

of a study by General Westmoreland, MACV placed the Special Force

detachments in the fi eld under the operational control of the corps se

nior advisers. Westmoreland intended this change to give these ofte

free-wheeling elite troops the “focus, fi rm direction, and adequate su

pervision” he believed they had lacked up to that point. The 5th Spe

cial Forces Group retained command, less operational control, of th

teams. Its commander advised Westmoreland on Special Forces ma

ters, and the group advised and assisted the South Vietnamese Specia

Forces command. Besides altering command arrangements, MACV sig

nifi cantly changed the primary mission of the Green Berets and th

irregulars they advised, from area pacifi cation to the provision of strik

forces to patrol and interdict Viet Cong infi ltration routes across th

border. It thereby largely diverted the Civilian Irregular Defense Grou

program from its original focus on paramilitary counterinsurgency t

more conventional reconnaissance and combat.45

As the Military Assistance Command expanded, President Johnso

and Secretary McNamara tried to improve the quality of its personne

in both headquarters and the fi eld. The president in December 196

Chap 4.indd 136 
137

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

directed all government agencies to send only their best people to Vietnam. McNamara, in a private talk with the newly assigned MACV chief 

of intelligence, General Youngdale, expressed dissatisfaction with the 

qualifi cations and performance of the MACV staff, calling it “a second 

rate team” and expressing his determination to replace many of its members. Under pressure from McNamara and at General Harkins’ recommendation, the Army, in particular, established strict standards for assignment to key MACV positions. Lieutenant colonels, for example, had 

to have graduated from the Command and General Staff College and 

not to have been passed over for promotion to colonel. At the outset, 

imposition of these criteria caused discontent and confusion in MACV. 

Incumbent offi cers who did not meet the criteria but were performing 

well resented an implied slur on themselves. Other personnel, on orders 

to Vietnam, were abruptly reassigned. While the effect of the new standards on the overall quality of the MACV staff was diffi cult to measure, 

their imposition refl ected the administration’s increasing concern over 

Vietnam as its only active war and principal foreign crisis, as well as a 

determination to commit the resources needed to secure victory.46

General Westmoreland, upon becoming acting commander in June, 

lost no time in imposing his own leadership philosophy and working 

methods on MACV headquarters. From the outset, he emphasized “professional and businesslike” advisory relations with the South Vietnamese; “open-minded and complete” cooperation with other U.S. agencies; 

and improved troop discipline, indoctrination, and welfare. He called 

for realistic, objective reporting, declaring that “we all seek the facts 

and the truth” and must aim at “the righting of the bad—not applauding success.” He insisted that all personnel of the command follow his 

own example of correct military appearance and hard work, requiring 

a “minimum” sixty-hour week in both headquarters and the fi eld. In 

contrast to Harkins, Westmoreland made himself accessible to American newsmen at command press briefi ngs and in informal background 

sessions. He regularly took correspondents along on his trips outside 

Saigon and made special visits to places where his presence might draw 

reporters’ attention to stories favorable to the allied war effort.47

Westmoreland employed the MACV staff intensively for consultation and anticipatory planning. He strengthened the Secretariate of the 

Joint Staff and transformed the commander’s daily staff conferences 

into lengthy discussions of issues and policy, as well as using them to 

call the section chiefs’ attention to complaints and defi ciencies he had 

noted on his fi eld trips. He established ad hoc groups to deal with special problems and often consulted directly with junior staff offi cers on 

matters of interest to him. The secretary of the Joint Staff declared that 

Westmoreland was “a great one for calling people directly, the section 

chiefs or even action offi cers if he knows them, telling them to come 

over and talk things over.” Westmoreland employed his deputy, General Throckmorton, to make fi eld investigations and follow through on 

Chap 4.indd 137 
138

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

special projects. Within headquarters, the chief of staff, General Sti

well, and the Assistant Chief of Staff for Operations, Brig. Gen. William 

E. DePuy, both men of strong intellect and dominant personality, wer

Westmoreland’s most infl uential counselors and assistants. Westmore

land attempted to draw his component commanders and corps senio

advisers into the development of strategy through monthly meeting

of a MACV Executive Council. However, the council, established i

October 1964, convened with increasing irregularity as the war, an

the pressure on the members’ time, expanded.48

Westmoreland and his staff worked in less than ideal surrounding

After combining with the MAAG, MACV headquarters occupied tw

principal facilities. MACV Compound 1, a converted hotel on Pasteu

Street in downtown Saigon, housed the commander, his deputy, th

chief of staff, the combat operations center, the communications cen

ter, and the directorates of intelligence, operations, and communica

tions/electronics. Compound 2, a former MAAG facility some distanc

away in Cholon, Saigon’s Chinese suburb, accommodated the person

nel and logistics directorates and most of the special staff. Other ele

ments, including the J5 section, the information offi ce, and the Join

Research and Testing Agency, occupied separate quarters elsewher

This dispersal of the headquarters forced personnel to do much time

consuming and potentially dangerous commuting across the crowde

city. It divided some key agencies such as the communications cente

which was split between Compounds 1 and 2 until October. Staff sec

tions not located in the Pasteur Street complex complained of a lack o

timely information and of inability to gain consideration of their view

on major plans and policies. All the facilities, which depended fo

security on the South Vietnamese Army, were vulnerable to Viet Con

attack. Compound 1, for instance, was separated from a busy avenu

only by a fence and a line of South Vietnamese army sentries.49

Even with these inconveniences and with the sixty-hour wor

week decreed by General Westmoreland, MACV headquarters person

nel, until the end of 1964, enjoyed a relatively comfortable existenc

Billeted in hotels and villas, most had leisure to sample the many ex

cellent restaurants and other pleasures of Saigon. Higher ranking o

fi cers participated in a busy round of diplomatic receptions and din

ners and found time for golf and tennis. The presence of America

families created a semblance of peacetime post and garrison life. A

the Viet Cong increased their terrorist attacks on Americans in Saigon

however, the wives and children had to cease their shopping and ex

ploring trips. MACV during the year gradually reduced the number o

accompanied positions on its roster. At the end of 1964, only 120 suc

slots remained. Nevertheless, although guerrilla bombings in the cit

and the deaths of friends or academy classmates in the fi ghting in th

countryside brought home the actuality of war, there persisted, in th

words of the MACV command historian, a “psychological gap betwee

Chap 4.indd 138 
139

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

the Headquarters and the fi eld, . . . [which] added to the remoteness 

and unreality of the war for Saigon staff offi cers.”50

MACV: Executive Agent for Pacifi cation?

Throughout 1964 the U.S. Mission struggled to revive the South Vietnamese campaign to recapture the countryside from the Viet Cong. The 

mission’s pacifi cation plans, and those of the Minh and Khanh governments, followed familiar principles. They called for regular forces, working out of relatively secure areas, to drive organized enemy units from 

steadily widening zones (“spreading oil spots”). Within those zones, territorial troops and police were to root out the Viet Cong guerrillas and 

political underground while civilian agencies of the government organized strategic hamlets, now called New Life Hamlets, and sought to win 

over the people through economic and social improvements. The allies, 

aware of the limitations on their resources and the diffi culty of the task, 

planned to concentrate their efforts in the most heavily populated and 

strategically important provinces, primarily those of the upper Mekong 

Delta, those surrounding Saigon, and the populous coastal provinces 

of I and II Corps. At the urging of MACV and the mission, the Minh 

regime embodied these principles in its DIEN HUONG pacifi cation plan, 

which General Khanh reissued, with minor modifi cations, under the 

title CHIEN THANG (“Struggle for Victory”). Khanh’s plan constituted the 

framework for the allied campaign throughout 1964.51

In November 1963, at Secretary McNamara’s behest and to guide 

its own deployment of personnel and allocation of resources, the U.S. 

Mission established a list of thirteen critical provinces, which were selected on the basis of size, strategic importance, and degree of Viet 

Cong domination. MACV and other mission agencies were to press the 

government to reinforce these provinces with troops and civilian personnel and were to concentrate additional American advisers, money, 

and materiel there. The White House and the State and Defense Departments continually demanded exhaustive reports on conditions in 

these provinces and on government progress (or lack of it) in pacifying them. The critical list, which had been reduced to nine by midyear, included Quang Tin in I Corps, Quang Ngai and Binh Dinh in II 

Corps, the provinces in III Corps surrounding Saigon, and several in 

the northern Mekong Delta in IV Corps.52

All the pacifi cation plans called for the closest possible integration 

of military and civilian activities. Hence, they raised anew the issue, for 

both South Vietnamese and Americans, of how to combine the actions 

of numerous separate agencies, each jealous of its own prerogatives and 

advocating its own particular variant of the general pacifi cation theory. 

On the American side, the Military Assistance Command throughout 

the year campaigned for its solution to this problem: placing all American pacifi cation support under COMUSMACV as the ambassador’s executive agent.

Chap 4.indd 139 
140

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

From the time of his arrival in Saigon, General Westmorelan

pressed this cause with conviction and vigor. As XVIII Airborne Corp

commander at Fort Bragg, he had worked closely with the Army Spe

cial Warfare Center and had absorbed much of the counterinsurgenc

doctrine under development there. He came to Vietnam well imbue

with the idea that the struggle was essentially a political one for th

allegiance of the people, with military force a subordinate element i

a larger effort. Upon his assumption of command, a State Departmen

offi cial rejoiced that “we can shift from trying to kill every Viet Cong

to protecting the Vietnamese population.”53

Westmoreland took every occasion to emphasize to his staff an

to American advisers that “the real battle here is for the people.” H

recommendations for strengthening the allied effort dealt with lan

reform and political democratization, as well as improvement of th

South Vietnamese Army. He early displayed concern for the effects o

heavy weaponry in populated areas, questioning “the need for the 50

pound bomb in consideration of the targets available and the essent

ality of winning the allegiance of the population.” Even so, like man

other Americans, civilians as well as military, Westmoreland tended to

ward a managerial, apolitical approach to counterinsurgency. He saw 

no incongruity in suggesting that the “young Saigon elite” be enliste

as government political cadres in the countryside (the enemy employe

peasant youths for such activities—a major ingredient in his success

His headquarters spent much of the year trying to induce the Vietnam

ese to adopt an American-style system for programming pacifi cation i

the provinces on the basis of “time phased requirements of manpowe

money, and materiel.” The effort failed because, the MACV comman

historian concluded, “the already overburdened Vietnamese offi cialdom 

. . . was neither responsive nor sophisticated enough to absorb it.”54

Westmoreland began campaigning to oversee pacifi cation suppo

while still MACV deputy commander. He was confronted at once wit

the disarray in the U.S. Mission caused by Lodge’s alienation from Ha

kins and soon joined in the general consensus that the ambassador wa

a poor administrator who confi ned his coordination efforts to dealing

with a few intimates. In an effort to overcome the country team’s frag

mentation, Westmoreland and the Deputy Chief of Mission, David G

Nes, in February organized an ad hoc Pacifi cation Committee made u

of the deputy heads of the interested agencies. After a promising star

Ambassador Lodge in April disbanded the committee, apparently be

cause he feared that through it Nes and Westmoreland were effectivel

running the mission.55

Meanwhile, General Stilwell, the MACV chief of staff, propose

that the MACV commander be made the ambassador’s executiv

agent for counterinsurgency, with representatives of the civilian agen

cies added to the MACV staff and with composite interagency team

headed by military senior advisers, at corps and province levels. Suc

Chap 4.indd 140 
141

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

an arrangement, Stilwell argued, would unify American dealings with 

the South Vietnamese. It would also create an American parallel to 

General Khanh’s organization for carrying out CHIEN THANG, which 

consisted of a largely civilian Central Pacifi cation Committee chaired 

by Khanh, with the armed forces commanders in chief in charge of 

implementing decisions through the corps commanders and province 

chiefs. Westmoreland in June urged Lodge, then nearing the end of 

his tenure as ambassador, to designate him as his executive agent for 

coordination of all American pacifi cation support. “Some designated 

individual,” he declared, “must be appointed to exercise initiative in 

getting all interested parties together so as to effect an integrated program.” Westmoreland recommended, as well, employment of a variation on Stilwell’s military-civilian teams to expedite pacifi cation in the 

most critical provinces. Attempting to assuage civilian fears that his 

proposals would lead to military domination of the counterinsurgency 

effort, he promised that, if assigned as executive agent, he would “work 

through committee arrangements designed to provide a consensus in 

approach.” Lodge received Westmoreland’s proposals with interest but 

took no action on them before leaving his Saigon post.56

Ambassador Taylor likewise declined to appoint the MACV commander his executive agent for pacifi cation. Instead, he attempted to 

unify the American effort by establishing a Mission Council. This body, 

which Taylor instituted the day he arrived in Saigon, consisted of himself, Westmoreland, Deputy Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson, the local 

heads of the U.S. Operations Mission and the U.S. Information Agency, 

and the chief of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Saigon station. The 

group, which Taylor used as a “miniature National Security Council,” 

met weekly to make recommendations to the ambassador on all aspects of the mission’s work. Supporting the council, a coordinating 

committee prepared the agenda and followed up on the carrying out of 

decisions. It also served as a vehicle through which the member agencies could resolve problems at the working level. The Mission Council 

did much to bring system and order to interagency deliberations, and 

it also contributed to more regular concert of action with the South 

Vietnamese, who established a National Security Council to work with 

it. It did not, however, bring about complete civil-military harmony 

among the Americans. Contact and cooperation between the MACV 

staff and those of USOM and the CIA, especially, remained occasional 

at best. The civilian agencies resented and resisted what they considered military interference with their counterinsurgency programs. The 

Operations Mission, for example, objected to MACV’s giving civil affairs training to its newly established district military advisory teams, 

even though the teams were the only Americans then working regularly at that level of Vietnamese administration.57

General Westmoreland came close to achieving the executive agent 

role he desired in the mission’s most ambitious pacifi cation campaign 

Chap 4.indd 141 
142

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

of the year: Operation HOP TAC. In early June, the embassy and MACV

concerned at increasing Viet Cong inroads in the provinces adjoinin

the capital, developed a proposal for bringing the pacifi cation activ

ties of the entire region under a unifi ed plan, administered by a singl

headquarters with a parallel American advisory and support organ

zation. At the June Honolulu conference, Lodge and Westmorelan

obtained approval of this concept from Rusk and McNamara. Lodg

in his fi nal act as Ambassador, persuaded General Khanh to adopt i

General Westmoreland, meanwhile, put a special staff headed by th

III Corps Senior Adviser, Col. Jasper Wilson, to work on a detaile

plan. Khanh placed his III Corps commander, General Tran Ngoc Tam

in charge of the project on the Vietnamese side; a small Vietnames

element joined Wilson’s planning task force.58

Completed late in August, the resulting plan, named Operatio

HOP TAC (the Vietnamese phrase for “cooperation”), called for a un

fi ed campaign in the six contiguous provinces—Gia Dinh, Bien Ho

Binh Duong, Hau Nghia, Long An, and Phuoc Tuy—that togethe

encircled Saigon. Regular and territorial troops, National Police, an

Ambassador Taylor, left, with Secretary McNamara (© Bettman/CORBIS)

Chap 4.indd 142 
143

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

civilian ministries, working in close cooperation, were to pacify this 

area by moving outward from the capital, the center of the “oil spot,” 

in a series of concentric rings. HOP TAC prescribed the familiar pacifi -

cation sequence of military clearing and civil reconstruction for each 

ring. What was distinctive about it was the concentration in the area 

of sizable South Vietnamese military and police reinforcements, including the entire 25th ARVN Division, transferred from II Corps, 

and a strengthening of the American advisory presence, both civilian and military. Advisory teams, for instance, went into every district in the target provinces. Distinctive, too, was the commitment 

of all South Vietnamese and American agencies to a single plan and 

the establishment of a special organization to direct their operations. 

That organization, the HOP TAC Council, chaired by General Tam, included representatives of all the involved Vietnamese commands and 

civilian ministries accompanied by their MACV and mission advisers. 

Westmoreland, as Ambassador Taylor’s representative to coordinate 

American HOP TAC support, played the role he desired as primary executive agent for the program. He established a special unit under 

Maj. Robert Montague, an experienced province adviser, within 

MACV headquarters to watch over the effort. The general himself, 

and other members of his staff, intervened frequently to keep the 

combined offensive moving.59

Initiated formally in September, HOP TAC in the end produced little cooperation and less progress. Hampered by divided command, repeated political upheavals in Saigon, frequent changes of commanders 

and province offi cials, and an insuffi cient number of trained people, 

the South Vietnamese were slow to deploy their troops, police, and 

civilian personnel. The Vietnamese HOP TAC Council, when fi nally 

established in October, lacked effective authority over the civilian 

elements and had no supporting staff of its own. On the American 

side, the civilian agencies objected to the plan as overcentralized and 

claimed that its concentric phase lines bore no relationship either to 

available South Vietnamese resources or to the actual centers of government and insurgent strength. Viet Cong main and guerrilla forces, 

steadily increasing in size, effectively obstructed government operations throughout the area and in some provinces forced the South 

Vietnamese Army onto the defensive. Perhaps most important, the 

South Vietnamese essentially regarded HOP TAC as a plan their American overseers had imposed upon them. Military and civilian offi cials 

alike accorded the effort less than top priority as a result, and their 

local subordinates, according to Westmoreland, displayed “a noticeable lack of . . . initiative and aggressiveness.” Westmoreland nevertheless regularly found evidence of slow progress in HOP TAC. He considered the HOP TAC organization, both American and Vietnamese, to 

be the prototype for an effective unifi ed approach to pacifi cation.60

Chap 4.indd 143 
144

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Struggling for Stability

The U.S. Mission attributed HOP TAC’s disappointing results pr

marily to the persistent instability of the Saigon government. Gen

eral Khanh proved unable to manage the cross-currents of militar

and political factionalism unleashed by the removal of Diem. Instead

the mercurial would-be strongman’s penchant for often self-defeatin

intrigue plunged him into a complex series of power struggles wit

Saigon politicians, the organized Buddhists, and a faction-ridden o

fi cer corps.61

During the late summer, fall, and winter, political conspiracies; a

tempted military coups; and Buddhist, Catholic, student, and labo

demonstrations and riots kept Saigon in turmoil, all but paralyzing o

derly administration. In August, Khanh attempted to impose a new 

constitution making him president with near-dictatorial powers, bu

he backed down in the face of Buddhist street crowds and militar

opposition. In late October, under an uneasy multifactional compro

mise, a High National Council of civilian notables installed a more o

less constitutional regime with Phan Khac Suu, an elderly politician, a

chief of state and Tran Van Huong, a former mayor of Saigon, as pre

mier. Khanh retained power as chairman of the Military Revolutionar

Council and armed forces commander in chief. This regime satisfi e

neither Khanh nor the militant Buddhists, with whom Khanh increa

ingly allied himself. Also discontented was a group of young general

originally promoted by Khanh after his takeover in January. In mid

September, these generals, nicknamed the Young Turks, suppressed 

coup attempt by anti-Khanh offi cers and from then on were the dom

nant element in Saigon’s armed forces. 

In late December the Young Turks made their bid for power. The

created a new political body, the Armed Forces Council, nominall

headed by Khanh; tried to abolish the High National Council; an

sought to purge the offi cer corps of what they considered deadwood

Their actions brought them, and Khanh, into open confl ict with Am

bassador Taylor, who supported the Suu-Huong government in the in

terests of political stability. Taylor publicly scolded Khanh and the gen

erals for their disruptive meddling in politics. The military men in tur

denounced Taylor for interfering in Saigon’s internal affairs. Aware h

no longer was America’s man in South Vietnam, Khanh aligned him

self more fi rmly with the Buddhists, who began open rioting again

the United States. After weeks of confused wrangling, the crisis ende

in February 1965 with the civilian government in place but with sev

eral Young Turks in the cabinet and Dr. Phan Huy Quat, a politicia

acceptable to the Buddhists, serving as premier instead of Huong. A

the same time, after indications from Taylor that the United States n

longer supported Khanh, the Armed Forces Council dispensed wit

the ambitious general. They took the occasion of another failed cou

Chap 4.indd 144 
145

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

attempt (which they may have stage-managed for the purpose) to remove Khanh as armed forces commander and dispatch him to exile as 

an ambassador-at-large. South Vietnam thus staggered into 1965 with 

a weak civilian regime in offi ce but with a generals’ junta holding the 

balance of power behind the constitutional facade. In fact, at all levels 

of government, military offi cers exercised extensive civil authority; the 

corps commanders, especially those remote from Saigon, were evolving into semiautonomous regional warlords.62

Throughout this period of turmoil, Taylor and Westmoreland struggled to maintain South Vietnamese political stability, prevent coups, 

and keep the Vietnamese armed forces unifi ed and protected from partisan disruption. At Taylor’s direction, Westmoreland periodically reassured the often despondent Khanh of American support and that of the 

South Vietnamese armed forces. On occasion, he acted as an intermediary between Khanh and other generals. During actual and rumored 

coups, Westmoreland, frequently after advance warning from advisers 

with the involved units, convened his staff at the MACV combat operations center and dispatched what he called “coup-qualifi ed” offi cers to 

the various Vietnamese headquarters to counsel moderation and prevent military actions in confl ict with American desires. On one occasion in November, Westmoreland himself talked a leading Young Turk, 

the Air Force chief, Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky, out of moving against the 

government.63

After the failure of Khanh’s constitution in August, and again after 

the attempted coup of mid-September, Westmoreland and his deputy, 

General Throckmorton, at Taylor’s behest, visited every major Vietnamese headquarters to assess troop morale and the commanders’ political intentions. On these occasions, they reminded the Vietnamese 

generals that armed forces unity and concentration on defeating the 

Viet Cong were essential to South Vietnam’s survival and that persistent political chaos in South Vietnam alienated American public opinion and jeopardized the continuation of U.S. military and economic 

aid. Westmoreland used his infl uence with Khanh, and later with the 

Young Turks, to prevent the fi ring of capable offi cers whose parties or 

patrons temporarily were in eclipse. He consistently urged the Vietnamese authorities to resist demands, especially from the Buddhists, 

for purges of senior commanders. By late 1964 Westmoreland could report success in holding the armed forces together and protecting some 

“highly competent” offi cers whose factions were out of power; but he 

acknowledged that “we have . . . no assurance that these gains are more 

than superfi cial or more than a lull in the storm.”64

In the midst of the government crisis in Saigon, the Military Assistance Command had to cope with a Montagnard revolt in the Central Highlands. There, Civilian Irregular Defense Groups recruited from 

among the aboriginal tribesmen, whom the Vietnamese referred to as 

moi (“savages”) and treated as such, but who worked well with their U.S. 

Chap 4.indd 145 
146

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Special Forces advisers, had become a mainstay of the counterinsurgenc

effort. On the night of 19–20 September, irregulars of the Rhade Montag

nard tribe, in a carefully planned uprising, seized four camps in Darla

Province. They arrested their American advisers, killed or locked up the

Vietnamese Special Forces offi cers, and took hostage a couple of hundre

other Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. However, their planned marc

on the province capital, Ban Me Thuot, failed due to rapid action b

the South Vietnamese 23d Division. A military standoff then developed

with the government massing forces to retake the camps.65

The Military Assistance Command intervened, both to rescue i

imprisoned personnel and to prevent a bloody battle that would hav

destroyed much of the pacifi cation program in the Central Highland

General Westmoreland dispatched his director of operations, Genera

DePuy, to Ban Me Thuot as his representative. To quiet perennial Vie

namese suspicions that the United States was encouraging Montagnar

separatism, Westmoreland provided DePuy with a letter to the reb

leaders expressing the “strong displeasure” of the American govern

ment at their actions and threatening to cut off pay and support t

CIDG units that persisted in rebellion. DePuy apparently did not ac

tually convey this message to the Montagnards. However, with som

diffi culty, and at one point only after a pre-dawn dash to 23d Divisio

headquarters, he did prevent an ARVN assault on the camps. After 

tense week, the American advisers, assisted at the end by a militar

show of force, secured the peaceable release of the hostages and surren

der of the mutineers. In subsequent negotiations, the Saigon govern

ment at least promised to alleviate some Montagnard grievances, thu

ending the crisis though not removing its underlying causes.66

The revolt revived General Westmoreland’s concern about the irregu

lar methods and command relationships of the American Special Force

whom both Montagnards and South Vietnamese had viewed during th

troubles variously as commanders, spokesmen, and advocates of the ab

origines. On 6 October, he instructed his Special Forces commander, Co

John H. Spears, to remind his troops that they were to “advise and assist

but “not to command” the CIDGs and to take every possible measur

to uphold the authority of the Vietnamese military commander of eac

camp. In the event of any future “dissidence, disagreement, or insurrec

tion,” the Green Berets, like all other U.S. representatives, were to spea

and act “in support of the Government of Vietnam.”67

In spite of the efforts of MACV and the rest of the American coun

try team, a year of political upheaval undermined the effectiveness o

the South Vietnamese government and brought pacifi cation to a stand

still. Military commanders and civilian offi cials, in the capital and th

provinces, were changed too frequently to master their jobs; those wh

did last any length of time concentrated on remaining in offi ce rathe

than waging the war. Not surprisingly, all elements of the America

mission agreed that the pacifi cation campaign had stood still durin

Chap 4.indd 146 
147

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

1964, except possibly in the HOP TAC area; and even there the extent of 

progress was debatable. The Americans overlooked the possibility that 

their programs might have been too complex, and too alien to indigenous ways, for even a stable Saigon regime to implement. Instead, they 

blamed South Vietnamese lack of political virtue for the absence of 

results. Typically, General Westmoreland declared: “the conduct of the 

government is characterized by ineffi ciency, corruption, disinterest and 

lack of motivation”; and he ruminated upon ways to attach more stringent conditions to American aid and to place Americans more directly 

in charge of the execution of the counterinsurgency program. Understandably, given their frustration with their Saigon ally, the Americans 

by the end of 1964 were planning for, and tentatively beginning to 

implement, an alternative strategy: direct military pressure on North 

Vietnam to end its support of the southern insurgency.68

Special Forces adviser briefs Montagnard strike force. (Stars and Stripes photo)

Chap 4.indd 147 
148

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Notes

1 Quote is from Memo, McNamara for the President, 21 Dec 63, sub: Vietnam Sit

ation, box 1, NSC CF, Vietnam, LBJL. For other assessments, see U.S.–Vietnam Relation

sec. 4.B.4, pp. 24–25; sec. 4.C.1, pp. 8–9, 19–20, 24–25, 30–32; Rpt, Col F. P. Seron

to Gen Harkins, sub: Situation in South Vietnam Following Change of Governmen

Nov 63, tab 37,Westmoreland Hist File 1 (30 Mar 62–Nov 63), CMH. CIA Special Rp

“Trends of Communist Insurgency in South Vietnam,” 17 Jan 64; NSF, CF Vietnam

LBJL.2 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 49–50; sec. 4.C.9(a), pp. 5, 7–8; Rpt, Seron

Situation in SVN, Nov 63, pp. 4–5, 7–8. For a summary of early military improvement

see Talking Paper, 1 Dec 63, sub: Current Operations to Achieve US Objectives in RVN

tab 1–E, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (Jan–4 Feb 64), CMH. For the Minh regime’s intere

in dividing the NLF, see George McT. Kahin, Intervention: How America Became Involv

in Vietnam (New York: Knopf, 1986), pp. 182–95. 3 For events of the coup, see ODCSOPS Summary–30 January Coup–Republic 

Vietnam, 30 Jan 64, Historians fi les, CMH. See also Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, 

308. Khanh criticism of Minh government is in CIA Info Rpt, 2 Dec 63, Historian

fi les, CMH. 4 Kahin, Intervention, pp. 194–202. Msg, CIA to SecState, JCS, and ACSI, 28 Jan 6

ACSI–Army–64, box 138, 66A3106, RG 319, NARA. Msg, Harkins MAC 0325 to Taylo

30 Jan 64, Historians fi les, CMH. Msgs, Lodge Saigon 1431 to SecState, 29 Jan 64, 8 PM

Ball State Flash 1149 to Lodge, 29 Jan 64; Harkins MAC 0321 to Taylor, 30 Jan 64. All 

NSF VN, LBJL. Harkins Interv, Apr 74, p. 63. For what the Americans knew of Khanh

background, see Current Intel Memo, CIA, Ofc of Current Intel, 20 Mar 64, sub: A

praisal of Gen Nguyen Khanh, Historians fi les, CMH. 5 For analysis of the early 1964 decisions, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, p

33–35; sec. 4.C.1, pp. i–iv; sec. 4.C.2(a), pp. xiii–xiv. NSAM 288 was based on recom

mendations of Secretary McNamara. Basic documents are Memo, McNamara for th

President, 16 Mar 64, sub: South Vietnam; and NSAM 288, 17 Mar 64. Both in NS

History, Presidential Decisions, Gulf of Tonkin Attacks, box 38, LBJL. 6 McNamara’s directive is quoted from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.4, p. 37; se

also p. 35. MACV Fact Sheet, 3 Mar 64, sub: Phaseout of U.S. Forces, Historians fi le

CMH. “Essentially the same” phrase is from Memo, Adams for Ch, MAAGV; Cmdr, 2

AD; CG, USASCV; and CO, HSAS, 8 Apr 64, sub: Short Range Plan for RVN, File 204–5

(201–45) Organizational Planning Files (RVNAF 1964), box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA

7 For typical allied assessments of Viet Cong progress, see Memo, Brig Gen C. A

Youngdale, USMC, MACV J2, for Distribution, 14 Feb 64, sub: Analysis of Viet Con

Posture during Period 1 July 1963 through 31 December 1963, File 204–58 (501–0

Intel Rpt Files (64), box 3, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Serong, Situation in South Vietnam

Nov 63, pp. 5–6. CIA Special Rpt, 17 Jan 64; Memo, Colby for Distribution, n.d., n

sub. Both in LBJL. 8 On Viet Cong assessments, see COSVN Standing Committee Directive Discussin

the Tasks for the Last Six Months of 1963, Sep 63 (doc captured in Phuoc Long Prov, 2

Apr 69), pp. 4–16, 21–22, 24; and A Party Account of the Revolutionary Movement 

South Vietnam from 1954 to 1963, and A Summary of the Situation in the South fro

1962 to mid-1963 (doc captured by allied forces in Opn CRIMP, early 1966), pp. 36–3

41–55, 57–59. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 9 The Central Committee’s Ninth Plenum Resolution Discussing the Situation 

South Vietnam, December 1963 (trans. version of copy captured by U.S. forces in Cam

Chap 4.indd 148 
149

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

bodia, 13 May 70), Historians fi les, CMH; quotes are from pp. l6–17. For interpretations 

of this momentous meeting and the arguments in Hanoi preceding and following it, 

see Duiker, Road to Power, pp. 221–27; and Wallace J.Thies, When Governments Collide: 

Coercion and Diplomacy in the Vietnam Confl ict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 

1980), pp. 242–53. 10 Duiker, Road to Power, pp. 230–32. Thies, When Governments Collide, pp. 253–61. 

War Experiences Committee, Resistance War, pp. 62–63. Douglas Pike, Vietnam and the 

Soviet Union: Anatomy of an Alliance (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987), pp. 45–49, 

attaches great importance to the removal of Khruschev as opening the way for more 

intensive military action by North Vietnam. Capture of North Vietnamese is reported 

in Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 6408 to JCS and CINCPAC, 21 Jul 64, NSF VN vol. 14 

Cables 7/64, Box 6; Memo, CIA, 1 Sep 64, sub: The Situation in South Vietnam, NSF 

VN, vol. 18, Memos 9/1–15/64, box 8. Both in LBJL. 11 For examples of American forecasts of enemy strategy, see Memo, Colby for 

Distribution, 11 Feb 64, LBJL; and Special National Intelligence Estimate (SNIE), 4 Mar 

64, Historians fi les, CMH. 12 McNamara quote is from Memo for the President, 21 Dec 63, sub: Vietnam Situation, NSC Country File, Vietnam, box 1, LBJL. Bundy quote is from Memo, McGeorge 

Bundy for William Bundy, 1 May 64, NSF/Intel File, box 9, LBJL. For Harkins’ dealings 

with Khanh, see Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 2198 to CINCPAC and JCS, 23 Mar 64, NSC 

Country File, Vietnam, boxes 1 and 3, LBJL. On the authority confl ict, see Ltr, Lodge 

to Rusk, 23 Apr 64, with encls, NSC Country File, Vietnam, box 3; and Ltrs, Lodge to 

Rusk, 30 Apr 64, Rusk to Lodge, 7 May 64, William P. Bundy to Lodge, 8 May 64, NSF 

Intel File, box 9. All in LBJL. 13 Quote is from Memo, Forrestal for Bundy, 4 Feb 64, sub: South Vietnam, NSC 

Country File, Vietnam, LBJL; in same fi le, see Memo, Forrestal for Bundy, 30 Mar 64, 

sub: South Vietnam. Memo, McGeorge Bundy for the President, 4 Feb 64, sub: Your 

Luncheon with Secs Rusk and McNamara, NSF Aides Files/M Bundy/Luncheons w Pres, 

vol. 1(2), LBJL; Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 4. Weede Interv, 23 Jul 73, pp. 6–7; USMACV 

Command History, 1964, p. 9; Msg, Taylor JCS 6023 to CINCPAC and COMUSMACV, 

27 Apr 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 14 Msg, President Johnson to Harkins, 27 May 64; Msg, Harkins MAC 2647 to Johnson, 

28 May 64; White House Press Release: Remarks of the President and Gen Paul D. Harkins 

upon Presentation of the Distinguished Service Medal to Gen Harkins . . . , 24 Jun 64. All 

in NSC Country File, Vietnam, box 5, LBJL. For Harkins’ reaction, see Greene Interv, 6 Jun 

65, pp. 4–7; and Interv, MACV Historian’s Offi ce with Lt Col Richard A. Naldrett, 22 Jun 65, 

Historians fi les, CMH. On Westmoreland as acting COMUSMACV, see Ernest B. Furgurson, 

Westmoreland: The Inevitable General (Boston: Little, Brown, 1968), pp. 297–99. 15 The standard biography is Furgurson, Westmoreland. For a less fl attering sketch, 

see Halberstam, Best and Brightest, pp. 663–82. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 9, 

27–28, 39–43, 65–67, 102, and 240, describes his introduction to Vietnam and previous 

involvement with counterinsurgency. Other views of Westmoreland: Palmer, 25-Year 

War, p. 40; Weede Interv, 23 Jul 73, pp. 11–12. Interv, Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Program 

with Gen Harold K. Johnson, 27 Jan 72–30 Oct 74, sec. 15, pp. 20–21 and sec. 16, pp. 

11–12, MHI. 16 First quote is from Ltr, Palmer to Vann, 14 Jan 64, John P. Vann Papers, MHI. Second is from Memo, Forrestal for McGeorge Bundy, 26 May 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 17 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, p. 85. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 313–

16. For Taylor’s authority, see Msg, State 20 to AmEmb Saigon, 2 Jul 64, NSC Country 

File, Vietnam, box 6, LBJL. Westmoreland quote is from A Soldier Reports, p. 68; see also 

p. 70.

Chap 4.indd 149 
150

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

18 Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 193–94. On embassy personnel, se

Msgs, Taylor JCS 3118–64 to Westmoreland, 24 Jun 64; and Westmoreland MAC 317

to Taylor, 24 Jun 64. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64; CMH. Taylo

and MACV staff: Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 8; Sternberg Interv, p. 1. Adams Interv, p. 

Interv, MACV Historian’s Offi ce with Maj Gen Gen Sternberg, Historians fi les, CMH. 19 MFR, Col J. E. Arthur, sub: Proposed Revision of MACV Structure, with at

Memo, ACofS, J5 for Harkins, sub: Revision of MACV Command Structure, 1 Sep 6

Taylor Papers, NDU. “Consolidation of MAAG and MACV,” pp. 1–2 , in MACV Hi

torical Records, File 206–02, Historians’ Background Material (1965) Files, J1 Month

Historical Summaries, Historians fi les, CMH. USMACV Command History, 1964, 

10. Stilwell Interv, 11 Jul 65, p. 2, emphasizes Harkins’ continuing belief that MAC

was a “short term venture,” as well as his reluctance to eliminate the job of his frien

General Timmes, the MAAG chief. 20 “Consolidation of MAAG and MACV,” pp. 2–3; USMACV Command Histor

1964, pp. 10–11; Ltr, Harkins to CINCPAC, Mar 64, sub: Study on Reorganization 

Hq MACV and MAAG, IS 322 (11 Jul 65), Historians fi les, CMH. For an example 

Army support, see Memo, Mock for Distribution, 12 Mar 64 sub: CINCUSARPAC O

servations, with encl, Ltr, Gen J. F. Collins to CofS, 29 Feb 64, CS 320 (12 Mar 64). O

Westmoreland’s role, see Ltr, Stilwell to Gen Johnson, 12 Mar 64. Both in Historian

fi les, CMH. 21 Harkins, MACV Reorganization Study, Mar 64. “Consolidation of MAAG an

MACV,” pp. 3–6; USMACV Command History, 1964, pp. 11–12. 22 Msg, CINCPAC to JCS, 22 Mar 64; 1st end., CINCPAC, to Ltr, COMUSMACV MA

J1 Ser 0415, 23 Apr 64, 1 May 64. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. CINCPAC Comman

History, 1964, p. 307. “Consolidation MAAG and MACV,” pp. 6–8. 23 “Consolidation of MAAG and MACV,” p. 10; Talking Paper for the JCS for th

SecDef/JCS Meeting, 6 Apr 64, sub: JCS 2343/335–5—Vietnam and Southeast Asia, J

T–49–64, Historians fi les, CMH; Note by the Secretaries to the JCS on Vietnam an

Southeast Asia, 8 Apr 64; Memo, Gen Taylor for SecDef, 8 Apr 64, sub: Vietnam an

Southeast Asia (JCSM–288–64), Memo, McNamara for JCS, sub: MACV/MAAG Reorg

nization. All in IS 322 (11 Jul 65), box 1, 68A3305, RG 330, NARA. 24 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 12–14, 17. “Consolidation MAAG an

MACV,” pp. 8–14; CINCPAC Command History, 1964, pp. 307–08. Msg, COMUSMAC

MAC 3067 to CINCPAC, 20 Apr 64; HQ MACV Dirs 10–2, 25 Apr 64; 35–4, 21 May 6

35–7, 14 Jul 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 3700 to DA

CNO, CSAF, CMC, JCS, 6 May 64, File 204–58 (201–45) Organizational Planning Fil

(RVNAF) (1964), box 2, 69A702, RG 334, NARA; Stilwell Interv, 11 Jul 65, pp. 3–4. 25 In this period, the Joint Table of Distribution of the combined MACV and MAA

headquarters included the Army, Navy, and Air Force advisory teams as well as th

command and staff. Hence, before the 15 May reorganization, MACV headquarte

had a strength of 387 and the MAAG—headquarters and advisers combined—include

2,892 personnel. Under the 15 May JTD, total strength, consolidated headquarters an

advisers, was 3,677 and by the end of 1964 had risen to 4,889 as a result of increases 

the advisory force as well as the headquarters staff. These numbers did not include th

American personnel in aviation and other support units. 26 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 14–15, 32; ibid., 1965, pp. 74–75; CINCPA

Command History, 1964, p. 308 and Chart IV–A. JTD, HQ, MACV, 15 May 64, 

Ltr, HQ, MACV, to CINCPAC, 23 Apr 64, sub: MACV 15 May 64 JTD, with 1st end

CINCPAC to JCS, 1 May 64; Msgs, JCS 7765 and 8053 to CSA, CNO, CSAF, CMC

CINCPAC, 6 and 24 Aug 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. 27 Msg, JCS 9743 to CINCPAC, 3 May 63, File 204–58 (201–45) Org Planning Files—

Chap 4.indd 150 
151

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

Functions, Missions, and Command Relationships (1963), box 1, 69A702, RG 334, 

NARA. Fact Sheet, MACV, 4 Mar 64, sub: Test and Evaluation Activities, in SecDef Conf 

MACV Notebook, Mar 64, Historians fi les, CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, p. 

439. CINCPAC Command History, 1965, pp. 344–46; MACV Dir 70–1, 21 Apr 64, no 

sub, Historians fi les, CMH. 28 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 22, 52–53, 63–64, 135, 157–59; ibid., 1965, 

pp. 94–95. MACV Fact Sheet, 3 Mar 64, sub: Review of COMUSMACV OPLAN 34A–64/

CAS Saigon OPLAN TIGER, in SecDef Conf MACV Notebook, Mar 64, Historians fi les, 

CMH. 29 For an example of administration concern with intelligence and reporting, see 

Memo, Forrestal for Bundy, 8 Jan 64, sub: Reporting on the Situation in South Vietnam, 

NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. Memo, ACSI for CofS, 3 Feb 64, sub: Intelligence Defi ciencies in SVN; Memo, Ops Br/Collection Div, 19 Mar 64, sub: Vietnam; Memo, Brig 

Gen D. V. Bennett for DCSOPS, 29 Apr 64, sub: USAF Representation on the MACV 

Staff. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Intervs, Marine Corps Oral History Program with 

Maj Gen Carl A. Youngdale, USMC (Ret.), 3 Jun 75 and 5 Mar 81, pp. 362–63, 367–69, 

MCHC, Washington, D.C. 30 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 40. Youngdale had been assistant chief of 

staff, G–2, at Headquarters, Marine Corps, during 1961–62; he came to MACV from 

command of the 1st Marine Brigade in Hawaii. See biographical sketch fi led with 

Youngdale Intervs, 3 Jun 75 and 5 Mar 81. 31 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 41–42, 47–48. Youngdale Interv, 5 Jun 65, 

pp. 7–8, 17. U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, Intelligence Guide and Operating Procedures, 19 Nov 64; MFR, n.d., sub: Day-to-Day Reconnaissance Plan in the RVN, 

Historians fi les, CMH. 32 The Army attaché in Saigon had become embroiled in institutional and personality clashes with Ambassador Lodge, and with Lodge’s special military assistant, Lt 

Col John M. Dunn. These political considerations, and McNamara’s preference for a 

single, unifi ed source of military reporting, sealed the fate of the attachés. See: Memo, 

Maj Gen E. C. Doleman, ACSI, for Dir, DIA, 7 Jan 64, sub: Operational Control of the 

Service Attachés in Vietnam by COMUSMACV; ACSI Talking Paper, 16 Jan 64, same 

sub; and Memo, Col R. C. Roth for ACSI, 16 Mar 64, sub: Transfer of USARMA Attaché Saigon Personnel to COMUSMACV. All in ACSI VN Gen File, 66A3138 3/33:36–1, 

Washington National Records Center (WNRC). 33 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 42–45; ibid., 1965, p. 465. Youngdale Interv, 5 Jun 65, pp. 5–6, 8–9, 14. Paper, “The Validity of Intelligence on the Viet Cong,” 

ca. 1963–64, att to Memo, Ops Br/Coll Div, 19 Mar 64, sub: Vietnam, Historians fi les, 

CMH. CIA Memo, 6 Apr 64, LBJL. Youngdale discusses MACV methods of developing 

Viet Cong order of battle in Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 7097 to CINCPAC, 29 Jul 64, 

NSF VN, vol. 14 Cables 7/64, box 6, LBJL. 34 Msg, Westmoreland to Taylor and Sec Arthur Sylvester, 8 Jun 64, tab 3, Westmoreland 

Hist File 6 (1 June–3 Aug 64), CMH. Hammond, Military and Media, 1962–1968, pp. 80–82. 35 Memo, CINCPAC for JCS, 13 Sep 63, sub: Reports of Counterinsurgency Progress, 

Vietnam, box 2, 71A226, RG 334, NARA. Msg, AmEmb Saigon to State, 21 Oct 63; NSF 

201 VN, vol. 20, 10/18–28/63, Memos and Misc, JFKL. Msg, State 552 to AmEmb Saigon, 9 Oct 63; MACV Dir 69, 6 Nov 63, sub: MACV Province Studies Working Group, 

Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, JCS 3689 to CINCPAC, 26 Nov 63; Msg, Nes to State, 3 Feb 

64. Both in NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. CINCPAC Command History, 1964, p. 

355. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 53–54. 36 Memo, William Bundy for Nes, 16 Jan 64, tab 4, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (Jan–4 

Feb 64). Memo, Chester L. Cooper for McNamara, 12 Mar 64, sub: Recommendations 

Chap 4.indd 151 
152

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

on Intelligence Reporting, tab 14, Westmoreland Hist fi le 3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64). Mem

Cooper for Sullivan, 24 Feb 64, sub: Washington Requirements for Reporting on th

War . . . Historians fi les, CMH; SecDef Conf, MACV Notebook, Mar 64; Memo, Wes

moreland for Mission Council, n.d., sub: Summary of MACV Reports to Higher Hea

quarters. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, Saigon 1925 to SecState, 7 Apr 64. Both 

NSC Country File, Vietnam, Boxes 1 and 3, LBJL. MACV Command History, 1964, p

53–56. COC quote is from Interv, author with Paul E. Suplizio, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tap

1, side 2, CMH. 37 Quote is from Ltr, Stilwell to Gen Johnson, 12 Mar 64, Historians fi les, CMH

MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 54–56; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, p. 8

For an example of Westmoreland’s reports to Taylor, see his Memo for Taylor, 8 Oct 6

sub: Monthly Assessment of Military Activity, September 1964, tab 65, Westmorelan

Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. Fact Sheet, Requirement for Reporting on Effectiv

ness of RVNAF Units and Leaders, in File 204–58(1001–09), Trng Op Files (65), box 

69A702, RG 334, NARA. 38 First quote is from Westmoreland MAC 2217 to Taylor, 6 May 64, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Second is from Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 24; see als

pp. 26–27. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 16–17; ibid.,1965, p. 92. MFR, Taylo

15 May 64, sub: Discussion in Joint Chiefs of Staff of a Deputy COMUSMACV; Fa

Sheet, n.d., sub: MACV 15 May 64 JTD; Taylor Papers, NDU. Msgs, Felt to Taylor, 7 Ma

64; and Wheeler WDC 4138 to Westmoreland, 20 Jun 64; Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Hammond, Military and Media, 1968–1973, pp. 83–85. Mem

Brig Gen D. V. Bennett for DSCOPS, 29 Apr 64, sub: USAF Representation on the MAC

Staff, Historians fi les, CMH. 39 Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 207–25; Adams Interv, p. 8. MACV Command Histor

1964, pp. 85, 88. Msg, JCS 4661 to CINCPAC, 1 Feb 64; Ltr, CINCUSAF to JCS, 8 Ap

64, with encl. “Comments on Topics Discussed at Keehi Beach Meeting, 12 Mar 64,” 

3. Both in Historians fi les, CMH; Ltr, Adm Sharp to Westmoreland, 10 Oct 64, tab 5

Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. Suplizio Intverv, 17 and 24 Jul 8

tape. 1, side 1, comments on the limited USAF representation in the MACV comb

operations center. 40 Quote is from Ltr, Wheeler to Westmoreland, 17 Sep 64, tab 23, Westmorelan

Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 86–87. Lt

Moore to Westmoreland, 30 May 64, in Book of Misc Facts, box 1, 67A4064, RG 33

NARA; Ltr, Sharp to Westmoreland, 10 Sep 64, tab 15, Westmoreland Hist File 8 

Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 3687–64, 3784–64 to Westmoreland, 28, 3

Jul 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Media and Congress: Ham

mond, Military and Media 1962–1968, pp. 76–78; Ltr, Sen John Stennis to McNamar

9 Jul 64, with atts., tab 25, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 June–3 Aug 64), CMH. Ms

Westmoreland MAC 6373 to Wheeler, 9 Dec 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 De

64, CMH. 41 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 4371, 4409 to Westmoreland, 3 and 5 Sep 64; Gen Johnso

WDC 5880 to Westmoreland, 3 Sep 64. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 De

64, CMH. 42 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 4790 to Wheeler, 4 Sep 64, Westm

reland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Westmoreland MA

5335, 5549 to Wheeler, 3, 19 Oct 64; Sharp to Westmoreland, 6 Sep 64, 9 Oct 6

Wheeler JCS 4522, 4795 to Westmoreland, 14 Sep 64, 15 Oct 64; Wheeler DIASO–

4726–64 to Sharp, 6 Oct 64. Ltr, Wheeler to Westmoreland, 17 Sep 64, tab 23, Westm

reland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, p. 93. 43 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 43–49, 54. Msgs, JCS 6473 and 6468 

Chap 4.indd 152 
153

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

CINCPAC, 25 May 64; CINCPAC to JCS, 23 and 27 May, 64; COMUSMACV MAC 

4259 to CINCPAC, 27 May 64. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, Box 5, LBJL. Msg, 

State 2095 to AmEmb Saigon, 27 May 64, in COMUSMACV Book of Misc Facts, box 1, 

67A4604, RG 334, NARA; MACV Command History, 1964, p. 76. 44 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 15–16, 56–61; ibid., 1965, pp. 75–76. U.S.–

Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 50–55; sec. 4.B.4, pp. 37–39. Msgs COMUSMACV 

MAC 4460 to CINCPAC, 1 Jun 64; Rusk State 205 to AmEmb Saigon, 21 Jul 64. 

Both in NSC Country File, Vietnam, Boxes 5 and 6, LBJL. Msgs, COMUSMACV MAC 

16180 to CINCPAC, 16 Jul 64; Taylor Saigon 125 to SecState, 17 Jul 64; CINCPAC to 

JCS, 20 Jul 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. MFRs, Westmoreland, 22 and 23 Jul 64, 

sub: Meeting with Gen Khiem, tab 20, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64), 

CMH. 45 South Vietnamese Special Forces command arrangements paralleled the 

American, with the corps commander exercising operational control. U.S.–Vietnam 

Relations, sec. 4.C.1, p. 73. Fact Sheet for Sec Army, sub: Command and Operational 

Control of U.S. Army Special Forces in the RVN, File OSA 000.76 Vietnam, 6/23/64, 

Historians fi les, CMH. Westmoreland’s concern about Special Forces command arrangements is expressed in the following, from which the quotes are taken: Memo for 

Spec Fcs Cmd, Apr 64, sub: Basis for Discussion of Special Forces Employment, tab 25, 

Westmoreland Hist File 3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64), CMH; MACV Command History, 1964, 

pp. 56–57, 90; Kelly, Special Forces, pp. 46–49, 64–74. 46 McNamara quotes are from Youngdale Interv, 3 Jun 75 and 5 Mar 75, pp. 361–

63. Memo, President Johnson for Taylor, 2 Dec 63; Memo, Taylor for President, 6 Dec 

63, sub: Assignment of Personnel to South Vietnam; Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 9407 

to JCS, 8 Dec 63. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. MACV Command History, 

1964, pp. 17–18. Talking Paper, sub: Quality of Military Personnel in Vietnam, tab 1, 

Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64), CMH. Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, pp. 28–29, 

recalls confusion caused by the new criteria. 47 Quotes are from Westmoreland, “Notes upon Taking Command,” tab 29, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64), CMH. In same historical fi le, see “Notes on Talk 

to Offi cers (Senior Advisers from Field) on Taking Command,” Jun 64, tab 29; Ltrs, 

Westmoreland to All Offi cers and Men of USMACV, 20 Jun 64, tab 8; to Component 

Commanders and Senior Advisers, Jul 64, tab 14; and to various correspondents, 22 

Jun 64, tab 10; HQ, MACV Dir 360–3, 2 Jul 64, tab 14. Hammond, Military and Media, 

1962–1968, p. 82. Stilwell Interv, 11 Jul 65, p. 3. 48 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 9. MACV Dir 10–8, 22 Oct 64, tab 15, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64), CMH. Quote is from Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 25; see 

also pp. 10–11, 14, 17, 22–26. Stilwell Interv, 11 Jul 65, pp. 3–4; Naldrett Interv, 22 Jun 65, 

pp. 2–4; Youngdale Interv, 5 Jun 65, pp. 25–26; Suplizio Interv, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 1, sides 

1 and 2; tape 4, side 1; Adams Interv, pp. 5–6, 17. Sternberg Interv, Historians fi les, CMH, 

pp. 4–5. Interv, Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Program with Gen William B. Rosson, 1981, p. 

328, MHI, notes Westmoreland’s emphasis on anticipatory planning. 49 Offi ce locations are specifi ed in MACV Dir 10–2, 25 Apr 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 

MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 140–41, 175; CINCPAC Command History, 1965, p. 

537. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports pp. 247–48; Suplizio Interv, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 1, 

side 1; tape 3, side 2; Adams Interv, pp. 5–6. 50 Quote is from MACV Command History, 1964, p. 19; see also p. 18. Adams Interv, pp. 6, 15; 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 3, sides 1 and 2; Col Francis F. Parry, “The War 

Generation,” pt. 4, p. 7, in Parry Family Papers, MHI; Youngdale Interv, 3 Jun 75 and 5 

Mar 81, pp. 13, 15, 22. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 1120 to OSD, 13 Feb 64, Historians 

fi les, CMH.

Chap 4.indd 153 
154

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

51 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 0196 to CINCPAC, 9 Jan 64; Talking Paper, 30 No

63, sub: Additional Actions Which Could Be Taken to Facilitate Attainment of US O

jectives in SVN, tabs 1–C and 1–E, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (Jan 64–4 Feb 64), CMH

Msgs, CINCPAC to JCS, 25 Jan 64; COMUSMACV MAC 1266 to CINCPAC, 19 Feb 6

Lodge Saigon 2331 to SecState, 28 May 64. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, Boxes 

2, and 5, LBJL. CHIEN THANG Plan, 22 Feb 64, Historians fi les, CMH; MACV Comman

History, 1964, pp. 64–65. 52 The original thirteen were Quang Ngai, Quang Tin, Binh Dinh, Dinh Tuon

Phuoc Thanh, Binh Duong, Tay Ninh, Hau Nghia, Long An, Kien Hoa, Kien Tuon

Chuong Thien, and An Xuyen. Evolution of the list is reviewed in Msg, Taylor Saigo

338 to SecState, 7 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, SecDef to Lodge,12 Dec 63; Ms

Defense 934322 to CINCPAC, 21 Dec 63; Msg, AmEmb Saigon 1925 to SecState, 7 Ap

64; Msg, State/DOD/CIA/AID State 1674 to Lodge, 11 Apr 64. All in NSC Country Fil

Vietnam, LBJL. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 17–19, 81–82. 53 Summary Record of the Meeting on Southeast Asia, Cabinet Room, June 1

1964, 5:30 PM. . . . , NSC File—Files of McGeorge Bundy, LBJL. 54 First Westmoreland quote is from Notes to Advisers on Day of Takeover, Histor

ans fi les, CMH. Quote on bombs is from Memo, Westmoreland for Ch, JRATA, 1 Ma

64, sub: Type of Ordnance Being Used in South Vietnam, tab 5, Westmoreland Hi

File 5 (6–30 May 64), CMH. Directive to All Offi cers and Men, USMACV, 1 Oct 64, su

Civic Action in Vietnam, tab 49, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64); Mem

Westmoreland for Taylor, 8 Dec 64, sub: Comments on Talking Paper re Strengthenin

the GVN, tab 6, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (7–31 Dec 64). All in CMH. The program

ming effort is recounted in MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 66–67. 55 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 68–70. The rise and fall of the Nes Commi

tee are traced in tab 9, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (Jan–4 Feb 64), CMH; and in tabs 4, 

10, 11, and 22, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64). All in CMH. 56 Paper, Stilwell, 10 Mar 64, sub: Counterinsurgency Vitalization, tab 13, Wes

moreland Hist File 3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64), CMH. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 1370 

CINCPAC, 23 Feb 64, NSC Country File Vietnam, Box 2, LBJL, describes Khanh’s org

nization. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 2815 to Taylor, 6 Jun 64, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Mr. Hurt, Dep D

USOM, 29 Jun 64, tab 9; see also MACV Draft Working Paper, 2 Jun 64, sub: Unite

States–Vietnamese Province Task Force Executive and Administrative Mission . . . , ta

2. Both in Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64), CMH. 57 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 86–87; sec. 4.C.8, pp. 8, 21–22. Taylo

Swords and Plowshares, pp. 317–18. Eckhardt, Command and Control, p. 48. Msg, Taylo

Saigon 41 to SecState, 7 Jul 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, Box 6, LBJL. Mission Coun

cil Action Memo 1, tab 16, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 June–3 Aug 64), CMH. Supliz

Interv, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 4, side 1; Sternberg Interv, pp. 1–3. On district advisers, s

Memos, James S. Killen for Westmoreland, 27 Aug 64; Westmoreland for Killen, 2 Sep 6

sub: Terms of Reference; tab 8, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. 58 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 68; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, p

66–67; sec. 4.C.8, p. 1. Talking Paper for Gen Westmoreland with Gen Khanh, sub: Ta

Force for Coordination of Pacifi cation in the Area of Saigon, tab 7, Westmoreland Hi

File 6 (1 Jun–3 Aug 64); Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 14 Nov 64, sub: Assumptio

by the US of Operational Control of the Pacifi cation Program . . . , tab 3, Westmorelan

Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64). Both in CMH. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 5423 to CJC

25 Jun 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. MACV Fact Sheet, 19 Jun 64, sub: Com

bined GVN–US Effort to Intensify Pacifi cation Efforts in Critical Provinces. Historian

fi les, CMH. 

Chap 4.indd 154 
155

Reorganizing and Reviving Pacifi cation

59 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 68; ibid., 1965, pp. 231–32; U.S.–Vietnam 

Relations, sec. 4.C.8, pp. 1–2. MFR, Col M. J. L. Greene, 9 Sep 64, sub: HOP TAC Briefi ng, 

tab 14; Msg, Taylor to SecState, 18 Sep 64, tab 28. Both in Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 

Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 19 Oct 64, sub: Weekly Assessment of Military Activity . . . , tab 14, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64); 

Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 14 Nov 64, sub: Assumption by US of Operational 

Control of the Pacifi cation Program . . . , tab 3, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 

Dec 64). All in CMH. Suplizio Interv, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 4, side 1. 60 For varying assessments of HOP TAC, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, pp. 

67–69; sec. 4.C.8, pp. 2–5; MACV Command History, 1964, p. 68; Westmoreland, A 

Soldier Reports, pp. 84–86. Westmoreland quote is from Memo for Taylor, 18 Jan 65, sub: 

Weekly Assessment of Military Activity . . . , tab 26, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (1–22 

Jan 65), CMH; in same fi le, see tab 7. Westmoreland sees progress in Msgs MAC 4830 

and 6191 to Wheeler and Sharp, 6 Sep 64 and 28 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. 61 Typical American views of the effect of government instability on the counterinsurgency effort, and of the sources of that instability, can be found in Msg, Taylor 

Saigon 377 to President and SecState, 10 Aug 64; and U.S. Intelligence Board, Special 

National Intelligence Estimate (SNIE), 8 Sep 64. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 62 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 88–98, 102; sec. 4.C.2(c), pp. 69–72, 79–80; 

sec. 4.C.3, p. 53; sec. 4.C.9(a), pp. i–ii, 54–66; Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 317–

37. Memo, Brig Gen William E. DePuy for Westmoreland, 26 Feb 65, sub: The Armed 

Forces Council, William E. DePuy Papers, MHI, evaluates that political body from the 

MACV perspective. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 2–5, describes the civil functions of South Vietnamese military commanders. 63 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 56–58, 60, 63–64, 95; sec. 4.C.9(a), pp. vi, 

50; Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 318, 355–56. MACV Command History, 1964, p. 

42; Youngdale Interv, 5 Jun 65, p. 2; Suplizio Interv, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 1, sides 1 

and 2; and Greene Interv, 6 Jun 65, p. 23, recount MACV’s efforts to keep track of coup 

activity. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 62–74, 90–98, gives his version of coup 

events. Westmoreland’s contacts with the Vietnamese generals on a variety of matters 

can be sampled in his Historical Files, Jun 64–Feb 65, CMH. Memo, Maj W. E. LeGro, 

27 Aug 64, sub: Changes in Government, Vietnam, with att. Resume of Questions and 

Answers, Telecon with Gen Westmoreland, 25 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 64 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6191 to Wheeler, 28 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH; in same fi le, Msg, Westmoreland MAC 4830 

to Wheeler, 6 Sep 64. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 0961 and 0985 to Wheeler, 24 Feb 65, 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 14 

Sep 64, sub: Military Personnel to be Contacted, tab 18; “Discussion with Senior Offi cers of the RVNAF,” Sep 64, tab 34; Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 1 Oct 64, sub: 

Your Memorandum of September 16th . . . ; tab 52, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 

Oct 64), CMH. 65 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 122–24. Kelly, Special Forces, pp. 63–64. 

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 77–80. 66 Ltr, Westmoreland to Gen Khanh, 25 Sep 64, tab 39, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 

Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH. DePuy’s account of his mission is in Romie L. Brownlee and William J. Mullen III, Changing an Army: An Oral History of General William E. DePuy, USA 

Retired (Washington, D.C.: Military History Institute and Center of Military History, 

1988), pp. 126–28;. Negotiations are recounted in Kelly, Special Forces, p. 64. 67 Memo, Westmoreland for Col John H. Spears, 6 Oct 64, sub: Mission and Command Relationships, tab 62, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (1 Sep–8 Oct 64), CMH.

Chap 4.indd 155 
156

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

68 Quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 31 Oct 64, sub: U.S. Postu

toward the Emerging GVN, tab 24, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64), CMH

See also, Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 14 Nov 64, sub: Assumption by U.S. of O

erational Control of the Pacifi cation Program in SVN, tab 3, Westmoreland Hist File 1

(14 Nov–7 Dec 64), CMH. For examples of U.S. pessimism, see U.S.–Vietnam Relation

sec. 4.C.1, p. 98; sec. 4.C.3, pp. 9–11; sec. 4.C.9(a), pp. i–ii. For views that America

programs were unrealistic at best, see MACV Command History, 1964, p. 125; also p

68–69 and Paper, Earl J. Young, 31 Jul 64 sub: Strategic Hamlet Program in Long A

Prov, Historians fi les, CMH.

Chap 4.indd 156 
5

The Beginning of Escalation

During 1964 the Johnson administration slowly moved toward a 

decision to implement the second track of NSAM 288: carrying the 

war to North Vietnam. From the beginning of the enlarged American 

role in the confl ict, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had favored direct use of 

U.S. forces against the insurgency’s support base. The president and 

his civilian advisers gradually came around to their point of view, as 

did Ambassadors Lodge and Taylor. Different advisers at different times 

held varying views on the reasons for going north, on the manner of 

doing so, and on the results to be expected. The Joint Chiefs consistently advocated heavy air strikes aimed at destroying Hanoi’s will and 

ability to support the southern insurgency; Lodge, Taylor, and many 

State and Defense Department civilians believed that a more limited 

campaign would bring the war’s costs home to the North Vietnamese 

leaders and result in negotiations on acceptable terms. Offi cials also argued that bombing the north would strengthen South Vietnamese confi dence in America’s commitment to the struggle and that the prospect 

of such operations would constitute an additional inducement to the 

Saigon leaders to stabilize and reform their government. Finally, as the 

pacifi cation effort fl oundered and seemed headed for defeat, attacks on 

the north came to be seen as the only additional expedient available 

for halting, and perhaps reversing, the adverse course of events. Ambassador Taylor declared early in January 1965: “We are presently on a 

losing track and must risk a change. . . . The game needs to be opened 

up and new opportunities offered for new breaks which hopefully may 

be in our favor.”1

Widening the War

President Johnson edged into escalation a step at a time, his apparent doubts about its effectiveness reinforced by election campaign 

politics and by a desire to have something resembling a stable government in place in Saigon before attacking North Vietnam in force.2

During the fi rst half of 1964, the president combined diplomatic warnings to Hanoi with the launching of a not very successful campaign of 

Chap 5.indd 157 
158

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

small-scale South Vietnamese maritime and airborne commando raid

into the north. In May he authorized limited American air operation

in Laos, both to counter a new Pathet Lao offensive and to reconnoite

and harass the Ho Chi Minh Trail. At the same time, the Joint Chief

the Pacifi c Command, and MACV began contingency planning fo

American and South Vietnamese air attacks on North Vietnam.

Those plans received their initial implementation in August, wit

Navy air raids in retaliation for North Vietnamese attacks on U.S. de

stroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin. President Johnson took this occasio

to secure from Congress, on 7 August, a resolution authorizing him 

to “take all necessary steps, including the use of armed force,” to a

sist any Southeast Asian nation threatened by Communist aggression

Yet the cautious Johnson delayed decisive action until well after h

reelection. Following a climactic civilian-military policy review in lat

November, the president early in December committed himself to 

two-phase program. The fi rst phase was to consist of continued com

mando raids, intensifi ed air operations in Laos, and bombing of Nort

Vietnam in reprisal for major Viet Cong depredations in the south. A

the same time, the United States and South Vietnam were to plan to

gether for the second phase—a campaign of gradually intensifying a

strikes against the north, to be launched once the Saigon governmen

met certain minimum requirements for stability and effectiveness. 

The Military Assistance Command played a major part in the plan

ning and execution of each escalatory step. However, throughout 1964

Generals Harkins and Westmoreland took a conservative attitude towar

expansion of the confl ict, and especially toward attacking North Vietnam

Both commanders assessed South Vietnam’s short-term prospects for su

vival more optimistically than did other American offi cials; they believe

that with a stable, reasonably effi cient government, the South Vietnames

could beat the Viet Cong on their own ground. Conversely, they feare

that premature assaults on the north would provoke strong Communist r

taliation in the south before Saigon was prepared to counter it. Both com

manders also insisted that even if Hanoi could be forced to reduce or ha

its support of the insurgency, the struggle in the south for control of th

people still would decide the issue.

In May, during early discussions of going north, General Harkin

commented: “Declarations of war, bombing of North Vietnam and th

other peripheral actions proposed or discussed can only be helpful afte

the GVN has demonstrated by concrete results its . . . capability to wi

the pacifi cation campaign on the home grounds.” General Westmore

land strongly supported commando raids on North Vietnam and a

and ground operations in Laos against the Ho Chi Minh Trail. He als

favored air reprisals against the north for major Viet Cong attacks o

American installations. Nevertheless, until early 1965 he urged that th

United States delay any sustained campaign against the north until th

South Vietnamese had achieved a measure of governmental stabilit

Chap 5.indd 158 
159

The Beginning of Escalation

and were militarily better prepared to defeat any Communist counterescalation. “We must assure ourselves that [the] GVN is established on [a] 

reasonably fi rm political, military and psychological base,” he declared 

on 27 November, “before we risk the great strains that may be incurred 

by vigorous external operations.” Consistent with his view on reprisals, Westmoreland supported Ambassador Taylor’s unsuccessful calls 

for a forceful U.S. response to the Viet Cong’s destructive mortaring of 

Bien Hoa Air Base in November and the blowing up of the Brink Hotel 

(which was serving as a bachelor offi cers quarters) in Saigon the following month. At the end of the year, in the light of continuing political 

upheaval in Saigon, the MACV commander fi nally joined the ambassador in recommending an immediate bombing campaign. He recalled 

later that, “like Ambassador Taylor, . . . I could see no viable alternative 

within current policy restrictions and a reasonable time frame.”3

OPLAN 34A

The Military Assistance Command planned and conducted a program of covert South Vietnamese airborne and amphibious raids into 

North Vietnam. Pacifi c Command had developed the concept for these 

operations in mid-1963, expanding on a Central Intelligence Agency 

effort carried on, without much effect, during the previous two years. 

At a Honolulu conference shortly after Diem’s overthrow, Secretary McAerial view of Bien Hoa Air Base after a Communist mortar attack (AP photo)

Chap 5.indd 159 
160

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Namara reviewed CINCPAC’s concept and directed MACV and the CI

jointly to prepare a detailed twelve-month plan for implementing it.

The two agencies completed their Operation Plan (OPLAN) 34A i

mid-December. They proposed a total of over 2,000 activities, in thre

ascending categories of scale and severity, to include reconnaissanc

psychological warfare, and sabotage operations as well as small-scal

military attacks. All were to be conducted by South Vietnamese ai

ground, and naval units supplemented by Asian, mostly Chinese Na

tionalist, mercenaries. MACV and the CIA would furnish equipmen

advisers, and base facilities within South Vietnam; but no American

were to enter North Vietnam. After an interdepartmental committee i

Washington reviewed the plan and refi ned the proposed list of action

President Johnson on 16 January 1964 authorized commencement o

the fi rst, most limited, phase of OPLAN 34A on 1 February. Ambassado

Lodge and General Harkins then secured South Vietnamese approval o

the plan—an essential step since the Saigon government would furnis

most of the forces involved.5

Aside from a jurisdictional dispute over responsibility for certai

agency-run activities along the North Vietnam–Laos border, the Mil

tary Assistance Command and the Central Intelligence Agency coope

ated with little diffi culty in carrying out OPLAN 34A. To conduct th

commando operations, General Harkins in March established the Spe

cial Operations Group, later retitled Studies and Observations Group

within MACV headquarters. Headed by an Army colonel with a CI

deputy and with an initial strength of 99 military people and 31 civi

ians, the group commanded the American personnel engaged in 34

and other special operations and advised, assisted, and supported th

South Vietnamese armed forces in planning and carrying out the mi

sions. Although the MACV commander had operational control o

SOG, fi nal implementing authority for its activities rested elsewher

On the basis of monthly lists of activities recommended by MACV, th

Defense Department, in consultation with the White House and Stat

Department, made the fi nal selections of operations to be conducte

and retained a veto over the launching of every raid.6

Operations under OPLAN 34A began slowly and initially produce

only meager results, due to shortages of equipment and inadequatel

trained, undermotivated personnel. However, they gradually expand

ed in number and destructiveness. By mid-1964, besides a variety o

propaganda and psychological warfare activities, they included sma

amphibious raids and bombardments of shore targets by fast arme

motorboats. In August, the Tonkin Gulf incident, which grew out o

the 34A raids, caused the United States to suspend the operations an

temporarily to shift the maritime forces involved from their base at D

Nang farther south to Cam Ranh Bay. The allies resumed the attack

early in October, but the stormy weather of the northeast monsoo

limited their number and effectiveness. As 1964 ended, nevertheles

Chap 5.indd 160 
161

The Beginning of Escalation

the headquarters in Honolulu and Saigon were planning for continuation of the program, to include additional shore attacks and capture of 

North Vietnamese naval and civilian vessels. The Johnson administration at the same time granted Westmoreland more fl exibility in scheduling activities on the monthly approved list. The MACV commander 

favored keeping up the incursions, without publicly acknowledging 

them, less for their military effect than for the display they made of 

American determination and their potential as a “real boost” to South 

Vietnamese morale.7

Air and Ground Operations in Laos

Simultaneously with its preparations for 34A operations, the Military Assistance Command in cooperation with South Vietnamese 

forces developed a series of plans for ground reconnaissance, harassment, and blockage of the enemy’s supply routes through the panhandle of southern Laos. MACV badly needed information about Viet 

Cong infi ltration and base construction in the area, but most sources 

for intelligence of that sort had dried up after the Geneva Accords of 

mid-1962. Early in 1964 the command reoriented the Special Forces’ 

CIDG program toward border surveillance, and it sought the opportunity to use these and other forces to penetrate Laos. That became 

possible in March 1964 when Laotian Premier Souvanna Phouma, as 

part of a reestablishment of diplomatic relations with South Vietnam, 

granted Saigon’s forces the right to conduct limited air and ground 

operations in the panhandle against the common enemy. About the 

same time, the Defense Department and the CIA agreed to transfer 

the agency’s remaining paramilitary activities in southern Laos to 

MACV’s control.8

To take advantage of the emerging opportunity, the MACV J5 section developed plans during March for employing patrols and aerial 

surveillance to locate enemy forces in the panhandle and then larger 

ground attacks and air strikes to disrupt their activities. At Secretary 

McNamara’s recommendation, President Johnson in mid-March incorporated incursions into Laos into NSAM 288, his fi rst major Vietnam 

policy directive. However, Ambassador Leonard Unger in Vientiane objected to operations on any but the smallest scale to avoid upsetting the 

fragile Laotian balance of power. Eventually, he agreed to the launching of covert six-man reconnaissance patrols, inserted and withdrawn 

by air. Early in May, at the direction of the Joint Chiefs, the Military 

Assistance Command and the South Vietnamese high command began 

combined preparation for these operations, code-named LEAPING LENA. 

The American and South Vietnamese Special Forces headquarters, coordinated by MACV’s Intelligence Directorate, did the detail work. The 

allies set up training facilities at Nha Trang for the personnel, selected 

from the South Vietnamese Special Forces, and dispatched their fi rst 

Chap 5.indd 161 
162

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fi ve teams across the border on 24–25 June. At the same time, the

began planning for more ambitious overt company- and battalion-siz

cross-border incursions, to involve regular infantry elements from 

and II Corps as well as the Special Forces.9

These plans and preparations came to naught. The Vietnamese Spe

cial Forces (VNSF), which had suffered severe disruption in the aftermat

of Diem’s overthrow, lacked the leadership, training, and motivatio

for the airborne operations originally contemplated. Most members o

the fi rst teams inserted were lost or straggled back to South Vietnam 

on foot after obtaining no signifi cant information. VNSF leadershi

defi ciencies meanwhile gave rise to riots among the troops at the Nh

Trang base that set back preparations for the entire program. MAC

and the Joint General Staff then shifted to planning for limited incu

sions on foot by CIDG elements, with possible larger ground offensive

to follow. However, continued disagreements with the Vientiane em

bassy, the South Vietnamese political upheavals, and the Montagnar

revolt prevented any signifi cant action. In late October, General Wes

moreland had to report to the Joint Chiefs that the South Vietnames

could not undertake cross-border operations before 1 January 1965. Fo

the rest of the year, the allies’ harassment of the Ho Chi Minh Trail wa

limited to occasional strikes by T–28s from the Royal Laotian Air Forc

with U.S. Air Force combat air patrols fl ying cover.10

In contrast to the stumbling pace of ground operations, Amer

can air activity over Laos expanded rapidly during 1964. Early in Ma

the administration, with Souvanna Phouma’s acquiescence, directe

MACV to conduct low-level reconnaissance fl ights with Air Force an

Navy jets over the panhandle and over the Plain of Jars in norther

Laos, the major battlefi eld of the Royal Laotian and Pathet Lao force

Besides providing MACV with information on enemy infi ltration int

South Vietnam, these missions, code-named YANKEE TEAM, were to fu

nish intelligence to friendly Laotians and demonstrate to both allie

and enemies U.S. resolve in Southeast Asia. General Westmoreland

through the 2d Air Division, coordinated YANKEE TEAM operation

which involved Thailand-based Air Force RF–101s and Navy RF–8A

from carriers in the South China Sea. He allocated sorties in respons

to his own intelligence requirements, and to those of the Joint Chief

the Pacifi c Command, and the American embassy in Vientiane.11 

Begun as a reconnaissance program, YANKEE TEAM soon took on 

more lethal aspect. In June, after Pathet Lao gunners shot down a Nav

jet over the Plain of Jars, fi ghter escorts began accompanying YANKE

TEAM missions. They conducted suppressive strikes against Commu

nist positions and, after the Tonkin Gulf incident, were authorized t

engage any enemy planes that interfered with the operations. In Au

gust, General Westmoreland recommended expansion of YANKEE TEA

to include outright attacks in the panhandle by Vietnamese Air Forc

and FARM GATE planes. The State Department vetoed this proposal, o

Chap 5.indd 162 
163

The Beginning of Escalation

the familiar grounds that the raids 

would excessively compromise 

Souvanna’s increasingly pro forma 

neutrality, but later in the fall 

agreed to operations by Laotian 

aircraft with YANKEE TEAM escorts. 

Finally, on 12 December, as part 

of President Johnson’s program 

of increased pressure on North 

Vietnam, the United States inaugurated Operation BARREL ROLL, a 

campaign of deliberate air attacks 

against enemy troops, infi ltration 

routes, and installations throughout the panhandle and Plain of 

Jars. As with YANKEE TEAM, General 

Westmoreland acted as CINCPAC’s 

coordinator for these missions, 

but CINCPAC and the Joint Chiefs 

occasionally intervened in matters of operational detail. By the 

end of the year, American aircraft 

had fl own more than 1,500 sorties over Laos, all but a handful under 

YANKEE TEAM.

12

As coordinator of YANKEE TEAM and BARREL ROLL, and as planner and 

potential executor of cross-border ground incursions, Westmoreland 

had to work closely with the U.S. ambassador to Vientiane. Both Ambassador Unger and William L. Sullivan, who replaced Unger in December, through the defense attaché offi ce in the Vientiane embassy, 

were conducting an unacknowledged but expanding ground and air 

war against the Pathet Lao and North Vietnamese centered around 

the Plain of Jars, with the ground fi ghting done by the Royal Laotian 

Army and by CIA-assisted Meo tribal irregulars. For practical purposes 

Unger and Sullivan could veto any Military Assistance Command proposal for operations in Laos. The ambassadors, understandably, evaluated such proposals from the perspective of their own war in Laos 

rather than the one MACV was waging in South Vietnam. In an effort to improve coordination of American activities in South Vietnam, 

Laos, and Thailand (the base for some YANKEE TEAM aircraft and an occasional clandestine participant in the ground fi ghting in Laos), Ambassador Taylor during the autumn secured State Department permission to form a Coordinating Committee for U.S. Missions in Southeast 

Asia (SEACOORD). This body consisted of the ambassadors to Saigon, 

Vientiane, and Bangkok and their military assistants, as well as representatives of Pacifi c Command. Westmoreland participated in both 

his own capacity and as commander of U.S. forces in Thailand. The 

Ambassador Sullivan 

(© Bettmann/CORBIS photo)

Chap 5.indd 163 
164

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

committee met monthly to review and harmonize the activities of th

three country teams, concentrating at its initial sessions on the detai

of air operations in Laos.13

In deference to JCS and CINCPAC concern that SEACOORD woul

duplicate or disrupt existing military chains of command, Taylor aban

doned plans for a formal parallel military committee. Instead, Genera

Westmoreland consulted informally with the other military countr

team members during SEACOORD meetings. Westmoreland reassure

General Wheeler that he would keep CINCPAC and the JCS informe

of what went on in SEACOORD meetings and that “the interest o

the military will be protected during the course of committee delib

erations.” Further reassuring the military leaders, Secretary McNamar

declared on 9 December that, as far as he was concerned, the establish

ment of SEACOORD did not change existing command relationship

The question of command relations aside, Westmoreland expecte

SEACOORD to be “helpful to us locally through the forum that it pro

vides to exchange ideas and points of view and to effect operations.”

The Military Assistance Command’s interest in air and ground op

erations in Laos was only one aspect of its larger effort to determine th

dimensions of, and to interfere with, the movement of enemy troop

equipment, and supplies across South Vietnam’s borders. Besides Lao

the command devoted much attention to formally neutral Cambodi

which it believed was the source of the increasing number of Com

munist–bloc weapons appearing in the Mekong Delta. During 196

the MACV J3 developed plans for a physical barrier along stretches o

the Cambodian border; and the country team pressed the Saigon gov

ernment to tighten its controls on vessels passing up the Mekong t

Phnom Penh. In connection with border control, Westmoreland we

comed a JCS proposal late in the year for stationing an internationa

so-called KANZUS (Korea, Australia, New Zealand, United States) forc

along the Demilitarized Zone. Built around a U.S. division, this forc

would deploy in conjunction with renewed bombing of the north t

deter or repel any retaliatory North Vietnamese ground attack. Wes

moreland put his own staff and that of the U.S. Military Assistanc

Command, Thailand, to work on proposals for using the force to re

strict enemy infi ltration into South Vietnam, as well as to block a direc

assault. The MACV commander argued throughout 1964 that “borde

control operations into Laos and positive control actions at the borde

of Cambodia” would benefi t the counterinsurgency campaign mor

than would attacks on North Vietnam.15

Early Planning for the Air War

MACV’s planning for the 34A raids and for operations in Laos too

place within the framework of more general escalation planning b

CINCPAC. On 18 March the Joint Chiefs of Staff directed Admira

Chap 5.indd 164 
165

The Beginning of Escalation

Felt to prepare plans for three levels of action: antiinfi ltration operations on and across South Vietnam’s borders, retaliatory air raids to be 

launched on 72 hours’ notice against North Vietnam, and sustained 

air operations against the north to be undertaken on 30 days’ notice. 

These actions were to be executed primarily with South Vietnamese 

forces reinforced as necessary by the FARM GATE unit and by other U.S. 

air elements. Pacifi c Command in response prepared its Operation Plan 

37–64, completing the basic draft by 30 April. Thereafter, it gradually 

altered and expanded the plan, adding, for example, a list of ninetyfour targets in North Vietnam with detailed air strike plans for each. 

Late in the year, the command incorporated all its plans and those 

of its subordinate commands for action outside South Vietnam into a 

single document titled Plan 37.16

The Military Assistance Command, with the J5 section doing most 

of the work and the 2d Air Division contributing detailed target selections and strike plans, prepared its own supporting Operation Plan 

37–64 as well as the separate 34A–series plans. The command also recommended air strike targets for the list of ninety-four, both for onetime reprisals and for the sustained bombing campaign; but the Joint 

Chiefs and CINCPAC determined the fi nal roster. In Washington, a 

MACV representative participated in a JCS escalation war game, SIGMA

I–64, in which offi cials attempted to assess the effects of increased U.S. 

military pressure on the North Vietnamese. The results of the game 

indicated that the proposed strategy would lead only to a larger war. 

Especially after the Tonkin Gulf reprisal in August, MACV’s strike planning concentrated on the requirements for attacking particular North 

Vietnamese targets with Vietnamese Air Force, FARM GATE, and U.S. Air 

Force planes. General Westmoreland reported in late November that 

planning for strikes against the north was “well underway” and provided “smooth phasing” from initial Vietnamese raids through rising 

levels of intensity which would engage FARM GATE, U.S. Air Force, and 

U.S. Navy aircraft “as required to accomplish assigned missions.” Ancillary to the air war planning, MACV intelligence initiated studies of 

what effect an order from Hanoi to suspend hostilities, accompanied 

by reduction or termination of logistic support from the north, might 

actually have on the southern insurgency. All this activity was in addition to the command’s continuous review and updating of its entire 

range of U.S. and SEATO contingency plans.17

Besides taking part in unilateral American planning for attacks on 

the north, the Military Assistance Command, as directed by the ambassador, engaged in combined planning for such operations with the 

South Vietnamese. This activity went forward with frequent interruptions, as the Johnson administration tried to use suspension of the 

planning as a bargaining chip in pressuring the South Vietnamese to 

stabilize their government. In the aftermath of the Tonkin Gulf incident, the MACV J3 set up a Combined Planning Section to cooperate 

Chap 5.indd 165 
166

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

with personnel of the RVNAF high command on short-range escala

tion and defense preparations. By late August, MACV and the Join

General Staff were working together on 34A operations and projecte

incursions into Laos, as well as “targeting aspects” of air strikes again

North Vietnam. In late November, General Westmoreland informe

Ambassador Taylor that his command could offer the South Vietnam

ese a chance to participate in combined planning for actions rangin

from small covert air strikes as part of OPLAN 34A to a full-scale ove

campaign involving all the allied air forces.18

In connection with this air strike planning, in the immediate afte

math of the Tonkin Gulf incident Westmoreland sought for his head

quarters to have command of both future reprisal strikes and of th

prospective sustained campaign. On 7 August, he proposed to Admira

Sharp, Felt’s successor, that General Moore be made the allied com

bined air commander in South Vietnam, with operational control o

U.S. aircraft in the country and also of the South Vietnamese Air Forc

Under Westmoreland, Moore then would assign missions to all thos

forces, including strikes into North Vietnam and Laos. Admiral Sharp

however, had other ideas. On the 8th, the admiral informed Westmo

reland that he intended to conduct operations directly through his A

Force and Navy component commanders. MACV, at Sharp’s direction

President Johnson confers with Secretary of Defense McNamara and 

Ambassador Taylor. (© Bettmann/CORBIS photo)

Chap 5.indd 166 
167

The Beginning of Escalation

would control the operations only of the FARM GATE unit and the VNAF. 

General Moore would receive orders from Pacifi c Air Forces for U.S. Air 

Force missions and from Westmoreland for those by FARM GATE and the 

Vietnamese. This arrangement, Sharp believed, would “best utilize the 

command and control facilities available to me”; and it would allow the 

MACV commander to concentrate on the war within South Vietnam 

while monitoring air operations through General Moore. Westmoreland raised no immediate objection to Sharp’s dictum, in large measure 

because he was preoccupied during the next several months with the 

consequences of the Tonkin Gulf incident in South Vietnam.19

After Tonkin Gulf: Reinforcing the South

The Military Assistance Command had little infl uence upon and 

only secondary involvement in the Tonkin Gulf naval engagements of 

2–4 August and the ensuing American air strikes on North Vietnamese 

boat bases and oil storage sites. MACV received intelligence on North 

Vietnamese coast defenses from the DE SOTO patrols which the destroyers were conducting when they came under fi re, but the patrols themselves were directed by CINCPAC through Pacifi c Fleet.20 The president, 

the Joint Chiefs, and CINCPAC decided upon the 5 August reprisal 

without reference to MACV and employed Navy carrier planes for the 

mission. General Westmoreland participated only by accompanying 

Ambassador Taylor when he notifi ed General Khanh of the raids.21

The Tonkin Gulf engagements and retaliatory raids, nevertheless, 

had signifi cant effects on Military Assistance Command’s plans and 

activities. In response to the incidents and reprisals, the command had 

to prepare for the potential consequences within South Vietnam of further escalation. It also had to absorb a rapid buildup of American forces 

within its theater and deal with an increasing tempo of Viet Cong attacks on U.S. installations.

On the day of the air strikes, 5 August, General Westmoreland met 

with General Khanh and his senior RVNAF commanders to warn them 

that the Viet Cong would probably strike back within South Vietnam. 

He urged the Vietnamese to strengthen the defense of ports, airfi elds, 

and other vital installations and to launch offensive operations to 

throw the enemy off balance and disrupt his activities. Besides taking the security measures, Khanh placed his ground forces in I and 

II Corps, his air force, and his navy on maximum alert. In line with 

earlier statements of his advocating that the allies “Go North,” he grandiloquently threatened air reprisals of his own if the North Vietnamese 

or Chinese attacked his country. On a more practical level, Khanh established an emergency command post at Vung Tau, for which MACV 

provided communications and a small staff liaison element. MACV 

and the Joint General Staff rapidly sketched out a combined plan for 

countering a North Vietnamese or Chinese ground invasion of South 

Chap 5.indd 167 
168

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Vietnam. In response, however, to the end of the crisis and to unex

pectedly intense Vietnamese objection to foreign command of the

forces, the headquarters soon suspended this planning, and the 2d A

Division prepared for unilateral American retaliation for any new a

tacks on DE SOTO patrols. Those plans also proved academic, for th

administration suspended the operations after another Tonkin Gulf in

cident on 18 September.22

Simultaneously with the Tonkin Gulf reprisal, the United State

began building up its air and naval forces in Southeast Asia. On 5 Au

gust the Joint Chiefs of Staff directed the immediate deployment of ce

tain units earmarked for the third phase of OPLAN 37–64, a sustaine

air campaign, with the dual purpose of deterring enemy attacks an

preparing for further offensive action. During the next several week

in consequence, an additional carrier air group and an amphibious tas

group with a Marine brigade embarked took station in the South Chin

Sea. Meanwhile, two squadrons of Air Force B–57 Canberra jet bombe

deployed to Bien Hoa Air Base north of Saigon; the equivalent of tw

more squadrons of interceptors and fi ghter-bombers fl ew into Tan So

Nhut and Da Nang; detachments of reconnaissance and aerial refue

ing craft took station at Tan Son Nhut; and other squadrons, alread

in the Western Pacifi c or transferred from the United States, moved t

airfi elds in Thailand, Okinawa, and the Philippines. On Okinawa, 

Marine aircraft wing and an Army brigade both received alerts for po

sible movement to South Vietnam. In Hawaii, another Army brigad

increased its readiness for possible deployment to Thailand.23

To accommodate the infl ux of aircraft and personnel into Sout

Vietnam, the Military Assistance Command adjusted its air control faci

ities and hurriedly resumed planning—suspended under the 1963 with

drawal program—for enlarging its air bases and other installations. O

6 August, General Moore established a new 2d Air Division comman

post at Tan Son Nhut, separate from the combined USAF/VNAF contro

system, through which to discharge his expanding command respon

sibilities throughout Southeast Asia. General Westmoreland had begu

air base expansion planning in June, when he realized that deploymen

under CINCPAC’s contingency plans would overload South Vietnam

three jet fi elds at Tan Son Nhut, Bien Hoa, and Da Nang. He accelerate

this effort in August, appointing master planning boards at the majo

bases and conducting engineering surveys of sites for an additional fi eld

At the end of the year, he and Admiral Sharp joined in proposing con

struction of a new jet base at Chu Lai in southern I Corps, and they ha

under discussion the building of a second runway at Da Nang.24

As the air bases fi lled up with American aircraft and their suppor

ing personnel and equipment, they presented tempting targets for Vie

Cong and North Vietnamese retaliation for any future allied strike

against North Vietnam. General Westmoreland, in the aftermath o

Tonkin Gulf, saw a twofold threat. Return air strikes by the rapidly ex

Chap 5.indd 168 
169

The Beginning of Escalation

panding North Vietnamese jet force, possibly reinforced by the Communist Chinese, were unlikely but not out of the question, especially 

against Da Nang in far northern South Vietnam. More probable, in 

Westmoreland’s view, were infantry and mortar attacks on the airfi elds 

by Viet Cong, possibly reinforced with North Vietnamese regular units. 

In Westmoreland’s assessment, the South Vietnamese Army, which was 

responsible for protecting the American bases, could do so only by diverting already thinly spread units from pacifi cation and territorial security missions at the risk of “serious loss of government control over 

sizeable areas and their populations.”25

On 15 August, accordingly, Westmoreland recommended to Admiral 

Sharp and General Wheeler that a Marine expeditionary brigade (MEB) 

and an Army brigade, either the 173d Airborne on Okinawa or one from 

the 25th Infantry Division in Hawaii, be prepared for deployment to 

the Da Nang and Tan Son Nhut–Bien Hoa areas. Already alerted as part 

of the post–Tonkin Gulf buildup, these units should be sent to South 

Vietnam as quickly as possible “in the event of an attack on Da Nang 

judged by COMUSMACV to be beyond the capability of the RVNAF to 

handle or a decision to execute operation plans . . . likely to cause retaliatory actions against SVN.” Westmoreland also asked for other forces. 

To counter the air threat, he requested the immediate deployment of 

one Marine and two Army HAWK (Homing All the Way Killer) antiaircraft missile battalions, to Da Nang, Saigon, and Nha Trang.26 He also 

asked for augmentation of his U.S. Army component command, which 

had been renamed in February U.S. Army Support Command, Vietnam 

(USASCV), by a small Army logistical command, an engineer group, 

and a signal battalion, all of which would be needed to support the additional American forces actually deploying and those projected for the 

future.27 Admiral Sharp endorsed Westmoreland’s proposals, with the 

reservation that deployment of the air defense battalions for Saigon 

and Nha Trang could be deferred until the enemy threat became more 

immediate. Ambassador Taylor withheld specifi c concurrence with the 

recommendations but accepted them in principle as precautions that 

should be taken before the United States launched any further attacks 

on North Vietnam.28

Westmoreland’s recommendations received a mixed response from 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff. With the immediate crisis at an end, the chiefs 

saw no need for action on the Marine and Army brigades beyond continuation of existing plans and preparations, which were designed for 

rapid reaction in emergencies. They promised to give “full consideration,” however, to Westmoreland’s proposals for “prudent deployment 

of additional forces” upon the launching of any major new escalation. 

The forces that Westmoreland wanted for Da Nang, at any event, already were prepared for deployment. On 6 August, Pacifi c Command 

had activated the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade as an amphibious force in readiness. It was composed of a reinforced regiment from 

Chap 5.indd 169 
170

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

the Okinawa-based 3d Marine Division and aircraft units from Japa

and the Philippines. Units of this brigade cruised off South Vietnam 

regularly during the remainder of 1964, drawing closer to Saigon an

Da Nang during each government crisis and coup attempt. The entir

brigade could move rapidly to Da Nang by sea and air on short notic

and if necessary it could fi ght its way ashore.29

The Joint Chiefs also responded negatively to Westmoreland’s re

quest for support and engineer troops. They declared on 1 Septembe

that, because of an armed forces-wide shortage of logistical units, 

was “inadvisable” to assign any to Vietnam solely in anticipation o

the “possibility” of future combat force deployments. Westmoreland

however, continued to press this issue, in an effort to resolve exis

ing MACV logistical problems as well as to prepare for contingencie

Since early in the year, his chief of logistics, Brig. Gen. Frank A. O

manski, had been urging reform of the existing supply system, unde

which each service provided for its own forces and furnished Militar

Assistance Program materiel to its South Vietnamese counterpart whil

an increasingly overburdened Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon

sustained MACV headquarters and attempted to maintain a joint sup

ply operation throughout the country. Barely suffi cient for existin

demands, this system could not accommodate the force buildup env

sioned in escalation plans.30

Seeking to remedy this situation, Westmoreland, with Admira

Sharp’s support, asked in December and again in early 1965 for a

Army logistic command of 3,500 offi cers and men and for an eng

neer group of 2,400. While not completely replacing the multiple sup

port systems, the logistic command, he argued, could at least serve a

a single source for items used by all services. In addition, it could unif

some facilities maintenance and other functions, and it could ope

ate a more effi cient transportation and distribution system throughou

South Vietnam. The engineer group would reduce MACV’s dependenc

on civilian contractors in meeting its growing construction needs. I

December, as the United States stepped up planning for air attacks o

North Vietnam, the Joint Chiefs, reversing their earlier stand, endorse

Westmoreland’s proposal. Secretary McNamara, however, responde

more cautiously. After a review of MACV’s logistical situation by a team 

from his own offi ce, in February 1965 he approved the deploymen

only of a tiny nucleus of the logistic command—thirty-eight planne

and thirty–seven other personnel.31

Although the other two parts of his proposal met with a tepid re

sponse, Westmoreland’s request for air defense missile battalions re

ceived immediate approval. During September, preparation for th

movement of the Marine HAWK battalion to Da Nang and preliminar

steps toward establishment of the Army missile units farther south go

under way. Marine and Army teams surveyed sites for the batteries an

drew up detailed deployment plans. The marines initially proposed t

Chap 5.indd 170 
171

The Beginning of Escalation

send to Da Nang an entire HAWK battalion of over 500 men, with a 

security force of 1,500 more. Believing this complement excessive for 

the air defense mission he had in mind and seeking to minimize the 

American presence at Da Nang, Westmoreland secured a reduction of 

the force to two batteries with 422 personnel, accompanied by a 153-

man rifl e company for ground defense.32

In mid-November, at JCS direction, the Marine 1st Light Antiaircraft 

Missile (LAAM) Battalion left California by ship for South Vietnam. 

The deployment, however, hit a series of snags early in December. Because the Vietnamese authorities at Da Nang were slow in turning over 

land for the battery positions, Taylor and Westmoreland on 3 December had to divert the battalion to Okinawa. Disagreements then developed among the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Sharp, and Westmoreland over 

the exact sites for the batteries and over whether civilian contractors 

or Navy Seabees should build their permanent positions. At the same 

time, over Westmoreland’s protests, Ambassador Taylor decided to 

hold the battalion on Okinawa so that he could use its deployment as 

a bargaining counter in his confrontation with Khanh and the Young 

Turks. Only the Marine infantry company intended to protect the batteries reached Da Nang during December. The rest of the deployment 

stood in abeyance as the new year began.33

As if to justify General Westmoreland’s requests for American base 

defense forces, the Viet Cong during late 1964 intensifi ed their campaign of terrorism and sabotage against American personnel and installations. Since late 1962, the Communist underground in Saigon and 

elsewhere had carried out, in the words of a North Vietnamese offi cial 

history, “many surprise attacks on U.S. lairs.” Agents threw grenades 

and planted bombs in bars, restaurants, movie theaters, and stadiums 

frequented by Americans. They sabotaged aircraft and fuel dumps. In 

one of their most dramatic coups, Viet Cong frogmen in April 1964 

mined and sank the aircraft ferry USS Card in the port of Saigon.34

The Military Assistance Command responded by developing internal defense plans for its headquarters, airfi elds, depots, housing, and 

communications centers. The command obtained a reduced strength 

Military Police company from the United States in April to protect 

its facilities in Saigon, but, in accord with longstanding U.S. policy, 

it left perimeter defense of air bases and other major installations to 

the Vietnamese armed forces. Their performance of the task left much 

to be desired, in spite of the efforts of American advisers at every level 

from Westmoreland on down. Over and above ineffi ciency and lack of 

resources, Vietnamese politics hindered effective use of the available 

forces. On the air bases, for example, hard feelings between the South 

Vietnamese Army and Air Force stemming from one of the many coup 

attempts prevented full interservice cooperation.35

Taking advantage of the allies’ lapses, the Viet Cong hit hard during 

the last two months of 1964. On the night of 1 November, they slipped 

Chap 5.indd 171 
172

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

past the outer defenses of Bien Hoa Air Base and launched a destruc

tive mortar bombardment. In half an hour, their gunners killed fou

Americans, wounded seventy-two, and put the equivalent of a squad

ron of B–57s out of action. On Christmas Eve, the Viet Cong bombe

the Brink Hotel offi cers quarters in Saigon, infl icting heavy casualtie

upon both Americans and Vietnamese. Besides vainly recommendin

retaliation against North Vietnam, MACV responded to these attack

by surveying the security of its installations, pinpointing defects, an

pressing the South Vietnamese to correct them.36

In reaction to the Brink Hotel bombing, for example, a MACV com

mittee chaired by General DePuy and with representation from all mi

sion agencies reviewed defense arrangements for the 60-odd America

installations in Saigon. After analyzing the manpower requiremen

for their proper protection, the MACV provost marshal recommende

that the mission obtain a full battalion of American Military Police t

reinforce the available South Vietnamese troops and police. Agency fo

International Development (AID) offi cials, however, refused to concu

preferring to leave the task entirely to the Vietnamese. This deadloc

over means continued into the new year.37

In the light of intensifying Viet Cong terrorism, and also of th

threat of South Vietnamese factional mob violence, MACV and th

U.S. Mission, under anxious prodding from Washington, examined th

question of evacuating the over 1,700 American dependents still in Sa

gon. As had General Harkins before him, Westmoreland, preferred t

let the number of wives and children shrink by attrition as tours ended

He pointed out that an abrupt evacuation, especially in the midst o

the continuing political crisis, might indicate to the Vietnamese tha

the United States was abandoning the struggle. By the end of the yea

nevertheless, it was clear that the dependents’ presence in Saigon ha

become an obstacle to action against North Vietnam. President John

son, for example, cited concern for the dependents’ safety as a consid

eration in declining to retaliate against North Vietnam for the Brin

bombing.38

Air War in the North: Planning and Command

Early in the new year, driven by fear that a South Vietnamese co

lapse might be imminent, the administration decided to launch i

air offensive against North Vietnam without waiting for a stable Sa

gon government. On 7 February 1965, after a Viet Cong raid on a

American advisers’ barracks and helicopter base near Pleiku in the Cen

tral Highlands, the United States sent its aircraft northward in a long

planned reprisal code-named FLAMING DART. A second FLAMING DAR

raid followed on the 11th, responding to a Viet Cong attack on Amer

cans at Qui Nhon. Two days later, President Johnson expanded FLAM

ING DART into a sustained air campaign against North Vietnam tha

Chap 5.indd 172 
173

The Beginning of Escalation

was subsequently named ROLLING THUNDER. Political turmoil in Saigon 

during late February along with bad weather over the north delayed 

the start of the program until 2 March, but the United States had nonetheless taken its fi nal step toward what would become a prolonged, 

though limited, air war against North Vietnam.39

Westmoreland and his staff were much involved in the fi nal preliminaries to the bombing campaign. Early in December, after President 

Johnson decided to intensify pressure on the north, Westmoreland 

helped Ambassador Taylor explain the decision to South Vietnamese 

military leaders and then oversaw the resumption of combined planning, both for one-time reprisals and for the prospective sustained 

bombing. The 2d Air Division and VNAF headquarters selected targets 

in the southern part of North Vietnam for combined U.S. and Vietnamese Air Force reprisal strikes, to be launched within twenty-four 

hours of a Viet Cong provocation. General Westmoreland considered 

it “important that we get the VNAF in the act” in such operations. He 

had his air commander, General Moore, working to “get them cranked 

up on short notice, provided . . . that their participation is cleared with 

appropriate authorities.”40

McGeorge Bundy, center, with General Westmoreland (NARA)

Chap 5.indd 173 
174

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

On 7 February, after the spectacular Viet Cong mortar and sappe

attack on the American advisers’ compound at Pleiku, Westmorelan

joined Ambassador Taylor and visiting presidential National Securit

Adviser McGeorge Bundy in recommending what became the fi r

FLAMING DART reprisal. Westmoreland notifi ed General Khanh, the

in his last days of power, of the American decision for the raid. Late

in the day, accompanied by Bundy, he met with Khanh at Pleiku t

confi rm which reprisal targets the Vietnamese Air Force was to hi

Westmoreland subsequently briefed Khanh on the results of the initia

strikes and on U.S. plans for a sustained bombing campaign. Mean

while, the MACV J5, Air Force Brig. Gen. Milton B. Adams, began wor

with his Joint General Staff counterpart on a fi nal list of reprisal ta

gets for the Vietnamese Air Force. In all these consultations, the Vie

namese, although welcoming the start of attacks on the north, mad

clear their wish to participate in both planning and execution of eac

new step in escalation. They also urged that the reprisals be justifi e

in terms of general Communist aggression against their country rathe

than simply the killing of Americans.41

These Vietnamese sensitivities fi gured prominently in Genera

Westmoreland’s determined challenge to Admiral Sharp’s 8 Augu

command directive, under which the FLAMING DART raids were con

ducted. Westmoreland’s drive to overturn this arrangement bega

after the second FLAMING DART operation on 11 February. In the afte

math of the strikes, in which the Vietnamese Air Force participated

Westmoreland complained to Sharp that the South Vietnamese, wh

Westmoreland believed must appear to play the “central role” in th

new stage of the confl ict, had been denied any voice in initiating an

planning the reprisal. To avoid such a political error in the futur

Westmoreland suggested that, after assignment of targets by Sharp

MACV coordinate the rest of the mission, at least those portions fl ow

by South Vietnamese and U.S. Air Force units based on the Southea

Asian mainland. He declared: “My vantage point would seem to mak

me a logical candidate for target selection (recommendation) and fo

operational coordination to be exercised through my Air Force com

ponent commander. I take this position because of the essentiality o

adaptation and coordination with the U.S. Ambassador, the GVN an

the RVNAF.”42

Admiral Sharp emphatically disagreed. The administration, Sharp d

clared, desired rapid action on reprisals, which Westmoreland’s propose

procedure would not provide. The admiral stated that he intended to kee

in force his August directive on command arrangements. Westmoreland, i

response, disclaimed any intention to challenge Sharp’s procedures. How

ever, he went over the Admiral’s head to plead his case to the Joint Chief

arguing that the political necessity of keeping the South Vietnamese in th

forefront should take precedence over the administration’s desire for th

most rapid possible reprisals.43

Chap 5.indd 174 
175

The Beginning of Escalation

Receiving no satisfaction from the JCS, Westmoreland returned 

to the attack early in March, after the fi rst four ROLLING THUNDER

missions had been ordered and then cancelled due either to bad 

weather or diplomatic considerations. Westmoreland again emphasized the importance of giving the South Vietnamese a signifi cant 

part in decisions on target selection, attack timing, and force levels. 

He also asked for authority to brief the Vietnamese on strikes at least 

twenty-four hours in advance so as to give their air force the needed 

time for planning and preparation; and he requested more freedom 

of action in diverting squadrons to operations within South Vietnam when weather delayed scheduled raids on the north. Summing 

up, he suggested with the concurrence of Ambassador Taylor and 

General Moore that the MACV commander have responsibility for 

all ROLLING THUNDER operations south of the 19th Parallel. In that 

case, MACV would use a list of preauthorized targets but would determine the timing and details of strikes on its own. Admiral Sharp 

and the Seventh Fleet would have responsibility for air attacks north 

of the parallel.44

Westmoreland’s proposal received a defi nitive rejection from 

both General Wheeler and Admiral Sharp. While he sympathized 

with Westmoreland’s desire for more operational fl exibility, Wheeler 

declared that the Washington authorities, because of political and 

diplomatic considerations, would have to continue to dictate most 

details of ROLLING THUNDER. Admiral Sharp was blunter: “In this one 

phase of the war,” he said, the United States was “a major participant 

with an overwhelming share of the forces involved” and hence would 

make the decisions. Since Vietnamese security precautions were questionable and one of their pilots sooner or later inevitably would be 

captured and interrogated by the enemy, Westmoreland should give 

them only the minimal information they required for their own missions and “not before we have to.” Finally, Sharp “most emphatically” rejected Westmoreland’s proposal for dividing strike control. 

He reiterated the principles of his August directive and declared, “I 

intend to use this method in the future and would appreciate it if you 

would accept that fact.”45

Westmoreland did so. From then on, as each subsequent ROLLING

THUNDER operation occurred, he and Ambassador Taylor briefed South 

Vietnamese authorities on it in general terms. General Moore informed 

his Vietnamese counterpart, Air Vice Marshal Ky, of the details of the 

strikes only insofar as they affected VNAF operations and only just 

before the Vietnamese planes took off. As for unilateral American attacks on the north, they took place under the command of Pacifi c Air 

Forces, which passed tasking orders to the 2d Air Division and Pacifi c 

Fleet. “My headquarters,” Westmoreland reported in mid-April, “is bypassed on these.”46

Chap 5.indd 175 
176

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

The Marines Land at Da Nang 

Responding to anxious questions from the Joint Chiefs about th

adequacy of his base security following the Pleiku and Qui Nhon inc

dents, General Westmoreland modifi ed MACV’s long-standing polic

of relying for protection on the South Vietnamese. He detailed in

creased numbers of Americans to close-in defense of their own qua

ters and facilities, even though such diversion of personnel from the

regular duties would “adversely affect our operational effi ciency.” We

before the February attacks, Westmoreland, with Ambassador Taylor

support, had requested a full Military Police battalion for installatio

security. The Joint Chiefs approved the deployment on 18 February

after additional urging from Taylor; but the unit did not reach Saigo

until 19 March. In the meantime, MACV brought in almost 300 A

Police and other U.S. military personnel on temporary assignment t

protect its principal air bases. On 9 and 11 February, General Wes

moreland warned the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the attacks on Pleik

and Qui Nhon marked the start of a new phase of the war and that h

might need the equivalent of a division of American troops to guar

his vital installations against retaliation.47

As the administration approached a decision to start bombin

North Vietnam, the question became not whether but when to extr

cate the American dependents and how to present the measure to th

South Vietnamese. Westmoreland on 6 February suggested immediat

removal of the families with small children, leaving the others, includ

ing his own wife, to be sent out as a group in response to a major eme

gency or, preferably, on a gradual basis as their husbands’ tours of dut

ended. “With this plan,” he argued, “the disappearance of U.S. depen

dents from the scene would be so gradual as to pass almost undetecte

by the Vietnamese.” 

The fi rst FLAMING DART raid cut short the discussion. President Johnso

on 8 February ordered removal of all dependents. Ambassador Taylor just

fi ed the action to the Saigon government as an effort to clear the way fo

an expanded U.S. commitment. Under a previously prepared MACV eva

uation plan, the civilians departed on commercial fl ights during the nex

ten days. Keenly aware of reported Viet Cong threats to American facilitie

including the children’s school, General Youngdale declared later, “I wa

never so glad to see dependents leave in all my life.”48

With the bombers going north and the Viet Cong assaulting Amer

can installations apparently at will, U.S. troop deployments planne

earlier came with a rush. On 23 January, the same day he called for th

MP battalion, Ambassador Taylor concurred in Westmoreland’s recom

mendation that the Joint Chiefs dispatch the HAWK battalion from 

Okinawa. President Johnson approved the move on 8 February, whe

he ordered the evacuation of American dependents. One battery a

rived at Da Nang by air the following day. The main body of the 1

Chap 5.indd 176 
177

The Beginning of Escalation

LAAM Battalion and a supporting Marine engineer company arrived by 

ship a week later.49

Even as the fi nal elements of the HAWK battalion disembarked, 

the dispatch of the full 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade to Da Nang 

also came under active consideration. On 12 February, as part of a 

general program of force deployments for the fi rst eight weeks of ROLLING THUNDER, the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended movement of a 

Marine expeditionary brigade from Okinawa and Japan to Da Nang, to 

deter and if necessary to repel attacks on the base. Asked to provide his 

views on this proposal, General Westmoreland sent his deputy, General Throckmorton, to make a quick security survey of Da Nang. On 

the 16th, on the basis of Throckmorton’s report and proposed deployment plan, Westmoreland endorsed immediate landing of the Marine 

brigade. In doing so, he pointed out that Da Nang was a key base for 

air operations in Laos and North Vietnam, that it was more exposed 

than any other American airfi eld to attack by both infi ltrators from 

the north and the Viet Cong, and that it was defended by South Vietnamese troops of doubtful political and military reliability. Westmoreland saw no immediate need for American ground forces elsewhere 

than at Da Nang but warned that troops might soon be required as 

well for base defense in the Saigon area and at Nha Trang and Cam 

Ranh Bay.50

Military dependents at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, waiting to depart 

to the United States (NARA)

Chap 5.indd 177 
178

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Admiral Sharp promptly supported the proposal to land the Marin

brigade, emphasizing the deterrent value of its presence on the ground

Ambassador Taylor, however, expressed reluctance. In a lengthy me

sage to the Joint Chiefs on 22 February, he questioned the ability o

even a full MEB to prevent stand-off mortar barrages of the sort tha

had devastated Bien Hoa. He also warned against drifting into a serie

of troop requests and commitments that would end with American

trying to wage the entire antiguerrilla war by themselves amid a sea o

hostile Vietnamese. Nevertheless, respecting Westmoreland’s “unde

standable concern” for the security of Da Nang, Taylor supported im

mediate placement of one battalion landing team (BLT) there. That siz

force, he believed, would eliminate any “substantial” danger of a Vie

Cong infantry assault on the airfi eld. In conjunction with the Sout

Vietnamese, it also would provide an “acceptable level” of protectio

against mortar bombardment.51

In deference to Taylor’s views, Westmoreland scaled down his re

quest for marines. On 22–23 February, after a visit to Da Nang, he rec

ommended landing only those elements of the 9th MEB required fo

the security mission—two BLTs, a helicopter squadron, and “minimum

command and support contingents. The remaining battalion an

other units would stand offshore for commitment later if required.

The marines were to come in partly by airlift and partly by amphibiou

landing, with the mission of occupying “defensive positions on critica

terrain features in order to secure the airfi eld and as directed commu

nications facilities, supporting installations, port facilities and landin

beaches at Da Nang against attack.”53

Admiral Sharp endorsed this reduced program, although he ex

pressed himself in favor of early deployment of the third battalio

landing team and an F–4 squadron; and the ambassador also accep

ed it. On 26 February, President Johnson ordered the landing of th

Marine elements Westmoreland had recommended. Secretary of Stat

Rusk instructed Taylor to obtain approval of the landing from Premie

Phan Huy Quat and other top South Vietnamese civilian and militar

leaders. Rusk emphasized to the ambassador that in all discussions wit

the Vietnamese he should defi ne the marines’ role as “general security

and avoid giving the impression that they would be involved in an

way in pacifi cation.54

Ambassador Taylor and General Westmoreland lost no time in pre

paring the ground, politically and militarily, for the landing. Taylor o

1 March secured the consent of Premier Quat to the introduction o

the brigade—which, it should be noted, the South Vietnamese govern

ment had not requested. General Westmoreland then opened negotia

tions on the details with General Minh, once more RVNAF commande

in chief, and General Nguyen Van Thieu, Quat’s Minister of Defens

Both Vietnamese urged caution in introducing this substantial Amer

can force into the Da Nang area, where Buddhist antigovernment dem

Chap 5.indd 178 
179

The Beginning of Escalation

onstrators were active and well-organized and apparently enjoyed the 

tacit support of the I Corps commander, Maj. Gen. Nguyen Chanh 

Thi. A member of the Young Turks’ group, Thi governed his region as 

a virtually autonomous warlord and was rumored to be contemplating 

secession from South Vietnam and a separate peace with the north. 

Whatever the case, after a personal visit from Westmoreland, Thi and 

his staff cooperated smoothly with representatives of MACV and the 

9th MEB in planning for the marines’ reception.55

The greater threat of disruption came from Washington, where policy makers, having made their decision, began to have second thoughts. 

On 2 March, with diplomatic and military preparations under way for 

deploying the MEB, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International 

Security Affairs John McNaughton cabled Ambassador Taylor with a 

proposal to substitute the U.S. Army’s Okinawa-based 173d Airborne 

Brigade for the marines. Sharp, Taylor, and Westmoreland all dissented 

vigorously from McNaughton’s proposal. They pointed out that the 

South Vietnamese government had approved bringing in the marines, that both United States and South Vietnamese preparations for 

the marines’ landing were far advanced, and that the marine brigade, 

which could supply itself over the beach, was more easily supportable 

through the limited Da Nang port facilities than would be an Army 

brigade. Admiral Sharp meanwhile objected to having the 173d, which 

constituted the Pacifi c Command’s air-transportable reserve, tied down 

in a static security mission. He and Westmoreland also noted that all 

Pacifi c Command contingency plans called for placement of the 173d 

Airborne Brigade at Saigon and the MEB at Da Nang, where substantial 

Marine elements, including a helicopter squadron engaged in supporting the South Vietnamese, were already established. Under this barrage of adverse facts, the substitution plan died quietly. On 7 March, 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff ordered CINCPAC to land the 9th MEB (–) at 

Da Nang. The landings, which began the next day, were hampered by 

heavy seas but not by the Viet Cong. Smiling Vietnamese girls carrying 

fl ower leis met the battalion that landed across the beach.56

During their fi rst month on shore, the marines operated under 

highly restrictive instructions from General Westmoreland. Issued on 

8 March, the instructions specifi ed that the 9th MEB would not “engage in combat operations against enemy forces except for its own protection or the protection of installations, facilities or other units it is 

charged with defending or assisting in defending.” The marines were 

not to perform any counterinsurgency functions. Under the operational control of MACV, the brigade was to work with the ARVN corps on 

a basis of “coordination and cooperation in the mutual self-interest 

of both commands.” Following these instructions, the Marine battalions took positions on the airfi eld perimeter and on hills immediately 

west of the base, in a largely unpopulated tactical area of responsibility (TAOR) assigned by General Thi. The rifl e companies manned deChap 5.indd 179 
180

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fensive positions and conducted short-range patrols within their are

They made no contact with the enemy, and most of their casualtie

came from heat prostration.57

The landing of the 9th MEB at Da Nang marked the culmination o

efforts to reinforce American positions in South Vietnam in counterpoin

to the bombing of the north. Concern for security of the vital air base

had been present throughout discussion of the bombing offensive in bot

Washington and Saigon, and plans for related force deployments in th

western Pacifi c had always included sending Marines to Da Nang. Th

terms under which President Johnson approved the Marine deploymen

and Westmoreland’s initial operational directive to the 9th Marine Exp

ditionary Brigade refl ected a continuing desire to keep American fi ghtin

men out of the counterguerrilla war. Truthfully, Westmoreland recalled: 

saw my call for Marines at Da Nang not as a fi rst step in a growing Amer

can commitment but as . . . a way to secure a vital airfi eld and the air uni

using it, . . . an airfi eld essential to pursuing the adopted strategy.”58

Because of the context in which it occurred, nevertheless, the land

ing at Da Nang on 8 March was to acquire in retrospect precisely th

signifi cance which Westmoreland claimed it did not have. Even as th

marines settled into their bunkers and ran their fi rst patrols, Genera

Westmoreland and his superiors, on the basis of a growing volume o

disturbing information about the military situation in South Vietnam

were beginning to consider seriously the most drastic intensifi catio

yet of the U.S. commitment: the direct engagement of large America

ground forces in the battle against the Viet Cong.

Marines take up defensive positions after landing at Da Nang. (AP photo)

Chap 5.indd 180 
181

The Beginning of Escalation

Notes

1 Quote is from Msg, Taylor Saigon 2052 to the President, 6 Jan 65, tab 14, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (1–22 Jan 65), CMH. For earlier, similar views, see William H. Sullivan, Memorandum on Situation in South Vietnam, 13 Jul 64; and Memo, Palmer for 

CSA, 1 Sep 64, sub: Analysis of Situation in Vietnam. Both in Historians fi les, CMH. 2 Unless otherwise noted, this discussion of the sequence of administration decisions is based on: U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1 through sec. 4.C.3; Berman, Planning a Tragedy, pp. 33–37; Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 34–35; Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 309–13, 320–21, 325–27; Gelb and Betts, Irony of Vietnam, pp. 96–120; and 

Thies, When Governments Collide, pp. 19–94. 3 Harkins quote is from Msg, Harkins MAC 2247 to Taylor, 7 May 64, in Conference 

for Gen Taylor, 11 May 64, Book 1/3, box 1, 67A4604, RG 334, NARA. First Westmoreland quote is from Msg, MAC 6164 to Wheeler, 27 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Second Westmoreland quote is from A Soldier Reports, p. 114; see 

also pp. 89, 105–06,109–14 for his retrospective views on escalation. Memos for Taylor, 

28 Aug 64, sub: Feasibility of OPLAN 37, tab 51, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 Jul–31 

Aug 64); and 9 Nov 64, tab 33, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64), CMH. 4 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(a), p. 2. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 106–07. 

An example of early planning for clandestine operations is Memo for the Special Group, 29 

Dec 62, sub: North Vietnam Operational Plan, NSF 197/VN Jan 63, JFKL. 5 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 158–59. COMUSMACV/CAS Saigon OPLAN34A–64/TIGER, 15 Dec 63, I–35034/64, OPLAN 34A File, box 2,73A1350; Ltr, CINCPAC 

3010, Ser 465, to JCS, 19 Dec 63, sub: Combined MACV–CAS Saigon Plan for Actions 

against North Vietnam, I–35033/64, ISA 092 NVN, box 8, 67A4660; both in RG 330, 

NARA. Msg, SecDef to Lodge, 12 Dec 63; Memo, McGeorge Bundy for the President, 7 

Jan 64; Msg, Lodge Saigon 3943, to SecState, 21 Jan 64. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 6 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 106–07. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(a), 

pp. 1–2. Memo, Bennett for DCSOPS, 29 Apr 64, sub: USAF Representation on the 

MACV Staff; Msg, JCS 7391 to CSA, CNO, CSAF, CMC, CINCPAC, 14 Jul 64. All in 

Historians fi les, CMH. MACV–CIA jurisdiction issue: Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 5521 

to JCS, 28 Jun 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. For a typical monthly operations 

proposal, see Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 15084 to White House, 27 Nov 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 7 Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 339–43, 406–10, 466–72, summarize the course of 34A operations. For the operation’s diffi culties, see MACV Fact 

Sheet, 3 Mar 64, sub: Review of COMUSMACV OPLAN 34A–64/CAS Saigon OPLAN 

TIGER; and Remarks by COMUSMACV Preceding Review of OPLAN 34A. Both in SecDef 

Conf MACV Notebook, Mar 64; Historians fi les, CMH. Example of Westmoreland view 

of 34A operations: Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 17 Aug 64, tab 22, Westmoreland 

Hist File 7 (27 Jul–31 Aug 64), CMH. 8 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 208. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(a), p. 

xv. Paper, “Validity of Intelligence on the Viet Cong,” att to Memo, Ops Br, Collection 

Div, 19 Mar 64, sub: Vietnam, encl. 1; CIA Info Rpt, 1 Aug 63, sub: Assessment of the 

Progress of the War against the Viet Cong . . . during the First Half of 1963, Fact Sheet, 9 

Jan 63. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Memo for the President, sub: Actions Taken Pursuant to Specifi ed Paragraphs of NSAM 273, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 9 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 163–64. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, 

p. 73; sec. 4.C.2(b), p. 4; Msgs, State 1630 and 836 to AmEmbs Saigon and Vientiane, 

7 Apr 64; Msgs, Vientiane 1116 and 1119 to SecState, 10 and 11 Apr 64; Memo, M. 

Chap 5.indd 181 
182

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

V. Forrestal for Bundy, sub: Laos, 5 May 64. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJ

Msgs, JCS 6163 to CINCPAC, 5 May 64; COMUSMACV MAC 3232 to JCS, 27 Jun 6

COMUSMACV MAC 5646 to CINCPAC, 1 Jul 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. MAC

Fact Sheet, 20 May 64, sub: Operation Delta, in Book of Misc Facts, box 1, 67A406

RG 334, NARA. 10 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 164; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(b

pp. 5, 7, 8–10, 22–23; Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 6068 and 6935 to CINCPAC, 14 an

25 Jul 64, Historians fi les, CMH; Msg, COMUSMACV to CINCPAC, 16 Aug 64, tab 2

Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 July–31 Aug 64), CMH. Ltr, Westmoreland to Maj Ge

Tran Thien Khiem, 25 Jul 64, File 204–58 (1007–03) Foreign Trng Prog Files (64), bo

3, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. 11 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 110. Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance 

Combat, pp. 380–81. MACV Command History 1964, pp. 107–08; ibid., 1965, pp. 208

09. CINCPAC Command History, 1964, pp. 269–70. Msg, State 1976 to Saigon, 18 Ma

64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 12 Evolution of YANKEE TEAM rules of engagement is traced in Marolda and Fitzge

ald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 381–92. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 46–4

107–08, 113–14; ibid., 1965, p. 209. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 28 Aug 64, su

Concept for Attack of Panhandle Targets, tab 50, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 July–3

Aug 64), CMH. Msg, Rusk to AmEmb Saigon, 14 Oct 64, tab 6, Westmoreland Hist Fi

9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64), CMH. Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, 21 Oct 64, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. 13 How the U.S. ambassadors to Vientiane ran the war in Laos is discussed in Charl

A. Stevenson, The End of Nowhere: American Policy Toward Laos since 1954 (Boston: Be

con Press, 1972), pp. 206–17. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 76–77. CINCPA

Command History, 1964, p. 21. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 166–67. 14 CINCPAC Command History, 1964, pp. 21–22. Quotes are from Msg, Westm

reland MAC 5908 to Wheeler, 11 Nov 64; see also Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5849 

Sharp, 6 Nov 64; both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. 15 Memo, Senior Member, Vietnam Delta Infi ltration Study Group, for COMU

MACV, 15 Feb 64, sub: Report of Recommendations Pertaining to Infi ltration in

South Vietnam of Viet Cong Personnel, Supporting Materials, Weapons and Amm

nition, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (15 Feb 64). MACV Command History, 1964, p

88–92. Talking Paper for the JCS for Their Meeting with General Westmoreland on 2

December 1964, 18 Dec 64, tab 23, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (7–31 Dec 64), CMH

Msg, Gen Easterbrook BNK 054 to Westmoreland, 18 Jan 65, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. Quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, sub: Feasibili

of OPLAN 37, 28 Aug 64, tab 51, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 July–31 Aug 64), CMH

16 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(a), pp. xv, 11; sec. 4.C.3, pp. 2–3. CINCPA

Command History, 1964, pp. 49–54. 17 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6191 to Wheeler, 28 Nov 64, Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH; in same fi le, see Msg, Westmoreland MAC 483

to Wheeler and Sharp, 6 Sep 64. MACV Command History 1964, pp. 160–65. Ms

Lodge Saigon 1937 to President; Msg, State 1677 to Saigon, 12 Apr 64; Memo, Re

Adm J. W. Davis, for Asst SecDef (ISA), 25 Jun 64, sub: Military Planning in Support 

NSAM 288. All in NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. JCS Final Rpt, SIGMA I–64, 15 Ap

64, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, sub: SNIE 10–3–64, 9 O

64, 13 Nov 64, tab 43, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64), CMH. 18 Memo, Asst CofS, J3, for CofS, MACV, 9Aug 64, sub: Summary of Accomplish

ments, 3–9 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 17 Aug 6

tab 22, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 July–31 Aug 64), CMH. Memo, Westmoreland f

Chap 5.indd 182 
183

The Beginning of Escalation

Taylor, 23 Nov 64, sub: Items We Can Offer to the GVN Now, tab 16, Westmoreland Hist 

File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64). For an example of use of planning as a bargaining chip, see Msg, 

Taylor to Amb Johnson et al., 3 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. 19 Westmoreland’s proposal is summarized in Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 232. Sharp’s 

directive is in Msg, CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 8 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 20 The North Vietnamese, in attacking the USS Maddox, apparently associated the 

destroyer with concurrent OPLAN 34A coastal raids, in spite of MACV’s efforts to keep 

its operations separate from the DE SOTO activities. Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance 

to Combat, pp. 393–444, recounts the relationship between MACV, 34A operations, and 

the destroyer incidents. 21 MACV Command History, 1964, ann. A, p. IV–3. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 7358 

to SecState, OSD, JCS, White House, 4 Aug 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. Msg, 

Taylor Saigon 303 FLASH to SecState, 5 Aug 64, NSC History, Presidential Decisions, 

Gulf of Tonkin Attacks, Box 38, LBJL. 22 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 7425 and AmEmb to CINCPAC, 5 Aug 64, NSC History Tonkin Gulf. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 7429 to CINCPAC, 5 Aug 64, Historians 

fi les, CMH. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 161–62, 174. Msgs, Westmoreland 

MAC 5147 and 6191 to Wheeler, 21 Sep 64 and 28 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 453–62, recount the September incident and subsequent suspension of DE SOTO operations. 23 Msg, JCS 7729 to CINCPAC, 5 Aug 64, NSC History Tonkin Gulf. For air unit 

deployments, see Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 229–30. 24 Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 230. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 140–41, 158. 

Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6260 to Sharp, 2 Dec 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 

64, CMH. 25 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 8149 to CINCPAC, 15 Aug 64, NSC History Tonkin 

Gulf. MACV Command History, 1964, p. 162. For the appearance of jets at North Vietnamese fi elds in August, see Futrell, Advisory Years, p. 230. 26 The HAWKs, mobile surface-to-air missiles effective against low-fl ying aircraft, 

would complement the medium- and high-altitude coverage of the already deployed 

Air Force F–102 interceptors. See MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 110–11. 27 In February 1964, at COMUSMACV’s recommendation, U.S. Army, Ryukyus, 

redesignated the U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam, as U.S. Army Support Command, 

a title more appropriate to its missions, roles, and responsibilities, which were “an 

amalgam of combat support and logistics command functions.” Msgs, CINCUSARPAC 

to CINCPAC, 14 Jan 64; CINCPAC to CINCUSARPAC, 28 Jan 64; CINCUSARPAC to 

CINCUSARYIS, 10 Feb 64; General Orders (GO) 14, HQ, US Army, Ryukyu Islands, 18 

Feb 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. 28 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 8149 to CINCPAC, 15 Aug 64, NSC History Tonkin 

Gulf. Westmoreland had requested the HAWKs by themselves earlier, on 9 August; see 

Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 7604 to CINCPACAF, 9 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. Msg, 

CINCPAC to JCS, 18 Aug 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. Msg, Taylor Saigon 465 

to SecState, 18 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 29 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(b), p. 38. Quotes are from Msg, JCS 8230 to 

CINCPAC, 1 Sep 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. For organization and activities 

of the 9th MEB, see Jack Shulimson and Maj Charles M. Johnson, USMC, U.S. Marines 

in Vietnam: The Landing and the Buildup, 1965 (Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1978), pp. xiii, 3. Msg, Taylor to SecState, 20 Aug 64, tab 27, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 July–31 Aug 64); and Msg, MACV 

MAC 4966 to JCS, 13 Sep 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, both in CMH, 

refl ect contemplated and actual uses of the MEB as a force afl oat.

Chap 5.indd 183 
184

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

30 Quotes are from Msg, JCS 8230 to CINCPAC, 1 Sep 64, NSC Country File, Vie

nam, LBJL. Background on logistic problem: MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 135

36; ibid., 1965, p. 104. Memo, Brig Gen Frank A. Osmanski for DEPCOMUSMACV, 1

Feb 64, sub: Logistics of the Counterinsurgency in RVN, tab 7, Westmoreland Hist Fi

2 (Jan 64–4 Feb 64). Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 358–61. 31 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 136; ibid.,1965, pp. 104–05. Westmorelan

A Soldier Reports, p. 127. CINCPAC’s part in the logistical debate is described in Marold

and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Combat, pp. 361–65. 32 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 110–11. Msgs, CINCUSARPAC ARP 1252

to CINCPAC, Aug 64; CINCPAC to JCS, 12 Aug 64; COMUSMACV MAC 8387 

CINCPAC and CINCUSARPAC, 19 Aug 64; CINCPAC to CINCPACFLT, CINCUSARPAC

and COMUSMACV, 2 Sep 64. All in Historians fi les, CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MA

5849 and 6138 to Sharp, 6 and 25 Nov 64, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 6

CMH. 33 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 111. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 6373 

Wheeler, 9 Dec 64 and Wheeler PRS 3198 to Westmoreland, 10 Dec 64. In Westmor

land Msg fi les, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 9 Dec 64, sub: LAAM 

Battalion Programmed for Da Nang, tab 8; tab A, app. B, Talking Paper for the JCS f

Their Meeting with Gen Westmoreland on 21 December 1964, 18 Dec 64, sub: Item

for Discussion with General Westmoreland, tab 23; both in Westmoreland Hist File 1

(7–31 Dec 64), CMH. 34 Quote is from Resistance War, pp. 66–67. MFR, Maj Peter T. Barrett (ACSI), 13 Ap

64, sub: Viet Cong Terrorist and Sabotage Activities against US Personnel and Install

tions in the Republic of Vietnam, Historians fi les, CMH. Card sinking, and subsequen

refl oating and salvage, are described in Marolda and Fitzgerald, Assistance to Comba

pp. 355–56. 35 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 20, 101–02, 107, 156–57. MP compan

Msgs, COMUSMACV MAC 2952 to JCS, 16 Apr 64; JCS 5921 to CINCSTRIKE/USCINC

MEAFSA, CSA, CINCPAC, 17 Apr 64; NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. ARVN–VNA

friction: Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 24 Nov 64, sub: Fact Sheet on Bien Hoa Inc

dent, tab 18, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–17 Dec 64), CMH. 36 For results of the Bien Hoa attack, see Futrell, Advisory Years, pp. 253–54; an

Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 24 Nov 64, sub: Fact Sheet on Bien Hoa Incident, ta

18, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64). Ltr, Westmoreland to Khanh, 4 No

64, tab 29, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64) is typical of efforts to pressu

the South Vietnamese to improve security. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 323–2

332–33, summarizes mission requests for reprisals. 37 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 101–07; ibid., 1965, pp. 424–25. 

38 Harkins’ views on removing U.S. dependents are in Msg, MAC 2247 to Taylor, 

May 64, in Conference for Gen Taylor, 11 May 64, Book 1/3, box 1, 67A4604, RG 33

NARA. Msg, Pres Johnson State 1281 to Lodge, 21 Feb 64, NSC Country File, Vietnam

LBJL. Msg, Pres Johnson to Taylor, 31 Dec 64, tab 46, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (7–3

Dec 64), CMH. Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 6 Jan 65; Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland an

Wheeler, 27 Jan 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. MACV Com

mand History, 1965, p. 425. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 87–88. 39 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. v–vii; sec. 4.C.2(c), pp. vii, 76–80; sec. 4.C.

pp. i–vi, 31–44, 48–50, 69, 71–72. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 199–201. 40 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 110 to Sharp, 9 Jan 65, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(c), pp. 68–69, 7

Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, pp. 329, 334. Msg, Rusk State 1419 to Taylor, 7 Jan 6

tab 15; and Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 10 Jan 65, tab 1. Both in Westmorelan

Chap 5.indd 184 
185

The Beginning of Escalation

Hist File 12 (1–22 Jan 65), CMH. Msgs, Taylor to SecState, 23 and 25 Jan 65, tabs 2 and 

7, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. 41 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 115–18, and Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, 

p. 335, describe activities on 7 February. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 0582 and 0619 to 

Sharp, 6 and 8 Feb 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH; MFRs, Westmoreland, 7 Feb 65, sub: Meetings with Gen Khanh, tab 25; Westmoreland, 8 Feb 65, 

sub: Visit with Gen Khanh, tab 26; Adams, 10 Feb 65, sub: Combined Planning for Operations against DRV, tab 34; Westmoreland, 18 Feb 65, sub: Meeting with Gen Khanh, 

18 February 1965, tab 47. All in Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. 42 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0732 to Sharp, 12 Feb 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Jan–31 Mar 65. See also MACV Command History, 1965, p. 200; and Westmoreland, A 

Soldier Reports, p. 117. 43 Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 13 Feb 65; Westmoreland MAC 0781 to Gen 

Goodpaster, OCJCS, 15 Feb 65; Goodpaster JCS 05720–65 to Westmoreland, 16 Feb 

65; Wheeler JCS 0587–65 to Westmoreland, 17 Feb 65; Westmoreland MAC 0848 to 

Wheeler, 18 Feb 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. Msg, Westmoreland to Sharp, 14 Feb 65, tab 37, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), 

CMH. 44 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1061 to Wheeler, 1 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 1387 

to Sharp, 14 Mar 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH; MACV 

Command History, 1965, pp. 200–201. 45 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 0739–65 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 1 Mar 65; Sharp to 

Westmoreland, 2 and 16 Mar 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, 

CMH. Sharp quotes are from the latter two messages. 46 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 2027 to Wheeler, 12 Apr 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, p. 202. 47 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 38, 424–25. Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0712 to Wheeler, 11 Feb 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, 

CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Wheeler JCS 0498–65, 0512–65, and 0602–65 to Westmoreland, 10 Feb 65 and 18 Feb 65; Westmoreland MAC 0675 to Gen Andrew J. Goodpaster, 10 Feb 65. Msg, Taylor to SecState, 23 Jan 65, tab 3, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 

Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. Msg, Taylor Saigon 2552 to SecState, 13 Feb 65, in NSC History, 

Deployment of Major US Forces to Vietnam, July 1965, box 40, LBJL. MACV J3 Historical Summary, Mar 65, in MACV History Backup Files, 1965, Historians Files, CMH. 48 First quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for McNaughton, 6 Feb 65, sub: Evacuation of Dependents, tab 24, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH; in 

same fi le, see Msg, Taylor to McGeorge Bundy, 1 Feb 65, tab 15; and MFR, Westmoreland, 10 Feb 65, sub: Visit with Gen Khanh, 8 Feb 65, tab 26. Msg, Westmoreland 

MAC 0666 to Gen Waters, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. MACV 

Command History, 1965, p. 425. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 118. Youngdale 

quote is from Interv. 49 Msg, Taylor to SecState, 23 Jan 65, tab 4, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 

Feb 65), CMH. Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, pp. 4–6. 50 Msgs, JCS 005147 to CINCPAC, 12 Feb 65; COMUSMACV MAC 4614 to CINCPAC, 

16 Feb 65; COMUSMACV MAC 4999 to JCS, 17 Feb 65. All in NSC History, Major Forces, 

box 40. Memo, Throckmorton for Westmoreland, 15 Feb 65, sub: Deployment of MEB 

(RLT/MAG) to Da Nang; Memo, Moore for COMUSMACV, 18 Feb 65. Both in MACV History Backup Files, 1965, 68A1395, RG 334, NARA. MACV Command History, 1965, p. 30. 51 Msg, CINCPAC to JCS, 18 Feb 65; Msg, Taylor to JCS, 22 Feb 65; NSC History, 

Major Forces, box 40. For retrospective comments on this issue, see Westmoreland, A 

Soldier Reports, p. 123; and Taylor, Swords and Plowshares, p. 338.

Chap 5.indd 185 
186

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

52 A Marine expeditionary brigade normally consisted of a regimental headquarter

three infantry battalions, an artillery battalion, combat and service support units, an

a composite Marine aircraft group (MAG) including fi xed-wing and helicopter squa

rons. Gen Moore objected to bringing in the Marine air squadrons on the grounds th

the marines were not going to conduct offensive combat operations that would requi

air support and that Da Nang Air Base already was overcrowded with U.S. and Sout

Vietnamese aircraft. See Memo, Maj Gen J. H. Moore for Westmoreland, 17 Mar 6

sub: Marine Fighter Squadrons at Da Nang Air Base, Historians fi les, CMH. 53 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 5515 and 5604 to CINCPAC, 22 and 23 Feb 65, NS

History, Major Forces, box 40. 54 Msgs, CINCPAC to JCS, 24 Feb 65; State 1840 to Saigon, 26 Feb 65. Both in NS

History, Major Forces, box 40. Msg, Wheeler to Sharp and Westmoreland, 27 Feb 6

tab 75, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. 55 Msg, Taylor Saigon 2789 to SecState, 28 Feb 65, NSC History, Major Forces, bo

40. Msg, Westmoreland to CINCPAC, 2 Mar 65, tab 7; Memo, Westmoreland MA

1107 for Taylor, sub: MEB, to Wheeler, tab 22 Both in Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–2

Mar 65). Msg, Westmoreland to Wheeler and Sharp, 3 Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. Concern over Thi’s possible separatist aspirations is expresse

in Memo, DePuy for Westmoreland, 12 Jan 65, sub: Separatism in I Corps, William 

DePuy Papers, MHI. 56 Certain DOD offi cials evidently thought use of the airborne brigade would b

less politically conspicuous and provocative than landing the more heavily equippe

marines; see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.4, pp. 6–8. Shulimson and Johnson, M

rines in Vietnam, 1965, p. 9. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 123–24. Msg, Tayl

Saigon 2820 to SecState, 3 Mar 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 40. Msg, Westm

reland MAC 1107 to Wheeler and Sharp, 3 Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–3

Mar 65. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 7 Mar 65, sub: MEB, tab 22, Westmorelan

Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), CMH. 57 Memo, Westmoreland for CG, 9th MEB, 8 Mar 65, sub: Regulations Governin

Operations of the US Marine Expeditionary Brigade in the Republic of Vietnam, tab 2

Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), CMH. For details of the landings and initi

Marine operations, see Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, pp. 7–20. 58 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 122–23. See also U.S.–Vietnam Relations, se

4.C.4, pp. 21–22.

Chap 5.indd 186 
6

Beginnings of the Ground Troop 

Commitment, January–June 1965

Early in 1964, soon after General Westmoreland arrived in Saigon, 

he received a “one classmate to another” letter of advice from Maj. 

Gen. William P. Yarborough, commanding general of the Army Special 

Warfare Center. On one point, General Yarborough was especially adamant:

Under no circumstances that I can foresee should US strategy ever be twisted into a 

“requirement” for placing US combat divisions into the Vietnamese confl ict as long as 

it retains its present format. I can almost guarantee you that US divisions . . .could lie 

almost unattacked for months or years, would reap nothing but propaganda reverses 

as alleged “representatives of a new colonialism,” and could fi nd no targets of a size 

or confi guration which would warrant division–sized attack in a military sense. The 

key to the beginning of the solution to Vietnam’s travail now lies in a rising scale of 

population and resources control.1

At the time he wrote them, Yarborough’s views constituted the conventional wisdom about Vietnam among American offi cials in both Saigon and Washington. However, as South Vietnam’s military situation 

deteriorated early in 1965, General Westmoreland and other American 

civilian and military leaders gradually discarded their former assumptions and committed their country’s ground forces to the struggle. Reports and recommendations from MACV did much to bring about the 

American intervention in the ground war and to determine the pattern 

of U.S. deployments and operations. 

Plans and Proposals, 1954–1964

Civilian and military leaders discussed committing U.S. troops at 

several crisis points during the American involvement in Indochina. 

The Eisenhower administration considered such action in 1954 but decided against it because opposition from Congress and America’s allies 

reinforced the president’s own reluctance to make the commitment. In 

the fall of 1961, as President Kennedy examined measures for strengthChap 6.indd 187 
188

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ening the Saigon regime, several of his key advisers along with Amba

sador Nolting, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the military members of th

Taylor mission urged deployment of U.S. and SEATO ground forces t

protect South Vietnam’s borders, block infi ltration routes in Laos, an

demonstrate American resolve. Kennedy rejected these suggestions i

favor of an expanded advisory and combat support effort.2

Over the years, The PACOM and MACV commanders made an

periodically revised contingency plans for employing U.S. troops i

Southeast Asia, either unilaterally or under SEATO, to counter variou

possible levels of North Vietnamese and Chinese Communist aggre

sion. By the mid-60s, the principal plan covering ground operation

in Indochina was Pacifi c Command’s OPLAN 32, with its supportin

plans from MACV and other subordinate commands. This scenari

identifi ed four degrees, or phases, of Communist threat: Phase I—

alert; Phase II—counterinsurgency; Phase III—direct North Vietnam

ese attack; and Phase IV—direct Chinese attack. In Phases III and IV

the United States was to deploy a Marine Expeditionary Force to D

Nang, an Army division and a corps headquarters to Qui Nhon an

the Central Highlands, and an Army airborne brigade to Saigon. Thes

forces would help the South Vietnamese halt Communist drives dow

the coast and through the Mekong Valley. The Phase II (counterinsu

gency) plan for Vietnam entailed simply a scaled-down version of th

Phase III deployment, with a portion of the Marine force going to D

Nang and two Army brigades to the Saigon area. Their principal mi

sion would be to defend vital areas for the South Vietnamese, thereb

freeing ARVN units for offensive operations; but the plan left ope

the possibility that the American troops might engage in unspecifi e

counterguerrilla activities. The 32-series plans were intended prima

ily for Korea-style conventional warfare and did not apply directly t

the situation as it actually developed in early 1965. Even so, the Ma

rine deployments to Da Nang were in conformity with them. Furthe

the planning process had acquainted commanders and staffs with th

practical aspects of placing large forces in Vietnam, and the contin

gency plans infl uenced the identities and locations of the fi rst uni

to go in.3

Troop deployments to South Vietnam came under consideratio

repeatedly during the Johnson administration’s escalation debates o

1964. State Department offi cials suggested insertion of sizable groun

forces in northern South Vietnam as a substitute for a bombing offen

sive against the north. The Joint Chiefs of Staff gave consideration t

an anti-infi ltration cordon of U.S. troops across both South Vietnam 

and Laos. Late in the year, the chiefs also undertook intensive study o

a more modest plan for an international force, built around an Amer

can division, to guard the Demilitarized Zone within South Vietnam

This force would deploy in conjunction with the bombing offensiv

to deter retaliatory North Vietnamese ground assaults. All these pro

Chap 6.indd 188 
189

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

posals envisioned a static, defensive mission for the American forces. 

However National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy contemplated 

more aggressive action. In late August, he declared: “A still more drastic possibility which no one is discussing is the use of substantial U.S. 

armed forces in operations against the Viet Cong. I myself believe that 

before we let this country go we should have a hard look at this grim 

alternative. . . . It seems to me at least possible that a couple of brigadesize units put in to do specifi c jobs about six weeks from now might be 

good medicine everywhere.”4

In spite of this interest in the issue in Washington, Ambassador 

Taylor and General Westmoreland opposed any direct commitment of 

American soldiers to counterinsurgency combat, although both men 

saw a need for troops to defend air bases in South Vietnam if the United 

States began bombing the north. They held to this position even when 

President Johnson expressed interest in enlarging the role of American 

ground forces in the fi ghting. On 30 December, the president rejected 

Taylor’s and Westmoreland’s call for reprisal air strikes in response to 

the Brink BOQ bombing but urged upon them greater attention to new 

initiatives within South Vietnam. “I have never felt that this war will 

be won from the air,” Johnson told Taylor: 

and it seems to me that what is much more needed and would be more effective is a 

larger and stronger use of rangers and special forces and marines, or other appropriate military strength on the ground and on the scene. I am ready to look with great 

favor on that kind of increased American effort, directed at the guerrillas and aimed to 

stiffen the aggressiveness of Vietnamese military units up and down the line. Any recommendation that you or General Westmoreland make in this sense will have immediate attention from me, although I know that it may involve the acceptance of larger 

American sacrifi ces. We have been building our strength to fi ght this kind of war ever 

since 1961, and I myself am ready to substantially increase the number of Americans in 

Vietnam if it is necessary to provide this kind of fi ghting force against the Viet Cong.5

In saying this, the president opened a door, but Taylor and Westmoreland declined to walk through it. On 6 January, Taylor, with Westmoreland’s concurrence, renewed his call for retaliatory bombing. He also 

transmitted a MACV staff analysis endorsed by Westmoreland of the 

question of using more American ground troops. The MACV staff, Taylor reported, believed that the number of American advisers and support personnel with the South Vietnamese forces had nearly reached 

the maximum that the Vietnamese could absorb. Beyond the advisory 

and combat support role, the staff had analyzed three possible uses of 

American troops: employment of Army and Marine infantry battalions 

as mobile reserves to counter major Viet Cong offensives and attack 

enemy units and base areas; integration of a U.S. infantry battalion 

into each ARVN regiment “to lead the way and set the standards”; and 

use of division-size forces of American, Vietnamese, and allied troops 

to hold coastal enclaves protecting vital ports and airfi elds. The staff 

Chap 6.indd 189 
190

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

had recommended none of these courses of action, arguing in eac

case that the political disadvantages outweighed the military benefi t

Taylor passed on to the president the MACV conclusion:

The Vietnamese have the manpower and basic skills to win this war. What they lac

is motivation. The entire advisory effort has been devoted to giving them both sk

and motivation. If that effort has not succeeded there is less reason to think that U.

combat forces would have the desired effect. In fact, there is good reason to believ

that they would have the opposite effect by causing some Vietnamese to let the U.

carry the burden while others, probably the majority, would turn actively against u

. . . Intervention with ground combat forces would at best buy time and would lea

to ever increasing commitments until, like the French, we would be occupying an e

sentially hostile foreign country.6

South Vietnamese offi cials at this time saw no need for U.S. troop

Late in January, for example, General DePuy, on his own initiativ

sounded out his Vietnamese counterpart, Colonel Nguyen Duc Thang

on “whether or not he thought we should make a larger military effo

in Vietnam and if so, in what manner.” Thang, an offi cer highly regard

ed by both DePuy and Westmoreland, replied that “additional air powe

might well be applied against the VC secret war zones.” However, h

declared that introducing American ground combat troops would be “

great psychological error” unless the United States planned “to escalat

into a limited war throughout Southeast Asia.”7

Taylor’s, Westmoreland’s, and Thang’s statements refl ected a long

standing consensus that South Vietnam should fi ght and win its ow

ground war and that it possessed the resources, if properly employed

to do so. Within two months, however, that consensus would chang

Collapse of the CHIEN THANG Plan

Throughout 1964 the Military Assistance Command had worke

to enlarge and improve the South Vietnamese armed forces and to de

ploy them for effective support of the CHIEN THANG pacifi cation plan

In March, after Secretary McNamara scrapped the Model Plan, with i

projections of U.S. and South Vietnamese force reductions, the Amer

can mission and the Khanh government hurriedly made plans to in

crease the ARVN and territorial forces by about 50,000 men. In Apri

General Khanh decreed nationwide mobilization for military or civi

ian public service of all able-bodied males between 20 and 45 years o

age. He established a Mobilization Directorate to enforce the decre

and to strengthen the government’s existing conscription system. Th

Americans provided additional MAP funds and advisory support fo

the increase. Although nothing resembling Khanh’s proclaimed tota

call-up occurred, and although government ineffi ciency and Viet Con

obstruction hampered conscription, the government secured enoug

new recruits during the year to meet its expansion goal and to reinforc

Chap 6.indd 190 
191

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

its many understrength units. At the same time, the government, at 

MACV’s urging, increased the pay, dependent housing, and benefi ts 

of regular and territorial troops; and it promised more equitable, rapid 

promotion for both offi cers and NCOs. These reforms, offi cials hoped, 

would improve unit leadership and reduce the continuing drain that 

desertions imposed upon the armed forces.8

Encouraged by these developments, General Westmoreland planned 

further expansion of Saigon’s military establishment during 1965. On 

the basis of a combined MACV–High Command force structure survey, 

he presented Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs with two alternative 

plans for increasing the regular and territorial forces. Under alternative 

one, the ARVN would expand by another 31,000 men and the Regional 

and Popular Forces by over 110,000, providing strength suffi cient, in 

Westmoreland’s estimation, to accelerate progress in HOP TAC and to 

forestall Viet Cong gains in other high-priority areas. Alternative two 

called for the same territorial force expansion as the fi rst but would add 

an extra 17,000 men to the ARVN. This alternative would permit larger gains in pacifi cation, according to Westmoreland, but would place 

greater strain on the government’s manpower resources and training 

facilities and take more time to complete. He therefore recommended 

Alternative one, and the U.S. government agreed to provide Military 

Assistance Program support for it. Under the plan adopted, South Vietnam was to have over 590,000 men under arms by the end of 1965, 

about 275,000 of them in the regular army, navy, and air force.9

Qualitative improvements accompanied the expansion. Pressed 

continuously by MACV, the South Vietnamese reorganized their high 

command along lines favored by the Americans. After lengthy negotiations, Westmoreland also secured the merger of several competing, ineffective hamlet-level militias into a single paid, full-time component, 

the Popular Forces. South Vietnamese military intelligence, under the 

infl uence of some 250 American intelligence advisers and with the support of specialized American units and personnel, provided a growing 

amount of reliable information about the Viet Cong. Intensifi ed training and new equipment—A–1H Skyraiders and H–34 helicopters for 

the Air Force; 105-mm. and 155-mm. howitzers, M41 tanks, and additional armored personnel carriers for the South Vietnamese Army—enhanced their fi repower, mobility, and combat performance. In spite of 

the persistence of high desertion rates and inadequate or insuffi ciently 

aggressive leadership at all levels, General Westmoreland felt justifi ed 

in declaring at the end of the year that the RVNAF now possessed the 

“greatest, most fl exible and responsive combat power in its history.”10

The Military Assistance Command worked throughout the year to 

translate the CHIEN THANG plan from the broad concept promulgated 

by General Khanh into practical military plans that would lead to what 

Westmoreland called “thoroughgoing operations on the ground.” To 

that end, Westmoreland during July defi ned the various military misChap 6.indd 191 
192

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

sions in aid of pacifi cation for the guidance of American advisers. Th

most important were “search and destroy”—attacks on enemy units an

base areas; “clearing”—prolonged operations to expel organized Vie

Cong forces from areas to be pacifi ed; and “securing”—elimination o

the Viet Cong shadow government and protection of the restored civ

administration. At MACV’s inducement, the High Command specifi e

on 25 December two principal military phases of pacifi cation—clearin

and securing. In the clearing phase, ARVN forces were to drive orga

nized Viet Cong forces out of areas targeted for pacifi cation while s

multaneously attacking enemy units and bases outside the pacifi catio

zones. In the securing phase, the Regional and Popular Forces and th

National Police were to take over defensive tasks from the ARVN an

to root out the Viet Cong infrastructure in order to provide the nece

sary underpinning for a restored civil administration. The ARVN at th

point would move on to new areas and begin clearing them, leavin

behind units to assist in securing operations if the territorials and po

lice lacked suffi cient strength.11

By the time this directive was issued, MACV had already mad

much progress in concentrating ARVN forces in the priority pacifi ca

tion areas—the “spreading oil spots”—established in the CHIEN THAN

plan. There were several of these in each corps besides the large HO

TAC zone around Saigon. General Westmoreland and his senior advi

ers gradually persuaded corps and division commanders to commit 

large proportion of their infantry battalions to these zones for long

term clearing and securing operations, conducted under province con

trol and emphasizing day and night small-unit patrols and ambushe

By the end of 1964, about 70 percent of the ARVN infantry battalion

in I and II Corps, and 78 percent of those in III Corps, were engage

in operations of this type. MACV also secured redeployments of troop

within and between corps and division areas and some changes i

corps boundaries to increase manpower in and around the principa

oil spots. In the largest single redeployment, the South Vietnamese i

October transferred their entire 25th Division from II Corps to Long A

and Hau Nghia Provinces in III Corps to reinforce HOP TAC. At the en

of 1964 the government’s military dispositions and operations at la

were coming into line with its national pacifi cation plan.12

By then, the Viet Cong were countering the CHIEN THANG program 

with increasing effectiveness. Like the government, the insurgents ex

panded their forces during the year, and at a greater rate. MACV’s est

mates of Viet Cong main force strength, which generally lagged behin

actual developments, increased from about 27,000 at the beginnin

of 1964 to 34,000 in July and to more than 48,000 in March 1965

These fi gures did not include the enemy’s guerrillas and hamlet militi

whose strength MACV intelligence estimated to be between 80,000 an

100,000, an admittedly rough and arbitrary approximation that prob

ably understated the total. In the same way, the number of main forc

Chap 6.indd 192 
193

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

formations grew from an estimated 

5 regiments, 46 battalions, and 132 

separate companies in mid-1964 to 

an estimated 10 regiments, 79 battalions, and 160 companies in early 

1965. The enemy’s armed forces, 

even with their rapid growth, remained much smaller than those of 

the government. Since government 

forces needed overwhelming superiority in manpower to carry out 

their clear-and-secure operations, 

however, any signifi cant increase 

in Viet Cong numbers threatened 

to upset the balance of forces essential to success of the CHIEN THANG

plan.13

The Viet Cong fi lled their expanding ranks mainly with southerners, often promoting men from 

the guerrilla ranks to form new main 

force units. However, they continued to rely heavily on infi ltrators from the north for offi cers, NCOs, and 

specialists. In October 1964, working from an expanded base of captured 

documents and prisoner interrogation reports, MACV’s J2 section tripled 

its estimate of infi ltration between 1959 and August 1964 from 13,000 to 

34,000 personnel. It also projected that total enemy infi ltration into the 

south during 1964 would be on the order of 10,000 men. By the middle of the year, the Military Assistance Command had established the 

presence of native North Vietnamese, as well as regrouped southerners, 

among infi ltrators in the northern corps areas; but until well into 1965 

it failed to verify South Vietnamese reports that organized northern 

army units were moving into the south.14

Besides growing in size, the Viet Cong’s main forces acquired heavier 

armaments and began to replace their old French, Japanese, and captured American weapons with newer ones of Communist-bloc manufacture. Beginning in late 1964, Chinese copies of the excellent Soviet 

automatic assault rifl e, the AK–47, appeared among weapons captured 

by the South Vietnamese, as did other small arms and machine guns 

fi ring the same 7.62-mm. cartridge. Main-force units also were more 

abundantly equipped with mortars, antitank rocket launchers, and recoilless rifl es. By introducing these Communist-bloc weapons, the Viet Cong 

standardized their infantry’s armament and increased its fi repower.15

Gradually implementing the directive of the Ninth Plenum to intensify their military effort, the Viet Cong used their growing forces to 

bloody the ARVN so as to erode the principal pillar of the unstable govAn enemy soldier holds his AK–47 rifl e. 

(CMH collection)

Chap 6.indd 193 
194

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ernment and to roll back pacifi cation. More frequently than in the pas

Viet Cong units from platoon to battalion size sought opportunities t

infl ict casualties on government regulars. Typically, they would besiege 

strategic hamlet or government outpost, then ambush the relieving uni

usually with a superior force fi ghting from carefully prepared position

Less frequently, Viet Cong in battalion or greater strength would seize 

hamlet or district town and then stand their ground for one or two day

against counterattacking ARVN or Regional Force elements. Cumula

tively, these actions cost the government heavily. Average casualties pe

month rose from about 1,900 at the beginning of 1964 to 3,000 at th

end. Although the Viet Cong suffered severely in many engagement

the overall loss ratios shifted steadily against the Saigon forces. 16

In late December, at Binh Gia in Phuoc Tuy Province about thirt

miles southeast of Saigon, the Viet Cong used their assault and ambus

tactics to deal the ARVN its most severe defeat of the year. Invading 

hitherto relatively quiet portion of the HOP TAC area, two main forc

Viet Cong regiments, newly equipped with Communist-bloc weapon

and supported by local units and guerrillas, seized a progovernmen

Catholic village and then stayed to fi ght the troops who came to re

take it. In a series of engagements between 28 December and 3 January

they destroyed a battalion of marines and another of rangers, kille

almost 200 government troops and 5 U.S. advisers, captured mor

than 300 individual and crew-served weapons, and shot down 2 he

licopters. The III Corps mounted a multibattalion search-and-destro

operation in response but failed to engage the Communist regiment

This battle, in the view of many Americans at the time, presaged a Vie

Covered by a U.S. Army helicopter, South Vietnamese marines advance 

into Binh Gia, 30 December 1964. (AP photo)

Chap 6.indd 194 
195

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

Cong advance from guerrilla warfare to large-unit operations.17

To break up the pacifi cation oil spots, the Viet Cong employed main 

force elements, guerrillas, and political cadres in combination. They 

developed their counter-pacifi cation campaign most fully in the piedmont and coastal plain of I and II Corps, where the government previously had seemed to be gaining ground through effective application 

of the “spreading oil spot” technique, but where the South Vietnamese 

Army was weakened late in 1964 by the transfer southward of the 25th 

Division. Working from mountain base areas, main-force and regional 

elements, in conjunction with local guerrillas, terrorized government 

village and hamlet offi cials, harassed small posts and defended hamlets, 

destroyed hamlet fortifi cations, and blocked road traffi c. To immobilize 

the South Vietnamese Army, main-force and regional units made occasional large attacks on outposts and district capitals. Behind the military units came Viet Cong political cadres who gradually gained access 

to and control over the villagers of the piedmont and coast.18

By the fi rst anniversary of its inception, the CHIEN THANG pacifi cation plan, with its associated dispersal of the South Vietnamese Army 

to clear and hold selected areas, was failing. The plan’s American and 

Vietnamese authors had assumed that the Viet Cong would continue 

operations on about the same scale and with the same combination of 

guerrilla and main force activity as in 1963. When the Viet Cong, employing main forces as well as guerrillas, began systematically to attack 

all elements of the pacifi cation program simultaneously, from ARVN 

units on clearing and securing missions to strategic hamlets in supposedly secure zones, the government lacked the forces, whether regular 

or territorial, to protect the pacifi cation oil spots effectively, let alone 

expand them or seek out and destroy the Viet Cong battalions. Its dispersed forces risked defeat in detail by well-armed Viet Cong regulars, 

who could concentrate seemingly at will against undermanned or isolated objectives. Especially in I and II Corps, Saigon’s troops, to avoid 

piecemeal annihilation, had to abandon outlying and hard-to-defend 

pacifi ed areas, which then promptly reverted to Viet Cong control. According to a later MACV estimate, the government, between mid-1964 

and mid-1965, lost an additional 6 percent of South Vietnam’s population to the Viet Cong. Only continued Viet Cong inability to manipulate the urban political factions and the persistent loyalty of the armed 

forces to the government stood in the way of an insurgent victory at the 

end of 1964. By then North Vietnamese regular units were moving into 

South Vietnam to provide what Communist planners hoped would be 

the fi nal impetus for Saigon’s military and political collapse.19

A Limited Response

The Military Assistance Command was slow to acknowledge any 

major change in the relative balance of power. Throughout 1964 GenChap 6.indd 195 
196

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

eral Westmoreland and his intelligence section interpreted Viet Con

strategy as essentially a continuation, somewhat intensifi ed, of the pre

vious pattern of terrorism, guerrilla warfare, and occasional opportu

nistic larger attacks. While expressing concern at the frequency an

deadliness of Viet Cong ambushes, Westmoreland noted on several oc

casions that the overall number of enemy large-unit operations was ac

tually declining. He suggested that, in the face of stronger governmen

forces, the Viet Cong were shifting their resources to terrorism an

small-unit action, expedients that were less costly and more effectiv

in extending their control in the countryside. At the end of the yea

a MACV study of Viet Cong strategy and tactics, while it took not

of the increases in enemy main force strength and the appearance o

new Communist-bloc weapons, concluded that “the VC still have no

reached the . . . ‘mobile warfare phase’ of their ‘people’s war’” and tha

they had not yet “faced up to the full risk of prolonged pitched battle

of the conventional type.” 20

As Westmoreland and Taylor indicated in their January response t

President Johnson’s suggestion that the United States introduce groun

troops into the war, MACV and the mission still attributed the lack o

pacifi cation progress primarily to South Vietnamese political instabi

ity and administrative ineffi ciency rather than to Viet Cong strength

Westmoreland initially even played down the military signifi cance o

the debacle at Binh Gia, claiming that the South Vietnamese Army

defeat had resulted from the preoccupation of senior III Corps com

manders with Saigon politics. “We must not,” he told Taylor, “be ove

whelmed by the loss of one battle. There will be more wins and mor

losses. If the GVN will turn its attention back to the war, there will b

more wins than losses.” 21

During the fi rst two months of 1965, the tone of Westmoreland

and MACV’s assessments changed rapidly. The change came in re

sponse to continued Viet Cong battlefi eld successes, especially in I an

II Corps, and to accumulating evidence from prisoners and capture

weapons and documents of the enemy’s rearmament and expansion. B

March, MACV was not only revising upward its estimates of Viet Con

strength but also making alarming projections of future growth. Base

on the Viet Cong’s apparent rate of expansion during 1964, the com

mand estimated that the enemy could have as many as 100 battalion

in the fi eld by the end of 1965, and that estimate did not include Nort

Vietnamese regular units, whose presence in the south now seeme

increasingly probable. The command also acknowledged a possibl

enemy movement toward large-unit warfare. Late in January, Genera

Westmoreland called Ambassador Taylor’s attention to “increasing ap

pearances of VC main forces which either sought open engagement o

occupied friendly villages with determination to stay until the RVNA

produced enough combat power to force them to withdraw.” A mont

later he informed the Joint Chiefs that the government’s military pos

Chap 6.indd 196 
197

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

tion was deteriorating everywhere but in IV Corps. “These trends indicate,” he warned, “that the situation visualized in OPLAN 32 Phase II 

(RVN) [a requirement for U.S. troops to reinforce the South Vietnamese 

Army in the counterguerrilla war] may be approaching.”22

Enemy pressure slackened throughout the country during March, 

but the situation remained ominous. In II Corps, South Vietnamese 

forces, supported by American air strikes and reinforced by a large part 

of Saigon’s general reserve, checked a Viet Cong offensive in populous 

Binh Dinh Province and reopened a number of key highways. The 

enemy, however, continued to build up his strength in the region, so 

much so that the hard-pressed corps commander was considering withdrawal of some of his exposed garrisons. In the cities the Viet Cong 

continued terrorist attacks on American facilities, severely damaging 

the U.S. embassy in Saigon with a car bomb on 30 March. Most disturbing of all, allied intelligence confi rmed during the fi rst days of April the 

presence of a battalion of the PAVN 325th Division northwest of Kontum 

in the Central Highlands and strongly suspected that other elements of 

the division were there as well. The infi ltration of North Vietnamese 

combat units to reinforce the still-expanding Viet Cong main forces, 

long considered possible by MACV, appeared to be under way.23

General Westmoreland issued a comprehensive, pessimistic review 

of the situation on 6 March, even before much of this bad news reached 

him. Surveying the corps tactical zones, he declared that enemy forces in I Corps were extending their infl uence from the piedmont into 

the lowlands and erasing what pacifi cation gains the government had 

made. In II Corps, where some ARVN units were already “in a pessimistic frame of mind and . . . reluctant to engage in offensive operations,” Westmoreland expected the enemy to reinforce his troops 

in the region’s northern provinces and try to cause a “psychological 

collapse” of the government side. In III Corps, the HOP TAC campaign 

had come to a stop for lack of additional forces. The general reserve, 

on which the program relied to counter enemy attacks and to conduct 

peripheral search and destroy operations, had been committed elsewhere, opening the way for the Viet Cong to wipe out government 

gains by throwing in their own available reserves. Only in IV Corps did 

the government appear to be holding its ground and perhaps gaining a 

bit in pacifi cation; but even there the Viet Cong were reportedly forming main force regiments and seemed capable of raising the intensity 

of military action at any time.

Looking ahead over the next six months, Westmoreland expected 

more of the same, only worse. He predicted that the Viet Cong, “holding the initiative,” would increase the tempo and intensity of their political-military offensive, especially in the northern and central parts of 

South Vietnam. They would add to their military manpower through 

conscription and recruiting in the south and infi ltration from the north, 

organize new units, and consolidate their main force elements into large 

Chap 6.indd 197 
198

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

formations with standardized weapons. By means of large- and smal

unit actions, they would try to compress the South Vietnamese Arm

and territorials into strongholds isolated from the people while cuttin

roads and communications and wearing down the marine and airborn

battalions of the South Vietnamese general reserve. As its military cam

paign went forward, the enemy would consolidate political control o

the territory it already dominated while striving to expand its infl uenc

over the people of militarily contested areas. In addition, it would in

tensify all forms of propaganda and subversion in government-held di

tricts to create “a massive popular peace movement” among religiou

ethnic, and political groups. Westmoreland concluded:

With the continuance of present trends, and provided that no new power elements a

brought into play, six months from now the confi guration of the RVNAF will essen

tially be a series of islands of strength clustered around district and province capita

clogged with large numbers of refugees in a generally subverted countryside; and th

GVN itself will be beset by “end the war” groups openly advocating a negotiated settl

ment. . . . We are headed toward a VC takeover of the country, sooner or later, if w

continue down the present road at the present level of effort.24

In the context of this rather cataclysmic projection, Westmoreland

immediate proposals for additional American action were modest an

did not include any major request for ground forces. He sought onl

to “postpone indefi nitely the day of collapse” until “other pressures

on North Vietnam—presumably the bombing campaign—could tak

effect. To this end, he repeated a request he had made in January fo

freedom of action in using U.S. tactical aircraft against the Viet Con

and put forward a number of proposals for enhancing MACV’s recon

naissance and targeting capabilities. To increase ARVN mobility an

counter enemy road-cutting, he requested three more UH–1B helicop

ter companies and a half squadron of C–130 transport planes. Notin

that the enemy, conducting larger operations and using standardize

Communist-bloc weapons, would have to depend on supplies infi ltra

ed by sea as well as land, Westmoreland urged more extensive use o

Pacifi c Fleet vessels to interdict Vietnamese coastal waters. In his onl

reference to ground troops, he declared that the deployment of ma

rines to Da Nang would enhance base security there and that “it ma

be necessary to bring in ground forces elsewhere, for identical purpose

or indeed to prevent a collapse in some particular area at a critica

time.” Ending on a note of incongruous optimism, Westmoreland sug

gested that the Viet Cong were “not 10 feet tall” and that they suffere

from tactical and logistical problems of their own. The South Vietnam

ese people meanwhile showed “remarkable resiliency” and little en

thusiasm for the Communists. In that light, he held out hope that th

United States, by an “increased show of strength and determination

might not only buy itself and the Saigon government more time bu

also “start the pendulum in the opposite direction.”25

Chap 6.indd 198 
199

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

Westmoreland’s optimism may have stemmed in part from the fact 

that his campaign to bring the full weight of American air power to 

bear on the Viet Cong was nearing success in early March. At the beginning of 1965, Westmoreland could not employ U.S. jets in South 

Vietnam, and the FARM GATE piston engine aircraft still had to carry a 

Vietnamese pilot or observer on all their missions, which were supposedly for training rather than combat. On 26 January, “as a matter of 

prudence,” Westmoreland asked the Pacifi c Commander and the Joint 

Chiefs for authority to launch jet strikes when important enemy targets were unreachable by the Vietnamese Air Force and when a combat 

situation was “of such criticality that the VC could obtain a major victory or numbers of American lives would be lost.” The administration 

granted his request, with the proviso that Westmoreland himself, with 

the ambassador’s concurrence, approve each mission. Westmoreland 

used this authority twice during February, once for a raid on a Viet 

Cong concentration in Phuoc Tuy Province, site of the Binh Gia battle, 

and the second time to relieve an ambushed Ranger and CIDG force 

near Pleiku.26

Although enemy pressure on the South Vietnamese Army mounted, the initial jet strikes had favorable military results with no visible 

adverse Vietnamese governmental or popular reaction. Thus, during 

F–4B Phantom II over South Vietnam (NARA)

Chap 6.indd 199 
200

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

late February and early March, Westmoreland pressed for complet

discretionary authority to employ air power. He wanted to eliminat

the cumbersome mission-by-mission approval requirement and to lo

cate strike request and control in the established MACV/VNAF tactica

air control system. The administration was at fi rst reluctant to giv

Westmoreland the broad mandate he requested, but it relented afte

increasingly urgent representations from the MACV commander, sec

onded by Admiral Sharp. On 9 March 1965, the Joint Chiefs grante

Sharp full discretion to employ U.S. aircraft in South Vietnam as h

and his subordinate commanders deemed prudent. On the same day

also at Westmoreland’s and Sharp’s recommendation, the Joint Chie

removed the restrictions on FARM GATE combat operations and autho

rized the air commando unit to replace with U.S. Air Force markings th

Vietnamese insignia their planes had borne hitherto. From that poin

onward, American jet and propeller-driven aircraft were fully commi

ted to the fi ght in South Vietnam, and heavy American air strikes coul

be expected to accompany every sizable engagement.27

Westmoreland had campaigned vigorously to bring American a

power into the battle, but until well into March he was much less aggre

sive in advocating the use of ground troops. This was true even thoug

MACV was rapidly realizing the extent of the enemy’s force buildup an

the degree to which it was tipping the balance against the governmen

in the countryside. Westmoreland mentioned troops only in genera

terms and largely in connection with base defense in his 6 March situa

tion estimate. This was at the time when the 9th Marine Expeditionar

Brigade was preparing to land at Da Nang. In endorsing Westmoreland

estimate, Admiral Sharp was equally conservative. He emphasized onl

the need for troops “in security missions within Vietnam” and the desi

ability of expanding the U.S. logistical base there.28 Only after receivin

a strong signal from Washington that more expansive proposals wer

desired and expected did Westmoreland submit his fi rst major recom

mendation for introducing American soldiers into the ground war.

Three Proposals for Sending Troops

The signal came during a visit to Vietnam by the Army Chief o

Staff, General Harold K. Johnson. As he had indicated in suggesting th

deployment of U.S. troops to Taylor and Westmoreland in Decembe

President Johnson was intent on taking every possible measure to in

fuse energy into the campaign against the Viet Cong. In addition, du

ing the fi rst months of 1965, the president and his principal advise

had come to share General Westmoreland’s concern that South Vie

nam might be in danger of collapse. Driven by both considerations, th

president on 2 March dispatched General Johnson to Saigon to review 

with the mission the existing American effort and decide what mor

could and should be done. In particular, General Johnson told Amba

Chap 6.indd 200 
201

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

sador Taylor, his task was to evaluate “present use of all DOD assets 

and . . . determine what additional 

forces and techniques, if any, can 

be of value.” President Johnson 

himself phrased his instructions 

more colorfully. After a breakfast 

meeting on the day of General 

Johnson’s departure for Saigon, the 

Army chief of staff later recalled, 

the president “bored his fi nger into 

my chest and . . . said ‘get things 

bubbling’” in Vietnam.29

The president’s dispatch of the 

chief of staff of the Army to investigate and report on what additional military measures should be 

taken in Vietnam in itself pointed 

toward an interest in more activity on the ground. In fact, General 

Johnson’s trip resulted in three 

separate but related proposals to 

that end, one from the Army chief of staff himself, one from Westmoreland, and one from the Joint Chiefs. During the months that followed, offi cials outlined the shape of the American commitment on 

the basis of those proposals.

General Johnson arrived in Saigon on 5 March 1965, with a party 

composed of fourteen military and civilian members. During a week’s 

stay, he and his group conferred with Ambassador Taylor, General Westmoreland, and the mission council and received extensive briefi ngs 

from the MACV staff. The Army chief of staff also met with South Vietnamese offi cials, including Premier Quat, Minister of Defense Thieu, 

and Air Vice Marshal Ky. The briefi ngs and conversations generally 

sounded the same note as Westmoreland’s assessment of 6 March, with 

emphasis on indications that the enemy might be preparing for a large 

takeover of territory in the Central Highlands, possibly as the base for 

an alternative National Liberation Front government.30

General Johnson brought with him for discussion a list of proposals for additional actions. The embassy and MACV furnished him with 

their own lists, prepared, at Secretary McNamara’s direction, on the 

assumption of “no limitation on funds, equipment or personnel.” 

The ensuing talks and briefi ngs included much mention of American 

troops. At their fi rst meeting, Johnson and the mission council agreed 

to explore a number of subjects, among them “use of U.S. manpower 

to offset present shortage in Armed Forces of GVN.” Westmoreland 

submitted to the chief of staff an extensive array of possible new miliGeneral Johnson (NARA)

Chap 6.indd 201 
202

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

tary actions. These included employment of U.S. troops to act as corp

and general reserve reaction forces, to defend enclaves, and to provid

“ground security for critical areas.” During March his staff was makin

an intensive study of the enclave plan and also of the feasibility of a

antiinfi ltration cordon across northern South Vietnam and the Lao

panhandle. At some point during the visit, Westmoreland broached t

Johnson the idea of deploying a U.S. Army division around Pleiku t

help relieve pressure on II Corps. The chief of staff indicated that th

new airmobile division might be available for that assignment.31

The Army chief of staff left Vietnam a convinced proponent of pu

ting in American ground troops in substantial numbers and with 

combat mission. On his way back to Washington, Johnson told th

staff of U.S. Army, Pacifi c: “I am the fi rst Chief of Staff, I think, sinc

World War II who believes that if it is in the interest of the Unite

States to hold South Vietnam . . . , then it is in the interest of the Uni

ed States to commit ground troops to Asia.” He dismissed as “fi ctional

the post-Korea doctrine that the United States should stay out of Asia

land wars and declared: “Where the U.S. interest requires it, that 

where the Army belongs, and so far as I am concerned, that’s where 

am going to recommend that it go. That’s our job.”32

In his trip report, delivered on 14 March 1965, Johnson was as goo

as his word. The chief of staff repeated much of General Westmore

land’s 6 March assessment, declaring that the Vietnam situation ha

“deteriorated rapidly and extensively in the past several months an

that major new remedial actions must be quickly undertaken.” He re

ported that the South Vietnamese armed forces, even with the planne

increase, lacked the resources to deal by themselves with the “magn

tude and scope” of Viet Cong aggression.

To reinforce the South Vietnamese, Johnson proposed three ca

egories of American action. The fi rst consisted of twenty-one specifi 

measures for reinforcing the existing advisory and support effort, in

tensifying the air war against North Vietnam, and bringing U.S. a

and sea power to bear more effectively in South Vietnam. Genera

Johnson’s second category was a proposal to send a “tailored divisio

force” of American troops to South Vietnam, either to defend certai

key towns and installations or (as Johnson preferred) to operate offen

sively against the Viet Cong in the Central Highlands in order to allow 

the ARVN in II Corps to concentrate more of its troops in the coasta

provinces. Implementation of his twenty-one points and deploymen

of the division, Johnson declared, would “alleviate but may not rem

edy” the military situation and probably would not provide “the powe

increase needed to support an acceptable political solution to the war

Hence, Johnson suggested a third and fi nal step: emplacement of a U.

or SEATO anti-infi ltration cordon of at least four divisions below th

Demilitarized Zone and across the Laotian panhandle. Besides stop

ping infi ltration, Johnson argued, the cordon force would supplemen

Chap 6.indd 202 
203

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

the bombing as a threat to North Vietnam and provide leverage in any 

negotiations that might develop in the future.33

General Westmoreland expressed satisfaction with the chief of 

staff’s proposals, which, he later declared, “refl ected much of my thinking.” Johnson’s visit evidently convinced the MACV commander that a 

major troop request would receive favorable consideration in Washington and indeed now was expected, and he lost no time in submitting 

one. Immediately after General Johnson’s departure, Westmoreland 

put his staff to work on a plan incorporating many ideas they had 

discussed. He outlined the results in a 17 March message to General 

Wheeler, and at the end of the month he sent the full plan to Washington in the form of a voluminous “Commander’s Estimate of the 

Military Situation in South Vietnam.”34

In both documents, Westmoreland defi ned the immediate problem 

as a need to gain time by preventing a South Vietnamese collapse under 

intensifying Viet Cong pressure until Saigon’s armed forces could complete their projected 1965 expansion and/or ROLLING THUNDER could 

cause North Vietnam to stop supporting the insurgency. To accomplish 

this, U.S. ground forces were required to “offset security defi ciencies 

and stabilize the situation pending the buildup of the RVNAF.”

Westmoreland began his argument with an extended analysis of 

the enemy threat. He reviewed the latest, most alarming estimates of 

Viet Cong main force and guerrilla strength and pointed out that by 

recruiting and conscription within South Vietnam supplemented by 

infi ltration from the north the enemy could raise at least twenty new 

battalions a year and an indeterminate number of irregulars. Reviewing a number of possible Viet Cong courses of action, Westmoreland 

believed the insurgents would most likely pursue a campaign of smallscale attacks, subversion, assassination, sabotage, and propaganda designed to expand the Viet Cong’s political, administrative, and security 

infrastructure in the south. They would couple this effort with “maximum feasible buildup of forces in preparation for a higher level of 

military operations” and “occasional large scale attacks where there is a 

high assurance of success.” As a supplement, they might also introduce 

regular North Vietnamese combat units of up to division size into I and 

II Corps “to attack and overrun a major installation or city. . . in an attempt to break the will to resist in the northern corps [and] establish 

a pseudo government.” The South Vietnamese Army, Westmoreland 

declared, even with its projected 1965 increase, could barely contain 

an intensifi ed guerrilla offensive with occasional large-unit attacks. 

If North Vietnamese units joined the battle as well, the government 

might suffer in I and II Corps major defeats and territorial losses severe 

enough to lead to the sort of military and political disintegration the 

Viet Cong sought.35

To ensure against such a disaster, the United States must commit 

ground forces at once. Like General Johnson, Westmoreland advocated 

Chap 6.indd 203 
204

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

deploying a U.S. Army division (if possible the new airmobile unit) t

conduct offensive operations against the Viet Cong on the axis betwee

Qui Nhon and Pleiku in the Central Highlands. As an alternative, th

division could secure coastal enclaves around the ports of Qui Nhon

Nha Trang, and Tuy Hoa. Westmoreland preferred the fi rst course o

action because it seemed more immediately benefi cial to the militar

balance in the critical highlands. It also gave American soldiers an o

fensive mission away from the densely populated lowlands where the

presence might provoke political hostility. In addition to the division

Westmoreland asked for a separate Army brigade for use in III Corps t

protect bases at Bien Hoa and Vung Tau and to conduct mobile opera

tions in defense of the HOP TAC area. Finally, he proposed rounding ou

the Marine force at Da Nang with a third battalion landing team an

the placement of a fourth Marine infantry battalion at Phu Bai, nort

of Da Nang, to protect the airfi eld and Army communications intell

gence unit there. Counting the 2 Marine battalions already at Da Nang

the units requested would constitute a force of 13 Army and 4 Marin

infantry battalions plus supporting elements. Westmoreland estimate

that their presence would release at least 10 ARVN battalions for rede

ployment or for reconstitution of Saigon’s general reserve. He aske

that the deployment of the units and the logistic elements required fo

their support begin as soon as possible and that it be completed no

later than early June. He warned in addition that if ROLLING THUNDE

had not succeeded by the middle of the year, “additional deploymen

of U.S. and third country forces should be considered, including intro

duction of the full [Marine expeditionary force] into I Corps.”36

In what was to become a recurring rationale when the Military A

sistance Command made troop requests, Westmoreland emphasize

the contribution his proposed reinforcement would make to improv

ing the overall ratio of allied to enemy strength as measured in com

parative numbers of maneuver battalions. Abandoning the 10-to-

ratio of government to enemy forces usually deemed essential to suc

cess in counterinsurgency but obviously unattainable in South Vie

nam, Westmoreland set 3-to-1 as the desirable margin instead. Howev

er, even with its projected 1965 increase, the South Vietnamese Arm

would end the year with a ratio to the Viet Cong of only 1.6 battalion

to 1, assuming a comparatively modest Viet Cong buildup and no larg

injection of North Vietnamese units. The insertion of American unit

Westmoreland contended, would improve the ratio considerably, espe

cially since each U.S. Army battalion could be considered as equal i

combat power to two ARVN or Viet Cong battalions and each Marin

battalion as equal to three. With the 13 Army and 4 Marine battalion

the ARVN thus would gain the equivalent of 38 of its own battalion

bringing the nationwide troop ratio to 1.9 to 1 by the end of 1965 an

the ratio in critical II Corps close to the desired 3 to 1. Further, if the Amer

can units arrived by the middle of the year, they would shift the balanc

Chap 6.indd 204 
205

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

toward the government much sooner than would the ARVN buildup 

alone, giving the U.S. force still greater military and political impact.37

Westmoreland gave extended consideration to an antiinfi ltration 

cordon across northern South Vietnam and the Laotian panhandle. 

However, he saw it as no immediate solution to the military problem 

he faced. He acknowledged that perhaps fi ve divisions of American, 

South Vietnamese, Thai, and Laotian troops, once deployed from the 

South China Sea to the Mekong, effectively would prevent North Vietnam from supporting the Viet Cong buildup. The disadvantage, he 

pointed out, was that it would take at least the remaining months of 

1965, and perhaps longer, to put the ports and roads in I Corps into 

condition to supply such a force, not to mention opening the necessary line of communications through Thailand. In addition, extension 

of the confl ict into nominally neutral Laos would undoubtedly provoke heated political opposition in the United States and lead to a 

multitude of diplomatic diffi culties, further delaying establishment 

of the cordon. Westmoreland suggested that if ROLLING THUNDER performed as hoped, the cordon would be superfl uous by the time it was 

in place. In any event, he concluded, the blocking force could not be 

in position soon enough to help reduce the immediate threat to the 

Saigon government.38

General Westmoreland sent his commander’s estimate to Washington at the end of March, carried by General DePuy, who accompanied 

Ambassador Taylor to the capital for a policy reassessment. High Defense Department offi cials and the Joint Chiefs of Staff received a briefing on the estimate. By the time it reached Washington, however, the 

chiefs already had developed a more ambitious proposal of their own 

based on General Johnson’s report and earlier communications from 

Westmoreland.39

General Johnson’s report, indeed, had set off a fl urry of top-level 

discussion. At a 15 March 1965 meeting with McNamara and the Joint 

Chiefs, the president approved in principle most of the Army chief 

of staff’s twenty-one recommendations for strengthening the existing American effort. He also made apparent his interest in more farreaching military proposals, urging the chiefs to devise measures to 

“kill more VC.” The Joint Chiefs reviewed General Johnson’s suggested ground force deployments. They also considered the possibility of 

introducing a South Korean division into South Vietnam to give the 

troop commitment an international fl avor, something much desired 

by the administration, and heard a proposal from the commandant 

of the Marine Corps to establish six coastal “beachheads” defended by 

American forces.40

On 20 March, after a study by the Joint Staff and considerable negotiation among themselves, the chiefs delivered their own proposal to 

the secretary of defense. Declaring that “the requirement is not simply 

to withstand the Viet Cong, . . . but to gain effective operational superiChap 6.indd 205 
206

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ority and assume the offensive,” the Joint Chiefs called for dispatch o

a Marine expeditionary force to Da Nang, a U.S. Army division to Ple

ku, and a Republic of Korea division (assuming one could be obtained

to a location to be determined later. The mission of the marines an

Army troops would be “counterinsurgency combat operations,” whil

that of the Koreans would be “counterinsurgency and base security op

erations.” On the day they submitted their proposal to Secretary McNa

mara, the chiefs directed Admiral Sharp and General Westmoreland t

comment on the logistical requirements for deploying and supportin

the three-division force and on command arrangements to permit th

MACV commander effectively to coordinate allied and South Vietnam

ese ground operations. From that point on, the JCS proposal becam

the basis for planning at all echelons and also eventually for presiden

tial deployment decisions.41

Edging into the Ground War

By the end of March, Westmoreland, the chief of staff of the Arm

and the Joint Chiefs of Staff all had recommended commitment o

large numbers of U.S. troops to ground combat. President Johnson an

his closest advisers strongly favored in principle reinforcement of th

South Vietnamese Army with American soldiers. Nevertheless, durin

the next two months, the president moved only slowly and cautiousl

albeit steadily, toward implementing the military leaders’ recommen

dations. He and his advisers were concerned with keeping all Executiv

Branch participants in the policy debate on board at each step an

hence sought to keep the steps small. They also wanted to avoid overl

abrupt or conspicuous acts of escalation so as to placate domestic pub

lic opinion and neutralize opponents of the war. Finally, they had t

deal with Vietnam in relation to other military and diplomatic prob

lems, including a major crisis in the Dominican Republic that had le

to U.S. military intervention.42

Even had the administration wanted to move faster, a number o

circumstances worked against any immediate large infusion of U.

troops into South Vietnam. For one thing, as of late March, no Amer

can logistical base existed in the country capable of supporting a mu

tidivision force. Insertion of major units, General Westmoreland an

Admiral Sharp told the Joint Chiefs, would have to await formatio

of an Army logistic command; deployment of thousands of suppo

troops; and extensive port, airfi eld, and road improvements. Thos

preparations had yet to begin or even to be authorized.43

During April and May 1965, the military situation in South Vie

nam, as reported by MACV and the U.S. Mission, appeared less despe

ate than it had at the beginning of the year. The civilian governmen

of Premier Quat proved unexpectedly effective, restoring a semblanc

of cohesive administration and moderating Saigon’s endemic faction

Chap 6.indd 206 
207

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

al strife. On the battlefi eld, Viet Cong offensive activity diminished, 

while the South Vietnamese Army regained the initiative and won victories in some areas. Westmoreland felt optimistic enough to suggest 

in his monthly evaluation for April that the government “may have 

actually turned the tide at long last.” To be sure, there were less favorable indications. The Viet Cong main forces continued to increase in 

size and appeared to be concentrating for probable new attacks in the 

I, II, and III Corps areas. Evidence continued to mount, moreover, of 

the presence of North Vietnamese regular units in the Central Highlands. General DePuy believed, as a result, that South Vietnam was in 

“the lull before a storm” and that the outcome of the war “seems to be 

hanging in the balance.” These ill omens notwithstanding, the sense 

of crisis that had given rise to the March troop proposals abated during April and early May, enough to encourage second thoughts about 

major commitments.44

For his own part, Ambassador Taylor had long advised a slow, cautious approach to the commitment of American combat units. An 

early and consistent advocate of bombing the north, he acknowledged 

that the force ratio in the south was changing in favor of the enemy 

and that at some point American soldiers might be needed to redress 

the balance. Even so, until late May, he repeatedly counseled against 

any immediate large-scale use of Americans to fi ght the Viet Cong. He 

The Joint Chiefs of Staff: left to right, General McConnell, Admiral McDonald, 

Generals Wheeler, Johnson, and Greene (© Bettmann/CORBIS photo)

Chap 6.indd 207 
208

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

doubted that the “white-faced soldier” could engage the guerrillas effec

tively on their own ground. Major troop involvement, he contended

would expose the United States to charges of colonialism and give th

Chinese Communists an excuse to send their own forces into Nort

Vietnam. In the south, American fi ghting men would have diffi cult

distinguishing Vietnamese friends from foes and would come into po

litically abrasive contact with the civilian population. The war-wear

Saigon government and army would turn the more diffi cult mission

over to the Americans, thereby generating still further demands fo

U.S. troops. Given these disadvantages, Taylor argued, only the grave

threat to South Vietnam’s survival could justify commitment of majo

U.S. combat units, and no such threat yet existed. Therefore, to avoi

tying down mobile Army and Marine forces unnecessarily and coun

terproductively, he urged the White House to minimize combat un

deployments and instead to bring in support troops to build a logist

base capable of sustaining large forces in case it became necessary t

commit them later.45

The administration’s fi rst major decision on troop commitmen

strongly refl ected Taylor’s advice. On 1 April, after conferences wit

his advisers and with the ambassador, President Johnson directed th

deployment to Vietnam of two additional Marine battalions, a Ma

rine aircraft squadron, and the 9th MEB headquarters and support ele

ments. One battalion was to round out the brigade at Da Nang; th

other, in accord with General Westmoreland’s recommendation in h

commander’s estimate, was to defend the Army radio unit and airfi el

at Phu Bai. Johnson also authorized the dispatch of 18,000–20,000 U.

support troops to Vietnam “to fi ll out existing units and supply need

ed logistic personnel.” Subsequent directives and messages made clea

that these troops were to establish a series of coastal bases capable o

supporting the three-division force proposed by the Joint Chiefs. Seek

ing allied troops to balance the new American commitment, Presiden

Johnson ordered “urgent exploration” of force contributions with th

South Korean, Australian, and New Zealand governments.

Finally, in perhaps his most portentous decision, the president a

tered the mission of all Marine battalions in Vietnam “to permit the

more active use under conditions to be established and approved b

the Secretary of Defense in consultation with the Secretary of State

Secretaries Rusk and McNamara and Ambassador Taylor construed th

language as authorizing a shift from static positional defense to at lea

limited offensive operations against the Viet Cong, including, in Tay

lor’s view, a “strike role” in support of the South Vietnamese Army any

where within fi fty miles of American bases. The President and his advi

ers postponed a fi nal decision on the Joint Chiefs’ three-division plan

They recognized, however, that deployment of the additional marine

and logistic troops was the fi rst step in implementing the larger pro

gram and expected to review further steps within about sixty days.46

Chap 6.indd 208 
209

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

In the meantime, the Joint Chiefs, at Secretary McNamara’s direction, began detailed planning for introduction of the entire three-division allied force into Vietnam “at the earliest practicable date.” At 

the chiefs’ direction, Admiral Sharp convened representatives of all the 

major Pacifi c commands, MACV among them, as well as delegations 

from the Defense Department, the JCS, and interested commands in 

the United States, for a deployment conference that ran between 9 

and 11 April at his Honolulu headquarters. The conference developed 

specifi c logistic requirements and movement schedules for the forces 

contemplated for deployment. In the course of their discussions, the 

conferees fl eshed out many portions of the chiefs’ plan. They suggested 

Qui Nhon and Nha Trang as coastal bases for the Army division and 

reiterated that the division’s mission should be counterinsurgency operations in the Central Highlands. Adopting MACV recommendations, 

the conference proposed Quang Ngai, in southern I Corps, as the most 

worthwhile location for the Korean division and added to the original plan a separate Army brigade for Bien Hoa/Vung Tau. For all these 

units, as well as the marines at Da Nang and Phu Bai, the conferees 

proposed a concept of operations calling for movement by stages from 

initial securing of coastal bases to wide-ranging offensive maneuvers, 

and they made proposals for command and control of the force in unilateral and combined operations.47

According to the U.S. Army, Pacifi c, historian, this conference, for 

the Pacifi c Command and its components, signaled imminent U.S. 

movement from a limited advisory role to preparation for full combat 

participation in the war. The Joint Chiefs incorporated the conference 

version of troop locations, concepts of operations, and command relations into an expanded version of their three-division proposal, which 

they presented to McNamara on 17 April. Subsequent discussions of 

all aspects of committing troops to Vietnam among the Joint Chiefs, 

Sharp, and Westmoreland revolved around the three-division plan as 

modifi ed by the April CINCPAC conference.48

General Westmoreland, whose commander’s estimate had been 

overshadowed in Washington by the Joint Chiefs’ three-division proposal, sought to incorporate MACV ideas into the chiefs’ plan. For 

example, he argued successfully for Quang Ngai as the location for 

the Korean division, in preference to the Saigon area initially favored 

by the Joint Chiefs. Recognizing that a full division for the Central 

Highlands was more than the administration could accept at once, he 

concentrated on separate requests for the smaller forces mentioned in 

his commander’s estimate. Hence, late in March, he pressed for an additional Marine battalion for Phu Bai, emphasizing the need to protect 

the Army radio unit and the desirability of securing an additional airstrip for Marine helicopters to relieve congestion at Da Nang. Ambassador Taylor supported Westmoreland in this recommendation, which 

became part of the president’s 1 April troop decision.49

Chap 6.indd 209 
210

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Westmoreland then shifted to a campaign for deployment of a

Army brigade to Bien Hoa and Vung Tau, also part of his commander

estimate. The CINCPAC conference of 9–11 April, which General Sti

well, the MACV chief of staff, reported was “heavily infl uenced” b

Westmoreland’s ideas, incorporated this deployment into its recom

mendations. Westmoreland then repeated it as a separate proposal o

11 April l965. Declaring that the brigade would enhance the security o

vital American installations while reinforcing the HOP TAC area again

growing Viet Cong main forces, he added that it would also serve as a

air-transportable reserve for the Central Highlands. While Westmore

land did not specify a unit in his request, the most likely candidate wa

the Okinawa-based 173d Airborne Brigade, long earmarked for Vie

nam in contingency plans and briefl y considered as a substitute fo

the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade at Da Nang. On the basis of 

MACV staff study of the possibility of bringing the 173d into Vietnam 

periodically for short-duration offensive operations, Westmorelan

early in April asked Admiral Sharp’s permission to begin planning fo

deployment of the brigade. After Sharp, the Joint Chiefs, and Secretar

McNamara approved Westmoreland’s 11 April proposal, the chiefs o

the 14th directed CINCPAC to deploy the 173d to Bien Hoa. U.S. Army

Pacifi c; U.S. Army, Ryukyu Islands; and MACV began making the pre

liminary arrangements for the movement.50

A protest from Ambassador Taylor brought these preparations t

an abrupt halt. Taylor complained to the secretary of state that th

order came as a “complete surprise” to him, confl icted with his un

derstanding of administration policy at that point, and had not bee

accompanied by State Department instructions to obtain agreemen

from Premier Quat. Always concerned with keeping all his advisers o

board, President Johnson suspended the order pending another ful

dress conference on troop deployments.51

A new conference was necessary, as well, because the Johnson ad

ministration, even more than General Westmoreland, was pressin

the question of introducing American troops. On 15 April, McGeorg

Bundy informed Ambassador Taylor that the president believed tha

the United States must use “all practicable means” to strengthen i

position in South Vietnam and that “additional United States troop

are [an] important if not decisive reinforcement.” That same day, th

State and Defense Departments, in a joint message to Taylor and Wes

moreland, directed MACV to plan for insertion of a brigade at Bien Ho

and additional multibattalion forces at several coastal points. All wer

to conduct counterinsurgency operations. The same message called o

the country team to undertake a number of other “experimental steps

suggested by the president himself, aimed at adding “something new

to American programs in South Vietnam in order to “achieve victory

These included encadrement of Americans into ARVN battalions, brig

ading of ARVN battalions with American ones, use of American exper

Chap 6.indd 210 
211

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

and techniques to improve South Vietnamese recruiting, employment 

of American mobile dispensaries to bring medical care to the peasantry, 

reinforcement of province administration with American civil affairs 

teams, and U.S. distribution of food directly to South Vietnamese soldiers and their families. Eager for immediate action, the administration 

proposed to send a large military-civilian party to Saigon within the 

week to begin implementing the new programs.52

If Westmoreland and Taylor had been out of step on the question 

of deploying the 173d Airborne Brigade, they responded in concert to 

these new proposals, which the ambassador later characterized as “the 

product of Washington initiative fl ogged to a new level of creativity by 

a President determined to get prompt results.” Taylor protested vehemently against rushing American deployments without suffi cient planning, justifi cation, and diplomatic clearance. He also complained that 

the administration was piling more programs on a Saigon government 

already fl oundering in its efforts to execute the existing ones. Supporting Taylor’s position, Westmoreland argued against all the encadrement 

plans as duplicating much of the advisory effort. He added that they 

would create morale and logistical problems for both the Americans 

and South Vietnamese out of all proportion to any military benefi ts. In 

the face of these objections, President Johnson suspended introduction 

of any new troops or programs until after a policy conference called for 

Honolulu on 20 April.53

When that conference convened, Secretary McNamara, accompanied by General Wheeler and other offi cials, met with Ambassador Taylor, Admiral Sharp, and General Westmoreland. Besides quietly burying 

most of the president’s cadre proposals, the conferees agreed to speed 

up the insertion of American combat units into South Vietnam, a move 

they rationalized as helping to break the will of the Viet Cong by denying them victory. Adopting a scaled-down version of the JCS plan, the 

group recommended the deployment to Vietnam during May and June 

of 3 additional American brigades, 2 Army and 1 Marine, along with 

substantial logistic elements, an Australian battalion (already promised by that country), and a Korean regimental combat team yet to be 

obtained. These deployments would bring American troop strength in 

Vietnam to about 82,000 men and 13 maneuver battalions before even 

counting the 7,200 Australians and South Koreans. One U.S. Army brigade was to go to Bien Hoa–Vung Tau and the other to Qui Nhon and 

Nha Trang. The Marine brigade and aviation units were to take position at Chu Lai in southern I Corps, the site of a planned new American airfi eld. The Australians were to reinforce the Army brigade at Bien 

Hoa and the Koreans to operate in southern Quang Ngai. As possible 

later deployments “not recommended now,” the conferees designated 

the U.S. Army airmobile division for use in the Central Highlands, a 

U.S. corps headquarters for Nha Trang, a full Korean infantry division 

for Quang Ngai, and three more Marine battalions for Da Nang.54

Chap 6.indd 211 
212

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

President Johnson accepted these proposals, but he implemente

them gradually. The Marine brigade targeted for Chu Lai and the 173

Airborne Brigade for Bien Hoa deployed early in May. The Australian

and large numbers of American support troops followed shortly there

after. The Koreans and the fi nal Army brigade for Qui Nhon and Nh

Trang did not begin to move until after events made the deploymen

plan for them obsolete. In the end, nonetheless, the 20 April decision

committed the United States to large-scale ground combat in Vietnam

Under them, indeed, Westmoreland obtained as many battalions a

he had requested in his March commander’s estimate, though not th

division for the Central Highlands.55

Questions of Command and the Concept of Operations

As each of the U.S. units deployed, the Military Assistance Com

mand helped prepare the way diplomatically and militarily. While Am

bassador Taylor secured Premier Quat’s approval of each new America

commitment, General Westmoreland informed the commander in chie

of the South Vietnamese armed forces and the chief of the Joint Genera

Staff and reached an understanding with them on the military arrange

ments. He also helped prepare for the introduction of third-country a

lied forces. For example, he worked out with the Australian ambassado

in Saigon the location and missions of that country’s battalion. For th

American forces, Westmoreland and his principal staff offi cers arrange

Left to right, Secretary McNamara, Air Vice Marshal Ky, President Johnson, 

and General Thieu (NARA)

Chap 6.indd 212 
213

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

cooperation with the ARVN commands in their areas of operation 

and tried to ensure the orderly arrival of the troops. On one occasion, he dissuaded the 9th Marine 

Expeditionary Brigade from conducting a full-scale amphibious 

assault at Chu Lai, complete with 

preparatory air strikes and naval 

gunfi re, on a beach which contained friendly civilians and was 

to be secured beforehand by the 2d 

ARVN Division.56

While the fi rst deployments 

were being debated, decided upon, 

and carried out, MACV, the Pacifi c 

Command, and the JCS engaged 

in continuing discussions aimed at 

refi ning aspects of the three-division plan. They concentrated their 

attention on three issues: tactical 

command and control of American forces; command relations between American and South Vietnamese forces; and the question of 

exactly what combat missions American troops should perform and 

by what stages they should enter upon them. Through a constant exchange of messages, and through the Honolulu conferences, the senior 

commanders reached a general consensus on these clusters of issues. 

Thus they made a number of decisions that would shape the future 

course of American ground operations in South Vietnam.

The simplest, most straightforward problem was that of tactical 

command of U.S. and allied fi eld forces once they entered the country 

in signifi cant numbers. Since most of the units would be in the northern corps areas remote from Saigon, MACV obviously would require 

a subordinate headquarters of some sort to direct day-to-day operations of the Army and Korean divisions and to coordinate their activities with those of the marines, who already had their own command 

structure in the form of the III Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) and 

its subordinate division and aircraft wing. Accordingly, during March, 

Westmoreland began considering formation of a Northern Area Command to direct operations of all non–South Vietnamese combat units. 

Spurred by General Wheeler and following OPLAN 32, he and Admiral Sharp decided during April that a U.S. Army corps headquarters 

should probably deploy to Nha Trang soon after the Army division did. 

This headquarters was to assume operational control of the III MEF, the 

Marines wade across a neck-deep river. 

(© The Mariners’ Museum/CORBIS)

Chap 6.indd 213 
214

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Army troops, and the Koreans. Westmoreland proposed to assign h

deputy, General Throckmorton, to command the headquarters sinc

Throckmorton was familiar with MACV plans and policies and po

sessed the rank and prestige to deal with the Vietnamese corps com

manders. After the Marine landings at Chu Lai in early May, the III Ma

rine Expeditionary Force, the 3d Marine Division, and the 1st Marin

Aircraft Wing headquarters moved into Da Nang and went into opera

tion. The force headquarters was retitled, at Westmoreland’s reques

the III Marine Amphibious Force (MAF) to avoid evoking unpleasan

Vietnamese memories of the French Expeditionary Corps. Deploymen

of the Army corps headquarters and formation of the northern fi el

force remained in abeyance along with deployment of the Army an

Korean divisions.57

The question of American–South Vietnamese command relation

was more complicated. With a large U.S. troop buildup and majo

American combat involvement in prospect, General Westmoreland i

March launched a low-keyed but insistent campaign for establishmen

of a combined allied command that, in effect, would place the ARVN 

under operational control of MACV. He believed that, beyond an

military benefi ts, such a command would enhance the Saigon govern

ment’s stability by bringing politically active South Vietnamese gene

als under American supervision and restraint. Prime Minister Quat an

at least a few senior RVNAF offi cers shared Westmoreland’s views o

this point. They agreed that only some form of combined comman

and staff could restore the government forces’ military effectiveness.5

Seeking to exploit this opportunity, Westmoreland during Marc

and April 1965 developed plans for a small American–South Vietnam

ese staff to assist him and the RVNAF High Command in planning an

directing combined operations. Westmoreland believed that creatio

of such a staff, serving otherwise independent national forces, woul

not offend Vietnamese nationalist sensitivities; at the same time 

would be a fi rst step toward a full-fl edged combined command. Durin

General Johnson’s visit early in March, Premier Quat expressed suppo

for a combined staff. At Westmoreland’s direction the MACV J3 an

J5 sections drew up terms of reference and a table of distribution fo

it. In April, Westmoreland secured a tour extension for his candidat

for chief of the combined staff, Col. James L. Collins, Jr., then senio

adviser to the Regional and Popular Forces. Soon to be promoted t

brigadier general, Collins spoke fl uent French and had a good relation

ship with senior Vietnamese offi cials. Westmoreland also intended t

establish similar combined staffs at corps and lower level headqua

ters when U.S. troops arrived. In addition, General Throckmorton de

veloped plans for creating an international fi eld force headquarters i

the northern corps areas, initially to be built around the 9th MEB an

later around the U.S. corps, which would exercise tactical control ove

American, South Korean, and some South Vietnamese combat units.5

Chap 6.indd 214 
215

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

This planning came to an abrupt halt early in May. The senior 

Vietnamese generals, increasingly the dominant force in the Saigon 

government, expressed strong opposition to any form of combined 

command. Complicating matters, the Saigon newspapers picked up rumors, probably planted by the generals, that a combined command was 

under consideration. They issued passionate editorial denunciations of 

any such surrender of Vietnamese sovereignty. Faced with this opposition, Westmoreland and Taylor abandoned the campaign for even a 

combined staff. On 8 May, in his fi rst comprehensive concept of operations for U.S. forces in Vietnam, Westmoreland declared that the command relationship between the Americans and the South Vietnamese 

armed forces would be one of “combat support through coordination 

and cooperation in the mutual self-interest of both commands.” Later 

in the month, when Secretary McNamara formally endorsed creation 

of a combined high-level staff and fi eld force headquarters, Taylor and 

Westmoreland both responded that such action was no longer politically feasible or desirable. From then on, the MACV commander concentrated on making the existing advisory and cooperative relationship 

work as well as possible. He did manage to install General Collins in 

the Joint General Staff compound as his personal representative. General DePuy continued informally to promote combined contingency 

planning at the JGS and corps levels.60

Even before signifi cant American ground combat forces arrived, 

MACV had thus decided, by default, against a Korea-style unifi ed allied 

command. General Westmoreland later justifi ed this decision as essential to appease South Vietnamese nationalist sensibilities and as desirable in enhancing their forces’ capacity to operate on their own when 

American troops eventually departed. He believed that, with advisers 

at every level of the Vietnamese armed forces, with his network of personal relationships with senior RVNAF commanders, and with the leverage he could exert through his control of American resources, he 

could infl uence South Vietnamese operations suffi ciently for his purpose without “puppetry or proconsulship.” Incoming MACV Chief of 

Staff, Maj. Gen. William B. Rosson, who arrived just after the effort for 

a combined staff collapsed, fully endorsed Westmoreland’s reasoning. 

Rosson, who had been in Indochina during the French war, declared 

that “anyone possessing even a cursory knowledge of the French colonial period in Vietnamese history could and should have dismissed 

out of hand . . . a scheme calling for foreign—particularly Occidental—

encadrement and command of GVN forces.” He “frankly was irritated 

to fi nd that the staff recently had been required to devote substantial 

time and effort to that subject.”61

Closely related to the question of command was that of a concept 

of operations for the U.S. forces. When American troops entered South 

Vietnam in substantial numbers, where were they to go and what, beyond static base defense, were they to do? Every troop commitment 

Chap 6.indd 215 
216

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

proposal addressed this question, directly or indirectly. By the end o

May, at least the military participants in the policy debate were ap

proaching a consensus on the subject.

From the start, General Westmoreland thought in terms of using U.

units aggressively, especially against the Viet Cong’s main forces. He tol

General Wheeler on 17 March that American troops, besides protec

ing the principal ports and air bases, “must be available and committe

when necessary as quick-reaction forces against the VC once he come

out into the open and chooses to engage.” In his commander’s estimat

Westmoreland envisioned employment of a division deep in the Centra

Highlands for mobile offensive operations; and he wanted the Army br

gade at Bien Hoa and Vung Tau as a reaction force for III Corps. Aware o

widespread offi cial interest in concentrating U.S. forces for the defens

of coastal enclaves, the MACV commander acknowledged that this con

cept, which his staff had studied, possessed “attractive features” from 

a logistical standpoint, and “to some degree” was “integral to all othe

plans.” Even so, he declared, this approach represented “an ingloriou

static use of U.S. forces in an overpopulated area with little chance o

direct or immediate impact on the outcome of events.”62

To varying degrees, Admiral Sharp, the Joint Chiefs, and Amba

sador Taylor shared Westmoreland’s preference for the offensive. Shar

opposed sending the Army division inland until its coastal bases wer

secured, but he emphasized that any American units committed shoul

“phase into the counterinsurgency role,” which would involve “activ

mobile search and destroy operations.” The Joint Chiefs, in their three

division proposal, favored placing the Army division in the Centra

Highlands for mobile operations and emphasized the need to “gai

operational superiority and assume the offensive.” Although skeptica

of the necessity and desirability of introducing a division-size Amer

can force, Ambassador Taylor considered an offensive mission in th

highlands the most militarily useful role for such a force if it did g

in. Late in March he expressed preference for an “offensive enclave

strategy, under which U.S. troops would establish secure coastal base

and then operate up to fi fty miles inland from them in support of th

South Vietnamese. This idea seems to have been the basis of Presiden

Johnson’s 1 April expansion of the mission of the 9th Marine Exped

tionary Brigade.63

Commenting on 27 March on the Joint Chiefs’ three-division plan

Admiral Sharp outlined a concept of operations that all the militar

participants were able to accept. Sharp proposed that American force

move into South Vietnam and onto the offensive in four phases. I

the fi rst, they were to protect vital U.S. installations and establish se

cure coastal enclaves from which they could support South Vietnames

operations. In the second, they were to conduct offensive operation

from those enclaves. In the third and fourth phases, they would mov

inland and repeat the process, fi rst establishing bases and then attack

Chap 6.indd 216 
217

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

ing outward from them. The 9–11 April CINCPAC conference adopted 

this four-phase concept, adding the proviso that the phases were “not 

necessarily sacrosanct” and could overlap or be conducted simultaneously in different areas, depending on the situation. Discussing specifi c 

operations of the three divisions, the conference members, partially 

endorsing Westmoreland’s views, recommended that the Army division fi rst establish coastal bases at Qui Nhon and Nha Trang and then, 

“when logistically feasible,” conduct mobile operations in the highlands. The Joint Chiefs, with Secretary McNamara’s approval, incorporated the PACOM conference concept into their own further revisions 

and expansions of their plan.64

General Westmoreland included the phase concept in his instructions to the 9th MEB implementing President Johnson’s 1 April expansion of the marines’ mission, but his initial effort was not aggressive 

enough for Admiral Sharp. On 11 April, after obtaining consent from 

South Vietnamese authorities, Westmoreland directed the Marine brigade commander to move onto the offensive by stages, beginning with 

extended patrolling, then undertaking small heliborne attacks within 

a fi fty-mile radius of Da Nang, and fi nally launching battalion-size offensives throughout I Corps in cooperation with the Vietnamese. He 

told Sharp that he did not expect the marines to reach the third stage 

for “several weeks.” Westmoreland’s directive drew strong criticism 

from Sharp. The admiral informed Westmoreland that the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff desired the “earliest feasible” involvement of the 9th MEB in 

offensive counterinsurgency combat, and he insisted that the MACV 

commander strengthen the wording of his instructions to that effect. 

Westmoreland complied. On 14 April, he sent the 9th MEB an amended directive that included a sentence, drafted by Sharp, calling for “an 

intensifying program of offensive operations to fi x and destroy the VC 

in the general Da Nang area.”65

Admiral Sharp’s phases were even more evident in Westmoreland’s 

fi rst general concept of operations for American troops, which he issued 

on 8 May after discussions with the South Vietnamese High Command. 

Westmoreland defi ned four missions for American and other non–South 

Vietnamese units, to be assumed successively and cumulatively as the 

units arrived in the country and gained experience in operating there: 

base area security; “deep patrolling and offensive operations”; “reaction 

operations in coordination with RVNAF”; and implementation of U.S. 

contingency plans. He discussed only the fi rst three, which coincided 

roughly with phases one and two of Sharp’s concept. The fi rst mission, 

base security, could entail close-in perimeter defense of an installation; 

but it also could mean protection of a wider area around the base, extending out to the limits of light artillery range. In the deep patrolling and offensive stage, the troops were to move farther out into the 

countryside and attack Viet Cong units and bases, normally in areas 

of operation assigned by local South Vietnamese commanders. These 

Chap 6.indd 217 
218

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

operations could take place at some distance from a base but shoul

contribute to its security by disrupting enemy offensive preparation

In the third stage, the troops were to be prepared to reinforce the Sout

Vietnamese Army anywhere within a corps area, and they were to en

gage in wide-ranging search and destroy operations, either unilaterall

or in cooperation with the South Vietnamese.66

Even before he issued this general concept, Westmoreland, on 

May, embodied its principles in letters of instruction to the command

ers of the III Marine Amphibious Force and the 173d Airborne Brigad

He directed each force to protect designated installations and prepar

to conduct deep patrolling, offensive, and reserve/reaction operation

in cooperation with the ARVN corps. Both were to move progressivel

from base defense onto the offensive through the stages outlined in th

8 May MACV concept. In Stage III, the marines were to operate in co

operation with and support of I Corps. Besides similarly working wit

III Corps, the 173d Airborne Brigade was to be available at Westmore

land’s order for search-and-destroy and reserve/reaction operations i

other corps areas, meaning primarily the Central Highlands.67

The Marine amphibious force and the Army brigade moved onl

gradually into the second and third stages of operations. During Apr

and May, the marines concentrated on close-in defense of their thre

enclaves and on experiments in population security and pacifi cation i

the few villages in their tactical areas of responsibility (TAORs). At D

Nang in late May, they entered the deep patrolling and offensive stag

but their operations were restricted by General Thi’s refusal to allow 

the marines into densely populated, Viet Cong–infested areas suc

as one that lay immediately south of the airfi eld. In all three of the

TAORs, the marines encountered Viet Cong units of only platoon an

smaller size. They suffered about 200 casualties, including 18 killed i

action, during their fi rst two months of combat operations. The stor

was substantially the same for the 173d Airborne. Initially divided be

tween Bien Hoa and Vung Tau, the brigade would not begin preparin

for major offensive action until mid-June, when its two infantry ba

talions were reunited at Bien Hoa and reinforced by the newly arrive

Australian battalion.68

Where the Question Stood, June 1965

At the beginning of June, after three months of argument and dec

sion-making within the U.S. government, American ground comba

forces in South Vietnam were still few in numbers and limited in ac

tivity. The larger part of a Marine division and aircraft wing were o

shore at Da Nang, Phu Bai, and Chu Lai. Elsewhere, the 173d Airborn

Brigade (on temporary duty status and scheduled to be replaced b

another brigade from the United States) and the Australian battalio

were the only non–South Vietnamese combat elements. Another Arm

Chap 6.indd 218 
219

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

brigade, from the 1st Infantry Division, had been authorized for deployment to Qui Nhon, and a South Korean regimental combat team 

also was on the way. The forces in South Vietnam, Marine and Army 

alike, had yet to mount a major offensive operation and yet to engage 

battalion-size or larger enemy formations.

Nevertheless, President Johnson and his advisers had crossed a critical threshold by deciding to commit American soldiers to fi ght the Viet 

Cong and, however deliberately and cautiously, committing them to 

combat. The president and his men also set in motion a military planning and preparation process predicated on the deployment of a much 

larger force than had yet been authorized and on engagement of that 

force in an offensive aimed at defeating the enemy militarily within 

South Vietnam. In the course of that planning, MACV, CINCPAC, and 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff had sketched the outlines of tactical command 

and control for the force, had decided against creating a combined 

command with their South Vietnamese ally, and had developed a concept of operations for feeding American units into the fi ght.

As of early June, Westmoreland and his superiors had nonetheless 

avoided discussing one vital question: how American troops would 

contribute to the achievement of the overall U.S. military and political 

objectives in South Vietnam. They had examined at length the commitment of particular units; but except for generalities about improving 

force ratios, preventing a South Vietnamese collapse, and regaining the 

initiative, they had not addressed the larger strategic issue. Westmoreland’s 8 May concept of operations laid out how individual units were 

to go about entering the fi ght, but it hardly constituted a plan of conduct for the war. Instead, it treated the introduction of ground combat 

units as simply an extension of American advice and assistance to the 

South Vietnamese armed forces. The troops would function, Westmoreland said, “in . . . a logical extension and expansion of [the] role already 

performed by a wide range of US units and forces throughout RVN.”69

This formula, adequate for the limited forces thus far committed, would 

wear thin as American numbers and fi repower overwhelmed those of 

the army they were supposedly supporting. Yet until the beginning of 

June, it seemed as if the Johnson administration would have time to 

work out these problems in the course of a continued gradual introduction of American forces. Time, however, was about to run out.

Chap 6.indd 219 
220

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Notes 

1

 Ltr, Maj Gen William P. Yarborough to Westmoreland, 26 Feb 64, tab 5, Westm

reland Hist File 3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64), CMH. 2

 For the 1954 proposals, see Spector, Early Years, pp. 194–214. The 1961 proposa

are in Porter, Vietnam Documentation 2:128–34. Msg, Nolting to SecState, 31 Oct 6

Memo, McGeorge Bundy for the President, 21 Nov 61; Msg, CHMAAG, Vietnam, 

CINCPAC, 21 Nov 61; Historians fi les, CMH. Taylor Rpt, tab D. 3

 Spector, Early Years, pp. 268–72, 300–301, 358–60, covers the early plannin

MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 29, 157; COMUSSEASIA OPLAN 32–64–Ph III, I

15 May 64, p. 1 and ann. B; COMUSMACV OPLAN 32–64–Ph II (RVN), ann. B, 1 J

63, with changes, 1 May 64; Historians fi les, CMH; Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 

Mar 65, sub: Ground Force Deployments into South Vietnam Under US/SEATO Con

tingency Plans, Folder: Buildup Problems, Fact Sheets, Misc Studies, MACV Histo

Backup Files 65, box 68A1395, RG 334, NARA. 4

 Quote is from Memo, McGeorge Bundy for the President, 31 Aug 64, NSF Aid

Files, Memos for Pres 6/64–2/65, McGeorge Bundy Memos, box 2, LBJL. U.S.–Vietna

Relations, sec. 4.C.2 (c), pp. 24–25, 66–67. Memo, Robert. H. Johnson and P. M. Ka

tenburg, sub: Alternative to Air Attacks on North Vietnam: Proposals for Use of U.

Ground Forces in Support of Diplomacy in Vietnam, Paul Warnke Papers, John M

Naughton Files, box 8, LBJL. Msg, JCS to CINCPAC and COMUSMACV, 2 Dec 64, ta

31, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64); see also tab 23, Westmoreland Hi

File 11 (7–31 Dec 64). Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 114–15. 5

 Msg, Johnson to Taylor, 30 Dec 64, in NSC History, Major Forces, box 40, LBJ

For comment and interpretation, see Berman, Planning a Tragedy, pp. 34–35. 6

 Msg, Taylor to the President, 6 Jan 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 40, LBJ

Compare with draft embassy telegram, tab 9, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (1–22 Jan 65

CMH. For a similar, earlier MACV staff conclusion, see Paper, Maj Gen Richard G. St

well, 10 Mar 64, sub: Counterinsurgency Vitalization, tab 13, Westmoreland Hist Fi

3 (17 Feb–30 Apr 64), CMH. 7

 Memo, DePuy for Westmoreland, 29 Jan 65, sub: Conversation with Gener

Thang . . . , DePuy Papers, MHI. Westmoreland transmitted this report to Ambassad

Taylor; see Memo, Westmoreland for Ambs Taylor and Johnson, 30 Jan 65, DePuy P

pers, MHI. 8 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1, pp. 59–60, 64, 72. CINCPAC Command Hist

ry, 1964, pp. 315–18. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 23–24, 61, 136–37, 155–5

Ltr, Harkins to Khanh, 5 Apr 64, fi le 204–58 (1418–03) MAP Files (64), box 3, 69A70

Memo, Stilwell for Distribution, 20 May 64, sub: Transmittal of FY 65–66 Force Stru

ture Plan, fi le 204–55 (201–45) Organizational Planning Files (RVNAF) (1964), box 

69A702; RG 334, NARA. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1840 to Wheeler, 3 Apr 65, Westm

reland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64 and 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH 9

 MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 61–62; ibid., 1965, pp. 57–58. CINCPA

Command History, 1964, pp. 323–24; Westmoreland emphasizes his desire to avo

overstraining the South Vietnamese manpower system in Memo for Taylor, 16 Nov 6

sub: Measures of National Mobilization to Put SVN on a War Footing, tab 5, Westm

reland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64), CMH. 10 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6468 to Brig Gen E. C. Dunn, 15 Dec 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64, CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Westmorelan

MAC 4830, 6164, 6191 to Wheeler, 6 Sep, 27 and 28 Nov 64. MACV Command Histor

1964, pp. 116–22, 159–60. CINCPAC Command History, 1964, p. 306. Msgs, COMU

MACV MAC 3299 to JCS, 27 Apr 64, and Saigon 774 to State, 8 Sep 64. Both in NSC Fi

Chap 6.indd 220 
221

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

Vietnam, LBJL. Memo, Col Walter Greenwood, Jr., 6 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. 11 Quotes are from Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 4568 to CINCPAC, 4 Jun 64, Historians fi les, CMH. MACV Command History, 1964, pp. 65–66; Westmoreland Paper, 

“Military and Security Situation and Trends,” tab 2; Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5423 to 

Taylor and Adm Harry D. Felt, 25 Jun 64; tab 11, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (1 Jun–3 

Aug 64), CMH. MACV Directive 320–1, 15 Jul 64, Historians fi les, CMH. RVNAF High 

Command Directive AB 139, 25 Dec 64, ann. E, Historians fi les, CMH. MACV Memo, 

sub: RVNAF Counterinsurgency Roles and Missions, 4 Feb 65, tab 23, Westmoreland 

Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. 12 MFR, Westmoreland, 23 Jul 64, sub: Meeting with Gen Khiem, 22 Jul 64, tab 20, 

Westmoreland Hist File 6, (1 Jun–3 Aug 64); Fact Sheet, sub: Background Material—

HOP TAC, tab 33, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (27 Jul–31 Aug 64); MFR, Westmoreland, 4 

Dec 64, sub: Meeting with Gen Khanh, tab 33, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 

Dec 64). All in CMH. Msg, Lodge Saigon 2479 to SecState,13 Jun 64, box 5, NSC File, 

Vietnam, LBJL. Execution of the redeployments is surveyed in Maj Paul E. Suplizio, 

“Military Support of Pacifi cation in South Vietnam, April 1964–April 1965” (Thesis, 

U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, 1966), pp. 176–79, 223–28, 234–36, 

256–61. Historians Files, CMH. 13 Msg, Saigon 107 to State, 15 Jul 64, box 6, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 

Suplizio, “Military Support of Pacifi cation,” pp. 158–62, 165–66. Youngdale Interv, 3 

Jun 65, p 9. MACV Command History, 1964, p. 121. The March strength estimate is 

in U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, Commander’s Estimate of the Situation in 

South Vietnam, 26 Mar 65, pp. 12–13, in tab 38, Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), 

CMH. 14 The higher infi ltration fi gure is discussed in tab A, app. A, of Talking Paper for the 

JCS for Their Meeting with Gen Westmoreland on 21 December 1964, 18 Dec 64, sub: 

Items for Discussion with Gen Westmoreland, tab 23, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (7–31 

Dec 64), CMH. See also U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.2(c), pp. 1–2. The earlier estimate is in Memo, Youngdale for Distribution, 20 Apr 64, sub: Viet Cong Infi ltration, fi le 

204–58(501–03) Intel Rept Files (64), box 3, 69A702, RG 334, NARA. Memo, CIA, 1 Sep 

64, sub: The Situation in South Vietnam, box 8, NSC Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 15 Memo, Youngdale for Distribution, 15 Mar 65, sub: Viet Cong Strategy and Tactics during 1964 (Historical Monograph), pp. 24–25, MACV Command History, 1965, 

pp. 10–11. Historians fi les, CMH; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 10–11. Intel 

Memo, CIA Ofc of Current Intel, Intel Memo, 20 Apr 65, sub: Modernization of Viet 

Cong Armament, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. 16 For an overview of military events in 1964, see Admiral U. S. G. Sharp and General W. 

C. Westmoreland, Report on the War in Vietnam (as of 30 June 1968) (hereafter cited as Report 

on the War) (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1968), pp. 92–95. The North 

Vietnamese in War Experiences Committee, Resistance War, pp. 64–65, emphasizes the need 

to increase large-unit operations and smash the ARVN in order to complete the overthrow 

of the Saigon government. For an analysis of Viet Cong strategy and operations in 1964, see 

Suplizio, “Military Support of Pacifi cation,” pp. 95–96, 105–29, 143–47, 262–66. 17 A North Vietnamese account of the campaign can be found in Resistance War, 

pp. 65–66. American accounts and analysis can be found in Memo, Westmoreland for 

Taylor, 4 Jan 65, sub: Weekly Assessment of Military Activity for Period 27 December 

1964 to 2 January 1965, and the same document for the period 3–9 January 1965; tabs 

7 and 19, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (1–22 Jan 65), CMH. Suplizio, “Military Support 

of Pacifi cation,” pp. 282–83; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 104. 18 Paper, 15 Oct 64, sub: I Corps Trends, tab 8, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 

Nov 64), CMH.

Chap 6.indd 221 
222

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

19 Suplizio, “Military Support of Pacifi cation,” pp. 12–13, 147, 179–82, 233n, 238

44, 285, 303–312, analyzes the effect of the changing balance of military forces on th

oil-spot plan. See also Suplizio Intervs, 17 and 24 Jul 86, tape 4, side 1. From May 1964

May 1965, Suplizio served as a J3 operations briefi ng offi cer and hence was deep

involved in the continuous monitoring of military operations during the period. The 

percent population loss estimate is from MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 235–3

Duiker, Road to Power, pp. 232–33, notes the paradox of continued Viet Cong succe

in the countryside but inability to bring down the Saigon government. 20 Quote is from Memo, Youngdale for Distribution, 15 Mar 65, sub: Viet Con

Strategy and Tactics During 1964 (Historical Monograph), p. 25; see also pp. 2

26, Historians fi les, CMH. MACV Fact Sheet, 24 May 64, sub: Synopsis of VC Stra

egy and Tactics Study, in Book of Misc Facts, box 1, 67A4064, RG 334, NARA. Ms

COM-USMACV MAC 7627 to CJCS, 9 Aug 64, Historians fi les, CMH. For typical view

on the reduction in large-scale Viet Cong attacks, see Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 712

to CINCPAC, 30 Jul 64, Historians fi les, CMH; and remarks by General Westmorelan

to Life magazine symposium with Mission Council members, 14 Nov 64, pp. 10–11, 

tab 1, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (14 Nov–7 Dec 64), CMH. 21 Quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 10 Jan 65, tab 17, Westmorelan

Hist File 12 (1–22 Jan 65), CMH. See also Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 5147 and 0081 

Wheeler, 21 Sep 64 and 7 Jan 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Dec 64 and 1 Jan–3

Mar 65, CMH. A MACV J2 study characterized Binh Gia as simply “a large size ambus

operation.” Memo, Youngdale for Distribution, 15 Mar 65, sub: Viet Cong Strategy an

Tactics During 1964 (Historical Monograph), p. 26, Historians fi les, CMH. 22 First quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 25 Jan 65, sub: Weekly A

sessment of Military Activity for Period 17–23 Jan 65, tab 8, Westmoreland Hist File 1

(21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. Second is from Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 4999 to JCS, 17 Fe

65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 40, LBJL. The 100-battalion estimate is in USMAC

Commander’s Estimate of the Military Situation in South Vietnam, 26 Mar 65, p. 1

tab 38, Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), CMH; in same fi le, see Memo, Wes

moreland for Taylor, 1 Mar 65, sub: Weekly Assessment of Military Activity for Perio

21–27 February 1965, tab 5. 23 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 5–6. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1221 

Wheeler and Sharp, 7 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 1842 to Taylor, 3 Apr 65; Westmor

land Msg Files, LBJL. CMH. Memo, CIA, 6 Apr 65, sub: Communist Intentions in Sout

Vietnam, NSC History, Major Forces, box 41 LBJL. Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, p

340–41. 24 COMUSMACV, “Military Estimate of the Situation in Vietnam,” cabled to JC

6 Mar 65, in Gen Harold K. Johnson, “Report on Survey of the Military Situation 

South Vietnam,”14 Mar 65, tab B, box 5A, Harold K. Johnson Papers, MHI. The me

sage form of this document is Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1190 to Wheeler and Sharp, 

Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. 25 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1190 to Wheeler and Sharp, 6 Mar 65, Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65. These proposals closely paralleled ideas that Gener

Wheeler had informed Westmoreland and Sharp were already under consideration b

the Washington “principals.” See Msg, Wheeler to Sharp and Westmoreland, 27 Fe

65, tab 75, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. 26 Chronology: COMUSMACV Recommendations and Observations on Use of U.

Airpower in Vietnam War, 1965–1968, pp. 1–4, fi le TS–0192–80, Westmoreland Paper

CMH. MFR, Westmoreland, 8 Feb 65, sub: Visit with Gen Khanh, tab 26, Westmorelan

Hist File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on the War, p

107–08, recounts the fi rst U.S. jet strikes.

Chap 6.indd 222 
223

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

27 COMUSMACV, “Chronology of Recommendations,” pp. 1–4. Quote is from Msg, 

Westmoreland MAC 6127 to Wheeler and Sharp, 27 Feb 65, tab 81, Westmoreland Hist 

File 13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH; in same fi le, see also tabs 54 and 55. Msg, Westmoreland to Wheeler and Sharp, 6 Mar 65, tab 20, Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), 

CMH. Memo, Wheeler JCSM–161–65 for Sec of Defense, 6 Mar 65, NSC History, Major 

Forces, box 40. Historical Division, Joint Secretariat, JCS, The History of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff: The Joint Chiefs of Staff and the War in Vietnam, 1960–1968 (hereafter cited as 

JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968 ) (Washington, D.C.: Historical Division, Joint Chiefs of 

Staff, 1 Jul 70), ch. 24, pp. 12–14. 28 Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 6 Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH.

29 First quote is from Msg, Gen Johnson to Taylor, 2 Mar 65, Close Hold File no. 

6, Johnson Papers, MHI. In same collection, box 2, see Msg, McNamara to Taylor, 2 

Mar 65. Interv, Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Program with Gen Harold K. Johnson, 27 Jan 

72–30 Oct 74, sec. 11, pp. 12–13, and sec. 12, pp. 14–15, MHI. Quote from the president is from Interv, Charles B. MacDonald and Charles von Luttichau with Gen Harold 

K. Johnson, 20 Nov 70, p. 8, Historians fi les, CMH. 30 Gen Johnson Trip Report, 14 Mar 65. Gen Johnson Interv, 27 Jan 72–30 Oct 74, 

sec. 12, pp. 16–18. Memo, Col M. J. Berenzweig for the Secretary of the General Staff, 

26 Mar 65, sub: Memoranda of Discussions in Vietnam, March 1965, box 5B, H. K. 

Johnson Papers, MHI. Berman, Planning, p. 54. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 

125–27. Johnson already had received a gloomy assessment of the situation in late February, including a warning from his deputy chief of staff for operations that only commitment of U.S. troops could save the country. See Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 38–40. 31 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 106, 421–22. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 

1228 to Waters, 8 Mar 6; Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65. Both in 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Gen Johnson, 5 Mar 65, sub: Items for Discussion, Close Hold fi le 4, Johnson Papers, MHI; Johnson Trip Rpt, 14 Mar 65, tab A. 32 Transcript of briefi ng for USARPAC staff, 12 Mar 65, folder 5, tab 47, box 9, 

Johnson Papers, MHI. 33 Johnson Trip Report, 14 Mar 65.

34 Quote is from Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 127–30. Msg, Westmoreland 

MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. 

USMACV, “Commander’s Estimate of the Military Situation in South Vietnam,” 26 Mar 

65, tab 38, Westmoreland Hist File 14 (1–26 Mar 65), CMH. 35 USMACV Commander’s Estimate, 26 Mar 65, pp. 2–3, 12–16, 19–20, and ann. A.

36 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65; USMACV “Commander’s 

Estimate,” 26 Mar 65, pp. 2–11. 37 Westmoreland justifi ed his abandonment of the 10-to-1 rule of thumb on grounds 

that, with the Communist shift toward larger actions in which air power and artillery 

could be brought to bear, the conventional attack superiority ratio of 3-to-1 could be 

considered suffi cient. MACV Commander’s Estimate, 26 Mar 65, pp. 7–10. 38 MACV Commander’s Estimate, 26 Mar 65, pp. 5, 25–26, ann. E. See also Msg, 

Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 

Mar 65, CMH. 39 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 84–85. The briefi ng is mentioned in Memo, 

William P. Bundy for Secretaries Rusk and McNamara and McGeorge Bundy, 28 Mar 

65, sub: Major Issues During Ambassador Taylor’s Visit, Warnke Papers, McNaughton 

Files, box 8, LBJL. 40 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p. 13; Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 24. Johnson Interv, 27 Jan 72–30 Oct 74, sec. 12, pp. 19–20.

Chap 6.indd 223 
224

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

41 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 92–93. Historical Division, JCS, JCS an

Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 19, pp. 13–14. Msg, Wheeler to Sharp and Westmoreland, 2

Mar 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. 42 For examples of the administration approach, see Memo, 1 Apr 65, sub: Ke

Elements for Discussion, Thursday, April 1; Msg, SecState to AmEmb Saigon, 3 Apr 6

and Memo, McGeorge Bundy for the President, 14 Apr 65. All in NSC History, Majo

Forces, boxes 40 and 41, LBJL. See also MFR of Meeting, 10:30 A.M., 3 Apr 65, in Secr

tary Rusk’s Offi ce, 6 Apr 65; and Msg, McGeorge Bundy to Taylor, 15 Apr 65; tabs 5 an

24, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH. For a general account of th

president’s manipulation of his advisers, see Berman, Planning a Tragedy. 43 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65, and MAC 1566 to Sharp, 2

Mar 65; Sharp to Wheeler, 27 Mar 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. 44 Quotes are from Memo, DePuy for Throckmorton, 28 May 65, sub: How Go

the War, DePuy Papers, MHI. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 5–6. U.S.–Vietna

Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 41– 47. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 M

65, and to Sharp, 12 Apr 65; Msg, Taylor Saigon 701 to Wheeler, 15 Apr 65. All i

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65 and 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Msgs, Taylo

to SecState,13 Apr 64 and 4 May 65; CIA Offi ce of National Estimates, Special Mem

12–65, 30 Apr 65, sub: Current Trends in Vietnam. All in NSC History, Major Force

box 41, LBJL. 45 Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 21, pp. 10–13. Msg

Taylor to JCS, 22 Feb 65, and to SecState,18 Mar 65, box 40; and Msgs, Taylor to Se

State, 12 and 14 Apr 65, and 19 May 65, box 41; NSC History, Major Forces, LBJL. Ta

lor, Swords and Ploughshares, p. 338. 46 Msg, JCS to CINCPAC, 3 Apr 65, National Security Council (NSC) Action Mem

328, 6 Apr 65. Both in NSC History, Major Forces, boxes 40 and 41. U.S.–Vietnam R

lations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 59–61; MFR, 6 Apr 65, sub: Meeting 10:30 A.M., 3 Apr 65, 

Secretary Rusk’s Offi ce, tabs 3 and 5, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65

CMH; Taylor quote is from Msg, Taylor to SecState, 4 Apr 65, Taylor Papers, NDU. Ta

lor, Swords and Ploughshares, p. 341; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 131. Memo, 

Apr 65, sub: Key Elements for Discussion, Thursday, April 1, at 5:30 P.M., NSC Histor

Major Forces, box 40, LBJL. 47 Msgs, Gen Burchinal JCS 008507 to Adm Sharp, 6 Apr 65; and CINCPAC to JC

6 Apr 65. Both in Taylor Papers, NDU. Memo, JCS for CINCPAC, 8 Apr 65, sub: Term

of Reference for the Honolulu Conference, (SM–333–65). In folder: Buildup Problem

Fact Sheets, Misc, MACV History Backup fi les 65, 68A1395, RG 334, NARA. U.S.–Vie

nam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 16–17. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960

1968, ch. 21, pp. 2–7; CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:280–88; MACV Comman

History, 1965, pp. 39, 48–49. 48 USARPAC Historical Summary, 1964–65, p. 66. CINCPAC Command Histor

1965, pp. 288–89. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 21, p

7–10. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 20–21. 49 Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 7 Apr 65; Westmoreland MAC 1968 to Sharp, 

Apr 65; Stilwell HWA 0869 to Westmoreland, 10 Apr 65. In Westmoreland Msg File

1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Memo, Throckmorton for Westmoreland, 24 May 65, su

Deployment and Command Arrangements for ROK Brigade, tab 9, Westmoreland Hi

File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. Marines for Phu Bai: U.S.–Vietnam Relations, se

4.C.5, pp. 14–15, 56–59; Msg, Taylor to SecState,18 Mar 65, NSC History, Major Force

Box 40, LBJL. 50 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 11682 to CINCPAC, 11 Apr 65, tab 15, Westmorelan

Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH; Msg, Stilwell HWA 0887 to Westmoreland,1

Chap 6.indd 224 
225

Beginnings of the Ground Troop Commitment, JanuaryJune 1965

Apr 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH; Msg, CINCPAC to JCS, 13 Apr 

65; Msg, JCS to CINCPAC and CINCSTRIKE/USCINCMEAFSA,14 Apr 65; NSC History, 

Major Forces, Box 41. Memo, Adams for CofS, MACV, 19 Mar 65, sub: Proposal for 

Employing 173d Abn Bde in RVN, Folder: COMUSMACV’s 1965 Files, MACV History 

Backup Files, 65, 68A1395, RG 334, NARA. 51 The confusion evidently arose from a 12 April message from Taylor to the State 

Department favoring accelerated logistic preparations for a U.S. brigade-size force at 

Bien Hoa/Vung Tau. Msg, Taylor to SecState,12 Apr 65, in NSC History, Major Forces, 

Box 41, LBJL. In same collection and box, see Msg, Taylor to SecState,14 Apr 65. U.S.–

Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 19, 62–64. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 

1960–1968, ch. 21, pp. 8, 13–15. 52 Msg, State and Defense to AmEmb Saigon, CINCPAC, and COMUSMACV, 15 Apr 

65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 41. Quote is from Msg, Bundy to Taylor, 15 Apr 65, 

tab 24, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH. 53 Taylor’s comment is in Swords and Ploughshares, pp. 341–42; see also pp. 339–40. 

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 131–32. On cadreing, see MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 81–82; and Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” p. 197. Msgs, Taylor 

to SecState,17 Apr 65; White House to AmEmb Saigon, 17 Apr 65; NSC History, Major 

Forces, box 41, LBJL. 54 Memo, McNamara for the President, 21 Apr 65; Msg, Rusk to Taylor, 22 Apr 65; NSC 

History, Major Forces, box 43. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 

21, pp. 15–16; Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, pp. 342–43. 55 Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 21, pp. 18–20. Memo, 

Bundy for President Johnson, 27 Apr 65, sub: Cable from Max Taylor; Msg, JCS to 

CINCPAC and CINCSTRIKE/USMEAFSA, 30 Apr 65; Msg, Rusk to Taylor, 19 May 65. 

All in NSC History, Major Forces, box 41. Msg, Taylor to SecState, 1 May 65, tab 52, 

Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, 

pp. 22–23, 64, 78–79, 93–94. 56 MFRs, Westmoreland, 28 Apr 65, sub: Conference with Gens Thieu and Minh, 

tab 45; and Westmoreland, 29 Apr 65, sub: Conference with Australian Ambassador, 

tab 47; Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH; Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 14 Apr 65; Westmoreland MAC 2115 to Sharp,16 Apr 65; Westmoreland MAC 

2270 to Gen V. H. Krulak, USMC, 26 Apr 65; Krulak to Westmoreland, 29 Apr 65. All 

in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Shulimson and Johnson, Marines 

in Vietnam 1965, pp. 30–32. 57 Memo, Gen Throckmorton for Westmoreland, 4 Apr 65, sub: Organization of 

Northern Area, tab 7; Msg, Westmoreland to CINCPAC, 11 Apr 65, tab 15. Both in 

Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 2029 

and 2135 to Sharp,12 and 17 Apr 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH; 

Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 22, pp. 15–16; CINCPAC 

Command History, 1965, 2:283–84. For activation of the III MAF, see Shulimson and 

Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, p. 36. 58 USMACV Commander’s Estimate, 26 Mar 65, p. 7. MFRs, DePuy, 26 Feb 65 and 9 

Mar 65, sub: Conversation with Gen Thang; Memo, DePuy for Westmoreland, 13 Apr 

65, sub: Moratorium on Further Changes in the Command Structure of RVNAF. All in 

DePuy Papers, MHI. Msg, Taylor to SecState, 23 Jan 65, tab 5, Westmoreland Hist File 

13 (21 Jan–28 Feb 65), CMH. MFR, Johnson, 8 Mar 65, sub: Meeting with Prime Minister Quat, box 5B; Transcript of Briefi ng for USARPAC Staff,12 Mar 65, box 9, Johnson 

Papers, MHI; Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 195–99. 59 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 100–101; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1463 

to Wheeler, 17 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 1566, 1968, and 2029 to Sharp, 22 Mar 

Chap 6.indd 225 
226

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

65, 9 and 12 Apr 65; Sharp to Wheeler, 27 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 1776 to Ge

Johnson,1 Apr 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, 1 Apr–30 Jun 6

Papers Concerning Advisers in the Support Role, Mar 65, tab 28, Westmoreland Hi

File 14 (1–26 Mar 65). Memo, Col J. L. Collins, Jr., for CofS, MACV, 14 Apr 65, su

Development of Combined Staff Organization, tab 20, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (2

Mar–7 May 65), CMH. 60 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 101–02. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylo

21 May 65, sub: Combined Command, tab 8, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–3

Jun 65). Both in CMH. Msgs, Taylor to SecState, 29 Apr and 24 May 65; COMUSMAC

to CINCPAC, 8 May 65. All in NSC History, Major Forces, box 41. Rosson, “Involv

ment in Vietnam,” pp. 195–200; MFR, DePuy, 24 Jul 65, sub: Conversation with Gen

Thang and Phong. Memo, DePuy for Thang, 24 Jul 65, sub: Combined Planning. Bot

in DePuy Papers, MHI. 61 For Westmoreland’s rationale, see Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 133–3

and Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on the War, p. 104. Rosson’s comments are 

“Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 195, 200. See also Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, p

349–50. 62 First two quotes are from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1463 to Wheeler, 17 Mar 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65; USMACV “Commander’s Estimate,” 26 M

65, ann. G; Draft Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, in Folder: COMUSMACV’s 196

Files, MACV History Backup Files 65, 68A1395, RG 334, NARA. Final quote is fro

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 128–30. 63 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 15, 67, 92–93; Historical Division, JC

JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 19, pp. 12–14. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 1008 to Sharp an

Westmoreland, 20 Mar 65; Sharp to Westmoreland, 21 Mar 65; Sharp to Wheeler, 2

Mar 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. For the 1 April dec

sion, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p. 59; and MFR, 3 Apr 65, tab 5, Westmor

land Hist File 15 (27 Mar–7 May 65), CMH. 64 CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:280–83. Msgs, Sharp to Wheeler, 27 M

65; Stilwell HWA 0869 to Westmoreland, 10 Apr 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg File

1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. USARPAC Historical Summary, 1964–65, pp. 67–68; Historic

Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 21, pp. 6–10. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, se

4.C.5, p. 18. 65 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1985 to Wheeler, 11 Apr 65; Sharp to Westmorelan

14 Apr 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Msg, CINCPA

to COMUSMACV, 14 Apr 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 41. MACV J3 Historic

Summary, Apr 65, in Folder: Buildup Problems, Fact Sheets, Misc Studies, MACV Hi

tory Backup Files 65, 68A1395, RG 334, NARA; Shulimson and Johnson, Marines 

Vietnam, 1965, p. 27. 66 Msg, COMUSMACV to CINCPAC, 8 May 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 4

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 135. Westmoreland issued this concept in respon

to decisions of the 20 April Honolulu meeting; see Historical Division, JCS, JCS an

Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 22, p. 18. 67 These instructions are summarized in Msg, Taylor to SecState, 9 May 65, NSC Histor

Major Forces, box 41. See also Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, p. 36. 68 Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 3 Jun 65, sub: Authority for the Commitmen

of US Ground Combat Forces, tab 21, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (16 May–30 Jun 65

CMH; Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, pp. 27–30, 36–42; MAC

Command History, 1965, pp. 40, 166; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 79–82. 69 Msg, COMUSMACV to CINCPAC, 8 May 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 4

LBSL.

Chap 6.indd 226 
7

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–

February 1966

During the fi rst six months of 1965, the Johnson administration 

moved slowly and cautiously, almost experimentally, toward committing American soldiers to fi ght the Viet Cong. Its actions in the last 

half of the year, however, contrasted starkly. In that period, responding to the absence of results from the bombing of the north and to the 

apparently accelerating political and military deterioration of South 

Vietnam, President Johnson made a rapid succession of decisions that 

plunged U.S. ground forces into battle without reservation and in great 

numbers before their effectiveness in the confl ict had been fully tested. 

At the same time, he altered the objective of the commitment, from 

the limited goal of preventing South Vietnamese collapse to the more 

ambitious one of defeating the Viet Cong insurgency by a predominantly American effort.

South Vietnam in Peril

On 3 June, in reply to a State Department request for his views 

on future ROLLING THUNDER targets, Ambassador Taylor warned that the 

air campaign by itself never would compel the Hanoi government to 

stop supporting the Viet Cong. While he advocated continued, heavier 

bombing of North Vietnam, the ambassador declared that only “a conviction on their part that the tide has turned or soon will turn against 

them in the South” would break the enemy’s will.1

By the time Taylor sent this message, the tide in South Vietnam 

seemed instead to be turning in favor of the enemy. Military events 

were taking much the course that Westmoreland had forecast back in 

March. Viet Cong main forces and guerrillas—steadily increasing in 

numbers and effectiveness—bled Saigon’s regulars and territorials in 

large and small engagements, opening the way for further subversion 

of the countryside and posing a threat of physical and moral collapse 

of the government forces. At the same time, the enemy conducted a 

systematic road-cutting campaign to isolate the towns and cities, paraChap 7EI.indd 227 
228

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

lyze the economy, and break up the remaining government territor

into separate, vulnerable islands of resistance.2

While most Viet Cong actions continued to be small hit-and-ru

attacks, their campaign also included main force engagements wit

ominous implications. Between mid-May and mid-June, Viet Con

troops in at least regimental strength fought three sustained battle

with government regulars—at Song Be and Dong Xoai north of Saigo

in III Corps and at Ba Gia in southern I Corps. In each, the enemy a

tacked district towns or small ARVN units to draw out relief forces an

then slaughtered the reinforcements piecemeal as they arrived. In th

engagement at Dong Xoai, the worst government defeat of the thre

several Viet Cong battalions stormed a South Vietnamese Special Forc

es camp and district town, then remained in the vicinity for fi ve day

to maul a succession of South Vietnamese battalions, including on

from the supposedly elite airborne. Over 400 government soldiers die

before the enemy broke contact and withdrew, and the toll of missin

men and lost equipment was high. In all these fi ghts, the Viet Con

demonstrated continued improvement in tactical profi ciency an

weaponry, as well as determination to destroy government forces i

prolonged combat, even at the cost of heavy casualties to themselve

South Vietnamese commanders, by contrast, became ever more defen

sive minded. In some regions, notably II Corps, they became hesitan

to reinforce posts under attack or simply gave up exposed position

including half a dozen district headquarters.3

The South Vietnamese commanders’ caution refl ected in part an in

creasingly unfavorable balance of regular forces. The Viet Cong, whi

replacing severe battlefi eld losses, continued to expand their regula

contingent, drawing on a seemingly inexhaustible reservoir of souther

recruits and northern infi ltrators. Their troops seemed well trained an

led, and their new array of Soviet- and Chinese-made infantry weap

ons gave them formidable fi repower which the artillery and air suppo

available to the ARVN could not always overmatch. Behind the Vie

Cong stood a growing force of North Vietnamese regulars in their ow

combat formations. By early June the Military Assistance Command ha

confi rmed the presence in northern II Corps of elements of the Nort

Vietnamese 325th Division. Another division, the 304th, was suspecte

to be in the Laos panhandle within easy reinforcing distance. Accordin

to General Westmoreland, the Viet Cong had built up their strength t

a point where they could mount regimental-size operations in all fou

corps areas and at least battalion-size attacks in “virtually all” province

Still worse, as of early June, only a small fraction of the Viet Cong mai

force and none of the North Vietnamese units had been committed t

major attacks. The enemy’s heaviest blows had yet to fall.4

By contrast, the South Vietnamese Army was forced to suspend i

expansion and suffered a gradual decline in combat strength. Early i

June, at Westmoreland’s suggestion, the government indefi nitely pos

Chap 7EI.indd 228 
229

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

poned the activation of eleven new infantry battalions that had been 

scheduled under the 1964 RVNAF mobilization plan. Instead, it used 

new soldiers coming out of the training centers to bring its existing battalions, which casualties and desertion had reduced to an average of less 

than 380 men, up to something resembling effective combat strength. 

To produce still more replacements quickly, the government shortened 

basic recruit training from 12 weeks to 9 and battalion training from 

21 weeks to 18. Yet the hemorrhage of ARVN manpower continued. By 

mid-June, MACV estimated that four South Vietnamese Army regiments 

and nine battalions were unfi t for combat due to personnel losses. With 

no new battalions scheduled for activation until November, the projected government-to-Viet Cong strength ratio appeared worse than it 

had been in March, when General Westmoreland made his fi rst request 

for substantial American reinforcements. Ambassador Taylor declared 

early in July that the South Vietnamese forces needed “an injection of 

new vitality which can only come from U.S. sources.”5

As enemy military pressure increased, civilian government in Saigon once again collapsed. Premier Quat stumbled into a political and 

constitutional standoff with Chief of State Suu, who challenged the 

premier’s authority to dismiss three members of his cabinet. Mediation 

efforts by Ambassador Taylor failed, due, Taylor reported, to tactical 

mistakes by Quat and to the ambiguous language of South Vietnam’s 

provisional constitution, which provided no legal way out of the impasse. Finally, on 9 June, Quat asked the senior military commanders 

Chief of State Thieu, left, and Air Vice Marshal Ky

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 7EI.indd 229 
230

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

to mediate the dispute. The generals, who had held aloof from th

controversy while growing increasingly impatient at the paralysis o

the government, responded by forcing out both Suu and Quat. On th

14th, they set up a ten-man military governing council, chaired b

General Nguyen Van Thieu, who became de facto chief of state. Th

Vietnamese Air Force commander, Air Vice Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky, a

sumed the premiership under the cumbersome title of Commissione

in Charge of the Executive Branch. Ky formed an all-military cabine

composed of relatively young, supposedly reform-minded offi cers an

promulgated an ambitious 26-point national mobilization program

In the midst of a battlefi eld crisis, Saigon’s military leaders thus onc

more immersed themselves in the cauldron of politics.6

The new regime did not inspire great confi dence among membe

of the U.S. Mission. General Thieu, Quat’s former defense ministe

had impressed many Americans favorably as a division and corps com

mander. However, the reserved, cautious native of central Vietnam

who had been involved in Saigon politics since the anti-Diem coup o

1963, had a reputation for self-seeking and intrigue. As chief of stat

he was an unknown quantity. Air Vice Marshal Ky, a northerner b

birth and a Buddhist, was Thieu’s opposite in personality—impulsivel

outspoken, a high-liver who affected purple jump suits and twin pear

handled revolvers. A member of the young generals’ group that fi r

backed and then got rid of Khanh, Ky had made a creditable record a

head of the air force. As premier, he again showed great energy, zeal fo

good government, and a desire for aggressive action against the Vie

Cong. But Ambassador Taylor regarded him as “completely without th

background and experience for an assignment as diffi cult as this one

The Catholics, Buddhists, and other political factions took a noncom

mittal attitude toward the new regime, responding tepidly at best to i

calls for austerity, unity, and sacrifi ce. The American embassy prepare

to give all possible moral and practical support to this, the fi fth Saigo

government in eighteen months, but its members expressed little hop

of immediate improvements. “With governments coming and goin

as if Saigon was a revolving door,” General Westmoreland later stated

“I could see little possibility of the South Vietnamese themselves ove

coming the military crisis.”7

Air Power Holds Back the Enemy

To check the enemy offensive, General Westmoreland resorted fi r

to the American forces on hand. Since his ground units still were few

that meant primarily air power. Westmoreland took full advantage o

the authority granted him and Admiral Sharp early in March to em

ploy jet fi ghter-bombers in South Vietnam. He also made the most of 

decision by Sharp, soon after the Honolulu conference in April, to giv

the war in South Vietnam priority in allocating air resources, even a

Chap 7EI.indd 230 
231

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

the cost of occasionally canceling strikes in North Vietnam and Laos.8

U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine fi ghter-bombers played perhaps 

the decisive role in blunting major Viet Cong attacks. These aircraft, 

although hampered until mid-summer by limited reconnaissance and 

forward air control support, fl ew an ever-increasing number of combat sorties. In engagements such as Song Be, Ba Gia, and Dong Xoai, 

the American and South Vietnamese air forces at a minimum prevented even worse government losses. They also substantially increased 

enemy casualties and made it prohibitively costly for the Viet Cong 

to hold their positions for any length of time. General Westmoreland 

declared on 11 June that maintenance of the government presence in 

a number of important areas of South Vietnam “is becoming more and 

more dependent upon air” and that “air capabilities . . . constitute the 

current difference between keeping the V. C. buildup under reasonable 

control and letting the enemy get away from us throughout most of 

the countryside.”9

To supplement his tactical air power, Westmoreland acquired a 

major new resource: B–52 heavy bombers of the Strategic Air Command (SAC). In February the Air Force had moved thirty of these aircraft, refi tted to carry large conventional bomb loads, to Andersen Air 

Force Base on Guam for possible use against North Vietnam. However, 

for a variety of political and military reasons, the Defense Department 

kept the Stratofortresses out of ROLLING THUNDER. Early in March, the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff, partly to “assist in opening the door” for eventual 

use of the planes over the north, suggested their employment against 

selected Viet Cong targets in South Vietnam. Although General John 

D. Ryan, USAF, the SAC commander, and Admiral Sharp (who later 

changed his mind) initially resisted the proposal, General Westmoreland took a more favorable view. In messages to Sharp and the Joint 

Chiefs and in person at the 20 April Honolulu conference, the MACV 

commander emphasized the value of the big bombers for attacking 

major Viet Cong base areas, such as War Zones C and D north of Saigon, where enemy facilities were too widely dispersed, deeply dug in, 

and well concealed to be seriously damaged by tactical aircraft.10 With 

the B–52s, which fl ew at altitudes beyond enemy sight and hearing and 

could carpet a wide area with bombs within a very short time, Westmoreland could disrupt Viet Cong bases while using his fi ghter-bombers 

for other more suitable missions.11

Early in May, the Defense Department approved in principle use of 

the B–52s in South Vietnam and directed Admiral Sharp and General 

Ryan to work out procedures for strikes on targets proposed by General 

Westmoreland. At the outset, either President Johnson or Secretary 

McNamara had to approve each individual mission. The fi rst B–52 raid, 

code-named ARC LIGHT I, took place on 18 June, against a suspected Viet 

Cong troop concentration in War Zone D, forty miles north of Saigon. 

At the cost of two Stratofortresses lost with most of their crews in a midChap 7EI.indd 231 
232

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

air collision, the aircraft from Guam churned up a portion of Vietnam

ese landscape with 1,300 bombs, all dropped within thirty minutes. Re

sults of this initial attack were unimpressive. South Vietnamese troop

searching part of the target area after the strike found little evidenc

of enemy casualties or damage to installations. Nevertheless, Genera

Westmoreland was convinced that, with improved preattack securit

and more rapid planning and strike authorization, the B–52s woul

be effective against otherwise unreachable enemy forces and facilitie

Admiral Sharp concurred in the MACV commander’s assessment an

urged him to propose additional missions as soon as possible so as t

“establish a pattern for the employment of this capability.” In spite o

many references in the news media to swatting fl ies with sledgeham

mers, and in spite of objections by members of the Air staff in Wash

ington to diversion of the strategic nuclear bombers to conventiona

tactical missions, by the end of June the B–52s were well on the wa

to becoming a permanent part of the Military Assistance Command

arsenal of weapons.12

Decisions for an American Ground War

By the time the B–52s went into action, a new round of debate an

decision-making on commitment of U.S. ground troops was well unde

way. On 5 June, two days after his declaration that bombing the nort

A B–52 ARC LIGHT bombing mission (U.S. Air Force photo)

Chap 7EI.indd 232 
233

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

alone would not end Hanoi’s aggression, Ambassador Taylor submitted to Washington a general 

political-military assessment of 

the situation in South Vietnam. 

Drafted by the Mission Intelligence Committee and concurred 

in by himself, Deputy Ambassador U. Alexis Johnson, and General Westmoreland, the assessment 

summed up how dangerously the 

tide was running against the allies. 

The ambassador reviewed the diffi culties of the Quat regime, then 

still clinging to offi ce; the developing enemy offensive; and the manpower and morale problems of the 

South Vietnamese armed forces. 

He warned that during the next several months the South Vietnamese, 

their inadequate military reserves spread increasingly thin, would likely suffer additional defeats comparable to those of late May and early 

June. Such reverses, combined with economic hardship caused by Viet 

Cong blocking of communication arteries, “will have a serious adverse 

impact on popular confi dence and morale, exacerbating political instability in Saigon.” Even worse, the “cumulative psychological impact” 

of a series of lost battles “could lead to a collapse in ARVN’s will to continue the fi ght.” To prevent such a collapse, Taylor concluded, “it will 

probably be necessary to commit U.S. ground forces to action.”13

General Westmoreland followed up Taylor’s political assessment 

with a military one of his own and with a proposal for reversing the 

adverse trend in the south by a major infusion of American troops. 

As in his previous reinforcement requests, he acted in response to a 

cue from his superiors in Washington. The administration, disturbed 

by Taylor’s situation assessments, summoned the ambassador home 

for another policy review. In preparation for Taylor’s visit, the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff decided to reopen the question of committing some of 

the forces discussed in the 20 April Honolulu conference, particularly 

additional marines and the Army division for the Central Highlands. 

On 4 June, General Wheeler asked Westmoreland and Sharp for their 

opinions on the desirability of early introduction of the division and 

for an estimate of when the American logistic base in South Vietnam 

would be built up enough to support it.14

On 7 June, Westmoreland furnished answers to Wheeler’s questions 

and much more besides. Assessing the military situation in the same 

terms and language as the Mission Intelligence Committee, he emphasized the presence of North Vietnamese regulars, the growing but as 

General Wheeler

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 7EI.indd 233 
234

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

yet largely uncommitted Viet Cong main force, and the likelihood o

heavy new attacks north of Saigon, in the Quang Ngai and Quang Ti

provinces of I Corps, and in the Central Highlands and Binh Din

province of II Corps. After recapitulating the decline in ARVN strengt

and aggressiveness, Westmoreland concluded: “In order to cope wit

the situation . . . , I see no course of action open to us except to re

inforce our efforts . . . with additional U.S. or third country forces a

rapidly as is practical during the critical weeks ahead.” He also advo

cated planning for commitment of “even greater forces, if and whe

required, to attain our objectives or counter enemy initiatives.”

Westmoreland built his troop request on the recommendations o

the 20 April Honolulu conference. Besides the two Army brigades an

the Korean regimental combat team agreed upon at that conferenc

the MACV commander asked for early dispatch of the units designate

at that time for later decision: the airmobile division, a South Korea

infantry division, an Army corps headquarters, and two Marine batta

ion landing teams, all to be accompanied by large contingents of Arm

logistical troops. Going beyond the units previously considered, he ex

pressed a need for another U.S. Army division, either the 1st Infantr

or 101st Airborne; another Marine amphibious brigade; additional tac

tical air, helicopter, and combat and logistic support units; and thre

antiaircraft missile battalions. Later in June, he asked to keep the 173

Airborne indefi nitely, rather than return it to Okinawa when the othe

Army brigades arrived. After some initial confusion, especially over th

173d, Westmoreland and the Joint Chiefs settled upon a request for 4

maneuver battalions—34 American, 9 Korean, and 1 Australian—all t

be in South Vietnam by the end of the year. Ten of those battalions—

U.S. Marine, 2 U.S. Army, and 1 Australian—already were deployed

Six more Army battalions (a brigade each from the 1st Infantry an

101st Airborne Divisions) and a South Korean regimental combat team 

were to enter South Vietnam during July. Westmoreland asked that th

rest of the troops be sent during August, September, and October, on 

schedule that matched closely one worked out by the Army staff late i

April as part of its contingency planning.15 When these deploymen

were completed, U.S. forces in South Vietnam would number abou

175,000 men, with the allies providing additional troops.16 (Map 3)

In his 7 June message and in more detail a week later, Westmore

land elaborated upon his plans for employing these forces. The add

tional marines all would go to build up the 3d Marine Division so tha

it could provide “adequate reserve reaction forces” for I Corps, whic

then had “virtually no reserve” and was “barely able to hold the majo

population centers, province and district towns.” The airmobile div

sion, the brigade from the 1st Infantry Division, and the Korean uni

all were to reinforce II Corps, where two ARVN divisions had “a hope

lessly large area to cover with the meager forces available.” The Korean

would secure coastal logistic bases at Qui Nhon and Cam Ranh Ba

Chap 7EI.indd 234 
X X

4

X X

25

X X

3 X X

1

XXX

III MAF

X

2 ROK

X X

CAP ROK

X X

9 ROK

X

196

X

199

X X

1

X

3 9

X

1 Australian TF

X

1 101

XXX

I FF

XXX

II FF

X

173

III

11

X X

1 CAV

Mekong River

Mekong River

LAOS

THAILAND

CAMBODIA

NORTH VIETNAM

DEMARCATION LINE

I Corps

III Corps

II Corps

IV Corps

Tay Ninh

Cu Chi

Di An

Bearcat

Bien Hoa

Song Be

Nha Trang

Ninh Hoa

Phan Rang

Qui Nhon

Pleiku An Khe

Da Nang

Hue

Chu Lai

Nui Dat

Long Binh

Soc Trang

SAIGON

PHNOM PENH

Attopeu

Saravane

Paksé

Stung Treng

Tchepone

Savannakhet

Snuol

Cam Ranh

0

0

100 Miles

100 Kilometers

SOUTH VIETNAM

MAJOR U.S. AND ALLIED FORCES

Corps Boundary

1966

MAP 3

Chap 7EI.indd 235 
236

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

while the American units swept the plateau around Kontum and Pleik

and kept open the main supply route into those towns, Highway 19

To reinforce III Corps against the enemy main forces that had demon

strated their power at Song Be and Dong Xoai, Westmoreland intende

to use the 173d Airborne, the brigade from the 101st Airborne, and th

rest of the additional Army division in the provinces north of Saigon

Westmoreland believed that IV Corps was “standing on its own tw

feet,” because of the nature of the region’s delta terrain and the effec

tiveness of the South Vietnamese divisions stationed there. “Whethe

or not US forces will be required in this area cannot now be forecast.”

The MACV commander expected that the majority of maneuve

battalions he had requested would be tied down defending America

bases and holding lines of communication. Nevertheless, in his di

patches he emphasized the importance of the troops’ offensive role. H

acknowledged that defeat of the Viet Cong guerrillas and political un

derground in the heavily populated Mekong Delta and nearby coasta

regions was essential to fi nal allied victory, but he insisted that onl

the South Vietnamese could “make real progress and succeed” in tha

part of the war. Since South Vietnamese troops, however, were bein

diverted from pacifi cation to counter the growing enemy main force

in the Central Highlands and elsewhere, he declared, “my concept 

basically to employ US forces, together with Vietnamese airborne an

marine battalions of the general reserve, against the hardcore Nort

Vietnam/Viet Cong forces in reaction and search and destroy opera

tions, and thus permit the concentration of Vietnamese troops in th

heavily populated areas.” He added: “We will be conducting mobil

warfare from fi xed and defended bases. Some of these bases will b

major logistics centers at ports and airfi elds, such as Chu Lai and Cam 

Ranh. Others will be tactical bases such as An Khe or Pleiku. The tact

cal bases will move as necessary and that may be with some frequenc

as the battle develops.”17

Westmoreland’s proposals received prompt endorsement from h

military superiors, at least as far as the size of the reinforcement wa

concerned. Admiral Sharp concurred on 7 June. Four days later, th

Joint Chiefs of Staff formally recommended to Secretary McNamar

the deployment on Westmoreland’s schedule of all the requested rein

forcements except the additional Army division and a Marine amphib

ious brigade. On the question of troop dispositions, both Sharp and A

Force Chief of Staff General John P. McConnell expressed strong rese

vations about immediate movement inland of the airmobile division

which still was in the process of formation and had yet to be tested i

combat. Both men argued that the division should operate initiall

around Qui Nhon, where it would not have to rely so completely o

air transport for supply. Sharp also suggested that a coastal deploy

ment would contribute more to controlling the populated lowland

which he considered strategically and politically more important tha

Chap 7EI.indd 236 
237

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

the plateau. From a broader perspective, General McConnell warned 

against committing American ground forces to a potentially endless 

battle of attrition in the south without a strong accompanying air campaign to knock North Vietnam out of the war.18

Ambassador Taylor and the new leaders of South Vietnam supported 

the MACV commander’s bid for reinforcements. On 28 June, Generals 

Thieu and Ky, “sober-faced and depressed” according to the ambassador, 

informed Taylor that they could not raise forces rapidly enough during 

the next few months to match the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese 

buildup. They must have American or other allied troops to hold off the 

enemy while they put their own political and military affairs in order. 

In contrast to his earlier hesitancy on the subject, Taylor now attested to 

the need for more American troops to contain the Viet Cong offensive, 

to compensate for declining ARVN strength and morale, and to prevent 

major defeats that could cause collapse of the still-fragile Thieu-Ky regime. He warned on 11 July, in his most urgent statement:

ARVN is alone clearly incapable of coping with growing Viet Cong capabilities as already reinforced by PAVN and we are faced with prospect of successive tactical reverses, 

piecemeal destruction of ARVN units, and gradual loss of key communication and 

population centers, particularly in the highlands. Unless this trend is reversed, there 

will be a growing danger of attrition of RVNAF will to fi ght in months ahead, accompanied by a similar loss of civilian confi dence. Only early commitment of U.S., third 

country forces . . . in strength greater than that now available in SVN can blunt and 

bloody the . . . offensive to the point of convincing Hanoi’s leaders that they cannot 

win in the South.19

President Johnson and his senior advisers, most of whom were determined at least to avoid losing in Vietnam, inexorably moved toward 

acceptance of the 44-battalion reinforcement, although at different 

rates and with varying degrees of misgiving. Secretary McNamara, after 

a lengthy review of Westmoreland’s plan, formally recommended it 

to the president on 26 June. To support the troop deployment and to 

rebuild the U.S. strategic reserve, he also urged a call-up of 100,000 

reservists and National Guardsmen and extension of enlistment terms 

in all services. Secretary of State Rusk, National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy, and CIA Director William Raborn, after some skeptical 

questioning, fell into line with McNamara’s request.

Yet dissent remained. What Bundy called “second level men” in 

the State and Defense Departments and the CIA raised questions. 

Some, including at one point Deputy Ambassador Johnson, expressed 

doubt that South Vietnam was as near collapse as Westmoreland and 

the mission were indicating or questioned whether the enemy really 

was shifting to large-unit warfare to an extent that would justify the 

commitment of so many American combat troops. Under Secretary of 

State George Ball, the most outspoken, articulate dissenter, considered 

South Vietnam already a lost cause and warned that the United States 

Chap 7EI.indd 237 
238

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

was heading for an interminable, costly, and ultimately futile struggl

in which Americans would repeat the French failure in a “white man

war” against Asian nationalists. He urged the president to minimiz

additional force commitments and to begin preparing to disengag

which he said could be done at less diplomatic cost before, rather tha

after, deeper American involvement in the fi ghting. President Johnso

himself seemed to favor another intensifi cation of the American mil

tary effort. Yet he delayed his decision, to allow a consensus to form 

among his advisers, to explore alternatives, and to buy time to prepar

the domestic political ground.20

Throughout the lengthy administration consideration of his pro

posal, General Westmoreland was in constant communication wit

General Wheeler and Admiral Sharp. He refi ned and defended his re

inforcement request and concept of operations. He also furnished a

guments against alternatives that Wheeler proposed, possibly as straw 

men in many instances, on behalf of Secretary McNamara. Westmore

land rejected as inadequate several variant deployment schemes tha

called either for a smaller total force or for substitutions for the airmo

bile division. He commented negatively on a new series of proposals fo

encadrement of small American units in South Vietnamese regimen

and battalions. Westmoreland also pronounced as politically unde

sirable or militarily impractical a number of suggested employmen

for American combat units, such as taking over protection of Saigo

to release the South Vietnamese general reserve airborne and marin

battalions for fi eld operations—a mission, Westmoreland pointed ou

that would detract from the appearance of Vietnamese sovereignty an

might involve Americans in politically embarrassing riot control dut

Responding to frequently expressed fears in Washington, Westmore

land, strongly seconded by Admiral Sharp, insisted that with prope

troop leadership and indoctrination, American forces could maintai

good relations with the Vietnamese people, thereby minimizing th

danger of a mass xenophobic reaction.21

Yet Westmoreland, as he pressed his campaign for reinforcemen

with increasing urgency, envisioned no short or easy struggle. Instead

on 24 June, he told General Wheeler that “we are in for the long pul

The struggle has become a war of attrition. Short of [a] decision to intro

duce nuclear weapons against sources and channels of enemy power, 

see no likelihood of achieving a quick, favorable end to the war.” Tw

days later, he declared: “We are deluding ourselves if we feel some nov

arrangement is going to get quick results. We must think in terms o

an extended confl ict; be prepared to support a greatly increased effor

give the commander on the scene the troops that he requires and th

authority to deploy these troops in accordance with his best judgmen

. . . We need more troops, and we need them quickly.”22

Even while the Johnson administration debated Westmoreland

reinforcement request, it took signifi cant steps toward unrestricted U.

Chap 7EI.indd 238 
239

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

participation in the ground war. To begin with, the administration reaffi rmed and strengthened the MACV commander’s authority to commit his troops to offensive action. Westmoreland had possessed such 

authority since early April, and his May concept of operations had as 

its fi nal stage entry of American units into active combat alongside 

the South Vietnamese. However, a public relations mishap resulted in 

confusion about the extent of the MACV commander’s tactical discretion. On 8 June 1965, a State Department briefi ng offi cer, more or less 

offhandedly, informed a press conference that U.S. troops in Vietnam 

were available to support their allies in combat beyond the boundaries 

of American-protected bases and had been for some time. A predictable 

furor erupted. The media and members of Congress denounced the executive branch for trying to maneuver the country into a full-fl edged 

land war without open public debate. Attempting to appease the critics, White House Press Secretary George F. Reedy and Secretary of State 

Rusk issued statements to the effect that the troops’ primary mission 

remained base defense. They denied that the president had ordered 

any change in that mission. Rusk especially appeared to tie any combat 

activity quite strictly to installation security.23

These pronouncements, issued just as the battle at Dong Xoai was 

approaching a crisis, left Westmoreland in a quandary. By mid-June, 

his available American units—the marines in I Corps and the 173d Airborne Brigade at Bien Hoa—were ready to move into offensive operations. Indeed, after the commander of I Corps came close to asking for 

Marine assistance at Ba Gia, Ambassador Taylor on 3 June had requested 

and promptly received State Department confi rmation that the MACV 

commander could “authorize commitment [of] U.S. ground forces to 

action in combat support on the basis of operational coordination and 

cooperation with RVNAF.” The new policy declarations, taken literally, 

seemed to nullify the previous authorizations. Specifi cally, they raised 

doubts as to whether Westmoreland could commit forces at Dong Xoai, 

which was far from any major American-protected base.24

On 12 June, in an effort to clarify his position, Westmoreland sent 

a message to Admiral Sharp, with copies to the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

and the State Department, asking for a redefi nition of his authority 

and suggesting new wording which he thought would conform to the 

most recent administration statements. This message drew a strong rebuke from Sharp. The Pacifi c commander told Westmoreland that, as 

far as he and the Joint Chiefs were concerned, the MACV commander 

already possessed ample discretion to “conduct operations necessary to 

achieve our objectives.” Emphasizing that the chiefs had carefully constructed the phrase “counterinsurgency combat operations” to provide 

that discretion, Sharp warned Westmoreland that more precise directives, if issued in the current Washington climate, likely would be more 

restrictive. At Sharp’s urging, Westmoreland withdrew his message of 

the 12th. However, when he simultaneously informed Sharp that he 

Chap 7EI.indd 239 
240

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

might be required to exercise his discretion by committing the 173

Airborne to rescue the South Vietnamese at Dong Xoai within the nex

12 hours, it was the admiral’s turn to be cautious. By telephone ca

and teletype message, Sharp acknowledged that Westmoreland, as “th

man on the ground,” had the responsibility and power to act; but h

left little doubt that he preferred to avoid a troop commitment at tha

time. He urged Westmoreland to take a “hard look” at the possibilit

of driving off the enemy with intensive air strikes, and he directed th

MACV commander to consult with him before ordering the brigad

into action.25

The crisis at Dong Xoai passed without involvement of America

ground forces, but the scope of Westmoreland’s tactical discretio

remained in doubt. Finally, on 26 June, in response to a query from 

Taylor, Secretary Rusk settled the question. He informed Taylor tha

Westmoreland could commit U.S. troops “independently of or in con

junction with” the South Vietnamese “in any situation in which th

use of such troops is requested by an appropriate GVN commander an

when, in COMUSMACV’s judgment, their use is necessary to strength

en the relative position of GVN forces.” This statement for practica

purposes gave Westmoreland a tactical free hand with the soldiers an

marines at his disposal.26

Besides giving Westmoreland freedom to use what troops he had

the administration took preliminary steps toward deploying the rein

forcements he had requested. On 19 June, Secretary McNamara autho

rized the Army to establish the airmobile division, under the name an

colors of the 1st Cavalry Division, as part of its permanent force struc

ture. A week later, he directed the division to prepare for movemen

overseas. At the same time, President Johnson authorized deploymen

of two Marine battalion landing teams that were part of the 7 June re

inforcement request. On 9 July, McNamara directed the secretary of th

Army to plan for commitment of the entire 44-battalion force as well a

for expansion of the Army by 1 additional division, 6 separate brigade

19 airmobile companies, and large support and service forces, to b

provided by adding 250,000 men to the active Army through the draft an

calling up 100,000 National Guardsmen and reserves. The following da

McNamara informed the Joint Chiefs that President Johnson on 8 July ha

approved the deployment of all the troops Westmoreland had requested

Also on 10 July, the president ordered to Vietnam 10,400 additional qua

termaster, engineer, ordnance, transportation, medical, and signal troop

needed to support U.S. forces already in South Vietnam and to receive th

1st Cavalry Division “if deployed.”27

A fi nal initiative had even more signifi cant implications. On 29 Jun

McNamara, through General Wheeler, asked Sharp and Westmorelan

what forces beyond the forty-four battalions then under consideratio

would be needed during 1966 to “prove to the VC/DRV that they can

not win in South Vietnam.” Shortly thereafter, in a face-to-face confe

Chap 7EI.indd 240 
241

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

ence, McNamara told the Pacifi c commander that he “did not want 

to depend upon further ARVN buildup since thus far it had not been 

suffi cient to offset losses plus VC gains and further it was too unreliable a factor.” The defense secretary wanted Sharp to make estimates 

without regard to the restrictions of “what up to now has been limited 

use of our assets”; and he indicated that at least “partial mobilization” 

remained a real possibility. Sharp and Westmoreland both replied that 

they would almost certainly need more forces, although they could 

not yet specify how many. Westmoreland declared on 30 June that 

the 44-battalion reinforcement, which was about the maximum that 

could be brought into South Vietnam during the rest of 1965, “should 

re-establish the military balance” by the end of the year but “will not 

. . . cause the enemy to back off.” Beyond that, he added, he tended 

“instinctively” to believe that he would need “substantial” additional 

forces. By these questions, and the answers they evoked, McNamara 

subtly but profoundly altered the terms of reinforcement planning, 

from what was needed to prevent the South Vietnamese from losing to 

what the Americans on their own required for winning.28

Immediately after receiving Wheeler’s 29 June query, Westmoreland 

set his staff to work on an estimate of additional troop requirements 

for 1966. In the absence of fi rm information on American unit combat 

performance and the future rate of the enemy buildup, the planners 

perforce based their initial estimate on a combination of mathematical rules of thumb, professional judgment, and what the MACV chief 

of staff called “a degree of wizardry.” Starting from their best guess of 

how many battalions the enemy would add during 1966 and a forecast 

of South Vietnamese strength, and assuming that each U.S. Army infantry battalion equaled in combat power two ARVN or Viet Cong battalions and each U.S. Marine battalion equaled three friendly or enemy 

Vietnamese ones, the planners calculated how many more American 

battalions the allies would require to maintain the three-to-one ratio 

deemed essential to seizing the tactical initiative. As a check, they also 

added up the number of battalions necessary for essential defensive 

and offensive missions; and they played a series of war games that pitted various combinations of American and South Vietnamese forces 

against projected enemy strength in different regions of the country. 

By these methods, the staff arrived at a recommended 1966 reinforcement of twenty-four U.S. maneuver battalions plus proportional combat and logistic support units and tactical air squadrons, a total of about 

100,000 additional men.29

General Westmoreland presented this estimate to Secretary McNamara in mid-July, when McNamara visited Saigon for a comprehensive 

review of the progress, or lack of it, of the war, the fi nal preliminary 

to a presidential decision on reinforcements. McNamara arrived in the 

South Vietnamese capital on the 16th, with an entourage that included 

General Wheeler and Ambassador Taylor’s designated successor, Henry 

Chap 7EI.indd 241 
242

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Cabot Lodge.30 His group spent fi ve busy days with the mission. The

also heard extensive briefi ngs from Chief of State Thieu, Premier K

and offi cials of their regime on South Vietnamese political, economi

and military plans. Discussions ranged over most aspects of the wa

including a review of proposed allied fi eld command arrangement

consideration and rejection of press censorship, and an evaluation o

ROLLING THUNDER.

Throughout, U.S. troop reinforcements were the issue of most con

cern. Preparatory to his visit, McNamara had asked the country team 

for estimates of troop needs for the rest of 1965 and “the probable re

quirements for additional forces next year.” The MACV briefi ng to Mc

Namara, presented by General DePuy, addressed both points. DePu

laid out MACV’s force requirements in two phases, each of which de

noted a stage in the progress of the military campaign as well as 

reinforcement increment. In Phase I, the 44-battalion reinforcemen

Ambassador-designate Lodge and Secretary McNamara meet with Head of State 

Thieu and Premier Ky in Saigon. (© Bettmann/CORBIS photo)

Chap 7EI.indd 242 
243

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

would enable the allies to “stem the tide” that until then had been 

running against them. This meant containing the Viet Cong offensive 

during the rest of the year and preventing a South Vietnamese political 

or military collapse. In Phase II, which should begin early in 1966, the 

second contingent of American reinforcements would give the allies 

the strength to “turn the tide” by attacking enemy main forces and 

base areas while simultaneously resuming the pacifi cation of economically and politically important regions. This phase would require an estimated 24 additional American maneuver and 17 combat support battalions with helicopter and logistic units and 9 Air Force squadrons.

Both troop requests met a favorable response. Indeed, discussion 

of Phase I ended almost at once. During the second day of the meetings, Deputy Secretary of Defense Cyrus Vance telephoned from Washington to inform McNamara that President Johnson had decided to 

deploy the entire forty-four battalions and was “favorably disposed” 

toward mobilizing reserves and extending the tours of active duty personnel. The conferees then turned to the reinforcement for 1966. McNamara accepted the Phase II proposal as a basis for further planning 

and appeared to support it. He also left his fi eld commander in little 

doubt that the war from then on would be primarily an American effort. Discussion throughout the conference, according to the MACV 

Chief of Staff, Maj. Gen. William B. Rosson, “revolved almost exclusively around the need for a major US effort—one calling for greater 

assets, greater vigor, greater effectiveness. . . . McNamara himself was 

dynamic and convincing—one who had a tremendous grasp for detail 

and who exuded confi dence and a positive approach.” Rosson found 

himself “not only surprised by the numbers of forces that Washington 

was prepared to send . . . , but somewhat awed by the realization that 

General Westmoreland was to play a key role in determining the numbers and types of forces that would be considered.”31

The long–awaited presidential decision quickly followed McNamara’s return to Washington. On 20 July, the defense secretary reiterated 

his endorsement of the 44-battalion reinforcement, a reserve call-up, 

and extension of active-duty tours. He also called for gradual intensifi -

cation of ROLLING THUNDER, renewed pacifi cation efforts in South Vietnam, and a diplomatic peace offensive, possibly to include a temporary cessation of bombing in the north. This proposal constituted the 

agenda for a fi nal round of administration policy deliberations. During 

them, most participants gave evidence that they realized the troops 

under consideration were a fi rst installment rather than a fi nal payment and that they were contemplating what amounted to an American takeover of the war. McNamara himself declared that deployment 

of another 100,000 men early in 1966 likely would be necessary and 

that acceptance of his proposal implied a “commitment to see a fi ghting war clear through at considerable cost in casualties and materiel.” 

No one was optimistic about the new Saigon regime. Ambassador-desChap 7EI.indd 243 
244

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

ignate Lodge observed that “we shouldn’t take the Government to

seriously” and must “do what is necessary” to hold South Vietnam 

“regardless of the Government.” Only George Ball continued to argu

for withdrawal rather than deeper involvement; the other advisers, an

President Johnson himself, rejected that alternative.32

At the end of a fi nal National Security Council session on 27 July

Johnson, as expected, went ahead with the 44-battalion program. How

ever, he ruled out an immediate reserve call-up, a request to Congre

for large supplemental military appropriations, and a declaration of 

national emergency, claiming that such actions would divide the coun

try politically and might provoke more direct Russian and Chinese in

tervention on North Vietnam’s side. In fact, Johnson wanted to avoi

a potentially divisive congressional and public debate on the war; h

overriding consideration was implementing his domestic Great Soc

ety legislation. He planned to meet Westmoreland’s requirements fo

1965 out of the resources of the active military establishment, but h

indicated that more drastic mobilization measures might come at th

beginning of the next year if renewed diplomatic initiatives prove

fruitless. Further to minimize the domestic and foreign political impac

of his decision, on the 28th, Johnson announced the deployment o

only a portion of the 44-battalion reinforcement, including the airmo

bile division. Privately, General Wheeler informed Sharp and Westmo

reland that “COMUSMACV’s requests for units, personnel and materi

. . . will be met in full according to the desired schedule” and tha

preparations were under way to “ensure that we can meet follow-o

requirements” in 1966.33

Johnson’s decision for an open-ended commitment of U.S. force

to the war without mobilization dismayed the Joint Chiefs. They rec

ognized that a reserve call-up was needed to carry out the Vietnam 

buildup effi ciently while maintaining American military readiness else

where in the world. In addition, they believed that the president wa

understating the number of American troops that would be neede

for victory, which some thought could go as high as a million men

General Johnson, whose service was most affected by the failure to mo

bilize, seriously considered resigning in protest. In the end, he staye

on—a decision he later characterized as “the worst, the most immoral

he had ever made. General Wheeler, the chairman, did not convey h

colleagues’ doubts to other policymakers. When asked for his view

in White House councils and meetings with congressional leaders, h

raised no objection to Johnson’s course of action.34

The president’s decision against mobilization of the reserves ha

the immediate result of slowing the deployment of the troops tha

Westmoreland had requested. Over the longer term, the effects on th

armed services and the country were much more severe. As the Mil

tary Assistance Command requested additional U.S. reinforcement

the point at which reserves would have to be mobilized would set th

Chap 7EI.indd 244 
245

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

limit on force deployments. To make commitments short of that point, 

the administration gradually would hollow out its forces in the United 

States and elsewhere in the world, undermining their discipline, cohesion, and combat readiness. Even worse, by deliberately understating 

the scale and costs of the U.S. commitment in July 1965, President 

Johnson made inevitable an erosion of congressional and public trust 

in his administration as the confl ict went on. During the years to come, 

the “credibility gap” would only grow wider, until it engulfed both the 

president and South Vietnam. 

Implementing Phase I

Once President Johnson had made his fateful decision, General 

Westmoreland and his staff turned their attention to carrying out the 

44-battalion deployment and to fl eshing out their proposals for Phase 

II. The deployment was largely a matter of putting into effect decisions 

reached and policies established during the lengthy discussion of the 

Joint Chiefs’ three-division plan. In addition, the command in Saigon 

solved practical problems as they arose, modifi ed the buildup schedule 

and troop list in response to unfolding events, and attempted to articulate an overall plan for the conduct of the war.

The major ground combat elements involved entered South Vietnam at the places and more or less at the times Westmoreland had 

specifi ed. During July two Army infantry brigades deployed, the 2d of 

the 1st Infantry Division to the Saigon area and the 1st of the 101st 

Airborne to Cam Ranh Bay in II Corps. The following month, the 7th 

Marines disembarked at Chu Lai to augment the III Marine Amphibious Force (MAF). In September the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) 

occupied its base at An Khe, midway between Qui Nhon and Pleiku. 

This location was Westmoreland’s concession to Admiral Sharp, who 

was still unwilling to place the division too far inland and thought it 

should concentrate initially on controlling the coastal regions. During 

October the remainder of the 1st Infantry Division joined its 2d Brigade 

north of Saigon. In the same month, the Korean Capital Division—two 

infantry regiments with a marine brigade attached—took position at 

Qui Nhon and Cam Ranh Bay. Combat and service support troops and 

fi xed- and rotary-wing air units arrived in a steady stream, although 

delays in construction of additional airfi elds capable of handling jets 

held up deployment of several Air Force tactical squadrons.35

General Westmoreland conducted this buildup on a very limited 

logistical base. Engineers and support troops had begun deploying to 

South Vietnam in April in response to repeated MACV requests; during the same month U.S. Army, Pacifi c, activated a logistic command 

in the country. In June engineers started building an extensive port 

and airfi eld complex at Cam Ranh Bay. Nevertheless, American base facilities still were rudimentary when the movement of major reinforceChap 7EI.indd 245 
246

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

ments commenced. Taking a calculated risk, Westmoreland accepte

combat troops simultaneously with their supporting elements, rathe

than bringing in the supporting forces fi rst. His logisticians, in severa

frantic months of improvisation, kept their part of the buildup barel

abreast of that of the fi ghting forces, with no adverse consequence

worse than occasional local supply shortages and administrative mix

ups and a growing backlog of vessels awaiting discharge off the port

By the end of the year, a support structure was taking shape, with majo

supply facilities at Da Nang, Cam Ranh, Qui Nhon, Nha Trang, Saigon

and Vung Tau. Under a policy established by Admiral Sharp, the Nav

provided common item support to all U.S. forces in I Corps; the Arm

1st Logistical Command covered the other three corps areas.36

As his combat forces expanded, Westmoreland put into effect th

plan that he, Admiral Sharp, and General Wheeler had adopted i

April for a fi eld command built around an Army corps headquarter

Details of the new command were still unsettled, however, when a

argument broke out over its service composition. During June and Jul

Sharp and Wheeler pressed Westmoreland to organize a joint, rathe

than an Army, fi eld force headquarters. They contended that it woul

likely have to control tactical air support and might have III MAF a

tached to it; hence, it should include offi cers of all concerned service

Westmoreland held out for the scaled-down Army corps headquarte

originally contemplated, promising to add liaison offi cers from othe

Soldiers of the 1st Cavalry Division disembarking at Qui Nhon

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 7EI.indd 246 
247

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

services as required. That arrangement, he said, would give him more 

fl exibility in restructuring the headquarters as the situation changed 

and would keep the details of its organization and personnel out of 

Washington interservice politics. The Joint Chiefs in late June ruled 

in favor of a joint headquarters but subsequently reversed themselves 

when they realized that Westmoreland, in line with long-standing contingency plans, intended to retain the III Marine Amphibious Force as 

a separate corps-level command.37

On 1 August, Westmoreland activated the tactical headquarters at 

Nha Trang under the designation Task Force Alpha. He assigned it the 

mission of exercising operational control over U.S. and South Korean 

units in II and III Corps and providing combat support to the South 

Vietnamese Army on the basis of “coordination and cooperation.” Initially modest in size and number of attached troops, the task force 

expanded to corps level when the 1st Cavalry Division came under its 

control. On 25 September, MACV redesignated it Field Force Vietnam, 

a title chosen to avoid confusion with the numbered South Vietnamese 

corps and to denote the American command’s supporting relationship 

to them. He enlarged the fi eld force’s responsibilities to include conduct of the MACV advisory effort in its area of operations. The force 

commander then became senior adviser to his counterpart Vietnamese 

Aerial view of the Cam Ranh Bay complex (NARA)

Chap 7EI.indd 247 
248

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

corps commander, an arrangemen

that took careful explaining t

General Vinh Loc of II Corps, wh

at fi rst considered it a reductio

in his own status. Westmorelan

since April had intended to assig

his deputy, General Throckmo

ton, to command the tactical head

quarters. However, he discovere

that he needed Throckmorton fo

other more urgent tasks. Hence, h

placed Maj. Gen. Stanley R. Larsen

Throckmorton’s designated depu

ty, in command of the fi eld forc

a job Larsen had held in an actin

capacity since early August. In pa

because Larsen was junior in ran

to the major general commandin

the 1st Infantry Division, and par

ly because he expected to form 

second fi eld force in III Corps earl

in 1966, Westmoreland restricte

Field Force Vietnam’s area of con

trol to II Corps. He placed the 1

Division, when it arrived, directl

under MACV.38

Besides organizing an Amer

can fi eld headquarters, Wes

moreland negotiated comman

arrangements with his Australian and Korean allies as their force

reached South Vietnam. The Australians readily agreed to place the

battalion and its supporting elements, which were attached to th

173d Airborne Brigade at Bien Hoa, under the general’s operationa

control. They were slow in permitting its use, however, in offensive

at any distance from the base. Only in October, after Westmoreland

low-key persuasion, did the Australian government authorize free em

ployment of the unit throughout III Corps. The Koreans’ much large

forces were more diffi cult to deal with. Their division entered Sout

Vietnam under a “Military Working Arrangement” with the Unite

States, which vested control of Korean forces in a commander, Repub

lic of Korea Forces, Vietnam. They refused to place their units unde

formal operational control of MACV, claiming that to do so woul

make them seem like mercenaries and puppets of the United State

After prolonged negotiations, General Westmoreland and the Korea

commander, General Chae Myung Shin, reached a gentlemen’s agree

ment (with nothing in writing) under which Chae placed his div

General Larsen (NARA)

Chap 7EI.indd 248 
249

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

sion under General Larsen’s de facto control. As a formal device for 

defi ning the missions, command relations, and operational areas of 

the Koreans, and for looking after their military interests, the allies, 

as provided in the Working Arrangement, set up a tripartite committee consisting of General Chae, the chief of the RVNAF Joint General 

Staff, and the chief of staff of MACV.39

Following Westmoreland’s May concept of operations, the newly 

arrived American ground forces fi rst established and secured their bases 

and then launched progressively more ambitious offensives. In late 

June the 173d Airborne Brigade drove into War Zone D north of Saigon, killing some enemy and uncovering base facilities. The marines, 

however, had the distinction of fi rst bringing a Viet Cong main force 

element to battle. On 17–18 August, in Operation STARLITE, the newly 

arrived 7th Marines encircled two battalions of an enemy regiment 

south of Chu Lai and infl icted a claimed 700 casualties while losing 45 

marines killed and 203 wounded.40

During the autumn U.S. Army troops also engaged the enemy main 

force. Pushing into the war zones north of Saigon, the 1st Infantry Division and the 173d Airborne Brigade fought elements of the 5th and 

9th PLAF Divisions in a series of battles. In the Central Highlands of II 

Corps, the 1st Cavalry Division, making extensive use of helicopters 

for mobility, during November waged the largest American campaign 

of the war thus far. Battling a North Vietnamese division, the cavalrymen suffered casualties of 305 dead and 524 wounded while claiming 

to have killed at least 1,500 enemy. Although enemy losses were undoubtedly substantial, in these engagements as in subsequent ones, 

American units posted “body counts” that were based on questionable estimates and at times deliberately infl ated. For lack of a better 

measurement of success, however, MACV and other U.S. agencies used 

these statistics as indicators of trends in the war and when the numbers 

looked favorable exploited them for public relations purposes.41

As Americans entered battle, offi cials in Saigon, Honolulu, and 

Washington grappled with the problem of designing a long-range plan 

of campaign and of determining what role U.S. forces should play in 

carrying it out. General Westmoreland issued his own fi rst comprehensive campaign plan on 1 September, entitled “Concept of Operations 

in the Republic of Vietnam.” He intended it partly as a guide for the 

activities of subordinate commands and partly as a framework for his 

requests for more forces in 1966.

Essentially an expansion upon the ideas he had presented to McNamara in July, his concept envisioned war in three phases, each associated with an American troop commitment. In Phase I, which would 

run through the rest of 1965, the allies were to hold their existing positions; continue pacifi cation in a few areas, principally around Saigon; 

and launch limited forays against Viet Cong combat units and bases to 

forestall enemy attacks. In Phase II, which Westmoreland at fi rst estiChap 7EI.indd 249 
250

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

mated would take up the fi rst half of 1966, the allies, strengthened b

a second wave of American troops, would mount sustained large-scal

offensives against the enemy’s main forces, occupy or neutralize th

most important Viet Cong base areas, and restore government con

trol to high-priority sections of the countryside, specifi cally the heav

ily populated coastal portions of I and II Corps, the HOP TAC province

around Saigon, and a belt of provinces across the middle of the Mekon

Delta. By the end of this phase, Westmoreland envisioned that the a

lies would have reduced considerably Viet Cong and North Vietnames

fi ghting power and reestablished Saigon’s authority over much of th

rural population. If the enemy still fought on after these setbacks, Phas

III would run for a year to a year and a half after the end of Phase I

In that period, U.S. forces, augmented by as many as sixty-three mor

maneuver battalions and by a much enlarged South Vietnamese Arm

would conduct offensive and pacifi cation operations “designed to de

stroy the remaining organized VC/DRV units in S[outh] V[iet] N[am

and to clear and secure all populated areas . . . with concurrent an

follow-on pacifi cation” of the entire country. They also might mov

into Laos to sever the Ho Chi Minh Trail and take unspecifi ed action

to stop Cambodian support of the Viet Cong.42

Westmoreland’s general concept of the development of the cam

paign within South Vietnam had the concurrence of Admiral Shar

and the Joint Chiefs and incorporated much of their thinking. Ther

was, however, lengthy discussion during the autumn among both mil

tary and civilian leaders of two intertwined issues: the extent to whic

U.S. troops should engage directly in pacifi cation; and the geograph

cal and military division of responsibility between American and Sout

Vietnamese forces.

Westmoreland initially expected American units to concentrate o

defending their own bases and attacking large organized enemy forma

tions while the South Vietnamese went after the guerrillas and politic

infrastructure. However, other presidential advisers, including Secreta

ies McNamara and Rusk, expressed interest in American participation i

territorial security and population control, especially during Septembe

and October when a lull in main force activity raised the possibility tha

the Viet Cong, in response to the American buildup, were reverting t

purely guerrilla warfare. Such a change in enemy tactics, Rusk and Mc

Namara suggested in mid-September, might even allow a slowdown i

U.S. troop deployments. If only to forestall such a decision, Westmore

land and Sharp were quick to affi rm that American troops could unde

take pacifi cation, something the marines already had begun on a limite

scale. They and the Joint Chiefs argued that if the enemy persisted in th

big-unit war, U.S. troops should be used primarily in that aspect of th

struggle. If the enemy did go back to small-unit activity, American force

should work with the South Vietnamese to clear and secure the country

side. At any event, they always would try to root out the Viet Cong i

Chap 7EI.indd 250 
251

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

the immediate vicinity of their own bases. The reemergence of enemy 

main forces during November, highlighted by the bloody engagements 

in the Ia Drang Valley, rendered this question largely moot.43

The issue of division of responsibility was closely related to that of 

pacifi cation. Westmoreland, from the time of his March commander’s 

estimate, envisioned that American troops would take on much of the 

burden of maintaining pressure on enemy main forces and base areas. 

Indeed, South Vietnam’s urgent need for men, mobility, and fi repower 

for that mission was at the heart of the rationale for committing American troops. The South Vietnamese themselves favored such an allocation of tasks. General Thieu and other offi cials of his government told 

McNamara during his July visit to Saigon that, for both military and 

political reasons, American forces should operate in thinly populated 

regions, notably the Central Highlands, while the South Vietnamese 

Army regrouped for another try at controlling the settled lowlands. 

Westmoreland and Sharp preferred a less rigid demarcation of duties, 

based on the CHIEN THANG pacifi cation support plan. Under it, both nations would share responsibility for each military mission. The Americans and the South Vietnamese general reserve would primarily but not 

exclusively conduct search and destroy and clearing operations on the 

fringes of the pacifi cation “oil spots.” The ARVN and the territorials, 

with American help as needed and available, would perform the securing mission among the hamlets and villages. This allocation of functions found widespread acceptance, although General Taylor, among 

others, expressed concern that it would result in American forces taking upon themselves too much of the burden of the war.44

The Phase I reinforcement increased in size during the summer and 

early autumn. As the buildup continued and American combat activity intensifi ed, General Westmoreland and his staff discovered that in 

preparing their initial troop list they had underestimated the number 

of support units needed to sustain the forty-four maneuver battalions 

at full effectiveness. During August and September, in response to a 

series of MACV requests for additional air transport, air defense, artillery, engineer, medical, and tactical air units, as well as miscellaneous 

elements needed to fi ll out other organizations, the administration enlarged Phase I from 175,000 American troops to more than 220,000. 

President Johnson, at Secretary McNamara’s insistence, readily approved these supplemental requests, known as the Phase I Add-ons. So 

enlarged, Phase I would take until April 1966 to complete, overlapping 

the troop movements of the prospective Phase II. It also would compete with Phase II for ready units, especially Army combat and service 

support organizations. Thus, enlargement of Phase I complicated the 

planning of Phase II, which went forward even as the troops of the fi rst 

reinforcement contingent were deploying.45

Chap 7EI.indd 251 
252

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Planning Phase II

At Secretary McNamara’s behest, development of the 1966 rein

forcement proposal followed a more orderly procedure than that o

the 44-battalion plan. Westmoreland told Admiral Sharp the numbe

of troops he required and the schedule on which he wished to receiv

them. Sharp then assembled a planning conference at his headqua

ters, attended by representatives of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the servic

staffs, and all concerned commands, both in the Pacifi c and in th

continental United States. At this conference, the providers and mov

ers of the forces reviewed the MACV proposal and revised it to bring 

into line with their capabilities and resources. As a fi nal step the Pacifi 

commander placed the conference’s decisions before McNamara an

the Joint Chiefs as a formal recommendation. Phase II went throug

two of these cycles. In the process, it changed in both time schedul

and number of troops involved.

General Westmoreland opened the fi rst round of planning on 1

September. He dispatched to Admiral Sharp a reiteration of his three

phase concept of operations, along with a list of major combat uni

for the 1966 reinforcement increment. These included two-thirds o

another Marine division for III MAF; two more Army infantry div

sions, one for the Saigon area and one for coastal II Corps; an armore

cavalry regiment, also for coastal II Corps; and an additional battalio

for the two-battalion 173d Airborne Brigade—in all, twenty-eight ma

neuver battalions. He also asked for another Army corps headquarte

as the nucleus of a second fi eld force; about 30,000 additional suppo

troops; and seven Air Force fi ghter-bomber and two transport squad

rons, bringing the total reinforcement to about 117,000 men. He wan

ed most of these troops to arrive in South Vietnam during the fi rst ha

of 1966, with the Army and Marine divisions and the armored cavalr

regiment deploying before the end of April.46

Westmoreland expected to encounter “tough sledding” in obtain

ing administration approval for a second major troop deploymen

hard on the heels of the fi rst. Accordingly, he and General DePuy

his principal spokesman on Phase II planning, developed a carefull

crafted presentation of the MACV proposal. In the form of a briefi ng

the presentation outlined the campaign phases of Westmoreland

concept of operations and then related the two reinforcement incre

ments to the military tasks they were designed to address. Using th

briefi ng and its extensive charts and graphs, General DePuy made th

point that the fi rst forty-four battalions would prevent the militar

situation from getting any worse, but that signifi cant progress in pac

fi cation and the destruction of enemy forces and base areas woul

come when the Military Assistance Command received the Phase 

reinforcements. As delivered by the forceful, articulate DePuy befor

various audiences in Honolulu, Washington, and Saigon, the MAC

Chap 7EI.indd 252 
253

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

briefi ng impressed, among others, Secretary McNamara, who characterized it as the “best professional performance” that he had seen in 

fi ve years in the Pentagon.47

Well-prepared briefi ngs, however, could not save Westmoreland’s 

preferred deployment schedule from a collision with the reality of limited service resources and the effects of President Johnson’s decision 

against mobilizing the reserves. That collision occurred almost immediately, at the Pacifi c Command Phase II planning conference, held at 

Admiral Sharp’s headquarters from 27 September through 1 October. 

After hearing General DePuy present MACV’s program, the delegation 

from the Army staff, headed by Maj. Gen. Frank J. Sackton, Assistant 

Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans, declared that the plan 

was unworkable. The Army representatives demonstrated conclusively 

that in the absence of a reserve call-up their service would be unable to 

provide the additional troops Westmoreland wanted for Phase I and at 

the same time meet his proposed Phase II deadlines.48

With little choice in the matter, Westmoreland, who headed the 

MACV delegation, reluctantly agreed to a revised timetable hastily 

worked out by the staffs from Washington and Saigon. Under it, most 

Army deployments were to be held back until the second half of 1966. 

Of the two infantry divisions, one, the 25th, would enter South Vietnam in September, as would the armored cavalry regiment. The other 

division, the 4th, was to be delayed until December. Aviation and logistic unit deployments were to stretch well into 1967. In partial compensation for these delays, Westmoreland was to receive a brigade of the 

25th Division at Saigon late in January and one from the 4th Division 

in II Corps in June. Marine, Navy, and Air Force deployments remained 

about as on Westmoreland’s original schedule.

Westmoreland insisted that “for the record” his preferred earlier 

deployment dates be included in the fi nal conference report, which 

would constitute Admiral Sharp’s recommendation to the Joint Chiefs. 

Nevertheless, he acquiesced in the stretch-out, even though it nullifi ed 

his projection that Phase II of the campaign might end by mid-1966. 

He and Admiral Sharp had been backing away from that projection 

even before the conference. At Honolulu they agreed upon phraseology, previously formulated by the admiral, to the effect that, while second-phase deployment plans should include a fi xed time schedule, no 

dates should be set for the start and fi nish of the military operations. 

Westmoreland reported to Ambassador Lodge that the conference had 

been “highly successful.” Privately, he expressed concern about the 

growing tension between himself and the Army staff over his expanding force requirements, which he acknowledged were “cutting into the 

meat and vitals of the Army.”49

To General Westmoreland’s surprise, Phase II met with an immediately favorable reception in Washington. On 15 and 18 October, General DePuy presented the conference recommendations to the Joint 

Chap 7EI.indd 253 
254

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Chiefs and Secretary McNamara in the form of a revised version o

the MACV briefi ng. On the 18th, McNamara directed the services t

prepare plans to complete both deployment phases, with and withou

a reserve call-up. On 3 November he recommended to the presiden

full implementation of the Phase II plan, noting that the services coul

furnish the proposed forces by the end of 1966 without using the re

serves. In justifi cation of the new reinforcement, the defense secretar

repeated DePuy’s quantitative analysis of how the troop commitmen

would hasten military and pacifi cation progress. He warned, howeve

that if the enemy also continued his buildup, the United States coul

face by early 1967 “stagnation at a higher level and . . . a need to decid

whether to deploy Phase III forces, probably in Laos as well as in Sout

Vietnam.” In hopes of avoiding this grim prospect through diplomacy

and at a minimum of establishing the administration’s good faith i

the search for peace, McNamara recommended that Johnson try an

other bombing pause before he committed the Phase II forces. This fo

mula received general endorsement from the president and his senio

advisers. They appeared resigned to the inevitability of another larg

troop deployment and devoted most of their attention to argumen

about the tactics and timing of the bombing pause. Although he pos

poned a decision on Phase II, Johnson in mid-November authorize

McNamara to prepare his budget requests for the next fi scal year on th

assumption that the deployments would take place.50

Meanwhile, the second cycle of Phase II planning got under way

largely in response to enemy actions. During October and Novembe

the Military Assistance Command’s intelligence section and other U.

intelligence agencies reported a continuing, rapid increase in all catago

ries of the opposing forces. The Viet Cong continued to form new loca

and main-force battalions even as they suffered and replaced heav

battle losses. At the same time, North Vietnamese regulars moved sout

in ever-increasing numbers. This buildup, and the persistent enem

willingness to make main force attacks during the autumn when th

situation favored them, had ominous implications for Phase II. Accord

ing to MACV staff projections based on these strength increases, eve

with the Phase II reinforcements and with small augmentations of th

South Vietnamese forces, the allies would fall short of the 3-to-1 ratio i

maneuver battalions. The only solution, it seemed to the MACV com

mander, was to ask for still more American or other allied troops.51

Westmoreland did so on 23 November, after receiving a combine

study by his intelligence and operations directorates of the enem

buildup and the force needed to counter it and after securing assen

from Ambassador Lodge and the Mission Council. He asked for nearl

a doubling of the Phase II reinforcement of maneuver battalions from 

28 to 53, with a corresponding increase in Army aviation and suppo

units and Air Force tactical squadrons. To reduce the burden on Amer

can resources, Westmoreland suggested that part of this reinforcemen

Chap 7EI.indd 254 
255

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

could be South Korean: a regimental combat team to round out the 

Capital Division and another full infantry division to protect coastal 

areas in II Corps and release the U.S. 4th Infantry Division for mobile 

operations in the highlands. He also asked for more American combat 

units: another infantry division to reinforce III Corps and operate in 

the northern part of the Mekong Delta, a separate infantry brigade for 

II Corps, an additional airmobile infantry battalion to augment the 1st 

Cavalry Division, and an air cavalry squadron each for the 1st Cavalry 

and 4th Infantry Divisions. Westmoreland requested deployment of 

the Koreans during the second quarter of 1966 and of the American 

units during the third and fourth quarters. He emphasized that before 

these deployments could take place he must have prior shipment of a 

much expanded list of logistical support forces. Otherwise, he argued, 

by further straining his already barely adequate support base, the new 

arrivals would reduce rather than increase his command’s capacity for 

sustained combat.52

The expanded Phase II proposal, like the original, received rapid, 

unquestioning administration acceptance. On 30 November and again 

on 6 December, McNamara endorsed the enlarged reinforcement, restating his October rationale and again urging a preparatory bombing 

pause. The proposal met with mild dissent from General Taylor and 

from the Air Force Chief of Staff, General McConnell. Both advocated a 

much intensifi ed air campaign against North Vietnam, and both questioned the wisdom of trying to match the projected enemy buildup, 

whose dimensions Taylor thought might be overestimated, man for 

man with American troops. Most senior administration offi cials, however, accepted the enlargement of Phase II with little argument. Late 

in December, in connection with a Christmas holiday truce, President 

Johnson took the fi rst step in McNamara’s recommended scenario. He 

halted the bombing of North Vietnam and then kept the pause in effect through the end of January as background to a global fl urry of 

American diplomatic activity. Fully expecting the diplomatic effort to 

fail, the president intended the pause primarily to prepare American 

opinion for the larger war toward which his course was set.53

Accordingly, military preparations for Phase II continued parallel 

to the diplomatic effort. On 1 December, McNamara instructed his 

principal civilian and uniformed subordinates to make detailed plans 

for carrying out the doubled Phase II, working toward a late-January 

Honolulu conference that would establish fi nal troop lists and movement schedules. Also during December, Sharp and Westmoreland prepared their own comprehensive deployment plan, by quarters, for all 

the remaining Phase I forces and for Phase II. Their program, which 

incorporated the units already deployed during 1965, called for 102 

allied maneuver battalions, 79 of them American, and over 440,000 

men to be in South Vietnam by the end of 1966. Refl ecting Sharp’s 

theater-wide concerns, it also included substantial American reinforceChap 7EI.indd 255 
256

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

ments for Thailand and another Army division for Hawaii to replac

the 25th as Pacifi c Command reserve. Westmoreland meanwhile mad

additional plans of his own. Aware that the military services were su

fering from manpower and unit shortages, he instructed his staff t

draw up a list of the minimum additional forces he would need to sta

even and to prepare “alternative and lesser force packages” as fallbac

positions for the conference.54

Movement of some Phase II units occurred before the defi nitiv

planning conference and before the end of the bombing pause. On 

December, citing the steady enlargement of North Vietnamese and Vie

Cong main forces in II and III Corps and the threat they posed to Ple

ku and Saigon, Westmoreland asked for and received early deploymen

of two brigades of the 25th Infantry Division. The 3d Brigade went b

air to Pleiku late in December, leapfrogging the congested South Vie

namese ports. It strengthened the defenses of Pleiku and released mor

of the 1st Cavalry for offensive operations. A month later the division

2d Brigade deployed by ship to Saigon and established itself at Cu Ch

located about fi fteen miles northwest of the capital, to reinforce th

none-too-steady ARVN 25th Division in that vital area.55

Decisions at Honolulu

The fi nal Phase II planning conference opened in Honolulu on 1

January, as the bombing pause was nearing its diplomatically unpro

ductive end. Running through 9 February, it began with two weeks o

meetings at which over 450 staff offi cers and civilians from the involve

commands thrashed out the details of the air and ground deploymen

and campaign plans for the coming year. It ended as a political summ

meeting between President Johnson and the South Vietnamese leader

Thieu and Ky. U.S. troop commitments had an important place in bot

sets of deliberations.

The staff discussions revolved around three alternative plans, calle

cases, which the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at McNamara’s direction, ha

drawn up for carrying out Sharp and Westmoreland’s 102-battalio

program. Case I called for a reserve mobilization and extension of en

listments. Cases II and III did not, and Case III also included withdraw

al of fewer men from forces outside the United States. The fi rst tw

cases would provide all 102 maneuver battalions, but in Case II the de

ployment of 9 would be postponed until early 1967. Case III require

outright deletion of 18 American battalions, including a complete div

sion, 2 brigades, and some smaller combat elements. As a result of pro

spective shortages of Army aviation and logistic units and personne

none of the cases would provide full helicopter, artillery, and servic

support to the fi ghting units, although Case I came close to doing so

Not surprisingly, General DePuy, who again headed the MACV de

egation, expressed preference for Case I as most fully contributing t

Chap 7EI.indd 256 
257

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

the achievement of the Military Assistance Command’s campaign objectives for 1966. He pronounced Case II acceptable but less desirable 

because of its reduction in support forces and its stretch-out of combat 

unit deployments. While “adequate for the safety of the command,” 

he said, Case III would leave MACV without suffi cient power to take 

the offensive. Admiral Sharp, in his fi nal conference report to the Joint 

Chiefs, substantially adopted the Military Assistance Command’s position, in effect recommending implementation of Case I while expressing a willingness to settle for Case II.56

President Johnson and the South Vietnamese leaders, in their formal sessions and conference communique, concentrated on the promotion of pacifi cation and political and social reform. In private, they 

made important decisions on strategy and troop commitments. The 

allies adopted a set of quantitative campaign objectives for 1966, based 

primarily on Westmoreland’s concept of operations, which the general 

took as his “marching orders.” The objectives included defending key 

military and civilian centers and food-producing areas, opening roads 

and railroads, clearing and securing the four national priority pacifi cation zones, and bringing 60 percent of South Vietnam’s people within 

secure territory by the end of 1966. Along with these security-related 

Secretary Rusk and President Johnson at the Honolulu conference, 1966 (NARA)

Chap 7EI.indd 257 
258

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

goals, the leaders promised to intensify their offensive against Viet Con

and North Vietnamese units, bases, and lines of communication withi

South Vietnam and infi ltration routes in Laos and North Vietnam, wit

the objective of destroying 40–50 percent of the enemy’s base areas durin

the coming year and of infl icting casualties on their forces “at a rate as hig

as their capability to put men into the fi eld.”57

Westmoreland was present for these fi nal meetings, which wer

the occasion of his fi rst face-to-face conference with President Johnso

since taking command of MACV. The general held lengthy talks wit

Johnson and with McNamara, who had accompanied the presiden

Both men assured the MACV commander that he would receive all o

his Phase II forces. McNamara told Westmoreland to expect deploy

ments under the planning conference’s Case I schedule but without 

reserve call-up. This meant that the general would have to prepare t

compensate for the resulting shortages in logistic support by arrangin

interservice exchanges of resources, employing civilian contractor

and, if possible, reducing requirements.58

Even as the Phase II reinforcements began moving into Vietnam 

during the fi rst months of 1966, McNamara and the Joint Chiefs en

gaged in a lengthy tug-of-war over implementation of the Honolul

decisions. At issue was the persistent question of a reserve call-up. O

9 February the secretary of defense instructed all Defense Departmen

agencies as planned to prepare to meet the troop requirements an

movement dates of Case I, but without mobilization and extension o

enlistments. The Joint Chiefs objected that this could be done only a

the cost of unacceptably large withdrawals from U.S. forces in Europ

and elsewhere. They argued for a stretchout of deployments throug

the fi rst half of 1967 to allow time for new units to be formed from 

men raised by enlarged draft calls. McNamara on 11 April reluctantl

approved a lengthened Case I schedule prepared by the Joint Chie

that in fact much resembled the original Case II, although he delaye

fewer units than the chiefs had proposed. Minor adjustments of th

schedule continued until 30 June, when McNamara issued a fi nal ve

sion, which the Defense Department dubbed Program Three.59

From General Westmoreland’s standpoint, this debate was not o

immediate concern, as the various changes had no effect on troo

movements during the fi rst part of 1966. The forces he most urgentl

needed, the 1st Marine Division and the remainder of the 25th Infantr

Division, entered Vietnam during the fi rst quarter. Under the plan ad

opted at Honolulu and later confi rmed in Program Three, other majo

combat formations were to arrive somewhat earlier than previousl

contemplated. The 4th Infantry Division, for example, was schedule

for July rather than December and in fact completed its deployment i

mid-October.60

Westmoreland knew by the end of February that he could coun

on greatly expanded American forces with which to pursue victory i

Chap 7EI.indd 258 
259

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

South Vietnam. Yet the Phase II he fi nally received was very different 

from the one he had proposed half a year before. Instead of a rapid 

infusion of a comparatively modest additional force during the fi rst 

half of 1966 to accelerate the momentum of allied operations, Phase 

II had turned into a much larger but also much slower reinforcement 

that would not have its full effect on the balance of forces in South 

Vietnam until late in the year. By that time, the enemy’s buildup also 

would have had its effect.

Chap 7EI.indd 259 
260

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Notes

1 Msg, Taylor 4035 to SecState, 3 Jun 65; see also Msg, Under SecState Ball 2769 

Ambs Taylor and Johnson, 1 Jun 65. Both in NSC History, Major Forces, box 41, LBJL

2 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 5–6, 235–36. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, se

4.C.5, pp. 49–55. Memo, Westmoreland for Taylor, 30 May 65 sub: Comparison of th

Rural Reconstruction Situation, 25 Jan and 25 Apr 65, tab 15, Westmoreland Hist Fi

16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Political Section, U.S. Embas

Saigon, 18 Jan 66, sub: Comparison of 1964 and 1965 Statistics, tab E–3, Westmorelan

Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. Msg, Taylor to SecState, 6 Jul 65, Historian

fi les, CMH. 3 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 6, 220–23, 227–28. U.S.–Vietnam Relation

sec. 4.C.5, pp. 47, 49–50. For growing ARVN defensiveness, see Msg, Taylor 4220 

SecState for the President, 17 Jun 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 42, LBJL. 4 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 50–51, summarizes intelligence estimate

For Westmoreland’s assessment, see Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 19118 to CINCPAC, 

Jun 65; see also Msg, Taylor 4074 to SecState, 5 Jun 65. Both in NSC History, Majo

Forces, box 41, LBJL. 5 Quote is from Msg, Taylor to SecState, 6 Jul 65, copy in Historians fi les, CMH

RVNAF buildup plans are summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p. 89; se

also pp. 49–50 and in this volume ch. 6, pp. 192–93. Msg, Taylor 4074 to SecState, 

Jun 65; Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 19118 to CINCPAC, 7 Jun 65. Both in NSC Histor

Major Forces, box 41, LBJL. Msg, Taylor 4220 to SecState, 17 Jun 65, NSC Histor

Major Forces, box 42, LBJL. Memo, Maj Gen Ben Sternberg for COMUSMACV, 7 Jul 6

sub: RVNAF Strength Summary, tab 11, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1 Jul–28 Aug 65

CMH. 6 Taylor analyzes the causes of the crisis in Msg 4074 to SecState, 5 Jun 65, NS

History, Major Forces, box 41, LBJL. MFR, Westmoreland, 31 May 65, sub: Call on Ge

Thieu, tab 17, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), refl ects initially alo

attitude of the generals. For narrative of events, see MACV Command History, 196

pp. 18–19; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, pp. 41–42; and Taylor, Swords and Ploug

shares, pp. 343–45.

7 Biographical data is from CMH fi les. Taylor quote is from Msg, EmbTel 4220 

SecState, 17 Jun 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 42, LBJL; see also his Swords an

Ploughshares, pp. 345–46. Westmoreland quote is from A Soldier Reports, p. 138; see als

pp. 90–91. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 19–20. 8 John Schlight, The War in South Vietnam: The Years of the Offensive, 1965–196

The United States Air Force in Southeast Asia (Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of Air Forc

History, 1988), pp. 31–33, 39–42; Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 4 Apr 65; Westmor

land MAC 2027 to Wheeler, 12 Apr 65; Stilwell HWA 0887 to Westmoreland, 13 Ap

65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 9 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3052 to Sharp, 11 Jun 65, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. For air operations, see Schlight, Years of the Offensiv

pp. 41–49, 81–82, 99–111 and app. 5. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 33–3

46–48. Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, pp. 152–54. 10 On 15 April, Westmoreland used his tactical aircraft in a saturation strike, Oper

tion BLACK VIRGIN, against part of War Zone C. The operation took twelve hours to car

out, tied up most of MACV’s combat aircraft, and achieved no signifi cant results. Se

Schlight, “USAF South Vietnam,” pp. 44–47; and Briefi ng Notes, in Westmoreland Hi

Notes, 29 Aug–4 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. 11 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 49–51. Msgs, Burchinal JCS 0789–65 to Wes

Chap 7EI.indd 260 
261

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

moreland, Sharp, and Gen Ryan, 4 Mar 65; Ryan CINC 03072 to Burchinal, 4 Mar 65; 

Sharp to Burchinal, 5 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 1187 to Burchinal, 6 Mar 65. All 

in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. COMUSMACV, “Chronology of 

Recommendations,” p. 2. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 98. 12 Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 24, pp. 2–6; COMUSMACV, “Chronology of Recommendations,” pp. 4–7. Schlight, Years of the Offensive, 

pp. 51–55, 82–83. Quote is from Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, 19 Jun 65; see also Msg, 

Westmoreland MAC 3172 to Sharp, 20 Jun 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Westmoreland’s views on the value of B–52s are summarized in 

Briefi ng Notes, in Westmoreland Historical Notes, 29 Aug–4 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist 

File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. 13 Msg, Taylor 4074 to SecState, 5 Jun 65; see also Taylor 4035 to SecState, 3 Jun 65. 

Both in NSC History, Major Forces, box 41, LBJL. 14 For administration reaction to Taylor’s reports, see Berman, Planning a Tragedy, 

p. 67. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 2080 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 4 Jun 65; Westmoreland 

MAC 2932 to Wheeler, 5 Jun 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, 

CMH. 15 The 1st Infantry and 82d Airborne Divisions long had been designated for Vietnam in Army contingency plans. The 101st Airborne replaced the 82d when the latter 

was committed in the Dominican Republic during the spring and summer. For the 

Army planning, see MS, Walter G. Hermes, “The Department of the Army: The Buildup,” ch. 3, pp. 11–14, 56; ch. 4, pp. 7–8; ch. 5, pp. 16–19. CMH fi les. 16 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 19118 to CINCPAC and JCS, 7 Jun 65, NSC History, 

Major Forces, box 41, LBJL; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 140–41; U.S.–Vietnam 

Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p. 91. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3240 to Wheeler and Sharp, 24 

Jun 65; Westmoreland MAC 3283 to Wheeler, 27 Jun 65; Wheeler JCS 2400–65 to Sharp 

and Westmoreland, 29 Jun 65; and Westmoreland MAC 3320 to Wheeler and Sharp, 30 

Jun 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. See also Memo, DePuy 

for Westmoreland, 3 Jul 65, sub: Deployment of Units, tab 4, Westmoreland Hist File 

17 (1 Jul–28 Aug 65), CMH. 17 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 19118 to CINCPAC and JCS, 7 Jun 65; text of telegram 

from Gen Westmoreland COMUSMACV 20055, 14 Jun 65; NSC History, Major Forces, 

boxes 41 and 42, LBJL. Of the 34 U.S. and 1 Australian battalions called for, Westmoreland expected to use 19 for defensive tasks, leaving 16, plus the 11 of the RVNAF general reserve, for offensive maneuver. All the Koreans would have essentially defensive 

missions. See Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3275 to Wheeler, 26 Jun 65, Westmoreland 

Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 18 Msgs, CINCPAC to JCS, 7 and 11 Jun 65; Memo, Wheeler JCSM–457–65 for 

SecDef, 11 Jun 65, sub: US/Allied Troop Deployments to South Vietnam. All in NSC 

History, Major Forces, boxes 41 and 42, LBJL. General McConnell’s arguments are summarized in Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 69–70. 19 Quote is from Msg, Taylor 108 to SecState, 11 Jul 65, NSC History, Major Forces, 

box 43, LBJL. In same collection, see Msgs, Taylor 4220 to SecState, 17 Jun 65; Taylor 

4265 to SecState, 18 Jun 65; and Taylor 4434 to SecState, 30 Jun 65. All in NSC History, Major Forces, boxes 42 and 43, LBJL. For South Vietnamese views and attitudes, 

see Msgs, Taylor 4422 to SecState, 29 Jun 65; and Taylor 009 to SecState, 1 Jul 65; Historians fi les, CMH. See also MFR, Westmoreland, 29 Jun 65, sub: Meeting with Gen 

Co, Minister of Defense, GVN, tab 42, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), 

CMH. Taylor recounts his change of mind in Swords and Ploughshares, p. 347. 20 This discussion of the administration’s decision-making process is based on Berman, Planning a Tragedy, pp. 67–129, 135–38, 146–48, 167; and Gelb and Betts, Irony of 

Chap 7EI.indd 261 
262

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Vietnam, pp. 120–23. For Ambassador Johnson’s views, see Memo, John T. McNaugh

ton, sub: McNaughton–Alexis Johnson Conversation, 25 Jun 65, in box 1, Warnk

Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL; for other comments on the debate, see U.S.–Vietna

Relations, sec. 4.C.6, p. 1. 21 Msg, JCS 003800 to CINCPAC, 11 Jun 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 4

LBJL. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 2323–65, JCS 2331–65, JCS 2360–65 to Sharp and Westmor

land, 22 Jun 65; 23 Jun 65; 24 Jun 65; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3237 to Sharp, 24 Ju

65; MAC 3275 to Wheeler, 26 Jun 65; and MAC 3320 to Wheeler and Sharp, 30 Jun 6

Sharp to Wheeler, 23 Jun 65, 25 Jun 65, and 27 Jun 65. All in Westmoreland Msg File

1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 22 Quotes are from Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3240 to Wheeler and Sharp, 24 Ju

65; and Westmoreland MAC 3275 to Wheeler, 26 Jun 65. Both in Westmoreland M

Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 23 For development of the “credibility gap” on this issue, see Hammond, Mi

tary and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 161–68, and U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p

81–82. White House statement is quoted in Msg, OSD to CINCPAC, 1 Jun 65, tab 2

Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. Taylor, Swords and Ploughshare

pp. 344–45. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 134–36. 24 Msg, Taylor to SecState, 3 Jun 65; Msg, State/Defense to AmEmb Saigon, 5 Ju

65. NSC History, Major Forces, box 41, LBJL. 25 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 19912 to CINCPAC, 12 Jun 65, NSC History, Maj

Forces, box 42, LBJL; Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 13 Jun 65; Westmoreland MA

3074 to Sharp, 13 Jun 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. See als

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 138–39. On the 173d Airborne Bde, see Msg

COMUSMACV MAC 3072 to CINCPAC info JCS, 13 Jun 65; Sharp to Westmorelan

13 Jun 65; Westmoreland MAC 3077, to Sharp, 13 Jun 65. All in Westmoreland M

Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. Memo, Maj Lloyd J. Matthews for Westmoreland, 13 Ju

65, sub: Telephone Call from Adm Sharp at 1555, tab 26, Westmoreland Hist File 1

(10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. 26 Msg, Taylor EmbTel 4370 to State, 25 Jun 65; Msg, State 3057 to Saigon, 26 Ju

65; copies in Historians fi les, CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, p. 104. 27 Lt Gen John J. Tolson, Airmobility, 1961–1971, Vietnam Studies (Washingto

D.C.: Department of the Army, 1973), pp. 61–62. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, 

110. Msg, State and Defense to AmEmb Saigon, 10 Jul 65, NSC History, Major Force

box 43, LBJL. Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 4, pp. 31–36. Johnson’s 8 July decision is d

scribed in H. R. McMaster, Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, th

Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam (New York: Harper Collins, 1997

pp. 304–05. 28 Quotes are from Msgs, Wheeler JCS 2400–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 29 Ju

65; Sharp to Westmoreland and Lt Gen Paul S. Emrick, 30 Jun 65; and Westmorelan

MAC 3320 to Wheeler and Sharp, 30 Jun 65; see also Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 4 Jul 6

All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 29 Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 201–07; Quote is from p. 205. For an

other description of calculation methods, see USMACV, Concept of Operations in th

Republic of Vietnam, 1 Sep 65, ann. B, app. 12. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, p

10, 40–41, suggests the requirements were based more on what was available in th

United States than on any other consideration. 30 The year Taylor had promised the president he would serve ended in July. F

Lodge, the visit was an opportunity to participate in decisions he would be implemen

ing, and it would help him prepare for his Senate confi rmation hearing. See Taylo

Swords and Ploughshares, p. 348; and Msg, McGeorge Bundy CAP 65391 to the Pres

Chap 7EI.indd 262 
263

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

dent, 4 Jul 65, 1:10 p.m., copy in Historians fi les, CMH. 31 Westmoreland quote is from A Soldier Reports, p. 142; see also pp. 141–43. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, ch. 22, p. 6. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.5, 

pp. 108–10, and sec. 4.C.6, p. 8. Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, pp. 348–51. Msg, 

SecDef 5319 to AmEmb Saigon, 7 Jul 65, NSC History, Major Forces, box 43, LBJL; in 

same collection, see Chronology of Presidential Decisions, and Msg AmEmb Saigon to 

State, 27 Jul 65. Msg, Taylor Saigon 136 to SecState,13 Jul 65, copy in Historians fi les, 

CMH. Rosson quotes are from Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 328–30; see also his “Involvement in Vietnam,” p. 208. 32 First McNamara quote is from his Memo for the President, 20 Jul 65, sub: Recommendations of Additional Deployments to Vietnam. Other quotes are from MFR, 

22 Jul 65, sub: Meetings on Vietnam July 21, 1965. Both in NSC History, Major Forces, 

box 43, LBJL. 33 Johnson’s decision is recorded in Summary Notes of 553d NSC Meeting, July 27, 

1965, 5:40 pm–6:20 pm, sub: Deployment of Additional U.S. Troops to Vietnam, NSC 

History, Major Forces, box 43, LBJL. Quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 2800–65 to Sharp 

and Westmoreland, 28 Jul 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. 34 The Joint Chiefs’ acquiescence is detailed in McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, pp. 

312–20, and U.S. Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, The U.S. Government and the 

Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part IV: July 1965–January 1968 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1994), pp. 21–22; the quote 

from General Johnson is on p. 22. 35 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 42–44, 365. CINCPAC Command History, 

1965, 2:292–94. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 107–11. For air buildup, 

see Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 85–88, 93–94, 113. 1st Cavalry location: Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 144–45, 156; Interv, Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Program 

with Gen William E. DePuy, Mar–Apr 79, p. V–23, MHI. 36 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 106–08. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 4128 

to Wheeler, 14 Aug 65; Westmoreland MAC 5419 to Gen Johnson, 30 Oct 65. Both in 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Westmoreland 

Hist Notes, 23 Nov 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. Sharp and 

Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 99, 254. 37 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3277 to Lt Gen James L. Richardson, Jr, 26 Jun 65; 

Westmoreland MAC 3307 to Gen Johnson, 29 Jun 65; Wheeler JCS 2413 to Westmoreland, 29 Jun 65; Westmoreland MAC 3322 to Wheeler, 30 Jun 65; Sharp to Westmoreland, 6 Jul 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65 and 1 Jul–30 Sep 

65, CMH. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 22, pp. 21–22. 

Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 52–53. 38 Maj Gen Jonathan O. Seaman, the 1st Division commander, was the senior 

Army major general in MACV. Msgs, Richardson WDC 05151 to Westmoreland, 16 Jun 

65; Westmoreland MAC 4052 to Gen Johnson, 9 Aug 65; Westmoreland MAC 4217 to 

Gen Johnson, 20 Jun 65; Westmoreland MAC 4749 to Sharp, 23 Sep 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65 and 1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. Westmoreland Hist 

Notes, 20 Sep 65, 18 Oct 65, and 17 Nov 65, in Westmoreland Hist Files 1 (29 Aug–24 

Oct 65) and 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 53–55, 

summarizes headquarters activations. 39 Eckhardt, Command and Control, p. 60. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3876 to Goodpaster, 30 Jul 65; Westmoreland MAC 4097 to Sharp, 12 Aug 65; Westmoreland MAC 

4114 to Wheeler, 13 Aug 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. MFR, 

Westmoreland, sub: Meeting with Lt Gen Sir John Wilton, 25 Jun 65, tab 37, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. Military Working Arrangement between 

Chap 7EI.indd 263 
264

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

COMROKFORV and COMUSMACV, 6 Sep 65, copy in Historians fi les, CMH. Westm

reland Hist Notes, 5 Sep 65 and 6 Dec 65, Westmoreland Hist Files 1 (29 Aug–24 O

65) and 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. 40 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 107–11. Shulimson and Johnso

Marines in Vietnam 1965, pp. 69–83. 41 John M. Carland, Stemming the Tide: Combat Operations, May 1965 to Octob

1966, United States Army in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Milita

History, 2000), chs. 4–6; the body count problem is discussed on p. 150. 42 USMACV, Concept of Operations, 1 Sep 65, pp. 1–3, ann. B; Quote is from an

B, app. 5. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 137–48, 152–53. Westmoreland, A So

dier Reports, pp. 145–46. 43 CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:298–303; Msg, Rusk DepTel 753 to AmEm

Saigon, 14 Sep 65; Msg, Lodge EmbTel 953 to SecState, 18 Sep 65; copies in Historian

fi les, CMH. MFR, Gen Creighton W. Abrams, 27 Sep 65 sub: JCS Executive Session wit

Secy of Defense and Dep Secy of Defense, 20 Sep 65, 1400 hrs, Close Hold File 3, H. 

Johnson Papers, MHI; Msgs, Wheeler JCS 3428–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 16 Se

65; Westmoreland MAC 4642 and 4675 to Wheeler and Sharp, 17 and 18 Sep 65; Shar

to Wheeler, 22 Sep 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. 44 Msg, Taylor Saigon 182 to State, 18 Jul 65, Historians Files, CMH. Historic

Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, ch. 23, pp. 2–11. Taylor, Swords and Ploughshares, p

363–65. Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 2 Nov 65; Wheeler JCS 4500–65 to Sharp an

Westmoreland, 20 Nov 65; Sharp to Wheeler, 23 Nov 65; Westmoreland MAC 5875 

Wheeler and Sharp, 21 Nov 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. 45 CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:292–95. MACV Command History, 196

pp. 42–43, 117; Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 22, pp. 8–

Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 7, p. 26; Memo, McNamara for the President, 22 Sep 65, NS

History, Major Forces, box 40, LBJL. MFR, 29 Sep 65, sub: Luncheon Meeting wit

the President, Ball, McNamara, McGeorge Bundy, Raborn, Moyers, and Califano, NS

Country File, Vietnam, LBJL. 46 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 43–44; see also p. 36. CINCPAC, Comman

History, 1965, 2:295–97; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 15 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist Fi

1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65); MFR, Maj Gen F. R. Sackton, 4 Oct 65, sub: CINCPAC Phase 

Planning Conference, 27 September–1 October 1965, Blue Tab D, Hermes Backup File

Both in CMH. 47 First quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 4701 to Sharp, 20 Sep 65; second 

from Msg, Gen Johnson WDC 10453 to Westmoreland, 1 Dec 65. Both in Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Note

15 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. MACV J3 Briefi n

18 Oct 65, in National Military Command Center, Pentagon, copy in Historians fi le

CMH. Summary of the DePuy Briefi ng for Secretary of Defense, 18 Oct 65; and MF

Acting Secy of the Army Willis M. Hawkins, 18 Oct 65, sub: Presentation by Gener

DePuy to the JCS and Service Secretaries, 18 Oct 65. Both in fi le TS–0175–80, Westm

reland Papers, CMH. 48 Without a reserve call-up, the Army would have to carry out its planned expan

sion and furnish units for Vietnam by forming new organizations with draftees, usin

cadres and trainers drawn from the active forces. It could do this, at the cost of reduce

unit readiness everywhere but in Southeast Asia, but not as rapidly as with a reserv

mobilization. See Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 4, pp. 41–46; ch. 6, p. 54; and ch. 7, pp. 26

29. Also Ltr, Paul D. Phillips to DePuy, 2 Sep 65, DePuy Papers, MHI. The other servic

had similar diffi culties; see for example Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 85–86. 49 MFR, Sackton, 4 Oct 65, sub: CINCPAC Phase II Planning Conference, 27 Se

Chap 7EI.indd 264 
265

The Fateful Decisions, June 1965–February 1966

tember–1 October 1965, Hermes Backup Files, CMH; Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 7, pp. 

29–33; CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:297–98, 306–07; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 44, 51, 117. First Westmoreland quote is from Msg, HWA 2667 to Amb 

Lodge, 2 Oct 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Second is from 

Westmoreland Hist Notes, 25 Sep–3 Oct 65, in Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 

Oct 65), CMH. CINCPAC Command History, 1965, 2:295–97. Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 

22 Sep 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65. 50 Wheeler JCS 3912–65, JCS 3931–65, and JCS 4431–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 18 and 19 Oct 65 and 17 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, 

CMH; MFR, Acting Secy of the Army Willis M. Hawkins, 18 Oct 65, sub: Presentation 

by Gen DePuy to the JCS and Service Secretaries, 18 October 1965; fi le TS–0175–80, 

Westmoreland Papers, CMH. McNamara quote is from Memo for the President, 3 Nov 

65, sub: Courses of Action in Vietnam, 1st Rough Draft, copy in Historians fi les, CMH. 

Memo, William P. Bundy, 23 Oct 65, sub: Policy Choices and Decision-Making Procedures on Vietnam, Memos, McGeorge Bundy for Jacobsen for the President, 8 Nov 

65; and McGeorge Bundy for the President, 27 Nov 65, sub: Once More on the Pause. 

Copies in Historians fi les, CMH. 51 Enemy buildup: Briefi ng by Brig Gen Joseph A. McChristian, J–2 MACV, HQ 

MACV, 28 Nov 65, box 43; HQ MACV, Offi ce of the AC/S J–2, Order of Battle Study no. 

66–1: Enemy Force Buildup, July 1964–December 1965, 18 Feb 66; box 31, Joseph A. 

McChristian Papers, MHI. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5358 to Sharp, 27 Oct 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 

ch. 23, pp. 14–16. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 7–9, 14–15, 58. 52 Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 and 22 Nov 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–

20 Dec 65), CMH; U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 21–23; Msg, Westmoreland 

MAC 6053 to Gens Johnson and Waters, 30 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 

Dec 65, CMH; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 44–45, 117–18. 53 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 24–25. Memos, McNamara for President, 

30 Nov 65; and sub: Military and Political Actions Recommended for South Vietnam, 6 

Dec 65; Memos, McGeorge Bundy for President, 3 and 9 Dec 65; Memo, Taylor for McNamara, 6 Dec 65, sub: Comments on Reference Documents; Msg, Bundy CAP 65828 

to President, 7 Dec 65. All in Historians fi les, CMH. McConnell’s views are in Schlight, 

Years of the Offensive, pp. 114–15. For the bombing pause, see Thies, When Governments 

Collide, pp. 115–22; and Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 218–26. 54 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 4658–65 to Sharp, 1 Dec 65; Gen Johnson WDC 10453 to 

Westmoreland, 1 Dec 65; DePuy MAC 6456 to Westmoreland, 15 Dec 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 25–26, 

28; Historical Division, JCS, JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 32, pp. 1–2; CINCPAC 

Command History, 1965, 2:308. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 9 Dec 65 and 11 and 16 Jan 

66, Westmoreland Hist Files 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65) and 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. 55 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 45; and ibid., 1966, pp. 69–70. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0006 to Sharp, 1 Jan 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66; 

CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 9 and 11 Dec 65; MFR, Maj C. M. Putnam, 30 Dec 65, 

sub: COMUSMACV Conference with FFORCEV Commanders and II Corps Advisers. 

Both in Westmoreland Hist Files 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65) and 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), 

CMH. 56 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 26–27, 35–37; Historical Division, JCS, 

JCS and Vietnam, 1960–1968, ch. 32, p. 2. MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 66–67; 

Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 8, pp. 29–32. Work and positions of the MACV delegation can 

be followed in detail in a series of Msgs from DePuy to Westmoreland, 19 to 30, Jan 66, 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH.

Chap 7EI.indd 265 
266

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

57 Goals are summarized in “1966 Program to Increase the Effectiveness of Milita

Operations and Anticipated Results Thereof,” 8 Feb 66, tab A–6, Westmoreland Hi

File 4 (30 Jan–1 Mar 66), CMH. “Marching orders” quote is from Col Paul L. Mile

USA (Ret.), Specifi c Comments on “MACV: The Joint Command,” 11 Mar 2002, p. 

CMH. 58 Msgs Sharp to Westmoreland and Stilwell, 1 Feb 66; Sharp to Wheeler, 1 Fe

66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH. “NSC History, Honolulu Confe

ence,” box 44, NSC Files, LBJL. Westmoreland Hist Briefi ng, 16 Feb 66, tab A; Declar

tion of Honolulu, 9 Feb 66, tab A–10; Text of Joint Communique, tab A–11; MFR, Br

Gen W. K. Jones, USMC, 20 Feb 66, sub: MACV Commander’s Conference, 10 Mar 6

tab C–1. All in Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66), CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Rel

tions, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 21–22; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 159–60. 59 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 29–33, 37–40, 48–50; Historical Divisio

JCS, JCS and Vietnam, ch. 32, pp. 2–5. Hermes, “Buildup,” ch. 8, pp. 36–37. 60 MFR, W. K. Jones, 10 Mar 66, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 20 Feb 6

tab C–1, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66), CMH, contains Westmoreland

report to his commanders on reinforcements to be expected. For actual arrivals, se

Westmoreland and Sharp, Report on War, pp. 123–29; and Jack Shulimson, U.S. Marin

in Vietnam: An Expanding War, 1966 (Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Div

sion, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1982), pp. 128, 130–31.

Chap 7EI.indd 266 
8

MACV Headquarters: The Years of 

Expansion,1965–1967

During the period between President Johnson’s troop commitment 

decisions of July 1965 and the end of 1967, the United States attempted to win the war in Vietnam by an escalating application of its 

military power on the ground in South Vietnam and in the skies over 

North Vietnam and Laos. The Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, 

directed much but not all of this effort. In the process, the command 

grew from an advisory and support organization into what amounted to the headquarters of a fi eld army of American and allied troops 

actively battling a growing enemy main force. Yet at the same time, 

MACV continued to be responsible for equipping, training, and advising the armed forces of the Republic of Vietnam. It also took a major 

part in the American mission’s effort to promote a stable, constitutional, democratic Saigon government; and it became the central directing 

agency for an ambitious new American-sponsored try at pacifying the 

South Vietnamese countryside. Beyond the boundaries of South Vietnam, MACV, in not always harmonious collaboration with American 

authorities in Vietiane and Bangkok, conducted a covert air and ground 

war in Laos. It also cooperated, and at times quarreled, with CINCPAC 

over the bombing campaign against North Vietnam.

As MACV’s missions proliferated, its organization grew in size and 

complexity. The expansion was largely ad hoc and unplanned, with 

new agencies springing up or hiving off of old ones and command 

relationships being improvised under pressure of circumstances and 

service interests. Each new mission, and each policy or institutional 

confl ict, brought an organizational response, as did each fresh initiative from an administration in Washington increasingly desperate to 

achieve some measurable amount of progress in the war.

Enlarging the Headquarters

As allied strength in Vietnam mushroomed to over half a million 

American, Australian, South Korean, New Zealand, Filipino, and Thai 

Chap 8.indd 267 
268

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

military personnel and nearly 80,000 civilian employees of variou

nationalities, the Military Assistance Command headquarters grew i

proportion. Between December 1964 and December 1967, the MAC

headquarters complement tripled in size, from about 1,100 offi ce

and enlisted men to almost 3,300. The addition of personnel to th

headquarters ran ahead of formal Joint Table of Distribution change

Because Westmoreland since August 1964 had possessed authority t

requisition personnel for staff increases at the same time as he submi

ted the enlarged organization tables for JCS approval, the new peopl

were usually at work long before the formal organizational revision

went into effect.1

The central structure of the headquarters—the six joint general sta

(“J”) sections and the special staff offi ces—remained largely unchange

during this period of rapid growth. However, within the major sta

sections, branches and divisions multiplied, merged, and divided at 

bewildering pace to deal with new functions and responsibilities, an

additional staff elements grew up in response to a variety of new task

Early in 1967, a contract team studying MACV’s requirements for au

tomatic data processing declared itself unable to develop formal fl ow

charts for the headquarters because it was “too large, too dispersed, an

too dynamic in structure.” Not surprisingly, much of the expansion i

manpower and organizational complexity came in the intelligence, op

erations, and logistics sections, which provided much of the command

control, and management impetus for the American force buildup. B

early 1967, MACV’s intelligence staff alone numbered more than 600

well over twice the size of the entire headquarters in 1962.2

With expansion, the MACV staff dispersed into a proliferatin

number of buildings throughout downtown Saigon, adding to th

command’s existing security vulnerabilities and communications di

fi culties. In March 1965, even before the American buildup got unde

way, General Westmoreland began a search for a new location larg

enough to accommodate the entire headquarters. He initially tried t

obtain a site near the Joint General Staff compound at Tan Son Nhu

Airport, desirable from the standpoint of removing Americans from 

central Saigon and placing MACV conveniently close to its Vietnam

ese counterpart. The Vietnamese government, however, refused to tur

over the most suitable location, a soccer fi eld near the civilian air te

minal, allegedly because Premier Ky wanted to keep the property for 

postwar tourist hotel. MACV in October 1965 settled for a triangula

31-acre site along Petrus Ky Street in western Saigon, which afforde

adequate space. Ironically, it bordered upon the residence area of th

International Control Commission which was still supposedly oversee

ing the 1954 Geneva cease-fi re in Indochina.3

The big American construction contractor, Raymond

Morrison-Knudsen, Brown and Root, and J. A. Jones (RMK-BRJ) barel

had ordered prefabricated buildings from the United States and begu

Chap 8.indd 268 
269

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

clearing land and pouring concrete foundations when MACV and the 

U.S. Mission decided on a change of site. MACV always had regarded 

the Petrus Ky plot as a second choice; residents of the area had protested location of the American headquarters there; and, most serious, the 

site was close to a Buddhist institute militantly opposed to the ThieuMAP 4













1

13

1

1

4

4

Saigon Riv er

Saigon River

TAN SON NHUT

AIRPORT

SAIGON

CHOLON

Joint General Staff

(JGS) HQ

MACV HQ

U.S. Embassy

Independence Palace

0

0

2 Miles

2 Kilometers

SAIGON

1967

Chap 8.indd 269 
270

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Ky government. In late April 1966, with the Saigon regime locked in 

tense confrontation with Buddhist and ARVN rebels in I Corps, Amba

sador Lodge and General Westmoreland reopened the effort to acquir

the Tan Son Nhut soccer fi eld. Under their combined remonstration

Ky gave way. At the cost of about six months’ delay in completing th

project and an additional $3 million, the Americans turned the Petru

Ky site over to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID

for a trade school and began construction at Tan Son Nhut.4 (Map 4)

MACV occupied its new headquarters early in August the followin

year. Completed at a total cost of $25 million, the new complex soo

earned the nickname “Pentagon East.” The air-conditioned structur

of two-story prefabricated buildings, a little more than a third the siz

of its Washington namesake, included some twelve acres of enclose

offi ce space. In addition to the headquarters offi ces, the complex in

cluded a barracks, a mess hall, a refrigerated storage building, and i

own power plant and telephone exchange. Inside, according to on

staff offi cer, “the well-waxed corridors had the fl uorescent feel of a

airport terminal.” A cyclone fence, topped with barbed wire and wit

watch towers at intervals, provided close-in protection. While long i

MACV headquarters, with Tan Son Nhut in the background (DOD fi les)

Chap 8.indd 270 
271

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

coming, the move to Tan Son Nhut unifi ed all elements of the headquarters in one place, conveniently near the Joint General Staff and the 

headquarters of MACV’s Air Force component command.5

At MACV headquarters, as throughout the command, most offi -

cers and enlisted men served unaccompanied one-year tours of duty 

under a Defense Department policy that dated back to the advisory 

years before the American buildup. Generals and a small number of 

key fi eld grade offi cers remained longer for the sake of continuity in 

important posts; their tours ranged in length from eighteen months to 

two years, depending on the requirements of the command, individual 

circumstances, and the needs of their parent services. Under a program 

established by General Westmoreland, offi cers in important positions 

who volunteered, at COMUSMACV’s invitation, to spend additional 

time in Vietnam received special incentives, including the privilege 

of moving their families to government quarters in the Philippines. 

While he supported longer service in Vietnam for selected individuals, 

Westmoreland favored the one-year tour as a general policy, on the 

grounds men could not keep up the pace of work he expected of them 

for more than a year in Vietnam’s tropical climate and that frequent 

personnel changes infused fresh ideas and viewpoints into the command. Frequent rotation also allowed the services to give their best 

commanders Vietnam experience while at the same time distributing 

their leadership talent among Southeast Asia and other important theaters. According to Lt. Gen. Frederick Weyand, his deputy chief of staff 

for personnel, Army Chief of Staff Johnson “feels quite strongly that 

with the talent we have on the bench, it would be a mistake to play 

the whole ball game, or even a major portion thereof, with only one 

G[eneral] O[ffi cer] team. . . . The long range needs of the Army and 

the nation require maximum utilization of this opportunity to give as 

many of our GO’s as possible the actual counter-insurgency combat 

experience they can acquire only in RVN.”6

Selection and assignment of general offi cers to key command and 

staff positions was a matter of continuous negotiation between General Westmoreland, Admiral Sharp, General Wheeler, and the service 

chiefs. The MACV commander left Navy, Air Force, and Marine selections largely to the respective services. If he intervened at all, he did 

so only occasionally, very circumspectly, and when possible in concert 

with his component commanders. He exercised much greater infl uence over the assignment of Army general offi cers, on which he dealt 

directly, as Army component commander, with General Johnson. As 

commanders and key staff offi cers became due for rotation, Westmoreland, his deputy Army component commander, and the chief of staff 

would work out a “slate” of replacements. Westmoreland’s wishes carried great weight in this process, and he usually could block assignment 

of offi cers he defi nitely did not want; but he had to yield on occasion 

to other Army requirements enunciated by General Johnson, includChap 8.indd 271 
272

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

ing the aforementioned career management considerations. Neverthe

less, the MACV commander’s personal preferences normally prevaile

when he expressed them strongly. As a result, the Military Assistanc

Command appears to have received the best talent the Army and th

other services could provide.7

For members of the MACV staff, derisively referred to by comba

troops as “Saigon Commandos” or by the unprintable acronym REMF

a tour at headquarters combined long working hours and a lingerin

threat of terrorism with access to the amenities, wholesome and oth

erwise, of a booming wartime capital. Veterans of the pre-1965 MAC

saw a decline in the quality of Saigon life as the infl ux of American

and war refugees brought price infl ation, overcrowding, pollution, tra

fi c jams, and a growing air of squalor and brutalization. Nevertheles

there were still tennis and swimming available at the exclusive Cerc

Sportif (offi cers only), golf at the Saigon Golf Club, and horseback rid

ing at the Cercle Hippique. Well-stocked post exchanges offered me

chandise, snacks, and a variety of concessions. Special Services ope

ated a library, bowling center, swimming pool, and craft shop, as we

as the out-of-country rest and recuperation (R & R) program; and b

mid-1966 two USO clubs were open. Armed Forces Radio and Telev

sion stations carried American music, news, and other programs. Th

17th Field Hospital provided American military and civilian personn

with a full range of inpatient and outpatient medical services. Senio

offi cers continued to live in rented villas and lower ranking personn

in hotels converted into offi cer and enlisted quarters. Residents of th

hotels could take their drinks up to the roofs at sundown and watch th

fl ares and gunfl ashes of the distant war on the horizon while awaitin

the start of the evening’s motion picture. Leisure time for most MAC

headquarters personnel, however, was increasingly limited. Genera

Westmoreland considered a seven-day, sixty-hour work week “par fo

the course”; he himself averaged close to eighty hours.8

As time went on, an increasing number of American personnel from 

MACV and the many other headquarters in the Saigon area moved ou

of the city. As South Vietnam’s capital and only major seaport, Saigo

naturally attracted more than its share of the American buildup. As 

result, by April 1966 the city and its environs contained nearly 36,00

U.S. personnel. The American infl ux overburdened the city’s real e

tate, drove up prices, and created an embarrassingly conspicuous fo

eign presence at the political heart of South Vietnam. At the urging o

Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs, and under personal instruction

from President Johnson to accelerate the exodus from downtown Sa

gon, General Westmoreland directed his staff and his component com

manders to halt further deployment of American units to the capita

and to plan for the dispersal of those already there.9

The resulting program, known as Operation MOOSE (Move out o

Saigon Expeditiously), and to some harassed planners as GOOSE (Ge

Chap 8.indd 272 
273

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

out of Saigon Eventually), took until early 1968 to complete and cost 

at least $40 million for the required construction and relocations. In 

the process, besides MACV’s move to Tan Son Nhut, U.S. Army, Vietnam (USARV), and the 1st Logistical Command relocated to Long Binh 

about fi fteen miles north of the capital. Numerous facilities went to 

Bien Hoa, Cam Ranh Bay, and other locations in the provinces. By the 

end of 1967, the number of American personnel working in Saigon and 

its Chinese suburb, Cholon, had fallen to about 7,900, while nearly 

20,000 were located at Tan Son Nhut. MACV and its subordinate commands at the same time turned back to the South Vietnamese some 

seventy offi ce and residential properties.10

The threat of Viet Cong terrorism was present wherever Americans 

lived and worked in the Saigon area. The capital city constituted a separate Viet Cong special zone, with its own main and local forces, guerrillas, and political cadres. Many Viet Cong native to the area lived and 

moved about legally as ostensibly loyal citizens. They kept up a campaign of assassination, sabotage, and harassment against United States 

and South Vietnamese personnel and installations. On 1 April 1966, 

after a short, violent gunfi ght with U.S. MPs, the enemy set off a large 

truck bomb at the Victoria Bachelor Offi cers Quarters, causing over 

120 American, Vietnamese, and Australian casualties. A little less than 

a year later, Communist gunners managed to fi re fi ve 81-mm. mortar 

rounds at the old main MACV building, using a house with the roof 

removed as a fi ring position. The shells missed their target but one hit 

an ARVN truck killing twelve soldiers. A time bomb left behind at the 

Viet Cong mortar site caused several more casualties.11

To protect its installations, MACV, for political reasons, continued 

to rely primarily on South Vietnamese Army regulars, territorial forces, 

and police of the South Vietnamese Capital Military District. In cooperation with these forces, the U.S. 716th Military Police Battalion under 

Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon, and its successor the U.S. Army 

Headquarters Area Command manned reinforced concrete guard posts 

at American military installations, the U.S. embassy, and the major billets and conducted nightly roving patrols with machine gun-equipped 

jeeps. In addition, the residents of each billet were organized for security 

and self-defense. At Tan Son Nhut, the American and South Vietnamese 

Air Forces protected their own installations. The command imposed 

curfews on Americans and warned individual personnel to exercise caution in using public transportation, to vary their routes to and from 

work, to inspect their vehicles frequently for hidden bombs and booby 

traps, and to travel in groups when in the city. These precautions kept 

terrorism at a relatively low level until the Tet offensive in early 1968 

for the fi rst time brought full-scale warfare to Saigon’s streets.12

As American forces in Vietnam expanded, so did the stream of offi -

cial and semi-offi cial visitors to the Military Assistance Command. Offi -

cial visitors included President Johnson himself, who made two hastily 

Chap 8.indd 273 
274

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

arranged stopovers at Cam Ranh Bay in October 1966 and Decembe

1967. Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Secretary McNamara, Genera

Wheeler, the service chiefs and secretaries, and a host of people from 

the Defense Department and its civilian contractors passed throug

Saigon on a more or less regular basis, as did offi cials of other govern

ment departments and senators, congressmen, and their staffs. Nume

ous private citizens, ranging from clergymen through advice columni

Ann Landers, also toured Vietnam. These persons either traveled o

their own or were sponsored by the government for various purpose

usually related to enhancing American public support for the war. Th

number of visitors to MACV swelled to an average of 552 per mont

during 1966 and 740 per month the following year.13

General Westmoreland welcomed these visitations as an opportu

nity to educate Americans in and out of government in the realities o

the war as MACV understood them. Even so, he also recognized th

burden they placed on his command. Visits by senior offi cials called fo

extensive preparatory staff work, followed by lengthy schedules of con

General Westmoreland (second from left) receives the Boy Scout Silver Buffalo 

Award for distinguished service in Washington, D.C. (© Bettman/CORBIS)

Chap 8.indd 274 
275

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

ferences, briefi ngs, and trips to the fi eld, usually requiring the presence 

of Westmoreland and his principal subordinates. Lesser fi gures were 

the responsibility of lower-ranking members of the staff, but these offi cers also had duties that suffered from their absence. Senators and 

congressmen could be especially demanding and, depending on their 

importance to the administration, usually had to be accommodated.14

MACV and the Defense Department attempted repeatedly to curtail 

the fl ood of visitors to Saigon. In early 1967, for example, the Defense 

Department directed all its agencies to hold trips to Vietnam and Thailand to an “absolute minimum” and required each visit to meet one 

or more of three criteria: helping fi eld commanders and staffs acquire 

needed resources; aiding future operations; and providing fi eld commanders or higher echelons with signifi cant information not otherwise available. Similarly, the ambassador asked the State Department to 

help keep down the number of non-Defense delegations. Nevertheless, 

the fl ow continued and reached an all-time high of 1,429 people in 

December 1967.15

With practice, the MACV system for entertaining and instructing 

visitors achieved considerable polish, with social occasions as well as 

briefi ngs delivering the command’s message. Westmoreland, for example, often invited junior offi cers from combat units to his dinners for 

congressmen, journalists, and other prominent civilians, to give the offi cers “a pleasant occasion” and the guests “some feel for the fi ghting.” 

He also used his visitors as sources of information for himself on policy 

trends in the administration and public sentiment in the country.16

Planning and Control of Operations

As the American role in the war changed from advice and support 

of the South Vietnamese to direct combat participation, General Westmoreland endeavored to keep all aspects of the effort under his close 

personal control. He claimed later that “although the line of authority 

ran to me in several different ways, I was able to provide unity of command for the entire American military effort in South Vietnam, and 

. . . to give my personal attention to the entire range of advisory, combat, and support activities.”17 To accomplish this, he relied both on his 

individual efforts and on an expanding network of staff agencies for 

command and control, planning, logistical management, communications, and intelligence.

Sometimes characterized as a “workaholic,” Westmoreland fi lled 

his sixteen-hour days in Saigon with staff conferences, meetings with 

the ambassador and country team, discussions with Vietnamese counterparts, and an endless round of welcoming, informing, persuading, 

and entertaining his command’s many visitors. The general devoted 

several days each week to fi eld trips, during which he orchestrated 

plans with his tactical commanders, saw and talked with the troops, 

Chap 8.indd 275 
276

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

and attempted to gain a fi rsthand impression of conditions in the fou

corps areas. Paperwork occupied most of the long hours he spent o

airplanes, whether traveling within South Vietnam or to periodic high

level conferences at Honolulu; Bangkok and Udorn, Thailand; an

other points. To break the work routine, he played an occasional gam

of tennis or took brief holiday trips to visit his wife and children, wh

had left Saigon in the 1965 dependent exodus and were quartered i

the Philippines.18

A self-confessed believer in conferences as “a useful, even essen

tial, tool of command,” Westmoreland held regular Saturday mornin

meetings with his principal staff offi cers in the headquarters comba

intelligence center. During these sessions, which evolved from simpl

intelligence briefi ngs, he reviewed events, issued oral guidance on plan

ning and operations, announced major tactical decisions, and directe

staff agencies to produce studies and recommendations on particula

issues.19

Outside of these formal staff meetings, Westmoreland depend

ed heavily on certain members of his staff for advice and informa

tion. Brig. Gen. William E. DePuy, highly intelligent, articulate, an

forceful, was perhaps Westmoreland’s most infl uential counselor o

a wide range of matters until he left the MACV Operations Directo

ate to command the 1st Infantry Division in March 1966. Until then

“there was much truth to the assertion that the chain of comman

was Westmoreland to DePuy to the fi eld.” After his wife and childre

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CHART 3—ORGANIZATION OF MACV HEADQUARTERS, MAY 1967

Chap 8.indd 276 
277

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

left Saigon, Westmoreland had certain key staff offi cers, including at 

various times his surgeon, his science adviser, and offi cers involved 

in intelligence and relations with 

the South Vietnamese, live with 

him in his villa. At breakfast and 

dinner, which the men usually ate 

together, Westmoreland drew out 

members of this “kitchen cabinet” 

on matters of interest and sometimes made decisions on the basis 

of their discussions.20

The position of the deputy 

MACV commander expanded in 

importance and increased in rank 

as the Military Assistance Command’s operations and responsibilities multiplied. Although the 

other services periodically angled 

for the slot, Westmoreland insisted 

on an Army second-in-command. 

The deputy COMUSMACV, Westmoreland repeatedly declared, had to 

be qualifi ed to direct ground operations and to deal with the Armydominated Vietnamese Joint General Staff in order to be able to fi ll in 

for him during absences or to replace him in the event of his death or incapacitation. Only an Army general could fulfi ll those requirements.21

Westmoreland’s fi rst two deputies, John L. Throckmorton and John 

A. Heintges, were lieutenant generals.22 In March 1967, Secretary McNamara, Admiral Sharp, and General Westmoreland decided the job 

should go to a four-star general who would also be Westmoreland’s 

designated successor. The increase in rank would strengthen the deputy’s authority over the Army lieutenant generals who headed the Army 

component command and the two fi eld forces, as well as the three-star 

Marine general commanding the III Marine Amphibious Force (MAF). 

At McNamara’s, Sharp’s, and Westmoreland’s recommendation, President Johnson on 6 April appointed General Creighton W. Abrams, Jr., 

to the position. (Chart 3) Abrams, then serving as vice chief of staff of the 

Army, was one of that service’s ablest, most respected leaders. The new 

deputy’s arrival in Saigon in June sparked rumors at MACV headquarters 

of Westmoreland’s imminent departure, an expectation apparently shared 

by Abrams and by Maj. Gen. Walter T. Kerwin, the new MACV chief of 

staff, who had served with Abrams in the Pentagon and accompanied 

him to Vietnam. In fact, Abrams would spend nearly a year and a half 

as Westmoreland’s deputy before succeeding him. Although Abrams and 

Westmoreland differed greatly in personality and command style, the 

General Abrams (NARA)

Chap 8.indd 277 
278

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

two generals worked harmoniously together. Increasingly preoccupie

with tactical operations and pacifi cation, Westmoreland put Abrams i

charge of advice and assistance to the South Vietnamese armed force

Previous deputy MACV commanders had also been involved in th

task, but Abrams brought to it additional rank, prestige, and force o

character, qualities needed both to unify the diffuse American advisor

effort and to pressure and persuade the South Vietnamese into improv

ing their military performance.23

To monitor operations, furnish information to higher headqua

ters, and make short-term plans, General Westmoreland drastically en

larged his headquarters’ hitherto rudimentary combat operations cen

ter. Planning for the new center, part of the J3 section, began late i

October 1965, with the assistance of a team of offi cers sent out by th

Joint Chiefs of Staff and the National Military Command Center. T

improve service balance in MACV headquarters and to strengthen h

ties to the III Marine Amphibious Force—which then constituted clos

to half his U.S. ground combat power—Westmoreland proposed tha

the command center be headed by a Marine brigadier general. Pendin

fi nal JCS approval of the new organization, Westmoreland and Genera

DePuy activated the Combat Operations Center (COC) under directio

of Marine Col. Francis F. Parry, a member of DePuy’s section. The de

ignated director, Brig. Gen. William K. Jones, USMC, reached Saigo

early in January 1966, whereupon Colonel Parry became his deput

Later in the year, Parry was joined by a second, Army, deputy directo

assigned at the instigation of DePuy, who did not want to leave th

powerful staff agency under exclusively Marine control.24

From a modest start—when Jones arrived, “they had the offi c

space, they had a few desks and chairs and so forth,” as well as som

offi cers assigned—the Combat Operations Center grew within a yea

into virtually a staff within a staff. With its more than 200 person

nel, the center took over most of the old MACV command compoun

until it moved to specially designed secure facilities in the new head

quarters at Tan Son Nhut. By early 1967, the center had six division

Surface Plans and Operations did most of MACV’s short-term groun

operational planning, as well as overseeing the politically sensitiv

employment of herbicides and other chemicals. Air Plans and Opera

tions maintained current information on U.S. and South Vietnames

fi xed-wing air activity throughout Southeast Asia and planned an

monitored B–52 strikes. According to Colonel Parry, the offi ce pro

vided the forum in which Westmoreland himself chose the B–52 ta

gets. Army Aviation kept track of the allocation of Army helicopte

among tactical commands. Joint Operations followed the activities o

the South Vietnamese forces. It provided advisers and liaison offi cer

to the J3 and Joint Operations Center of the Joint General Staff. 

Tactical Air Support Element processed fi eld command requests for a

missions.25

Chap 8.indd 278 
279

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

The Command Center Division, heart of the new staff element, 

manned and operated the MACV 

Command Center. This facility, according to Colonel Parry, “became 

the center of day-to-day activity, 

the show place of headquarters, 

and the sine qua non for all visiting fi remen of consequence.” 

Manned around the clock, with 

secure communications links to 

MACV’s subordinate headquarters 

in South Vietnam and to Pacifi c 

Command and the Joint Chiefs of 

Staff, the Command Center was 

MACV’s focal point for the assembly of information on current operations and the dispatch of orders 

to the fi eld and reports to higher 

authority. Each duty watch included desk offi cers for each corps area 

and for air and naval operations, 

as well as representatives of the Intelligence, Logistics, and Communications/Electronics Directorates. Also part of the Command Center 

Division, a Briefi ng and Reports Branch conducted major portions of 

the headquarters’ regular command and staff briefi ngs, prepared the 

MACV daily and weekly Situation Reports (SITREPs), and contributed 

to Westmoreland’s weekly military reports to the embassy.26

The Combat Operations Center did more than transmit information. General DePuy, who oversaw the COC’s creation, assigned it responsibility for all operational planning within the current year. The 

COC issued six-month operational guidance to the senior U.S. tactical commanders. It also managed the details of allocating to the corps 

areas MACV airlift, sealift, air support, and helicopter resources and of 

conducting major force redeployments. The COC directors, key members of General Westmoreland’s inner offi cial family, arranged for the 

general’s monthly commanders’ conferences, frequently accompanied 

him on fi eld trips, and regularly made inspection tours of their own for 

the commander. The Marine Corps appreciated the importance of the 

COC directorship and provided some of its best offi cers for it. General 

Jones, the fi rst director, went on to command Fleet Marine Force, Pacifi c. His replacement, Brig. Gen. John R. Chaisson, formerly G3 of III 

MAF, where Westmoreland met him and was impressed by him, was 

one of the Marine Corps’ most popular and promising offi cers, a likely 

future candidate for commandant. Chaisson developed a close working relationship with Westmoreland, who personally had requested his 

General Chaisson (as a lieutenant general 

in 1970) (U.S. Marine Corps photo)

Chap 8.indd 279 
280

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

assignment to MACV and who retained him as COC director beyon

the end of his regular tour.27

 General Westmoreland placed great emphasis on contingenc

planning by his headquarters so as to have a plan on fi le for ever

foreseeable eventuality. Long-range plans and studies were the prov

ince of the J5 offi ce, headed throughout the confl ict by an Air Forc

major general—an appropriate allocation of service responsibility sinc

the directorate dealt with many contingencies in which air operation

would predominate. The offi ce produced an endless stream of studie

many personally called for by Westmoreland, on subjects that range

from blocking enemy infi ltration routes through Laos and Cambo

dia to posthostilities nation-building by the South Vietnamese arme

forces. One subdivision within the directorate maintained and revise

MACV’s portions of Pacifi c Command and SEATO contingency plan

another developed plans for special operations by American and allie

forces. Most of these projects, for example those dealing with Laos an

Cambodia, never went beyond the paper stage but were available fo

prompt implementation had the administration decided to broade

the war. In addition to formulating plans, the J5 section at Westmo

reland’s direction also reviewed current tactics and strategy and oc

casionally proposed alternatives. “Since J5 was not involved in actua

operations,” the MACV commander declared, “this provided me wit

an outside view.”28

Occasionally, at General Westmoreland’s direction, several staff sec

tions combined their efforts to examine contingencies. In May 1967, fo

example, with enemy forces building up in northern I Corps, the inte

ligence, operations, and planning directorates conducted a “wargamin

exercise” to analyze North Vietnamese and Viet Cong “capability an

possible courses of action” and to recommend countermeasures. Late

in the year, after the North Vietnamese siege of Con Thien, Westmore

land instructed the intelligence directorate to form a DMZ Front Com

mand, which was to review, from the enemy’s viewpoint, the tactics o

the engagement and try to forecast possible new Communist courses o

action. Special problems produced special arrangements. When Wes

moreland decided to establish a division-size Army force in southern 

Corps, for instance, he assigned Kerwin’s predecessor as chief of staf

Maj. Gen. William B. Rosson, who also was commander-designate o

the unit, to plan the deployment. Rosson did so, using offi ce space fu

nished by the Army component headquarters and a skeleton divisio

staff pulled from a variety of Army units.29

The Military Assistance Command headquarters had to make ad

justments to manage the logistics of the American buildup. Early i

1966 General Westmoreland decided to employ his J4 offi ce prima

ily to plan and coordinate logistical support while the service com

ponents handled the details of execution. The directorate, hithert

mainly concerned with advising its RVNAF counterpart, reorganize

Chap 8.indd 280 
281

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

to become “in effect a joint logistical staff for a theater of operations.” 

It established a system for keeping track of the month-by-month balance between MACV’s requirements and capabilities in key areas such 

as port operations, supply, maintenance, and transportation. It also 

absorbed the Directorate of Army MAP Logistics, previously a separate 

staff agency, and pulled together a number of small engineer organizations into a single MACV Engineer’s Offi ce. Westmoreland, in selecting 

his assistant chiefs of staff, J4, took account of the changing problems 

of the buildup. In spring 1966, when base development and construction constituted MACV’s principal joint logistical concern, he selected 

Maj. Gen. Carroll H. Dunn, an Army engineer, as his J4. When Dunn 

fi nished his tour in September of the following year, Westmoreland 

replaced him with Maj. Gen. Henry A. Rasmussen, an offi cer skilled in 

supply management, since that function had assumed fi rst priority.30

General Dunn’s selection as MACV J4 came after a prolonged debate between General Westmoreland on one side and the Offi ce of the 

Secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs on the other over how best to 

direct the huge construction effort in support of the American buildup. 

The newly established MACV engineer, a colonel, lacked the rank and 

staff to bring unity to the actions of the various services; the planning, 

funding, and execution initially fell to the service component commanders and to a fl ag-rank Navy offi cer in charge of construction who 

directed the work of the private contractor combine, RMK-BRJ. As the 

total programmed cost of military construction rose toward the billion 

dollar mark, these agencies were unable to develop a joint construction 

plan or agree on priorities. They competed with each other for scarce 

real estate, building materials, engineer units, port access, and transportation.31

Anticipating this situation, the staff of the secretary of defense, in 

mid-1965, began promoting creation of a “Construction Czar” within 

Military Assistance Command, separate from the Logistics Directorate. 

This offi cial, preferably an Army engineer major general with a sizable staff, would have authority to make unifi ed construction plans for 

the entire command and to allocate tasks, manpower, and resources 

among the services. Pressed by Secretary McNamara, the Joint Chiefs 

and the chief engineers of the Army, Navy, and Air Force all endorsed 

the concept. In December, General Wheeler proposed it to Westmoreland and Admiral Sharp. At the same time, Wheeler recommended 

then-Brigadier General Dunn, a major general designee, for construction chief, noting that Dunn possessed the necessary technical qualifi -

cations and had the confi dence of Secretary McNamara and his civilian 

subordinates.32

General Westmoreland resisted this proposal, fearing that the “czar” 

would function as an independent agent of the Defense Department 

rather than a subordinate of his own. He declared that construction 

was too intertwined with other aspects of logistics, port clearance for 

Chap 8.indd 281 
282

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

example, to be separated from the jurisdiction of his J4. All he neede

to manage the development effort, he contended, was a strengthene

J4 engineer offi ce and authority to allocate military construction fund

among the services. McNamara and Wheeler, however, insisted that th

construction program needed “strong, centralized operating directio

on a big scale” with its own independent chief. Acknowledging tha

Westmoreland should have maximum authority and fl exibility in fun

allocation, Wheeler emphasized that the Defense Department woul

grant that authority only if it were exercised through a separate MAC

chief of construction. Gaining the support of Admiral Sharp, who in

tially had taken Westmoreland’s side, they overrode Westmoreland

protests against dictation by Washington of the structure of his staff.

The MACV Construction Directorate, headed by General Dunn a

assistant chief of staff for construction, went into operation on 15 Feb

ruary 1966. Dunn had authority over all military construction in Sout

Vietnam, except the activities of engineers assigned to tactical unit

He also served as adviser to the South Vietnamese Army engineer. A

though Dunn and his 144-man offi ce were quickly integrated int

MACV headquarters and served Westmoreland well in bringing orde

to the construction effort, the MACV commander had the last organ

zational word. Still preferring to have the construction effort under h

J4, he fi nally won over Undersecretary of Defense Cyrus Vance, hith

erto a strong advocate of the construction czar concept, to his position

In July, with the concurrence of CINCPAC and the JCS, he appointe

General Dunn his J4 and placed the Construction Directorate, heade

by a brigadier general, under supervision of the Logistics Directorat

where it remained thereafter.34

Similar questions of organization and control arose concerning th

increasingly complex communications system through which MAC

directed its forces’ expanding operations and maintained contact wit

higher headquarters in Hawaii and Washington. When the America

buildup began, MACV relied for communications with the fi eld on th

South Vietnamese civilian and military radio, telephone, and teletyp

systems, which had been modernized with American equipment an

advice, and on a U.S.-built and -operated long-distance or “backbone

system, called BACK PORCH, which transmitted messages between Sa

gon and other major centers in Vietnam, as well as Bangkok and Udor

in Thailand. High frequency radio and undersea cable systems, supple

mented by a satellite ground terminal near Saigon, connected MAC

with the Philippines, Okinawa, Hawaii, and the continental Unite

States. The message traffi c generated by the 1965 troop buildup quickl

overwhelmed these facilities. MACV and the services responded wit

ad hoc expansions using tactical signal equipment, most of it provide

by the Army. The command, in conjunction with the Defense Depar

ment, also hastily developed plans for a new Integrated Wideban

Communications System to replace BACK PORCH, as well as for auto

Chap 8.indd 282 
283

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

mated telephone and data transmission networks—the latter essential 

to managing the supply buildup.35

Before these plans could be implemented, MACV, the Department 

of the Army, and the Defense Department had to resolve a jurisdictional dispute over control of Army signal troops in Southeast Asia. 

The dispute involved the Defense Communications Agency (DCA), 

an organization established in the late 1950s to build and manage a 

worldwide Defense Communications System, and the Army’s Strategic 

Communications Command, which operated BACK PORCH and MACV’s 

other communications links in Vietnam and also built, maintained, 

and manned the Southeast Asia portions of the Defense Communications System. After much discussion, all sides accepted a compromise originated by Brig. Gen. Walter E. Lotz, Jr., the MACV director 

of communications/electronics, which unifi ed Army signalmen under 

General Westmoreland by a roundabout route. Under it, the Army on 

1 April 1966 consolidated its signal units in Vietnam, except those attached to tactical formations, into a signal brigade nominally attached 

to the Strategic Communications Command but under the operational 

control of MACV’s Army component command. Under the brigade, a 

Regional Communications Group operated the Defense Communications System network in South Vietnam, and other Army signal groups 

directly supported the fi eld forces and divisions. The brigade shared 

responsibility for communications at theater level and above with the 

Defense Communications Agency offi ce in Saigon and both organizations were under the oversight of the MACV J6.36

The communications system the two agencies jointly managed 

took until mid-1968 to complete, due to delays in construction and 

procurement of equipment. Even before all its elements were in place, 

it provided MACV headquarters with comprehensive telephone, radio, 

and teletype network links to most places of signifi cance in Vietnam 

and Southeast Asia, as well as to Hawaii and the continental United 

States. The system routinely handled a huge volume of messages and 

raw data and was indispensable to coordinating military operations, 

especially air support. However, it also deluged higher authorities with 

undigested information and facilitated constant intervention in the 

details of MACV’s activities by CINCPAC, the Joint Chiefs, the Defense 

Department, and the White House.37

Throughout the elaboration of MACV’s command, control, and 

communications structure, one key element, the commander’s instrument for detecting defi ciencies and abuses and responding to soldiers’ 

complaints, the Offi ce of the Inspector General, developed only slowly. MACV, until well into the buildup, left the conduct of inspections 

and investigations for U.S. forces to the component commands, all of 

which included substantial inspector general offi ces. The MACV Inspector General’s Offi ce, which consisted until 1965 of one offi cer and 

one enlisted man, did little more than keep the commander informed 

Chap 8.indd 283 
284

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

about the work of the components and make occasional visits to fi el

advisory teams. 

The MACV inspector general’s functions and staff slowly grew du

ing the years of the buildup, as inspection and investigation require

ments developed that the individual services could not meet. Genera

Westmoreland formally made his inspector general responsible fo

monitoring the entire inspection effort within MACV in 1965, bu

he rejected suggestions that the position be upgraded from colonel t

general offi cer. During the next two years, the offi ce acquired respon

sibility for advising the Joint General Staff Inspector General’s Offi c

for making regular inspections of the MACV advisory teams, and fo

investigation of matters that cut across service jurisdictions or involve

both American and South Vietnamese forces. In the latter cases, th

MACV inspector general began conducting combined investigation

with his Joint General Staff counterpart. General Abrams, as deput

COMUSMACV responsible for improving the South Vietnamese force

initiated combined inspections as well, both of RVNAF units and the

American advisers. Col. Robert M. Cook, who became MACV inspec

tor general in August 1967, aggressively pressed the expansion of h

offi ce in all these areas, with strong support from General Abram

under whom Cook had commanded a tank platoon in the Battle o

the Bulge. Neverthless, the MACV Inspector General’s Offi ce remaine

small through the fi rst part of 1968, its eleven offi cers and fi ve enliste

men struggling to meet its increasing inspectional, investigative, an

advisory responsibilities.38

Combined Intelligence

The expansion of the Military Assistance Command’s operationa

and planning elements, and also of its combat forces, created an all bu

insatiable demand for timely, accurate intelligence. As of mid-1965

the Intelligence Directorate, in spite of considerable enlargement du

ing 1964, was far from able to meet that demand. Still engaged pr

marily in advising South Vietnamese military intelligence agencies an

transmitting to MACV and higher headquarters information obtaine

from them, the offi ce possessed little independent capacity for collec

tion, analysis, and production and was ill-prepared to furnish comba

intelligence to units in the fi eld.39

The task of expanding MACV’s intelligence capabilities fell to Ma

Gen. Joseph A. McChristian, who replaced Maj. Gen. Youngdale a

assistant chief of staff, J2, at the beginning of July 1965, just as th

large-scale commitment of U.S. troops was getting under way. A ve

eran Army intelligence offi cer whose counterinsurgency experienc

dated back to the Greek civil war in 1949–1950, McChristian was fa

miliar with conditions in South Vietnam from his previous assign

ment as G2 of U.S. Army, Pacifi c. He arrived in Saigon just in time fo

Chap 8.indd 284 
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MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

the crucial mid-July visit of Secretary of Defense McNamara. As part 

of discussions of the American 

troop commitment, McNamara 

directed Westmoreland to specify 

the requirements for a full-fl edged 

American combat intelligence system in Vietnam and promised to 

provide whatever resources the 

MACV commander and his new 

intelligence chief requested. McChristian, an offi cer of formidable 

energy, took full advantage of the 

secretary’s support and also that 

of Westmoreland, with whom 

he occasionally played tennis. 

Within two weeks of his arrival 

in Vietnam, McChristian and his 

staff had put together a proposed 

MACV intelligence organization, 

which Westmoreland promptly 

approved.40

McChristian enlarged and reorganized the MACV J2 offi ce. In mid1967, after several interim reorganizations, the intelligence staff included over 600 personnel. Three deputy J2s, for combat intelligence, 

production, and support, supervised the work of the offi ce’s divisions, 

which included Intelligence Operations, Exploitation, Estimates, 

Plans and Training, Production, Management, and Counterintelligence. Other elements maintained contact with foreign military attachés and provided representatives for the Combat Operations Center. 

To keep track of his offi ce’s proliferating activities, McChristian instituted a management system that made periodic checks of the status 

of major functions and projects. In an effort to pull together the intelligence activities of all services, McChristian issued annual MACV 

collection programs that specifi ed particular command requirements 

and areas of interest. McChristian drew the Special Forces and Studies and Observations Group deeper into the intelligence collection 

program and reestablished ties with the foreign military attachés in 

Saigon, many of whom possessed access to people and governments 

not directly approachable by the Americans. To enhance dissemination of his product, McChristian in August 1966 instituted a widely 

distributed monthly Periodic Intelligence Report (PERINTREP). He 

also revised the weekly MACV headquarters intelligence briefi ng to 

include recommended courses of action based on his estimate of the 

enemy situation. General Westmoreland soon made this enhanced 

briefi ng the basis of his weekly strategy conference.41

General McChristian (DOD fi les)

Chap 8.indd 285 
286

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

In the fi eld, McChristian built up the Army G2 advisory elemen

with Vietnamese corps and divisions into full-scale intelligence detach

ments. He also secured Army military intelligence units to enhanc

MACV’s capabilities in imagery interpretation, counterintelligenc

and other technical functions. All these units were subordinate to th

525th Military Intelligence Group, over which McChristian, in a de

parture from normal joint staff practice, exercised operational contro

In late 1967 MACV organized all the American fi eld intelligence an

advisory elements under the 525th into fi ve integrated battalions, on

for each corps area and one for the Capital Military District. Each ba

talion performed counterintelligence, collection, and advisory func

tions within its area of responsibility. It also provided direct support fo

the American divisions and separate brigades and coordinated U.S. an

ARVN intelligence efforts. Under MACV, a special operations intell

gence battalion worked against COSVN and other high-priority target

Further to support the combat troops, McChristian and his staff spe

up the dissemination to fi eld commands of intelligence from the mo

highly classifi ed American sources.42

While building up purely American intelligence resources, Gen

eral McChristian also sought to capitalize on those of the South Vie

namese. He knew that his allies possessed a familiarity with their ow

language and culture and an intimate, detailed understanding of th

enemy that the Americans, for all their organizational and technica

sophistication, lacked. To combine the strengths of both allies whil

making more effective the MACV J2 Directorate’s advice and assi

tance to its Vietnamese counterpart, McChristian undertook to creat

a full-fl edged combined American and South Vietnamese intelligenc

organization soon after assuming his duties. He had the support o

General Westmoreland, who generally resisted creation of combine

staff agencies because he wanted to promote RVNAF self-suffi cienc

but made an exception in the case of intelligence. Westmoreland nego

tiated the necessary agreements with the Vietnamese high command

McChristian’s counterpart, Col. Ho Van Loi, Joint General Staff chie

of intelligence, accepted the combined concept at once and committe

his resources to it.43

When it reached its full development late in 1966, the system in Sa

gon consisted of four combined centers. Each had American and Vie

namese codirectors and a staff of intelligence specialists, technician

translators, and clerical personnel of both nationalities. The America

contingent came from MACV’s Intelligence Directorate, which supe

vised the centers and reviewed, revised, or rejected their product. Thre

of the centers performed specialized functions. The Combined Militar

Interrogation Center questioned selected enemy prisoners and defec

tors; coordinated interrogation throughout South Vietnam; helped t

develop standard operating procedures for handling POWs and Vie

Cong who came over to the government; and sent teams to fi eld com

Chap 8.indd 286 
287

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

mands for immediate exploitation of captives during operations. The 

Combined Document Exploitation Center, with an American-Vietnamese staff of over 300, evaluated and translated the growing volume 

of enemy unit and headquarters fi les uncovered by allied offensives. 

Distilling the results into spot reports for immediate exploitation by 

combat units, it also stored these fi ndings in an automated data base 

from which it could produce longer studies on demand. The document 

exploitation center also maintained “go teams,” for quick on-the-scene 

evaluation of captured material during operations. The third specialized element, the Combined Materiel Exploitation Center, examined 

and evaluated items of captured enemy equipment and issued technical intelligence reports, summaries, and analyses.44

The fourth agency, the Combined Intelligence Center, Vietnam 

(CICV), brought together the product of all the other centers into “an 

all-source intelligence data base” for use by MACV and the Joint General Staff. Housed initially in a converted warehouse at Tan Son Nhut 

and later in a specially constructed building close to the new MACV 

headquarters at the air base, CICV eventually reached a strength of 

more than 600 Americans and Vietnamese. In operation twenty-four 

hours a day, its branches prepared detailed terrain studies and correlated the products of photographic, infrared, and radar reconnaissance. 

The center’s largest element, its Order of Battle Branch, maintained 

complete, up-to-date listings by corps area of PAVN and PLAF units, 

with histories and estimates of their strengths. It also assembled information on enemy infi ltration from North Vietnam and on the Viet 

Cong’s political underground and issued specialized studies on enemy 

organization and operations. Another key unit, the center’s Targets Acquisition Branch, compiled information that MACV used to direct air 

strikes and ground operations. This branch made extensive use of “pattern analysis,” a technique for assembling and analyzing data from 

multiple sources on all forms of enemy activity in a given area in order 

to determine the most profi table objectives.45

The combined centers, with their heavily automated data bases, 

produced a steadily growing volume of intelligence with increasing responsiveness to the needs of commanders and staffs. The document 

exploitation center alone during 1967 printed some 1,400 pounds of 

reports per day. Yet the system had its limitations. Because of the security risk created by the presence of its Vietnamese personnel, the Combined Intelligence Center lacked access to data from the most sensitive U.S. technical sources, which was reserved to the purely American 

elements of MACV intelligence. As a result, its estimates—for example 

on enemy strength and infi ltration—were often altered or disregarded 

farther up the chain of command. For lack of technical talent, the Vietnamese were underrepresented in many elements of the system. As a 

result, Americans in the Combined Intelligence Center outnumbered 

Vietnamese by about fi ve to one. American members within the comChap 8.indd 287 
288

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

bined agencies, moreover, distrusted their South Vietnamese associate

whose competence the Americans doubted and whose language the

did not speak. In consequence, a de facto separation of the two nation

alities prevailed within offi ces and branches. The Vietnamese, for the

part, were reluctant to share the output of their unique sources wit

other American and Vietnamese agencies that they viewed as potentia

rivals for power and infl uence. The worst drawback of the system, from 

the standpoint of its effect on the conduct of the war, was the timin

of its creation. Set up after, rather than before, American troops wer

committed to battle, it took the better part of two years to become full

operational and to assemble a really comprehensive body of data o

the enemy. Until then, MACV and its subordinate commands had t

fi ght, in the words of a Marine offi cer, “half-blind and nearly deaf.”46

The Advisory Mission

MACV’s responsibility for advice and support to the South Vie

namese armed forces continued after the arrival of American troop

and its organization for discharging this duty became the subject o

periodic review. Command and administration of the advisers was d

vided between MACV and its service components. Navy and Air Forc

advisers were under the operational control of their respective compo

nent headquarters. Army advisory teams in the fi eld worked under th

III MAF and I and II Field Force commanders, who functioned as senio

advisers to their counterpart Vietnamese corps commanders. The adv

sory groups in IV Corps, where no major U.S. combat units operated

and those with the Airborne Division and other specialized Vietnames

commands, remained directly under MACV.47

After the abolition of the Military Assistance Advisory Group i

mid-1964, MACV was without a single staff focal point for the advisor

program. Each headquarters directorate advised its Joint General Sta

counterpart on matters within its regular cognizance. Under J3 supe

vision, the MACV Training Directorate controlled the U.S. Army advi

ers with the South Vietnamese Central Training Command, the ARVN 

schools and training centers, and the ranger, artillery, and armor com

mands. Also under J3, the Political Warfare Advisory Directorate worke

with the RVNAF General Political Warfare Department—the arme

forces’ propaganda, troop indoctrination, and social welfare agency—a

well as discharging a variety of staff responsibilities for American psy

chological warfare and civic action. The Military Assistance Program 

(MAP) Directorate, which reported directly to the MACV chief of staf

oversaw the management of fi nancial and materiel aid to the Sout

Vietnamese. The MACV comptroller, through his Vietnamese Advisor

Division, for practical purposes made up the South Vietnamese defens

budget and monitored Saigon’s spending and fi scal management. B

late 1967, the Military Assistance Command’s headquarters containe

Chap 8.indd 288 
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MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

about 1,000 American advisers—not counting those with tactical units, 

provinces, and districts—distributed among or reporting to more than 

a score of different staff agencies.48

At the top, the advisory effort possessed a degree of unity. General 

Westmoreland, as senior American adviser to the South Vietnamese 

armed forces, conferred regularly with General Cao Van Vien, chief 

of the Joint General Staff. Westmoreland used his deputies to oversee the South Vietnamese forces, and in mid-1967 he placed General 

Abrams in charge of the entire RVNAF improvement program. He also 

employed a special assistant for liaison with the South Vietnamese 

Ministry of Defense and Joint General Staff. The holders of this position, Brig. Gen. James L. Collins and his successor, Brig. Gen. John F. 

Freund, represented Westmoreland at conferences with the Vietnamese and on combined inspections. They also cultivated informal contacts with key Vietnamese offi cers, both to obtain information and to 

exercise behind-the-scenes infl uence on Saigon’s political and military 

affairs. Below Westmoreland, his deputy, and his special assistant, however, no element existed in the MACV staff to pull together the effort 

to strengthen the South Vietnamese forces. In consequence, as General 

Bruce Palmer put it, there was “a lack of cohesiveness, a lack of overall 

direction and control, a lack of . . . supervision, and a lack of coordination” in the command’s dealings with the South Vietnamese.49

During 1966 an initiative by Secretary McNamara forced MACV to 

review its advisory organization and procedures. McNamara directed 

the transfer of the foreign aid-funded Military Assistance Program to 

the individual armed services, each of which from then on was to support its Vietnamese counterpart out of its own appropriations. This 

change involved the service component commands in planning and 

funding military assistance, necessitating a reconsideration of the 

MACV advisory structure. The review, however, was inconclusive. Arguing that only one American headquarters should deal with Saigon’s 

army high command, General Westmoreland rejected a recommendation from his Army component command—which had been retitled 

U.S. Army, Vietnam (USARV), in July 1965—that it should assume responsibility for the entire Army advisory program in much the same 

way as the other service components had taken charge of their own 

advisers. In July, Westmoreland approved the shift of the logistical advisory mission from the MACV Logistics Directorate to USARV, which 

established a general staff section to conduct it; but he kept the rest of 

the Army advisers under MACV. Further, to pull together the advisory 

effort, the MACV commander in December established a deputy J3 for 

RVNAF matters. The fi rst incumbent of this position, Brig. Gen. Albert 

R. Brownfi eld, later succeeded General Freund as Westmoreland’s liaison offi cer with the Joint General Staff.50

The issue arose again the following year, in the context of a reorganization of American support for pacifi cation and of a new emphasis 

Chap 8.indd 289 
290

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

by the Johnson administration on improving the South Vietnames

forces. In June 1967, the J5 directorate undertook a full-dress study

called Project 640, of a number of alternatives for unifying the com

mand’s advisory function. These included reestablishing the Militar

Assistance Advisory Group, enlarging or reducing the advisory role o

USARV, and creating some new advisory focal point in the MACV staf

The J5 planners rejected the idea of a revived MAAG as proliferatin

headquarters and re-creating an arrangement earlier found unsatisfac

tory. In September, they recommended that MACV establish an assi

tant chief of staff for military assistance to handle both Military Assi

tance Program and advisory matters and that it take back from USAR

the Army advisory functions so as to avoid division of authority an

duplication of effort.51

Westmoreland approved these recommendations. The Offi ce o

Assistant Chief of Staff for Military Assistance went into operation i

November 1967, headed by an Army brigadier general. Its mission wa

“to supervise, coordinate, monitor, and evaluate, in conjunction wit

appropriate agencies,” the joint advisory effort and the Military Assi

tance Program. The section’s 29-man staff came largely from the MA

Directorate, which the new agency absorbed, and was broken into tw

divisions: one for military assistance and the other for plans, polic

and advisory support. Early the following year MACV transferred th

ARVN logistics advisory program, and the personnel who administere

it, from USARV headquarters back to itself. While some improvemen

these changes still left the actual conduct of advice to the South Vie

namese scattered throughout the headquarters, with the new militar

assistance offi ce limited to oversight and coordination. MACV, for ex

ample, dispersed the logistical functions it reclaimed from U.S. Arm

Vietnam, among four separate staff divisions. As a result, at the begin

ning of 1968, four years after abolition of the MAAG, Westmoreland

headquarters still lacked a single advisory organization capable o

bringing to bear unifi ed, effective American infl uence for reform an

modernization of the South Vietnamese armed forces.52

Reporting, Research, and Analysis

The Military Assistance Command confronted steadily expandin

requirements for the collection, reporting, and analysis of data abou

its multifarious activities. In response, the number of reports generate

by MACV and its subordinate headquarters grew to impressive propo

tions. The Intelligence Directorate produced, among others, a monthl

enemy order of battle summary; daily, weekly, and monthly intelligenc

summaries; the weekly estimates updates that were the basis of Genera

Westmoreland’s Saturday staff conferences; and the PERINTREPs. Th

Operations Directorate issued a daily SITREP, a weekly operations sum

mary, weekly and monthly U.S./RVNAF/Free World Forces orders o

Chap 8.indd 290 
291

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

battle, and a monthly herbicide use summary. Still other reports, many 

requiring extensive data-gathering in the fi eld, dealt with subjects of 

special concern to MACV and higher authorities. Thus, in February 

1966, MACV instituted a monthly measurements-of-progress briefi ng, 

summarized quarterly for CINCPAC, on achievement of the military 

and pacifi cation goals set at the Honolulu conference. Another series 

of reports dealt with RVNAF improvement. The Hamlet Evaluation System (HES), introduced early in 1967, attempted to measure the degree 

of government and Viet Cong control in each of Vietnam’s thousands 

of hamlets. By early 1967 MACV and its component commands were 

producing nearly 400 different reports on a regular basis. In addition, 

MACV received constant demands for special reports from the National 

Military Command Center and the White House, especially when controversial or unfavorable Vietnam stories broke in the news media.53

Authorities in Washington and Saigon tinkered continually with the 

reporting system. They attempted to resolve discrepancies between the 

various sets of statistics and to arrive at common terminology and criteria for measuring such signifi cant indicators as the number of enemy 

attacks, the rate of infi ltration from North Vietnam, and the percentage 

of peasants under government control. Above all, they sought a simple 

set of reliable indexes of progress, or lack of it, in the many-faceted 

campaign. In late 1967 a presidentially appointed interagency working group reviewed the data then used to measure trends in the war 

in South Vietnam. The group concluded that “data most frequently 

used [are] not adequate for [the] task” and recommended creation of 

still another interagency task force, chaired by the director of central 

intelligence, to develop “new ways of measuring progress.” Admiral 

Sharp and General Abrams, who responded for Westmoreland, both 

endorsed the goals of the interagency group. Abrams pointed out that 

MACV already had efforts of its own under way to improve its evaluation of RVNAF development and pacifi cation. The command’s aim, he 

reported to General Wheeler in a masterpiece of management jargon, 

was to be able to conduct “extensive analysis using all systems . . . to 

develop management utility devices, concentrating on correlating program progress/effectiveness indicators against burden parameters to assist in program planning, control, and feedback for re-planning.”54

With ever-growing amounts of data to process, the Military Assistance Command headquarters inevitably turned to automation. The 

various staff agencies made early and extensive use of punch-card and 

tape machines, and the Intelligence Directorate secured a computer to 

manage its growing data bases. However, the headquarters as a whole 

was slow to acquire its own computer and instead sent most of its operational data to Pacifi c Command for processing in its machine—an 

arrangement that seemed satisfactory until the extent of MACV’s information requirements became apparent. During 1965 and 1966 study 

teams from Pacifi c Command, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the AdChap 8.indd 291 
292

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

vanced Research Projects Agency all reviewed MACV’s informatio

management practices and problems. While their conclusions varie

in specifi cs, they all indicated the desirability of establishing a centra

computerized data processing agency for the headquarters.55

During 1967, at the ARPA team’s recommendation, MACV installe

in its new building an IBM 360 model computer, then the most ad

vanced available, as the centerpiece of a Data Management Agenc

serving the entire staff. Within a year, the Data Management Agenc

automated most of the command’s operational, intelligence, and logi

tics fi les, as well as the Hamlet Evaluation System and the reports o

military assistance and RVNAF performance. To simplify the transfer o

data to other headquarters, MACV whenever possible used compute

programs and information formats compatible with those elsewhere i

the Defense Department. The Combat Operations Center, for exampl

managed its computerized daily journal with the same system used b

the National Military Command Center.56

With increasing amounts of readily retrievable, easily manipulate

data, MACV expanded its capacity to analyze its operations, both t

improve effi ciency and effectiveness and to support its positions in di

cussions with the Department of Defense. In September 1967 Gener

Westmoreland decided to establish a MACV Systems Analysis Divisio

under his deputy chief of staff. The new division was to perform prima

ily short-range operational studies of immediate benefi t to the comman

and also to coordinate analysis by the service components. Seeking t

place the eighteen-man offi ce in operation as rapidly as possible, Wes

moreland secured agreement from the Joint Chiefs to expedite approv

of the necessary change to the MACV organization table and assistanc

from the Offi ce of the Secretary of Defense in recruiting qualifi ed civi

ian analysts and computer programmers. As a nucleus for the division

he obtained three offi cer-analysts and three enlisted men from withi

Vietnam. With this skeleton staff, the MACV Operations Research/Sy

tems Analysis Offi ce (MACEVAL) began work in mid-November. It ha

the missions of conducting studies employing “the disciplines of op

erations research” as directed by the MACV commander, advising him 

on systems analysis matters, and overseeing the overall analysis effo

within the command. As its fi rst major assignment, the offi ce unde

took an examination of methods for measuring the comparative com

bat capabilities of American and South Vietnamese forces.57

The systems analysis agency was a latecomer to the Military Assi

tance Command’s effort to apply science and technology to the Vie

nam confl ict. Throughout the buildup, the service testing and deve

opment units—the Army Concept Team in Vietnam, the Air Force Te

Unit, and the more recently created U.S. Navy Research and Develop

ment Team, Vietnam—continued in operation, as did the Advance

Research Projects Agency’s fi eld unit which assisted South Vietnames

military research and development. In addition, MACV drew upon th

Chap 8.indd 292 
293

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

resources of the Offi ce of the Director, Defense Research and Engineering, and outside contractors such as the RAND Corporation for studies 

of problems ranging from hamlet security to assessment of the effects 

of allied propaganda on the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese. 

During 1966 General Westmoreland once again reorganized MACV’s 

research, development, and testing elements. With the concurrence of 

Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs, the MACV commander abolished 

the Joint Research and Testing Agency. He transferred the service test 

units, and the responsibility for service-peculiar development and testing, to the respective component commanders. In Westmoreland’s 

view, this function properly belonged to the components, which with 

the buildup of American forces possessed the resources to discharge it. 

The MACV commander, through his assistant chief of staff, J3, continued to supervise the services’ research and testing. He retained the 

right to veto projects unrelated to immediate operational needs and to 

assign projects of joint signifi cance to particular service test agencies.58

The ARPA Field Unit remained in MACV headquarters and came 

under the supervision of the newly established scientifi c adviser to the 

commander. In March 1966, the Joint Chiefs of Staff suggested that 

General Westmoreland add to his staff a prominent civilian scientist 

who could serve as his technical adviser and maintain contact with the 

scientifi c and engineering communities in the United States. Westmoreland, who had been thinking along the same lines, at once accepted 

the proposal. The Offi ce of MACV Scientifi c Adviser went into operation in December, headed by Dr. William G. McMillan. A chemistry 

professor from the University of California at Los Angeles, McMillan 

possessed an extensive background as a Defense Department scientifi c 

consultant; he had been nominated for the MACV position by Assistant 

Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Dr. John W. Foster. 

As MACV scientifi c adviser, Dr. McMillan counseled General Westmoreland on scientifi c and technical matters, exercised staff supervision 

over the ARPA fi eld unit, and continually reviewed development, testing, and evaluation within the command. He also kept in touch with 

the director of defense research and engineering and alerted Westmoreland to new technologies potentially worth trying out in Vietnam.59

During his offi ce’s fi rst year in operation, Dr. McMillan’s responsibilities rapidly expanded. At General Westmoreland’s invitation, the 

scientifi c adviser lived with the MACV commander in his villa and 

participated in the weekly MACV staff conferences. Westmoreland assigned McMillan specifi c projects of command interest, for example, 

assessment of all available advanced technologies that might help locate and destroy the North Vietnamese artillery bombarding American positions from north of the Demilitarized Zone. To help unify the 

decentralized research efforts of the services, the science adviser during 1967 instituted biweekly seminars attended by representatives of 

all commands even peripherally involved in development and testing, 

Chap 8.indd 293 
294

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

including the Special Forces and the Studies and Observations Group

and also the scientifi c offi ce of the U.S. embassy.60

Inevitably, the scientifi c adviser sought to enlarge his empir

Early in December 1967, McMillan presented Westmoreland with 

plan to attach science advisers to fi eld commanders down to indepen

dent brigade level and to bring the “fragmented” service research an

development agencies back under MACV’s direct control. To manag

all this, the Offi ce of the Scientifi c Adviser would add to its existin

strength of 1 civilian, 4 offi cers, and 2 enlisted men a brigadier gen

eral deputy scientifi c adviser, 5 other offi cers, a warrant offi cer, and 

enlisted men. Still not satisfi ed with his command’s ability to brin

scientifi c expertise quickly to bear on operational problems, Genera

Westmoreland proved receptive to McMillan’s proposals. Elsewher

however, the MACV historian dryly recorded, they “did not exper

ence smooth sailing.” The combat commanders saw no need for sc

entifi c advisers, and Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs rejected th

proposal out of hand. In the end, it produced only one tangible re

sult. General Westmoreland early in 1968 “double-hatted” Dr. McMi

lan as science adviser to the deputy commanding general of USAR

and placed a civilian deputy to McMillan at the Army componen

headquarters. According to the USARV deputy commander, this a

rangement strengthened the tie between the combat forces and th

research and development community. Field commanders, howeve

continued to complain that it took too long for new devices, once th

need for them had been established, to be produced and delivered t

troops.61

While MACEVAL and the Offi ce of the Scientifi c Adviser generate

an increasing volume of studies, the extent of their infl uence on com

mand decisions is open to question. Signifi cantly, the chief of the Sy

tems Analysis Offi ce did not regularly attend General Westmoreland

weekly strategy meetings, though “requirements for him emerged from 

those meetings.” Westmoreland later insisted that he based his majo

decisions on “the feel of the battlefi eld, the situation, and knowledg

of the fundamentals of tactics and history” and that systems analys

“usually verifi ed the tactical judgment.” The terms in which he di

cussed such issues in private “back channel” messages to Admiral Shar

and General Wheeler tend to bear out this statement.62

Most of the reports and analyses emanating from MACV and th

echelons below and above it were based on quantitative measuremen

of various aspects of the war—friendly and enemy casualties, weapon

captured, miles of road and waterway opened, percentage of populatio

under government control, number of battalion-size North Vietnames

and Viet Cong attacks, and so on and on. From General Westmorelan

down, American commanders in Vietnam realized that many of th

numbers upon which they relied so heavily were of questionable origi

and accuracy. They also appreciated that many aspects of the uncon

Chap 8.indd 294 
295

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

ventional, diffuse confl ict in which they were engaged did not lend 

themselves to quantifi cation. Admiral Sharp declared in August 1967: 

“In my opinion, we have trapped ourselves because of our obsession 

to quantify everything. . . . I suggest that we attempt to move away 

from the great dependence on demonstrating our results with numbers 

and concentrate on the less tangible but more important results of our 

operations.” Nevertheless, in a war without front lines and decisive 

battles, statistics remained the only available measurement of progress; and Secretary McNamara continually demanded more of them. 

Moreover, even fl awed data, when properly analyzed, could yield valid 

insights and contribute to a more effective strategy.63

Unfortunately, statistics also were used for public relations. As the 

war became more controversial in the United States, MACV felt increasingly heavy pressure from higher authorities to produce data demonstrating progress. Inconsistencies in the fi gures or changes in them that 

appeared unfavorable—even if they resulted from alterations in terminology or counting methods—regularly led to questions in Congress 

and the news media and consternation in the White House, Pentagon, 

and State Department. Major substantive controversies within MACV 

and between MACV and other agencies, such as that over what forces 

should be included in the enemy order of battle, became inextricably 

intertwined with administration efforts to shape public perceptions 

of the war. In these and other instances, statistics and their analysis 

became not management tools, but weapons in public relations campaigns and policy battles. Operational analysis in the Vietnam confl ict 

too often served, to paraphrase Clausewitz, as a continuation of politics by other means.64

How Joint the Command?

As the Military Assistance Command headquarters expanded, the 

services continued their tug-of-war over the distribution of key staff 

positions. Underlying the disputes over control of particular slots remained the question whether the MACV headquarters should have 

genuinely balanced service representation or whether it should continue—as the absorption of the MAAG in 1964 had left it—as essentially an Army organization with limited participation by the other 

services. General Westmoreland, backed by the Army chief of staff and 

to a lesser degree by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Wheeler, adhered to the latter position. He maintained that, since ground 

operations predominated in the Vietnam confl ict; since MACV performed a number of purely U.S. Army functions, such as administering the 

Army advisory program; and since the South Vietnamese Army was the 

largest and most important of the Vietnamese armed forces that received 

MACV’s assistance and advice, U.S. Army members had to occupy the majority of command and staff positions in the joint headquarters.65

Chap 8.indd 295 
296

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

The other services disagreed, particularly the Air Force. Air Forc

leaders persisted in their claim that the Joint Chiefs and the secretar

of defense intended MACV to be “a single unifi ed headquarters wit

a well-balanced Joint Staff,” not a thinly disguised single service com

mand. They also contended that MACV was not making use of the fu

range of American military expertise, particularly that of airmen, i

conducting an increasingly complex war. Lt. Gen. Joseph H. Moor

the 2d Air Division commander, told Westmoreland late in 1965, “Th

size of the forces assigned to your command and the complexity of th

policy, planning, and management problems generated by these com

bined forces surely favors the requirement for a strong, well-balance

unifi ed joint staff.”66

The Army’s grip on MACV tightened during 1965. Lacking a re

placement for General Youngdale, the Marine Corps surrendered b

default the post of assistant chief of staff, J2, to the Army, which ha

long coveted it and which possessed a qualifi ed candidate in Gen

eral McChristian. When General Throckmorton had to step down a

deputy COMUSMACV due to a back ailment, the Marine Corps an

the Air Force both nominated general offi cers to succeed him. Gen

eral Westmoreland, however, preferred an Army deputy, and the Join

Chiefs reluctantly appointed General Heintges, only because he wa

the MACV commander’s fi rst choice for the position. The Air Forc

won a partial victory in May, with the assignment of General Moore t

additional duty as MACV deputy commander for air, but complaine

that Moore’s terms of reference, issued by Westmoreland, gave him 

only nominal authority. Army predominance extended to the lowe

ranks as well. At the end of 1965, more than 1,600 of the 2,400 MAC

headquarters personnel were from the Army.67

Early in 1965, under pressure from the Joint Chiefs, General Wes

moreland incorporated increased Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corp

representation in a new MACV headquarters Joint Table of Distributio

(JTD) then being prepared. The changes, he declared, were “in con

sideration of the greater emphasis now being placed on air and nava

activities.” Early in April, Westmoreland also recommended creatio

of a new MACV deputy chief of staff position, to be fi lled by an A

Force brigadier general, and the advancement of the chief of the Nava

Advisory Group, the senior naval offi cer at MACV, to fl ag rank. He als

expanded Air Force and Navy representation in the intelligence, opera

tions, logistics, and planning directorates by transferring to those service

various branch chief or deputy chief positions or by adding Navy and A

Force deputies to Army-headed branches. Out of a proposed total increas

of 100 offi cers in the general staff directorates, Westmoreland reserve

about one-third for the Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps.68

This JTD, submitted in May, was overtaken by the accelerate

American troop buildup of the last half of the year. Accordingly, in lat

August, with another headquarters distribution table in preparation

Chap 8.indd 296 
297

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

Westmoreland assigned four senior offi cers, one from each service, to 

make an “objective” analysis of each position and to determine which 

service was “best able to provide the expertise” to fulfi ll its “functional 

requirements.” He perhaps slanted the outcome, however, by requiring that the offi cers take into account the service composition of forces 

under the Military Assistance Command; the fact that COMUSMACV 

was not responsible for out-of-country air operations; and MACV’s 

three principal missions: as a subordinate unifi ed headquarters, as adviser to the South Vietnamese armed forces, and, “most pertinent,” as 

a senior ground force tactical headquarters.69

The board reported to Westmoreland in October. Besides endorsing the earlier changes in favor of the other services, it recommended 

the addition of an Air Force deputy director of personnel and more 

Navy and Air Force division and branch chiefs in the other general 

staff sections. General Moore, the board’s Air Force member, refused to 

endorse the recommendations on grounds that they still left his service underrepresented. He argued that the positions of MACV directors 

of intelligence and communications/electronics should go to the Air 

Force, along with those of deputy assistant chiefs of staff for operations 

and logistics and deputy chief, Engineering Division, J4. Partially meeting Moore’s requests, Westmoreland, in order “to mollify . . . the Air 

Force zealots who are interested in greater representation on the MACV 

staff,” agreed to shift the J6 position from the Army to the Air Force 

after the departure of the incumbent, General Lotz, who was then engaged in establishing MACV’s communications organization. At the 

same time, as a gesture to the marines, he awarded them the post of 

chief of the Combat Operations Center. When he submitted the new 

JTD to General Wheeler and Admiral Sharp early in November, he declared that the resulting staff was “reasonably balanced with regard to 

the composition of the forces and the character of the operations” and 

“provides the professional expertise we need to do the job, considering 

the unique conditions under which we operate here as opposed to the 

classic organization of a joint staff.”70

In spite of Westmoreland’s concessions to the Air Force and Marine 

Corps, among the Joint Chiefs, only Army Chief of Staff Johnson, fully 

supported the new headquarters organization. The Navy, Air Force, 

and Marine chiefs all believed their services deserved more representation. Each service had its list of desired MACV staff positions, most 

then held by the Army. Air Force Chief of Staff McConnell, insisted his 

service should have the personnel, intelligence, or operations directorates in addition to communications/electronics and also made a bid, 

quickly quashed, to take the Combat Operations Center away from 

the marines. General Wheeler loyally upheld his joint commander but 

privately told Westmoreland that he thought the proposed JTD shortchanged the other services. The Joint Chiefs did not act on the November JTD proposal until mid-May of 1966 and then they submitted 

Chap 8.indd 297 
298

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

a split paper. The Air Force and Marine Corps formally dissented whil

the Navy endorsed the MACV proposal but with reservations. Deput

Secretary of Defense Vance, acting for McNamara, approved the majo

ity recommendation.71

Westmoreland had won the battle, but by the narrowest of ma

gins, as General Wheeler made clear in transmitting the fi nal Defens

Department decision. The chairman warned Westmoreland that Nav

Air Force, and Marine discontent with their representation at MAC

was “deep-seated and will persist”; hence, Westmoreland in the futur

must “go further in bringing offi cers of other Services into importan

positions. . . . Within the confi nes of effi ciency,” Wheeler concluded

“the staffi ng of the joint effort should move in the direction of wide

participation.” In response, Westmoreland promised that service rep

resentation in his headquarters would “continue to be the object o

timely, objective analysis,” although in the future he planned to review 

specifi c functions rather than, as in the August 1965 effort, attemptin

to study the entire headquarters. To be sure, as new staff organization

proliferated, the general did attempt to promote service balance. In th

MACV Construction Directorate, for instance, one-fourth of the 14

personnel were Navy and Marine and another fourth Air Force. Gen

eral Dunn had a Navy Civil Engineering Corps captain as deputy an

an Air Force lieutenant colonel as executive offi cer. Air Force offi ce

headed two of the directorate’s seven divisions.72

After mid-1966, the interservice battle over MACV’s compositio

declined in intensity. The headquarters remained predominately Arm

in personnel and procedures, but the other services, while still le

than satisfi ed with their representation, appear to have accepted Arm

domination of MACV as a fact of life. General Westmoreland empha

sized interservice teamwork and fair play, seemingly to good effect. Th

fi rst marine to head the Combat Operations Center, General Jones, re

called that his Army colleagues were “quite interested in knowing th

viewpoints of the other services and in trying to develop a teamwor

that was necessary to run the command.” From his viewpoint, Admira

Sharp preferred an Army-heavy MACV headquarters. So constituted

the Military Assistance Command was sure to remain oriented on i

main task, carrying on the ground war in South Vietnam. In addition

MACV’s lack of a truly joint staff reduced the likelihood of its bein

removed from under Sharp and made a separate unifi ed command—a

eventuality that the Navy had been determined to prevent since th

fi rst discussions of MACV’s establishment.73

During the years of the American buildup, the internal structur

of Military Assistance Command headquarters became steadily mor

complex. New or expanded functions produced new organization

Individual efforts at staff empire-building further accelerated this pro

cess. The insatiable information demands of the American policy e

tablishment brought proliferation of reports and the elaboration of th

Chap 8.indd 298 
299

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

headquarters’ data management and communications systems. As new 

offi ces were created and old ones expanded, the services maneuvered 

for staff positions and command infl uence, the better to promote their 

interests and advance their views on the conduct of the war. The complexity of MACV’s internal structure was matched by that of its external relationships as it attempted to carry out its combat, advisory, and 

pacifi cation missions in South Vietnam and to infl uence operations in 

the wider Southeast Asian theater.

Chap 8.indd 299 
300

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Notes

1 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.B.3, p. 125. MACV Command History, 1965, p

74–75, 91. 2 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 91–92. Quote is from Rpt, ARPA, Proje

AGILE, “Information Handling in Headquarters MACV: An Analysis and Recommen

dation for ADP Support (hereafter cited as “MACV Information Handling”),” 1 Feb 6

p. iii, Historians fi les, CMH. For an overview of MACV’s structure early in 1967, see p

34–117 of this report. For the structure later in the year, see HQ MACV Interim Tel

phone Directory, copy in NAVFORV Ops Files (7), box 431, COMNAVFORV Record

Naval Historical Center. 3 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 247–48; MACV Command History, 196

pp. 135–36. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1811 to Wheeler, 2 Apr 65; and Westmorelan

MAC 5017 to Wheeler and Sharp, 8 Oct 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–3

Jun 65 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. MS, Lt Col Adrian G. Traas, “Builders and Fighter

Military Engineering in Southeast Asia,” ch. 11, pp. 26–27, CMH. 4 MACV Command History, 1966, p. 145. Westmoreland Hist Briefi ngs, 26 Apr 6

and 3 May 66, tab F, Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66) and tab A, Westm

reland Hist File 6 (24 Apr–28 May 66). Both in CMH. MFR, Westmoreland, 6 May 6

sub: Meeting with Prime Minister Ky, 1100–1130 hrs, 6 May 66, tab B–3, Westmorelan

Hist File 6 (24 Apr–28 May 66), CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3332 and 3628 

Sharp, 28 Apr 66 and 6 May 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. Traa

“Builders and Fighters,” ch. 11, pp. 27–28. 5 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 154; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 6–1

Aug 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 20 (4–20 Aug 67), CMH. For description of th

complex, see Traas, “Builders and Fighters,” ch. 11, p. 28. Quote is from Bruce E. Jone

War Without Windows: A True Account by a Young Army Offi cer Trapped in an Intelligen

Cover-Up in Vietnam (New York: Vanguard, 1987), p. 142. 6 Quote is from Msg, Woolnough WDC 8360 to Westmoreland, 29 Sep 65, Westm

reland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1587 to Wheeler an

Sharp, 24 Mar 65; Westmoreland MAC 8578 to Sharp, 1 Oct 66; Westmoreland MA

1888 to Johnson, 25 Feb 67; Westmoreland MAC 7684 to Lt Gen Frederick Weyand, 1

Aug 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65; 1 Oct–31 Dec 66; 1 Jan–31 M

67; and 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 160–63. Westmor

land’s rationale for the one-year tour can be found in A Soldier Reports, pp. 294–97. 7 On selections in other services, see Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0293 to Krulak, 1

Jan 66; Wheeler JCS 3299–67 to Westmoreland, 4 May 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 

May 67; Westmoreland MAC 7454, to Sharp and Lt Gen Horace M. Wade, USAF, 9 Au

67; Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 25 Feb 67, tab B, Wes

moreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67). Westmoreland’s dealings with Gen Johnso

on Army rotations can be followed through his Msg Files and History Files. See als

Interv, Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Program with Gen Bruce Palmer, Jr., 1975, pp. 20

205–06, 210–12, 214–15, 246–47, MHI. 8 Detail on life in Saigon can be found in USMACV, General Information Brochure, 

Jun 66, copy in CMH fi les; Suplizio Interv, 17 and 24, Jul 86, passim; Col Francis Fo

Parry, USMC, Three-War Marine (New York: Jove Books, 1989), pp. 260–62, 272–74; an

Jones, War Without Windows, passim. MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 145–4

Westmoreland’s views on working hours can be found in address to Joint US Senior O

fi cers’ Conference, 13 Oct 67, summarized in Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–13 Oct 6

tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 23 (1–15 Oct 67), CMH. 9 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 144–47. Ibid., 1967, p. 901. Msgs, Westmor

Chap 8.indd 300 
301

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

land MAC 3332 to Sharp, 28 Apr 66; Wheeler JCS 5039–66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 

24 Aug 66; Westmoreland MAC 7441 to Lodge, Sharp, and Wheeler, 27 Aug 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66 and 1 Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH. 10 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 146–47. MACV Command History, 

1966, pp. 147–48; ibid., 1967, 901–05; ibid., 1968, 2:803–06. 11 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 192–93, 196–97; Westmoreland Hist Briefing, 25 Feb 67, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67), CMH. 12 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 191–93. MACV, General Information Brochure, 1 Jun 66, pp. 19–20, CMH fi les. Interv, Charles B. MacDonald with Brig Gen 

Robert Ashworth, Columbia, S.C., 21 Jun 73, Notes in CMH fi les. For a personal view, 

see Jones, War Without Windows, pp. 41–43, 46–48. 13 Statistics on visitors: MACV Command History, 1967, p. 1199; see also ibid., 

1965, pp. 260–61. A sense of the dimensions of the visitor infl ux, and of MACV’s methods for handling them, can be gained from the Westmoreland Msg Files for 1965–67 

and the Westmoreland Historical Briefi ngs in his Hist Files for the same period. 14 For Westmoreland’s views on visitors, see Ltr, Westmoreland to Wheeler, 11 Nov 

64, tab 39, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–13 Nov 64); Westmoreland Hist Notes, 

5–11 Sep 65 and 1–20 May 67, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), and tab 

A, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67); All in CMH. MACV Command History, 

1967, pp. 1201–03. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6077 to Sharp et al., 1 Dec 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, Dec 65, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for CINCPAC, 18 Aug 67, sub: 

Assignment of C–140B Aircraft, SVN, COMUSMACV Signature (Sig) File, Aug 67. 15 DOD rules are summarized in MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 1199–2000; 

see also pp. 1202–04 and MACV Command History, 1965, p. 261. Msgs, Johnson WDC 

10558 to Westmoreland, 3 Dec 65; Sharp to Wheeler, 30 Dec 66; Westmoreland MAC 

12668 to Sharp, 26 Dec 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. 16 Quote is from Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 277. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 7227–

66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 25 Nov 66; Westmoreland MAC 5693 to Momyer, et 

al., 16 Jun 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 11 Oct 65, 

Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65) and 16 Feb 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist 

File 4 (30 Jan–13 Feb 66), CMH. For a sardonic view of MACV’s system for handling 

visitors, and of the visitors themselves, see William R. Corson, The Betrayal (New York: 

Ace Books, 1968), ch. 11. 17 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 101. 18 “Workaholic” characterization is from Palmer, 25-Year War, p. 40; see also pp. 

134–35. Westmoreland describes his routine and methods in A Soldier Reports, pp. 265–

68, 277–78, 284; but the best sense of his activities can be gained through his Historical 

Notes and Briefi ngs in the Westmoreland Hist Files, 1965–68, CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 11106 to Sharp, 21 Dec 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. 19 Quote is from Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 268. Palmer Interv, 1975, p. 

227, MHI. Parry, Three-War Marine, p. 284. Westmoreland Hist Briefi ng, 20 Mar 66, tab 

A, Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. MFRs of some of these meetings are reproduced in the Westmoreland Historical Files, CMH. For an example, see 

tab D–3, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66). 20 Quote is from Parry, Three-War Marine, pp. 262–63. Interv, Marine Corps Oral 

History Program with Lt Gen William K. Jones, USMC, 13 Apr–5 Jun 73, p. 26, MCHC. 

For an account of Westmoreland’s housemates, see Interv, Senior Offi cers Oral History 

Program with Maj Gen Spurgeon H. Neel, Jr., 1985, pp. 168–71, MHI. 21 Westmoreland explains his insistence on an Army deputy in Msgs MAC 5286 

and 5387 to Wheeler, 23 and 29 Oct 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, 

CMH.

Chap 8.indd 301 
302

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

22 General Heintges replaced General Throckmorton in November 1965 aft

Throckmorton was disabled by a back ailment. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 21 Oct 6

Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 526

to Wheeler, 21 Oct 65; Wheeler JCS 4001–65 to Westmoreland, 22 Oct 65; Woolnoug

WDC09469 to Westmoreland et al., 2 Nov 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oc–3

Dec 65, CMH. 23 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 214, 222; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 2

Mar–8 Apr 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–30 Apr 67), CMH. Msg

Wheeler JCS 2166–67 to Westmoreland, 22 Mar 67; Westmoreland MAC 2816 

Wheeler and Sharp, 24 Mar 67; Abrams to Westmoreland, WDC 4617, 10 Apr 67. All 

Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. Headquarters speculation is recounted in Lt Gen Joh

R. Chaisson, USMC, Oral History Transcript, 1975, pp. 56–58, History and Museum

Div, HQMC, and Kerwin Interv, 1980, pp. 347–48, 350–53; Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Ju

68, p. 470. 24 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 95; ARPA, Project AGILE, “MACV Inform

tion Handling,” pp. 11–12; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 22 and 29 Oct 65, Westmorelan

Hist Files 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65) and 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH; Msg, Westmorelan

MAC 5416 to Sharp, 30 Oct 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Parr

Three-War Marine, pp. 264–65, 286; Ltr, Col F. F. Parry, USMC, to E. O. Parry, 30 May 6

Parry Family Papers, MHI; Ltr, Westmoreland to Wheeler, 2 Dec [65], 1966 R–Z Folde

William E. DePuy Papers, MHI. 25 Quote is from Jones Interv, MCHC, pp. 3–4. Parry, Three-War Marine, pp. 264

266. ARPA, Project AGILE, “MACV Information Handling,” pp. 93–102. 26 ARPA, Project AGILE, “MACV Information Handling,” pp. 96–100. Quote is fro

Parry, Three-War Marine, p. 265. 27 Jones Interv, 13 Apr and 5 Jun 73, pp. 23–25, p. 88; Parry, Three-War Marine, p

266, 270; Ltr, Brig Gen John R. Chaisson to Mrs Chaisson, 22 Jan 67, box 6, John 

Chaisson Papers, Hoover Institution, Stanford, Calif. For Chaisson’s background, se

sketch in Chaisson Oral History. Westmoreland comments on his respect for Chai

son in Notes of General Westmoreland’s Conference with CMH Historians, 6 Dec 8

author’s fi les. CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 8055 to Gen Greene, CMC, 25 Aug 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. 28 Typical Westmoreland demands for contingency planning are in Westmorelan

Hist Briefi ngs, 24 Jul 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), and 4 Ja

67, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH. MACV Comman

History, 1965, pp. 421–23; ibid., 1966, pp. 745–54; ibid., 1967, pp. 1024–31. Quote 

from Interv, MacDonald with Westmoreland, 28 Jan 73, in MacDonald Notes, CM

fi les; in same fi le, see Westmoreland Interv, 12 Mar 73. 29 Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–20 May 67; MFR, Brig Gen A. M. Hendry, Jr., USA

12 May 67, sub: CIIC Meeting, 12 May 1967, tabs A and A–11, Westmoreland Hist Fi

17 (1–31 May 67), MFR, Col R. S. Breen, USMC, 22 Oct 67, sub: CIIB Meeting, 21 O

tober 1967, tab A–1, Westmoreland Hist File 24 (15 Oct–12 Nov 67). Both in CMH. F

the I Corps reinforcement planning, see Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 358–61. 30 Quote is from MACV Command History, 1965, p. 134; see also ibid., 1966, p

232–35. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 253. Traas, “Builders and Fighters

ch. 9, pp. 37–38. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 418. 31 MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 839–40. Traas, “Builders and Fighters,” c

9, pp. 1–10. 32 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 134–35. Traas, “Builders and Fighters,” ch. 9, p

10–11. Msgs, Throckmorton HWA 2069 to Westmoreland, 5 Aug 65; Wheeler JCS 4658–6

to Sharp, 1 Dec 65; JCS to CINCPAC, 4 Dec 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH.

Chap 8.indd 302 
303

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

33 Traas, “Builders and Fighters,” ch. 9, pp. 11–16; MACV Command History, 1965, 

p. 135; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 6176, 6257, 0179, 0215 to Sharp and Wheeler, 5 and 

6 Dec 65 and 9 and 10 Jan 66; Westmoreland MAC 0459 to Wheeler, 18 Jan 66; Msgs, 

Wheeler JCS 4761–65, 4934–65, 0205–66, 0227–66 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 7 and 

18 Dec 65 and 13 and 15 Jan 66; Wheeler JCS 0103–66 to Westmoreland, 6 Jan 66; 

Sharp to Wheeler, 22 Dec 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. 34 Traas, “Builders and Fighters,” ch. 9, pp. 19–38. Dunn came to South Vietnam 

from South Korea by way of Washington, where he met with senior DOD offi cials; 

Msgs, Woolnough WDC 00369 and 00411 to Beach, 11 and 12 Jan 66; Westmoreland 

MAC 2751 to Sharp, Wheeler, and Johnson, 7 Apr 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 

1 Jan–31 Mar 66, and 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. 35 This discussion is based on Maj Gen T. M. Rienzi, Communications-Electronics, 

1962–1970, Vietnam Studies (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1972), chs. 

1 and 2. See also MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 392–94. 36 John D. Bergen, Military Communications: A Test for Technology, United States 

Army in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1986), pp. 167, 170–

71, 175–85; Rienzi, Communications-Electronics, pp. 22–27, 40– 41, 47–48, 57–59; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 16 Nov 65, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65); 

and 23 Jan 66, tab F, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. 37 Bergen, Military Communications, pp. 291, 310–11. Rienzi, CommunicationsElectronics, ch. 7. For comment on the effect of rapid communications, see Parry, ThreeWar Marine, p. 266. 38 MS, Col Robert Sholly, “The Role of the Inspector General, Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam, 1964–1971,” n.d., pp. i–iii, 1–43, CMH fi les. Manuscript provided 

the author by Colonel Sholly. Westmoreland’s views on IG: Westmoreland Hist Notes, 

5 Nov 65, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65). Msgs, Westmoreland to 

Wheeler, MAC 2837, 10 Apr 66; Wheeler to Westmoreland and Sharp, JCS 2256–66. 

Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. 39 The defi ciencies of the MACV J2 as of early 1965 are described in Interv, Senior 

Offi cers Oral History Program with Brig Gen Glenn Muggleberg, 1985, pp. 6–7, 18–19, 

20–22, MHI. For additional comment on U.S. intelligence defi ciencies, see Palmer, 25–

Year War, pp. 39–40. 40 Maj Gen Joseph A. McChristian, The Role of Military Intelligence, Vietnam Studies (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1974), pp. 3–5. Msgs, Westmoreland 

MAC 2621 to Johnson, 17 May 65; Richardson WDC 04380 to Westmoreland and 

Walters, 20 May 65. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. McChristian’s work habits and relationship with Westmoreland are described in Muggleberg 

Interv, 1985, pp. 23–24; see also pp. 8–9. 41 McChristian, Military Intelligence, pp. 6–20, 148–49. ARPA, Project AGILE, “MACV 

Information Handling,” pp. 45–89, describes the MACV intelligence establishment as 

of early 1967. Ltr, McChristian to Maj Gen J. E. Thomas, ACSI, USAF, 1 Nov 66, CMH 

fi les. Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 326–327; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 465–67; 

ibid., 1968, 2:582–88. MACV J2 PERINTREP, vol. 1, 1 Jan–30 Jun 66, pp. i–ii, copy in 

MHI, is the fi rst issue of the series. Muggleberg Interv, 1985, pp. 13–16, describes J2’s 

contacts with the Studies and Observations Group and the attachés. 42 MACV Command History, 1968, 2:569–70. Muggleberg Interv, 1985, pp. 9–10. 

43 McChristian, Military Intelligence, pp. 11, 21–24. The Vietnamese intelligence establishment and its relation to MACV J2 are discussed in Col Hoang Ngoc Lung, Intelligence, 

Indochina Monographs. (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1982), pp. 11–17, 

37–78, 82–83. MACV Command History, 1968, 2:569. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1 Sep 65, 

Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. A Soldier Reports, p. 254.

Chap 8.indd 303 
304

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

44 MACV Command History, 1968, 2: 571, 574–80. McChristian, Military Inte

ligence, pp. 26–44. 45 Quote is from MACV Command History, 1968, 2:571–72. McChristian, Milita

Intelligence, pp. 45–64. Jones, War Without Windows, chs. 5 and 6, describes CICV fro

the perspective of a junior intelligence offi cer. 46 Quote is from Brig Gen Edwin H. Simmons, USMC, in Graham A. Cosmas an

Lt Col Terrence P. Murray, USMC, U.S. Marines in Vietnam: Vietnamization and Redeplo

ment, 1970–1971 (Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, HQMC, 1986

p. 255. McChristian, Military Intelligence, pp. 38, 127, 149–54. Muggleberg Interv, 198

pp. 16–17. Jones, War Without Windows, pp. 61–62, 92–94; Memo, CO, U.S. Naval Am

phibious School, for CNO, 17 Aug 66, sub: Debrief of Kidd, James L. . ., and Sutherlan

Ronald “V”. . ., pp. 3–4, 6, Vietnam Command Files, Naval Hist Ctr. Interv, Charles 

MacDonald with Lt Gen Phillip Davidson, 7 Sep 73, in MacDonald Notes, CMH fi le

Lung, Intelligence, p. 11. 47 MACV advisory organization is surveyed in Jeffrey J. Clarke, Advice and Suppor

The Final Years, 1965–1973, United States Army in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: Cent

of Military History, 1988), pp. 53–57. See also MACV Command History, 1967, p

129–32. 48 Clarke, Final Years, pp. 54–55, 76–77; Gen Cao Van Vien, et al., The U.S. Adv

sor, Indochina Monographs (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1980), p

34–38; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 94–96, 253–54, 448–50; ibid., 1967, p

221–31; Msg, Westmoreland MAC 8807 to Sharp, 17 Sep 67, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH; Memo, Col J. L. Clancy for COMUSMACV, et al., 17 Sep 67, su

Briefi ng on the Overall Status of the CY 1967 and CY 1968 GVN Defense Budgets, ta

A–7, Westmoreland Hist File 22 (10–30 Sep 67), CMH. 49 Quote is from Exit Interv, Historical Section, USARV, with Lt Gen Bruce Palme

Jr., 7 and 10 Jun 68, p. 253; See also Palmer Interv, 1975, pp. 217–18, MHI. Vien, et a

The U.S. Advisor, pp. 38–40. MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 453, 748. Westm

reland Hist Notes, 5 Jun 66; and Chronology, 1 Jan–30 Jun 66; tabs A and D–5, Wes

moreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 4074 an

MAC 5197 to Gen Johnson, 22 May 66 and 1 Jun 67. Both in Westmoreland Msg File

1 Apr–30 Jun 66 and 1 Apr–30 Jun 67, CMH. Neel Interv, 1985, p. 171. 50 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 67. MACV Command History, 196

pp. 244–245, 284–288, 453–454. Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, p. 252. Westmorelan

Hist Notes, 13 Dec 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH

Clarke, Final Years, p. 210. 51 Clarke, Final Years, pp. 209–10. MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 226–2

231–32. 52 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 142. MACV Command History, 196

pp. 233–35; ibid., 1968, 2:621–22. Clarke, Final Years, p. 210. 53 ARPA, Project AGILE, “MACV Information Handling,” apps. A and B, lists an

summarizes the major MACV reports. Msgs, Westmoreland to Sharp, 25 Sep 65; Wes

moreland MAC 1362 to Sharp, 17 Feb 66, Westmoreland Msg Files; Westmoreland Hi

Briefi ngs, 8 Mar 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66); CMH. Wes

moreland Hist Notes, 1–20 May 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67

CMH. MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 191–93, 622–25. Ltr, Col F. F. Parry, USMC

to E. O. Parry, 30 May 66, Parry Family Papers, MHI. 54 First quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 9573–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 8 No

67; second is from Msg, Abrams MAC 11159 to Wheeler and Sharp, 21 Nov 67. Both 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67, CMH. See also Msgs, Wheeler CJCS 0547–67 

Westmoreland and Sharp, 20 Jan 67; Westmoreland MAC 0753 to Wheeler, 23 Jan 6

Chap 8.indd 304 
305

MACV Headquarters: The Years of Expansion, 1965–1967

Sharp to Wheeler, 12 Feb 67; Sharp to Wheeler, 29 Nov 67. All in Westmoreland Msg 

Files. Ltr, Abrams to Gen Johnson, 23 Dec 67, Westmoreland Sig File, Dec 67. 55 Youngdale Interv, 5 Jun 75, p. 4. J2 automation is covered in McChristian, Military Intelligence, pp. 152–54. ARPA, Project AGILE, “ MACV Information Handling,” pp. 

9–20, 143–70, summarizes earlier studies and gives its own recommendation. 56 Msgs, Sharp to Wheeler, 12 Feb 67; Westmoreland MAC 1550 to Sharp, 14 Feb 

67. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 

1–13 Oct 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 23 (1–15 Oct 67); and 29 Nov–16 Dec 67, 

tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 26 (29 Nov–16 Dec 67). Both in CMH. MACV Command History, 1968, 2:711–12, 803–804. MACV Data Management Agency, Command 

Manual for Journal Data System, 6 Aug 68, copy in CMH fi les. In same collection, see 

manuals for other automated data bases. 57 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 8829 to Gen McConnell, 18 Sep 67; Westmoreland 

MAC 9558 to Gen Johnson, 12 Oct 67; Gen Johnson JCS 8692–67 to Westmoreland, 

14 Oct 67; Westmoreland MAC 10169 to Wheeler, 27 Oct 67; Wheeler JCS 9242–67 

to Westmoreland, 30 Oct 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. MACV Command 

History, 1967, pp. 1251–52; ibid., 1968, 1:332–33. 58 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 457; ibid., 1966, pp. 763–64; ibid., 1967, pp. 

863–65; ibid., 1968, 2:743–46. Ltr, Westmoreland to Dr John S. Foster, Jr., 30 Jul 67, 

Westmoreland Sig File, July 67, CMH. 59 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 763–64; ibid., 1967, pp. 862–63; ibid., 

1968, 2:744–46. Westmoreland Hist Briefi ngs, 15 Mar 66, tab E, Westmoreland Hist 

File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66) and 8 Oct 66, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 

66), CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 267–68. Msg, Wheeler JCS 5516–66 to 

Westmoreland and Sharp, 14 Sep 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 66. 60 Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 33247 to CINCPAC, 10 Oct 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 

1967, CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 265–68. MACV Command History, 

1967, p. 866. 61 Quote is from MACV Command History, 1968, 2:746–47; ibid., 1967, pp. 865–

66. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 11794 to Sharp, 6 Dec 67; Dr. Foster, OSD (DDR&E) 

11234 to Westmoreland, 30 Dec 67. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–31 Dec 67, 

CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 29 Nov–16 Dec 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 26 

(29 Nov–16 Dec 67), 28 Dec 67–31 Jan 68, tab A–1, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 

67–31 Jan 68), CMH. Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, p. 257. R & D delays are commented on in Interv, Senior Offi cer, Debriefi ng Program with Lt Gen William R. Peers, 

26 Jan and 12–15 Apr 77, sec. 3, pp. 18–19, MHI. Copy in CMH. 62 Westmoreland quotes are from Interv with MacDonald, 20 Feb 73, MacDonald 

Notes, CMH Files. 63 Quote is from Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 3 Aug 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH; for similar caution by Westmoreland, see his Msg MAC 3102 to 

McNamara, 20 Apr 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. Westmoreland, 

A Soldier Reports, p. 273 presents a standard defense of use of statistical measurement. 

Thomas C. Thayer, “How to Analyze a War without Fronts: Vietnam 1965–1972,” Journal of Defense Research, Series B, Tactical Warfare, vol. 7B (Fall 1975), ch. 1, provides an 

OSD systems analyst’s view of the usefulness of Vietnam statistics in understanding the 

course of the confl ict. 64 The public relations implications of statistics are illustrated in Msgs, Wheeler 

CJCS 0624–67 to Westmoreland, 23 Jan 67; and Westmoreland MAC 0869 to Wheeler 

and Sharp, 26 Jan 67. Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. In same source, 

see Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 9127 to Wheeler, 19 Oct 66; Wheeler JCS 4476–67 to 

Sharp and Westmoreland, 15 Jun 67; and Wheeler JCS 9468–67 to Westmoreland, 5 

Chap 8.indd 305 
306

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Nov 67. Hammond, Military and the Media 1962–1968, pp. 279–84, 315–20, 325–2

Parry, Three-War Marine, p. 279, recalls the pressure to report progress. 65 Westmoreland defends the Army-heavy MACV staff in Ltr, no. 01562, 30 Nov 6

sub: JTD, HQ Staff, USMACV, 15 Nov 65, quoted in MACV Command History, 196

p. 94; and Msg MAC 5601 to Wheeler and Sharp, 9 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. 66 Quote is from Ltr, Moore to Westmoreland, 8 Oct 65, sub: Air Force Represent

tion on MACV Staff, tab F–7, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. A

Force complaints are summarized in Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 10–11. 67 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 92–93, 274. Msgs, Denholm WDC 157

to Westmoreland, 27 Feb 65; Westmoreland MAC 2602 to Gen Johnson, 15 May 6

Wheeler JCS 4098–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 28 Oct 65; Throckmorton WD

9824 to Westmoreland, 13 Nov 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. Westmor

land Hist Notes, 5–11 Sep 65, 16 and 21 Oct 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–2

Oct 65), CMH. 68 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 93. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1787 to Ge

Johnson, 1 Apr 65; Westmoreland MAC 1850 to Sharp, 3 Apr 65; Westmoreland MA

5601 to Wheeler and Sharp, 9 Nov 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, CMH. 69 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5601 to Wheeler and Sharp, 9 Nov 65, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. 70 First quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 8 Nov 65, tab C, Westmorelan

Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65); see also Westmoreland Hist Notes, 12 Oct 65, Wes

moreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65). Both in CMH. Second quote is from Ms

Westmoreland MAC 5601 to Wheeler and Sharp, 9 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Ltr, Moore to Westmoreland, 8 Oct 65, sub: Air Force Represent

tion on MACV Staff, tab F–7, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. Lt

Wheeler to Westmoreland, 18 May 66, Att. 2, tab D–26, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (2

Apr–28 May 66), CMH. 71 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 4220–65 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 3 Nov 65; Westmor

land MAC 5674 to Throckmorton, 12 Nov 65; Throckmorton WDC 9824 to Westmor

land, 13 Nov 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Ltr, Wheel

to Westmoreland, 18 May 66, tab D–26, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (24 Apr–28 May 66

CMH; Att. 1 to this letter summarizes the services’ demands for additional MACV sta

slots. 72 Quotes are from Ltrs, Wheeler to Westmoreland, 18 May 65; and Westmorelan

to Wheeler, 27 May 66. Both in tab D–26, Westmoreland Hist File 6 (24 Apr–28 Ma

66), CMH. Makeup of the MACV Construction Directorate is summarized in Traa

“Builders and Fighters,” p. 24. 73 Quote is from Jones Interv, 13 Apr–5 Jun 73, pp. 1–2. Adm U. S. Grant Shar

“Reminiscences of Adm U. S. Grant Sharp, USN (Ret.),” 2 vols., Transcript of Intervs b

Cdr Etta Belle Kitchen, USN (Ret.), for Oral History Program, U.S. Naval Institute, 2

Sep 69–7 Jun 70, pp. 246–47.

Chap 8.indd 306 
9

Controlling U.S. Forces

During the buildup, the command and control structure for U.S. 

forces evolved along established lines. General Westmoreland remained a subtheater commander under CINCPAC. Within South Vietnam, he exercised command of his American units through the service 

component headquarters and through the fi eld forces and the III Marine Amphibious Force. All these organizations expanded and evolved 

to meet growing operational and administrative requirements. Their 

relationships with MACV often became the subject of controversies 

within and between the services. As such issues arose, General Westmoreland, in conjunction with Admiral Sharp and General Wheeler, 

sought resolutions which both accommodated service interests and 

doctrines and preserved his ability to give central direction to the campaign in South Vietnam.

Military Assistance Command, Pacifi c Command, and the JCS

Even as the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam’s forces and activities expanded far beyond what had been contemplated at its establishment, it remained a subordinate unifi ed command under Admiral 

Ulysses S. Grant Sharp, the Commander in Chief, Pacifi c. Under Sharp, 

General Westmoreland conducted all American operations within South 

Vietnam as well as those portions of the air war in Laos and North 

Vietnam that Sharp delegated to him. From his Honolulu headquarters 

Sharp directed the bombing campaign against North Vietnam through 

his Air Force and Navy component commanders. He also retained control of the American forces stationed in Thailand and the Seventh Fleet 

carriers and other vessels that supported operations in South Vietnam.

Admiral Sharp closely supervised MACV’s activities. He periodically 

issued an overall concept of operations for Southeast Asia, in which he 

emphasized the interdependence of the campaigns in North and South 

Vietnam and Laos and of American support activities in Thailand. He 

transmitted Defense Department and JCS directives on matters such as 

rules of engagement for South Vietnam’s border areas. As the offi cer in 

charge of military construction throughout the Pacifi c, Sharp reviewed 

Chap 9.indd 307 
308

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

the Military Assistance Command’s proposals on, including the loca

tion of new jet airfi elds in South Vietnam, to ensure their compatibilit

with theater strategy. In spite of the distance between his headquarte

and Saigon, Sharp kept himself informed of the details of the counte

insurgency campaign through frequent exchanges of messages wit

General Westmoreland, periodic visits to South Vietnam, and regula

conferences with Westmoreland in Saigon and Honolulu. Sharp rarel

interfered in Westmoreland’s day-to-day running of the war, but th

admiral did not hesitate to express his views on tactics and other ma

ters, and Westmoreland often incorporated Sharp’s ideas into his ow

policies and recommendations. Sharp also intervened directly in th

allocation and use of certain scarce air munitions and in the cros

border activities of MACV’s Studies and Observations Group. Finally

as MACV’s principal source of logistical support, Sharp and his compo

nent commanders played a central role in planning and carrying ou

troop deployments to South Vietnam.1

Sharp’s Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine component command

ers maintained constant contact with their service subordinates i

Vietnam, who were under their direction in all but operational ma

ters. This linkage provided MACV’s component commanders, notabl

those of the III Marine Amphibious Force, with a channel of commu

nication to Westmoreland’s immediate superior and a potential mean

of reversing the MACV commander’s decisions. A Marine Corps ob

server praised Admiral Sharp for “his conscientious actions in seekin

Marine Corps counsel . . . on purely Marine Corps affairs affectin

forces under MACV authority.” Marines welcomed Sharp’s oversigh

as protecting their interests in the “strongly Army-oriented” Militar

Assistance Command. On more than one occasion, they took advan

tage of this channel to challenge MACV decisions that they deeme

adverse to Corps interests.2

As the confl ict in South Vietnam expanded, so did direct commun

cation between the authorities in Washington and Westmoreland. Gen

eral Wheeler found it convenient to deal with Westmoreland directl

instead of through Sharp, especially when he needed a quick MAC

response to an urgent policy question. Such exchanges became frequen

and informal. The Army Chief of Staff, General Johnson, recalled tha

when serving as acting chairman of the Joint Chiefs while Wheeler wa

incapacitated by a heart attack, “there were periods when I would ca

. . . Westmoreland once or twice a day and talk to him direct on a privat

line.” President Johnson increasingly regarded Westmoreland, rathe

than Sharp, as his principal military commander in Southeast Asia an

sought to develop a personal relationship with him. Thus, in Augu

1966 Johnson summoned the general and his wife to the LBJ Ranc

for what was largely an informal get-acquainted visit. Later in the yea

when he met at Manila with the heads of state of America’s Far Eas

ern allies, the president saw to it that Westmoreland rather than Shar

Chap 9.indd 308 
309

Controlling U.S. Forces

attended as the senior American 

military representative. Eventually, Johnson drew a reluctant Westmoreland into his administration’s 

political defense of the war.3

The enlargement of Westmoreland’s forces, responsibilities, and 

public visibility created the potential for confl ict between the MACV 

commander and Admiral Sharp, a 

strong-willed offi cer who was determined to maintain his own prerogatives and to promote his views 

on strategy. Through tact and diplomacy, and with cooperation 

from General Wheeler, the two 

commanders avoided a rupture. 

When communicating directly 

with Westmoreland, Wheeler customarily sent Sharp information 

copies of his messages. Westmoreland did the same with his replies 

to Wheeler, an arrangement that allowed Sharp to add his own comments when he chose to do so. Frequently, Wheeler simultaneously 

sought the views of both commanders.

Westmoreland went out of his way to keep Sharp informed on the 

details of ground operations and troop deployments. He consulted 

his superior on plans and recommendations and often deferred to his 

preferences, for example on locating the 1st Cavalry Division base 

at An Khe instead of Pleiku. For his part, Sharp respected Westmoreland’s substantial autonomy, including the MACV commander’s right 

to deal directly with the ambassadors to Thailand and Laos. However, 

Sharp was quick to rebuke his subordinate for any failure to keep him 

informed of such dealings and took steps to block any direct communication between MACV staff sections and agencies in Washington. He also kept himself at the center of operations evaluation and 

policy-making for the ROLLING THUNDER campaign.4

Wheeler, Sharp, and Westmoreland for the most part maintained 

a united front in discussing Vietnam policy and strategy with Secretary of Defense McNamara and other high administration offi cials. 

Preparing for McNamara’s periodic trips to Honolulu and Saigon, 

Westmoreland and Sharp carefully coordinated their briefi ngs for the 

secretary, especially on ROLLING THUNDER issues. Wheeler regularly 

coached Sharp and Westmoreland as to what issues to raise with McNamara, as well as soliciting suggestions from them on matters he 

should bring up with the secretary and the Joint Chiefs in Washington. The result of this continuous consultation was a seamlessness 

in military advice and reporting from the fi eld, with the rough edges 

Admiral Sharp 

(Naval Historical Center photo)

Chap 9.indd 309 
310

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

of disagreement smoothed away. Wheeler operated similarly with th

Joint Chiefs. He went to great lengths to prevent the issuance of “spl

papers” which might give McNamara and his civilian analysts an op

portunity to intervene in technical military questions. While thes

methods achieved the chairman’s immediate tactical purposes, the

also prevented a full airing at the administration’s highest levels o

important disagreements among the armed services, for example ove

the effi cacy of bombing North Vietnam.5

Naval Forces, Vietnam

At the beginning of 1965 the principal naval element of MACV, th

600-man Naval Advisory Group, although nominally a service compo

nent command headquartered in Saigon, in practice carried out onl

advisory and support functions for the South Vietnamese Navy. Durin

the year, it acquired operational responsibilities. In July, to facilitat

coordination with the South Vietnamese, the Seventh Fleet transferre

to the advisory group operational control of the U.S. Navy vessels an

aircraft participating in Operation MARKET TIME, a combined U.S.–Sout

Vietnamese coastal patrol aimed at preventing seaborne supply an

reinforcement of the Viet Cong. In addition to these units, designate

Task Force (TF) 115, the advisory group also commanded the U.S. Nav

and Coast Guard boats patrolling South Vietnam’s rivers (TF 116). Eve

with these additions, the advisory group was overwhelmingly outnum

bered by the III Marine Amphibious Force, which quickly grew int

the largest naval organization in South Vietnam. In May 1965 the I

MAF commander, Maj. Gen. William R. Collins, as the senior naval o

fi cer on shore, assumed the naval component command. The advisor

group and its subordinate task forces, however, remained outside Co

lins’ jurisdiction, reporting directly to MACV.6

The resulting situation was anomalous and unsatisfactory to a

concerned. General Collins’ successor, Maj. Gen. Lewis W. Walt, as se

nior U.S. commander in I Corps, directed the operations of more tha

40,000 marines in a reinforced division and air wing, acted as senio

adviser to the ARVN corps commander, and provided common-item 

logistical support to all American forces in his area through a larg

Naval Support Activity at Da Nang. Understandably, he had little tim

to spare for his duties as naval component commander, although h

maintained a small III MAF staff element for that purpose. With h

headquarters located at Da Nang, over 300 miles from Saigon, Walt wa

hardly in a position to provide timely advice to General Westmorelan

on naval matters. The Naval Advisory Group, for its part, was consid

ered a MACV staff element rather than a Navy command, even thoug

it had task forces under it. It lacked a formal channel to General Wal

and its small Saigon staff had all it could do to cope with its new opera

tional responsibilities.7

Chap 9.indd 310 
311

Controlling U.S. Forces

For practical purposes, as of the end of 1965 MACV included two 

naval component headquarters, neither of which was fully effective. 

The Navy at the same time had no single coordinator or authoritative 

spokesman within MACV. In the light of these facts, Westmoreland, 

with the support of Admiral Sharp, in September 1965 directed the 

Chief, Naval Advisory Group, Rear Adm. Norvell G. Ward, to initiate a 

study of alternative command arrangements.8

In January 1966, after nearly three months of work and consultation with the Pacifi c Fleet, the advisory group staff presented a 

rather convoluted proposal. They recommended that the III Marine 

Amphibious Force commander, with a strengthened staff, retain his 

naval component “hat” and that a new headquarters in Saigon, Naval 

Forces, MACV, under a fl ag-rank deputy naval component commander, 

control the two task forces and perform naval component functions 

outside I Corps. Although nominally under III MAF, the commander 

of Naval Forces, MACV, would be considered directly subordinate to 

Westmoreland in his advisory and operational capacities. This plan, 

its authors argued, would keep all Navy and Marine forces in Vietnam 

under a single component commander, avoid placing a naval offi cer 

between the MACV Commander and one of his principal ground force 

headquarters, and yet ensure effective control of naval forces while 

providing MACV with authoritative Navy representation.9

Admiral Ward (Naval Historical Center photo)

Chap 9.indd 311 
312

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Presented with this proposal on 9 January, General Westmorelan

rejected it as too complicated. Instead, he recommended that Adm

ral Sharp establish a “straightforward” naval component command i

Saigon that would exercise operational control of all naval forces i

South Vietnam except those of III MAF, which should become a “sepa

rate uniservice command” under MACV. To protect the “prestige an

political view” of the South Vietnamese Navy and Marine Corps, th

naval component commander would also serve as chief of the Nava

Advisory Group. Westmoreland’s proposal received the endorsemen

of Sharp, of General Walt (who was more than willing to be relieved o

his component responsibilities), and of General Wallace M. Greene, Jr

Commandant of the Marine Corps, whom Westmoreland made sur

to consult during one of the commandant’s periodic trips to Vietnam

With such support behind it, the plan received quick approval from 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff.10

On 1 April 1966, the Pacifi c Fleet activated the new componen

headquarters, U.S. Naval Forces, Vietnam (NAVFORV), under Admira

Ward’s command. NAVFORV, under operational control of COMUS

MACV and administrative control of Pacifi c Fleet, took command o

the Naval Advisory Group, of Task Forces 115 and 116, and of Nava

Support Activity Da Nang. It conducted all naval combat and logist

cal operations in MACV’s purview, provided common-item supply an

other services to U.S. forces in I Corps, advised and assisted the Sout

Vietnamese Navy and Marine Corps, and assumed certain Unite

States and SEATO contingency planning tasks. At the same time, the I

Marine Amphibious Force became a separate single-service command

under the operational control of the MACV Commander and the ad

ministrative control of the commanding general, Fleet Marine Forc

Pacifi c (FMFPAC), at Honolulu. Charged with the conduct of land an

air combat in I Corps, and responsible for the logistics and administra

tion of its attached Marine units, III MAF for practical purposes const

tuted a fourth service component command.11

As part of these rearrangements, Headquarters Support Activity Sa

gon, which since 1962 had provided logistical support to MACV head

quarters and to American forces elsewhere in South Vietnam, went ou

of existence. The Army, through its 1st Logistical Command, assume

common support functions in II, III, and IV Corps. Another Army o

ganization, the newly established Headquarters Area Command, too

over housekeeping and security chores for MACV headquarters and th

other installations in and around Saigon.12

The establishment of Naval Forces Vietnam did not resolve a

naval command problems within MACV. Command of the joint Army

Navy Mobile Riverine Force, established early in 1967 to seek out an

destroy the Viet Cong along the innumerable waterways of the Me

kong Delta, was one such problem. Eventually designated Task Forc

117, the force comprised an Army infantry brigade and a supportin

Chap 9.indd 312 
313

Controlling U.S. Forces

Navy element of gunboats, landing craft, and other shallow-draft vessels. Both NAVFORV and Pacifi c Fleet rejected a bid by MACV and U.S. 

Army, Pacifi c, to place the joint force under a single Army-dominated 

headquarters. As a compromise, MACV established separate headquarters for the Army and Navy elements of the force, with the latter under 

operational control of Admiral Ward but assigned to “close support” of 

the Army brigade. The Army and Navy commanders of the force conducted operations by mutual coordination, much as had their counterparts in nineteenth century joint expeditions. The commander of the 

Pacifi c Fleet, who had been concerned over the “long range impact” of 

precedents set by the riverine force on future amphibious command 

relationships, accepted this arrangement as a unique solution of a special problem which yet prevented Army dictation of the movement of 

Navy ships. The compromise remained in effect until the joint riverine 

force ceased operations in August 1969, in spite of repeated attempts by 

MACV commanders and IV Corps senior advisers to establish a greater 

degree of Army control over the Navy elements.13

Amphibious command relationships lay at the heart of another 

persistent issue: control of the operations of the Seventh Fleet’s Special 

Landing Force (SLF). This unit, which consisted of a reinforced Marine 

A vessel of the riverine force patrols waters of the Mekong Delta. (U.S. Navy 

Chap 9.indd 313 
314

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

infantry battalion and a helicopter squadron embarked in amphibiou

shipping, constituted Pacifi c Command’s mobile landing force reserv

for contingencies throughout the Far East. Admiral Sharp made th

landing force available to MACV and the III Marine Amphibious Forc

to attack Viet Cong targets along the coasts and to reinforce groun

operations in I Corps and throughout South Vietnam. Under well-e

tablished joint doctrine, strongly supported by the Navy and marine

command during any landing operation, including control of the ai

space over the beachhead, was to be exercised by the Navy offi cer com

manding the amphibious task force until the ground troops were fi rm

ly established on shore. This system, designed for assaults upon hostil

coastlines, created problems when applied in Vietnam, where the Spe

cial Landing Force normally disembarked into the operating areas o

friendly units. It effectively excluded the overall commander, who wa

ultimately accountable for success or failure, from the planning an

execution of the amphibious portion of the operation. It also infringe

upon Seventh Air Force’s coordination of tactical air support.14

General Westmoreland fi rst encountered this problem in Marc

1966, during the planning of Operation JACKSTAY, a combined a

sault near Saigon by the SLF and elements of the Vietnamese Marin

Corps. Westmoreland and Vice Admiral John J. Hyland, the Sevent

Fleet commander, improvised liaison between MACV and the am

phibious task force for JACKSTAY. At a formal conference on Okinaw

in late May, representatives of MACV and of the Pacifi c Fleet worke

out a permanent agreement that provided for more systematic join

scheduling and planning of SLF operations by the two headquarter

However, joint doctrine on the separation of amphibious and onshor

commands remained in effect, to General Westmoreland’s dismay. T

no avail, he recommended to Admiral Sharp that all SLF operations i

South Vietnam be “planned and executed under operational control o

CG, III MAF, or other fi eld commander designated by me.” After earl

1967, the Special Landing Force rarely was employed outside I Corp

thereby limiting confl icts of authority between MACV and the fl ee

Nevertheless, the question of command of the landing force remaine

an irritant in MACV-Navy relations until the end of its operations i

Vietnam in late 1969.15

U.S. Army, Vietnam: A Question of Roles

When major troop commitments came under serious conside

ation in March 1965, control over the Army elements in Vietnam wa

divided. Since abolition of the MAAG the year before, Westmorelan

had directly commanded the Army advisers with the South Vietnames

forces. The Army combat support and combat service support units i

the country were attached to the U.S. Army Support Command, Vie

nam (USASCV), which performed primarily logistical functions. Unde

Chap 9.indd 314 
315

Controlling U.S. Forces

an arrangement established in 1963, General Westmoreland, as an additional duty, acted as MACV’s Army component commander, with the 

USASCV commander as his deputy for Army matters. These arrangements were adequate for the size and missions of the Army contingent 

through 1964. With the deployment of major combat units, however, 

Army leaders had to reconsider their command structure in Vietnam.16

Army Chief of Staff Harold K. Johnson; the commander of U.S. 

Army, Pacifi c, General John K. Waters; and General Westmoreland 

agreed early that MACV would direct Army combat operations through 

one or more corps-level headquarters, which were to deploy when the 

divisions did. They differed, however, over the role of MACV’s Army 

component command. Johnson and Waters wanted to upgrade U.S. 

Army Support Command, Vietnam, into a full-fl edged Army component headquarters under its own commander. That headquarters, they 

argued, should relieve Westmoreland of as many as possible of his 

nontactical, noncombat Army functions, including the entire Army 

advisory effort as well as all service-related logistics and administration. Westmoreland objected to this proposal. Removal of the Army 

advisers from MACV, he argued, would re-create the division of responsibility that had existed under the MAAG. In addition, creation of a 

full-fl edged Army component command would result in the presence 

of “two large headquarters in the Saigon area [with] the same span of 

control I now have, and complicate the relationship between my headquarters and the [South Vietnamese Joint General Staff] which is also 

the senior Army headquarters.”17

These considerations notwithstanding, MACV headquarters by itself could not conduct all the affairs of an Army force that was expanding rapidly toward a projected total strength of at least 300,000. In late 

March 1965 the Defense Department, after repeated urging from Westmoreland, established in Vietnam the 1st Logistical Command to support Army and other U.S. and allied forces. The logistical command, 

along with Army aviation, engineer, signal, and medical organizations, 

the Special Forces, and the combat divisions and brigades, required at 

least a minimal component headquarters to handle its administration 

and coordinate its activities.18

The solution was another compromise. On 20 July 1965, U.S. Army, 

Pacifi c, redesignated the U.S. Army Support Command as United States 

Army, Vietnam (USARV), with Westmoreland as its commander and 

the former USASCV commander, Brig. Gen. John Norton, as his deputy. The deputy, whose position was upgraded to three stars when Lt. 

Gen. Jean E. Engler replaced Norton early in 1966, commanded USARV 

for all practical purposes under Westmoreland’s general direction. By 

retaining the Army component command, however, Westmoreland remained the sole point of contact between USARV and the Joint General 

Staff. Refl ecting Westmoreland’s preferences, USARV exercised command in all but tactical matters over Army forces attached to MACV 

Chap 9.indd 315 
316

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

and furnished them with supply and combat service support. It als

provided common-item supply to all U.S. forces in South Vietnam ou

side I Corps, as well as much logistical and combat assistance to th

Free World allies and the South Vietnamese. U.S. Army, Vietnam, nom

inally was under the administrative control of USARPAC. However, a

the Vietnam command expanded in size and functions, it increasingl

communicated on many issues directly with the Department of th

Army in Washington rather than the Pacifi c component headquarte

in Honolulu.19

As a theater commander, Westmoreland was following well-estab

lished practice in retaining for himself the direct command of his Arm

forces. During World War II, General Dwight D. Eisenhower serve

simultaneously as Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Forc

and as Commanding General, European Theater of Operations, U.

Army. General Douglas MacArthur made similar arrangements, both a

commander of the Southwest Pacifi c Area during World War II and a

commander in chief of United Nations Forces in Korea.20

Westmoreland intended U.S. Army, Vietnam, to function primaril

as a logistic support command, roughly analogous to the Services o

Supply and Communications Zone theater headquarters of World Wa

I and II. In spite of his intentions, however, as American ground force

expanded and began active campaigning, USARV took on many of th

tasks of a fi eld army headquarters. To provide the tactical fi eld forc

commands with suffi cient, timely supplies and replacements, as we

General Norton, center (NARA)

Chap 9.indd 316 
317

Controlling U.S. Forces

as essential aviation, engineer, artillery, and medical support, the component headquarters had to enter into the planning and execution of 

operations. Its staff and those of the fi eld forces established a network of 

contacts for this purpose. In addition, USARV controlled and allocated 

the theater reserve of helicopters and other combat support units, a 

function for which the MACV staff lacked the time and technical expertise. USARV, through its aviation, supply, and medical support channels, usually possessed earlier and more complete combat information 

than did MACV. According to Lt. Gen. Bruce Palmer, Engler’s successor, 

“the people who know there is a fi ght going on somewhere are the medics who handle the dustoffs. By the same token, the aviators know right 

away where the action is. When we hit a hot LZ, our Aviation Brigade 

people know about it very quickly. When somebody runs low of ammunition, we know it right away. . . . Thus, First Log . . . and our other 

commands have a very close and rapid feel for the basic situation.”21

General Westmoreland himself steadily expanded USARV’s responsibilities. The component command’s headquarters at Long Binh constituted MACV’s alternate combat operations center, for use if the Tan 

Son Nhut facility was put out of action. Westmoreland delegated to 

the component headquarters much of the administration and logistical support of Army fi eld advisers and assigned to it as well as an 

ever-expanding role in assistance to Free World and South Vietnamese 

forces. At his direction, the USARV staff helped prepare MACV’s operational contingency plans and did much work on force structure, 

USARV headquarters at Long Binh (NARA)

Chap 9.indd 317 
318

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

base development, and the reception of newly arrived combat unit

USARV also became involved in operations because of its responsibi

ity for training Army troops, for instance in detecting and destroyin

Viet Cong booby traps.22

General Waters, the U.S. Army, Pacifi c, commander, as well as Gen

erals Engler and Palmer, pressed for a formal expansion of USARV

charter, but with only limited success. After one of Waters’ period

visits to Saigon, Westmoreland complained: “He apparently feels tha

the Army component should become operational like the Air Force an

Navy components.” During 1966 Engler made his abortive bid to tak

over the Army advisory program. When he succeeded Engler in June o

the following year, General Palmer strongly advocated that his head

quarters be given full operational control over Army forces, includin

tactical command, thereby freeing Westmoreland to concentrate o

joint matters and assistance to the South Vietnamese. Palmer’s pro

posal may have refl ected his experience in command of U.S. forces i

the Dominican Republic in 1965, where he employed a separate Arm

tactical commander. MACV’s existing command relationships, Palme

declared, were “not sound from either a joint or service point of view

and made it “extremely diffi cult to develop operational and suppo

plans in any logical fashion.” Palmer’s views refl ected those of Genera

Johnson, who pressed unsuccessfully during early 1967 for transfer o

Westmoreland’s component responsibilities to a separate four-star fi el

army commander. (Chart 4)23

Westmoreland refused to attempt any fundamental redistributio

of responsibilities, claiming that such proposals refl ected “a lack o

understanding of the situation and the nature of the operations.” A

Palmer’s request, he did grant the deputy commanding general, USARV

the right to prepare effi ciency ratings for fi eld force commanders an

to review those for commanders at division level and below, tasks hith

erto reserved respectively to the MACV and fi eld force commanders. H

also permitted Palmer to assign offi cers to brigade commands withou

veto by the divisions. These authorities, Palmer recalled, gave him “

little teeth” in dealing with the tactical headquarters. Nevertheless, th

formal division between tactical and logistical commands in MACV

Army component remained, allowing the fi eld forces and division

in Palmer’s words, to “play both sides against the middle. Where the

cannot get their way in the command channel, they simply go to th

OPCON channel.”24

General Westmoreland’s retention of extensive Army command re

sponsibilities involved him continually in Army service matters. H

and Army Chief of Staff Johnson together managed the rotation o

general offi cers in and out of MACV and its subordinate command

Sometimes directly and sometimes through his deputies at USARV, th

MACV commander negotiated continually with Johnson and the Arm

staff about a myriad of other details of Army administration, rangin

Chap 9.indd 318 
CHART 4— PACIFIC COMMAND RELATIONSHIPS, 1967

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Chap 9.indd 319 
320

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

from the fl ow of replacements to reorganization and standardizatio

of infantry battalions. General Johnson attempted to keep informe

about affairs in Vietnam through regular visits and daily reading of th

cable traffi c, but his relations with Westmoreland, if amicable in ton

were strained by personality differences and by an underlying mutua

distrust. More fundamentally, the interests of the two clashed sinc

Westmoreland sought all possible reinforcements for his theater whil

Johnson tried to protect the Army’s worldwide capabilities against th

voracious demands of the war in Vietnam.25

Although less involved in the internal affairs of the other service

Westmoreland paid constant attention to their interests and sensitiv

ties. He could hardly avoid doing so since the other service chiefs, lik

General Johnson, kept close watch over their forces in Vietnam. Th

Air Force and Marine chiefs were especially vigilant in protecting the

prerogatives, at times to the point where they themselves seemed to b

trying to command their components from Washington. In Vietnam

the component headquarters developed their own informal contac

with MACV to help defend their interests. Especially when major i

sues of command relations or roles and missions were involved, th

components were quick to appeal MACV decisions to Honolulu an

Washington through their service chains of command. To avoid suc

complications, MACV staff offi cers as a result frequently cleared eve

routine directives with the components. As the MACV Surgeon, Ma

Gen. Spurgeon H. Neel, recalled: “you had a unifi ed commander ther

. . . but . . . he had to be sure that he didn’t ruffl e the feathers of th

Army component, the Navy component, and the others.” 26

The Seventh Air Force: A Multiplicity of Masters

No interservice issues were more contentious than those related t

command and control of air power. Air power, both fi xed and rotar

wing, profoundly affected the way in which the United States fough

the war. The availability of airborne fi re support, of air transport fo

troops and cargo, and of aerial reconnaissance permitted the Militar

Assistance Command to carry out otherwise impossible ground opera

tions and to occupy and hold positions otherwise untenable. In add

tion, through most of the confl ict, the United States relied almost ex

clusively on air power for offensive action against North Vietnam an

for attacks on enemy bases and lines of communication in nominall

neutral Laos and Cambodia.27

For his part, General Westmoreland viewed air power as a key ele

ment in his effort to defeat the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese. “A

capabilities . . . constitute the current difference between keeping th

V. C. buildup under reasonable control,” he avowed in June 1965, “an

letting the enemy get away from us throughout most of the country

side.”28 In that light, his objectives with regard to air power were simpl

Chap 9.indd 320 
321

Controlling U.S. Forces

to obtain as much of it as possible for his operations in South Vietnam 

and to infl uence the air wars in Laos and North Vietnam so that they 

would have the maximum effect in reducing enemy reinforcement and 

supply of the Viet Cong.

The Military Assistance Command’s position as a subtheater within CINCPAC’s domain greatly complicated its efforts to evolve proper 

command and control arrangements for its air assets. The American 

armed forces during World War II and the Korean confl ict had evolved 

the practice of centralizing control of air power at the theater level, 

normally under an Air Force general who served as both air component commander and deputy theater commander for air operations. In 

the Air Force view, which amounted to an article of faith within that 

service, theater air power could function at full effi ciency and effectiveness only under such unifi ed direction. Hence, any parceling-out 

of air elements to subordinate commands had to be avoided. Adhering to this principle, the commanders of Pacifi c Command’s Air Force 

component, Pacifi c Air Forces (PACAF), successively Generals Jacob E. 

Smart and Hunter Harris, were concerned throughout the early years of 

the Vietnam War with keeping their forces unifi ed and able to respond 

rapidly and fl exibly to any contingency, including a theater-level confl ict with the Soviet Union and Communist China. To that end, they 

worked to restrict the number of air units assigned to the Military Assistance Command and the size and status of MACV’s subordinate Air 

Force headquarters. So effective were they that MACV’s air component 

at the outset consisted only of the small advance echelon of the 2d Air 

Division (2d ADVON), which in turn was subordinate to the Philippines-based Thirteenth Air Force, the command through which PACAF 

directed its operations in Southeast Asia.29

As the war in Vietnam intensifi ed and the role of American combat 

forces grew, Pacifi c Air Forces had to enlarge its command structure in 

South Vietnam and Thailand. In October 1962 the Air Force expanded 

the 2d ADVON into the 2d Air Division. At that point, the division’s 

commander served two masters. As air component commander under 

COMUSMACV, he exercised operational control of Air Force units 

based in South Vietnam. Simultaneously, under direction of Thirteenth 

Air Force, he commanded the Air Force elements in Thailand and was 

to conduct operations in Laos and elsewhere in Southeast Asia, should 

the need arise.30

Further evolution occurred during 1964 and 1965, as the number of 

American aircraft in Southeast Asia increased and they began striking 

targets in Laos as well as the two Vietnams. Late in 1965 Air Force Chief 

of Staff John P. McConnell formally separated the 2d Air Division from 

the Thirteenth Air Force and placed the command directly under Pacifi c Air Forces for its functions in both South Vietnam and Thailand. 

The Air Force at the same time settled for half a loaf on the long-debated issue of whether Westmoreland’s deputy should be an Air Force 

Chap 9.indd 321 
322

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

offi cer by agreeing to designation of Maj. Gen. Joseph H. Moore, th

2d Air Division commander, as deputy to Westmoreland—but for a

operations only. Air Force units in Thailand, in deference to diplomat

considerations, came under a deputy commander, Thirteenth Air Forc

who served simultaneously as deputy commander of the 2d Air Div

sion. This arrangement maintained the formality of a separate Amer

can Air Force commander in Thailand; yet in practice General Moor

who delegated only logistical functions to his deputy, still could assig

missions to all U.S. aircraft based in Southeast Asia. The arrangemen

also had the advantage, from PACAF’s point of view, of keeping th

Thai-based squadrons out from under the Military Assistance Com

mand, Vietnam’s control.31

The fi nal stage in the evolution of MACV’s Air Force componen

command quickly followed. As a tactical headquarters, the 2d Air Div

sion lacked the staff to manage the large Air Force base developmen

program in South Vietnam. By early 1966, its strength—nearly 1,00

aircraft and 30,000 men—had grown to that of a higher organizationa

unit, a numbered air force. Accordingly, with JCS approval, on 1 Apr

General McConnell, portrayed as a lieutenant general 

(Defense Visual Information Center photo)

Chap 9.indd 322 
323

Controlling U.S. Forces

1966, General McConnell redesignated the division as the Seventh Air 

Force. Besides solving immediate organizational problems, the change, 

in McConnell’s view, increased Air Force infl uence in the joint headquarters by elevating MACV’s air component commander from a major 

general to a lieutenant general. The new air force’s command relationships to MACV and PACAF were identical to those of the 2d Air Division, with the deputy commander of the Seventh Air Force retaining his 

dual position as Thirteenth Air Force deputy in Thailand. In that capacity, he kept Ambassador Graham Martin in Bangkok informed about Air 

Force operations from Thai bases and also served as principal Seventh 

Air Force liaison offi cer with the embassy in Vientiane, Laos.32

By the time the Seventh Air Force went into operation, Admiral Sharp 

had confi rmed his intention to direct ROLLING THUNDER from Honolulu 

through his Air Force and Navy component commanders. His decision 

required the Seventh Air Force commander to serve several masters. In 

South Vietnam, General Moore and his successor, Lt. Gen. William W. 

Momyer, directed air operations as deputies and component commanders to General Westmoreland, although their authority over Navy, Marine, and Army aircraft, as well as the Strategic Air Command’s B–52s, 

was limited. For the offensive against North Vietnam, the Seventh Air 

Force received its missions from Admiral Sharp through Pacifi c Air Forces and employed aircraft based in Thailand as well as South Vietnam in 

executing them. (Thailand-based aircraft, in deference to Thai political 

concerns, did not fl y missions in South Vietnam but could be used in 

the North and in Laos.) The Seventh Air Force also provided aircraft for 

missions in Laos, some fl own under Westmoreland’s orders and others 

under direction of the American ambassador in Vientiane. Perhaps understating the case, a Seventh Air Force staff offi cer declared that “it became . . . fragmented and awkward for the Commander at Seventh Air 

Force to meet the requirements of these . . . different people who could 

tell him to do different things with a single set of forces.”33

The Air War in the South: A Single Manager?

At the 20 April 1965 Honolulu conference, Secretary McNamara 

put the war in South Vietnam ahead of ROLLING THUNDER and strikes in 

Laos, where the allocation of American air power in Southeast Asia was 

concerned. General Westmoreland took maximum advantage of this 

decision to ensure lavish air support of his ground operations. His everescalating demands for sorties, which included periodic bids to control 

the squadrons based in Thailand and on the offshore carriers, irritated 

Admiral Sharp. The admiral believed that the air war against North 

Vietnam was of equal importance with that in the south and that Westmoreland’s requirements for support of his command often exceeded 

the number of profi table targets. Sharp declared that Westmoreland 

always wanted to “get the absolute maximum of ordnance dropped 

Chap 9.indd 323 
324

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

on every objective he could fi nd,” including some targets “that coul

just barely be justifi ed.” Nevertheless, Westmoreland had the suppo

of Secretary McNamara, who repeatedly reiterated his South Vietnam

fi rst ruling—as much, Sharp suspected, to limit bombing of the north

about which the defense secretary had increasing doubts, as to ensur

suffi cient air power in the south. Sharp, however, did succeed in limi

ing Westmoreland’s access to the aircraft in Thailand. He also kept th

Seventh Fleet’s carriers fi rmly under his own control, forcing Westmo

reland to request Navy sorties through Sharp’s headquarters.34

Although, in the Air Force view, the theater air component com

mander, under general guidance from the joint commander, neede

the broadest possible authority and autonomy in conducting the a

war, conditions in Vietnam never approached that ideal. Viewing a

power as an implement in the ground campaign, General Westmore

land retained many important air command-and-control functions i

his Army-dominated MACV staff. By so doing, he limited the purview 

and authority of his deputy for air operations. In September 1965, fo

example, he established a board under MACV to review air strike con

trol procedures and rules of engagement, rejecting protests from Gen

eral Moore that such a task properly belonged to the 2d Air Division

In the same way, Westmoreland entrusted the allocation of air sorties

among missions and corps areas to the Tactical Air Support Elemen

(TASE) of the MACV Combat Operations Center, and he kept mo

target evaluation and selection for both fi ghter-bombers and B–52s 

function of the MACV staff. The Seventh Air Force, which possesse

extensive reconnaissance and intelligence capabilities, could nominat

targets; but its suggestions had to compete for approval with those o

the fi eld forces, the Combined Intelligence Center, and other agencie

Air Force offi cers objected that these arrangements denied MACV th

full benefi t of their own technical and tactical expertise and shackle

air power too closely to the requirements of ground commanders—

conditions exacerbated by the continuing underrepresentation of the

service in the MACV intelligence and operations directorates.36

Despite the tensions that arose because of Westmoreland’s approac

to air power, the general’s relations with his air deputies were charac

terized more by cooperation than confl ict, if only because MACV an

the Seventh Air Force shared an interest in unifi ed control of all a

operations in Southeast Asia. Enhancing the effect was Westmoreland

high regard for Moore, an old friend, and for Momyer, Moore’s succe

sor. Commanders and staff offi cers of Pacifi c Air Forces and Seventh A

Force almost unanimously praised Westmoreland for his understandin

and fairness. The Seventh Air Force commander regularly participate

in the MACV commander’s weekly headquarters strategy meetings. H

staff and that of MACV gradually developed close cooperation, to th

point where the air component headquarters eventually came to dra

most MACV messages and position papers on air power questions.37

Chap 9.indd 324 
325

Controlling U.S. Forces

Unifi ed control of air operations, however, proved to be an elusive goal. The Strategic Air Command, for example, kept its B–52s outside MACV’s and Seventh Air Force’s authority. General Westmoreland 

placed great value on the heavy bombers as a weapon for disrupting 

enemy base areas and troop concentrations and increasingly for providing close-in fi re support to American and South Vietnamese ground 

forces in combat. Although SAC and the Air staff continued to question the effectiveness of the strikes, code-named ARC LIGHT, and to object to diversion of a growing number of B–52s from their primary 

strategic mission, Westmoreland secured Defense Department approval of repeated increases in his monthly allocation of bomber sorties. 

By late 1967, the authorized B–52 sortie rate for Southeast Asia had 

reached 1,200 per month, fl own by planes operating out of U Tapao in 

Thailand as well as from their main base on Guam. Along with more 

sorties, Westmoreland obtained greater freedom of action in their use. 

Whereas in 1965 each individual ARC LIGHT mission required JCS, State 

and Defense Department, and White House approval, within a year 

the administration, at Westmoreland’s urging, had delegated the responsibility to Admiral Sharp. Sharp in turn permitted Westmoreland, 

in consultation with the embassy in Saigon and the South Vietnamese 

government, to select all targets in South Vietnam.38

To the persistent displeasure of the Seventh Air Force, Westmoreland concentrated ARC LIGHT targeting in his own headquarters. On 

recommendations from the fi eld forces, the Seventh Air Force, and 

the targeting section of the Combined Intelligence Center, the MACV 

commander personally established the target list and set priorities. 

At the outset, target selection was largely a process of guesswork on 

the basis of very limited information. With the expansion of MACV’s 

intelligence establishment, the process became more sophisticated. 

The multiservice staff of the Combined Intelligence Center assembled 

a weekly list of preplanned targets, using information from the entire range of sources available to MACV. CICV’s list then underwent 

review and amendment by the J2 and other staff sections and fi nal 

evaluation and approval by General Westmoreland. Combat units 

could also submit immediate ARC LIGHT requests to MACV through 

the fi eld forces for rapid review, clearance with the South Vietnamese, 

and transmission to the Strategic Air Command, which then either 

diverted missions in fl ight or launched planes kept on alert at Guam 

or U Tapao.39

While the B–52s were highly responsive to MACV’s requirements, 

they remained under the operational control of the Strategic Air Command, exercised through the Guam-based Eighth Air Force. The Air 

Force refused to assign any of the bomber units to either Pacifi c Command or MACV on grounds that SAC, a specifi ed command directly under the secretary of defense, must keep its planes under unifi ed 

control, ready for instant reversion to their strategic nuclear mission. 

Chap 9.indd 325 
326

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Instead, SAC directed the Eighth Air Force to provide a fi xed monthl

number of sorties in support of MACV and maintained a small liaiso

group, the SAC Advance Echelon (ADVON), at MACV headquarters t

expedite the processing of strike requests.

This arrangement was acceptable to General Westmoreland sinc

it permitted the Military Assistance Command to select targets for th

ARC LIGHT strikes. However, when General Momyer took command o

the Seventh Air Force in July 1966, he was less satisfi ed and launched 

campaign to bring ARC LGHT operations under the more direct contro

of his own headquarters. One of his sevice’s leading exponents of tact

cal air power, Momyer believed that the B–52s, when used in a tactica

role as they were in Vietnam, should be under the theater air compo

nent commander, who then could employ them as part of a unifi e

pool of aircraft. He also was convinced that MACV, dominated as it wa

by ground offi cers, was using the strategic bombers uneconomicall

for strikes on targets of dubious validity and for missions that coul

be performed as effectively and more effi ciently by fi ghter-bomber

Under the existing system, the Seventh Air Force, which possessed th

expertise on proper B–52 use, was all but excluded from mission plan

General Momyer, center, receives his fourth star from Generals Westmoreland an

Abrams. (Defense Visual Information Center photo)

Chap 9.indd 326 
327

Controlling U.S. Forces

ning, relegated to escorting the Stratofortresses over Vietnam and coordinating their bombing runs with other tactical air activities.40

While he acknowledged MACV’s fi nal authority in B–52 targeting, 

General Momyer urged Westmoreland to transfer the details of mission 

planning and execution, along with the SAC Advance Echelon, from 

MACV to Seventh Air Force headquarters. However, he remained unable to overcome Westmoreland’s determination to control B–52 targeting and Air Force opposition to any parceling out of SAC’s airplanes. 

Momyer obtained only the formal attachment of the advance echelon 

to himself as deputy MACV commander for air operations, although in 

practice the echelon’s members worked as part of the Seventh Air Force 

staff. General Westmoreland withheld from the advance echelon any 

role in planning strike requests. As a result, General Momyer acquired 

in the end simply a more effective liaison body for air traffi c control of 

the ARC LIGHT missions. ARC LIGHT planning remained concentrated in 

the MACV staff for the rest of the joint command’s existence.41

The debate within the Air Force over control of the B–52s paralleled 

a much more vehement interservice dispute about the air component 

commander’s authority over Army, Navy, and Marine aircraft. On this 

question, which involved doctrinal convictions of near-religious intensity on all sides, the Air Force differed sharply with the other services. 

General Momyer, a dedicated and effective advocate of the Air Force 

position, summarized the controversy:

The fl exibility of airpower and its capacity to concentrate large quantities of fi repower 

in a short time make it a most desirable addition to an army or navy. As a consequence, 

these two forces have sought the division of airpower, placing it under their control 

when needed for their own mission.

Airmen, on the other hand, have argued that airpower is a decisive element of 

war in its own right and that the full effects of airpower can only be achieved when it 

is centrally controlled and directed against the most vital part of the enemy, whether 

that part be the industrial base or the military forces deployed to a theater of war. 

. . . Thus, for airpower to be employed for the greatest good of the combined forces in 

a theater of war, there must be a command structure to control the assigned airpower 

coherently and consistently and to ensure that the airpower is not frittered away by 

dividing it among army and navy commands.42

This issue, along with disputes over the airmobility concept, had 

embittered Army–Air Force relations during the early years of MACV’s 

existence. However, by mid-1966, the two services had resolved their 

major differences, largely as the result of an unusual top-level agreement between their respective chiefs of staff, Generals Johnson and 

McConnell. Under this agreement, signed in April 1966, the Air Force 

in effect acknowledged the Army’s complete control over its helicopters; the Army in return transferred its fi xed-wing Caribous and other 

transports to the Air Force and promised not to procure or develop 

such aircraft in the future. In Vietnam, Army helicopters continued to 

Chap 9.indd 327 
328

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

operate under the control of fi eld force and division commanders; re

serves were parceled out by USARV under MACV’s direction, exercise

through the Army Aviation Division of the Combat Operations Cente

To enhance coordination of airmobile maneuvers with artillery and a

support, the Army and Air Force linked their separate aircraft contro

networks through a MACV Joint Air–Ground Operations System. Thes

arrangements ended Army–Air Force feuding over air power in Vie

nam. As a result, Army commanders, ultimately including Westmore

land, increasingly sided with Seventh Air Force in its efforts to secur

control over the other services’ fi xed-wing aircraft.43

With the Army air issue settled and with the Navy carriers fi rml

under Admiral Sharp’s control, the Marine Corps became the princ

pal target of Westmoreland’s air deputies. Marine Corps doctrine calle

for employment of aircraft as part of a unifi ed air-ground team, unde

control of the amphibious force commander, with the primary missio

of supporting marines in ground combat. During the Korean confl ic

marines had seen their air-ground team broken up, with their air win

placed under operational control of the Fifth Air Force and employe

wherever needed along the front. Recalling that arrangement, whic

marines believed had resulted in less responsive support to frontlin

troops, the leaders of the Corps were determined to maintain the in

tegrity of their air-ground team in Vietnam.44

The marines had the backing of CINCPAC, who reserved to himse

the right to establish policies and procedures for the conduct of tactic

air support in South Vietnam, as elsewhere in his theater. In late 196

Admiral Felt, Sharp’s predecessor, had appointed a board of offi cers, rep

resenting all the services, to develop general principles for tactical a

support in joint operations. The board was headed by Marine Brig. Gen

Keith B. McCutcheon, the PACOM assistant chief of staff for operation

who had been a leader since World War II in the development of th

Corps’ air support doctrine. It produced a document refl ecting stron

Marine Corps infl uence, laying down as a central principle that each se

vice component of a joint force should retain command and control o

its air element “in order to take maximum advantage of its organization

equipment, training, and uni-service doctrine.” The joint force com

mander should exercise operational control of the different air elemen

through the component commanders, one of whom he was to designat

as “coordinating authority”for tactical air support.45 The designated co

ordinator, in consultation with the other component commanders, wa

to draw up joint operational procedures but was not to exercise anythin

resembling genuine command of the different air forces. Further rein

forcing the Marine Corps position, the board stated that Marine forces i

joint operations “normally will be employed as air-ground teams.”46

In developing tactical support procedures for the growing America

forces in Vietnam, Admiral Sharp followed the principles of the Mc

Cutcheon board. He did so in part because he shared the Marine view 

Chap 9.indd 328 
329

Controlling U.S. Forces

on the merits of the issue and also out of a desire to avoid interservice 

wrangling over air power doctrine. “My goal,” he told General Westmoreland, “has been to establish procedures which satisfy operational requirements, while minimizing the interservice debate which has much 

newspaper appeal but little in the way of constructive suggestion.” In 

accord with this approach, in March 1965 Sharp vetoed a proposal by 

Westmoreland to place the fi rst Marine fi ghter-bomber squadron to 

arrive at Da Nang under operational control of General Moore as Air 

Force component commander. The following month, in a directive establishing policies and procedures for control of tactical air support 

throughout Pacifi c Command, Sharp declared that in South Vietnam 

close support of ground forces in contact with the enemy should have 

fi rst priority in the allocation of air power and that authority to control 

strikes should be exercised at the level of command as close as possible 

to the action. He reiterated that MACV’s air component commander 

should function as no more than a “coordinating authority” for tactical air support and air traffi c control.47

After Admiral Sharp blocked his initial move to place the 1st Marine Aircraft Wing’s fi ghter-bombers under the 2d Air Division, General Westmoreland in effect let the marines keep their own planes. The 

Military Assistance Command’s basic air command and control directive, published in July 1965 and reissued with minor amendments the 

following year, provided that the commanding general of III MAF, in 

his role as what amounted to a component commander under MACV, 

would exercise operational control over the 1st Marine Aircraft Wing 

through the marines’ tactical air control system. The wing’s aircraft fl ew 

missions in support of the III MAF, which had fi rst call upon them except in the direst emergencies. Under an agreement with 2d Air Division/Seventh Air Force, III MAF daily placed fi xed-wing sorties in excess 

of those needed for its own operations at the disposal of MACV’s air 

component commander for employment throughout the theater. In addition, III MAF committed itself to transfer certain of its fi ghter-bombers, HAWK missiles, and control facilities at Da Nang to the command 

of the Seventh Air Force, as MACV air defense coordinator, in the event 

of a North Vietnamese air attack. Westmoreland defi ned the functions 

of his air component commander in terms of “coordinating authority,” 

with responsibility for air traffi c control and for promoting cooperation 

among the different services’ air forces, but no command over them.48

General Moore considered these arrangements wrong in both principle and practical effect. Under them, air power in South Vietnam was 

geographically divided between two separate control systems: a Marine 

one in I Corps and an Air Force one, which included the South Vietnamese Air Force, encompassing the rest of the country. In addition, 

the Seventh Air Force retained responsibility for supporting South Vietnamese and non-Marine U.S. ground units in I Corps, a circumstance 

that occasionally created confusion in requesting and directing tactical 

Chap 9.indd 329 
330

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

air power. Late in 1965, in connection with plans for deployment o

additional Marine squadrons to South Vietnam, Moore reopened th

issue with Westmoreland, who expressed unhappiness at having “thre

air forces in I Corps” and “alluded to the possibility” of putting the Ma

rine squadrons under the operational control of the 2d Air Division.

Westmoreland commissioned his J3, General DePuy, to review th

question of control of Marine air power. DePuy recommended again

breaking up the Marine air-ground team and favored continuing th

practice of having III MAF turn over its excess sorties to the 2d Air D

vision. The alternative, DePuy declared, “would be certain to arouse 

violent and emotional opposition on the part of the Marines whic

would be registered at every echelon from here to the White House an

I can not see that it would be worth the trouble.” Accepting DePuy

reasoning, Westmoreland left the existing arrangement in place.49

General Moore and his successor, General Momyer, attempted re

peatedly to obtain at least more Marine sorties for employment unde

their control, but to no avail. They did secure a proviso in MACV

air support directive allowing COMUSMACV, “in the event of a majo

emergency or disaster,” to place all U.S. tactical air resources under th

commander, Seventh Air Force; but until 1968 General Westmorelan

did not see fi t to exercise that authority. The marines, at both III MA

and FMFPAC headquarters, vigorously and in the main successfully re

sisted every Air Force encroachment on their air-ground team. Late i

1967, Lt. Gen. Victor H. Krulak, the FMFPAC commander, told his fe

low Marine generals: “Today we have what we longed for in Korea. 

is no accident. We have CINCPAC to thank for putting his foot dow

and saying, ‘No, the Marines fi ght as a team. I will not see them broke

up.’ We have him to thank, plus the stubborn persuasion on him by 

few Marines. Today we have our [air-ground] team in its classic sens

and for the fi rst time really in combat history.”50

Through 1967, Westmoreland and Sharp took a pragmatic approac

to the interservice confl icts over tactical air power. They tried, wit

considerable success, to accommodate differing service doctrines whil

still maintaining a unifi ed air effort. In spite of rivalry and divisions o

authority, the services in Vietnam managed to mesh their air contro

systems suffi ciently to provide the Military Assistance Command wit

a powerful, fl exible tactical air weapon. In I Corps, the Seventh A

Force and III MAF worked out techniques for effective cooperation, fo

example in so-called SLAM operations, concentrated strikes by B–52

and fi ghter-bombers against enemy troops and infi ltration routes. Nev

ertheless, by the end of 1967, the issue of air command and control i

III MAF’s area of operations was coming up for reconsideration. Chang

ing tactical circumstances in I Corps, combined with General Westmo

reland’s growing dissatisfaction with III MAF’s overall conduct of th

campaign in the north, were eventually to permit General Momyer t

reopen the air command question.51

Chap 9.indd 330 
331

Controlling U.S. Forces

The Field Forces and the III Marine Amphibious Force

The tactical commands under MACV developed parallel to the 

service components. Westmoreland, Sharp, and the Joint Chiefs had 

settled upon the general features of the Army fi eld force headquarters 

by mid-1965. The fi rst such command, Field Force, Vietnam, essentially built around an Army corps headquarters, went into operation 

at Nha Trang on 25 September, after several months’ existence as Task 

Force Alpha, initially controlling all U.S. ground forces in II Corps. In 

III Corps, the commander of the 1st Infantry Division, who reported 

directly to Westmoreland, directed American combat operations. On 

15 March 1966, Westmoreland activated II Field Force, Vietnam, with 

headquarters at Bien Hoa and jurisdiction over American forces in III 

Corps. At the same time, the MACV commander redesignated Field 

Force, Vietnam, as I Field Force, Vietnam. As had been the case since 

the initial Marine landing at Da Nang, American ground operations 

in I Corps remained under the control of the III Marine Amphibious 

Force. In IV Corps, where no major American ground units were deployed, the corps senior adviser directed U.S. military activities.52

The lieutenant generals commanding the two fi eld forces and III 

MAF all reported directly to General Westmoreland on operational 

matters and were under their service components, respectively USARV 

and FMFPAC, for administrative and logistical purposes. They exercised operational control over combat and support units attached to 

them and also over Army Special Forces detachments in their areas. 

They planned and executed American combat operations and coordinated activities with the South Vietnamese and Free World allied forces. As senior advisers to their counterpart ARVN corps commanders, 

they were Westmoreland’s agents for directing Army advisory activities. When MACV took over pacifi cation during 1967, they assumed 

extensive responsibilities in that fi eld as well. The III MAF commander, 

due to the marines’ air-ground organization, controlled as well his own 

fi xed- and rotary-wing air force, with which he executed operations in 

I Corps and elsewhere at COMUSMACV’s direction. In order to oversee 

varied, complex activities over extended territory, the fi eld force staffs 

expanded to nearly 500 offi cers and enlisted men in I Field Force, over 

1,000 in II Field Force, and more than 700 in III Marine Amphibious 

Force. Even with these resources, and with deputy commanders, which 

they acquired in 1967, the fi eld force commanders found themselves 

stretched to the limit by their many responsibilities. One declared fl atly that at his level “the span of control was unmanageable,” requiring 

him to “operate by exception and . . . only . . . on crises.”53

Acting in effect as his own fi eld army commander, General Westmoreland closely supervised and guided his corps-area subordinates. 

Besides issuing yearly and six-month campaign plans and formal letters of instruction on particular subjects, Westmoreland assembled his 

Chap 9.indd 331 
332

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

fi eld commanders, along with those of the service components an

often representatives of other American agencies and the allied forc

es, for periodic conferences. Invariably held outside Saigon, most fre

quently at Nha Trang or Cam Ranh Bay, these meetings provided 

forum for policy guidance by Westmoreland and for briefi ngs by th

fi eld commanders on their operations, successes, and problems. The

also included occasional presentations by the ambassador and othe

mission offi cials on non-military aspects of the confl ict. Westmorelan

valued these meetings as opportunities for widely separated command

ers to exchange information and ideas and for himself to emphasiz

problems or issues of current importance. At least in bringing the com

manders together, the meetings seem to have served their purpose. 

commander of I Field Force commented: “Hell, I never left II Corps. 

we didn’t have those meetings, I would never have seen anybody.”54

Formal plans and conferences, however, were not the primar

means by which Westmoreland guided the day-to-day course of op

erations. The few combat units available, especially during 1965 an

1966, required careful allocation to keep maximum pressure on th

enemy and to counter his initiatives. The fi eld force headquarters wer

slow to acquire essential staff personnel and to develop their full op

erational capabilities. Even when they did, they lacked MACV’s acce

to the most reliable and sensitive sources of intelligence. Hence, Wes

moreland sometimes had no alternative but to exercise close persona

direction over operational planning and over deployment of units a

small as battalions.55

He did so largely through regular visits, at least once a month an

more often during crisis periods, to fi eld force, division, and brigad

headquarters. Westmoreland went to the commanders rather than sum

moning them to Saigon, he later explained, to keep the fi eld genera

alert and because tactical decisions were best made on the spot wher

he could get the “feel” of the situation and obtain the most complet

up-to-date information. Normally traveling with his combat operation

center chief and a few aides, Westmoreland typically received briefi ng

from the host commander and his staff on the military situation an

on current and projected operations. He then commented and issue

instructions. To confi rm the decisions reached, Westmoreland, using 

practice he claimed that he copied from General J. Lawton Collins i

World War II, had the fi eld force or division commander send him 

message summarizing the results of the meeting, to be checked again

a similar record prepared by his own staff offi cers.56

With the Army fi eld forces, which were subordinate to him in bot

his MACV and component capacities, Westmoreland maintained a gen

erally harmonious working relationship; but he had continual diffi cult

imposing his will upon his third, and in some respects most impo

tant, regional command, the III Marine Amphibious Force. The III MA

functioned under the close supervision of FMFPAC and Marine Corp

Chap 9.indd 332 
333

Controlling U.S. Forces

headquarters, to which it reported 

in detail on operational matters 

as well as on the administrative 

and logistical concerns proper to 

a component command. The FMFPAC commander, General Krulak, 

who had been involved in counterinsurgency in various capacities 

since the Kennedy administration, 

had strong views on ground strategy in Vietnam that he vigorously 

promoted to his immediate superior, Admiral Sharp. According to 

General Johnson, Marine Corps 

Commandant Greene “made a call 

once or twice a day from his own 

headquarters in Washington to 

Da Nang . . . , and always had upto-date information on what was 

going on by phone at any meeting of the JCS that we both attended.” 

Westmoreland confi ded to his diary late in 1965: “I detect a tendency 

for the Marine chain of command to try to unduly infl uence the tactical 

conduct of III MAF which is under my operational control.”57

The III MAF was at odds with MACV and the other services on a 

number of matters. The marines’ retention of their own air arm kept 

them perpetually in contention with the Seventh Air Force. The I Field 

Force and III MAF during 1966 had repeated diffi culty coordinating 

operations along their mutual boundary, in part due to poor personal 

relations between Generals Larsen and Walt. Both in their military operations and in their pacifi cation efforts, the marines at times infringed 

on the prerogatives of South Vietnamese authorities in I Corps, resulting in Vietnamese complaints to the U.S. Mission and MACV. More 

substantively, MACV and III MAF disagreed, at least in emphasis and 

priorities, on how best to conduct the ground war. Strongly convinced 

of the importance of winning the struggle for the allegiance of the rural 

population, the marines were more inclined than Westmoreland and 

his Army commanders to commit their American battalions to territorial defense and security as opposed to mobile operations against the 

North Vietnamese and Viet Cong main forces. The marines developed 

their approach almost entirely through their own chain of command, 

without review of its potential costs and policy implications by the 

embassy, MACV, or the State and Defense Departments. In Westmoreland’s view, they were unresponsive to his efforts to modify their tactics. Westmoreland criticized the marines’ overcentralization of control 

of their helicopters; he pressed Walt, Krulak, and Greene in vain to reorganize Marine units so as to make what he considered would be more 

General Walt 

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 9.indd 333 
334

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

effi cient use of their available manpower; and he became increasingl

dissatisfi ed with the quality of III MAF’s operational planning.58

Public relations were another source of irritation. The marines ag

gressively publicized their own activities in contravention of MACV

policy of maintaining a unifi ed military information program—an o

fense of which the other services also were guilty to one degree or an

other. In part to restrain such Marine activities, Westmoreland in Octo

ber 1965 established a jointly staffed MACV information center in D

Nang. The marines, however, quickly transformed the center into wha

amounted to their own public affairs offi ce. Word of Army-Marine di

agreements reached the press, provoking strongly worded directive

from General Wheeler that Sharp, Westmoreland, and their compo

nent commanders stop their subordinates’ public airing of interservic

disputes. The commanders in Vietnam promised stern action again

violators while insisting on the innocence of their own people, but th

leaks and news stories kept coming.59

In the belief that “it is in the best interest of this command to avoi

any inter-service confl icts,” Westmoreland relied on diplomacy mor

than command authority to move III MAF in the directions he desired

He tactfully tried to dissuade General Greene from intervening in th

affairs of his command and succeeded in maintaining cordial relation

with the strong-willed commandant. He also lost no time in cour

ing Greene’s successor, General Leonard D. Chapman. At the end o

General Walt’s tour as commander of III MAF in May 1967, Westmo

reland made a point of fl ying to Da Nang for the change of comman

ceremony, at which he presented Walt with a decoration and publicl

praised his service in Vietnam.60

Westmoreland attempted to guide III MAF’s operations through th

same mixture of formal directives and personal visits that he used wit

the two fi eld forces. To improve Marine planning, he directed III MA

to conduct numerous studies and war games and reviewed and at time

criticized the results. He also required the marines to plan for specifi 

operations against enemy main force units and base areas in an effo

to reduce what he thought was their excessive defensive-mindednes

Marine commanders, however, never fully accepted Westmoreland

concept of how to fi ght the war and continued as much as possible t

adhere to their own. Even after Lt. Gen. Robert E. Cushman replace

Walt at the head of III MAF, Westmoreland in turn remained dissati

fi ed with the methods and policies of the amphibious force headqua

ters and increasingly doubted its competence to direct the expandin

and increasingly violent battle for I Corps. By late 1967, the deve

opment of large-scale fi ghting along the Demilitarized Zone, and th

need to reinforce III MAF with growing numbers of Army troops wer

rapidly bringing to a head issues of both ground and air command i

the northernmost military region.61

Chap 9.indd 334 
335

Controlling U.S. Forces

Notes

1 For examples of Sharp’s intervention in South Vietnam, see Sharp, “Reminiscences,” pp. 203–04, 261–62, 308–10, 326–27. MACV Command History, 1967, 1: 310–

16, 350–51. Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 9 Apr 66, 26 Aug 67, 29 Oct 67, 4 Nov 67, 

and 19 Dec 67; Westmoreland MAC 12505 to Sharp, 22 Dec 67; Sharp to Amb Sullivan, 

17 Feb 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–1967, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Briefings, 17 Aug 66 and 4 Jan 67, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66) and 

tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67). Both in CMH. 2 Aide Memoir for Use by the CMC in Discussion with CINCPAC . . . , box 2, Victor 

H. Krulak Papers, MCHC. 3 Quote is from Gen Johnson Interv, 20 Nov 70, pp. 15–17. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 189–92. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 6313–66 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 15 

Oct 66; Lt Gen George S. Brown, USAF, JCS 7472–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 9 Sep 

67. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Westmoreland describes his acquaintanceship with President Johnson in Interv, Lyndon B. 

Johnson Library with William C. Westmoreland, 8 Feb 69, LBJL. 4 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 76, 261–62; Westmoreland Interv, 8 Feb 69, 

sec. 1, p. 14; Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 334–35; Peers Interv, 26 Jan and 12–15 Apr 77, 

sec. 3, p. 36. Ltr, Westmoreland to Lt Gen Leonard D. Heaton, 28 Jan 67, Westmoreland 

Sig File, Jan 67, CMH; in same fi le, see Ltr, Heaton to Westmoreland, 10 Jan 67. Msg, 

Sharp to Wheeler, 26 May 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, Apr–Jun 67. The relationship 

between Sharp, Westmoreland, and Wheeler can be followed through the Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–1967. 5 For examples of coordination, see Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 5690, MAC 8757, 

MAC 6052 to Sharp, 7 Jul 66, 7 Oct 66, 27 Jun 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 7 Oct 66, 

20 Jan 67, 12 Oct 67; Wheeler JCS 6428–66, JCS 1691–67 to Westmoreland, 20 Oct 66, 

6 Mar 67; Wheeler JCS 6200–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 3 Aug 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–1967, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 13–28 Nov 67, tab 

A, Westmoreland Hist File 25 (13–28 Nov 67), CMH. Wheeler’s avoidance of split JCS 

recommendations is commented on in Palmer, 25-Year War, pp.34–35. 6 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 54–56, 99–100; Shulimson and Johnson, 

Marines in Vietnam, 1965, p. 36; Staff Study, Ch, NAVADVGRP, MACV, sub: An Examination of the Naval Component Commander Requirement for the Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam, (hereafter cited as Naval Component Commander Requirement) 

5 Jan 66, pp. 9–13, COMNAVFORV Plans Files, 1966 Da Nang Conference Folder, box 

471, COMNAVFORV Records, Naval Historical Center (NHC), Washington, D.C. 7 Ch, NAVADVGRP, MACV, Naval Component Commander Requirement, 5 Jan 66, 

pp. 11, 14, 17–18; Memo, 51 for 05, 12 Feb 66, sub: Report of Field Trip to NCC Staff, 

Da Nang. Both in COMNAVFORV Plans Files, 1966 Da Nang Conference Folder, box 

471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. Msg, Rear Adm N. G. Ward to Rear Adm Thomas 

F. Connolly, 11 Aug 65, Rear Adm N. G. Ward’s Personal Msg Files, 1965, box 108, 

COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. 8 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 100. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 25 Sep–3 Oct 

65, in Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 

32718 to Adm McDonald, 17 Sep 65, Rear Adm Ward’s Personal Msg File, 1965, box 

108, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. 9 Ch, NAVADVGRP, MACV, Naval Component Commander Requirement, 5 Jan 66, 

pp. 18–21, COMNAVFORV Plans Files, 1966 Da Nang Conf Folder, box 471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. Staff Study, NAVADVGRP Dec 65, sub: Requirements for a Naval 

Chap 9.indd 335 
336

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Component Commander under COMUSMACV; Ch, NAVADVGRP, MACV, Naval Com

ponent Commander Requirement, 8 Jan 66. Both in Vietnam Command Files, NHC

10 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0185 to Sharp, 9 Jan 66, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 9 Jan 66, tab D, Westmorelan

Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. Memo, 51 for 05, sub: Report of Field Trip 

NCC Staff, Da Nang, 12 Feb 66; Memo, Ch, NAVADVGRP, sub: Assignment of Tasks 

COMNAVFORV and CG III MAF, 28 Mar 66. Both in 1966 Da Nang Conference (Con

Folder, box 471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. Msg, CNO to CINCPACFLT, 072103

Mar 66, Buildup of Forces Folder, NAVFORV Ops Files (7), box 432, COMNAVFOR

Records, NHC. 11 Westmoreland Hist Notes, 3 Apr 66, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–2

Apr 66), CMH. Memo, Ch, NAVADVGRP, sub: Assignment of Tasks to COMNAVFOR

and CG III MAF, 28 Mar 66, 1966 Da Nang Conf Folder, box 471; Memo, Ch, NAVAD

VGRP for MACJ02, sub: Assignment of Tasks to COMNAVFORV, 7 Apr 66, box 55

Memo, Cdr J. P. Iredale for N–5, N–3, 0–2, 15 Mar 68, box 471. All in COMNAVFOR

Records, NHC. MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 126–28. 12 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 240–42; Chronology, 1 Jan–30 Jun 66, ta

D–5, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. 13 Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 78–80. Msg, CINCPACFLT to COMNAV

FORV, 22 Oct 66, Command Relations Folder; Memo, Brig Gen A. R. Brownfi eld f

CofS, sub: U.S. Command Relationships, IV CTZ; Memo, Capt J. D. Eaton for COM

NAVFORV et al., 24 Mar 68, sub: U.S. Command Relations, IV CTZ; Memo, COMNAV

FORV for ACofS J3 MACV, sub: U.S. Command Relations, IV CTZ, 31 Mar 68. All in bo

471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. Msg, COMNAVFORV to CINCPACFLT, 21 Aug 6

box 477, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. 14 For doctrinal issues of command of the SLF, which arose between III MAF an

Pacifi c Fleet as well as between the fl eet and MACV, see Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam

1966, pp. 297–99.

15 MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 415–20; Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam

1966, pp. 300–304; Jones Interv, pp. 8–12, MCHC; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 27 M

66, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. Quote is from Msg, Wes

moreland MAC 00196 to Sharp, 5 Jan 68, tab A–13, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 De

67–31 Jan 68), CMH. 16 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 96.

17 Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 49–50; MACV Command History, 1965, p

96–97. Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3307 to Gen Johnson, 29 Jun 65; se

also Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1724 to Johnson, 30 Mar 65; and Westmoreland MA

5387 to Wheeler, 29 Oct 65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, 1 Apr–3

Jun 65, and 1 Oct–31 Dec 65. See also Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 346–47. 18 Interv, Senior Offi cers Oral History Program with Lt Gen Jean E. Engler, 1981, p

244–45. MHI. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 105–06. MS, Joel Meyerson, “Logi

tics in the Buildup,” 1989, pp. 2–3, CMH. Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 44–45

19 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 97; ibid., 1967, pp. 125–26, 128–29; Engl

Interv, 1981, pp. 218, 242, MHI; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 7 Nov 65, tab C, Westm

reland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. Interv, Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Progra

with Lt Gen Stanley R. Larsen, 1977, sec. 8, pp. 1–2, MHI. 20 These precedents are cited in Eckhardt, Command and Control, pp. 51–52. Arm

doctrine as of 1965 is summarized in MS, Maj Steve E. Dietrich, “Corps-Level Com

mand-and-Control in an Unconventional Confl ict: U.S. Army Field Forces in Vie

nam,” Military Studies Branch, CMH, 1989, ch. 2, p. 3, CMH fi les. 21 Ltr, Lt Gen Bruce Palmer, Jr., to Gen Johnson, 14 Nov 67, Close Hold Misc Fil

Chap 9.indd 336 
337

Controlling U.S. Forces

H. K. Johnson Papers, MHI. Quote is from Exit Interv, Historical Section, USARV, with 

Lt Gen Bruce Palmer, Jr., 7 and 10 Jun 68, in Interv, Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Program 

with Gen Bruce Palmer, Jr., 1975, p. 258, MHI; see also pp. 261–63, 240, 280. Interv, 

Senior Offi cers Debriefi ng Program with Lt Gen Jonathan O. Seaman, 1971–1972, sec. 

5, pp. 27–28, MHI. 22 Ltr, Palmer to Gen Johnson, 14 Nov 67, Close Hold Misc File, H. K. Johnson 

Papers, MHI. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 27658 to DCG USARV, 19 Aug 67, Command 

Relations Folder, box 471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. See also 9th Division’s Move 

to the Delta Folder, box 477, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC. Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 

Jun 68, pp. 250, 252; Palmer Interv, 1975, pp. 225–26. Memo, Westmoreland for DCG 

USARV, 24 Jun 67, sub: Establishment of Mine and Booby Trap Confi dence Courses, 

Westmoreland Sig File, Jun 67, CMH. 23 First quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 Mar 66, tab A, Westmoreland 

Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. Second is from Ltr, Palmer to Gen Johnson, 14 

Nov 67, Close Hold Misc File, H. K. Johnson Papers, MHI. Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 

31–32, 49; Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, pp. 258–59. General Bruce Palmer, Jr., Intervention in the Caribbean: The Dominican Crisis of 1965 (Lexington: University Press of 

Kentucky, 1989), p. 155. Other Army generals had varying views on this subject; see for 

example Seaman Interv, 1971–72, sec. 5, p. 33; and Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 346–47. 24 First quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 Mar 66, tab A, Westmoreland 

Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. Second is from Palmer Interv, 1975, p. 511; see 

also pp. 221–22. Third is from Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, pp. 258–59; see also pp. 

257–58, 260. Ltr, Palmer to Gen Johnson, 14 Nov 67, Close Hold Misc File, H. K. Johnson Papers, MHI. Memos, Palmer for Westmoreland, 25 Jun 67, sub: Role of USARV, 

and sub: Effi ciency Report Chain, 25 Jun 67; Memo, Westmoreland for Palmer, sub: 

Role of USARV, 30 Jun 67. All in Westmoreland Sig File, Jun 67, CMH. 25 Westmoreland’s dealings with General Johnson can be followed in the Westmoreland Message Files and Historical Files for the 1965–1968 period. Johnson describes 

his efforts to keep abreast of Vietnam developments in his Interv, 27 Jan 72–30 Oct 

74, sec. 13, pp. 31–32, and sec. 14, pp. 6–7. For the relationship between Johnson and 

Westmoreland, see Interv, Charles B. MacDonald and Charles von Luttichau with Gen 

Harold K. Johnson, McLean, Va., 20 Nov 70, p. 21, CMH; MacDonald-Westmoreland 

Interv, 12 Mar 73; and Palmer Interv, 1975, p. 204. Both in CMH. 26 Quote is from Interv, Senior Offi cers Oral History Program with Maj Gen Spurgeon H. Neel, Jr., 1985, p. 172, MHI. H. K. Johnson Interv, 20 Nov 70, pp. 42–45. 

Memo, Cdr J. P. Iredale for Force Plans Offi cer, sub: U.S. Command Relations, IV CTZ, 

31 Mar 68, box 471, COMNAVFORV Records, NHC, indicates the complex informal 

relationships that developed between service component and MACV staffs. 27 The overall impact of air power on the Vietnam confl ict is surveyed in Donald J. Mrozek, Airpower and the Ground War in Vietnam (Washington, D.C.: Pergamon–

Brassey’s, 1989). 28 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3052 to Sharp, 11 Jun 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. 29 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 70–71; see ch. 2 in this volume for an overview of the evolution of U.S. command and control of tactical air power. Schlight, Years 

of the Offensive, pp. 31–32. 30 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 71–73. See also ch. 2, pp. 42–44 in this volume for the command rearrangements of October 1962. 31 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 80–83. Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with 

Maj Gen Gilbert L. Meyers, USAF, 27 May 70, pp. 51–54. AFCHO. 32 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 80, 83–84. Schlight, Years of the Offensive, 

Chap 9.indd 337 
338

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

pp. 129–30. Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with Gen John P. McConnell, USAF, 4 No

70, pp. 6–7. AFCHO. 33 Air command is summarized in Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p

101–03. Quote is from Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with Maj Gen Gordon F. Bloo

USAF, 6 Apr 70, p. 25, AFCHO. 34 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 32–33, 54. Quote is from Sharp, “Reminiscen

es,” pp. 369–70; see also pp. 310–32, 360–62, 636–37. Msgs, Sharp to Westmorelan

24, 27 Jul 66; Sharp to Wheeler, 13 Apr 66; Wheeler JCS 9682–67 to Westmoreland, 1

Nov 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1965–1967, CMH. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 8297 

Sharp and Westmoreland, 12 Apr 66, tab E–2; Westmoreland MAC 12815 to Wheel

and Sharp, 13 Apr 66, tab E–5; Wheeler JCS 8463 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 14 Ap

66, tab E–7; Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. MACV Comman

History, 1966, pp. 394, 398–99. 35 A sortie consists of one mission by one aircraft.

36 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 126–27. MACV Command History, 1965, p

188–90. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 5–11 Sep 65, 15 Sep 65, and 5 Oct 65; Memo, MAC

for Distribution, 10 Sep 65, sub: Joint Board to Study Tactical Air Firepower. Both 

Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH; in same fi le, see tabs C–2 an

H–4. Muggleberg Interv, 1985, pp. 25–26, 28; Memo, Joint Coordinator, Ofc, Dep Co

(Plans and Programs) for CofS [HQMC], sub: Trip Report to WestPac, tab A, in HQM

Staff Visit WestPac, Nov–Dec 65, MCHC Archives; Meyers Interv, 27 May 70, pp. 49–5

Blood Interv, 6 Apr 70, pp. 22–24. 37 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p. 293. Westmoreland’s views of his air com

manders are in: Westmoreland Hist Briefi ng, 3 Jul 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 

(29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6073 to Gen McConnell, 18 J

66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH; and MacDonald-Westmorelan

Interv, 18 Jun 73. For typical Air Force praise of Westmoreland, see McConnell Inter

4 Nov 70, p. 7. Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with Gen George S. Brown, USAF, 19–2

Oct 70, pp. 10–11, AFCHO, and Interv, Project CORONA HARVEST with Lt Gen David C

Jones, USAF, 4–6 May 69, pp. 6–8, AFCHO. 38 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 82–83, 148, 150–54, 256–58; MACV Com

mand History, 1965, pp. 192–99; ibid., 1966, pp. 400–401; Msg, COMUSMACV MA

35970 to CINCPAC, 1 Nov 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 1967, CMH. MacDonal

Westmoreland Interv, 28 Jan 73, CMH. 39 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p. 283; Ltr, Westmoreland to Lt Gen J. C. Meye

USAF, 15 Aug 67, COMUSMACV Sig File, 1967, CMH. Parry, Three-War Marine, pp. 266

67. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 126. Intervs, Project CORONA HARVE

with Gen Hunter Harris, USAF, 22 Apr 71, pp. 33–34; with Maj Altha M. Stewart, USA

and with Adm Ulysses S. Grant Sharp, 19 Feb 71, pp. 4–6. All in AFCHO. 40 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 148–49. Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p

99–101. MACV Command History, 1965, p. 193. 41 Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 149–50. Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p

101–04. Westmoreland Hist Briefi ng, 13 Dec 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (3

Oct–12 Dec 66); Msg, Westmoreland MAC 11160 to Sharp, 23 Dec 66, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66. Both in CMH. 42 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p. 39. General Momyer had participated in th

early development of Air Force tactical air support doctrine as a fi ghter group com

mander in North Africa in World War II. Thereafter, against the tide of Air Force em

phasis on strategic nuclear warfare, Momyer, in various command and senior sta

positions, continued as a proponent of tactical air power within his service. His care

is outlined in Schlight, Years of the Offensive, p. 139.

Chap 9.indd 338 
339

Controlling U.S. Forces

43 The Johnson-McConnell agreement is recounted in Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 122–25; and in Tolson, Airmobility, pp. 104–08. Text of the agreement is in 

Msg, Johnson WDC 4210 to Westmoreland and Waters, 6 Apr 66, Westmoreland Msg 

Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. For control of Army helicopters, see HQ MACV Directive 

(Dir) 95–4, 28 Jun 66, ann. C, copy in III MAF Command Relations Files, MCHC. 44 Air command relations in Korea are summarized in Momyer, Airpower in Three 

Wars, pp. 59–62. The marines’ determination not to repeat the Korean experience is 

noted in Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, p. 151. Schlight, Years of 

the Offensive, pp. 110–11, succinctly summarizes the Marine Corps–Air Force argument 

over control of air power. 45 The Joint Chiefs of Staff defi ned “coordinating authority” as “a commander 

or individual assigned responsibility for coordinating specifi c functions or activities 

involving forces of two or more services, or two or more forces of the same service. He 

has the authority to require consultation between the agencies involved but does not 

have the authority to compel agreement. In the event he is unable to obtain essential 

agreement he shall refer the matter to the appointing authority.” JCS Pub. 1, Dictionary 

of US Military Terms for Joint Usage, July 1962, p. 57. 46 HQ CINCPAC, Report of the CINCPAC Tactical Air Support Procedures Board, 18 

Dec 63, box 14, Keith B. McCutcheon Papers, pp. 1–2 and app. H, p. 7, MCHC. In same 

collection, box 13, see Ltrs, McCutcheon to Col E. E. Anderson, USMC, 18 Dec 63, and 

to Brig Gen G. S. Bowman, USMC, 23 Jan 64. Neither Felt nor Sharp adopted this report in its entirety, but they incorporated its recommendations in other directives. Brig 

Gen Keith B. McCutcheon, “Marine Aviation in Vietnam,” in The Marines in Vietnam, 

1954–1973: An Anthology and Annotated Bibliography (Washington, D.C.: History and 

Museums Div, HQMC, 1974), p. 175. 47 Quote is from Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, info Wheeler, McConnell, Chapman, and Krulak, 18 Jan 68, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–31 Jan 68, CMH. Msgs, 

COMUSMACV MAC 9775 to CINCPAC, 28 Mar 65; CINCPAC to COMUSMACV, 29 

Mar 65 and 24 Apr 65. Both in CINCPAC Msg Files, NHC. Sharp Interv, 19 Feb 71, p. 

19; Sharp, “Reminiscences,” pp. 638–40. 48 MACV Dir 95–4, 28 Jun 66, copy in III MAF Command Relations File, MCHC 

Archives; Memo, Westmoreland for Moore, 25 Aug 65 sub: TOR, Deputy for Air Operations, HQ U.S. MACV, copy in box 14, McCutcheon Papers, MCHC; 1st MAW Operations Order (OpOrd) 303–65, 15 Jul 65, in app. 3, 1st MAW Command Chronology, 

MCHC Archives; in same document, see pt. 3, sec. 11. Shulimson and Johnson, Marines 

in Vietnam, 1965, p. 152. 49 Westmoreland quotes are from his Historical Notes, 28 Dec 65, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH; see also tab C in same fi le. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 7 May 73. Memo, DePuy for Westmoreland, 3 Mar 66, sub: 

Tactical Air Control, 1966 R–Z Folder, DePuy Papers, MHI. For the Air Force view, see 

Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 81–82; and Schlight, Years of the Offensive, pp. 

108–10. 50 Msg, Westmoreland to Sharp, 9 Apr 66, Westmoreland Msg File, 1 Apr–30 Jun 

66; Westmoreland Historical Briefi ng, 13 Dec 66, tab D. Westmoreland Hist File 11 

(30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH. Emergency provision is in MACV Dir 95–4, 28 Jun 66, par. 

3.e., in III MAF Command Relations File, MCHC Archives. Interv, USMC Oral History 

Program with Lt Gen Victor H. Krulak, 1970, sess. 5, p. 2, MCHC. Quote is from Krulak, Speech to 1967 HQMC General Offi cers’ Symposium, p. 21, box 2, Krulak Papers, 

MCHC. 51 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 277–78, outlines the scope and effectiveness 

of tactical air support in Vietnam. For favorable assessments of air support, see Sharp 

Chap 9.indd 339 
340

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Interv, 19 Feb 71, p. 15; and Peers Interv, 26 Jan and 12–15 Jan 77, sec. 3, pp. 60–6

Both the successes and growing diffi culties of Air Force–Marine cooperation in I Corp

are outlined in MACV Command History, 1967, 1: 325, 450–52; and ibid., 1968, 

423–24, 434–36. 52 For establishment of the fi eld force headquarters, see Dietrich, “Field Forces,” c

1, pp. 9–21; ch. 2, p. 1; ch. 3, passim. 53 MACV Command History, 1967, p. 128. Strengths of the headquarters are 

Dietrich, “Field Forces,” ch. 3, pp. 58, 69; and Maj. Gary L. Telfer, USMC; Lt. Col. Lan

Rogers, USMC; and V. Keith Fleming, Jr., U.S. Marines in Vietnam: Fighting the Nor

Vietnamese, 1967 (Washington: History and Museums Division, HQMC, 1984), p. 31

Lt Gen Fred C. Weyand, Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Report, 15 Jul 68, pp. 6–7, CMH

Peers Interv, sec. 4, pp. 6–7, MHI. Msg, Johnson WDC 0195 to Westmoreland, 6 Jan 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. Quote is from Douglas Kinnard, Th

War Managers (Hanover: University Press of New England, 1977), p. 58. 54 HQ MACV Dir 525–4, 17 Sep 65, sub: Tactics and Techniques for Employment 

U.S. Forces in the Republic of Vietnam, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65

CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 02916 to Component and Field Force Commander

24 Jan 67; COMUSMACV MAC 35945 to CGs, III MAF, I and II FFORCEV, and DCG

USARV, 1 Nov 67. All in Westmoreland Sig File, 1967, CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldi

Reports, pp. 268–69. MFR, Chaisson, 9 Feb 67, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conferenc

22 January 1967, tab D–11, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH

Quote is from Peers Interv, sec. 3, pp. 75–76, MHI. 55 MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 18 Jun 73, CMH; Westmoreland, A Soldier R

ports, p. 271. Early fi eld force headquarters diffi culties are recounted in Dietrich, “Fie

Forces,” ch. 3, pp. 18–19. 56 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 269–70; MacDonald-Westmoreland Inter

28 Jan 73 and n.d., CMH; Westmoreland Conference with CMH Historians, 6 Dec 8

Notes in CMH; Interv, Charles B. MacDonald and Charles von Luttichau with Lt Ge

Stanley R. Larsen, 6 Dec 68, pp. 1–2, copy in CMH; Seaman Interv, sec. 3, pp. 42–4

MHI; Palmer, 25-Year War, p. 63. Records of Westmoreland’s conferences are scattere

throughout his History Files for 1965–1968, CMH. 57 First quote is from H. K. Johnson Interv, sec. 12, p. 16, MHI. Second is from Wes

moreland Hist Notes, 4 Oct 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH; 

same fi le, see Notes for 17 Oct 65. Larsen Interv, 1977, sec. 5, pp. 13–14, CMH. Pee

Interv, sec. 3, pp. 35–36, MHI. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 25 Apr 73, CMH

Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5038 to Gen W. M. Greene, CMC, 9 Oct 65, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. General Krulak’s views and infl uence on strategy a

summarized in Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 1966, pp. 11–14. 58 Larsen Interv, 1977, sec. 5, pp. 9–13, CMH. MacDonald-Westmoreland Inter

17 and 19 Jun 73, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 17 Oct 66, tab D, Westmorelan

Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); 29 Jan 67, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 De

66–26 Jan 67); 6–18 Aug 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 20 (4–20 Aug 67). All 

CMH. Chaisson Oral History, pp. 223–25, MCHC. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 7598 

Sharp, 13 Aug 67; Msg, Krulak to Westmoreland, 19 Aug 67; tabs A–11 and A–26. Bot

in Westmoreland Hist File 20 (4–20 Aug 67), CMH. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.1

pp. 17–19. 59 Service rivalry, media leaks, and the Da Nang press center are covered in Ham

mond, Military and Media, 1962–1968, pp. 243–44. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 5419–66 to Shar

and Westmoreland, 12 Sep 66; Engler MAC 7999 to Gen Johnson, 14 Sep 66; Larse

NHT 0648 to Johnson, 14 Sep 66; Westmoreland MAC 8020 to Wheeler and Sharp, 1

Sep 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Aug–30 Sep 66, CMH.

Chap 9.indd 340 
341

Controlling U.S. Forces

60 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 9128 to Johnson, 29 Sep 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 166. 

Westmoreland Hist Notes, 16 Jan 67, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 

Jan 67), and 23–31 May 67, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67). Both in 

CMH. MFR, Westmoreland, 20 Jan 68, sub: Meeting with General Chapman, Newly 

Appointed Commandant of the Marine Corps . . . , Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 

67–31 Jan 68), CMH. 61 Ltr, Westmoreland to CG III MAF, 21 Nov 65, sub: Letter of Instruction (LOI–4), 

tab E–1, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65); MFR, Jones, 16 Sep 66, sub: 

COMUSMACV’s Visit to III MAF . . . , tab A–5, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 

Oct 66); Msg, III MAF COC to COMUSMACV COC, 20 Jan 67, tab D–5; Westmoreland 

Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH, are examples of Westmoreland’s guidance to 

III MAF. Other examples can be found throughout Westmoreland’s History and Message Files. For Marine response to MACV guidance, see Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 

1966, pp. 14–15. 

Chap 9.indd 341 
Chap 9.indd 342 
10

The Allies and Pacifi cation

Besides controlling its U.S. units, the Military Assistance Command 

had to coordinate the operations of allied forces that varied greatly 

in capabilities and in willingness to accept American tactical direction. 

In addition, after much interagency squabbling within the U.S. government, MACV became responsible for managing the pacifi cation 

campaign. To meet these challenges, General Westmoreland, his subordinates, and his military and civilian superiors resorted to piecemeal 

adjustments and modifi cations of existing arrangements and institutions. The expedients they adopted were shaped in part by operational 

realities, in part by American interservice and intergovernmental politics, and in part by the requirements of interallied diplomacy.

The Allies

MACV’s forces included sizable contingents from America’s Asian 

and Pacifi c allies. Beginning in mid-1964, the Johnson administration pressed anti-Communist nations around the world to join in the 

struggle in Vietnam. The administration valued such assistance not 

only for the additional resources it provided but also because it lent 

multilateral respectability to a domestically and internationally controversial venture.

This “more fl ags” appeal elicited only token humanitarian contributions from America’s principal European, Middle Eastern, and Western Hemisphere allies; but a number of countries closer to Vietnam 

dispatched signifi cant forces as an accompaniment to the U.S. troop 

buildup. The Republic of Korea, which in late 1964 had contributed a 

1,900-man paramilitary civic action (“DOVE”) unit, during the next 

two years sent a marine brigade and two full infantry divisions. Australia and New Zealand early furnished advisers, then added the equivalent of a brigade of combat troops. Thailand fi rst sent a regiment and 

later enlarged it to an undersize division. The Philippines provided a 

2,000-man paramilitary force. At peak strength, Free World allied forces in South Vietnam amounted to more than 68,000 men and included 

31 maneuver battalions—more allied troops, though of mixed qualChap 10.indd 343 
344

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ity, than had served alongside Americans during the United Nation

sponsored Korean War. Each contributing country sent forces unde

a separate agreement with the United States and South Vietnam, an

each—except for Australia and New Zealand, which largely paid the

own way—received in return substantial American support in mone

and new arms and equipment for its Vietnam contingent and in som

instances for its forces at home. In Vietnam each allied unit drew com

bat and logistical support from MACV, normally through its counte

part American service component.1

In December 1964 the Military Assistance Command set up a spe

cial staff element, the International Military Assistance Offi ce, unde

supervision of the J5 section, to oversee the affairs of the third coun

try forces. Renamed the Free World Military Assistance Offi ce in Octo

ber 1965, this agency acquired its own building in downtown Saigon

which it shared with representatives of the troop-contributing coun

tries. Codifying earlier ad hoc arrangements, the Free World Militar

Assistance Offi ce outlined command relationships between MACV, th

allied forces, and the South Vietnamese. Each allied force was under th

command of a general offi cer of its own nationality who maintaine

his headquarters in Saigon. The national commander, cooperatin

with representatives of MACV and the South Vietnamese Joint Genera

Staff (JGS) (in practice Generals Westmoreland and Cao Van Vien fo

major contingents, such as the Koreans), formed a policy council tha

implemented the terms of the military agreements between the Uni

ed States, South Vietnam, and the contributing country. The council

most important task was the establishment of an exact command rela

tionship between the allied force, MACV, and the JGS. In practice, th

meant that the allies dealt directly with MACV, since the third coun

tries ruled out any subordination of their forces to those of Saigon.2

The Australians, New Zealanders, Thais, and to a degree the Fil

pinos placed their troops under General Westmoreland’s operation

al control and that of his subordinate American tactical command

ers. These arrangements, however, were less militarily absolute an

straightforward than their formal terms might have suggested. Eac

country kept close watch over its contingent and negotiated wit

MACV the exact extent of its forces’ participation in combat. Con

cerned about the domestic political effects of heavy casualties, for ex

ample, the Australian government was reluctant to engage its soldie

in risky offensive operations and also wanted to keep them out o

internationally sensitive areas such as the Vietnam-Cambodia borde

region. After lengthy negotiations with Lt. Gen. John Wilton, chie

of the Royal Australian Army General Staff, and other Australian o

fi cials, as well as with the South Vietnamese, Westmoreland early i

1966 assigned the Australian–New Zealand task force its own area o

operations in Phuoc Tuy Province east of Saigon. There, in a provinc

well away from Cambodia that large enemy main-force units rarel

Chap 10.indd 344 
345

The Allies and Pacifi cation

entered, the task force could protect an important highway and fi ght 

Viet Cong guerrillas.3

The South Koreans, whose troops eventually took over defense of 

most of the populated coastal region of II Corps, rejected any semblance of formal American operational control. Viewing their presence 

in Vietnam as a bargaining lever in their relations with the United 

States and as an occasion to assert themselves as an Asian anti-Communist power in their own right, the Koreans from the outset insisted 

that their expeditionary force be treated as independent of, and coequal 

with, the U.S. and South Vietnamese armies. Since the United States 

needed Korean soldiers in Vietnam much more than the Koreans needed to be there, the Seoul government was able to extract large fi nancial 

and diplomatic concessions in return for the two army divisions and 

the marine brigade it contributed to the war. It also obtained generally 

what it wanted in terms of command relationships in Vietnam.4

The Koreans’ attitude compelled Westmoreland to engage in some 

delicate diplomacy. Early in 1965 the Koreans agreed to place their 

DOVE unit under Westmoreland’s operational control. When planning 

began for deployment of their divisions and brigade, however, the Commander, Republic of Korea Forces, Vietnam, Maj. Gen. Chae Myung 

Shin, withdrew the concession. A new military working arrangement 

signed on 6 September 1965, after lengthy conferences between Chae, 

Westmoreland, and Cao Van Vien, provided for MACV logistical and 

intelligence support for the Korean force, but Chae, on grounds of national sovereignty and prestige, refused to sign any document formally 

placing his troops under Westmoreland’s operational control. On the 

question of command, the document simply declared that the Korean 

units would “execute necessary operational missions in support of the 

National Pacifi cation Program” under their own commander. Privately, 

Chae and other Korean offi cials assured Westmoreland that their forces 

would act as though they were under his orders and those of the I Field 

Force commander, General Larsen, as long as nothing was put in writing and the orders were couched as requests. Westmoreland accepted 

this gentlemen’s agreement as “probably more durable and certainly 

more politically palatable than a formal arrangement that would create 

unnecessary controversy . . . , be politically awkward to the Koreans, 

and in the fi nal analysis not be binding.”5

At the fi eld force level, considerable jockeying for position ensued 

over the exact terms of the informal command arrangement. General Larsen initially assumed that he could exercise operational control of the Korean divisions, transmitting instructions to them directly 

through Korean liaison elements at I Field Force headquarters. General 

Chae, however, denied that Larsen had operational control and insisted 

that the fi eld force commander deal with the divisions through Chae’s 

headquarters, Republic of Korea Forces, Vietnam (ROKFORV), on the 

basis of requests rather than orders. After the second Korean infantry 

Chap 10.indd 345 
346

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

division arrived during 1966, Cha

tried to channel all of Larsen’s com

munications with the Korean forc

es through a small ROKFORV fi el

headquarters that he set up at Nh

Trang at Westmoreland’s sugge

tion. Chae also sought to establis

his own contacts with the ARVN 

Corps commander and considere

attaching Korean advisers to Sout

Vietnamese Army units withi

his area of responsibility. Durin

1966, the Korean government pro

moted Chae to lieutenant genera

compelling Westmoreland hastil

to obtain a third star for Genera

Larsen, who otherwise would hav

labored under a disadvantage i

rank. Westmoreland responded t

the Koreans’ stubbornness wit

more personal diplomacy by bot

himself and Larsen. He told th

Mission Council in October 196

that he was “simply letting wate

fi nd its own level and not raisin

diffi cult questions which woul

require formalized answers at th

time.” He continued to rely as far as possible on “informal accommo

dations” in defi ning MACV-ROKFORV command relations.6

Under these arrangements, the Koreans obtained the independenc

they wanted. Westmoreland and his I Field Force commanders too

care to maintain cordial personal and working relationships with Gen

eral Chae and to respect Korean nationalist sensitivities. In practic

engaging in only minimal cooperation with the South Vietnamese, th

Korean divisions largely conducted their campaign in their own are

of responsibility and under only the most general American direction

Continuing to assert his status as an independent third force, Genera

Chae in late 1967 demanded that he be made a cosigner with Genera

Westmoreland and Vien of the annual American-Vietnamese combine

campaign plan, even though Chae’s forces operated in only two of th

four corps areas. Westmoreland sidestepped this bid by suggesting tha

the Koreans and Vietnamese adopt supplemental combined plans fo

the regions where the Koreans were deployed.7

Apparently under instructions from Seoul to minimize casualtie

the Koreans concentrated on defense and pacifi cation of the coasta

strip they controlled. While seemingly effective in suppressing th

Brig. Gen. Edward H. de Saussure, 

196th Brigade commander, with

General Chae (NARA)

Chap 10.indd 346 
347

The Allies and Pacifi cation

Viet Cong, their pacifi cation methods provoked 

repeated complaints from 

the South Vietnamese 

and from American advisers that the Koreans were 

killing and torturing civilians. The Koreans attacked 

enemy main forces and 

base areas only occasionally, after much persuasion 

by I Field Force and after 

being assured of lavish 

American tactical air, helicopter, and artillery support. Korean offensives, 

in the view of American 

commanders, were usually 

ineffi cient in proportion 

to the resources tied up in 

supporting them. General 

Larsen and his successors 

respected the discipline 

and professionalism of 

their Korean allies but, 

because of their defensivemindedness, considered 

them, in Larsen’s words, 

“on balance . . . about one 

half as effective in combat 

as our best US units.”8

Besides working out command relationships and operational missions for the allied contingents, General Westmoreland participated in 

continuing U.S. diplomatic efforts to obtain still more third-country soldiers. He cooperated with U.S. ambassadors as well as military commanders and advisers in negotiating with contributing countries about the 

size, composition, equipment, and missions of their units. During 1967, 

for example, he and his staff worked with Ambassador Graham Martin 

in Bangkok and with the commander of the U.S. Military Assistance 

Command, Thailand, Maj. Gen. Richard G. Stilwell (and his successor, 

Maj. Gen. Hal D. McGown) on plans for expanding the Thai contingent 

from a regimental combat team to a small division. Throughout these 

discussions, Westmoreland took the position that allied units must 

come to Vietnam fully trained and ready for combat because MACV 

lacked resources to complete their preparation and to protect them 

until they could defend themselves. He also tried to minimize drafts 

South Korean troops inspect a dead Viet Cong 

guerrilla. (© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 10.indd 347 
348

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

on MACV for men and equipment to aid in activating allied units i

their own countries. Such assistance, he contended, should come from 

outside his theater so as not to hinder either the American buildup o

efforts to expand and improve the South Vietnamese military. In ac

cord with this policy, he persuaded U.S. Army, Pacifi c, and the Depar

ment of the Army to reduce by 50 percent the number of personn

taken from USARV and the MACV advisers to help organize and trai

the Thai division.9

The allied contingents kept the MACV commander and staff bus

with a host of minor military and political problems, most requirin

international diplomacy to solve. The distribution of M16 rifl es, fo

example, became a question of face for the Koreans, who insisted tha

in recognition of the size and importance of their forces, they shoul

receive them ahead of the other allies and the South Vietnamese. Pro

vision of national food and entertainment for the foreign contingen

generated message traffi c and consumed command and staff time, a

did occasional scandals, such as the Koreans’ clandestine shipmen

home of spent brass artillery shell casings and allegations of brutalit

in their pacifi cation campaigns. In coping with such problems, MAC

often enlisted the aid of U.S. commanders stationed in the contribu

ing countries, who used their military and government contacts to se

cure information and smooth over irritations. Those commanders, i

turn, often transmitted concerns of their host governments to MACV

Westmoreland, for example, maintained constant communicatio

with General Charles Bonesteel, commander of U.S. forces in Korea, o

matters concerning that country’s contingent.10

Overall, the allied forces were a mixed blessing for the Military A

sistance Command. On the one hand, they made a signifi cant, if lim

ited, contribution to the war effort. The Koreans, for example, pro

tected a large, heavily populated area containing several major por

and allied bases, freeing American and South Vietnamese troops fo

other tasks. The Australians and New Zealanders, though few in num

bers, were competent professional soldiers experienced in antiguerrill

operations. The Thais and Filipinos, much less effective, neverthele

enhanced security in the areas where they were stationed. On the othe

hand, the allied forces, and most notably the Koreans, required dispro

portionate amounts of American logistical and combat support and o

MACV command and staff attention. Their presence further compl

cated the persistent question of establishing an American–South Vie

namese combined command.

The South Vietnamese: Cooperation and Coordination 

As American and allied participation in the war expanded, Genera

Westmoreland continued to reject proposals that surfaced periodicall

in Washington and Saigon for a combined command. He commi

Chap 10.indd 348 
349

The Allies and Pacifi cation

sioned several MACV staff studies of the subject, but all concluded that 

the political and military diffi culties and disadvantages of attempting 

to establish an international headquarters would outweigh any possible benefi ts. Westmoreland argued that he already exercised de facto 

control of South Vietnamese operations through the advisory system 

and through the provision of logistical and combat support, and that 

imposition of an American supreme commander on the Vietnamese 

would add substance to Communist charges of U.S. imperialism. He 

asserted that a combined staff would be divided by language barriers 

and could not be given access to the most sensitive intelligence for 

fear of security breaches by its South Vietnamese members. Westmoreland pointed out that the other allies would have to be given “various prestige command positions” in any such headquarters. Finally, a 

combined military command would require an international political 

authority of some kind to direct its activities, adding still more diplomatic complications. Westmoreland preferred to stick with the existing 

system, imperfect as it was, and his superiors accepted his judgment.11

Accordingly, the Military Assistance Command continued to work 

with the South Vietnamese forces on the basis of “mutual coordination and cooperation.” Each nation retained control of its own forces, 

and fi eld commanders were to collaborate as equals in planning and 

executing operations. The South Vietnamese were considered to be ultimately responsible for the defense of all their national territory, with 

the Americans and other allies assisting in particular assigned areas.12

By late 1965, the command structure of Saigon’s armed forces had 

assumed the form it would retain throughout the rest of the war. At the 

top, the Joint General Staff, which served as a counterpart to MACV, 

functioned as both an army and a joint headquarters, planning and 

directing all aspects of the Vietnamese military effort. Its general staff 

sections corresponded closely to those of MACV and were grouped into 

three directorates, for operations, personnel, and logistics. Two other 

specialized directorates oversaw training and political warfare. Directly 

subordinate to the JGS were separate commands for the air force, navy, 

marine corps, and airborne forces, as well as administrative headquarters for branches of the army, the territorials, and the Special Forces. In 

the fi eld, four corps commanders under the JGS controlled the South 

Vietnamese Army’s infantry divisions and other regular formations. 

Almost invariably military offi cers, the province chiefs exercised command over the Regional and Popular Forces under the operational control of the divisions and the political authority of the corps commanders, who did additional duty as civil governors of their regions.13

As a matter of policy, General Westmoreland enjoined his subordinates to work closely and continually with the Vietnamese. He told his 

commanders early in 1966: “We are not taking over. Our objective is 

to keep them in the war. We must use diplomacy, tact, and fi nesse to 

get them more and more into the act, to use their forces in joint opChap 10.indd 349 
350

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

erations. They must shar

in any battlefi eld victor

It pays to defer to some se

nior commanders, to mak

them feel that they hav

responsibility. We mu

not let them lose face, los

interest, and lessen the

interest.”14

The MACV command

er himself was as good a

his word. He conferre

several times a week wit

his counterpart, Genera

Vien, on all aspects of th

war effort, and he com

municated with Vien b

formal letter on impo

tant matters. Westmore

land continued to urg

Vien, Thieu, and Ky t

correct their forces’ man

persistent defi ciencies, e

pecially the crippling in

adequacy of leadership

Recognizing the politica

character of RVNAF com

mand assignments an

the desirability of avoid

ing any appearance of a direct American role in making them, Wes

moreland approached such issues with circumspection, the more s

because changes in senior military command amounted to change

in the government that the armed forces dominated. He told Genera

Wheeler that he preferred to give advice on personnel “in connec

tion with proposals made by the Vietnamese as opposed to exercisin

positive . . . initiative in proposing personalities, although I do th

discreetly from time to time.” An offi cer with a good combat recor

whom Westmoreland and other Americans considered nonpolitica

and reasonably free of corruption, General Vien also was a friend an

supporter of President Thieu, who retained the general in his po

throughout the life of the Saigon government. Vien was usually re

sponsive to Westmoreland’s suggestions insofar as Vietnamese mil

tary politics allowed. According to General Chaisson, Westmorelan

“could get . . . Vien to do mostly what he would suggest to him—if 

was within his capability; if it wasn’t getting into a big power struggl

or something like that.”15

General Vien, center, confers with Lt. Gen. Le 

Nghen Khan and Lt. Col. Ted Gordiner.

(U.S. Army photo)

Chap 10.indd 350 
351

The Allies and Pacifi cation

In form at least, Americans and South Vietnamese at all levels of 

command engaged in close and continuing cooperation. MACV and 

JGS staff sections and committees, guided by parallel directives from 

Westmoreland and Vien, regularly collaborated in combined studies 

and plans. The most important of these, the annual Combined Campaign Plans, were prepared by representatives of the general staffs of 

both headquarters and signed by Westmoreland and the chief of the JGS 

with great ceremony. Supplemented by subordinate plans for each corps 

area, the plans constituted the authoritative statements of allied strategy. 

Growing more detailed and elaborate with each passing year, they specifi ed military and pacifi cation objectives and assigned roles and missions 

to American, South Vietnamese, and third-country forces.16

Yet cooperation and coordination between MACV and the JGS 

often consisted more of form than substance. Combined planning 

was frequently little more than a facade for unilateral American staff 

work. The MACV staff, for instance, did most of the drafting of the 

fi rst three Combined Campaign Plans, for 1966, 1967, and 1968, with 

only comments and suggestions from the South Vietnamese. Except 

for the combined intelligence centers, genuine combined headquarters 

agencies did not develop, for lack of Vietnamese technical competence 

and American fear of Viet Cong penetration of the South Vietnamese 

armed forces. Each headquarters maintained its own combat operations center, with MACV liaison offi cers stationed at that of the JGS. 

For security reasons, MACV staff sections often withheld information 

from their JGS counterparts. The command, for example, notifi ed the 

Joint General Staff of American annual plans for military assistance to 

South Vietnam only after Washington had approved them. At times, 

MACV left the JGS entirely out of the planning for major operations 

until the moment of execution.17

Much the same pattern prevailed at the fi eld force level. Generals 

Westmoreland and Vien attempted to encourage combined efforts by 

American fi eld forces and ARVN corps, through such devices as joint 

visits to their subordinate commanders and the holding of combined 

tactical conferences and quarterly reviews of progress under the campaign plans. Nevertheless, although they maintained overtly cordial 

relationships with their ARVN counterparts, American fi eld force commanders were preoccupied with direction of their own forces. Their 

visits to Vietnamese units and headquarters tended to be infrequent 

and mostly ceremonial. In their turn, Vietnamese corps commanders 

devoted much of their time to their political responsibilities, often at 

the expense of their military functions. The Vietnamese commanders, untrained in systematic planning and staff work on the American 

model, short of qualifi ed offi cers, and in some instances convinced 

their headquarters were Viet Cong-infi ltrated, did little long- or middlerange operational planning. They found it easier to leave the initiative 

to the Americans, who in any event controlled most of the logistical 

Chap 10.indd 351 
352

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

and combat support. American commanders, in turn, found it simple

to operate without the less effi cient South Vietnamese units. Coordina

tion and cooperation usually meant in practice that each army ope

ated separately, the Americans attacking enemy main forces and bas

areas with at best token Vietnamese participation, and the ARVN try

ing to protect the populated regions.18

Occasionally, the allies attempted closer cooperation. For exampl

between December 1966 and November 1967 MACV and the JGS con

ducted Operation FAIRFAX/RANG DONG in the Capital Military Distric

surrounding Saigon. In this operation, the U.S. 199th Light Infantr

Brigade, commanded by Westmoreland’s RVNAF-relations trouble

shooter, General Freund, and the Vietnamese 5th Ranger Group coop

erated in an effort to improve security in the environs of the capita

Results of FAIRFAX/RANG DONG were ambiguous. The allied troops infl ic

ed signifi cant enemy casualties and reduced Viet Cong activity to th

point that Westmoreland in November 1967 felt justifi ed in removin

the 199th Brigade from the operation and returning responsibility fo

the capital’s outskirts entirely to the Vietnamese. However, the com

bined command and intelligence arrangements worked imperfectly a

best, due mostly to rivalry and distrust among the Vietnamese agencie

involved; and the South Vietnamese rangers were less effective tha

the American troops, both in antiguerrilla combat and in winning th

confi dence of the villagers. Above all, as so often occurred in this pe

riod of the war, American resources, initiative, and energy were th

driving force behind the operation. When the American brigade lef

security and pacifi cation in the region declined.19

During the years of the American buildup, the U.S. and South Vie

namese forces, with only occasional exceptions, failed to commit th

effort and resources that would have been required to make combine

operations a day-to-day reality. They conducted more or less paralle

rather than truly combined, campaigns. Overwhelmed by the resourc

es and power of their ally, South Vietnamese commanders fell into 

habit of operational dependence on the Americans. “Gradually,” on

of them admitted, “they lost interest in the combat situation outside o

the pacifi cation areas. It was as if the war was being fought in a distan

and alien world.” Whether formation of a genuine combined com

mand with Vietnamese units under direct control of American genera

would have produced better ARVN performance and closer interallie

cooperation will remain forever a matter of conjecture and controve

sy. A combined command had worked in the Korean War, but Sout

Korea in the 1950s had possessed a strong civilian national leadershi

independent of the armed forces. In South Vietnam by contrast, th

armed forces in essence constituted the national government, so tha

an American assumption of military control would have amounted t

an assumption of political control as well, lending an unacceptable co

lonialist aura to the entire arrangement. Besides this political obstacl

Chap 10.indd 352 
353

The Allies and Pacifi cation

considering the limited results of Operation FAIRFAX and similar experiments, it seems likely that the fundamental defi ciencies of Saigon’s 

forces, rooted in South Vietnamese society and culture, would have 

prevented the full integration of operations under any command relationship.20

Pacifi cation and Saigon Politics

Although often overshadowed by the escalating armed confl ict, 

pacifi cation—Revolutionary Development in the terminology of the 

Thieu-Ky regime—continued to command the attention of infl uential 

men and organizations in both Washington and Saigon. Henry Cabot 

Lodge, who began his second term as ambassador to South Vietnam 

in August 1965, regarded pacifi cation as “the heart of the matter.” He 

sided with those members of the U.S. Mission who questioned the increasing weight of the military in the American effort and considered 

securing the countryside more important than destroying enemy units. 

In Washington, a number of conferences and studies of varying agency sponsorship called anew for an integrated American military and 

nonmilitary strategy in Vietnam. Though preoccupied with staying in 

power, the Thieu-Ky government showed stirrings of new attention to 

the problem, for example by establishing a Ministry of Revolutionary 

Development to pull together Saigon’s pacifi cation programs.

At the Honolulu conference in February 1966, President Johnson, 

Chief of State Thieu, and Premier Ky formally accorded pacifi cation 

equal importance with the military offensive. They publicly committed 

themselves to ambitious social and economic programs and to the promotion of democracy and justice for the Vietnamese people. Johnson, 

in private sessions, told American offi cials that he expected in the ensuing months not promises but tangible progress toward those objectives. 

He used the oft-quoted phrase, “Nail those coonskins on the wall.”21

The reemphasis on pacifi cation reopened the long-standing issue 

of how best to unify American military and civilian support of a campaign that had to be carried out primarily by the South Vietnamese. In 

Saigon, the U.S. Mission was still essentially a congery of separate bureaucratic baronies, each of which pursued its own version of the common strategy under the loose coordination of the Mission Council and 

which maintained its own lines of communication to its parent agency 

in Washington. Ambassador Lodge, for all his interest in pacifi cation, 

proved no better an administrator in his second tour than he had been 

in his fi rst. Viewing himself as a presidential representative and policy 

advocate rather than as director of the mission, he refused to involve 

himself in the internal workings of the agencies under him, thereby 

rendering himself ineffective at ensuring unity of purpose and action. 

In Washington, a State Department-chaired Vietnam Coordinating 

Committee coordinated in name only; in practice, no one below PresiChap 10.indd 353 
354

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

dent Johnson and Secretaries Rusk and McNamara was pulling the e

fort together.22

In contrast to his predecessor, General Harkins, Westmoreland main

tained cordial and cooperative relations with Ambassador Lodge and wit

Lodge’s successor, Ellsworth Bunker. Westmoreland and Lodge worked to

gether effectively in trying to stabilize the Saigon government. The am

bassador generally avoided interference in military operations. On mo

occasions, Lodge asked Westmoreland to review military portions of h

messages or sought the MACV commander’s suggestions on the drafts. Th

harmonious relationship became somewhat frayed as Lodge came unde

increasing White House pressure for pacifi cation progress. The ambassado

then began blaming military preoccupation with large-unit operations an

failure to orient the ARVN toward counterinsurgency for the deteriora

ing security in the countryside. Westmoreland responded with extensiv

defenses of MACV’s operational and advisory performance. Privately, h

complained that Lodge lacked “a deep feel of military tactics and strategy

and was “inclined to over-simplify the military situation and to deal with 

on a . . . formula basis.” This disagreement notwithstanding, the two me

maintained a friendly working relationship until Lodge’s departure in Apr

1967.23

If anything, the cooperative relationship between the MACV com

mander and the ambassador improved under Ellsworth Bunker. A ve

eran diplomat who replaced Lodge in May 1967, Bunker had worke

closely with soldiers during the 1965 Dominican intervention an

in Westmoreland’s view was a strong friend of the military. He coul

be counted on to take the soldiers’ side on such issues as recommen

dations for expanded operations in Laos and Cambodia. Early in h

ambassadorship, Bunker included Westmoreland in a small executiv

committee that gathered over lunch after each weekly Mission Coun

cil meeting to resolve major policy questions outside the cumbersom

formality of the larger body.24

As the largest single component of the U.S. Mission, in manpowe

resources, and presence in the countryside, MACV inevitably played 

major part in nonmilitary activities. Representatives of the comman

sat on mission committees dealing with economic warfare and psy

chological operations. They participated in and often initiated period

mission attempts to persuade the Vietnamese to undertake general mo

bilization. At Ambassador Lodge’s request, the Military Assistance Com

mand assumed responsibility for the debriefi ng, transportation, an

medical care of American civilians recovered from Viet Cong captivit

In mid-1966, when the embassy established a committee on strateg

and priorities, the MACV representative, according to Westmoreland

“had a major infl uence over the committee and the end product wa

therefore fully acceptable to me.”25

Since the armed forces constituted the political framework of Sout

Vietnam, MACV’s advisory function kept the command embroiled i

Chap 10.indd 354 
355

The Allies and Pacifi cation

South Vietnamese politics. By late 1965 the armed forces and the government had achieved a precarious stability dependent upon a balance 

of power between the offi cer factions headed by Chief of State Thieu 

and Premier Ky. In close coordination with the ambassador, Westmoreland employed his advisers with the senior commanders to help keep 

this factional balance stable and to guide the military leaders toward 

reestablishment of constitutional, democratic government. The MACV 

commander himself devoted many hours to counseling various generals, advising on removals and replacements of commanders, and encouraging the offi cers to maintain their precarious unity. He also kept 

a wary watch on Vietnamese relations with the Montagnards and on 

the activities of his own Special Forces teams among the tribespeople, 

seeking to prevent a repetition of the 1964 revolt.26

The Military Assistance Command played a crucial part in resolving 

the most severe crisis of the Thieu-Ky regime. Early in March 1966, in 

the midst of political maneuvering over the fi rst steps toward drafting 

a new constitution, the military directorate in Saigon dismissed the 

commander of I Corps, Lt. Gen. Nguyen Chanh Thi, whom the Saigon 

generals viewed as a threat to their power. Thi’s ouster set off a rebellion in his corps area, where he enjoyed wide popularity and ruled as 

an independent satrap. Mutinous ARVN soldiers, allied with Buddhists 

and other non-Communist dissidents, took control of Hue, Da Nang, 

and other towns in the military region. Thieu and Ky sent troops from 

Saigon to quell the uprising. The resulting armed confrontation raised 

the imminent possibility of an intra-South Vietnamese civil war, to the 

consternation of American authorities in Saigon and Washington.

General Thi, center (© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 10.indd 355 
356

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

In this crisis General Westmoreland became the major America

agent working to restore stability. Through his advisory network, h

communicated on a soldier-to-soldier basis with leaders of all faction

and secured up-to-date information on the unfolding events for the em

bassy, CINCPAC, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He infl uenced Saigon

actions by providing or withholding air transport and other forms o

military assistance. At the outset, Westmoreland directed General Wa

at Da Nang to maintain strict neutrality between the contending forc

es, whose actions periodically threatened Walt’s own troops and insta

lations. The marines, through an astute combination of diplomacy an

shows of force, kept an uneasy peace. 

After pro-Saigon troops forcibly suppressed the rebels at Da Nan

in mid-May, Westmoreland, at the direction of General Wheeler an

with the concurrence of Ambassador Lodge, undertook to divide th

insurgent military leaders and to separate them from the Buddhis

and other civilian elements. To develop strategy, he established an a

hoc “Think Group” at MACV headquarters. There followed a perio

of tortuous negotiations, arranged by MACV, between generals of th

two sides, as well as a rapid series of appointments and reliefs of new 

I Corps commanders. While the MACV effort did not bring about th

rebels’ surrender, it appears to have weakened and divided them. A fi na

government military drive into Hue early in June effectively ended th

revolt without full-scale fi ghting and without a mass defection of th

dissidents to the Viet Cong, who, to the Americans’ surprise, had re

mained passive throughout the troubles.27

MACV’s political involvements did not end with the defeat of th

I Corps rebels. During 1967, as South Vietnam drafted a new constitu

tion and then held village, hamlet, presidential, and national assembl

elections, General Westmoreland and Ambassadors Lodge and Bunke

worked to keep the generals united and committed to the political pro

gram. Westmoreland reported to General Wheeler on 25 June: “Th

Ambassador and I are discussing the matter almost daily, keeping ou

ears to the ground and exercising discreet infl uence without suggestin

any preference for candidates. We are by all means encouraging unit

within the armed forces, and stressing the importance of free and fa

elections.” As Thieu and Ky maneuvered for the presidency, Westmo

reland maintained impartiality between the two aspirants while urgin

them not to let their rivalry split the nation’s armed forces. The MAC

commander and Ambassador Bunker greeted with relief Ky’s eventua

decision, after lengthy negotiations among the Vietnamese general

to settle for the vice presidency on a Thieu-Ky ticket. During the cam

paign and election that followed, the Military Assistance Comman

cooperated closely with the South Vietnamese armed forces in protec

ing the polling places from Viet Cong attack and harassment. In add

tion, the command helped transport ballots and conducted nonpart

san get-out-the-vote psychological operations. As the Americans ha

Chap 10.indd 356 
357

The Allies and Pacifi cation

hoped, Thieu and Ky won a contest that, despite some controversy, 

U.S. observers and the American news media rated as largely fair and 

honest.28

CORDS: A Single Manager at Last 

By the time the Vietnamese held their presidential election in September 1967, the Military Assistance Command had taken control of 

the American side of the pacifi cation campaign. It did so as the result 

of a prolonged struggle within the U.S. government over pacifi cation 

management that began in earnest in the period immediately preceding the Honolulu conference and accelerated during the months following it. The central issue in the debate was the establishment of an 

American single manager for pacifi cation in Saigon who could pull together the personnel and activities of all the U.S. agencies working in 

the Vietnamese countryside.

The champions of single management included Secretary McNamara and Robert W. Komer, whom President Johnson in March 1966 appointed his special assistant to coordinate pacifi cation efforts in Washington. Within six months of the Honolulu conference, McNamara 

and Komer concluded that the single manager should be the MACV 

commander, since the provision of military security was central to effective pacifi cation and since MACV controlled more manpower and 

resources in the countryside than any other agency. In addition, Komer 

believed that the military would pay adequate attention to pacifi cation only if they received responsibility for it. Led by the State Department, the civilian agencies vigorously opposed a MACV takeover of 

pacifi cation. They were unwilling to sacrifi ce their own independence, 

doubted the military’s competence to perform the task, and objected 

to further militarization of what they considered essentially a political 

struggle. Rather than have the military take over, the civilian agencies, 

along with Ambassador Lodge who championed their views, preferred 

to continue coordinating their efforts through the Mission Council.29

In his principal gesture at unifi ed management of pacifi cation, 

Lodge brought into the mission Brig. Gen. Edward G. Lansdale, USAF, 

a veteran practitioner of anti-Communist political warfare in Asia who 

was credited with defeating the Hukbalahap insurgency in the Philippines. Lodge gave Lansdale, who arrived with a ten-man staff, the 

title Special Liaison Offi cer and a vague mandate to coordinate civilian 

and military pacifi cation activities. Lansdale, whose management approach was as unsytematic as Lodge’s, engaged in jurisdictional quarrels with MACV and other mission agencies. He spent most of his time 

making contacts among South Vietnamese civilian and military fi gures 

in an effort to fi nd dynamic new popular leaders and to promote an 

anti-Communist people’s revolution. Lacking support from the other 

elements of the mission, Lansdale and his assistants accomplished 

Chap 10.indd 357 
358

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

nothing tangible and were gradually isolated from the rest of the U.

establishment in Saigon.30

President Johnson early made clear his own desire for tighter man

agement, but he hesitated to impose military control and instead d

rected a series of reorganizations of the civilian side of the mission

Soon after the Honolulu conference Ambassador Lodge, at White Hous

insistence, formally named Deputy Ambassador William Porter as co

ordinator of civilian pacifi cation programs. Porter, however, lacked th

staff, the ambassadorial support, and the administrative skill to unif

the effort. Lodge and the mission civilians resisted further reorganiza

tion and seemed to the increasingly impatient president to lack a sens

of urgency about the problem. 

During October, under the infl uence of McNamara and Komer, John

son appears to have decided to turn over pacifi cation to MACV. Neve

theless, he gave the civilians one last chance. Early in November, h

ordered Lodge to unify the pacifi cation programs of all civilian agencie

except the CIA under one embassy offi cial with his own staff and wit

single managers under him in the fi eld at corps, province, and distric

levels. The Offi ce of Civil Operations (OCO), which Lodge establishe

on 21 November under Deputy Ambassador Porter, constituted a unifi e

chain of command for civilian pacifi cation operations; but it started lif

on borrowed time. President Johnson warned Lodge in his Novembe

message that OCO would be “on trial” for 90–120 days, “at the end o

which we would take stock of progress and reconsider whether to assig

all responsibility for [pacifi cation] to COMUSMACV.”31

Throughout these maneuvers, General Westmoreland kept to th

sidelines. He had been convinced since 1964 of the need for a unifi e

military-civilian approach to pacifi cation and had volunteered himse

as the ambassador’s agent for managing it. Even as the U.S. troop build

up and military operations absorbed much of his attention, Westmore

land continued to emphasize publicly and privately that victory reste

ultimately on restoring the connection between the Saigon govern

ment and the rural population. He remained a supporter of Operatio

HOP TAC, which he considered a model for an integrated American

Vietnamese, civilian-military campaign, and persisted in promoting 

until July 1966, when a Vietnamese command reorganization in I

Corps provided an opportunity to give the faltering operation a de

cent burial. Westmoreland cooperated in U.S. Mission experimen

with province team chiefs and informally tried to coordinate MAC

pacifi cation activities with those of other agencies. He was quick t

offer MACV staff support to Deputy Ambassador Porter as pacifi catio

coordinator and provided the deputy ambassador, at his request, wit

a brigadier general as a military assistant.32

When invited to comment on questions of American organizatio

for pacifi cation, Westmoreland advocated single management. He de

clared that military and nonmilitary efforts must be completely in

Chap 10.indd 358 
359

The Allies and Pacifi cation

tegrated; he called attention to the large existing involvement of his 

command, especially the 1,100 MACV district advisers, in civilian as 

well as military aspects of the effort; and he proposed various plans for 

unifi ed management under the ambassador. However, to avoid a confrontation with the civilian agencies, he allowed other offi cials, such as 

McNamara and Komer, to argue for designating him as single manager, 

telling visitors only that he was not volunteering for the job but would 

accept it if directed to do so.33

During the summer and autumn of 1966, Westmoreland received 

regular reports from Generals Wheeler and Johnson on the president’s 

growing inclination to give the pacifi cation effort to MACV. During 

a mid-October visit to Saigon, McNamara informed Westmoreland 

of administration plans for the last-chance civilian reorganization 

and expressed his belief that a military takeover was inevitable. The 

MACV commander in response put his J5 section to work on a contingency plan for transformation of his headquarters into a directorate 

of fi eld operations for the U.S. embassy, controlling both civilian and 

military activities. At the urging of Wheeler and Johnson, Westmoreland strengthened the pacifi cation element of the MACV staff. On 

7 November 1966, he established a Revolutionary Development Support Directorate under the staff supervision of his J3. Headed by Brig. 

Gen. William A. Knowlton, former secretary of the MACV Joint Staff, 

the new directorate assumed inspection and liaison functions with the 

South Vietnamese Revolutionary Development Ministry, duties that 

were formerly performed by a division of J3. It also assumed oversight 

of MACV’s general support for pacifi cation. Its ulterior purpose, as 

Wheeler told Westmoreland, was “fi rst, to plug in a pacifi cation channel between the Embassy and your headquarters; and, second, to permit a transfer of authority and direction of the whole operation to you 

at some future time.”34

MACV cooperated with and assisted the Offi ce of Civil Operations 

during that agency’s brief existence. “I sure as hell knew OCO wouldn’t 

work,” General Westmoreland later recalled, “but I gave it the best I 

had.” He furnished Ambassador Porter with a military deputy, Brig. 

Gen. Paul Smith, former commander of the 173d Airborne Brigade, 

whom Westmoreland considered a “superlative staff offi cer.” Members 

of MACV’s Revolutionary Development Support Division worked with 

the OCO staff on analyses of hamlet self-defense requirements and development and evaluation of pacifi cation plans. When Porter appointed the four OCO regional directors, the key men of the new civilian 

chain of command, Westmoreland instructed the commanders of I and 

II Field Forces and III MAF and the IV Corps senior adviser to provide 

them with support and assistance. Tensions developed, however, both 

in Saigon and in the fi eld, when Porter and his regional directors tried 

to intervene in what Westmoreland considered strictly military decisions such as the deployment of U.S. infantry battalions and the trainChap 10.indd 359 
360

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ing of South Vietnames

Regional Force troop

Westmoreland told Whee

er in February that “th

civilian side of the hous

is tending to exercise au

thoritative prerogative

in military matters. If th

trend continues, a clash 

inevitable although we ar

doing our utmost to avoi

such a collision.” A visit t

Saigon by Robert Kome

the president’s oversee

of pacifi cation, prevente

a full-scale MACV-OC

confrontation; but OCO

days were numbered i

any event.35

In spite of OCO’s suc

cess in unifying civilia

pacifi cation activities a

every level from Saigon t

the districts, the new orga

nization, in the short tim

allowed it, could not produce signifi cant change in the actual balanc

between government and Viet Cong control in the countryside. Th

apparent lack of results, as well as Lodge’s persistent foot-dragging o

reorganization and the civilian agencies’ lack of enthusiasm in suppor

ing OCO, opened the way for McNamara, Komer, and other advocate

of a military takeover to resume their campaign. During the fi rst tw

months of 1967, they explored the possibility of appointing Westmo

reland ambassador to South Vietnam to succeed Lodge, who had ex

pressed his intention to step down. As ambassador, with deputies fo

military operations and pacifi cation, Westmoreland could then direc

the entire American war effort in what Wheeler called a “MacArthu

type operation.” Early in March, however, President Johnson, at Sec

retary Rusk’s urging, rejected this proposal on grounds that the Unite

States should not have a military man as ambassador in Saigon whe

the Vietnamese appeared likely to elect a general as president.36

The fi nal decision came in late March 1967, during a conference o

Guam between President Johnson and the South Vietnamese leader

With all the American principals from Washington and Saigon, includ

ing newly appointed Ambassador Bunker, on hand, Johnson place

pacifi cation support under Westmoreland and assigned Komer to hea

the program as a deputy MACV commander with the personal ran

Ambassador Bunker, right, with Generals Westmoreland and Wheeler (U.S. Air Force photo)

Chap 10.indd 360 
361

The Allies and Pacifi cation

of ambassador. Under a plan outlined by Westmoreland, Komer’s organization was to be formed by merging OCO and the MACV Revolutionary Development Support Directorate into a new MACV joint staff 

section, the Offi ce of Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development 

Support (OCORDS). Komer and a small staff then fl ew back to Saigon 

with Westmoreland to work out the details of the new organization. 

On 11 May, soon after arriving in Saigon, Ambassador Bunker formally 

announced the establishment of CORDS and the assignment of pacifi -

cation responsibility to General Westmoreland with Komer as his civilian deputy. Two days later, at a commanders’ conference at Cam Ranh 

Bay, Westmoreland, Bunker, and Komer explained the new organization to the senior American military leaders.37

In its fi nal form, worked out in prolonged negotiations between 

Komer, Westmoreland, and their staffs, CORDS represented a unique 

infusion of civilians into a military organization. The CORDS offi ce 

in MACV had a civilian chief, L. Wade Lathram, the former OCO staff 

director, who was designated assistant chief of staff for CORDS. General Knowlton, who had headed MACV’s Revolutionary Development 

Directorate, served as Lathram’s deputy. Besides engaging in planning 

and analysis, CORDS exercised operational control over pacifi cation in 

the fi eld. Under it, the four OCO regional directors became deputies to 

the fi eld force and III MAF commanders for CORDS, on an equal footing with the deputy senior military advisers. The CORDS deputies in 

turn controlled single managers, some military and some civilian, for 

each province, who had charge of the MACV provincial and district 

advisory teams as well as personnel of the civilian agencies. In a fully 

integrated chain of command, soldiers came under the authority of 

civilians who wrote their effi ciency reports; civilians similarly came 

under the command of soldiers.38

Komer, who well deserved the nickname “Blowtorch,” made the 

most of his ambassadorial rank and his at times abrasive personality 

in establishing his position within the Military Assistance Command. 

He secured, for example, the right of direct access to both Westmoreland and Ambassador Bunker. Although in theory he was to communicate with the CORDS organization only through the MACV chief of 

staff, in practice he regularly bypassed the chief of staff and operated 

what amounted to a separate chain of command for pacifi cation that 

stretched from MACV headquarters down to the districts. He secured 

comparable authority for his deputies for CORDS at corps level. “Basically,” Komer recalled, “the corps commanders left us alone. The pacifi cation business was run autonomously.”39

Komer owed much of his success in building up his agency to his 

own aggressiveness and skill as a bureaucratic infi ghter and to his 

White House connections and backing. He also benefi ted from the 

strong support of General Westmoreland. Throughout the crucial formative period of Komer’s agency, the MACV commander repeatedly 

Chap 10.indd 361 
362

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

overrode his military staff and his fi eld commanders on questions o

CORDS authority and autonomy. For example, when Komer clashe

with General McChristian over whether CORDS or the MACV Inte

ligence Directorate should conduct a new campaign against the Vie

Cong infrastructure, Westmoreland ruled in favor of Komer. He als

upheld Komer on the question of the regional deputies’ authority ove

province and district military advisers. At the same time Westmorelan

protected his own prerogatives as MACV commander by quickly sup

pressing Komer’s attempts to communicate directly with Washington

Nonetheless, the two men developed a working relationship of mutua

trust and confi dence. Westmoreland permitted Komer wide latitud

within the pacifi cation sphere, and Komer deferred to Westmorelan

on military operational matters.40

 Komer’s relations with the rest of the MACV hierarchy were fa

from placid. General Abrams—like Komer, a man of strong opinion

and colorful language—became a rival of the CORDS deputy. MAC

Chief of Staff Kerwin, an Abrams protegé, resented Komer’s free-whee

ing tendency to bypass his offi ce on pacifi cation matters, a habit tha

made coordination of the sprawling MACV staff even more diffi cul

Partly to ease relations between Komer and the military elements o

MACV, Westmoreland provided the CORDS deputy with a persona

military assistant, Maj. Gen. George Forsythe, an offi cer with much ad

visory experience, pacifi cation expertise, and diplomatic skill. In agree

ing to assign Forsythe to this position, the Army chief of staff note

that the new deputy was “an individual known by Komer who ca

work with him and yet is fully conscious of the complexities of mil

tary/civilian relationships.”41

Within MACV headquarters, CORDS constituted one of the large

staff sections, both in manpower and demands on facilities. Its div

sions for Plans and Programs, Operations and Analysis, and Region

and Popular Forces were located in the main MACV complex at Tan So

Nhut. A number of specialized divisions, many inherited from OCO

occupied an Agency for International Development building, known a

USAID Number Two, in downtown Saigon. The CORDS Operations an

Analysis Division, responsible for assembling and analyzing pacifi ca

tion data and managing the Hamlet Evaluation System, alone include

about 100 personnel, half of them military people and civil servants an

half contract computer technicians. The division, which worked closel

with the MACV Data Management Agency, used more than 50 percen

of the time and capacity of the headquarters’ IBM computer in prepa

ing its many reports. As seemed to be true of every reorganization, th

establishment of CORDS created demands in MACV for still more mil

tary manpower, both in Saigon and in the fi eld. Westmoreland shifte

personnel within his organization wherever possible, to stay within in

creasingly tight strength ceilings, but he also had to request addition

offi cers and men from outside the theater.42

Chap 10.indd 362 
363

The Allies and Pacifi cation

As a merger of civilians and soldiers in one organization, CORDS 

achieved a high level of success. Civilian pacifi cation operatives initially greeted its establishment with near despair, anticipating their 

complete submergence by the military. However, Komer’s strong infl uence in MACV, the U.S. Mission, and Washington, coupled with the 

placement of civilians in high posts, as exemplifi ed by the elevation 

of Lathram over Knowlton, did much to alleviate these fears. Cooperation between the MACV staff and the divisions of CORDS was informal 

and effective; the Operations and Analysis Division chief, for example, 

maintained a direct exchange of information with the Intelligence and 

Operations Directorates of the military staff. At the fi eld force level 

also, the new organization proved to be workable, although commanders complained occasionally that their CORDS deputies bypassed them 

in dealing with MACV headquarters.43

The placement of pacification under the Military Assistance 

Command led to other organizational adjustments within the U.S. 

Mission. Representatives of the command began attending USAID 

regional planning conferences. Late in 1967 MACV, by agreement 

with USAID and with the Mission Council’s approval, took over advice and support to the South Vietnamese civil highway construction and veterans’ affairs administrations, hitherto USAID responsibilities but closely connected with the military and pacification 

programs.44

During the formation of CORDS, MACV and the Joint U.S. Public Affairs Offi ce (JUSPAO) engaged in much discussion and many 

studies of the proper division of labor in psychological warfare. Since 

1965, JUSPAO, an agency formed by combining elements of the U.S. 

Information Service (USIS), MACV, and USAID, had been responsible 

for both U.S. Mission relations with the press and propaganda directed 

at friends and enemies. MACV during the ensuing years had built up 

its own Psychological Operations Directorate to attack enemy military 

morale; OCO had formed a similar offi ce of its own to support pacifi cation. In July 1967 a MACV study group, formed at General Wheeler’s 

request, recommended that the command replace JUSPAO as mission 

coordinator of psychological warfare, leaving, it to concentrate on the 

increasingly diffi cult problem of press relations. However, after negotiations with Ambassador Barry Zorthian, Embassy Minister–Counselor 

for Public Affairs and Director of JUSPAO, Westmoreland agreed instead to retain roughly the existing division of labor. The Public Affairs 

Offi ce continued to set overall psychological warfare policy and conducted certain nationwide propaganda campaigns; the Military Assistance Command carried out military psychological operations through 

its Psychological Operations Directorate and propaganda support of 

pacifi cation through the CORDS Psychological Operations Division.45

With the establishment of CORDS, the entire direction of the interrelated military and political campaign against the Viet Cong was 

Chap 10.indd 363 
364

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

vested in the Military Assistance Command as the principal operatin

agent of the U.S. Mission. General Westmoreland occupied the cente

of a complex web of relationships with American, allied, and Sout

Vietnamese military forces; with the South Vietnamese governmen

and with American civilian agencies. Yet the structure of his comman

was a ramshackle one created by a long series of piecemeal accretion

most of them heavily infl uenced by internal U.S. bureaucratic politic

and by the imperatives of international diplomacy. He directed it mor

by negotiation among semi-independent fi efdoms than by the autho

ity of rank. 

With the American services, Westmoreland had to tread carefull

through a minefi eld of doctrinal issues and to accommodate diffe

ing concepts of operations and tactics. His employment of his Fre

World allies was circumscribed both by their varying military capabil

ties and by the policies of their governments. As a matter of what h

considered political necessity, Westmoreland denied himself real com

mand authority over the South Vietnamese forces and relied instea

on persuasion backed by indirect pressure to guide their operation

Finally, while the establishment of the Offi ce of Civil Operations an

Revolutionary Development Support brought the political and para

military campaigns under his purview, the new agency constituted 

separate, semi-autonomous entity within MACV under a civilian chie

who enjoyed direct access to the ambassador and possessed conside

able infl uence with Westmoreland’s superiors in Washington. Genera

Westmoreland made this system work through diplomacy, patienc

and a high degree of adaptability to the complicated requirements o

an unconventional confl ict. He confonted similar complexities, an

responded with similar tactics, in attempting to infl uence the war i

Southeast Asia outside South Vietnam.

Chap 10.indd 364 
365

The Allies and Pacifi cation

Notes

1 Allied contributions are conveniently summarized in Lt Gen Stanley R. Larsen and Brig Gen James L. Collins, Jr., Allied Participation in Vietnam, Vietnam Studies 

(Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1975). A table of allied strengths is on p. 

23. The political importance of securing more fl ags is illustrated in Msg, Wheeler JCS 

2904–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 5 Aug 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 

65, CMH. 2 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 72, 94–95, 354–57; ibid., 1966, pp. 288–89. 

3 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 71–72, 359–62. MFR, Westmoreland, 25 Jun 

65, sub: Meeting with Gen Wilton . . . , tab 37, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 

Jun 65). Westmoreland Hist Notes, 2 Sep 65 and 6 Oct 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 

Aug–24 Oct 65); and 20 Mar 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66); 

Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3876 to Lt Gen Goodpaster, 30 Jul 65; MAC 4097 to Sharp, 

12 Aug 65; MAC 2163 to Sharp, 17 Mar 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65 

and 1 Jan–31 Mar 66. All in CMH. 4 Negotiations for the Korean troops are described in Larsen and Collins, Allied 

Participation, pp. 120–31. 5 First quote is from Military Working Arrangement between COMROKFORV and 

COMUSMACV, 6 Sep 65, copy in CMH fi les. Second is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 

6 Dec 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 72–73, 363–67; Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3888 to Beach, 30 Jul 65, 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 5 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65). Both in CMH. Interv, Charles B. MacDonald 

with Gen William C. Westmoreland, 11 Feb 73, CMH. 6 Quote is from Mission Council Action Memo 129, 5 Oct 66, tab C–1, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); Westmoreland Hist Notes, 8 Mar 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66); 17 Sep 66, tab E, Westmoreland Hist File 8 

(17 Jul–17 Sep 66); 25 Nov 66, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66). All in 

CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 5718 to Beach, 8 Jul 66; Gen Johnson WDC 8006 to 

Westmoreland, 8 Jul 66; Larsen NHT 0609 and NHT 0654 to Westmoreland, 2 Sep, 17 

Sep 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH. 7 Debriefi ng Rpt, Lt Gen Stanley R. Larsen, CG I FFV, 31 Jul 67 (DTIC Tech Rpt), p. 

27, CMH fi les. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 5 Jun 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 

May–16 Jul 66). MFRs, Westmoreland, 13 Nov 67, sub: Meeting with General Vien on 25 

October 1967; and 13 Nov 67, sub: Signing of Combined Campaign Plan for CY 68 . . . ; 

tabs A–20 and A–22, Westmoreland Hist File 24 (15 Oct–12 Nov 67). All in CMH. Msgs, 

Westmoreland MAC 5978 to Sharp, 25 Jun 67; Rosson NHT 1249 to Westmoreland, 7 

Oct 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67 and 1–31 Oct 67. All in CMH. 8 Larsen is quoted in Msg, Westmoreland to Sharp, 28 Jan 66, Westmoreland 

Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH. In same fi le, see Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0184 to 

Wheeler, 9 Jan 66. Msgs, Larsen NHT 0522 and 0747 to Westmoreland, 5 May 67 and 

28 Jun 67; Westmoreland MAC 5978 to Sharp, 25 Jun 67. All in Westmoreland Msg 

Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67, CMH. MacDonald-Westmoreland, Interv, 17 Jun 73, CMH. Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 384–86; Larsen and Collins, Allied Participation, pp. 147–59. 9 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 72, 361, 367–68, 371–72; ibid., 1967, pp. 

248–76; ibid., 1968, 1: 346–48, 351–52. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 27 Mar–8 Apr 67, 

tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–30 Apr 67); Memo, Westmoreland for Clifford and Taylor, 25 Jul 67, sub: Requirements for Free World Military Assistance Forces, 

tab A–15A, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67); CMH. Msg, COMUSMACV 

MAC 41358 to CINCPAC, 12 Dec 67, Westmoreland Sig File, Dec 67, CMH. Details of 

Chap 10.indd 365 
366

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Westmoreland’s negotiations with the Thais and other nationalities can be followed 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1965–1968, CMH. 10 On M16 issue, see Msgs, Bonesteel KRA 101 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 19 Ja

67; Westmoreland MAC 0755 to Bonesteel, 23 Jan 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–3

Jan 67, CMH. For rations and special services, see Msgs, MAC 9256 Westmoreland 

Sharp, 22 Oct 66; Bonesteel KRA 1730 to Sharp, Beach, and Westmoreland, 1 Nov 6

Westmoreland MAC 9752 to Bonesteel, 7 Nov 66. Brass: Msgs, Bonesteel KRA 207

and KRA 2021 to Westmoreland, 24 Dec 66 and 6 Sep 67; Westmoreland MAC 0182 

Bonesteel, 6 Jan 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–67. 11 Westmoreland sums up his objections to a combined command in Msg 

CINCPAC, 19 Feb 68, reproduced in MACV Command History, 1968, 1:221–22. Se

also Clarke, Final Years, p. 212; MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 11 Feb 73, CMH fi le

MACV Command History, 1966, p. 246; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 16 Feb 66, tab A

Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66), CMH. 12 MACV Command History, 1967, p. 133, contains the offi cial defi nition of U.S

RVNAF relationships. 13 Organization of the JGS and RVNAF is described in Clarke, Final Years, ch. 

Useful information also can be found in Truong, Cooperation and Coordination, p

20–22, 42–43. 14 MFR, Jones, 24 Apr 66, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, tab A–2, Westm

reland Hist File 6 (24 Apr–28 May 66), CMH. 15 First quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 7988 to Wheeler and Sharp, 23 Au

67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. In same fi le see Msg, Westmor

land MAC 8807 to Sharp, 17 Sep 67. Second quote is from Chaisson Oral History, p

252–53, MCHC. A typical expression of Westmoreland’s approach to dealing with th

Vietnamese is in Memo, Westmoreland for MACV Offi cer Advisers, 8 Jan 67, sub: U.

Adviser/Counterpart Relationship, Westmoreland Sig File, Jan 67, CMH. Westmorelan

sketches Cao Van Vien’s character in A Soldier Reports, pp. 242–43. For Vien’s relation

with the military directorate, see Clarke, Final Years, pp. 109–10 and 266–68. 16 Truong, Cooperation and Coordination, pp. 22–25, 53–56; Sharp and Westmor

land, Report on War, pp. 104, 142. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1 Sep 65, Westmorelan

Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65), CMH; 26 and 31 Dec 65, tabs A and B, Westmorelan

Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66); MFR, Westmoreland,13 Nov 67, sub: Signing 

Combined Campaign Plan for CY 68 (AB 143) at JGS, 0800 hrs, 13 November 1967, ta

A–22, Westmoreland Hist File 24 (15 Oct–12 Nov 67); Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1057

to Sharp, 7 Nov 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67. All in CMH. See also tex

of the combined plans in CMH fi les. 17 MFR, Westmoreland, 13 Nov 67, sub: Meeting with Gen Vien on 25 Octob

1967, tab A–20, Westmoreland Hist File 24 (15 Oct–12 Nov 67), CMH, discusses desi

ability of the JGS’s originating the next combined campaign plan. Truong, Cooperatio

and Coordination, pp. 26–27. Gen Cao Van Vien et al., The U.S. Advisor, Vietnam Mon

graphs (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1980), pp. 44–45. 18 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 6018 to Sharp, 16 Jul 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 243–46; MFR, DePuy, 3 Se

65, sub: Combined Tactical Conference . . . , Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 O

65), CMH; MFR, Col John Hayes, 27 Oct 67, sub: Vietnamese–US Commanders’ Con

ference, tab A–5, Westmoreland Hist File 24 (15 Oct–12 Nov 67), CMH; Vien et al., U.

Advisor, p. 41. Truong, Cooperation and Coordination, pp. 59–61, 69–72, 177–80; Larse

Debrief, 31 Jul 67, pp. 17, 25–26, CMH; Seaman Interv, 1971–72, sec. 5, pp. 34–35; an

Peers Interv, sec. 3, 1977, pp. 69–70. Both in MHI. Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 56–57. 19 Clarke, Final Years, pp. 250–51. Truong, Cooperation and Coordination, pp. 128

Chap 10.indd 366 
367

The Allies and Pacifi cation

34. The importance of Freund’s experience in dealing with the South Vietnamese to his 

command of this operation is emphasized in Westmoreland Hist Notes, 25 Feb 67, tab 

B, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67), CMH. 20 Quote is from Truong, Coordination and Cooperation, p. 165. Some U.S. commanders believed that a combined command would have been benefi cial; see Throckmorton Interv, 14–15 Mar 78 and 14 Apr 78, sec. 3, pp. 4–5; Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng 

Rpt, Lt Gen Frederick C. Weyand, 15 Jul 68, p. 7, CMH; and Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 

64, 194. Robert W. Komer also criticizes the absence of combined military control; see 

his Bureaucracy Does Its Thing, pp. 94–102. Clarke, Final Years, pp. 500–501, summarizes 

the political obstacles. 21 The revival of interest in pacifi cation is traced in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 

4.C.11, pp. 1–45. “Coonskins” quote is on p. 41. Vietnamese efforts are recounted in 

MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 562–63; and Westmoreland Hist Notes, 10 Dec 65, 

Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. 22 The management problem is summarized in Thomas W. Scoville, Reorganizing for 

Pacifi cation Support (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1982), p. vi and ch. 

1; Komer, Bureaucracy Does Its Thing, ch. 6; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 210; and 

MACV Command History, 1967, p. 565. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.11, p. 8; and 

MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 24 Apr 73, CMH, are typical comments on Lodge’s 

lack of interest in administration. 23 Quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 13 Dec 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist 

File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH. His relations with the ambassador can be followed 

in Westmoreland’s Historical and Message Files, 1965–67. MACV Command History, 

1965, p. 402; and ibid., 1968, 1:222–23. Disagreements over pacifi cation are refl ected 

in Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 10822 to Wheeler and Sharp, 12 Dec 66, Westmoreland 

Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH; and Msg, Lodge Saigon 10204 to SecState, 6 Nov 66, 

tab B–3, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH. Also MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 17 Jun 73, CMH fi les. 24 MACV Command History, 1967, pp.584–85. Bunker’s character is sketched in 

Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 217; and Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 47–48. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–20 May 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67) and 

1 June–5 Jul 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67), CMH. MacDonaldWestmoreland Interv, 12 Mar 73, CMH fi les. Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, pp. 60–61. 25 Quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 10 Jul 66, tab E, Westmoreland Hist File 

7 (29 May–16 Jul 66); see also notes of 23–31 May 67, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 17 

(1–31 May 67); both in CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 249, 406–07; ibid., 

1966, pp. 178–91, 557. Ltr, Lodge to Westmoreland, 13 Mar 67; Memo, Westmoreland 

for Lodge, 29 Mar 67, sub: Handling of Civilian Personnel Recovered from the Enemy; 

Westmoreland Sig File, Mar 67, CMH. 26 Saigon’s military politics are discussed in detail in Clarke, Final Years, chs. 2, 7, 

and 14. Westmoreland’s relationships with the Vietnamese generals can be followed 

through his Msg Files and Historical Files for 1965–1968, CMH. Memo, Westmoreland 

for Taylor, 27 Jul 65, sub: The Montagnards and FULRO, tab 17, Westmoreland Hist 

File 17 (1 Jul–28 Aug 65); MFR, Maj Carl M. Putnam, 30 Dec 65, sub: COMUSMACV 

Conference with FFORCEV Commanders and II Corps Advisers, tab B–1, and Westmoreland Hist Notes, 27 Jan 66, tab F, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66); and 

Ltr, Westmoreland to Col W. A. McKean, 2 Feb 66, tab A–2, Westmoreland Hist File 4 

(30 Jan–13 Mar 66). All in CMH. 27 Events of the crisis are covered in Clarke, Final Years, ch. 7; and Shulimson, 

Marines in Vietnam, 1966, pp. 73–74, 81–91. Westmoreland’s part in events can be followed through his Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66 and 1 Apr–30 Jun 66; and his Historical 

Chap 10.indd 367 
368

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Files 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), 6 (24 Apr–28 May 66), and 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66). All 

CMH. Jones Interv, p. 32, MCHC, comments on the extent to which the embassy a

lowed Westmoreland to manage the crisis. 28 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5994 to Wheeler and Sharp, 25 Jun 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67, CMH. Political events are covered in Clark

Final Years, ch. 14. Election results are summarized in Sharp and Westmoreland, Repo

on War, pp. 152–56. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–20 May 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hi

File 17 (1–31 May 67); and 10–29 Sep 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 22 (10–30 Se

67); Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 32676 to CINCPAC, 5 Oct 67, Westmoreland Sig Fil

1967. Both in CMH. 29 The controversy over pacifi cation management is recounted in Scoville, Paci

cation Support, chs. 2 and 3, and U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.11, pp. 53–121. Ms

Lodge Saigon 10204 to SecState, 6 Nov 66, tab B–3, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (3

Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH, is an expression of Lodge’s views. See also Westmoreland, 

Soldier Reports, p. 211. 30 Msgs, Rosson MAC 6481 to Westmoreland, 16 Dec 65; Westmoreland HWA 342

to Lodge, 17 Dec 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Draft Talkin

Paper for Gen Westmoreland with Amb Lodge and Amb Porter, Dec 65, tab A–3, Wes

moreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. U.S. Congress, Senate, Committe

on Foreign Relations, The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War, Executive and Legislati

Roles and Relationships, Pt. IV, July 1965–January 1968 (Washington, D.C.: Governmen

Printing Offi ce, 1994), pp. 58–61. 31 Quote is from Msg, SecState 78865 to AmEmb Saigon, 4 Nov 66, tab A–1, Wes

moreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH; in same fi le, see Msg, Lodge Saigo

10204 to SecState, 6 Nov 66, tab B–3. 32 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 403–05; ibid., 1966, pp. 739–41. Ltrs, Wes

moreland to Gens Cao Van Vien and Nguyen Huu Co, 3 Sep 65, tabs A–5 and A–6, Wes

moreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65); Westmoreland Hist Notes, 26 Feb 66, tab C

Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66); and 25 Nov 66, tab C, Westmoreland Hi

File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66). All in CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 4642 to Wheeler an

Sharp, 17 Sep 65; Westmoreland MAC 5021 to Wheeler, 8 Oct 65; Westmoreland MA

7242 to Gen Johnson, 20 Aug 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, Jul 65–Sep 66. All in CMH

33 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0117 to Collins, 7 Jan 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH, is typical of Westmoreland’s position. Westmoreland, A Soldi

Reports, pp. 210–12. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 11 Dec 65, Westmoreland Hist File 

(25 Oct–20 Dec 65), and 16 Sep 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66

CMH. 34 Quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 6339–66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 17 O

66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66; Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 8 Oct 6

Gen Johnson WDC 13803 to Westmoreland, 23 Nov 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Oct–31 Dec 66; Draft Msg (not sent), Westmoreland to Wheeler and Sharp, Oct 66, ta

D–8, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); Westmoreland Hist Notes, 17 O

66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); All in CMH. MACV Comman

History, 1966, p. 532; ibid., 1967, pp. 566, 583–84. 35 First quote is from MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 4 Feb 73, CMH fi les. Se

ond is from Westmoreland MAC 1523 to Wheeler, 13 Feb 67, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. In same fi le, see Msg, Westmoreland MAC 01629 to Wheele

16 Feb 67. Westmoreland and Sharp, Report on War, p. 119. Msg, Westmoreland MA

10050 to Sharp, Wheeler, and Johnson, 17 Nov 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–3

Dec 66. All in CMH. MACV Command History, 1967, p. 568. For examples of OC

entrance into military affairs, see Westmoreland Sig Files, Jan and Feb 67, CMH.

Chap 10.indd 368 
369

The Allies and Pacifi cation

36 Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, pp. 43–48. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.11, pp. 

122–26. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 0831–67, JCS 1190–67, JCS 1527–67, JCS 1528–67, JCS 

1573–67, JCS 1637–67, JCS 1815–67 to Westmoreland, 30 Jan 67; 14, 28 Feb 67; 1, 3, 

10 Mar 67; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 1629 and MAC 1998 to Wheeler, 16, 28 Feb 67, 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67. All in CMH. 37 Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, pp. 49–55. U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.11, pp. 

127–30. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 213–15. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 25 Mar 

67, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67); 1–20 May 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67). Both in CMH. In latter fi le, AmEmb Saigon, Admin 

Ops Notice 473, 11 May 67, sub: Statement by Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker, tab A–10; 

and MFR, Chaisson, 21 May 67, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 13 May 1967, 

tab A–13. MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 585–87. 38 Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, pp. 62–69. MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 

587–88. For a description of the mixed staff of one major CORDS offi ce, see Interv, 

CMH with Col James R. Loome, USA (Ret.), 27 Feb 91, tape in CMH fi les. 39 Quote is from Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, p. 73. Komer’s personality and operating methods are sketched in Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 215; Chaisson Oral 

History, pp. 54–55, MCHC; and Interv, Charles B. MacDonald with Lt Gen George 

Forsythe, 16 Jun 73, CMH fi les. 40 The infrastructure dispute is recounted in Scoville, Pacifi cation Support, pp. 78–79; 

see also pp. 71–78. McChristian, Military Intelligence, p. 78, gives his view of the issue. 

Forsythe Interv, 16 Jun 73. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, n.d., in Personalities Section of Notes, CMH fi les; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–20 May 67, tab A, Westmoreland 

Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67); 1 Jun–5 Jul 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 

67); and 6 Jul–3 Aug 67, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67). All in CMH. 41 Kerwin Interv, 1980, pp. 351–56, 362–64. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 

215. Quote is from Msg, Gen Johnson WDC 5845 to Westmoreland, 4 May 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67; Forsythe Interv, 16 Jun 73. Both in CMH. 42 Loome Interv, 27 Feb 91. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 3126 to Johnson, 3 Apr 67; 

Gen Johnson WDC 4282 and WDC 4882 to Westmoreland, 4 Apr 67 and 14 Apr 67; 

Westmoreland MAC 8230 to Sharp, 31 Aug 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 2 Sep 67. All in 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67 and 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Ltr, Weyand to 

Westmoreland, 21 Jul 67, Westmoreland Sig File, Jul 67, CMH. 43 For civilian reaction, see U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.11, pp. 130–31. Loome 

Interv, 27 Feb 91. Ltr, Weyand to Westmoreland, 21 Jul 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 

CMH. See also Larsen Interv, 6 Dec 68, p. 5; and Msg, Westmoreland MAC 11573 to 

Wheeler, 30 Nov 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67, CMH. 44 Memo, D. G. MacDonald for Westmoreland, 31 Jul 67; Memo, Westmoreland 

for MacDonald, 7 Aug 67, sub: MACV Participation in USAID’s Forthcoming Honolulu 

Conference. Both in Westmoreland Sig File, Aug 67, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 

19–26 Dec 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 27 (19–26 Dec 67); and 28 Dec 67–31 Jan 

68, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 67–31 Jan 68), CMH. Sharp and Westmoreland, 

Report on War, pp. 261–62. 45 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 253; ibid., 1966, pp. 555–57; ibid., 1967, pp. 

7–8, 634–39. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1 Jun–5 Jul 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 

18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67), CMH. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 5742–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 22 

Jul 67; Westmoreland MAC 6964 to Wheeler, 24 Jul 67; Westmoreland MAC 9882 to 

Sharp, 20 Oct 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 67, 

CMH; Memo, Westmoreland for Bunker, 12 Oct 67, sub: Psychological Operations in 

the US Mission, Westmoreland Sig File, Oct 67, CMH.

Chap 10.indd 369 
Chap 10.indd 370 
11

The Wider Theater

Besides conducting the many-faceted campaign in South Vietnam, 

General Westmoreland’s command was heavily engaged in the 

other three separate “wars” into which, for policy reasons, the Johnson 

administration felt compelled to divide the struggle for Indochina. The 

same pool of Seventh Air Force aircraft that bombed and strafed Viet 

Cong troops and base areas in South Vietnam also struck targets in 

North Vietnam in ROLLING THUNDER and fl ew missions against the Ho 

Chi Minh Trail and the Plain of Jars in Laos. Irregulars of the Military 

Assistance Command’s Studies and Observations Group harassed and 

reconnoitered the trail and carried on the OPLAN 34A operations in 

North Vietnam.

Westmoreland shared the direction of these operations with other 

civilian and military offi cials whose interests and strategic priorities 

often differed from his. Admiral Sharp kept control of ROLLING THUNDER. 

The U.S. ambassador in Vientiane exercised ultimate authority over 

the semi-clandestine American campaigns in Laos. His counterpart in 

Bangkok closely supervised the actions of American forces based in 

Thailand. Westmoreland thus had to rely on negotiation in his effort 

to infl uence operations on what he considered an extension of the 

South Vietnam battlefi eld.

Fragmentation of Command 

As the enemy understood and waged them, the Southeast Asian 

wars in fact constituted interdependent parts of a single politico-military struggle. Many American leaders also appreciated the unity of the 

confl ict and submitted suggestions from time to time for the establishment of a single U.S. military commander for all Southeast Asia, 

either subordinate to CINCPAC or reporting directly to the secretary 

of defense. Secretary McNamara had initially proposed that MACV be 

separated from the rest of Pacifi c Command and in 1967 told Westmoreland that he had “made a mistake in not having set up a Southeastern Asia theater with [Westmoreland] in command.” Westmoreland, at least in retrospect, held the same view. Among the services, the 

Chap 11EI.indd 371 
372

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Army and Air Force favored a unifi ed American theater command fo

all Southeast Asia.1

Nevertheless, seemingly intractable bureaucratic and political ob

stacles stood in the way of creating such a command. Admiral Shar

insisted, as had his predecessor, Admiral Felt, that Southeast Asia wa

an integral part of the Pacifi c theater and could not practically b

separated from it. He and his Navy superiors continued to resist an

command rearrangement that would divide the Pacifi c Fleet and a

tach any major element of it to an Army-dominated headquarters o

the Asian mainland. The State Department, echoed by offi cials of th

Southeast Asian countries, pointed to the diplomatic diffi culty of e

tablishing a single American military commander for South Vietnam

an active belligerent, and for Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos, whic

were neutral at least in name. In a mid-1965 study of the problem, th

MACV staff concluded that creation of a single U.S. commander unde

CINCPAC for South Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos would be desirabl

from a strictly military standpoint but that the political complication

attending such a reorganization would outweigh the military benefi t

In the end, all concerned accepted the existing system (or lack of i

as the lesser evil and attempted to make it work through coordinatio

and cooperation.2

Indeed, the only change during the buildup was in the direction o

further fragmentation. Since the Laotian crisis of 1962, the MACV com

mander had performed additional duty as commander, U.S. Military A

sistance Command, Thailand (COMUSMACTHAI). In this capacity, h

commanded the growing American forces in Thailand, which include

a joint military assistance group working with the Thai armed force

an Army logistics command laying the groundwork for U.S. troop de

ployments in the event of a broadening of the Southeast Asian wa

and a rapidly expanding number of Air Force installations and uni

involved in operations over Laos and North Vietnam. Westmorelan

delegated the day-to-day oversight of operations in Thailand to th

commander of the assistance group, Maj. Gen. Ernest F. Easterbrook

who served also as deputy COMUSMACTHAI.3

As the Vietnam confl ict intensifi ed, Thai offi cials increasingly ex

pressed discontent with this arrangement. They considered that hav

ing the American forces in their country commanded from Saigon, 

foreign capital, was an affront to their national dignity. They also wer

concerned that the link between MACV and MACTHAI might entangl

Thailand too deeply in the war in South Vietnam. The U.S. Ambassa

dor to Bangkok, Graham Martin, respected Thai concerns. Seeking t

increase his own infl uence over American military activity in Thailand

he campaigned for separation of the assistance command in that coun

try from MACV. Accepting the need to mollify the Thais, General Wes

moreland initially endorsed Martin’s proposal, as did Admiral Felt du

ing his fi nal months as CINCPAC. However, in early 1965, the MAC

Chap 11EI.indd 372 
373

The Wider Theater

commander changed his position. He called for continued unifi cation 

of the two commands, on grounds that with the growing battlefi eld 

crisis in South Vietnam, “Thai sensitivities should take second place to 

practical military solutions.”4

The Johnson administration, valuing at least the appearance of Thai 

neutrality, accepted Martin’s, rather than Westmoreland’s, arguments. 

In late May, Secretary McNamara directed the formation of a U.S. Military Assistance Command, Thailand (MACTHAI), separate from MACV 

and reporting to CINCPAC, with an Army major general in command. 

Formal activation of the new headquarters came on 10 July. General 

Westmoreland succeeded in having Maj. Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, his 

former chief of staff, appointed to head the neighboring command; 

but, Westmoreland recalled, “Martin ran a one-man show, operated 

out of his hip pocket. Stilwell [was] not always consulted.”5

In spite of the formal separation of the two commands, General 

Westmoreland remained much involved in military affairs in Thailand. He retained his position as commander-designate of U.S. and 

SEATO ground forces in the event of a general Southeast Asian war; 

hence, the MACV J5 directorate carried on extensive regional contingency planning. In addition, Westmoreland continued to employ 

a small SEATO planning staff in Bangkok, and MACV and MACTHAI 

developed a facility at Korat as the site for a command post in case 

of a region-wide war. Working closely with Ambassador Martin and 

the MACTHAI commander, General Westmoreland coordinated the 

steady expansion of Thailand-based American air operations against 

North Vietnam and the Ho Chi Minh Trail and prepared plans for 

the deployment to South Vietnam of Thai troops and for possible operations from Thailand into the Laotian panhandle. His headquarters 

and the Bangkok embassy exchanged information on enemy activity 

in Cambodia, and he received briefi ngs on the Communist insurgency 

in Thailand. Such practical cooperation notwithstanding, the separation of MACV and MACTHAI further complicated American command relations in Southeast Asia, creating another set of independent 

authorities with whom Westmoreland had to negotiate in order to 

shape operations outside South Vietnam.6

The Ho Chi Minh Trail and the Plain of Jars

Although they preserved a facade of neutrality, Laos and Cambodia contained major North Vietnamese and Viet Cong supply depots, 

headquarters, training facilities, and rest areas. Some of those in Cambodia were within fi fty miles of Saigon. Both countries served in addition as conduits for the fl ow of troops and war material from North 

Vietnam and the Soviet bloc. The Ho Chi Minh Trail complex ran 

through the jungled mountains of the Laotian panhandle, the elongated extension of that country that bordered South Vietnam from 

Chap 11EI.indd 373 
374

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

the Demilitarized Zone to the Central Highlands. The trail continue

southward through eastern Cambodia, a region studded with Commu

nist bases and largely abandoned by Cambodians. Seeking to destro

the enemy base areas and stem the fl ow of supplies and troops int

South Vietnam, General Westmoreland continually sought authorit

to use his air power against the enemy-controlled portions of Lao

and Cambodia. He also tried to obtain permission for ground opera

tions, ranging from clandestine reconnaissance to full-scale multidiv

sion offensives. Political and command complications attended, an

frequently frustrated, all these efforts.7

By the end of 1965, an active American air war was in progress i

Laos. MACV had initiated these operations, code-named BARREL ROL

late in 1964, as part of the Johnson administration’s early intensifi ca

tion of pressure on the North Vietnamese. During 1965, as both the a

campaign and the continuing Laotian civil war intensifi ed, CINCPA

and MACV divided the BARREL ROLL area of operations. In the northern

most portion, which retained the BARREL ROLL designation, America

aircraft fl ew in support of the Royal Laotian Army and CIA-organize

Meo tribal irregulars fi ghting the Pathet Lao and North Vietnamese o

and around the Plain of Jars. The two southern zones, STEEL TIGER an

TIGER HOUND, covered the eastern portion of the panhandle, respective

ly north and south of the Demilitarized Zone in Vietnam, and were th

scene of air attacks and limited ground incursions against the Ho Ch

Minh Trail. These operations were most intensive in the TIGER HOUN

zone, where MACV obtained wide freedom to attack both fi xed facil

ties and moving vehicles located by aerial reconnaissance. Supportin

TIGER HOUND, MACV’s Studies and Observations Group late in 196

began inserting ground reconnaissance teams into the panhandle, i

an operation code-named SHINING BRASS. These teams, recruited from 

the ethnic groups of the region and led by American Special Force

personnel, had the mission of locating targets hidden in the rough te

rain and of conducting raids on lightly defended command posts, wa

stations, and other facilities.8

From the beginning of the air war in Laos late in 1964, Admir

Sharp delegated all aspects of the actual conduct of operations to Gener

Westmoreland, even though Laos was outside the MACV commander

territorial jurisdiction. Westmoreland in turn entrusted the day-to-da

running of the campaign to the commanders of 2d Air Division/Sevent

Air Force. The air component commander and his staff obtained targe

clearance from the American embassy in Vientiane and then planned

scheduled, and executed strikes. He was responsible, however, to tw

employers. In the STEEL TIGER and TIGER HOUND areas, he operated unde

General Westmoreland’s direction; but in BARREL ROLL, he received mi

sion assignments from the American embassy in Vientiane.9

The ground reconnaissance and raiding portion of the campaig

was the province of MACV’s Studies and Observations Group. Forme

Chap 11EI.indd 374 
375

The Wider Theater

in February 1964 to conduct clandestine OPLAN 34A operations 

against North Vietnam, this agency enlarged its functions to encompass the entire array of MACV’s irregular cross-border activities. It also 

incorporated Pacifi c Command’s Joint Personnel Recovery Center, 

charged with efforts to rescue American servicemen missing anywhere 

in Southeast Asia. At the height of its activities, SOG had a strength 

of about 2,500 American personnel and 7,000 Southeast Asian irregulars organized in reconnaissance and other special operations teams 

as well as company- and battalion-size reinforcement and reaction 

forces. These personnel, besides continuing the original OPLAN 34A 

airborne and naval operations against North Vietnam, fought a covert 

and small-scale but dangerous and deadly ground war in Laos and 

eventually Cambodia.10

Directed by an Army colonel, SOG headquarters constituted a more 

or less autonomous entity within the Military Assistance Command. 

With a staff that eventually numbered more than 400 personnel representing all the armed services and the Central Intelligence Agency, the 

headquarters performed its own operational planning, intelligence, 

logistical, and communications functions but relied heavily on U.S. 

Army, Vietnam, for supply and helicopter lift. SOG “could do anything,” one of its commanders recalled, “that a corps, division, or what 

have you [headquarters] could do.” The organization received missions 

from Westmoreland, who had to secure authorization from Washington for certain operations. Its commander reported to Westmoreland 

through the MACV chief of staff and was under the “cognizance” of 

the J5 Directorate. Even so, whenever possible SOG avoided the regular 

MACV headquarters channels of coordination and supervision, in order 

to preserve the secrecy of its activities. Col. Donald D. Blackburn, who 

originated SHINING BRASS and presided over much of SOG’s expansion, 

explained: “Considering the sensitivity of the . . . operations, I felt that 

there was too much of a risk for leaks if I had to coordinate everything 

with the MACV staff.”11

In every aspect of operations in Laos, General Westmoreland and 

his Seventh Air Force and Studies and Observations Group commanders had to deal with the U.S. Ambassador to Vientiane, William L. Sullivan. A skillful bureaucratic warrior with strong connections within 

the Johnson administration and extensive experience in Southeast 

Asia policy-making, Sullivan directed the entire American military and 

paramilitary effort in Laos through his country team. With the technical assistance of his Air Force attaché, he selected targets for air strikes 

in the BARREL ROLL area, and he established rules of engagement and 

approved targets in STEEL TIGER and TIGER HOUND. He also set territorial 

limits and operating rules for SHINING BRASS. 

Where in Westmoreland’s view the war in South Vietnam took precedence and Laos was merely an extension of that battlefi eld, to Sullivan 

the preservation of Laos and of U.S. interests there came fi rst. Sullivan 

Chap 11EI.indd 375 
376

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

was willing to accommodate Wes

moreland’s desire to sever the H

Chi Minh Trail, but not at the co

of America’s interest in preservin

Souvanna Phouma’s governmen

and the forms of Laotian neutra

ity ratifi ed under the 1962 Genev

Agreement. Because of that, Sull

van was usually in the position o

resisting MACV efforts to intensif

the campaign in the panhandl

At minimum, he sought to kee

American activity clandestine an

small in scale. He was also dete

mined to prevent Westmorelan

from encroaching upon his terr

tory and his war. According to on

associate, “The biggest job Bill Su

livan had was to keep Westmore

land’s paws off Laos.”12

As was to be expected, th

ambassador’s insistence on retaining veto power over all military op

erations in Laos irritated and frustrated General Westmoreland an

his Seventh Air Force commanders. Westmoreland confi ded repeate

complaints to his diary about what he called Sullivan’s “fi eld marshal

complex. For their parts, Generals Moore and Momyer and their sub

ordinates chafed under Vientiane’s tight restrictions on targets an

objected to Sullivan’s attempts to dictate the types of aircraft and ord

nance to be used in BARREL ROLL missions. They also had constantly t

resist attempts by the ambassador to secure guaranteed numbers of so

ties for Laos at the expense of what air commanders considered mor

important operations in North and South Vietnam.13

To exchange information, resolve differences, and coordinate mil

tary and political activity, the ambassadors and military commanders i

South Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos, together with Admiral Sharp, contin

ued regular meetings of the Coordinating Committee for U.S. Missions i

Southeast Asia (SEACOORD), established in 1964. For military coordina

tion, however, SEACOORD, with its proliferating working committees an

elaborate procedures for setting agendas and arranging meetings, prove

too cumbersome. Westmoreland and Sullivan, usually joined by Ambassa

dor Martin from Bangkok, did most of their negotiating in less formal an

more frequent sessions, most often held at the American base at Udorn

Thailand. Westmoreland regularly brought his Seventh Air Force and SO

commanders, his intelligence director, and the chief of his Combat Op

erations Center to these conferences. Occasionally, the Political Counselo

or other offi cials from the U.S. embassy in Saigon also attended. It wa

General Blackburn (1968 photo) 

(NARA)

Chap 11EI.indd 376 
377

The Wider Theater

at Udorn, in an informal, at times 

jocular atmosphere, that the MACV 

commander and the “fi eld marshal” 

from Vientiane hammered out the 

shape of the American war in Laos. 

They incorporated their understandings in parallel recommendations to 

the State and Defense Departments 

or sought formal ratifi cation of them 

from SEACOORD.14

Over two years of negotiation, 

Westmoreland, often assisted by Admiral Sharp and General Wheeler on 

particularly diffi cult points, gradually obtained Sullivan’s agreement 

to expanded MACV operations 

against the Ho Chi Minh Trail. As 

a result, by late 1967 American aircraft could strike very nearly at will 

throughout the TIGER HOUND area. 

Even so, they could attack targets of opportunity such as moving supply 

convoys only within a fi xed distance of roads and tracks and only after 

obtaining clearance through Laotian military representatives on board 

airborne command and control planes. With Vientiane’s agreement, 

B–52s were also striking targets throughout the Laotian areas of operation, in some instances under the cover of missions near the border in 

South Vietnam. However, restrictions likewise remained on these operations. For example, although he allowed ARC LIGHTs in Laos, Souvanna 

Phouma, for political reasons of his own, refused to permit Thailandbased B–52s to fl y over his country on the way to targets in South Vietnam. On the ground, the SHINING BRASS zone of operations, renamed 

PRAIRIE FIRE early in 1967, expanded into a twenty-kilometer deep strip 

extending from the Demilitarized Zone to the Cambodian border. Within it, the Studies and Observations Group could employ reconnaissance 

and raiding forces of up-to-company size. In addition, American artillery at positions in northwestern I Corps had begun fi ring in support of 

Laotian irregular units operating in the panhandle.15

 Sullivan nevertheless continued to protect his prerogatives within 

Laos and to enforce limits on those of COMUSMACV. During August 

1967 General Westmoreland made a determined effort, in the context 

of a further enlargement of the PRAIRIE FIRE zone and of planning for 

an electronic sensor barrier across the DMZ, to have the PRAIRIE FIRE

boundary redefi ned as a “line of coordination” rather than a rigid barrier. This would enable SOG teams to pursue the enemy across it when 

permitted by Vientiane. While willing to adjust the PRAIRIE FIRE line to 

incorporate roads and terrain features of interest to MACV, Sullivan 

Prince Souvanna Phouma 

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 11EI.indd 377 
378

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

refused to weaken the boundary in any way. He stated that PRAIRIE FIR

was “not a piece of territory which has been detached from my respon

sibilities . . . and given over to your command. It is instead an area i

Laos where MACSOG is permitted to conduct certain types of opera

tions which have been agreed to by higher authority in Washington

subject to my concurrence.” Sullivan reserved the right to send h

own road-watch teams of Laotian irregulars into the PRAIRIE FIRE are

when he deemed it desirable, and in spite of appeals by Westmore

land to Wheeler and Sharp, he won his point. Strict territorial limi

on MACV’s penetrations into the panhandle remained in effect. The

would do so, Sullivan told Westmoreland acidly, until “the JCS turns . 

MACSOG . . . over to me or else the President names you Ambassado

to Laos. The larger national interests would suggest that we avoid bot

these extremes.”16

Besides seeking to expand air operations and ground reconnai

sance, General Westmoreland kept his headquarters at work on contin

gency plans for full-scale American and South Vietnamese offensive

into Laos aimed at blocking the Ho Chi Minh Trail with ground force

and destroying the enemy troops and supplies already in the panhan

dle. The military logic of creating a solid barrier to North Vietnames

reinforcement of the Viet Cong had been apparent to many America

offi cials from the beginning of the war. General Johnson, for instanc

had recommended such action in his pivotal report of March 1965

Westmoreland likewise recognized the importance of cutting the H

Chi Minh Trail with signifi cant forces, the more so as it became appa

ent that air strikes and ground harassment by themselves could no

halt infi ltration and as enemy reaction units began regularly drivin

PRAIRIE FIRE teams out of key base areas.17

During 1966 and 1967 the Military Assistance Command deve

oped a series of plans for large-scale incursions into Laos. The most am

bitious of these, Operation FULL CRY, completed late in 1966, called fo

several U.S. infantry divisions, after extensive logistical preparation, t

drive into Laos along Route 9, which ran just south of the Demilita

rized Zone and seemed the most practical line along which to establis

a cordon. Simultaneously, the airmobile 1st Cavalry Division was t

descend upon the Bolovens Plateau in the southern panhandle. Th

force moving along Route 9 was to block the infi ltration routes whil

the division from the Bolovens pushed northward to meet it, destroy

ing bases and supply depots as it advanced.18

The plan for FULL CRY assumed the availability of a “corps con

tingency force” to supplement the American troops already in Sout

Vietnam. During 1967, as it became apparent that the Johnson ad

ministration had no intention of providing such a force, General Wes

moreland scaled back his planning. Under his direction, the MACV sta

developed proposals, dubbed SOUTHPAW and HIGH PORT, for employin

respectively brigade- and division-size forces of elite South Vietnames

Chap 11EI.indd 378 
379

The Wider Theater

troops in limited cross-border search and destroy operations. Closely 

coordinated with intensive B–52 and tactical air strikes, they essentially formed an expansion of the existing PRAIRIE FIRE campaign. At the 

end of the year, anticipating a possible change of administrations and 

hence of national policy during 1968, Westmoreland resumed more 

ambitious planning. He set his J5 section and the deputy commander 

of USARV to work on Operations EL PASO I and II, both of which envisioned a westward advance along Route 9 by American and ARVN divisions, to occur possibly during late fall or early winter of 1968.19

None of these plans came anywhere near adoption. The Johnson 

administration was determined to confi ne the ground war, at least, 

within South Vietnam. Ambassador Sullivan adamantly opposed any 

large-scale, overt allied invasion of Laos, even the predominately South 

Vietnamese SOUTHPAW and HIGH PORT operations. Such actions, he and 

his country team insisted, would compromise irretrievably Laotian neutrality, probably bring down Souvanna Phouma’s government, and provoke dangerous counteraction by China and the Soviet Union. Equally 

important, both Admiral Sharp and General Westmoreland were less 

than urgent in advocating major operations in Laos. Sharp had no desire to commit American forces to a new land front in Southeast Asia. 

Instead, he preferred to strengthen the naval and air campaigns against 

North Vietnam. Westmoreland, while affi rming the eventual necessity 

of a drive into Laos, initially declared it logistically and politically unfeasible. As his forces expanded, he treated the offensive as a supplement to his campaign in South Vietnam, a project to be undertaken 

sometime in the future after the enemy was already well on the way to 

defeat and when additional large American reinforcements were available. He never considered or advocated a movement into Laos as an 

alternative and potentially more worthwhile employment for the U.S. 

troops he already had in hand.20

Cambodia 

In Cambodia, command relationships were much simpler. No active war was going on in that country and no American ambassador 

was present, Prince Norodom Sihanouk having broken off formal relations with the United States over earlier cross-border incursions by 

the South Vietnamese. Hence, Westmoreland had complete authority 

over all American military activity in Cambodia. There was, however, 

very little of it to direct. Following a policy of strict respect for Cambodian neutrality and sovereignty in hopes of regaining Sihanouk’s 

cooperation against the Communists, the Johnson administration 

closely restricted allied military operations along the South Vietnamese–

Cambodian border. Under the rules of engagement prescribed by the JCS 

and CINCPAC, MACV’s air and ground forces could strike enemy positions in Cambodia only to protect themselves against North Vietnamese 

Chap 11EI.indd 379 
380

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

and Viet Cong attack; they coul

not fi re on places inhabited b

Cambodians under any circum

stances.21

For the most part, Genera

Westmoreland rigorously enforce

these regulations on his fi eld com

manders, although he was willin

to stretch them to some degree t

gain a tactical advantage. In Marc

1966, for example, he turned dow

a suggestion by General Larsen tha

MACV simply move the Cambod

an border with II Corps, which wa

disputed, several kilometers wes

ward to facilitate a I Field Forc

search and destroy operation

Instead, with General Wheeler

concurrence, Westmoreland urge

Larsen to interpret the self-defens

aspect of the regulations liberall

when maneuvering within Sout

Vietnam against enemy troop

near or at the border.22

By the time Westmorelan

gave these instructions to Larsen

he was well aware that Cambodia

posture as a neutral haven of peac

in Southeast Asia was a facade. Beginning as early as 1964, South Vie

namese and later U.S. military intelligence had gradually accumulate

evidence that the North Vietnamese, with at least the passive suppo

of Prince Sihanouk’s government, were making extensive use of Cam

bodia not only as a location for camps and supply depots but also a

a conduit and source of food, weapons, and munitions. By late 1966

the MACV Intelligence Directorate and other U.S. agencies were we

on the way to establishing that the North Vietnamese were feedin

their troops in the Central Highlands with Cambodian rice and tha

Communist arms were being delivered by ship to Sihanoukville, from 

whence they were fl owing into the Mekong Delta. The extent of th

enemy base network paralleling the South Vietnamese–Cambodia

border also was well known.23

The Johnson administration nevertheless declined to take actio

against the enemy’s facilities in Cambodia for fear of diplomatic oppro

brium over a U.S. attack on a neutral, ostensibly peaceful state. Pres

dent Johnson and his advisers believed that Prince Sihanouk might ye

be drawn to the allied side, especially as he learned the extent of Nort

Prince Norodom Sihanouk with 

President Kennedy (CMH fi les)

Chap 11EI.indd 380 
381

The Wider Theater

Vietnamese and Viet Cong violation of his nation’s jealously guarded 

sovereignty. Disagreements within the intelligence community also 

made for inaction. The Central Intelligence Agency persistently rejected military claims that major arms shipments were coming through 

Sihanoukville and insisted that the enemy’s border bases were being 

stocked primarily from within South Vietnam or via the Ho Chi Minh 

Trail. Constrained by these considerations, President Johnson throughout his term relied primarily on quiet diplomacy in attempting to turn 

Sihanouk against his not altogether welcome Communist guests.24

The president and his advisers also gradually enlarged the scope 

of military action, especially in gathering additional information on 

enemy activities with which to infl uence Sihanouk. To that end, during 1966 and 1967, at the urging of the Joint Chiefs and General Westmoreland, they instituted step by step a highly secret program of air 

and ground reconnaissance of eastern Cambodia.

 The effort began in mid-June 1966, when the administration authorized General Westmoreland to conduct a one-time series of aerial 

photographic missions over a twenty-kilometer-deep strip of Cambodia along the South Vietnamese border. Carried out by the Seventh Air 

Force and code-named DORSAL FIN, the missions were limited to a total 

of twelve, with no more than four aircraft over Cambodia at any one 

time. MACV confi ned information about the fl ights and distribution 

of the intelligence gained from them to a minimum number of key 

command and staff personnel. It made no public announcements of 

the missions and provided the crews with cover assignments on the 

South Vietnamese side of the border. When the initial incursions produced no international furor, the administration over the following 

year gradually enlarged the program. It allowed MACV to carry out 

continuous aerial reconnaissance within the twenty-kilometer zone, 

although at a rate of no more than twenty missions per month and 

with tight security restrictions remaining in effect.25

Supplementing the aerial surveillance, in May 1967 the president 

authorized General Westmoreland to send SOG teams into the twenty-kilometer border strip. Code-named DANIEL BOONE, these incursions 

were initially limited to only the northern part of the border zone, 

with a ceiling of ten missions a month and three teams in Cambodia 

at any one time. To avoid attracting attention, the teams were to enter 

and leave their operating areas on foot, avoid contact with Cambodian troops and civilians, and engage only in reconnaissance. As was 

the case with DORSAL FIN, the administration gradually relaxed the restrictions. By the end of 1967, MACV could conduct thirty missions 

a month along the entire length of the border and insert a limited 

number of teams by helicopter. Even so, the command had to inform 

Pacifi c Command of each mission forty-eight hours in advance, and it 

had to obtain JCS approval of each individual patrol in the southern 

part of the border strip. Despite these restrictions, the reconnaissance 

Chap 11EI.indd 381 
382

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

effort grew to substantial size, with ninety-nine teams inserted int

Cambodia during the last half of 1967.26

Besides executing the limited operations permitted him, Gener

Westmoreland sought to promote more extensive U.S. efforts, both dip

lomatic and military, to eliminate the enemy’s Cambodian sanctua

ies. As early as December 1965, he directed the chief of MACV’s Nav

Advisory Group to prepare plans for a naval blockade of Sihanoukvil

and the Mekong River, Cambodia’s principal outlets to the sea. Late th

following year, he organized a staff committee chaired by the MACV J5

code-named STEAM BATH, to recommend courses of both military an

nonmilitary action in Cambodia. MACV headquarters worked closel

with SEACOORD in promoting the establishment of interdepartmen

tal Cambodia monitoring groups in Washington and Southeast Asi

Westmoreland kept Australian offi cials, whose embassy represente

U.S. interests in Phnom Penh, informed about North Vietnamese an

Viet Cong violations of Cambodia’s neutrality; and early in 1968 MAC

headquarters provided intelligence support for an effort by Ambassado

Chester Bowles to reopen diplomatic contact with Sihanouk.27

On the military side, Westmoreland, with encouragement from 

SEACOORD and Ambassador Bunker, pressed forward with plans an

proposals for seizing or blockading Sihanoukville, for blockading th

Mekong, for limited ground operations against enemy base areas, an

for air attacks, including B–52 strikes, into Cambodia. In Decembe

1967, in his most ambitious proposal up to that time, he asked Admira

Sharp and the Joint Chiefs for permission to conduct artillery fi re from 

within South Vietnam and tactical air and B–52 strikes against enem

forces in the so-called Tri-Border Area where Laos, Cambodia, an

South Vietnam came together. This region, according to MACV inte

ligence, contained a North Vietnamese division headquarters, impo

tant supply depots and road junctions, and several enemy regimen

recuperating from recent heavy fi ghting in South Vietnam. Westmore

land argued that a surprise bombardment of a base complex hithert

safe from attack would infl ict heavy enemy losses. Since the area wa

remote and had few civilian inhabitants, the attack should produc

little diplomatic reaction and might be conducted without publicit

Both Ambassador Bunker and Admiral Sharp endorsed the tri-borde

plan. Nevertheless, the administration withheld approval rather tha

risk disrupting the Bowles mission. At the end of 1967, MACV’s mil

tary activity in Cambodia remained confi ned to reconnaissance.28

MACV and ROLLING THUNDER

From its beginning in February 1965, the bombing campaig

against North Vietnam gradually expanded in the number of raids an

in the importance of the industrial, transportation, and military targe

struck. American public and offi cial debate over the campaign—its ju

Chap 11EI.indd 382 
383

The Wider Theater

tifi cation, objectives, and effectiveness—intensifi ed even as the bombing did. Within the government, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Admiral 

Sharp continuously pressed for heavier bombing of more signifi cant 

targets. Civilian offi cials from the State Department and Central Intelligence Agency, and increasingly from the Department of Defense, 

challenged the political wisdom and military value of ROLLING THUNDER

and urged that Johnson reduce the program or even halt it entirely. By 

late 1966 Secretary McNamara had joined their ranks. Pressed from all 

sides and concerned as well with congressional and public opinion, 

President Johnson held back. He authorized incremental expansion of 

the campaign, but never to the levels desired by the military. While 

not directly responsible for ROLLING THUNDER, Westmoreland of necessity became involved in both the campaign and the debate. He sought 

to infl uence the conduct of operations in order to assist his efforts in 

South Vietnam, and he added his voice to the military’s advocacy of 

the air offensive.29

Westmoreland followed closely the activities of his 2d Air Division/Seventh Air Force commander, to whom Pacifi c Air Forces, Admiral Sharp’s agent for directing the northern air war, delegated much 

of the responsibility for coordinating Air Force and Navy raids against 

North Vietnam. At Sharp’s request, Westmoreland offered recommendations for improving ROLLING THUNDER’s effectiveness in interdicting 

the fl ow of enemy troops and supplies into the south. In addition, at 

the insistence of the American embassy in Saigon, late in 1965 he took 

on the task of investigating periodic mistaken bombings in the Demilitarized Zone by jets, usually from the carriers, trying to hit targets 

in the southernmost part of North Vietnam and instituted more rigorous control procedures for strikes close to the buffer zone between the 

two Vietnams.30

From the beginning of major air attacks on the north, General Westmoreland had argued with Admiral Sharp, to no avail, that he should 

be CINCPAC’s agent for direction of the campaign. In mid-March 1966 

he made a more modest bid for jurisdiction over operations in Route 

Packages One and Two, the segments of North Vietnam just above the 

Demilitarized Zone.31 Concerned about an enemy force buildup in the 

area that appeared to threaten the two northernmost provinces of I 

Corps, he proposed that MACV take over direction of air strikes in the 

zone, which had become, in effect, an extension of the southern battlefi eld. The operations he envisioned, patterned on the TIGER HOUND

concept used in Laos, would feature strikes directed by forward air controllers on the basis of continuous air reconnaissance and intensive 

intelligence gathering. (Map 5)

The MACV commander argued that with these route packages under 

his jurisdiction, he could readily shift air power between infi ltration targets in Laos and North Vietnam in response to changing weather and 

tactical conditions. He also contended that a more clear-cut division 

Chap 11EI.indd 383 
Mekong R

Mekong R

M ekong R

Mae Nam Nan

Mekong R

Red R

Black R

GULF

O F

TONKIN

DEMARCATION

LINE

CHINA

BURMA

NORTH VIETNAM

SOUTH VIETNAM

THAILAND

CAMBODIA

Luang Prabang

Dien Bien Phu

Lao Cai

HANOI

Haiphong

Samneua

Xieng

Khouang

Muong Soui

Pak Sane

VIENTIANE

Vinh

Udon Thani Muang Nakhon Phanom

Nakhon Ratchsima

Ubon Ratchathani Paksé

Savannakhet Tchepone Quang Tri

Sisophon

Attopeu

0

0

150 Miles

150 Kilometers

LAOS

INTERDICTION AREAS

BARREL ROLL

STEEL TIGER

TIGER HOUND

1965–1967

MAP 5

Chap 11EI.indd 384 
385

The Wider Theater

of labor would result, with Sharp directing the “strategic” bombing of 

the upper portions of North Vietnam and Laos while MACV conducted 

what was essentially a “tactical” air war in the lower regions. To avoid 

any appearance of an appeal over his superior’s head, Westmoreland 

addressed this recommendation only to Sharp, with no information 

copy to General Wheeler. He explained, “It is Admiral Sharp’s prerogative to organize this command as he sees fi t and I did not want my 

recommendation with respect to internal command relations to be 

known outside of this headquarters.”32

Initially reluctant, Sharp on 26 March granted the MACV commander authority over Route Package One, whose boundaries were 

expanded slightly northward. Route Package Two, however, he kept 

out of Westmoreland’s jurisdiction because strong North Vietnamese 

air defenses there prevented the use of TIGER HOUND tactics. Sharp provided Westmoreland an allowance of sorties from Thailand and from 

the carriers for use in both the Laotian panhandle and Route Package 

One, and he permitted the MACV commander to use aircraft based in 

South Vietnam in those same areas when Westmoreland considered 

such employment “advantageous to the overall battle.” From that time 

on, the Seventh Air Force fl ew missions in Route Package One under 

Westmoreland’s direction.33 (Map 6)

With Route Package One in hand, Westmoreland reached out for 

control of more of the northern air war. During one of Admiral Sharp’s 

visits to Saigon early in July 1966, the MACV commander suggested 

that he also receive responsibility for Route Package Two, again on 

grounds that the area was an extension of the battlefi eld in South Vietnam. Sharp refused. He declared that South Vietnam, Laos, and Route 

Package One were plenty for Westmoreland to handle and that carriers 

of Task Force 77 were providing adequate coverage of Route Package 

Two. Subsequently, Sharp turned down a proposal by Westmoreland 

that the air effort against the northern route packages be reduced in 

favor of an all-out interdiction campaign in southern North Vietnam. 

Insisting that “pressure on the northern area may be what is needed to 

convince Hanoi that they are embarked on an unprofi table course of 

action,” Sharp instructed Westmoreland to reallocate his own already 

ample air resources for interdiction if he considered the mission that 

important. The admiral reminded Westmoreland that “the responsibility for ROLLING THUNDER remains with me, including the allocation of 

sorties.” Following this exchange, Westmoreland made no further efforts to encroach on Sharp’s ROLLING THUNDER preserve.34

Even as he tried to extend his jurisdiction over ROLLING THUNDER, 

Westmoreland joined Admiral Sharp and General Wheeler in defending the bombing offensive and advocating its expansion. Westmoreland was a relatively late convert to this position. During the policy deliberations of 1964 and early 1965, he repeatedly expressed doubt that 

air attacks would bring Hanoi to terms while its forces were winning 

Chap 11EI.indd 385 
386

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

in the south. He also warned against provoking the North Vietnames

until the Saigon government and army were strong enough to with

stand enemy retaliation. The arrival of American troops relieved Wes

moreland’s anxieties on the latter point. Nevertheless, he continued t

regard ROLLING THUNDER as having at best peripheral effects on the wa

in the south, his primary concern. He informed General Wheeler a

late as February 1967 that air interdiction in North Vietnam and Lao

while it had infl icted “appreciable damage” on the enemy’s logistica

system, had not affected “in drastic degree” the movement of troop

on foot into South Vietnam. In allocating air power, Westmoreland fa

vored giving priority to tactical support in South Vietnam, if necessar

at the expense of ROLLING THUNDER. “We continually were faced wit

trying to make Westy realize that the air campaign in the north wa

an essential part of the whole operation,” Admiral Sharp declared. “

was probably late 1966 or early 1967 before he fully understood how 

important the air campaign against North Vietnam was.”35

Whatever his initial reservations, Westmoreland did join Adm

ral Sharp and General Wheeler in their advocacy of the northern a

campaign. He had no objection to putting direct pressure on Hano

provided that such action did not jeopardize South Vietnam or dive

resources from the campaign there; and he appears to have wanted t

maintain a united front with Sharp and Wheeler in favor of strong mi

itary action, especially in the face of rising challenges from “dovish” c

vilians. Accordingly in June 1966, at Sharp’s and Wheeler’s suggestion

Westmoreland recommended attacks on North Vietnam’s petroleum 

storage and distribution facilities. He argued that such an escalation

by demonstrating American resolve, would improve the morale of th

South Vietnamese government, then recovering from near-civil war i

I Corps. In October, Westmoreland repeated his endorsement of ROL

ING THUNDER directly to McNamara when the defense secretary visite

Saigon. He told McNamara that South Vietnam was secure enough tha

“we are now in a position to apply whatever pressure is necessary t

infl uence the leadership in the North.”36

As the sole senior military representative at the Manila conferenc

later that month, Westmoreland, coached in advance by Wheeler, de

livered a still stronger endorsement of ROLLING THUNDER to Presiden

Johnson and other Washington offi cials. He claimed at that time tha

the bombing was reducing the fl ow of enemy troops and munition

into South Vietnam and undermining Hanoi’s general ability to carr

on the war. He declared that any halt to air attacks in the north woul

have an “adverse psychological effect” on South Vietnamese and a

lied fi ghting forces. Echoing a persistent theme of Admiral Sharp’s, h

deplored the slow and cautious expansion of the air offensive to tha

point and urged heavier bombing of a wider range of targets.37

During 1967, as the military-civilian debate over ROLLING THUNDE

approached a critical stage, Westmoreland closely coordinated his com

Chap 11EI.indd 386 
387

The Wider Theater

MAP 6

ments on the air campaign with those of Sharp and Wheeler. In March, 

at the request of President Johnson transmitted through McNamara 

and Wheeler, Westmoreland held a press conference on the bombing 

to counter a proposal by Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York, for 

an immediate suspension of attacks on North Vietnam followed by 

negotiations. In an on-the-record statement to reporters in Saigon, 

6A

5

6B

4

3

2

1

Mekong River

Red River

GULF

O F

TONKIN

DEMARCATION LINE

Meng-tzu

Yen Bai

Dien Bien Phu

Samneua

Son Tay

Phuc Yen

Dong Anh

HANOI

Kien An

Haiphong

Kep

Lang Son

Khammouane

Muang Nakhon

Phanom

Savannakhet

Quang Tri

Dong Hoi

Luang Prabang

Nam Dinh

Thanh Hoa

Thai Nguyen

Lao Cai

Vinh

CHINA

LAO S

S OUTH 

VIETNAM

THAILAND

0

0

100 Miles

100 Kilometers

NORTH VIETNAM

ROUTE PACKAGES

ROLLING THUNDER

Route Package Boundary

Route Package Number

Restricted Zone

Prohibited Zone

Chinese Border Buffer Zone

Railroad

1967

6A

Chap 11EI.indd 387 
388

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Westmoreland repeated his claim that ROLLING THUNDER “saves Amer

can and Vietnamese lives on the battlefi eld” by limiting the buildup o

enemy forces. In that light, he declared, a cessation of bombing “wi

cost many additional lives and probably prolong the confl ict.”38

Disillusioned by mid-1967 with the course of the war in both Nort

and South Vietnam, Secretary McNamara proposed a leveling off o

reduction of air attacks in the north and a halt to further ground troo

deployments in the south. He hoped thereby to establish a military po

sition that the United States could sustain indefi nitely while pursuin

a negotiated settlement. Seeking to present a united front against thes

deescalation proposals, Sharp and Westmoreland worked closely wit

Wheeler in coordinating a response to the defense secretary. Preparin

for a decisive conference with McNamara in Saigon in early July, Wes

moreland and Sharp, along with General Momyer, who was drafte

to defend the air war, assembled an orchestrated series of briefi ngs fo

the secretary. During the Saigon conference, held from 7 to 12 Jul

the military leaders argued unanimously against reduction of ROLLIN

THUNDER, to the annoyance of McNamara, who had hoped they woul

provide justifi cation for his proposals. In the end, the results of th

conference, as far as the bombing campaign was concerned, were in

Ambassador Bunker and General Westmoreland greet Secretary of Defense McNa

mara on his arrival in Saigon, July 1967. (NARA)

Chap 11EI.indd 388 
389

The Wider Theater

conclusive. President Johnson held to his policy of incremental expansion of the target list but declined to give the military the authority for 

the heavy attacks they deemed necessary.39

Through the end of the year, in the face of rising debate in the 

United States over the war and its strategy, General Westmoreland kept 

up his support of the bombing campaign, always in terms of its importance in assisting allied operations and saving American lives in South 

Vietnam. He thus told presidential adviser Walt Rostow in November: 

“I believe the bombing campaign is of the greatest importance. If we 

are to have real impact on the enemy’s lines of communication, we 

should bomb them throughout their entire length.”40

A Tangled Chain of Command

In attempting to unify the air campaigns and cross-border operations in Southeast Asia in support of the war in South Vietnam, General 

Westmoreland faced multiple adversaries and obstacles. For reasons of 

both international diplomacy and U.S. interservice rivalry, the Johnson 

administration declined to establish a single U.S. theater command for 

Southeast Asia, leaving the development and execution of strategy to 

negotiation among a number of power centers with different interests 

and priorities. The administration’s policy of maintaining the facade of 

neutrality in Laos and of avoiding confrontation with Cambodia imposed narrow limits on what MACV could do against the cross-border 

bases and infi ltration routes that sustained the enemy in South Vietnam. Admiral Sharp’s insistence on directly conducting ROLLING THUNDER operations further circumscribed Westmoreland’s ability to unify 

the American military effort. 

The Military Assistance Command’s arrangements for prosecuting 

the cross-border wars, like those for conducting air and ground operations in South Vietnam, were a fabric of compromises that sought to 

reconcile military effectiveness with a multitude of contradictory diplomatic, political, and bureaucratic interests. In developing these arrangements and making them work, General Westmoreland displayed 

a talent for maintaining reasonably cordial personal and working relationships with colleagues, such as Ambassador Sullivan, with whom 

his interests confl icted. Promoting his own strategic objectives tactfully but persistently, he achieved incremental successes on many of 

the points that were of concern to him. But working arrangements 

and incremental gains on particular issues added up to much less than 

a coherent strategy for victory, whether in the extended battle area of 

Cambodia, Laos, and North Vietnam or in Westmoreland’s main area 

of interest, South Vietnam.

Chap 11EI.indd 389 
390

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Notes

1 Quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 6 Jul–3 Aug 67, tab A, Westmorelan

Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67), CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 411, argues re

rospectively that a Southeast Asia theater command should have been formed. Gener

William M. Momyer, USAF (Ret.), Airpower in Three Wars (Washington, D.C.: Depar

ment of the Air Force, 1978), pp. 68–69; and Claude Witze, “The Case for a Unifi e

Command: CINCSEA,” Air Force 50, no. 1 (January 1967): 23–29, in tab C–7, Westm

reland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), refl ect Air Force support for a theater–wid

commander. 2 Sharp’s views are in Sharp, “Reminiscences,” pp. 244, 246. MACV Staff Study, c

Jun 65, sub: Organization of MACV, MACTHAI, USSEASIA, tab 50, Westmoreland Hi

File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. Rosson Interv, 1981, pp. 335–38; Mrozek, Airpowe

p. 33.3 MACV Staff Study, ca. Jun 65, sub: Organization of MACV, MACTHAI, USSEASIA

tab 50, Westmoreland Hist File 16 (10 May–30 Jun 65), CMH. 4 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1723 to Sharp, 30 Mar 65, Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 65, CMH. CINCPAC Command History, 1964, pp. 19–2

MACV Command History, 1965, p. 102. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 76–77. 5 Msg, Wheeler JCS 1884–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 22 May 65, Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65, CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 102–0

Quote is from MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 14 May 73. 6 MACV Command History, 1964, p. 156; ibid., 1965, pp. 156–60, 422; ibid., 196

pp. 743–45; ibid., 1967, pp. 1021–24. Memo, Westmoreland for CINCPAC, 27 Oct 6

sub: SEATO Log TM Conference, Westmoreland Sig File, Oct 67; Msgs, Stilwell BN

0195 to Sharp, 21 Jan 66; Westmoreland MAC 8956 to Amb Martin, 13 Oct 66. In Wes

moreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH. Westmoreland Hi

Briefi ng, 5 Jun 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. 7 MACV Command History, 1967, 1:332–33, summarizes MACV’s objectives 

Laos. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 2015 to Sullivan, 1 Mar 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH, is a typical compendium of the command’s knowledge of enem

infi ltration.

8 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 209–13, 216–17; ibid., 1966, p. 422. Wes

moreland Hist Notes, 24 and 28 Nov 65, 3 and 8 Dec 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (2

Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH; 31 Dec 65 and 12 Jan 66, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 De

65–29 Jan 66). Both in CMH. Inception of SHINING BRASS is recounted in Interv, Seni

Offi cers Oral History Program with Brig Gen Donald D. Blackburn, 1983, pp. 346–4

MHI. See also Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3894 to Sharp, 31 Jul 65, Westmoreland M

Files, 1 July–30 Sep 65, CMH. 9 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 84–86; MACV Command History, 1965, p

213–14, 465; ibid., 1967, 1:439–40; Parry, Three-War Marine, p. 269, provides a MAC

staff offi cer’s view of the direction of operations in Laos. 10 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 107–09; Blackburn Interv, 1983, pp. 340–4

MHI; Interv, Charles B. MacDonald with Maj Gen John K. Singlaub, 18 Oct 73, Not

in CMH fi les; Memo, Westmoreland for Lt Gen Starbird, 17 Dec 66, sub: Barrier Pla

tab A–3, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH; MACV Comman

History, 1966, pp. 681–83. 11 Quotes are from Blackburn Interv, 1983, pp. 359–60, MHI; see also pp. 339–4

361. MACV Command History, 1967, 1:129 and ann. G, app. 1; ibid., ann. F, pp. 1–

and app. 1.

Chap 11EI.indd 390 
391

The Wider Theater

12 Sullivan’s role in Laos is described in Charles A. Stevenson, The End of Nowhere: 

American Policy Toward Laos since 1954 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1972), pp. 208–17; quote 

is from p. 217. Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 85–86; MACV Command History, 

1965, p. 216. Blackburn Interv, 1983, p. 362, MHI. For a typical statement of Sullivan’s 

approach to the confl ict, see Memo, Sullivan for W. P. Bundy, 1 May 67, sub: Limitations on Military Actions in Laos, box 2, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. 13 Westmoreland Historical Briefi ng, 17 Sep 66, tab E, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 

Jul–17 Sep 66), CMH. See also tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66); 

tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67); tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 

Jul–3 Aug 67); and Msg, Westmoreland MAC 3318 to Sharp, 27 Apr 66, Westmoreland 

Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66. All in CMH. Air Force complaints are summarized in Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 86–87; Brown Interv, 20 Oct 70, pp. 53–54; and Blood 

Interv, 6 Apr 70, pp. 27–34. 14 These consultations can be followed through General Westmoreland’s Message 

Files and Historical Files for 1965–1968. For an example of SEACOORD’s activities and 

procedures, see Msgs, Amb Bunker Saigon 2203 to SecState and SecDef, 1 Aug 67, tab 

A–21, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 July–3 Aug 67), CMH. Rosson Interv, p. 336, MHI, 

comments on the slowness of SEACOORD procedures. Ltrs, Brig Gen Chaisson to Mrs 

Chaisson, 14 Jan and 27 May 67, box 6, Chaisson Papers, Hoover Institution, describe 

the Udorn meetings. 15 MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 196–97, 213, 215–16; ibid., 1966, pp. 421, 

423, 425–27; ibid., 1967, 1: 332–33, 351–52, 440–44, 453–55, and ann. G, p. G–1 and 

app. 4, pp. 1–2. Blackburn Interv, 1983, pp. 349–51, MHI. Memo, Sullivan for W. P. 

Bundy, 1 May 67, sub: Limitations on Military Actions in Laos, box 2, Warnke Papers, 

McNaughton Files, LBJL, summarizes Vientiane’s concessions to that point. Msgs, Rosson MAC 5076 to Westmoreland, 19 Jun 66; Westmoreland MAC 6209 to Sharp and 

McDonald, 21 Jul 66; Wheeler JCS 1422–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 22 Feb 67; 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–1967, CMH. 16 Quotes are from Msg, Sullivan to Westmoreland and Sharp, 10 Aug 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 7617 to Sharp, 13 Aug 67, 

tab A–8, Westmoreland Hist File 20 (4–20 Aug 67), CMH. The dispute can be followed 

through Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 7473 to Sullivan, 9 Aug 67; Westmoreland MAC 

7627, MAC 8918, MAC 9415 to Sharp, 13 Aug 67, 21 Sep 67; 8 Oct 67; Gen Johnson 

JCS 7491 to Sharp, 23 Sep 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 1 Oct 67; Westmoreland Msg 

Files, Aug–Oct 67, CMH. 17 Early consideration of a Laos cordon by Westmoreland and Gen Johnson is described in Chapter 6 of this volume. Msg, Momyer and W. G. MacMillan MAC 3859 

to Westmoreland, 23 Apr 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67; and Memo, 

MacMillan for Westmoreland, 18 Apr 67, sub: Panhandle Truck Traffi c, tab A–17, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67), both in CMH, refl ect the conclusion that aerial 

interdiction could not stop enemy truck movement in Laos. For PRAIRIE FIRE’s diffi culties, see Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 32035 to CINCPAC, 29 Sep 67, Westmoreland Sig 

File, 1967, CMH. 18 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 0907 to Waters, 2 Feb 66; Westmoreland MAC 10627 

to Sharp, 5 Dec 66; Westmoreland to McDonald, 14 Dec 66. All in Westmoreland Msg 

Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66 and 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 23 Jan 

66, tab F, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. 19 Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 272; MACV Command History, 1967, 1:333–

34; Westmoreland Hist Briefi ng, 3 Feb 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 

Mar 67); MFR, Rosson, 8 Apr 67, sub: CIIC Meeting, 8 Apr 67, tab A–7; Westmoreland 

Hist Notes, 10–30 Apr 67, tab B. Both in Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–30 Apr 67), 

Chap 11EI.indd 391 
392

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

CMH. Memo, Westmoreland for Secretary of Defense, sub: Laos, 10 Jul 67, tab A–1

Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67), CMH; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 19–2

Dec 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 27 (19–26 Dec 67), CMH. Msg, Westmorelan

MAC 00686 to Sharp and Wheeler, 15 Jan 68, tab A–28, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (2

Dec 67–31 Jan 68), CMH. 20 “Laos: Problems, Policies, and Outlook for 1967,” Approved by Ambassador an

Country Team, Vientiane, 15 Jan 67, Westmoreland Hist File 14 (Baguio Conference

CMH. Memo, Sullivan for William Bundy, 1 May 67, sub: Limitations on Military A

tions in Laos, box 2, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. Sharp, “Reminiscences

pp. 312–13, 411–12, 562–63; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 148, 153. Palme

25-Year War, pp. 187–88; and Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, pp. 229–32, criticizes the failu

of Westmoreland and other U.S. leaders to consider the Laos cordon as an alternativ

to a war of attrition waged throughout South Vietnam. 21 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 214; ibid., 1967, 1:351; Chaisson Oral Hi

tory, p. 155. 22 Msgs, Larsen NHT 0154 to Westmoreland, 21 Mar 66; Wheeler JCS 1710–66 

Sharp and Westmoreland, 1 Apr 66; Westmoreland MAC 2574 to Larsen, 1 Apr 6

Sharp to Westmoreland, 2 Apr 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 6

CMH. 23 MACV Command History, 1965, p. 209; ibid., 1966, pp. 27–28. Msg, Larsen NH

0896 to Westmoreland, 23 Jul 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH

Westmoreland Hist Notes, 14 Nov 65, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–2

Dec 65) and 23 Dec 65, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH

Memo, McChristian for Distribution, 30 Sep 66, sub: The Role of Cambodia in th

NVN–VC War Effort, tab B–3, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66), CMH. In

terv, LBJL with Lt Gen Phillip Davidson, 30 Mar and 30 Jun 82, sec. 2, pp. 24–26. 24 For administration policy, see Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 7152 to Larsen, 30 J

67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67; and Bunker Saigon 13345 to SecStat

13 Dec 67, tab A–18, Westmoreland Hist File 26 (29 Nov–16 Dec 67). Both in CMH

Intelligence disagreement: Davidson Interv, 30 Mar and 30 Jun 82, sec. 2, pp. 26–3

Rpt, Ofc of ACofS for Intel, DA, “The Role of Cambodia in the NVN–VC War Effor

1964–1970,” overview, extracts in Vietnam Command File, NHC; Westmoreland, 

Soldier Reports, pp. 180–83. 25 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 3087–66 to Sharp, 2 Jun 66; Westmoreland MAC 4613 

Sharp, 5 Jun 66; Wheeler JCS 3307–66 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 11 Jun 66; Wes

moreland MAC 5278 to Emrick, 25 Jun 66; Westmoreland MAC 10431 to Sharp, 2

Nov 66; CJCS JCS 1641–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 2 Mar 67. All in Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. MACV Comman

History, 1965, p. 214; ibid., 1967, 1: 444–45. 26 MACV Command History, 1967, ann. G. app. 4, pp. 2–4.

27 Msg, Rear Adm Ward to Vice Adms Clarey and Hyland and Rear Adm Swanso

27 Dec 65, Rear Adm Ward’s Personal Msg File, 1965, box 108, COMNAVFORV Record

NHC. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 8213 to Sharp and Wheeler, 20 Sep 66; Wheeler JC

5872–67 to Westmoreland, 26 Jul 67. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Se

66, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 28 Dec 67–31 Jan 68, tab A–

Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 67–31 Jan 68), CMH. Memo, Westmoreland f

Bunker, sub: Cambodia, 9 Nov 67, Westmoreland Sig File, Nov 67. All in CMH. MAC

Command History, 1966, pp. 747, 750. 28 For military planning, see tab B–4, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 De

66); tab A–7, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–30 Apr 67); tab A–11, Westmorelan

Hist File 23 (1–15 Oct 67); and tab A–5, Westmoreland Hist File 26 (29 Nov–16 Dec 67

Chap 11EI.indd 392 
393

The Wider Theater

All in CMH. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 11702 and MAC 12208 to Sharp, 4 Dec 67, 16 

Dec 67; Rosson NHT 1536 to Westmoreland, 10 Dec 67; Sharp to Wheeler, 19 Dec 67; 

Wheeler JCS 11097–67 to Westmoreland, 23 Dec 67; Westmoreland MAC 12674 to 

Wheeler, 26 Dec 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1–31 Dec 67, CMH. 29 The offi cial debates over ROLLING THUNDER can be followed in detail in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.7.(a) and (b). Development of the campaign is summarized in 

Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 23–43, 53–54. Admiral Sharp vigorously 

defends the bombing campaign in Strategy for Defeat: Vietnam in Retrospect (San Rafael, 

Calif.; Presidio Press, 1978), and in his “Reminiscences,” pp. 370–72, 335–38, 511. 

George Herring, “‘Cold Blood’: LBJ’s Conduct of Limited War in Vietnam,” Harmon 

Memorial Lectures in Military History no. 33 (Colorado Springs: USAF Academy, 1990), 

analyzes Johnson’s strategy-making by compromise. 30 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, pp. 89–98. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on 

War, p. 20; MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 202–06; Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 

4758, MAC 5712, MAC 5937, MAC 5987 to Sharp 23 Sep, 13 Nov, 23 Nov, 26 Nov 

65; Rosson MAC 4814 to Westmoreland, 27 Sep 65; Sharp to Westmoreland, 22 Nov 

65. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–31 Dec 65, CMH. Memo, Lt Gen Moore for 

Westmoreland, 26 Nov 65, sub: Procedures to Control Strikes Near the DMZ, tab E–2, 

Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH. 31 The better to coordinate their operations, the Air Force and Navy divided North 

Vietnam into “route packages,” geographical areas in which one or the other service 

normally fl ew most of the missions. 32 MACV Command History, 1966, p. 428. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 2165, MAC 

2261, MAC 2275 to Sharp, 17, 21, 22 Mar 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 

66, CMH. Quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 Mar 66, tab A, Westmoreland 

Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH; in same fi le, see tab B. 33 Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 19 and 26 Mar 66; Sharp to Wheeler, 26 Mar 66; 

Westmoreland MAC 2428 and MAC 3050 to Sharp, 27 Mar and 18 Apr 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–30 Jun 66, CMH. MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 395, 

428; Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 24. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 3 Apr 

66, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 5 (13 Mar–23 Apr 66), CMH. 34 Momyer, Airpower in Three Wars, p. 102; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 10 Jul 66, 

tab E, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH; MACV Command History, 

1966, p. 398. First quote is from Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, 18 Jul 66; second is 

from Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, 13 Jul 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 

66, CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 6018 and MAC 6148 to Sharp, 

16, 19 Jul 66. 35 For Westmoreland’s views during 1964, see Chapter 5 of this volume. Also Westmoreland Hist Notes, 8 Nov 65, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), 

CMH. Westmoreland’s retrospective views on ROLLING THUNDER are in A Soldier Reports, 

pp. 112–13, 119–20, 122. Sharp quotes are from his “Reminiscences,” p. 370. Westmoreland’s comments on interdiction are in Msg, MAC 01297 to Sharp, 6 Feb 67, tab B–2, 

Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67), CMH. 36 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 3086–66 to Sharp info Westmoreland, 2 Jun 66; Sharp to 

Westmoreland, 4 Jun 66; Westmoreland MAC 4613 to Sharp, 5 Jun 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 5 Jun 66, tab A, 

Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66 and 17 Oct 66), tab D, Westmoreland Hist 

File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66). Both in CMH. Quote is from latter entry. 37 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 6339–66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 17 Oct 66; Westmoreland (Manila) to Wheeler, 25 Oct 66; Wheeler JCS 6549–66 to Westmoreland, 25 

Oct 66; Sharp to Westmoreland, 28 Oct 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 

Chap 11EI.indd 393 
394

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Dec 66, CMH. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 21 Oct 66; Memo, Westmoreland for W. W

Rostow, 24 Oct 66, sub: COMUSMACV’s Comments on ROLLING THUNDER, tab 4; Ms

Westmoreland to Wheeler and Sharp, 27 Oct 66, tab 3. All in Westmoreland Hist Fi

10 (18–29 Oct 66), CMH. Memo, McNaughton for Secretary McNamara, 26 Oct 6

sub: McNaughton in Manila . . . , box 7, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. 38 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 2101 to Wheeler and Sharp, 3 Mar 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Wheeler JC

1594–67, JCS 1613–67, JCS 1617–67 to Westmoreland, 1, 2 Mar 67; and Westmorelan

MAC 2086 to Wheeler, 2 Mar 67. 39 Msgs, Wheeler JCS 3891–67, JCS 3930–67 and JCS 3892–67, to Sharp, info Wes

moreland, 25, 26 May 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 27 May 67 and 27 Jun 67; Wheel

JCS 4200–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 6 Jun 67; Westmoreland MAC 5865 to Shar

21 Jun 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 67, CMH. Westmoreland Hi

Notes, 1 Jun–5 Jul 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67), CMH; Shar

“Reminiscences,” pp. 463–65, 481–82. Decisions resulting from Saigon conference a

summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.7.(b), pp. 78–80. 40 MFR, Westmoreland, 22 Nov 67, sub: Luncheon Meeting with Mr. Walter [si

Rostow at the White House on 20 November, tab A–23, Westmoreland Hist File 2

(13–28 Nov 67), CMH. 

Chap 11EI.indd 394 
12

An Evolving Strategy

Like everything else about the Military Assistance Command, its 

strategy for fi ghting the ground war evolved over time, in response 

to circumstances and to a variety of internal and external infl uences. 

Early U.S. pacifi cation plans and operating experience; assessments of 

enemy capabilities and intentions; the condition of the South Vietnamese government and armed forces; the availability of American 

troops; and the maneuverings of individuals and agencies in Saigon, 

Honolulu, and Washington all infl uenced the way in which COMUSMACV conducted his campaign. 

As senior U.S. commander in South Vietnam, General Westmoreland took the initiative in proposing ground strategy and requesting 

forces to carry it out. Nevertheless, his freedom of action was far from 

absolute. He labored under tight political restrictions, especially on operations against the enemy’s Laotian and Cambodian bases; and he 

had to maintain the appearance, and insofar as possible the reality, of 

South Vietnamese sovereignty. He also had to accommodate the advice, criticism, and demands of numerous other actors. Civilian offi -

cials in Washington from the president down, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

the Department of Defense and other agencies, Admiral Sharp and his 

Pacifi c component commanders; the U.S. Mission in Saigon, the South 

Vietnamese government and armed forces, and the allied military contingents all sought to impose their own patterns on the confl ict.

Basic Questions

By the time American ground troops entered the confl ict in force, 

the basic allied military strategy in South Vietnam was well established. 

In common with most counterinsurgency struggles, the ground war effort had two elements. The fi rst, often referred to as the “big unit war,” 

consisted of mobile operations by regular troops to disperse or destroy 

the insurgents’ organized military units and disrupt their logistical 

bases. During 1964 General Westmoreland had labeled these “search 

and destroy” operations. The second element comprised the complex 

range of military and paramilitary activities known in American parChap 12.indd 395 
396

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

lance as “pacifi cation” and by the Saigon government as “Revolution

ary Development.” The military work of pacifi cation included smal

unit patrols and ambushes to eliminate Viet Cong guerrillas in an

around villages and hamlets, police operations to root out the enemy

clandestine political administration, and protection of population an

economic centers and lines of communication. The most importan

military task in pacifi cation and the ultimate measure of its success wa

the provision of round-the-clock security both to the peasants and t

the government offi cials who provided services to them.

Even as the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong main and local force

and guerrillas operated in mutual support of one another, the two e

ements of allied strategy were supposed to be mutually reinforcing

Search and destroy operations would deprive the guerrillas and polit

cal infrastructure of their large-unit support and allow Saigon’s polic

and paramilitary elements safely to carry out their work in the vi

lages. At the same time, effective pacifi cation would provide the a

lies with improved intelligence to guide their offensives while denyin

intelligence, supplies, and hiding places to the Viet Cong and Nort

Vietnamese main force. Conducted simultaneously, in proper balanc

search and destroy and pacifi cation would bring every segment of th

insurgent structure under constant pressure and ultimately cause th

enemy to collapse.

As of late 1965, both elements of the allied campaign were in ser

ous diffi culty. By building main force regiments and divisions equippe

with top-quality modern infantry weapons, the enemy was enlargin

the scale of the big-unit war, intensifying its violence, and seizing th

initiative in it. Mauling Saigon’s regulars and driving them out of th

countryside, the main force opened the way for guerrillas and loca

force detachments to dismantle pacifi cation in the villages. They di

not have much to dismantle. Saigon’s pacifi cation program languishe

as governments came and went in the capital and politico-military fac

tions jockeyed for power. Wracked by seemingly endless political insta

bility, Saigon could neither fi ght nor govern effectively.

In this context, how could the arriving American forces be be

employed to halt Saigon’s decline and turn the war around? Shoul

American troops concentrate on breaking up the enemy’s main forc

a mission for which their mobility and fi repower seemed best suited

Or should they be used in a direct relationship to the peasantry t

strengthen village and hamlet security and root out the Viet Con

guerrillas and shadow government? Could pacifi cation proceed at a

while the Saigon regime lacked any semblance of stability and legit

macy? Would the introduction of massive American military power, i

the air over the north and on the ground in the south, convince Hano

and its Soviet and Chinese sponsors that their side could not win an

induce them to negotiate deescalation and political accommodation

Or should the United States level off its commitment and prepare t

Chap 12.indd 396 
397

An Evolving Strategy

hold on through a prolonged stalemate? These questions preoccupied 

General Westmoreland and his civilian and uniformed superiors as 

they shaped military strategy during the two years following the initial 

commitment of American soldiers to battle in South Vietnam.

The Initial Concept

The fi rst American combat troops who entered South Vietnam arrived before their government had formulated any real plans for their 

operations. President Johnson and Secretary McNamara dispatched 

troops to Vietnam on the assumption that they were needed to turn 

the tide on the battlefi eld and that they would attack the Viet Cong 

and North Vietnamese main forces and possibly help the South Vietnamese Army clear and secure the countryside. They left it to General 

Westmoreland, under the guidance of the JCS and CINCPAC, to produce an operational plan.1

The Military Assistance Command developed its ground war strategy under far from ideal conditions. The headquarters staff itself was 

in a state of rapid growth and organizational fl ux; it worked in a dispersed, barely adequate physical plant. Although MACV and its subordinate American fi eld commands possessed a relatively sophisticated 

understanding of overall enemy strategy and intentions, they had little 

detailed current information at the outset about the opposing forces’ 

strength and locations. Resources also were limited. In the absence of 

a reserve call-up, the deployment of Westmoreland’s reinforcements 

and the establishment of the logistical base in South Vietnam to support them proceeded slowly. Most of the forces with which the MACV 

commander had planned to take the offensive were not in place until 

the last months of 1966. The South Vietnamese government was at the 

same time struggling to maintain its authority and establish some semblance of constitutional legitimacy. Its armed forces barely could protect the government’s vital areas, and the regime could muster organization and manpower for only the most limited pacifi cation endeavors. 

Fully engaged against an enemy whose main forces and guerrillas alike 

were increasing in numbers, aggressiveness, and effectiveness, MACV 

could do little at the beginning except rush American troops to the 

most threatened points. Westmoreland told General Wheeler on New 

Year’s Day, 1966: “The fact is there are high security risks in almost 

every direction . . . and we are reacting as rapidly and forcefully as we 

can with the forces available to us.”2

From MACV’s perspective, strategic and operational direction of this 

unconventional, decentralized confl ict entailed principally the establishment of general policies and objectives, the allocation of troops and 

combat and logistical support, and the establishment of geographical 

priorities for security and pacifi cation. In South Vietnam, the corps and 

divisions, once deployed, remained in place and conducted operations 

Chap 12.indd 397 
398

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

within fi xed tactical areas of responsibility. There were few opportun

ties for the theater headquarters to maneuver large formations. Corp

areas, and regions within corps areas, differed in geography, popula

tion, and the character and disposition of enemy forces. Hence, eac

local commander had to work out his own mix of the search and de

stroy and pacifi cation components of the overall strategy. For the mo

part, MACV had no choice but to allow fi eld force and division com

manders to fi ght their own local wars. The command’s directives an

campaign plans promulgated broad principles, published lists of thing

to be done, and established criteria—usually statistical—for measurin

progress. Plans and directives often had more the character of exhorta

tions than of specifi c orders, and high-level debates over the conduc

of the war took on an air of abstraction.3

Westmoreland and his staff did not plan in a vacuum. They worke

within a rough offi cial consensus that took shape during late 196

and early 1966. That consensus had varied origins. One was the bas

spreading–oil-spot concept of pacifi cation that had dominated Amer

can and South Vietnamese conduct of the war since Kennedy’s inau

guration. When the American buildup began, the South Vietnames

Army was still trying, without much success, to put into effect the la

est version of that approach in the HOP TAC region around Saigon an

in other national priority areas. General Westmoreland’s fi rst MAC

concept of operations, issued on 1 September 1965, also centered o

territorial pacifi cation. It envisioned a three-phase campaign in whic

the South Vietnamese would continue their clearing and securing e

forts while American forces attacked the Viet Cong’s major units an

base areas. The concept provided for geographical expansion of pacifi 

cation in each phase until the Saigon government regained control o

most of South Vietnam’s population and resources.4

To territorial pacifi cation, Westmoreland during late 1965 adde

the concept of attrition. The general predicted to the president, Secre

tary McNamara, Ambassador Lodge, and assorted offi cial and unoffi cia

visitors that the war would be prolonged and that it would be won b

slowly grinding down the enemy. Typically, he told Ambassador Lodg

on 29 December 1965 that “unless we escalated to the point where a

weapons available to us were used . . . I foresaw an extended war o

attrition.” He expected to win such a war because “our troops shoul

always be fresh because of the one year tour” and because America

fi repower and mobility would infl ict greater losses on the Viet Con

and North Vietnamese than they could sustain in the long run. How

ever, the MACV commander studiously avoided estimating how muc

time the process would take, especially in the absence of authorizatio

to cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail and clean out the enemy’s cross-borde

bases. On a couple of occasions, Westmoreland had his J5 Directorat

examine other possible approaches to conducting the war. Howeve

given the political limitations within which MACV had to operate, th

Chap 12.indd 398 
399

An Evolving Strategy

staff could produce no workable alternative to trying to outlast the 

enemy in a politico-military endurance contest.5

As the war went on, Americans increasingly referred to attrition—

meaning primarily the attack on the other side’s main force—as a 

“strategy,” contrasted with pacifi cation. Attrition, however, was in reality more an objective and measurement of progress than a concept 

that shaped the deployment and maneuver of forces at theater and 

corps level. Particularly for American combat units, enemy casualties 

became the most important of the many statistical indicators that the 

authorities in Saigon, Honolulu, and Washington used in attempting 

to determine how the confl ict was going. Yet the principal means of 

infl icting those casualties, the search and destroy operation, originated as a component of the pacifi cation campaign and continued to be 

closely tied to it. Further complicating the issue, pacifi cation was itself 

an attritional process of gradually wearing down the insurgent local 

units, guerrillas, and infrastructure. General Westmoreland deployed 

his American divisions more to defend important terrain objectives, 

notably Saigon, than to bring enemy forces to battle. Hence, the Americans would carry on attrition from a territorial security posture. In the 

light of these facts, the attrition versus pacifi cation debate came down 

largely to an argument about the allocation of U.S. troops in particular 

areas between anti-main force offensives and the attack on the local 

Viet Cong guerrillas and political underground. In the end, the North 

Vietnamese and Viet Cong usually resolved that issue through their 

own decisions on where and when to mount a large-unit threat.

Advocates of pacifi cation made themselves heard during the strategy deliberations of late 1965. Westmoreland, and most other American 

offi cials, appreciated that a successful pacifi cation program could at the 

very least shorten the attrition process by depriving the Viet Cong of 

access to the food and manpower of the countryside. More positively, Ambassador Lodge and General Lansdale consistently argued that 

pacifi cation—by which they meant democratic social and economic 

reform as well as the provision of military security—was the only road 

to assuring the survival of a non-Communist South Vietnam. Several 

high-level Washington conferences and committees produced studies 

and reports with the same conclusion. For example, the authors of the 

Army’s PROVN (Program for the Pacifi cation and Long-Term Development of South Vietnam) study, completed in March 1966 under the 

sponsorship of the Chief of Staff, General Johnson, declared fl atly that 

victory in South Vietnam “can only be achieved through bringing the 

individual Vietnamese, typically a rural peasant, to support willingly 

the government.” They called for radical reorganization of the U.S. 

Mission so that it could formulate and execute a unifi ed civil-military 

program directed toward that end.6

This agitation of the pacifi cation question appears to have infl uenced President Johnson and his senior advisers, at least to the extent 

Chap 12.indd 399 
400

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

that they insisted that planning for revival of the Saigon government

rural security and development effort accompany the preparations fo

military escalation. General Wheeler told Westmoreland late in 1965

“We must have Vietnamese military, para-military and police action

(together with related non-security programs) compatible with th

build-up of Third Country forces in order that the pacifi cation program 

can move forward in step with military operations against main-forc

VC units. . . . A comprehensive and carefully drawn program” for thes

purposes, he continued, “is considered here to be the keystone of ou

future efforts.” Emphasizing the same theme at the Honolulu confe

ence in February 1966 President Johnson issued a ringing public ca

for renewed nonmilitary efforts in South Vietnam. Johnson and th

South Vietnamese leaders promulgated a mixture of military and pac

fi cation goals for the allied war effort.7

General Westmoreland attempted to link attrition and pacifi catio

in MACV directives and in the annual Combined Campaign Plans. H

concept of operations differed little in fundamentals from that whic

he previously had urged upon the South Vietnamese, except that Amer

can troops were taking on much of the task of fi ghting the enemy mai

force within an overall territorial-security approach to the confl ict. Th

combined plans stated the allies’ mission succinctly: “to defeat the V

and extend GVN control in the Republic of Vietnam.” To accomplis

this mission, the allied military forces were to defend major bases an

government centers; secure key resources, such as rice and salt; ope

and protect important roads, railways, and waterways; conduct “su

tained air and ground operations” against enemy forces and bases; a

sist in the expansion of government control of the countryside; an

interdict enemy land and water infi ltration routes. Each annual pla

established national, corps, and ultimately province priority areas fo

pacifi cation, very limited in the 1966 plan but gradually expanding i

later years. In these areas, following the familiar sequence, governmen

regular troops were supposed to drive out or destroy Viet Cong militar

units. Regional and Popular Forces, police, and pacifi cation cadres the

were to root out the insurgent infrastructure, reestablish village an

hamlet administration and public services, and, it was hoped, regai

the people’s allegiance for the Saigon regime.8

The combined plans called for American and other allied contin

gents to concentrate on attacking North Vietnamese and Viet Con

units and base areas while the South Vietnamese regulars and the Re

gional and Popular Forces did most of the work of clearing and securin

the villages and hamlets. Yet the distinction was never absolute. Th

marine and airborne battalions of Saigon’s general reserve continue

to perform primarily an offensive role, as did some ARVN units; an

General Westmoreland left open the possibility of American participa

tion in territorial security activities. The Combined Campaign Plan fo

1967, issued late in 1966, summarized the somewhat blurry division:

Chap 12.indd 400 
401

An Evolving Strategy

RVNAF will have the primary mission of supporting Revolutionary Development [pacifi cation] activities, with priority in and around the National Priority Areas and other 

areas of critical signifi cance. . . .The primary mission of U.S. and FWMAF will be to 

destroy the VC/NVA main forces, base areas, and resources and/or drive the enemy 

into the sparsely populated and food-scarce areas. . . . Although RVNAF is assigned the 

primary responsibility of supporting Revolutionary Development and US/FWMAF are 

assigned the primary mission of destroying the main VC/NVA forces and bases, there 

will be no clear cut division of responsibility. RVNAF General Reserve and ARVN Corps 

Reserve units will conduct unilateral and participate in coordinated and combined 

search and destroy operations. US/FWMAF will continue to provide direct support and 

implicit aid to Revolutionary Development activities.9

In conferences with his American troop commanders, Westmoreland emphasized the attack on enemy forces. When General Larsen 

assumed command of U.S. troops in II Corps, Westmoreland “directed that our primary combat mission was to seek out and destroy, 

wherever we found them, the hard core . . . NVA and Main Force 

units.” During his frequent visits to Larsen’s headquarters, the MACV 

commander “emphasized one thing. ‘Go out and seek the enemy 

and hit him wherever and whenever you can fi nd him. Drive, drive, 

drive. You take the initiative and don’t let him ever get back his balance.’” Westmoreland delivered similar exhortations at his periodic 

commanders’ conferences during late 1965. However, the fi rst MACV 

directive on tactics and techniques for U.S. forces in Vietnam was 

more cautious in tone. It emphasized the Viet Cong’s skill at evading 

offensive sweeps and instructed American units to conduct thorough 

reconnaissance and establish close liaison with Vietnamese military 

and provincial authorities in order to locate the enemy and develop 

effective operations.10

General Westmoreland’s assignment of American troops to a primarily anti-main force offensive mission refl ected a widespread consensus 

among American and South Vietnamese offi cials. Secretary McNamara, 

the Joint Chiefs, and Admiral Sharp all assumed that American troops, 

with their mobility and fi repower, could operate to best advantage outside the most densely populated areas and against the enemy’s large 

units, whereas their lack of knowledge of Vietnamese language and 

culture would limit their usefulness in village- and hamlet-level pacifi -

cation—a mission for which the South Vietnamese forces seemed best 

suited. The Army’s PROVN study, while it emphasized the importance 

of pacifi cation, also called for concentration of American troops against 

the enemy main force. Chief of State Thieu and other South Vietnamese offi cials preferred to keep American forces on the offensive outside 

the populated areas, both for military reasons and from reluctance to 

allow foreign soldiers to exercise direct police power over their citizens, 

as they would have to do in security activities such as searching hamlets, manning road checkpoints, or arresting suspected members of the 

Viet Cong underground.11

Chap 12.indd 401 
402

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

In Westmoreland’s view, attacks on Viet Cong and North Vietnam

ese main forces and bases, besides being the best method of infl ictin

attrition on the enemy, were necessary to any revival of pacifi cation

As Westmoreland and members of his staff interpreted it, the main le

son of the collapse of the CHIEN THANG campaign during 1964 was tha

forces engaged in clearing and securing had to be shielded from attack

by the enemy’s concentrated large formations. The shielding could b

done most effectively by allied spoiling attacks on the main force uni

and their assembly points. General Youngdale, McChristian’s predece

sor as MACV J2, declared that the command’s view had changed from 

“if we can just get the VC infrastructure, in the hamlets, the rest of 

will fall apart” to “you have got to do both, you have got to kill th

main force and you have got to fi nd the little guy. It has got to progre

together.”12

 Westmoreland’s plan to direct American operations primaril

against enemy main forces met early on with dissent from advocates o

a greater emphasis on securing people and territory. Ambassador Lodg

periodically urged Westmoreland to devote more battalions to fi gh

ing guerrillas and fewer to pursuing the big units. General Taylor als

questioned use of American troops in the “preponderant” offensiv

role, claiming that such employment would lead to U.S. assumption o

an open-ended commitment to destroy the enemy throughout Sout

Vietnam.13

More important operationally, the Marine command in I Corp

both advocated and attempted to implement a security-oriented cam

paign. As the fi rst major American ground combat element to arrive i

South Vietnam, the III Marine Amphibious Force based its own inde

pendent concept of operations on its primary task—securing the larg

Da Nang airfi eld. Maj. Gen. Lewis W. Walt, the III MAF commande

quickly realized that to protect the base, he had to control the thick

ly populated villages that bordered it and extended southward int

Quang Nam Province. Those villages were dominated by strong Vie

Cong guerrilla forces and a well-entrenched clandestine administra

tion, but they contained few enemy main force elements. Walt an

his troops accordingly launched a methodical campaign emphasizin

small-unit operations to drive out the guerrillas and gradually expan

secure zones around Da Nang and the subsidiary Marine bases at Ch

Lai in southern I Corps and Phu Bai near Hue in the north. They als

took the lead in instituting a number of pacifi cation expedients, includ

ing the Combined Action Program, under which they paired Marin

rifl e squads with Popular Force platoons to protect particular villages

The marines were willing to engage big enemy units when goo

targets presented themselves, and they did so with considerable suc

cess on several occasions. Nevertheless, General Walt; his immediat

superior at Fleet Marine Force Pacifi c, Lt. Gen. Victor H. Krulak; an

the Marine Corps Commandant, General Greene, all believed tha

Chap 12.indd 402 
403

An Evolving Strategy

the struggle for the people 

in the hamlets and villages 

would decide the issue. If 

effective pacifi cation denied the main forces access 

to the recruits, intelligence, 

and food of I Corps’ narrow coastal plain, the Marine commanders insisted, 

the big units would have to 

choose between starving in 

the mountains and coming 

down to the plain to fi ght 

where III MAF’s artillery 

and air power could destroy 

them. In this assessment, 

the Marine commanders 

left out of account the fact 

that the enemy large units 

in I Corps, operating close 

to their bases in Laos and 

North Vietnam, were less dependent than Communist 

forces elsewhere in South 

Vietnam on the populated 

lowlands. In addition, if the 

enemy came down to fi ght 

amid the villages and hamlets, the resulting destruction would wipe out whatever pacifi cation gains 

the marines had made.14

General Westmoreland criticized the marines’ approach. As he saw it, 

by trying to occupy villages where the government was incapable of providing civil administration and territorial forces, the marines were simply bogging down their limited number of troops in what amounted to restricted 

beachheads, leaving the Viet Cong virtual freedom of action throughout 

most of I Corps. “You are already experiencing the extreme diffi culty involved in pacifying an area which has long been under VC control,” he 

told General Walt in November 1965. “The longer the VC have a free hand 

in the rest of the Corps, the more area they will consolidate, and the more 

diffi cult it will be for us in the long run to make signifi cant gains.” Hence, 

Westmoreland urged Walt to maintain a mobile force of at least two or 

three battalions for continuous offensive operations throughout I Corps, 

to destroy Viet Cong forces and keep the enemy off balance. To varying 

degrees, Generals Wheeler and Johnson, many other Army offi cers, and 

some civilian offi cials shared Westmoreland’s view, deploring what they 

considered excessive Marine defensive-mindedness.15

General Krulak 

(Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 12.indd 403 
404

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

In practice, the differences between Army and Marine strategies wer

less sharp than the rhetoric of partisans on both sides. The debate too

form during mid- and late 1965, at a time when American forces ha

only just begun combat operations. Indeed, a Pentagon analyst late

noted: “The Marine strategy was judged successful, at least by the Ma

rines, long before it had even had a real test. It was applauded by man

observers before the VC had begun to react to it, and . . . encourage

imitators while it was still unproven.” As North Vietnamese regular d

visions moved into I Corps during 1966, III MAF perforce committe

more battalions to large-unit operations. General Krulak modifi ed h

descriptions of Marine strategy, pointing out to Secretary McNamar

and others that it was actually a balance of pacifi cation and offensiv

action; and he acknowledged that the geography of II and III Corps re

quired a different operational approach from that adopted in I Corps.

On his side, as he moved closer to taking over pacifi cation, Gen

eral Westmoreland permitted and even encouraged his Army com

manders to employ battalions in clearing and securing operations wit

the South Vietnamese, especially when weather and lack of profi tabl

targets prevented major offensives. At times, as in Operation FAIRFA

around Saigon, he committed brigade-size American forces to pro

longed pacifi cation campaigns in conjunction with the ARVN and te

ritorials. He began describing MACV’s strategy as “two-fi sted,” wit

one fi st continually jabbing at the main forces and base areas whil

the other remained close to the body to secure people and territory

After three years of campaigning, General Chaisson, the Marine chie

of MACV’s Combat Operations Center, who previously had served a

G3 of III MAF, declared that “there wasn’t really a rat’s ass worth of di

ference between the major things that [the marines]. . .were doing an

the things that the Army was doing.”17

Both MACV and III MAF were grappling with the problems inhe

ent in contending with an enemy who combined large-unit and gue

rilla military action with a highly developed system of political sub

version and control. Lt. Gen. Frederick C. Weyand, who commande

successively the 25th Infantry Division and the II Field Force, summe

up the problem: “There was no single element of the enemy’s orga

nization that, if attacked alone, would cause the collapse of his forc

structure or the reduction of his will to resist.” Instead, the allies ha

to apply “concentrated pressure against the entire enemy system from 

hamlet level to Hanoi rather than against some single element” in 

“strategy of all-round pressure, changing only in emphasis from tim

to time.”18 During most of the period from the start of the America

troop buildup in mid-1965 through the end of 1967, MACV and th

Saigon government lacked the military and nonmilitary resources t

apply such pressure effectively against the entire enemy organization

General Westmoreland and his fi eld commanders accordingly shifte

their available resources among priorities and objectives as their ow

Chap 12.indd 404 
405

An Evolving Strategy

views of the situation evolved and as they responded to pressures from 

Washington and the actions of the PLAF and PAVN.

Problems of Implementation

American and allied forces devoted late 1965 and most of 1966 to 

building up their troop strength and logistical base and to gradually intensifying combat operations. As U.S. Army divisions arrived, General 

Westmoreland deployed them to meet what seemed to be the principal 

enemy main force threats north of Saigon and in the Central Highlands. Not coincidentally, the other side long had viewed these areas as 

the decisive battlefi elds for large-unit combat and was building up its 

own main force regiments and divisions there. The two South Korean 

divisions and marine brigade occupied much of the coastal area of II 

Corps, protecting major ports and bases and controlling a portion of 

the agricultural region. In I Corps, III MAF deployed its two Marine divisions to protect what amounted to enclaves around Hue/Phu Bai, Da 

Nang, and Chu Lai. MACV initially left military operations and pacifi -

cation in the Mekong Delta of IV Corps to the South Vietnamese Army, 

deferring to the reluctance of both the U.S. Mission and the Saigon 

government to place large foreign troop contingents in that thickly 

populated region. However, late in 1966, General Westmoreland began 

experimental deployments of both infantry units and riverine forces 

to the delta, in hopes of breaking what appeared to be a military stalemate in those rice-rich provinces.19

As American units established their base camps and acclimated 

themselves to the South Vietnamese weather and terrain, they began 

attempting to seek out and destroy PLAF and PAVN units in increasingly wide-ranging search and destroy operations. In III Corps, the 1st and 

25th Infantry Divisions, working outward from Saigon, made their fi rst 

incursions into the large enemy war zones that menaced the capital. In 

II Corps, the 1st Cavalry Division spent much of 1966 trying to clear 

strong guerrilla and main force elements out of the important coastal 

province of Binh Dinh; in the highlands, the 4th Division and other 

American units battled PAVN regiments, which periodically moved in 

from Cambodian sanctuaries to threaten Kontum and Pleiku. The marines in I Corps attempted to join their three enclaves through clearing 

and securing operations while occasionally lashing out, at Westmoreland’s insistence, at enemy main forces. Increasingly, however, III MAF 

had to shift strength northward to drive back North Vietnamese divisions invading across the Demilitarized Zone, which rapidly became 

demilitarized in name only.20

In assessing the results of operations during 1966, General Westmoreland took an optimistic tone. He emphasized his command’s success 

in blocking enemy offensives through well-timed spoiling attacks. He 

claimed that the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese had suffered heavy 

Chap 12.indd 405 
406

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

losses in men and supplies and that the allies had made limited but rea

progress toward all of the pacifi cation goals set at Honolulu. Neverthe

less, he also had to admit that the enemy, in spite of his casualties, ha

increased his troop strength during the year. While battered in man

engagements, his large units remained intact and dangerous, while th

allies’ effort to root out the guerrillas was “just getting underway.” Th

enemy, Westmoreland told Wheeler and Sharp early in 1967, was “hu

. . . but he is far from defeated.”21

Overall, allied efforts to implement a combined attrition and pac

fi cation strategy had run into problems that would persist, in varyin

degree, for the duration of the war. The enemy’s main forces prove

more diffi cult to engage than American commanders had expected. A

advocate and practitioner of attrition as MACV J3 and then command

er of the 1st Infantry Division, General DePuy later admitted: “We h

more dry holes than I thought we were going to hit. They were mor

elusive. They controlled the battle better. They were the ones who usu

ally decided whether or not there would be a fi ght.” American offen

sives throughout 1966 and much of the following year were hampere

by inadequacies in the collection, distribution, and use of intelligenc

both in the fi eld and at MACV; by a shortage of helicopters for mobi

ity; by defi ciencies in communications security; and by an insuffi cien

number of infantry battalions. According to a later Defense Depar

ment analysis, MACV, with nearly half of its battalions normally tie

up in defensive missions, much of the time barely equaled the enem

in manpower available for mobile operations. American artillery an

air strikes became the equalizer in many engagements.22

While ineffi cient, the attrition campaign at the very least had hu

the enemy and effectively shut down whatever main force offensiv

operations he had planned. The allies’ pacifi cation effort, however, re

mained stalled, as the American mission struggled with issues of civi

military coordination and the Saigon government suppressed the 

Corps mutiny, drafted a constitution, held elections, and completed i

own “revolutionary development” organization. These actions laid e

sential foundations for the campaign to redeem the countryside, but i

themselves they reclaimed few villages and hamlets. After a late 196

visit to Saigon, Secretary McNamara concluded that “pacifi cation ha

if anything gone backward,” with enemy guerrilla forces, attacks, an

terrorism increasing and no visible allied progress in controlling ric

supplies, territory, and people.23

American air and ground combat operations created still anothe

obstacle to pacifi cation by infl icting a rising toll of civilian casualtie

property damage, and population displacement in rural South Vietnam

As early as August 1965, Westmoreland pointed out to General Wheele

that, while he planned to keep the fi ghting away from inhabited area

as much as possible, nevertheless the enemy often chose to defend fort

fi ed hamlets and other populated places. His forces would have to fi gh

Chap 12.indd 406 
407

An Evolving Strategy

the enemy where they found him. In addition, since the Viet Cong’s 

ultimate objective was “to control each and every hamlet in [South] 

Vietnam” and the allies’ objective was “to prevent this from happening, 

or where it has happened, to regain control,” inevitably the action was 

drawn “toward the people and the places where they live.”24

As American and North Vietnamese main forces fought with increasing frequency and as guerrilla and antiguerrilla activity intensifi ed, the 

toll of noncombatants caught in the crossfi re steadily mounted. Many 

of these casualties resulted from Communist terrorism, indiscriminate 

rocket and mortar shellings, and road minings; but allied operations 

also infl icted a major share of suffering and death. American and South 

Vietnamese artillery fi re and air strikes, necessary to defeat heavily 

armed guerrillas and main force units dug into populated areas, killed 

and injured noncombatants; there were as well occasional deliberate 

acts of murder and other crimes by American and allied soldiers. The 

war forced tens of thousands of peasants to move into refugee camps 

and urban shantytowns to escape bombing, shelling, and the extortion 

of recruits and supplies by both Vietnamese sides. In some instances, 

U.S. and South Vietnamese forces leveled villages and removed their 

inhabitants to deny food, intelligence, and concealment to the Viet 

Cong. The destruction of the Communist village stronghold of Ben 

Suc during Operation CEDAR FALLS, although militarily justifi able, received sensational critical coverage in the American news media. In 

the United States and around the world, the growing opposition to the 

Vietnam War publicized civilian death and suffering, and Communist 

propagandists kept up a barrage of atrocity charges.25

From the start of large-scale ground operations, MACV issued and 

attempted to enforce strict rules of engagement designed to minimize 

civilian casualties and property damage. The rules restricted fi ring in 

inhabited areas to positively identifi ed enemy targets and required that 

commanders obtain clearance from both American and South Vietnamese authorities before employing artillery and air strikes near towns, 

villages, and hamlets. General Westmoreland issued directives, incorporated into the orientation of arriving American troops and printed 

on pocket cards for each individual soldier, calling for humane treatment of prisoners and noncombatants. The standing operating procedures of MACV’s subordinate commands repeated the same principles. 

Given the constant rotation of personnel, lapses inevitably occurred in 

the enforcement of these rules, and commanders and troops had to be 

indoctrinated and reindoctrinated in their terms and importance. Even 

more thankless was Westmoreland’s task of persuading his South Vietnamese and Korean allies to abide by the American standards rather 

than their own harsh rules of war.26

Too often, the desperate circumstances of combat trumped the most 

carefully drawn rules and the best intentions. On 12 November 1965, 

at the hamlet of Bau Bang, for example, the 2d Battalion, 2d Infantry, 

Chap 12.indd 407 
408

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division fought off a determined attack by th

better part of two battalions of the Viet Cong 9th Division. A couple o

days before the battle, the American battalion had sent a civic actio

team into Bau Bang to distribute food, clothing, and CARE package

to the inhabitants. In the fi ght on the 12th, the Viet Cong used Ba

Bang as a staging point for assaults, placing their supporting morta

and recoilless rifl es in the hamlet itself. The Americans responded b

calling in artillery and air strikes with bombs and napalm. Around 15

Viet Cong fi ghters and 20 American soldiers died in the action. No on

counted how many people perished in Bau Bang. At the end of th

fi ght, the hamlet “lay barren, a smoldering, lifeless ruin.”27

The Communists met the American intervention with a counte

strategy of their own. After initial uncertainty in the face of the large

scale entry of U.S. troops into the war, an event they had not anticipa

ed, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong leaders determined to continu

and intensify both their main force and their guerrilla campaigns. On

of the senior commanders of COSVN, which controlled enemy forces i

the southern half of South Vietnam, General Tran Van Tra, recalled:

In 1965–1966, when the Americans were sending large numbers of troops into Sout

Vietnam, a number of comrades in charge of the city of Saigon directly asked me, “Th

Americans are bringing in large numbers of troops and strong weapons, and are chan

ing over to a limited war, so should we change our strategic line? Should we disper

our main force so that we can wage a protracted guerrilla war in order to defeat th

enemy?” I emphatically said no. I explained the passive, fi re-extinguishing role of th

Americans . . . and that we would not disperse . . . to fi ght as guerrillas but would org

nize many additional divisions . . . and advance to the formation of corps. There w

absolutely no question of changing the strategic line.28

True to the COSVN commander’s word, the North Vietnames

and Viet Cong continued to expand their armed forces by increa

ing both infi ltration from the north and recruiting in the south. B

the end of 1966, MACV estimated that enemy troops of all categorie

totaled more than 280,000; the command credited them with 9 div

sions, 34 regiments, and 186 combat and combat support battalion

many equipped with heavy mortars and 140-mm. and 122-mm. rock

ets as well as excellent Soviet- and Chinese-made infantry weapon

For practical purposes, the Communists’ buildup thus matched tha

of the Americans. For although the allies between 1965 and the en

of 1967 increased their manpower preponderance from a ratio of 3.

to 1 to 5.9 to 1, the crucial ratio in maneuver battalions rose onl

from 1.25 to 1 to 1.63 to 1, a fi gure that helps to explain the allie

limited ability to trap and destroy the enemy’s big units. The buildu

included as well the village guerrillas, district companies, and provin

cial battalions—the key forces combating pacifi cation. According t

General Weyand, the enemy’s local squads, platoons, and companie

in III Corps “en toto, equated to 45 [italics in original] battalions o

Chap 12.indd 408 
409

An Evolving Strategy

infantry,” over and above the 32 main force battalions in the corps 

area. Against such forces, the ARVN and territorials in many provinces 

simply lacked the strength to carry out their clearing and securing 

mission as prescribed in allied campaign plans.29

In a mirror image of Westmoreland’s strategy, the enemy leaders, 

realizing that they could not defeat American forces outright, sought 

every opportunity to infl ict casualties on U.S. units even at the cost 

of heavier casualties of their own. Such losses, they believed, would 

weaken the American people’s will to continue the struggle. Seeking to 

retain the military initiative against superior American mobility and 

fi repower, the PLAF and PAVN during 1966 disposed their regular units 

to achieve what the Military Assistance Command labeled “strategic 

mobility.” They concentrated large numbers of battalions at several different points at once, to compel the allies to disperse their reserves and 

to create opportunities for major attacks that would bring signifi cant 

military or psychological advantage. Thus the North Vietnamese repeatedly sent divisions through the Demilitarized Zone into northern I 

Corps and concentrated others nearby just above the DMZ and in Laos, 

compelling III MAF to shift most of the 3d Marine Division away from 

pacifi cation around Da Nang to defend Quang Tri and Thua Thien Provinces. They also concentrated other forces in Cambodia for periodic 

incursions into II and III Corps. While these incursions cost the North 

Vietnamese and Viet Cong dearly whenever they resulted in engageGeneral Westmoreland, center, tours III MAF headquarters. 

(Courtesy of the Vietnam Archive at Texas Tech University)

Chap 12.indd 409 
410

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

ments with American units, the Communist leaders appeared satisfi e

that by these tactics they were maintaining the strategic offensive.30

General Westmoreland understood the enemy strategy but coul

fi nd no solution to it beyond trying to engage the North Vietnames

and Viet Cong at every point. In a typical assessment, he declared i

October 1966: “The enemy has embarked on a war of attrition involv

ing protracted guerrilla warfare supported by large formations of con

ventional troops operating from base areas and sanctuaries in diffi cu

terrain and in neutral countries. . . . His purpose is to create a state o

mind in our troop units and at home that is characterized by insecurit

and futility. . . . He believes that his will and resolve are greater tha

ours. He expects that he will be the victor in a war of attrition in whic

our interest will eventually wane.” The allies could foil this strategy, h

concluded, only by resisting the enemy “throughout this spectrum o

warfare.”31

During 1966 Westmoreland became increasingly preoccupied wit

the enemy divisions massing in the DMZ and along South Vietnam

western border. He identifi ed “containment” of these forces as a thir

major military mission for the allies, along with pacifi cation support an

attacks on units and bases within South Vietnam. Allied forces would

in effect, have to meet the enemy regulars and bring them to battle a

soon as they crossed South Vietnam’s border. To do otherwise would b

to grant the enemy a psychological victory, increase his access to Sout

Vietnam’s people and resources, and allow him to infi ltrate main forc

elements into the coastal lowlands where they could assist the guerrilla

in disrupting pacifi cation. Strategic necessity, in Westmoreland’s view

was also tactical opportunity. When the enemy chose to fi ght in remot

areas, he exposed himself to the full weight of the allies’ air power an

artillery, facilitating the process of attrition. Allied forces’ air mobilit

Westmoreland insisted, permitted rapid concentrations against emerg

ing threats and equally rapid redeployments to the populated region

“I can see absolutely no psychological or military advantage,” he tol

General Wheeler, “to a strategy that would intentionally invite the wa

east toward the coast. It would be retrogressive, costly in casualties an

refugees, and almost certainly prolong the war.”32

Nevertheless, whatever the rationalizations Westmoreland migh

offer, MACV clearly was being forced to react to enemy maneuvers. A

General Krulak declared during an October 1966 Marine shift north

ward to the DMZ, “I am deeply concerned that the enemy has playe

the tune, and induced us to dance to it.” Early the following yea

Westmoreland himself acknowledged that the enemy had develope

“relatively well defi ned courses of action which he is still capable o

implementing, under most circumstances, at times and places of h

choice” and that allied concentrations against threats in some area

had resulted in “a draw down of forces in other areas and, concom

tantly, a degraded capability for decisive action in these areas.”33

Chap 12.indd 410 
411

An Evolving Strategy

To restore that capability while countering the Communists’ initiatives, required additional allied manpower. Hence, Westmoreland 

sought more American troops. His reinforcement requests and the political implications of meeting them led to prolonged internal debate 

within the Johnson administration, and to modifi cations in the conduct of the war. 

More Troops or a New Strategy?

Throughout 1966, American combat and support units streamed 

into South Vietnam under a reinforcement schedule worked out during the previous year. That schedule—which the Defense Department 

labeled Program Three—took fi nal form only in mid-April, after a prolonged wrangle between Secretary McNamara and the Joint Chiefs 

over whether or not to mobilize the reserves. Deployments under it, 

however, had begun during December 1965 and were to continue well 

into 1967. By the end of that year, the United States would have more 

than 437,000 troops, including seventy-nine maneuver battalions, in 

South Vietnam.34

Secretary McNamara had hardly approved the fi nal version of Program Three when Admiral Sharp initiated planning for its successor. 

Early in April 1966 the Pacifi c commander directed his subordinates, 

including General Westmoreland, to begin determining their force requirements for 1967. Sharp hoped to complete the complex process 

more quickly and with less confusion and disorder than had characterized the development of Program Three, soon enough in the year 

to give the military services the long lead times they would need to 

produce the additional forces. The headquarters promptly set to work, 

coordinating their efforts at a series of planning conferences in Saigon 

and Honolulu.35

On 18 June Admiral Sharp transmitted the results of this process 

to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. His request included both adjustments to 

Program Three and new forces for the following annual increment. It 

provided for rebuilding of Pacifi c Command’s theater reserves as well 

as for reinforcements for MACV. The additions for Vietnam, proposed 

by MACV and accepted by CINCPAC, were modest compared to the 

dramatic force expansions of the previous year. General Westmoreland 

asked for what he called a “rounding out” force consisting of eleven U.S. 

infantry, armored cavalry, and tank battalions; a fourth rifl e company 

for each Army infantry battalion already in Vietnam; fi ve additional 

tactical air squadrons; and numerous combat and logistical support 

units. When deployed, they would increase total American strength 

in South Vietnam to more than 542,500 personnel and 90 maneuver 

battalions. These reinforcements, Westmoreland and Sharp declared, 

were required to offset the enemy’s expected continuing buildup and 

to carry forward CINCPAC’s threefold war strategy of bombing in 

Chap 12.indd 411 
412

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

North Vietnam and attrition and pacifi cation in South Vietnam. Wes

moreland in addition requested that a “corps contingency force” o

three divisions remain in readiness in the United States for dispatch t

Southeast Asia in an emergency or if the administration decided on 

major expansion of operations, for example a drive into Laos to cut th

Ho Chi Minh Trail. That force, however, quickly disappeared from th

negotiations that ensued.36

In contrast to his attitude of the previous year, Secretary McNamar

subjected CINCPAC’s new reinforcement request, which became Pro

gram Four in Pentagon terminology, to close and skeptical scrutin

Infl uenced by the analyses of his civilian “whiz kids,” the defense sec

retary during the summer of 1966 was beginning to question the pro

pects for success of both ROLLING THUNDER and the American groun

war, and he had started to suspect that commitment of additional re

sources to those campaigns would bring little in the way of improve

results. A visit to Honolulu early in July did nothing to resolve h

doubts. As a result, when the Joint Chiefs formally presented Sharp

Program Four proposal to him on 5 August, McNamara responded wit

a request for a “detailed line-by-line analysis of these requirements” t

determine which were “truly essential to the carrying out of our wa

plan.” He admonished that “excessive deployments weaken our abilit

to win by undermining the economic structure of the RVN and by rai

ing doubts concerning the soundness of our planning.” To guide th

Joint Chiefs in their review, McNamara transmitted to them a series o

“issue papers” prepared by his staff that questioned the necessity fo

some 70,000 of the requested reinforcements.37

While the Joint Chiefs were conducting the analysis, prospectiv

economic diffi culties in South Vietnam and shortages of military re

sources in the United States emerged as obstacles to any further majo

reinforcement of MACV. In Saigon, Ambassador Lodge and his Eco

nomic Counselor, Roy Wehrle, became concerned that the expansio

of U.S. forces, by increasing local American piaster spending, woul

accelerate South Vietnam’s already severe infl ation, with potentiall

devastating social, political, and economic effects. At Lodge’s recom

mendation, Secretary McNamara set a ceiling in October of 42 billio

piasters on U.S. military expenditures in Vietnam during 1967. Genera

Westmoreland protested that under this ceiling it would be imposs

ble to complete the Program Three deployments, let alone those pro

posed for Program Four. In the end, the Military Assistance Command

helped by the completion of much of its base construction, was abl

to reduce its troops’ piaster spending per man to a level much below 

that assumed by the embassy, allowing further deployments withi

the ceiling. Nevertheless, the need to curb infl ation in South Vietnam 

hung over the Program Four debate; if nothing else, it provided an ad

ditional argument for offi cials who had other reasons for wanting t

limit further troop deployments.38

Chap 12.indd 412 
413

An Evolving Strategy

The Joint Chiefs of Staff drove what was perhaps the fi nal nail into 

the coffi n lid of Admiral Sharp’s Program Four on 7 October, when they 

presented the secretary of defense with an analysis of the effects Program Four would have on U.S. military posture worldwide. They concluded that, to meet Program Four’s requirements without dangerously 

weakening forces earmarked for NATO and other commitments, the 

services would have to call up more than 600,000 reservists, an action 

President Johnson considered politically out of the question. Program 

Four thus bumped up against what was later nicknamed the administration’s “Plimsoll Line” on reinforcements for Vietnam: the point at 

which sending more troops would necessitate a major reserve call-up.39

Informed early in August that his new reinforcement package was 

“in trouble in the Washington arena,” General Westmoreland prepared 

to reduce it. Throughout the spring and summer, the MACV commander received repeated warnings from General Johnson that the 

Army, due to lack of manpower and materiel, was straining to provide 

his Program Three forces on schedule as well as to replace losses in Vietnam among key personnel such as combat arms NCOs. He learned also 

that the Navy would have to stretch out the deployment of its riverine 

force in the Mekong Delta because of a McNamara-decreed cost reduction. All things considered, it seemed clear that, in the absence of a reserve call-up, the services could not furnish many additional units and 

might not be able adequately to support the force he already had. 40

Late in July, Westmoreland instructed his J3 to try to establish “a 

possible leveling off point for our forces which might take place after 

the fi rst of the year and involve no augmentation except for relatively 

small elements that would round out the force.” The resulting structure, Westmoreland directed, should be “well-balanced,” capable of 

“sustained combat,” and “able to be supported without calling the reserves.” Pursuing the same theme, early in September Westmoreland 

asked General Johnson for a specifi c estimate of “how much expansion 

in terms of supported maneuver battalions the Army believes it can 

sustain” without a reserve call-up and “without an undesirable deterioration in quality including morale.” In response, the Army chief of 

staff sent a team to Saigon to brief MACV on the Army’s likely situation 

in 1967. Westmoreland incorporated this information in additional 

guidance to his force planners.41

The MACV commander was thus forearmed when Secretary McNamara arrived in Saigon on 9 October to discuss additional forces for 

1967, among other issues, in the light of South Vietnam’s infl ation 

problem and the Joint Chiefs’ ominous posture statement. Westmoreland told the defense secretary that he agreed that the reserves should 

not be mobilized at that time. His headquarters, he said, was studying what size “level-off” force could be “sustained indefi nitely without great degradation in quality” by “our manpower and industrial 

bases.” He was convinced that “it is to be a long war and we should 

Chap 12.indd 413 
414

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

gear ourselves for it,” as opposed to continuing to “build forces whic

might be diffi cult to support indefi nitely, which would involve deg

radation in quality, and which would put increasing strains on th

piaster economy.” His “best estimate” put the sustainable force at be

tween 480,000 and 500,000 men. McNamara, Westmoreland reported

“agreed with this philosophy and stated he was thinking in the sam

terms. He seemed to be relieved that I had thought the matter throug

to this extent and had taken such a position.”42

With the fi eld commander on record as being able to live with 

ceiling on the force buildup, the decision to scale down Program Fou

was all but a foregone conclusion. Upon returning to Washington

McNamara on 14 October recommended that only enough troops b

added in Program Four to bring U.S. strength in South Vietnam to abou

470,000 men and 87 maneuver battalions by June 1968. Not coinciden

tally, this was the maximum force that offi cials then estimated could fi 

within the 42 billion piaster spending ceiling. About the same time, a

their fi nal CINCPAC deployment conference, Westmoreland and Shar

recommended a buildup to about 555,000 but at McNamara’s directio

also submitted three alternative smaller force packages based on vary

ing piaster spending ceilings. In conversations with Assistant Secretar

of Defense for International Security Affairs John McNaughton, Wes

moreland suggested that 480,000 men by the end of 1967, rounded ou

to 500,000 during the following year, would be acceptable and sustain

able. With the military commanders thus fl exible, President Johnso

early in November accepted McNamara’s recommendation for 470,00

troops by June 1968. McNamara then informed the Joint Chiefs tha

he approved those strength fi gures for Program Four.43

Secretary McNamara justifi ed his Program Four decision in term

that amounted to a major revision of his thinking about the war an

to a call for reexamination of the prospects and purposes of both th

air and ground campaigns. In his proposal of 14 October for a reduce

Program Four, and in a draft presidential memorandum on the sub

ject one month later, McNamara declared that he saw “no reasonabl

way to bring the war to an end soon.” Based on studies by civilia

consultants and intelligence analyses completed during the summe

he concluded that ROLLING THUNDER had not “signifi cantly affected in

fi ltration or cracked the morale of Hanoi” and was unlikely to do so

American ground forces in South Vietnam had infl icted heavy losse

on the enemy and eliminated any chance of his winning a militar

victory but had not broken his morale or driven his casualties abov

the level he could replace. At the same time, the enemy had adopte

“a strategy of keeping us busy and waiting us out (a strategy of attritin

our national will).” 

McNamara recommended to the president a five-point course o

action aimed at girding the United States “openly, for a longer war an

. . . taking actions immediately which will in 12 to 18 months give clea

Chap 12.indd 414 
415

An Evolving Strategy

evidence that the continuing costs and risks to the American people 

are acceptably limited, that the formula for success has been found, 

and that the end of the war is merely a matter of time”—a posture that 

might discourage the other side from “trying to ‘wait us out.’” He proposed to “stabilize” U.S. strength in South Vietnam at 470,000 men; 

install a ground barrier across the Demilitarized Zone and the Laotian 

panhandle to reduce North Vietnamese infi ltration (a possible substitute for ROLLING THUNDER); limit bombing of North Vietnam to existing 

sortie levels and targets; make a major effort to revive the South Vietnamese pacifi cation campaign; and press for negotiations with Hanoi, 

possibly using a complete or partial cessation of ROLLING THUNDER as a 

bargaining chip. McNamara expressed little hope for an early diplomatic breakthrough but argued that the United States, by implementing his military recommendations and especially by improving pacifi -

cation performance, could strengthen the allied position and in time 

perhaps bring the enemy to terms.44

McNamara’s proposal to level off and deemphasize ROLLING THUNDER set off an acrimonious debate between himself on one side and the 

Joint Chiefs, Admiral Sharp, and key members of Congress on the other, 

one that persisted throughout the remainder of his tenure at Defense. 

His suggestions on ground strategy, on the other hand, produced much 

less confrontation because they envisioned more a shift of emphasis 

and rationale than a radical change of missions and tactics. McNamara 

did not challenge—indeed he reaffi rmed—the assumption that U.S. 

ground forces in Vietnam should concentrate on attacking the enemy’s 

regular units, both to “punish” them and to prevent them from interfering with pacifi cation. But pacifi cation itself, essential though it was, 

had to be performed primarily by the South Vietnamese government 

and armed forces. “It is known that we do not intend to stay,” McNamara explained. “If our efforts worked at all, it would merely postpone 

the eventual confrontation of the VC and GVN infrastructures.”45

Having made those points, McNamara asserted nonetheless that 

the anti-main force campaign was reaching the point of diminishing 

returns. Using an input-output analysis of MACV’s statistics on enemy 

casualties and infi ltration, he concluded that adding more American 

troops would not increase enemy losses in proportion to the cost of 

the reinforcement to South Vietnam in accelerated infl ation and to 

the United States in additional casualties, government expenditures, 

and domestic political discontent. McNamara argued that instead of 

continuing in 1967 “to increase friendly forces as rapidly as possible, 

and without limit,” and to engage in large-scale operations “to destroy 

the main force VC/NVA units,” the United States should “follow a similarly aggressive strategy of ‘seek out and destroy,’ but . . . build friendly 

forces only to that level required to neutralize the large enemy units 

and prevent them from interfering with the pacifi cation program.” Not 

coincidentally, McNamara believed the required force level to be about 

Chap 12.indd 415 
416

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

470,000 Americans, plus the 52,000 Free World allied troops and “le

than half of the ARVN.” The rest of the South Vietnamese Army, plu

a “portion” of the U.S. force, “would give priority to improving th

pacifi cation effort.” McNamara thus proposed to stop the growth o

American troop strength in South Vietnam but not fundamentally t

alter General Westmoreland’s “two-fi sted” military operations and pac

ifi cation strategy, although by implication at least the defense secretar

sought to tie the former element more closely to the latter.46

The Joint Chiefs of Staff rejected McNamara’s concept of levelin

off the American effort, insisting that it would prolong the war an

possibly lead to allied defeat. Throughout the winter of 1966–196

they continued to advocate a steady increase of American pressure o

the enemy in both ROLLING THUNDER and the ground campaign. As pa

of this effort, in February General Wheeler in effect invited Westmo

reland to reopen the question of Program Four force levels, claimin

that President Johnson now was receptive to proposals for acceleratin

military operations. Reinforcing the case for reviving the issue, Admira

Sharp and General Westmoreland estimated that, as a result of econo

my measures, the piaster cost of the 470,000-man force would run we

under the 42 billion piaster ceiling. They thereby removed one argu

ment against expanding Program Four at least to the 550,000 men th

two commanders had initially recommended.47

On 18 March 1967, General Westmoreland formally raised the cu

tain on the second act of the reinforcement drama. He dispatched t

the Joint Chiefs, via Admiral Sharp, a request for additional troops ove

and above those in Program Four. In fact, he submitted two propo

als. The fi rst was an “optimum” reinforcement of 4 2/3 divisions (4

maneuver battalions), 10 tactical air squadrons, and a large riverin

force. The second was more modest: a “minimum” augmentation o

2 1/3 divisions (21 maneuver battalions), with 4 tactical air squadron

and a smaller riverine force. The optimum plan would add more tha

200,000 men to the 470,000 of Program Four, the minimum about ha

as many. In each case, Westmoreland wanted the additional deploy

ments completed by 1 July 1968.

Westmoreland provided extensive justifi cations for both proposal

He declared that he needed additional troops both to match continu

ing increases in North Vietnamese and Viet Cong strength and to ac

celerate the allied campaign against the enemy’s main forces and gue

rillas. He envisioned employing most of the reinforcements in I Corp

but his maximum proposal called for augmentation of the other corp

areas as well. Throughout his justifi cations, he talked in terms of speed

ing up allied success both in attrition and pacifi cation rather than o

avoiding defeat. On a public relations visit to Washington in April, h

estimated for President Johnson and Secretary McNamara that wit

the minimum force the war might last another three years, wherea

with the maximum force it might be ended in two.48

Chap 12.indd 416 
417

An Evolving Strategy

On 20 April the Joint Chiefs endorsed Westmoreland’s request for 

the minimum package, to be deployed by mid-1968, and indicated that 

they would make a recommendation later on the optimum force. The 

chiefs declared that the additional troops were needed to “offset” growing enemy strength at the DMZ and to “improve the environment” 

for pacifi cation in I and IV Corps. They also informed the secretary of 

defense that “considering our current worldwide commitments, a reserve call-up for a minimum of 24 months and involuntary extension 

of terms of service for twelve months” were “the only feasible means” 

of providing the minimum reinforcements within the desired period 

of time. Adding an additional discouraging note, they suggested that, 

to sustain the proposed force, it would be desirable to hold reserve 

units “for the duration of the emergency,” an action that would require congressional authorization as would involuntary extension of 

terms of service. These statements once again brought reinforcements 

for MACV up against the administration’s determination to avoid the 

domestic political trauma of a reserve call-up.49

The new reinforcement request, ultimately dubbed Program Five, 

set off another round of debate within the government. In general, 

most of the civilian participants, from the White House, the State and 

Defense Departments, and the CIA, opposed the military recommendation and advanced alternative strategies requiring few or no additional 

U.S. troops. Their arguments in the main paralleled those McNamara 

had made during the previous round: the need to halt the steady escalation of the human, economic, and material cost of the war to the 

United States; the diminishing returns of further reinforcing the main 

force campaign; the importance of improving South Vietnamese performance in pacifi cation; and the desirability of adopting a military 

posture that would enable the United States to sustain a prolonged war 

of attrition while at the same time seeking a negotiated settlement. The 

argument became entangled with the controversy over ROLLING THUNDER, as opponents of an additional ground force increase also lined up 

against any further escalation of the bombing of North Vietnam.50

In the main, as with McNamara the previous year, the civilian critics of Program Five agreed that the principal mission of U.S. forces 

must be to battle the enemy’s big units. They were reluctant to commit additional American troops to support of pacifi cation, partly, no 

doubt, because General Westmoreland and the Joint Chiefs were using 

this mission as one justifi cation for their reinforcement request. However, the civilians also appreciated that pacifi cation in the long term 

depended for success primarily on South Vietnamese political and social reform, not American military force. They doubted that American 

troops would remain in South Vietnam long enough, and in suffi cient 

numbers, to secure permanent control of the countryside. Preparing 

to take over the CORDS effort, Robert Komer observed late in April, “A 

major US force commitment to pacifi cation . . . basically changes the 

Chap 12.indd 417 
418

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

nature of our presence in Vietnam 

and might force us to stay indefi 

nitely in strength.” He suggeste

that “an all-out effort to get mor

for our money” from the Sout

Vietnamese forces promised bette

ultimate results. Alain Enthoven

head of the Defense Departmen

Systems Analysis Offi ce, conclud

ed that American antiguerrilla an

antiinfrastructure operations, suc

as those of the marines in I Corp

and the Army in Operation FAIR

FAX around Saigon, did nothin

more than temporarily deny con

trol of regions to the Viet Cong

“In the long term,” he declared

“the RVNAF must assume a greate

role for maintaining the secur

ty of SVN. The longer the task 

delayed, the more diffi cult it be

comes. We have made the Koreans into an effective fi ghting force, an

we must do the same for the RVNAF. They can do the job far better an

cheaper than we can, and they will remain after we leave.”51

Writing earlier in the year, General Taylor, then serving as a spe

cial consultant on Vietnam to President Johnson, summed up the cas

against employing U.S. ground forces extensively in “clear-and-hol

operations, static security missions, and local civil administration

Such tasks, he argued, were “inconsistent with the distinguishing a

tributes of our troops—mobility, fi re-power, and aptitude for the offen

sive.” Even so, Taylor expected that American soldiers probably woul

perform “quite well” in pacifi cation-related operations, to the point o

resolving “a lot of the short-term problems which are delaying prog

ress in pacifi cation.” However, this short-term progress would com

at the cost of creating “long-term problems resulting from substitu

ing American initiative and leadership in areas where the Vietnames

must eventually assume responsibility.” Finally, Taylor warned that a

open-ended commitment of American troops to pacifi cation suppo

would lead to repeated requests from General Westmoreland for mor

forces “which it may be hard to decline.” In conclusion, Taylor, lik

Enthoven, urged the president, in preference to enlarging America

troops’ role in pacifi cation, instead to “leave no stone unturned” i

expanding the South Vietnamese military contribution to the effort.5

As with Program Four, the availability of forces in the end dete

mined the size of Program Five. By mid-June, Admiral Sharp and Gen

eral Westmoreland had accepted that, with no reserve mobilization i

Dr. Enthoven (NARA)

Chap 12.indd 418 
419

An Evolving Strategy

prospect, the services could not provide the optimum force. Planning 

for a July visit of Secretary McNamara to Saigon, they prepared briefings arguing that the larger reinforcement would produce the most 

progress toward U.S. objectives while the minimum force would permit progress also, but more slowly. They agreed, however, not to present “too gloomy” an evaluation of the minimum force because it was 

the one they were likely to get. At the same time in Washington, after 

a detailed examination of military capabilities, Enthoven’s offi ce concluded that the services, without extending tours, calling the reserves, 

or diverting units earmarked for NATO, could provide the equivalent of 

three and two-thirds divisions for MACV by 31 December 1968—more 

than Westmoreland’s requested minimum reinforcement. McNamara 

carried this study with him when he departed for Saigon on 5 July for a 

defi nitive review of both Program Five and ROLLING THUNDER.

53

The stage thus was set for another compromise. During his stay 

in Saigon from 7 to 9 July, McNamara heard detailed briefi ngs from 

Sharp, Westmoreland, and their staffs making the case for further expansion of ROLLING THUNDER and reviewing the effects of the optimum 

and minimum troop reinforcement packages. The MACV J3 briefi ng 

on the reinforcements included the familiar discussions of enemy-tofriendly battalion ratios, the question whether the “cross-over point” 

at which enemy casualties exceeded replacements had been or would 

be reached, and projections of the effects of different American troop 

strengths on these and other statistics. In conclusion, the J3 declared 

that with the smaller reinforcement, the “war of attrition” would be 

a “long drawn out process” that would “postpone the time when US 

forces could redeploy from South Vietnam.”54

Even so, Westmoreland was prepared to settle for the lesser force. 

After dinner the fi nal evening of McNamara’s visit, the defense secretary 

and Generals Westmoreland and Abrams came to terms on an increase 

well within the three and two-thirds division ceiling, amounting to a 

bit over 50,000 more men and a fi nal force level of 525,000. To bring 

the maximum number of additional combat troops under this ceiling, 

McNamara and the generals agreed to replace as many as 14,400 military personnel in support units with civilian contractors.

After further negotiations with MACV, the Defense Department on 

14 August published the fi nal version of Program Five. It called for a 

total American strength in Vietnam of 525,000 troops by 30 June 1968 

and for adding 19 maneuver battalions and 5 tactical air squadrons 

to the forces prescribed in Program Four. General Westmoreland then 

set up a Force Development Section at MACV headquarters to refi ne 

the details of a “well-rounded” force within the ceiling that would accommodate the “minimum essential” numbers and types of tactical 

units. He also began negotiating for a speedup of deployments of all 

the forces scheduled for the rest of Program Four and Program Five, so 

as to have as many additional troops as possible in Vietnam before an 

Chap 12.indd 419 
420

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

expected Christmas truce that might delay the introduction of rein

forcements.55

The exchanges over Programs Four and Five between Secretary Mc

Namara and the military leaders never approached the level of conten

tiousness of the simultaneous argument over the air war against Nort

Vietnam. Westmoreland and the Defense Department civilians all ac

cepted the “two-fi sted” ground war strategy that combined a primaril

American campaign against the enemy main force with one of territo

rial pacifi cation waged by the South Vietnamese with American advic

and assistance. The civilians differed from MACV in doubting that th

big-unit war could injure the enemy enough to break his strength or h

will. Instead, they emphasized the campaign’s other major objective o

protecting the pacifi cation effort, which they insisted could be don

without additional forces. Both sides also implicitly acknowledged tha

the war, if fought within established territorial and operational limit

must be a prolonged attritional struggle. Indeed, McNamara’s avowe

aim in leveling off American strength was to ensure the ability of th

United States to last out such a contest. General Westmoreland wa

aware of the limits on what the services, especially the Army, coul

provide in the absence of a reserve mobilization, and he was willing t

accept a “level-off” force, but he pressed for a higher ceiling than McNa

mara initially favored. In the end, he and the defense secretary settle

on the strength the services could make available without breachin

the political barrier of mobilization. 

Incremental Adjustments

While they produced no radical changes in strategy, the reinforce

ment discussions nevertheless indicated that Westmoreland’s superio

desired several refi nements and incremental alterations in the conduc

of the war in South Vietnam. Ever sensitive to shifts in the policy con

sensus, Westmoreland adjusted his plans and operations accordingl

In particular, he placed greater emphasis on American forces’ role i

pacifi cation, attempted to build an antiinfi ltration barrier across th

Demilitarized Zone and the Laotian panhandle, tried to make more e

fi cient use of American manpower and materiel, and sought to stimu

late the South Vietnamese to take a more vigorous and prominent pa

in combat and population security.

Westmoreland’s attention to U.S. forces’ role in pacifi cation in

creased along with the likelihood of his being made responsible for th

effort and in response to Washington pressure. In December 1966, fo

example, General Wheeler informed Westmoreland that the admini

tration wanted to see new territorial security plans for South Vietnam 

incorporating both enhanced ARVN activity and “the participation o

US troop elements in the pacifi cation program to the degree whic

COMUSMACV believes desirable and feasible.”56

Chap 12.indd 420 
421

An Evolving Strategy

Beginning in late 1966, Westmoreland directed his fi eld commanders to give “maximum weight” to support of pacifi cation, both in their 

own operations and in their advice and assistance to the South Vietnamese. In their Combined Campaign Plan for 1967, besides reaffi rming the ARVN’s commitment to population security, MACV and the 

Joint General Staff declared that fi rst priority in operations against main 

forces and base areas should go to those that most directly threatened 

the pacifi cation zones. General Westmoreland directed his fi eld force 

commanders to keep their troops busy between major offensives at 

hunting down guerrillas and local forces in the vicinity of their bases. 

As a rule, he told them, “US forces should react to hard intelligence 

on NVA/main force units to destroy them and their base areas. If suitable hard intelligence is lacking, US forces should conduct continuous 

op[eration]s directed at destroying guerrillas and VC infrastructure.”57

The exact infl uence of these pronouncements on the allocation of 

American effort is diffi cult to determine with any precision. During 

1967 American forces, under urging from Westmoreland to “maintain 

the momentum of the offensive . . . on a seven-day-a-week, aroundthe-clock basis,” continued to attack enemy base areas and hunt for 

their big units in operations of increasing size and duration. Early in 

the year, MACV and II Field Force conducted the largest American ofArmored vehicles of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment advance northward 

during Operation JUNCTION CITY. (AP photo)

Chap 12.indd 421 
422

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fensives of the war thus far, Operations CEDAR FALLS and JUNCTION CIT

against the enemy’s Iron Triangle and War Zone C base areas north o

Saigon. Yet I and II Field Forces, unilaterally and in conjunction wit

the South Vietnamese, also committed units to security-related mi

sions, such as road clearing and protection of the rice harvest. The I

MAF, in spite of its diversion of troops to the DMZ, continued its Com

bined Action Program and other pacifi cation activities. When Arm

brigades deployed to southern I Corps under Task Force OREGON durin

the spring and summer, they operated both against guerrillas in th

coastal plain and against the nearby mountain base areas.58

General Westmoreland claimed later that over half of his troop

were employed against guerrillas and local forces during 1967. Othe

analysts believed that 25 to 30 percent was a more accurate estimat

The proportion varied with the season and the region of the coun

try. Further complicating analysis was the fact that about 50 percen

of American offensive operations were aimed at the enemy’s provin

cial and district military units rather than the regiments and division

controlled by COSVN and the other Communist regional command

Since the province and district units conducted most of the resistanc

to the government’s efforts to expand territorial security, and usuall

were more than the South Vietnamese Army could handle by itsel

any enemy losses infl icted benefi ted pacifi cation. General DePuy de

clared that advances in regaining the villages “in large measure can b

equated directly to the scope and pace of US/Free World Forces opera

tions against provincial VC forces contiguous to those areas in whic

Revolutionary Development activities are in progress.”59

During 1967 enemy actions to a great degree dictated the Militar

Assistance Command’s disposal of its forces. In particular, Genera

Westmoreland steadily shifted strength to counter expanding PAV

pressure on the two northern provinces of I Corps. Isolated from th

rest of South Vietnam by a mountain spur that runs down to the se

just above Da Nang, the region was within easy reach of the Nort

Vietnamese logistic bases in Laos and above the DMZ; and it containe

the old Vietnamese imperial city of Hue, an important political an

psychological objective. Hence, General Westmoreland always ha

considered it the most likely target of a North Vietnamese conven

tional military offensive, should the enemy decide to launch one. Afte

initial probes through the DMZ during 1966, the North Vietnames

in 1967 opened something like a regular war front in northern Quan

Tri province. They attacked the marines’ positions there, notably Kh

Sanh and Con Thien, not only with infantry and the usual rocket an

mortar barrages but also with heavy artillery emplaced in North Vie

nam just beyond the demarcation line.60

In response Westmoreland augmented the forces under III MAF. Fo

lowing a MACV contingency plan, in April 1967 he stripped brigade

from I and II Field Forces to create a provisional Army division, initiall

Chap 12.indd 422 
423

An Evolving Strategy

designated Task Force OREGON and later renamed the Americal Division, for operations in the two southernmost provinces of I Corps. The 

III MAF then shifted its 1st Marine Division to the Da Nang area while 

the 3d Marine Division committed all its troops to the DMZ battle. 

During the summer and autumn, Westmoreland became increasingly 

convinced that the decisive engagement of the war was imminent in 

northern I Corps and made plans and preparations for further strengthening of the region. He arranged for expansion of ports and logistical 

facilities in the area and by the end of the year was preparing to move 

the bulk of the 1st Cavalry Division northward from II Corps to reinforce the marines. Even before transferring the air cavalry, MACV by 

the end of 1967 had committed 42 percent of its U.S. maneuver battalions to the northernmost corps area.61

Westmoreland’s reinforcement of I Corps, and the intensifying 

combat south of the DMZ, were closely related to MACV’s effort to establish an antiinfi ltration barrier running across northern South Vietnam and the Laotian panhandle, an operation virtually dictated by the 

secretary of defense. Early in 1966 McNamara and his civilian advisers 

began exploring the concept of a barrier made up of mine and sensor 

fi elds supported by air and perhaps ground forces as an alternative to 

ROLLING THUNDER for reducing enemy vehicle and foot movement from 

North to South Vietnam. During the summer, an authoritative panel of 

government scientifi c consultants, set up by the Institute for Defense 

Analyses to review the entire northern bombing campaign, concluded 

that ROLLING THUNDER had done little or nothing to stop infi ltration 

and recommended a high-technology barrier as an alternative. Infl uenced by a well-founded suspicion that McNamara favored the project 

as a way out of ROLLING THUNDER, Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs 

expressed deep reservations about the feasibility and effectiveness of 

such a barrier. They warned that its creation and operation would divert American forces from other missions the Joint Chiefs considered 

more worthwhile. 

Nevertheless, McNamara, his earlier interest strengthened by the 

summer study, went ahead with the project. In September he established a special Defense Department joint task force with the cover 

designation of Defense Communications Planning Group (DCPG), to 

oversee design and construction of the barrier. Indicating the importance he attached to the project, McNamara instructed its director, Lt. 

Gen. Alfred D. Starbird, to report directly to him and authorized Starbird to deal as necessary with the Joint Chiefs, the military services, 

and “subordinate organizations,” including MACV.62

Agreeing with his military superiors, Westmoreland approached 

the barrier plan with much skepticism. In his initial response to McNamara’s proposal, the general warned that the technologies on which 

the barrier was based were untried and that the project would divert 

MACV’s resources from other endeavors, including existing, effective 

Chap 12.indd 423 
424

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

mobile operations below the DMZ and the various anti-infi ltration ac

tivities in Laos. Above all, he sought to avoid having a detailed opera

tional and tactical plan imposed upon him from Washington. He tol

General Starbird early in November that the barrier plan should b

carried out “in such fashion as to preserve the commander’s freedom o

action and avoid jeopardizing other essential operational and logist

undertakings.” As commander on the ground, Westmoreland shoul

set the pace of development “based on his continuing assessment o

the overall situation and [the] availability of resources.”63

Westmoreland nevertheless realized that McNamara was dete

mined to have a barrier. In prolonged discussions with Starbird an

McNamara, he worked to modify the plans for both South Vietnam 

MAP 7











1

1

9

9

9

CON THIEN

GIO LINH

ALPHA 3

PLANNED TRACE

ALPHA 4

ALPHA 2

CHARLIE 2A

CHARLIE 2

CHARLIE 1

ALPHA 1

DONG HA

COMBAT BASE CAM LO

CHARLIE 3A

CHARLIE 3

CHARLIE 

CUA VIET

QUANG TRI

COMBAT BASE

CAMP CARROLL

CA LU

KHE SANH

COMBAT BASE

ROCKPILE

DEMILITARIZED ZONE

PROVISIONAL MILITARY

DEMARCATION LINE

Song Ben Hai

SOUTH VIETNAM

LAOS

Trung Luong

Dong Ha

Cam Lo

Trieu Phong

Quang Tri

Lang La Vang Ta

Ba Long

Huong Hoa

Khe Sanh

0

0

5 10 Miles

5 10 Kilometers

STRONG POINT OBSTACLE SYSTEM

Base

1967

ELEVATION IN METERS

0 500 1000 1500 and Above

Chap 12.indd 424 
425

An Evolving Strategy

and Laos so as to integrate them into his existing operations and to 

minimize the project’s diversion of MACV forces and materiel. For the 

portion of the system within South Vietnam, he put his own staff and 

those of III MAF and the 3d Marine Division to work on a plan for a 

conventional barrier of cleared strips, barbed-wire obstacles, and minefi elds, backed by battalion-size outposts and artillery fi re bases. This system, requiring in its fi nal form the equivalent of two regiments—one 

American and one South Vietnamese—as permanent garrison, could 

detect, delay, and channel North Vietnamese invading forces, facilitating their destruction by mobile reserves which could move in and out 

of the DMZ region as required. Early in 1967 after months of discussion, 

McNamara essentially accepted Westmoreland’s plan for the barrier in 

South Vietnam. He retained the air-supported sensor system for the 

element in Laos, modifi ed to integrate it with PRAIRIE FIRE, TIGER HOUND, 

and other existing activities. However, the MACV commander was less 

successful in reducing the barrier’s demands on his theater resources. 

Although he incorporated troops for the barrier in his minimum Program Five request, he was forced to employ existing forces, particularly 

those of III MAF, to build and man the system.64 (Map 7)

During late spring of 1967, work began on the barrier, which was 

initially code-named PRACTICE NINE. Under the oversight of General 

Starbird’s task force, MACV managed both programs but with a different command arrangement for each. The III Marine Amphibious Force 

completed the detailed planning for DYE MARKER, the segment within 

South Vietnam, and the 3d Marine Division carried out construction.65

Westmoreland delegated emplacement and operation of the Laotian 

barrier, called MUSCLE SHOALS, to General Momyer, the Seventh Air 

Force commander, who already directed the air effort against the Ho 

Chi Minh Trail. Under Momyer, a Seventh Air Force task force headed 

by an Air Force brigadier general oversaw the emplacement of the sensors by aircraft and ground reconnaissance teams and the operation of 

the surveillance center in Thailand, which requested air strikes on the 

basis of sensor readouts. In setting up MUSCLE SHOALS, which required 

cooperation from both the Laotian and Thai governments and which 

had to be fi tted into the extensive but publicly unacknowledged war in 

Laos, Westmoreland and Ambassadors Sullivan and Martin established 

a coordinating committee for the project. Sullivan attached an offi cer 

from his staff to MACV for MUSCLE SHOALS planning. To tie both halves 

of the project together, Westmoreland established a small MACV staff 

element under an Army brigadier general, with personnel furnished by 

the Defense Communications Planning Group.66

The MUSCLE SHOALS sensor fi elds in Laos went into operation in midDecember 1967, but the strong point-obstacle system fell far short of 

the 1 November completion date that McNamara set for it. From the 

start, the commanders of III MAF and the 3d Marine Division questioned the tactical soundness of establishing fi xed defenses below the 

Chap 12.indd 425 
426

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

DMZ, which would tie up infantry and engineers badly needed else

where. Supported by the entire Marine Corps chain of command, the

preferred to rely on rapid temporary deployments from other areas t

repel major enemy incursions. During the summer, the marines strug

gled to build the barrier in the midst of constant infantry and arti

lery battles with the North Vietnamese. In September, as casualties an

equipment losses mounted and the northeast monsoon rains began

the III MAF urgently requested reduction in the scope of the projec

In response, Westmoreland authorized the marines to abandon the e

fort to bulldoze a cleared strip along the border and to concentrate o

completion of selected strongpoints and artillery positions. The year

effort ended with MACV complaining about the quality of the ma

rines’ construction work and Marine commanders denouncing the ba

rier as ill-conceived and unfeasible. Although General Westmorelan

continued to press the barrier project into the new year, it was obviou

by the end of 1967 that III MAF’s part of the system, at least, had serve

mainly to fi x many marines in exposed positions and to add one mor

irritant to the already contentious relationship between MACV and th

Marine command.67

As the Military Assistance Command’s demands for reinforcemen

increased, its operating effi ciency came under close scrutiny in the De

fense Department, especially by McNamara’s Offi ce of Systems Analy

sis. Among other things, analysts called into question the high propo

tion of support to combat troops in U.S. Army, Vietnam, noting tha

51 percent of USARV’s May 1967 Program Four strength of 322,00

offi cers and enlisted men were in combat and combat support unit

with only 20 percent, or 66,000, in maneuver battalions. General Wes

moreland and his USARV deputy responded that MACV as a whol

with about 45 percent of its troops in support units, was maintainin

a combat-to-support ratio equal to that of American forces in Worl

War II and Korea; that American support personnel in Vietnam such a

engineers and artillerymen regularly exchanged fi re with the enemy i

this war without fronts; and that MACV furnished extensive comba

and logistical assistance to South Vietnamese and Free World allie

Those rejoinders notwithstanding, McNamara wanted to pare dow

Westmoreland’s troop requests; thus he repeatedly pressed the genera

to transfer noncombat functions to civilian contractors whenever po

sible. Westmoreland kept his command’s force structure under con

stant review, promising to eliminate unnecessary rear-area elements; i

fact he discovered few that he considered unnecessary.68

To save on resources and improve his command’s image of mana

gerial effi ciency, during the autumn Westmoreland instituted a com

mand-wide drive for increased economy in all aspects of operation

Dubbed Project MACONOMY, the program had as its objective “to de

velop a well balanced, hard hitting and effi cient military force whic

can be sustained at a minimum cost for an indefi nite period” throug

Chap 12.indd 426 
427

An Evolving Strategy

vigorous management and attention to “cost effectiveness” by every 

element of the Military Assistance Command. Service components 

were to report monthly on the savings achieved. The reductions the 

commands reported were small in relation to the steadily increasing 

overall costs of the war, but the project did help reassure the Defense 

Department that the command was trying to conserve resources and 

probably enhanced Secretary McNamara’s regard for Westmoreland’s 

management skills.69

As American offi cials grew concerned about the war’s drain on U.S. 

resources, they sought ways of expanding the share of the military burden borne by the South Vietnamese. As early as the discussion of the 

44-battalion deployment, Admiral Sharp told General Wheeler that in 

addition to sending American soldiers, “we must do something positive to regenerate the ARVN as an effective force in the pacifi cation of 

the country.” In the months that followed, as American forces in South 

Vietnam expanded and casualty lists lengthened, President Johnson 

and his advisers reiterated the same theme during every discussion of 

the Military Assistance Command’s reinforcement requests. During 

the deliberations over Program Five, General Wheeler asked Westmoreland on behalf of the president and secretary of defense whether “additional Vietnamese manpower could be recruited . . . thereby reducing 

the need for U.S. troops.” He declared that “the subject of utilization 

of more Vietnamese troops rather than additional U.S. troops is very 

much in the forefront of people’s minds here in Washington.”70

General Westmoreland responded to his superiors’ demands for additional measures to restore the South Vietnamese to the forefront of 

the action. As a fi rst step, in conjunction with his assumption of responsibility for pacifi cation, he attempted to strengthen the ARVN’s 

role in territorial security, a project endorsed by McNamara, the U.S. 

Mission in Saigon, and South Vietnamese leaders. In August 1966 he 

told his fi eld commanders that the South Vietnamese Army must “get 

more into the pacifi cation business—do more securing, with perhaps 

less punching.” American troop commanders and advisers “must help 

by teaching them saturation patrolling and proper area defense.” He 

inserted in the 1967 Combined Campaign Plan a reiteration that pacifi -

cation support was the primary, though not the only, mission of South 

Vietnam’s regular forces. To a great extent Westmoreland was simply 

placing more formal emphasis on what was already a fact. Most South 

Vietnamese units rarely operated very far from populated areas, and 

the division of labor between the allies had been assumed throughout 

the American buildup. As he himself acknowledged, the MACV commander essentially was trying to resuscitate the CHIEN THANG plan of 

1964, which had called for long-term commitment of ARVN battalions to clearing and securing particular areas. This plan, Westmoreland 

declared, had collapsed under attack by the enemy’s expanding main 

forces. With U.S. and allied troops forming a shield against the big 

Chap 12.indd 427 
428

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

units, it was time to revive it.71

During 1967 the South Vietnamese kept 50 to 60 of their 158 in

fantry battalions committed to security missions in coordination wit

provincial authorities. In support, the MACV advisers and special mo

bile training teams began systematically to instruct South Vietnam

ese units in the necessary tactical skills and to try to instill in them 

a concern for civic action and protection of the peasantry. In severa

areas, notably around Saigon in Operation FAIRFAX, American battalion

worked with South Vietnamese units in combined territorial securit

campaigns, hoping to improve their allies’ performance by example a

well as precept.72

Besides attempting to revive in both word and deed the ARVN

commitment to pacifi cation, General Westmoreland during late 196

publicly broached the idea, for the fi rst time since the American build

up began, of turning back to the South Vietnamese the conduct of th

entire war. The concept was hardly new. American offi cials since Joh

F. Kennedy’s time had regularly proclaimed that the confl ict was ult

mately South Vietnam’s to win or lose. Withdrawal also had appeare

in military contingency planning. As early as September 1965 Westmo

reland had directed his J5 to “begin studying how we might procee

to phase down our military effort in Vietnam.” In July of the followin

year, MACV had made a study of the military implications of a negot

ated termination or suspension of hostilities. In December 1966 Adm

ral Sharp had likewise directed MACV and other Pacifi c commands t

develop contingency plans for redeploying forces from South Vietnam 

within six months of a cease-fi re.73

These discussions expanded during 1967 to include the possibi

ity of turning over the war, at least partially, to the South Vietnames

while hostilities still continued. In a June review of Vietnam strategy

the State Department Policy Planning Council recommended that “re

sponsibility for the conduct of the war . . . be progressively turned ove

to the GVN as it develops the requisite competence” with American ad

vice and assistance “on a priority basis.” In November, General Whee

er informed Westmoreland that “high interest” existed in Washingto

in modernization of the South Vietnamese forces and in ways to mak

them “bear visibly a greater share of the load of combat operations

With additional American reinforcements in doubt, Wheeler added

RVNAF improvement was “one of the few remaining areas in which . 

signifi cant increases in effectiveness and capabilities are possible.” Th

question, he said, took on added importance “with the possibility o

some kind of cease fi re or negotiations hanging over our heads.”74

General Westmoreland echoed and amplifi ed this emerging tenden

cy in American policy. As early as September, he suggested to Admira

Sharp that “by the 1969–70 time frame I now anticipate that the mai

force will be suffi ciently under control to permit the withdrawal of pa

of the [third country allied units] if this should become necessary

Chap 12.indd 428 
429

An Evolving Strategy

He included South Vietnamese units in a proposed operation in the 

Demilitarized Zone and secured the deployment of a regiment of the 

1st ARVN Division to garrison portions of the DYE MARKER strongpointobstacle system. Responding to General Wheeler’s interest in RVNAF 

improvement, Westmoreland provided the chairman with a quickly 

drawn MACV plan that incorporated mostly existing and previously 

proposed measures for strengthening the South Vietnamese forces before a cease-fi re.75

Finally, during a speech to the National Press Club in Washington 

on 21 November, Westmoreland made public the outlines of what later 

would be called Vietnamization. He told the assembled newspeople 

that as the military situation improved and the Saigon government 

became stronger, “it is conceivable to me that within two years or less, 

it will be possible for us to phase down our level of commitment and 

turn more of the burden of the war over to the Vietnamese Armed 

Forces, who are improving and who, I believe, will be prepared to assume this greater burden.” During questioning he added that American 

troop withdrawals would be “token” at fi rst but that “we’re preparing 

our plans to make it progressive.”76

Westmoreland tried to give his proposal some practical reality. After 

returning to Saigon early in December, he directed the MACV J5, in 

coordination with other staff agencies, to prepare a two-year plan for 

weakening the enemy, strengthening the South Vietnamese government, and improving the RVNAF. The main thrust would be an “orderly GVN take-over and US phasedowns in as many functional areas 

as possible.” At the same time, he told his generals at one of his regular 

commanders’ conferences that building up the South Vietnamese forces was now a “co-equal” objective with “grinding down the enemy” so 

that Saigon’s army “will be able to carry more and more of its share of 

the load and at some future date allow us to reduce our effort here.” 

General Abrams emphasized at the same meeting that RVNAF improvement was “everybody’s job” and urged the commanders to conduct 

more combined operations with the South Vietnamese.77

As of the end of 1967, however, the accelerated drive for RVNAF improvement existed largely in plans and rhetoric rather than in fact. During 

the two years of the American buildup, MACV had pressed ahead with 

programs for modest expansion and rounding out of the South Vietnamese regular establishment and with more ambitious efforts to enlarge the 

Regional and Popular Forces. It had also continued trying to improve 

South Vietnamese combat effectiveness, logistics, military administration, 

and troop welfare. MACV reports from both headquarters and fi eld advisory teams regularly recounted modest progress in these endeavors. Yet the 

major defi ciencies of the South Vietnamese armed forces—poor leadership 

by a corrupt and politicized offi cer corps, uneven combat performance, 

neglect of training, and a crippling drain of manpower through desertion—persisted. MACV’s campaign to get the South Vietnamese Army 

Chap 12.indd 429 
430

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

back into territorial security, for example, produced only meager in

tial results. Many ARVN leaders did not understand the mission an

considered it demeaning, and disputes between division commande

and province chiefs over control of battalions engaged in pacifi cation

among other problems, hindered operations. Most of the units com

mitted to the campaign thus did nothing but defend static position

Only a small percentage of their offensive operations resulted in con

tact with the enemy.

The American buildup itself contributed to this unhappy state o

affairs. With U.S. troops pouring into their country in overwhelmin

numbers, the South Vietnamese perhaps inevitably responded, in th

words of General Rosson, “by relaxing to some extent in their own e

forts.” At the same time, the MACV advisory program, lacking as it did 

strong organizational focus within the headquarters, took second plac

to the needs of the growing American combat forces in commander

attention and in the allocation of American leadership talent. In spit

of efforts by Generals Johnson and Westmoreland to keep high-calibe

offi cers in advisory positions and to offer “command credit” for suc

tours, the quality and morale of advisers suffered. Much the same stor

applied to materiel assistance. Due to production delays and priorit

for American units, for instance, issues of the M16 rifl e to the Sout

Vietnamese Army began only in late 1967—a damaging delay, con

sidering that the army’s effectiveness in its territorial security missio

depended on small-scale actions in which basic infantry weapons pre

dominated.78

At this stage, then, Westmoreland’s increased attention to prepa

ing the RVNAF to assume the main burden of the war was essen

tially a promise for the future. He publicly had committed himse

and his command to that course, however, and in doing so had agai

responded to the shifting interests and concerns of his civilian an

military superiors.

Chap 12.indd 430 
431

An Evolving Strategy

Notes

1 Herring, “‘Cold Blood,’” discusses the vagaries of Johnson’s strategy-making, as 

does Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 182–92. 2 On slowness of buildup, see Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 153–54; Paper, 

Joel Meyerson, “Logistics in the Buildup,” 1989, CMH fi les; Msg, Westmoreland HWA 

2419 to Wheeler, 16 Aug 66, tab C–2, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), 

CMH. On the South Vietnamese, see Memo, Chester L. Cooper for Walt Rostow, 8 Apr 

66, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, box 1, LBJL; Palmer Interv, 1975, pp. 228–29, 

232–33. Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0006 to Sharp, 1 Jan 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH. 3 For an account of similar decentralization in an earlier American antiguerrilla war, 

see Brian M. Linn, The U.S. Army and Counterinsurgency in the Philippine War, 1899–1902 

(Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1989), pp. xi–xii and 163–70. 4 For earlier RVNAF plans, see Chapters 4 and 6, of this volume. RVNAF JGS Dir 

AB 139, 25 Dec 64, and AB 140, 15 Dec 65; MACV, Concept of Operations in the 

Republic of Vietnam, 1 Sep 65. All in CMH. MACV Command History, 1965, pp. 

137–40. 5 Quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 29 Dec 65, tab B, Westmoreland Hist 

File 3 (20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. For other comments on same theme, see his Hist 

Notes, 29 Nov 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65) and 25 Mar 67, tab 

C, Westmoreland Hist File 13 (27 Jan–25 Mar 67), CMH. Alternative strategies: Westmoreland Hist Notes, 5 and 21 Jan 66, tabs C and E, Westmoreland Hist File 3 (20 Dec 

65–29 Jan 66), CMH. MACV Command History, 1966, p. 753; Westmoreland, A Soldier 

Reports, p. 153. 6 The continued interest in pacifi cation is summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, 

sec. 4.C.8, pp. 8–27, 74–87. Sharp, “Reminiscences,” pp. 286–87. Rpt, Ofc of the DCofS 

for Mil Ops, DA, Mar 66, sub: A Program for the Pacifi cation and Long-Term Development of South Vietnam, copy in CMH; quote is from Summary Rpt, p. 1. 7 Quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 3710–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 4 Oct 65, 

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. See also Msg, Wheeler JCS 3499–65 to 

Sharp, 21 Sep 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 65. The Honolulu conference 

and the military goals set there are discussed in Chapter 7 of this volume. Goals are 

summarized in “1966 Program to Increase the Effectiveness of Military Operations and 

Anticipated Results Thereof,” 8 Feb 66, tab A–6, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–1 

Mar 66), CMH. 8 Quotes are from AB 142, JGS/MACV Combined Campaign Plan 1967, 7 Nov 66, 

p. 5, copy in CMH. This discussion is based also on AB 141, Campaign Plan for Military 

Operations in the Republic of Vietnam—1966, Dec 65; and AB 143, Combined Campaign Plan 1968, 11 Nov 67. Both in CMH fi les. 9 AB 142, JGS/MACV Combined Campaign Plan 1967, 11 Nov 66, pp. 4 and 6, 

CMH. Westmoreland alludes to requirements for American operations in populated 

areas in Msg MAC 4382 to Wheeler, 28 Aug 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 

65, CMH. 10 Quotes are from Larsen Interv, 6 Dec 68, sec. 5, pp. 22–23, and Larsen Debrief, 

31 Jul 67, p. 1; see also pp. 2, 15–16, 19–20. MFR, Collins, 6 Nov 65, sub: Conference 

at Nha Trang on 24 Oct 65, tab H–5; MACV Dir 525–4, 17 Sep 65, sub: Tactics and 

Techniques for Employment of US Forces in the Republic of Vietnam, tab 7; Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65); MFR, Jones, 10 Mar 66, sub: MACV Commanders’ 

Conference, 20 Feb 66, tab C–1, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66). All in 

CMH.

Chap 12.indd 431 
432

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

11 Memo, McNamara for the President, 20 Jul 65, sub: Recommendations of A

ditional Deployments to Vietnam, in NSC History, Major Forces, box 43. U.S.–Vietna

Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 1–6, 16–17; Sharp Interv, 19 Feb 71, p. 18, AFCHO. Study, DA

n.d., “Pacifi cation and Long Term Development,” pp. 5, 23–24. MFR, DePuy, 24 Jul 6

sub: Conversation with Generals Thang and Phong, 23 July 1965, DePuy Papers, MH

and Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5184 to Walt, 17 Oct 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. Standard justifi cations by Westmoreland are in A Soldier Report

pp. 146–47; and MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 28 Jan 73. 12 This view receives systematic expression in Suplizio, “Military Support of Pac

fi cation.” For other expressions of this viewpoint, see Memo, Gen Throckmorton f

Taylor, 24 Oct 64, sub: HOP TAC Evaluation, tab 20, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (9 Oct–1

Nov 64); Westmoreland, Remarks for Honolulu Conf, 7 Feb 66, tab A–5, Westmor

land Hist File 4 (30 Jan–13 Mar 66), CMH. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 18 Jun

73; Seaman, “Elements of Command,” pt. 1, p. 28; and Larsen Debrief, 31 Jul 67, p

5–7. Youngdale quote is from Interv, 5 Jun 65, p. 17; he made these comments in Jun

1965.13 Lodge expresses his view in Memo for the President, 20 Jul 65, in NSC Histor

Major Forces, box 43; and Westmoreland Hist Notes, 11 Nov 66, tab B, Westmorelan

Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH. Taylor’s views are summarized in Msg, Wheel

JCS 4500–65 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 20 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oc

31 Dec 65, CMH. 14 Development of the Marine strategy and reasoning behind it are summarize

in Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, pp. 115–16, and 133–46; an

Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 1966, pp. 11–14. See also Msg, Walt to Westmorelan

19 Nov 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. 15 Quote is from Ltr, Westmoreland to CG III MAF, 15 Nov 65, sub: Operations in 

Corps, tab D–6, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65), CMH; also, Ltr, Westm

reland to CG III MAF, sub: Letter of Instruction (LOI–4), 21 Nov 65, tab E–1 in same fi l

Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 Oct 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 Oct 65

and 8 Dec 65, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct–20 Dec 65). Msg, Wheeler JCS 4552–6

to Westmoreland, 23 Nov 65; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 65, CMH. MF

Gen C. W. Abrams, 25 Sep 65, 27 Sep 65, sub: JCS Meeting with Amb Johnson, Clo

Hold File 3; Gen H. K. Johnson, “Noteworthy Viewpoints Encountered and Observ

tions Made on VN Trip,” box 5B. Both in Johnson Papers, MHI. 16 First quote is from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.8, p. 18. Krulak emphasiz

balanced approach in Ltrs to McNamara, 9 May 66, and to Nitze, 17 Jul 66; he a

knowledges corps area differences in Ltr to McNamara, 11 Nov 65. All in box 2, Krula

Papers, MCHC. 17 Westmoreland makes a typical statement of his “two-fi sted” strategy in MF

Jones, 3 Oct 66 sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 28 Aug 66, tab D–4, Westmor

land Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), CMH; in same fi le, see Hist Notes, 10 Aug 66, tab 

Westmoreland also stresses pacifi cation support in MFR, Jones, 10 Mar 66, sub: MAC

Commanders’ Conference, 20 Feb 66, tab C–1, Westmoreland Hist File 4 (30 Jan–1

Mar 66), CMH. Quote is from Chaisson Oral History, pp. 222–23, MCHC. 18 Lt Gen Frederick C. Weyand, Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Rpt, 15 Jul 68, pp. 3–

CMH. 19 Deployments and their rationale are summarized conveniently in Sharp an

Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 98–99 and 127–28; and Westmoreland, A Soldier R

ports, pp. 124, 162–63. For typical considerations, see Msg, Westmoreland MAC 145

to Wheeler, 20 Feb 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 66, CMH. Mekong Delt

Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 19 Feb 66 and 13 Dec 66; Westmoreland MAC 8211 

Chap 12.indd 432 
433

An Evolving Strategy

Sharp, 20 Sep 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, Feb–Dec 66, CMH; MFR, Westmoreland, 10 

Jun 66, sub: Meeting with Gen Vien . . ., 7 Jun 66, tab B–2, Westmoreland Hist File 7 

(29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. 20 Convenient summaries of operations are in Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on 

War, pp. 113–14, 123–29; and U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6, pp. 46–48. Army operations during this period are covered in John M. Carland, Stemming the Tide: Combat 

Operations, March 1965–September 1966, United States Army in Vietnam (Washington, 

D.C.: Center of Military History, 2000); and George L. MacGarrigle, Taking the Offensive: Combat Operations, October 1966–October 1967, United States Army in Vietnam 

(Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1998). Marine campaigns are described 

in Shulimson and Johnson, Marines in Vietnam, 1965, and Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 1966. 21 Quotes are from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1658 to Sharp and Wheeler, 17 Feb 

67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. In same fi les, see Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 8371 and MAC 10204 to Sharp, 24 Sep 66, and 22 Nov 66, for typical 

claims of success. Statistics on advancement toward Honolulu goals during 1966 are 

summarized in MFR, Chaisson, 9 Feb 67, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 22 Jan 

67, tab D–11, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH. 22 Quote is from DePuy, Changing an Army, p. 160; see also p. 161. Larsen Debrief, 

31 Jul 67, pp. 1, 4; Seaman Interv, p. 40; and Palmer Interv, pp. 256–57, in MHI fi les, 

all describe combat intelligence defi ciencies. Helicopter shortage: Msg, Westmoreland 

MAC 1658 to Sharp and Wheeler, 17 Feb 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, 

CMH. Security: CINCPAC Operations Security Briefi ng, attached to Memo, Maj Gen 

K. G. Wickham for DA Distribution, 3 Jul 68, sub: Operations Security Briefi ng, CMH. 

Troop numbers: Thayer, “War without Fronts,” pp. 837–39. 23 The allies’ struggle to organize for pacifi cation is recounted in Chapter 9 of this 

volume. Slowness of the process is reviewed in Memo, Komer for Bunker, 1 Oct 67, tab 

A–1, Westmoreland Hist File 23 (1–15 Oct 67), CMH. McNamara quote is in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6 (a), p. 82. 24 Msg, Westmoreland MAC 4382 to Wheeler, 28 Aug 65, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

1 Jul–30 Sep 65, CMH. 25 Civilian casualty and atrocity issues can be followed in Hammond, Military and 

the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 185–93, 266–70, 274–79, 300–306. The destruction of Ben 

Suc is described in MacGarrigle, Taking the Offensive, pp. 104–11. 26 MACV’s rules of engagement are summarized in Gen William B. Rosson, “Assessment of Infl uence Exerted on Military Operations by Other Than Military Considerations,” ch. 1, CMH; and Extracts of Remarks by General Westmoreland Relating to 

Noncombatant Casualties, in Westmoreland–CBS Case File Folder, MACV Collection, 

MHI; and Lt Gen William R. Peers, USA (Ret.), The My Lai Inquiry (New York: W. W. 

Norton, 1979), pp. 29–30. An example of enforcement efforts can be found in MACV 

Command History, 1967, 3: 1121–23. 27 Carland, Stemming the Tide, pp. 80–84; quote is from p. 84. 28 Quote is from Col Gen Tran Van Tra, Vietnam: History of the Bulwark B2 Theater, 

vol. 5: Concluding the 30-Years War (trans. by Foreign Broadcast Information Service. 

JPRS Southeast Asia Report no. 1247, 2 Feb 83), pp. 59–60; see also p. 58. Thomas K. 

Latimer, “Hanoi’s Leaders and their South Vietnam Policies, 1954–1968” (Ph.D. diss., 

Georgetown University, 1972), ch. 8. The enemy saw large-unit and guerrilla operations as mutually supporting; see The People’s Armed Forces of the Western Highlands during the War of National Salvation against the Americans (Hanoi: People’s Army Publishing 

House, 1980), pp. 69ff; translated excerpt in CMH fi les. 29 MACV strength estimate is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 0610 to Sharp and 

Chap 12.indd 433 
434

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Wheeler, 2 Jan 67, in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6 (b), pp. 26–28. Enemy weapon

is described in Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 114–15, 146. Battalion r

tios are compared in Paper, n.d., sub: Analysis of Strategies, Folder 42, Thayer Paper

CMH. Quote on local forces is from Weyand Debrief, 15 Jul 68, pp. 1–3. 30 Gen Tran Van Tra affi rms the PAVN/PLAF commitment to attrition in Interv, Joh

M. Carland, CMH, with Tra, 23 Nov 90, transcript, pp. 7–8, CMH fi les. A convenien

U.S. summary of the enemy strategy is in MACV Command History, 1966, pp. 19–2

Westmoreland gives his view in Assessment of the Situation in South Vietnam, drafte

during the Manila Conference, 23 Oct 66, encl. 15, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (18–2

Oct 66), CMH. For an enemy commander’s assertion that they have the initiative, se

translation of speech by “9 Vinh” attached to Memo, Lt Col Henry Ajina, 7 May 6

sub: Translation Report, tab A–4, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67), CMH. 31 Assessment of the Situation in South Vietnam, Drafted during Manila Confe

ence, 23 Oct 66, encl. 15, Westmoreland Hist File 10 (18–29 Oct 66), CMH. 32 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 11956 to Wheeler, 10 Dec 67, Wes

moreland Msg Files, 1–31 Dec 67, CMH; in same fi le see Msg, Sharp BNK 2388 to Ge

Johnson, 11 Dec 67. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 5 Feb 73. Westmoreland Hi

Notes, 17 Sep 66, tab E; MFR, Rosson, 17 Sep 66, sub: CIIC Meeting, 17 Sep 66, tab E–

Both in Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MA

8212 to Sharp, 20 Sep 66, tab A–2; Mission Council Action Memo no. 123, 22 Sep 6

tab A–8. Both in Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66), CMH. Chaisson Or

History, pp. 119–20. 33 Krulak quote is from Msg to Walt, 7 Oct 66, box 2, Krulak Papers, MCHC. Wes

moreland quote is from Msg, MAC 01928 to Sharp, 26 Feb 67, Westmoreland Msg File

1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. 34 For development of Program 3, see Chapter 7 of this volume. Force levels a

summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4C.6(a), pp. 52–53; and Memo, Col A. C

Edmunds, USAF, for Westmoreland, 16 Nov 67, sub: Force Requirements, tab A–

Westmoreland Hist File 25 (13–28 Nov 67), CMH. 35 Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland and Stilwell, 5 Apr 66, and to Westmoreland, 1

Jun 66; Stilwell BNK 0847 to Sharp, 7 Apr 66; Westmoreland MAC 2810 to Sharp, 

Apr 66; Tillson HWA 1781 to Westmoreland, 7 Jun 66. All in Westmoreland Msg File

1 Apr–30 Jun 66, CMH. 36 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 52–53; Rosson, “Involvement in Vie

nam,” p. 215. Memo, Col A. C. Edmunds, USAF, for Westmoreland, 16 Nov 67, su

Force Requirements, tab A–7, Westmoreland Hist File 25 (13–28 Nov 67), CMH. O

corps contingency force, see Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 30 May 66, and Westm

reland MAC 4437 to Sharp, 31 May 66. Both in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Ju

66, CMH. 37 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 53–54; McNamara quotes are from th

source. For McNamara’s growing disillusionment with ROLLING THUNDER, see ibid., se

4.C.7(a), pp. 138–45. On his July visit to Saigon, see Msg, Sharp to Westmorelan

6 Jul 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH. Rosson, “Involvement 

Vietnam,” pp. 214–15, sees McNamara’s request as the formal opening of the civilian

military confrontation over reinforcements. 38 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 69–79; Msg, Gen Johnson WDC 1241

to Westmoreland, 19 Oct 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH. Ma

Donald-Westmoreland Interv, 17 Jun 73; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 248–49

39 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 79–81. Palmer, 25-Year War, pp. 44, 17

The Plimsoll line is the mark on a vessel’s side that indicates when the vessel is loade

beyond safe limits.

Chap 12.indd 434 
435

An Evolving Strategy

40 Quote is from Msg, Emrick to Westmoreland, 3 Aug 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 

1 Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH. In same fi le, see Msgs, Abrams WDC 8561 to Engler, 21 Jul 66; 

Engler MAC 6480 to Abrams, 28 Jul 66; Gen Johnson WDC 9860 to Engler, Waters, 

Westmoreland, and Eifl er, 20 Aug 66; and Gen Johnson WDC 10849 to Westmoreland, 

13 Sep 66. Msgs, Polk WDC 4023 to Engler, 1 Apr 66; Westmoreland MAC 4787 and 

MAC 4848 to Sharp, 10 and 12 Jun 66; Sharp to Westmoreland, 14 Jun 66; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 66; Msg, Gen Johnson WDC 11776 to Westmoreland, 5 

Oct 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66. All in CMH. 41 First quote is from Westmoreland Hist Notes, 24 Jul 66; see also Hist Notes, 

17 Sep 66; tabs A and E, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), CMH; Msgs, 

Westmoreland MAC 7720 and MAC 8085 to Gen Johnson, 5 and 16 Sep 66; Msg, Gen 

Johnson WDC 10846 to Westmoreland, 13 Sep 66. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 

Jul–30 Sep 66, CMH. MacDonald-Westmoreland Intervs, 12 Mar 73, and n.d., Strategy 

and Policy Section, CMH fi les. Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” p. 217. 42 Westmoreland describes this conference in his Hist Notes, 17 Oct 66, tab D, 

Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66), CMH. See also Westmoreland, A Soldier 

Reports, pp. 193–94. 43 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 81–119. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 17 

Oct 66, tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); see also Hist Notes, 25 Nov 

66, tab C, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66). Both in CMH. Memo, McNaughton for McNamara, 26 Oct 66, sub: McNaughton in Manila . . . , box 7, Warnke 

Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. 44 McNamara’s memorandums are reproduced in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 

4.C.6(a), pp. 81–91 and 105–19. 45 Quote is from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), p. 85. 46 McNamara develops this argument most fully in his 17 Nov 66 draft Memo for 

the President, reproduced in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(a), pp. 105–19; quotes 

are from pp. 108–11. 47 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 22–24. Msgs, Wheeler JCS 1284–67 to 

Sharp and Westmoreland, 17 Feb 67; Westmoreland MAC 1658 to Wheeler and Sharp, 

17 Feb 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 21 Feb 67 and 15 Mar 67; Westmoreland MAC 1928 

to Sharp, 26 Feb 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67, CMH. 48 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 61–67, 83. Msgs, COMUSMACV MAC 

09101 to CINCPAC, 18 Mar 67; COMUSMACV MAC 10311 to JCS, 28 Mar 67; tab A–8, 

Westmoreland Hist File 15 (27 Mar–30 Apr 67); Msg, Sharp to Westmoreland, 28 Mar 

67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67. All in CMH. For the detailed MACV 

justifi cation of this request, see Ltr, Westmoreland to CINCPAC, 5 Apr 67, sub: FY 68 

Force Requirements, with appendixes and annexes, in CMH fi les. 49 Memo, Wheeler JCSM–218–57 for Secretary of Defense, 20 Apr 67, sub: Force Requirements—Southeast Asia FY 1968, box 6, Warnke Papers, McNaughton Files, LBJL. 

U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 73–77. 50 These arguments are recounted in detail in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), 

pp. 77–82, 85–89, 93–100, 105–92. Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 219–20. 51 Komer quote is from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p. 80; Enthoven remarks are in ibid., pp. 108–09. In late 1966, in a speech at Manila, President Johnson 

promised to withdraw American combat forces within six months if the North Vietnamese would do the same. Gelb and Betts, Irony of Vietnam, p. 150. 52 Taylor, “Comments on Vietnam,” 1 Jan 67, in U.S. Department of State, Foreign 

Relations of the U.S., 1964–1968, vol. 5, Vietnam, 1967 (Washington, D.C.: Government 

Printing Offi ce, 2002), pp. 1–2. 53 Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 13 Jun 67; Westmoreland MAC 5601 to Sharp, 

Chap 12.indd 435 
436

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

13 Jun 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–30 Sep 67, CMH. Memo, Maj Gen Walt

T. Kerwin, Jr., for Westmoreland, 6 Jul 67 sub: SecDef Briefi ng, tab A–1, Westmorelan

Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67), CMH. Enthoven paper is summarized in U.S.–Vietna

Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 195–96. 54 Saigon briefi ngs are described in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 197

208; J3 quotes are from p. 208. Westmoreland’s view of the conference is in his Hi

Notes, 6 Jul–3 Aug 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67), CMH. 55 Final negotiations are summarized in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p

209–22. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 6 Jul–3 Aug 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 1

(6 Jul–3 Aug 67), and 6–18 Aug 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 20 (4–20 Aug 67

Both in CMH. Msg, Westmoreland to Abrams via CG Ft. Jackson, SC, 11 Jul 67, Ta

A–8, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–3 Aug 67), CMH. Negotiations for accelerate

deployment can be followed in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–31 Oct 67, CMH; se

also Chapter 3, above. 56 Quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 7420–66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 3 Dec 6

Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH; in same fi le, see Msgs, Wheeler JC

7859–66 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 21 Dec 66; and Westmoreland MAC 10608 

Wheeler and Sharp, 4 Dec 66. 57 First quote is from MFR, Jones, 3 Oct 66, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conferenc

28 Aug 66, tab D–4, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66); see also tab C–3, Wes

moreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66); and tab A–11, Westmoreland Hist File 18 

Jun–5 Jul 67). All in CMH. RVNAF/MACV Combined Campaign Plan 1967, AB 142, 

Nov 66, p. 13, CMH. Final quote is from Msg, CG I FFORCEV to COMUSMACV, 2 Ja

67, tab B–3, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH; in same fi le, se

Draft Msg, Westmoreland to Sharp and Wheeler, Jan 67, tab B–9. 58 Westmoreland quote is in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p. 24. For th

course of operations, see MacGarrigle, Taking the Offensive, and Maj Gary L. Telfe

USMC; Lt Col Lane Rogers, USMC; and V. Keith Fleming, Jr., U.S. Marines in Vietnam

Fighting the North Vietnamese, 1967 (Washington: History and Museums Divisio

Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1984). For pacifi cation efforts, see: MFR Maj Gen 

R. Chaisson, USMC, 24 Jun 67, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 11 Jun 67, ta

A–11, Westmoreland Hist File 18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67); Msg, CG II FFORCEV to COMU

MACV, 21 Sep 67, tab A–17, Westmoreland Hist File 22 (10–30 Sep 67). All in CMH

Rosson Interv, pp. 367–69, MHI. 59 Westmoreland’s estimate is in his and Sharp’s Report on War, pp. 131–32. Thir

percent fi gure comes from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p. 35. DePuy quo

and analysis are in his paper, “Revolutionary Development,” sec. 1, 20 Apr 67; see als

Memo, W. W. Rostow for the President, 20 May 67. Both in NSC Country Files, Vie

nam, boxes 74 and 75, LBJL. 60 The fi ghting in northern I Corps is detailed in Telfer et al., Marines in Vietnam

1967, chs. 1–4, 7, 8, and 10. Typical expressions of Westmoreland’s concern about th

area are in MFR, Rosson, 17 Sep 66, sub: CIIC Meeting, 17 Sep 66, tab E–6, and Wes

moreland Hist Notes, 17 Sep 66, tab E, both in Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Au

66), CMH. See also Hist Notes, 6 Oct 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–1

Oct 66); 1 Jan 67, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67); and 28 De

67–31 Jan 68, tab A–1, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 67–31 Jan 68). All in CMH

61 Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 137–38, 143–44. Formation an

operations of Task Force OREGON are covered in MacGarrigle, Taking the Offensive, ch

12, 14, and 17. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1–13 Oct 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist Fi

23 (1–15 Oct 67); 29 Nov–16 Dec 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 26 (29 Nov–16 De

67); 28 Dec 67–31 Jan 68, tab A–1, Westmoreland Hist File 28 (27 Dec 67–31 Jan 68

Chap 12.indd 436 
437

An Evolving Strategy

All in CMH. On additional reinforcements, Msgs, COMUSMACV MAC 31448 to CG, 

III MAF, 23 Sep 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 1967, CMH. Battalion distribution is from 

Paper, Analysis of Strategies, Folder. 42, Thayer Papers, CMH. 62 U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.7(a), pp. 145–62, summarizes the genesis of the 

barrier scheme. Memo, McNamara for Lt Gen A. D. Starbird, 15 Sep 66, sub: Infi ltration 

Interdiction System for Vietnam, tab E–4, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66); 

Msgs, Wheeler JCS 5586–66 and JCS 7590–66 to Sharp, 17 Sep 66 and 10 Dec 66. All in 

Westmoreland Msg Files, Sep 66–31 Jan 67, CMH. 63 Quote is from Memo, Westmoreland for Director, DCPG, 5 Nov 66, sub: Barrier Concepts, tab A–2, Westmoreland Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66), CMH. See also 

Memo, Westmoreland for Starbird, 17 Dec 66, sub: Barrier Plan, tab A–3, Westmoreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67); and Hist Notes, 6 Oct 66, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66), CMH. See also Msg, Westmoreland MAC 10295 to 

Sharp, 24 Nov 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–31 Dec 66, CMH; and MacDonaldWestmoreland Intervs, 11 Feb 73 and 17 Jun 73. 64 The course of barrier planning is traced in detail in Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 1966, pp. 314–318; and Telfer et al., Marines in Vietnam, 1967, pp. 86–90. U.S.–

Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), pp. 39–41, 43–44. Westmoreland Hist Notes, 17 Oct 66, 

tab D, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66); 6 Nov 66, tab A, Westmoreland 

Hist File 11 (30 Oct–12 Dec 66); MFR, Rosson, 3 Dec 66, sub: CIIC Meeting, 3 Dec 66, 

tab D–7, ibid.; Msgs, Starbird to Westmoreland, 18 Dec 66; Wheeler JCS 2752–67 to 

Westmoreland, 14 Apr 67; Westmoreland MAC 3600 to Wheeler, 15 Apr 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, Dec 66–Apr 67. All in CMH. 65 The code-name PRACTICE NINE was discontinued in June 1967 because offi cials 

believed it had been compromised. MACV temporarily renamed the project ILLINOIS

CITY. On 14 July the separate names for the two portions of the barrier came into effect. 

See Telfer et al., Marines in Vietnam, p. 91. 66 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 4866, MAC 7600, MAC 7616, MAC 7718, MAC 9963, 

to Sharp, 24 May 67, 13 Aug 67, 17 Aug 67, 22 Oct 67; Westmoreland MAC 5793 to 

Wheeler and Sharp, 19 Jun 67; Wheeler JCS 6127–67 and JCS 6812–67 to Westmoreland, 2 Aug 67 and 21 Aug 67; Sharp to Westmoreland, 8 Aug 67; Westmoreland MAC 

7432 to Wheeler, 8 Aug 67; Westmoreland MAC 7472 to Starbird, 9 Aug 67; Dr John W. 

Foster, DDR&E 9034 to Westmoreland, 24 Oct 67; Westmoreland MAC 10256 to Foster, 

28 Oct 67; Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–31 Oct 67. All in CMH. 67 Shulimson, Marines in Vietnam, 1966, pp. 317–19, documents Marine Corps opposition to the project. Msgs, COMUSMACV MAC 27375 and MAC 34760 to CG III 

MAF, 17 Aug 67 and 22 Oct 67; COMUSMACV MAC 32676 to CINCPAC, 5 Oct 67. All 

in Westmoreland Sig File, 1967, CMH. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 9056 to Johnson and 

Sharp, 27 Sep 67, tab A–33, Westmoreland Hist File 22 (10–30 Sep 67), CMH. Criticism 

of marines: Msg, CG III MAF to COMUSMACV, 13 Oct 67, tab A–20, Westmoreland 

Hist File 23 (1–15 Oct 67); Westmoreland Hist Notes, 19–26 Dec 67, Westmoreland Hist 

File 27 (19–26 Dec 67). All in CMH. 68 Analysts’ estimates are in U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p. 132. Msg, Westmoreland MAC 1550 to Sharp, 14 Feb 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67; 

Ltr, Westmoreland to W. W. Rostow, 9 Dec 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 1967. Both in 

CMH. Palmer Interv, 7 and 10 Jun 68, pp. 250–52, 266–68. Sharp and Westmoreland, 

Report on War, pp. 147–48, 253. 69 MACV Command History, 1967, pp. 1195–97. Msg, COMUSMACV MAC 35612 

to CINCPAC, 29 Oct 67, Westmoreland Sig File, 1967, CMH. 70 First quote is from Msg, Sharp to Wheeler info Westmoreland, 25 Jun 65; second 

is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 3332–67 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 5 May 67; third is from 

Chap 12.indd 437 
438

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Msg, Wheeler JCS 4495–67 to Sharp info Westmoreland, 15 Jun 67. All in Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Jun 65 and 1 Apr–30 Jun 67, CMH. 71 Quotes are from MFR, Jones, 3 Oct 66, sub: MACV Commanders’ Conferenc

28 Aug 66, tab D–4, Westmoreland Hist File 8 (17 Jul–17 Sep 66), CMH. The evolutio

of the reemphasis on RVNAF’s pacifi cation mission is traced in Clarke, Final Years, p

173–83. 72 Clarke, Final Years, pp. 184–87, 249–50. Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on Wa

pp. 129, 216–17. MFR, Rosson, 17 Dec 66, sub: CIIC Meeting, 17 Dec 66, tab A–4, Wes

moreland Hist File 12 (13 Dec 66–26 Jan 67), CMH. 73 Westmoreland Hist Notes, 12 Sep 65, Westmoreland Hist File 1 (29 Aug–24 O

65). COMUSMACV Policy Points, Notes for Discussing with Amb Lodge, 13 Oct 66, ta

D–7, Westmoreland Hist File 9 (18 Sep–17 Oct 66), CMH. MACV Command Histor

1966, p. 748. Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 15 Dec 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Oct–3

Dec 66, CMH. 74 First quote is from Paper, Dept of State, Policy Planning Council, 15 Jun 67, su

Possible Alternatives to the Present Conduct of the War in Vietnam, tab A–13, Wes

moreland Hist File 18 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67), CMH. Second and third are from Msgs, Wheel

JCS 9449–67 and JCS 9680–67 to Westmoreland, 3 Nov and 10 Nov 67, Westmorelan

Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67, CMH. 75 Quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 8908 to Sharp, 21 Sep 67, Westmor

land Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67. Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 10451 to Sharp, 3 Nov 6

Westmoreland MAC 10556 and MAC 10817 to Wheeler, 6 Nov and 12 Nov 67, Wes

moreland Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67. All in CMH. Clarke, Final Years, pp. 279–80. 76 Address by General W. C. Westmoreland . . . to National Press Club, Washingto

D.C., 21 November 1967, copy in CMH fi les. 77 First quote is from MFR, Bryan, 2 Dec 67, sub: CIIB Meeting, 2 Dec 67, tab A–

Westmoreland Hist File 26 (29 Nov–16 Dec 67), CMH. Remaining quotes are fro

Clarke, Final Years, pp. 281–82; see also pp. 280 and 283. Memo, Westmoreland f

Bunker, 20 Dec 67, sub: Address to National Press Club . . . , Westmoreland Sig Fil

1967, CMH. MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 11 Feb 73, CMH. 78 Discussion of RVNAF improvement efforts and results is drawn from Clark

Final Years, chs. 8–15, passim. Rosson quote is from his Interv, 1981, pp. 331–32; se

also Rosson, “Involvement in Vietnam,” pp. 208–09, 243–44. Detrimental effects 

the delay in rearming ARVN are noted in Weyand Debrief, 15 Jul 68, p. 7.

Chap 12.indd 438 
13

An Autumn of Uncertainty

As 1967 wore on, General Westmoreland and his fi eld commanders expressed growing confi dence that they were achieving their 

goal of grinding down all elements of the enemy’s interlocked military and political systems. While still hampered by what the military 

leaders thought were excessive political restrictions, ROLLING THUNDER

was nevertheless battering North Vietnam’s economy and society and 

increasing the cost and diffi culty of that country’s prosecution of the 

war in the south. Meanwhile in South Vietnam, American and allied 

troops were infl icting heavy casualties on the enemy’s big units in every 

engagement, pushing them away from the population and agricultural 

centers, and invading and disrupting their base areas. Gradually improving South Vietnamese regular and territorial forces, with growing allied 

help, were whittling away at the Viet Cong guerrillas and their political 

infrastructure. Evidence was mounting of declining enemy strength and 

morale. Communist forces were encountering diffi culties in attracting 

recruits within South Vietnam, the fl ow of reinforcements from North 

Vietnam was slowing. Most of all, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong 

military offensives seemed regularly to end in bloody failure. 

Rural pacifi cation continued to progress slowly, if at all; but the 

future seemed to hold promise. A series of orderly, reasonably honest elections during 1967 produced, for the fi rst time since the fall of 

Ngo Dinh Diem, a stable Saigon government with a degree of constitutional legitimacy and popular support. With the new CORDS organization unifying American backing for pacifi cation, the elements fi nally 

seemed to be coming together for an effective allied political and paramilitary offensive in the countryside.1

General Westmoreland’s civilian counterparts in Saigon for the 

most part shared his belief that the allies were moving forward. Barry 

Zorthian, the U.S. Mission’s chief of public relations, recalled that “the 

senior people in the U.S. Mission” genuinely “felt we were making 

progress in the war, although newspaper headlines usually overstated 

the degree of that feeling.” In July Ambassador Komer, the new CORDS 

chief, told President Johnson that “at long last we are slowly but surely winning [the] war of attrition in [the] South.” The Viet Cong, he 

Chap 13.indd 439 
440

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

declared, were “visibly declining.” “Wasteful and painful though 

is,” he assured Johnson, “our massive investment out here is fi nall

beginning to pay off.”2

Even as offi cials in the embassy and commanders at MACV mad

plans to continue their campaign along the lines they believed wer

gradually producing success, events in the United States and Nort

Vietnam were shifting the sand under their feet. In the United State

a growing number of Americans in the executive branch and Con

gress, in the news media, and among the general public did not shar

the optimism. To the dissenters, the incremental progress regularl

reported from Saigon appeared more like stalemate, especially whe

weighed against the apparently limitless duration and steadily in

creasing cost of the confl ict. Doubts about the success of the war, a

well as its wisdom and morality, continued to spread in the Unite

States. In an effort to counter this pessimism, the Johnson admini

tration during 1967 mobilized all its forces, including the Saigon em

bassy and the Military Assistance Command, to convince the natio

that the war was being won. Privately, however, the president himse

was concerned about the increasing cost and inconclusive results o

the American military effort. He was beginning to search for a wa

out of the war.

General Westmoreland with Barry Zorthian (Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)

Chap 13.indd 440 
441

An Autumn of Uncertainty

Unknown to the Americans, North Vietnam’s leaders also were reevaluating their strategy during the last half of 1967. Like many of 

their adversaries the Communists believed that, as then being conducted, the war had reached a stalemate. As they saw it, the Americans, for 

all their numbers and fi repower, could not defeat the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong decisively, but neither could the Communist forces 

defeat the Americans. Still committed to ultimate victory and more 

confi dent than the Americans of their ability to achieve it, offi cials in 

Hanoi began making plans to force the confl ict off dead center and to 

shift the balance of forces conclusively in their favor.

The Public Relations War

From the time President Johnson committed the United States to 

large-scale ground and air combat in Southeast Asia in 1965, he and 

his senior advisers were preoccupied with what they perceived to be 

the fragility of American domestic support for their policies. They had 

reason for concern. Public questioning of and opposition to the war 

mounted even as combat expanded and casualties increased. By mid1967, outright antiwar protest had spread beyond the campuses and 

left-wing fringe groups and was drawing in major political, religious, 

labor, and civil rights leaders. Even more ominous, belief in victory was 

declining among politically moderate, patriotic Americans. Members 

of Congress who initially had supported the war began moving away 

from the administration’s position, mainly on the grounds that the 

war was costing too much and making too little progress. In the news 

media, important journals, reporters, and columnists were beginning 

to refl ect offi cial and popular doubts, although the bulk of news coverage of the confl ict still was neutral or favorable to the administration’s 

position. President Johnson’s performance ratings in the polls steadily 

declined, and an ever larger percentage of respondents to the same 

polls agreed with the proposition that U.S. intervention in Vietnam 

had been a mistake. Arguing against further expansion of American 

forces in Vietnam, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs John McNaughton summarized the general unease: “A 

feeling is widely and strongly held that ‘the Establishment’ is out of 

its mind. The feeling is that we are trying to impose some US image 

on distant peoples we cannot understand (anymore than we can the 

younger generation here at home), and that we are carrying the thing 

to absurd lengths.”3

General Wheeler repeatedly communicated the administration’s 

worries about public opinion to General Westmoreland and Admiral 

Sharp. As early as the I Corps troubles in spring 1966, he warned his 

subordinates that the upheaval had cost “irretrievably and for all time 

some of the support which until now we have received from the American people,” many of whom “will never again believe that the effort 

Chap 13.indd 441 
442

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

and the sacrifi ces are worthwhile.” A little more than a year later, h

told fi eld commanders that “there is deep concern here in Washing

ton because of the eroding support for our war effort,” with particula

distress over “the allegations of ‘stalemate.’” Sharp and Westmorelan

shared Wheeler’s apprehensive reading of the popular mood. The Pa

cifi c commander concluded late in 1966 that “The American peopl

can become aroused either for or against this war. At the moment, wit

no end in sight, they are more apt to become aroused against it.”4

At the administration’s urging, transmitted through Wheeler, Gen

eral Westmoreland redoubled his command’s efforts to inform the pre

and public about the war and, in Sharp’s words, “to convince our peo

ple and Hanoi that there is an end in sight and that it is clearly defea

for Hanoi.” From his assumption of command in mid-1964, Westmo

reland, who appreciated the importance of the news media as a chan

nel of communication to the American public, had labored diligentl

to repair MACV’s relations with the Saigon reporters. Westmorelan

enlarged the MACV Offi ce of Information and secured able offi cers t

head it. In cooperation with the embassy’s Joint U.S. Public Affairs O

fi ce, which oversaw all mission information efforts, and in consulta

Antiwar protesters at the Pentagon, October 1967 (NARA)

Chap 13.indd 442 
443

An Autumn of Uncertainty

tion with the correspondents, MACV public affairs offi cers developed 

voluntary guidelines for news reporting which adequately protected 

sensitive military information without imposing outright censorship. 

Insofar as they could, MACV information offi cers at Westmoreland’s 

direction maintained a policy of openness and candor, albeit with 

constant accent on the positive aspects of events. Faithfully adhering 

to his own policy, Westmoreland held frequent on-and off-the-record 

sessions with reporters, both individuals and in groups. He routinely 

took correspondents along with him on fi eld trips, especially those he 

expected would generate favorable stories.5

In discussions with correspondents and civilian visitors, as well 

as in his offi cial reports, Westmoreland tried to avoid the extremes of 

optimism that had destroyed the credibility of his predecessor, General Harkins. In December 1965 he enjoined offi cers of the 1st Infantry Division and the 173d Airborne Brigade to curb the “inclination 

toward optimism concerning the course of the war,” be “realistic” 

in their reporting, and concentrate on “hard facts and capabilities.” 

Nevertheless, Westmoreland persistently expressed confi dence in 

progress and victory. Before McNamara’s visit to Saigon in July 1967, 

he directed his subordinates to emphasize to the secretary of defense 

that “though the enemy is tough and elusive he can and is being 

licked. It will just take time and resourcefulness to do it.” He justifi ed his positive stance in terms reminiscent of those used by Harkins: 

“Even slight pessimism will pervade the ranks. A commander is the 

weathervane and must be positive. When I appeared before the press 

and public, I had to refl ect confi dence. I really was confi dent. . . . It 

was no act on my part, but I was sharply cognizant of the need to 

avoid any impression of pessimism or defeatism. I tried consciously 

to refl ect this image.”6

During 1967 General Westmoreland and his public affairs offi -

cers became deeply engaged in the Johnson administration’s effort to 

convince the American public that the allies were making progress in 

the war. To counter persistent press claims that the South Vietnamese 

armed forces were incompetent and ineffective, they fed both reporters and offi cials a steady stream of reports of ARVN organizational improvement and battlefi eld success. They also tried, with at best limited 

results, to improve their allies’ public relations techniques. As part of 

an administration-wide campaign to counter allegations that the war 

was a stalemate, Westmoreland kept up a barrage of news conferences 

and offi cial reports detailing slow but steady improvement in every 

aspect of the struggle against the Viet Cong. He also tried to exploit 

distinguished visitors to promote optimism and neutralize war critics. 

When retired General James M. Gavin, who had questioned administration war strategy, planned a visit to South Vietnam, the MACV commander and General Wheeler sought to trump him in the headlines 

with an overlapping tour by the Korean war hero, General Matthew B. 

Chap 13.indd 443 
444

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Ridgway, whom they considered more friendly to their side. Ridgewa

however, declined Westmoreland’s invitation.7 

Twice during 1967 General Westmoreland journeyed to the Unite

States to report in person to various audiences on the state of the wa

The MACV commander had declined previous invitations to speak t

groups in America, arguing that such activities were inappropriate fo

a fi eld general during hostilities. However, in April 1967, at Presiden

Johnson’s insistence, he agreed to address the annual luncheon of A

sociated Press executives in New York. The trip quickly expanded to in

clude several other public appearances, culminating in an address to 

joint session of Congress, probably the fi rst ever delivered to that bod

by a theater commander during a war. Although antiwar senators an

representatives criticized Johnson’s use of an active duty general as th

administration’s political spokesman, Westmoreland’s remarks drew 

a generally respectful and heavily favorable public response. Henc

Johnson in November brought Westmoreland and Ambassador Bunke

back to the United States for another round of appearances intermin

gled with private consultations. During this trip Westmoreland sug

gested in a speech to the National Press Club that it might be possibl

to begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Vietnam within a couple o

years. At a White House breakfast the day after the Press Club speech

the president, Secretaries Rusk and McNamara, Bunker, Westmoreland

General Westmoreland addresses a joint session of Congress, April 1967. 

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 13.indd 444 
445

An Autumn of Uncertainty

and other senior offi cials planned still further expansion of the public 

relations offensive, with emphasis once again on offsetting “the common belief that the South Vietnamese won’t fi ght.”8

The administration’s optimism campaign had mixed results. President Johnson in late January 1968 told his National Security Council 

that he detected “improvement” in media reporting from South Vietnam, a circumstance he attributed to the administration’s and MACV’s 

efforts. Nevertheless, large segments of the press and public remained 

unconvinced by the barrage of offi cial reassurance. By emphasizing 

only progress and good news, the administration risked severe public 

reaction if a setback occurred or if the enemy displayed unexpected 

aggressiveness and vigor. MACV faced the same danger. In the view of 

the Saigon correspondents, General Westmoreland’s ventures into the 

political arena had imbued all information and assessments released by 

his headquarters with a taint of administration propaganda. Westmoreland and his command thus lost rather than gained credibility with 

the news media.9

Giving credence to media suspicions, under the pressure of the 

optimism campaign Westmoreland allowed public relations considerations to infl uence his command’s offi cial military reports and assessments. In March 1967, for example, the MACV commander reported 

to General Wheeler that the monthly rate of enemy battalion-size attacks had increased during 1966, resulting in a total of 174 for the 

year instead of the 45 published in preliminary estimates. In response, 

Wheeler asked Westmoreland to keep this information closely held, 

even within the government. The chairman explained that he and the 

Joint Chiefs had used the lower total of large-scale enemy attacks in 

arguing to the president, the Congress, and the news media that the 

allies had seized the military initiative in the ground war. Having taken 

this position, Wheeler declared, he could not go back to the president 

and tell him that in fact “the situation is such that we are not sure 

who has the initiative in South Vietnam.” Westmoreland defended the 

procedures his staff had used to derive the larger number. Nevertheless, 

after a special team from Washington reviewed MACV’s methods for 

counting enemy large-scale attacks, the general reduced the estimate 

for 1966 back to 45.10

As was true of many statistical controversies in this war, the issue of 

enemy attacks turned heavily on defi nitions and counting methods. In 

addition, as was frequently the case, the meaning of the numbers was 

ambiguous. An increase in enemy attacks could indeed be interpreted 

as showing that the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese held the tactical 

initiative. The same increase, however, could be explained as an effort 

by the enemy to retrieve a losing situation, creating opportunities for 

American forces to destroy him with fi repower. Westmoreland and the 

administration he served risked the total loss of public faith by using 

such questionable estimates to support claims of military success.

Chap 13.indd 445 
446

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

The Order of Battle Controversy

Dring the summer and fall of 1967, as the progress campaig

reached its climax, the Military Assistance Command and the Cen

tral Intelligence Agency engaged in a lengthy, often bitter argumen

over the size and composition of the enemy’s forces. That argumen

brought MACV into unresolved confl ict with the majority of the U.

intelligence community. It also left the command at odds with muc

of its own intelligence staff. The sources of the dispute lay in part in th

substance of complex issues and in part in a tangle of personality an

bureaucratic confl icts. Pervading the entire controversy was the John

son administration’s obsession with convincing the American peopl

that the war was going well.

 Measurement of the enemy’s order of battle, both current and re

rospective, was essential to determining whether the allies were mak

ing progress in attrition and pacifi cation. It was a complex, often fru

trating task. Most of the enemy’s military units made only infrequen

contact with allied forces. The enemy’s irregulars and political infra

structure, which lacked standardized organization and hid among th

people most of the time, were even more diffi cult to count. Adding t

the complexity, many Communist organizations performed both civi

ian and military functions, a circumstance that gave rise to argumen

among the Americans over which categories belonged in the “military

order of battle and which did not. Most of the numbers used in mak

ing strength estimates, whether of enemy casualties and deserters or o

monthly rates of recruitment and infi ltration, were diffi cult to obtai

and prone to over- or underestimation. Hence, calculations of trend

based on them had to be employed with great caution. However, o

fi cials trying to validate their policy positions or to demonstrate prog

ress often treated approximations as fi rm fi gures and drew from them 

unwarrantedly positive conclusions. When personal and institutiona

reputations became tied to such conclusions, acrimonious interagenc

disputes were certain to follow.11

Every major U.S. intelligence organization—the Central Inte

ligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Nationa

Security Agency (NSA), and the State Department’s Bureau of Intell

gence and Research (INR), as well as the MACV and Pacifi c Comman

J2 sections—took part in the collection and analysis of information o

the enemy. While these agencies exchanged considerable amounts o

data among themelves, they operated, in both Washington and th

fi eld, without any overarching authority to coordinate their effort

Early in his tenure, General McChristian, invoking an established o

ganizational principle that in wartime CIA stations should come unde

operational control of the theater military headquarters, attempted t

bring the CIA station in South Vietnam under the authority of MACV

The agency blocked this effort. Its Saigon station continued to wor

Chap 13.indd 446 
447

An Autumn of Uncertainty

directly for the ambassador while also transmitting analyses to agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Similarly, the NSA installations 

in Vietnam, which were not under MACV’s operational control, sent 

their highly classifi ed product back to the United States for distribution. In Washington, the Offi ce of National Estimates presided over 

attempts to reach unifi ed interagency positions on major issues but 

possessed no directing authority over the intelligence community as 

a whole. Agencies developed stubbornly held institutional positions 

that often seemed impervious to contrary facts, as typifi ed by the running MACV-CIA argument over whether or not the Communists were 

bringing weapons into South Vietnam through the Cambodian port of 

Sihanoukville.12

While the resulting system was ineffi cient and fi lled with contention, it did afford senior administration offi cials a broad base of 

reports and raw data from which to develop their own assessments 

of the war’s progress. For example, besides receiving the entire product of military intelligence, Secretary of Defense McNamara also arranged late in 1965 for weekly briefi ngs by the CIA director’s deputy 

for Southeast Asia affairs. Thus President Johnson and his top advisers 

were aware of the intelligence community’s disagreement over the 

enemy order of battle. They imposed their own policy concerns upon 

its resolution.13

The president and his advisers were particularly concerned about 

the impact of enemy strength fi gures on American public opinion. As 

the U.S. intelligence establishment in South Vietnam expanded in size 

and capabilities, its estimates of the size of the enemy expanded as 

well. The increase refl ected in part a real buildup of Communist forces, 

but it also resulted in large measure from belated American confi rmation of the existence of enemies long present. As early as July 1964, 

Ambassador Taylor explained a substantial jump in mission estimates 

of Viet Cong strength as “not a sudden or dramatic increase but rather 

the acceptance of the existence of units suspected for two or three years 

for which confi rmatory evidence has become available only in the last 

few months.” Similar enlargements of the VC/NVA order of battle continued even as American troops entered combat and began infl icting 

heavy enemy casualties. Critics of the war were quick to seize on the 

seeming contradiction between administration claims of progress and 

reports of steadily growing North Vietnamese and Viet Cong numbers. 

The administration in turn pressed its military and civilian intelligence 

agencies to develop consistent order of battle procedures and to agree 

on a single common set of strength estimates for both internal government and external public affairs use.14

At General Wheeler’s direction, delegations from Pacifi c Command, 

the Military Assistance Command, and all the military and civilian 

intelligence agencies met at Honolulu from 6 to 11 February 1967 to 

standardize their methods for developing and presenting enemy order 

Chap 13.indd 447 
448

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

of battle and infi ltration statistics. The conference essentially endorse

a methodology already developed by General McChristian, who head

ed the MACV contingent. It established four categories of enemy forc

es—combat units, administrative service units, irregulars, and politica

cadre—and defi ned the enemy’s total strength as the sum of those fou

elements. The conferees adopted McChristian’s criteria for acceptin

new combat units into the order of battle and for counting North Vie

namese infi ltrators, and they called for more work on estimating th

strength of the less formally organized categories. They also adopte

relatively conservative rules for estimating enemy losses from death

wounds, desertion, and other causes.15

The Honolulu conference acknowledged the necessity for revisio

of American estimates of the number of enemy irregulars. Those forc

es, as defi ned at Honolulu, consisted of three Viet Cong military an

paramilitary elements subordinate to village and hamlet VC politica

authorities: the guerrillas, the self-defense forces, and the secret sel

defense forces. The guerrillas were village platoon and hamlet squad

of armed, full-time fi ghters who regularly engaged in combat opera

tions. The self-defense forces were made up of elderly men, women

youths, and children in Viet Cong-controlled areas who occasionall

performed—either willingly or under duress—a variety of tasks in de

fense of their immediate localities, for example, gathering intelligenc

planting booby traps and punji stakes, and constructing fortifi cation

The secret self-defense forces were similar, but lived in governmen

dominated rural communities and in towns and cities, where they en

gaged in espionage, propaganda, and sabotage.16

Since they possessed only rudimentary military organization an

lacked uniforms and often weapons, these elements—except the gue

rillas to some degree—could not be counted by MACV’s normal metho

of identifying units and assigning strengths to them. Instead, intell

gence analysts tried to extrapolate their numbers from whatever frag

mentary returns and reports they could fi nd in captured document

This frequently meant simply taking fi gures, of unknown accuracy, fo

one province or a few villages and multiplying them by the number o

provinces and villages in South Vietnam, then making various adjus

ments for casualties, desertions, and other factors to arrive at an approx

imate total. Overall, the process could produce widely varying result

depending on the documents, formulas, and assumptions used.17

The MACV Intelligence Directorate began trying to count the irreg

ulars and the Viet Cong political cadres in mid-1966. Up to that tim

the Military Assistance Command had published fi gures for these ca

egories provided by the South Vietnamese, which everyone, includin

the Vietnamese, conceded were probably too low. During the buildu

of his directorate, General McChristian gave fi rst priority to creatin

an order of battle for the enemy’s regular units, which constituted th

most urgent threat to the Saigon government. With this task in han

Chap 13.indd 448 
449

An Autumn of Uncertainty

and with the volume of captured documents and other source material 

rapidly increasing, the intelligence chief sought to complete MACV’s 

picture of the opposing forces. Thus he instituted new collection programs that targeted the irregulars and the political elements. By the 

time of the Honolulu conference in February 1967, McChristian’s analysts had confi rmed that the existing irregular and political strength estimates needed to be raised. The conference attendees directed MACV 

to continue its studies in this fi eld and cautioned that the result likely 

would be a “book increase” in enemy strength. The command, therefore, was to consider means to “refl ect these fi gures in the order of battle in a manner which will help prevent consumers of intelligence from 

viewing the increases as indicative of a sudden growth in the enemy 

force structure.” Instead, “consumers should view such changes as an 

increase of our knowledge of enemy strength already in being.”18

Following the Honolulu meeting, the MACV Combined Intelligence 

Center (CICV), after extensive consultation with ARVN intelligence offi cers and American province advisers, completed its studies and refi ned 

its analyses. On 18 May General McChristian signed the completed irregular forces study, which MACV was to issue with the Joint General 

Staff as a combined estimate. Using the categories defi ned at Honolulu, 

he numbered the enemy guerrilla force at 60,750, the self-defense forces 

at 101,150, and the secret self-defense forces at 23,400—a grand total 

of 185,300 irregulars, in contrast to the old South Vietnamese aggregate 

of about 112,000. McChristian noted that captured enemy documents 

contained much higher strength fi gures for the irregulars than those he 

was presenting. However, the age and accuracy of those numbers were 

uncertain, and CICV had discounted them on the basis of fi eld reports 

and also of evidence in the documents themselves of the enemy’s inability to achieve recruiting goals. McChristian also declared that in 

the unanimous view of the province intelligence offi cers, among the 

irregulars only the guerrillas represented “a real military threat,” since 

they were normally well armed, fought as units, and conducted offensive operations. The self-defense and secret self-defense components, 

which lacked both weapons and training, should be included in the 

MACV order of battle “in order to present a complete picture of enemy 

strength, but with the notation that as a combat force they are only 

marginally effective.” McChristian announced plans to incorporate the 

new categories and estimates in the monthly MACV order of battle for 

June with retroactive adjustments “to preclude inference of a sudden 

increase” in the number of irregulars.19

The new fi gures did not appear in the June summary. Early one 

evening in mid-May, McChristian met privately with Westmoreland in 

the latter’s offi ce. McChristian presented for Westmoreland’s signature 

a cable to Admiral Sharp and the Joint Chiefs that transmitted both 

the revised irregular total and an increase in political cadre strength 

from the previous estimate of about 40,000 to 88,000. Between them, 

Chap 13.indd 449 
450

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

the new fi gures would raise the Military Assistance Command’s tota

enemy strength holdings from about 300,000 to nearly 420,000. Onl

recently returned from the fi rst of his public relations trips to the Unite

States, Westmoreland seemed dismayed at the size of the numbers con

fronting him. He protested, according to McChristian, that the cabl

would “create a political bombshell” in Washington. The MACV com

mander refused to sign the cable or to allow McChristian, then abou

to leave Vietnam at the end of his tour, to hand carry the document t

Honolulu and Washington. Instead, he instructed McChristian to leav

it with him for further study.20

Westmoreland retained the revised estimates in his headquarters fo

the ensuing month, although information as to their contents seem

gradually to have leaked out to other intelligence agencies. At his regula

staff meeting on 19 May, he directed the J2, with representatives from 

the J3 and, signifi cantly, from public information, “to analyze this stud

in depth and to determine how this information should be presente

both offi cially and publicly.” He also “requested specifi cally that thos

irregular forces that are armed be identifi ed.” Westmoreland directed 

similar study of the new political order of battle estimate. The studie

continued through the next month, although the MACV commande

was sure enough of the fi gures by the end of May to have the Joint Pub

lic Affairs Offi ce and the Mission Council briefed on them. Neverthe

less, he continued to delay wider dissemination of the estimates, eve

when pressed for them by the DIA through Admiral Sharp.21

It became clear during this period that Westmoreland, for bot

substantive and public relations reasons, wanted to fi nd some way t

avoid reporting a 100,000-man increase in enemy strength, especiall

an increase based entirely upon a retrospective enlargement of the i

regulars. He appears to have questioned the validity of counting th

self-defense forces as the equivalent of regular soldiers, a position i

which he was not alone. A DIA team that reviewed MACV’s new e

timates in April 1967 had recommended excluding both the self-de

fense elements and the political cadre from the military order of battl

and McChristian’s 18 May report had indicated that only the guerrilla

were a signifi cant combat force. In addition, Westmoreland was all to

aware that the press and public would juxtapose reports of increase

enemy strength with his statements about progress in the war, to h

and the administration’s embarrassment. The newly arrived CORD

chief, Robert Komer, shared this awareness. As a result, Westmorelan

adopted a strategy of removing the self-defense forces and politica

cadre from the military order of battle. By this means, MACV coul

keep total Communist strength around 300,000 even while acceptin

higher fi gures for some of the military categories.22

The Military Assistance Command’s slowness in releasing its revise

estimates created increasing impatience and suspicion in the Centra

Intelligence Agency. Agency analysts in both Saigon and Langley du

Chap 13.indd 450 
451

An Autumn of Uncertainty

ing 1966 had begun producing 

estimates independent of the military but using the military’s sources for all elements of the Communist order of battle. Relying heavily 

on extrapolation and multiplication from limited evidence, they 

arrived at what they considered 

more up-to-date and useful, and 

usually higher, estimates of enemy 

combat power than those MACV 

was producing. The CIA analysts 

also defi ned enemy forces more 

broadly than did MACV. They preferred to talk of an “insurgency 

base” that included paramilitary 

and political as well as military elements in contrast to MACV’s more 

conventional “order of battle,” 

which was limited to organized 

armed formations. Following this 

approach, CIA analysts, notably 

the articulate and aggressive Sam 

Adams, were estimating the enemy’s irregular strength by late 1966 at 

more than 300,000 and the entire Communist order of battle at perhaps 600,000. They continued to circulate fi gures of this magnitude 

during and after the February 1967 Honolulu conference.23

The issue came to a head in mid-1967, when CIA Director Richard Helms, responding to a presidential request, instructed the Board 

of National Estimates to prepare a new assessment of Communist 

strength and capabilities in South Vietnam. The estimate, drafted 

initially by CIA representatives, was to refl ect a consensus of the entire intelligence community on the basic issue of the enemy’s ability 

to continue the war. Entitled Special National Intelligence Estimate 

(SNIE) 14.3–67, this document became the focal point of the order of 

battle controversy.24

On 23 June, the fi rst interagency meeting to review the CIA draft 

of the special estimate ended in deadlock. The document estimated 

total enemy strength at around 500,000 personnel of all categories, 

including substantially larger numbers than previously used for the administrative services, irregulars, and political cadre. All sides concurred 

in their estimates of enemy combat troops. However, spokesmen for 

the Defense Intelligence Agency, representing MACV at the meeting, 

rejected the CIA’s totals for the other categories and insisted on using 

MACV’s old fi gures, which would keep overall enemy strength around 

300,000. The meeting ended without a decision on which numbers to 

CIA Director Helms 

(© Bettmann/CORBIS)

Chap 13.indd 451 
452

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

use in the SNIE, but with the State Department and National Securit

Agency delegations generally supporting the CIA position.25

In spite of this unpromising beginning, Director Helms’ deputy i

charge of Vietnam War intelligence, George Carver, soon develope

the outlines of a compromise.26 Carver appreciated the Military Assi

tance Command’s public relations problem with the higher estimate

He, and most other CIA analysts, also recognized that lumping the sel

defense elements and political cadre with the more defi nitely militar

enemy components gave a distorted and exaggerated picture of th

armed Communist threat. Carver also regarded the numbers for th

nonmilitary categories as extremely “soft,” little more than general ap

proximations. Hence, he was willing to separate the self-defense force

and political cadre from the military order of battle, provided that th

paramilitary groups continued to be counted as part of the total enem

manpower base and that it was recognized that those elements contrib

uted a share of battlefi eld casualties, deserters, and prisoners. Carve

assistant George Allen early in July summarized the emerging CIA po

sition. He proposed to divide enemy forces into “two principal group

ings—military and non-military. The military would include comba

administrative support, and guerrilla, while the non-military would in

clude the self-defense (militia) and political. The totals for the militar

grouping would approximate the current listing (295,000), and th

is the fi gure MACV could use in discussing—offi cially and unoffi cia

ly—the enemy’s military potential. The non-military grouping woul

not—and should not—be used in assessing military matters, but woul

be considered in computations on input and loss . . . , particularly wit

reference to Chieu Hoi fi gures.”27

By the time Carver and Allen developed this position, a change o

Military Assistance Command chiefs of intelligence had complicate

matters. At the end of May, under an arrangement made by Genera

Westmoreland and Johnson in March, General McChristian, who ha

completed his regular two-year tour of duty, left Vietnam to take com

mand of the 2d Armored Division at Fort Hood, Texas. His replacemen

Maj. Gen. Phillip B. Davidson, was an experienced Army intelligenc

offi cer and like McChristian had served as the chief of intelligence o

U.S. Army, Pacifi c, before coming to MACV.”28

Davidson, however, was also a long-time professional rival of h

predecessor. Considering McChristian’s method of operation ponde

ous and pedantic, the new chief lost no time in imposing his own stam

on the MACV Intelligence Directorate, with abrasive effect. To staff th

senior positions in his directorate, Davidson brought in his own me

from USARPAC and the United States. Relations between Davidson

people and the McChristian-era holdovers who staffed many J2 offi ce

and the Combined Intelligence Center were often contentious. In pa

ticular, Col. Daniel O. Graham, the new chief of indications and est

mates, seemed to many to be overbearing and opinionated, rigid i

Chap 13.indd 452 
453

An Autumn of Uncertainty

holding to his established preconceptions, and inclined to browbeat 

analysts who did not substantiate his positions.29

General Davidson and Colonel Graham took up their duties already 

convinced that their predecessors had been overestimating enemy numbers. They claimed that McChristian had infl ated the size of the enemy 

main force and also doubted the validity of McChristian’s enlarged estimates of guerrilla and political strength. They could not reconcile the 

intelligence section’s regular claims of a larger enemy with operational 

reports of a low level of Communist offensive activity and with the evidence their own offi ce was accumulating of heavy enemy casualties, an 

apparent leveling-off of North Vietnamese infi ltration, and recruiting 

diffi culties and high desertion rates among the Viet Cong. To Davidson 

and Graham, logic and evidence indicated that enemy strength must 

be decreasing, and they were less than receptive to analyses that maintained the contrary position. Early in his tenure Graham prepared an 

extensive briefi ng which claimed that in fact the “cross-over point,” 

at which the enemy was losing more men in the south than he could 

replace, already had been reached.30

Besides Davidson and his assistants, other American offi cials questioned McChristian’s steady enlargement of the enemy order of battle. 

Walt Rostow, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Nitze, and Ambassador Robert Komer all suspected that MACV had been overcounting the 

enemy, both out of understandable military caution and in order to 

support requests for still more American troops. Komer, who had beGeneral Davidson, left, and Colonel Graham (shown as a brigadier general) 

Chap 13.indd 453 
454

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

come involved in order of battle discussions as the president’s specia

assistant for counterinsurgency, weighed heavily into the question a

the new chief of CORDS. He dismissed an early draft of SNIE 14.3–6

as a “rather superfi cial” document that did not “take into account th

interaction of our capabilities with those of the enemy” and portraye

an “infl ated” estimate of Communist strength. He also praised David

son’s endeavors to bring the Intelligence Directorate’s enemy strengt

estimates into line with what Komer thought was reality. He strongl

endorsed proposals to stop counting the self-defense forces and polit

cal cadre as part of the military order of battle.31

Unfortunately, the Intelligence Directorate’s working order-of-ba

tle analysts disagreed with their superiors’ views. Trained by McChri

tian and loyal to him, they stuck by the results of their own exam

nation of documents and prisoner interrogation reports, which the

contended did not support claims of an enemy decline and migh

in fact indicate increases in some categories. Yet they felt themselve

under pressure to adjust downward their estimates of both regular an

irregular forces and found it diffi cult if not impossible to gain a hea

ing for their claims that the enemy was being undercounted. Colone

Graham himself admitted that he kept “pounding on” the analysts t

reduce their guerrilla strength estimates. In the view of many of th

young intelligence offi cers, who usually were on their fi rst tours i

their specialty, this amounted to a demand that they lie. Faced wit

this pressure, Col. Gains Hawkins, head of the Combined Intelligenc

Center’s Order of Battle Branch, which published MACV’s monthl

estimates of enemy forces, later admitted that he had arbitrarily re

duced his subordinates’ estimates of guerrilla, self-defense, and polit

cal cadre strength. He declared that he never received a “direct order

to do this, but “I had a distinct understanding . . . that these fi gure

were going to have to go down.”32

The divisions within MACV intelligence notwithstanding, it seeme

initially as though the command and the CIA would reach a quic

agreement. Early in July, George Carver traveled to Saigon with Secre

tary McNamara, who had come for fi nal discussions with Westmore

land on the Program Five reinforcement. Carver took the opportunit

to present to Komer and Davidson the CIA plan for resolving the “po

litical and presentational” problem of the larger enemy numbers b

separating military from nonmilitary elements. Komer and Davidso

appeared “very receptive” to Carver’s proposal and also to the ide

favored by the CIA, of using ranges of fi gures for all categories but th

regular troops. At a fi nal amicable meeting on 9 July, the principa

agreed that Davidson would secure Westmoreland’s approval of a re

vised estimate; then Hawkins would bring it to Washington for pre

sentation to the interagency board working on the special intelligenc

estimate. Reporting to Director Helms on the meeting, Carver expecte

the estimate to “slide through . . . without dissent” and form the bas

Chap 13.indd 454 
455

An Autumn of Uncertainty

of a “solid piece of agreed national intelligence which all participants 

can support.”33

Carver’s optimism was premature. By the time the next round of 

discussions on SNIE 14.3–67 opened at CIA headquarters at Langley in 

mid-August, whatever understanding he had achieved with MACV had 

broken down. The conference, which Carver did not attend, turned 

into an acrimonious, confusing interagency wrangle with the military 

representatives from MACV, Pacifi c Command, and the DIA arrayed 

against the CIA and State Department. While all concerned agreed on 

estimates of the Communist regular combat forces, the CIA held out 

for higher numbers than MACV would accept for the administrative 

support troops, guerrillas, and political cadre and also insisted on including large numbers of self-defense and secret self-defense forces in 

the total enemy strength.34

The military delegations refused to count the self-defense categories 

and maneuvered to keep the total number of enemy in the estimate 

below what all believed was an arbitrary, command-established ceiling 

of 300,000. General Westmoreland denied then and later ever setting 

such a ceiling, and no documentation has been found of a direct order 

from him to do so. Nevertheless, his intelligence offi cers clearly believed that their commander wanted to keep enemy strength estimates 

within the set maximum. During the conference, General Davidson 

told the MACV delegation head, Brig. Gen. George Godding, “I am 

sure that this headquarters will not accept a fi gure in excess of the current strength . . . carried by the press.” “Let me make it clear,” he continued, “that this is my view of General Westmoreland’s sentiments. I 

have not discussed this directly with him but I am 100 per cent sure of 

his reaction.”35

Privately, the military delegates at Langley were divided among 

themselves. Lower-ranking offi cers from MACV and from the other 

military agencies, who were under orders to support the MACV position, confi ded to their CIA colleagues that the command fi gures they 

were compelled to defend were lower than their own best estimates. 

As for the conference sessions, according to one MACV participant, 

they “more closely resembled a labor negotiation than an intelligence 

operation.” Col. George Hamscher of Pacifi c Command recalled: “we 

haggled and bargained, even blustered. It progressed from unprofessional to wrongful; and it amounted to falsifi cation of intelligence.” In 

the end, trying to stay under the 300,000 ceiling while making concessions to the CIA on some categories, Colonels Hawkins and Graham, 

both of whom took part in the discussions, resorted to arbitrary reduction of their own estimates.36

In the midst of the sessions the press published an apparently leaked 

version of the CIA’s estimates, which included a total enemy strength of 

420,000. This development provoked a barrage of cables to the White 

House and Defense Department from Westmoreland, Abrams, Bunker, 

Chap 13.indd 455 
456

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

and Komer. All declared emphatically that the self-defense and secre

self-defense forces did not belong in the military order of battle becaus

they lacked signifi cant combat capability, and they warned that the

inclusion would result in a 100,000-man increase in apparent enem

strength that would falsely undercut valid claims of progress. Genera

Abrams succinctly summed up the MACV and embassy position: 

We have been projecting an image of success over the recent months, and properly s

Now, when we release the fi gure of 420,000–431,000, the newsmen will immediate

seize on the point that the enemy force has increased about 120,000–130,000. A

available caveats and explanations will not prevent the press from drawing an erron

ous and gloomy conclusion as to the meaning of the increase. All those who hold a

incorrect view of the war will be reenforced and the task will become more diffi cult.

In our view, the strength fi gures for the [self-defense] and [secret self-defense for

es] should be omitted entirely from enemy strength tables in the forthcoming NI

This will prevent the possibility that they can be added to the valid fi gures, and a

erroneous conclusion drawn as to an enemy strength increase.37

The Saigon offi cials may have misunderstood the Central Intell

gence Agency’s position. Headquarters at Langley cabled the Saigo

station at the end of the conference that the agency “does not repea

not” advocate including the irregulars in the “full-time military forc

fi gure” and still adhered essentially to Carver’s July proposal. Indeed

the fi nal draft estimate that emerged from the Langley meeting cam

close to MACV’s fi gures for all categories of the enemy and did no

add together the military and paramilitary/political elements. Wes

moreland, Bunker, and Komer nevertheless continued their protests t

Washington, joined by Admiral Sharp and the Pacifi c Command chie

of intelligence, General Peterson.38

As General Abrams indicated, the substance of the special estimat

had come to be less important than its public relations effects in th

view of MACV and the Saigon embassy and indeed throughout th

Johnson administration. As Komer declared at one point, publicatio

of estimates showing increased Communist numbers would undercu

the administration’s claims of progress and “give the American public 

misleading picture.” Komer concluded, “The intelligence aspects hav

ceased to be important, it is the press relations which are crucial now

The Joint Chiefs of Staff, according to General Godding, also viewe

the “public release problem” as “the major problem.” The fi gures them

selves the chiefs considered “of lesser importance.”39

On 25 August, with discussion of the intelligence estimate seemingl

deadlocked, General Westmoreland with Ambassador Bunker’s concu

rence recommended to General Wheeler that “a team from the Wash

ington intelligence agencies concerned with this NIE visit this com

mand as soon as possible to develop a common and valid set of enem

strength statistics.” Agreeing that the self-defense elements should b

omitted from total enemy strength but willing to compromise on fi g

Chap 13.indd 456 
457

An Autumn of Uncertainty

ures for the guerrillas and administrative services, Wheeler granted the 

request. After the Joint Chiefs heard a report by General Godding on 

the Langley talks, Wheeler asked CIA Director Helms, in his capacity as 

head of the intelligence community, to send a personal representative 

to Saigon to try to resolve the dispute with MACV. Helms dispatched 

George Carver, along with a team of CIA analysts. The other military 

and civilian intelligence agencies and—betokening the true nature of 

higher level concerns—the assistant secretary of defense for public affairs also sent delegates. Informing Westmoreland of arrangements for 

the meeting, Wheeler left little doubt that more than technical intelligence issues were at stake. It was “imperative,” he told the MACV commander, “that we use comparable fi gures both in Saigon and Washington” because “in addition to the intelligence estimative problem, there 

is involved here an important public affairs problem.”40 

The Saigon conference opened on 9 September and promptly fell 

into deadlock. The MACV delegation, headed by Davidson himself, remained intransigent. It insisted on a strength of 119,000 for the combat 

forces, 29,000 for the administrative services, 65,000 for the guerrillas, 

and 85,000 for the political cadre, with no quantifi cation of the selfdefense and secret self-defense forces. The CIA fi gures were essentially 

those of the fi nal Langley SNIE draft: 121,000 combat, 40,000–60,000 

administrative, 60,000–100,000 guerrillas, and 90,000 political cadre, 

plus 120,000 for the self-defense and secret self-defense elements. Mutual frustration and irritation increased as the contending sides juggled 

fi gures. The other delegations, both civilian and military, concluded 

that MACV was defending a position based purely on public relations 

considerations in total disregard of both logic and evidence. Outbursts 

of profanity and aspersions on personal and professional integrity 

punctuated the discussions.41

Carver had come out with instructions from CIA Director Helms 

to take all reasonable steps to secure interagency agreement on a set 

of fi gures. He had hoped to meet with Westmoreland and Komer in 

advance of the working sessions to secure a lifting of the presumed 

MACV ceiling on enemy strength before trying to negotiate numbers 

for specifi c force categories. Westmoreland and Komer, however, had 

just fi nished shepherding the South Vietnamese through their presidential election, and both had left Saigon for short vacations. Fortunately, 

both Westmoreland and Komer returned to Saigon on 11 September. 

After a meeting with Komer the following day, Carver assembled the 

Washington delegations to prepare a fi nal offer for MACV. In six hours 

of intense discussion they hammered out a compromise set of fi gures 

and a method for dealing with the irregulars, which Carver presented 

to General Westmoreland in a meeting on the 13th. Westmoreland 

promptly approved the proposal while denying that he ever had set 

an arbitrary “ceiling” on MACV’s estimates of enemy strength. Subsequently, Ambassador Bunker also endorsed the agreement.42

Chap 13.indd 457 
458

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

In the accord, the concerned agencies set enemy strength a

119,000 for the combat forces, 35,000–40,000 for the administra

tive services, and 70,000–90,000 for the guerrillas, and agreed tha

only those elements would be counted in the military order of ba

tle. Higher fi gures for the political cadre would be published but no

added to the military forces on grounds that “such an aggregate tota

is inherently meaningless and misleading.” The conferees omitted th

self-defense and secret self-defense forces from the estimate’s strengt

tables. Instead, they used the narrative portion of the estimate to in

sert a paragraph, drafted by the Washington representatives, that de

scribed the composition and role of those forces and suggested tha

they might number as many as 150,000. These adjustments were 

logical evolution from the terms of the fi nal Langley draft, which ha

avoided any totaling of military, paramilitary, and political strength

The CIA secured acceptable higher fi gures for the administrative se

vices, guerrillas, and political cadre and at least acknowledgment o

the existence of the self-defense elements. MACV could continue t

publish an enemy military strength of under 300,000 and could kee

the partially armed militia from artifi cially infl ating the size of the op

posing army. General Westmoreland declared himself “satisfi ed tha

this is a good estimate and the best that can be derived from availabl

intelligence.”43

The fi nal version of Special National Intelligence Estimate 14.3–6

published on 13 November 1967 with the concurrence of the CIA, th

State Department, the DIA, and the NSA, incorporated the compro

mises reached in Saigon. It was a far from optimistic document. SNI

14.3–67 declared that, in spite of heavy casualties and growing dese

tion and recruiting diffi culties among the Viet Cong, the enemy coul

carry on his existing strategy of attrition in South Vietnam for “at lea

another year.” In support of this judgment, the estimate declared tha

although sustaining losses to ROLLING THUNDER, North Vietnam still ha

suffi cient manpower reserves to sustain indefi nitely its forces in th

south and to compensate at least partially for what the estimate con

sidered to be a decline in Viet Cong strength.

The estimate reiterated that the increases in Communist force cate

gories outside the regular forces resulted primarily from more sophist

cated analysis and asserted that the strength of those elements actuall

was less than it had probably been earlier. The estimate declared tha

any attempt to add together the military, paramilitary, and politica

components of enemy strength “would be misleading since it woul

involve adding components that have widely different missions an

degrees of skill or dedication.” Nevertheless, the SNIE noted that th

military force of 223,000–248,000 “constitutes but one component o

the total Communist organization” and warned that “any comprehen

sive judgment of Communist capabilities in South Vietnam must em

brace the effectiveness of all the elements which comprise that organ

Chap 13.indd 458 
459

An Autumn of Uncertainty

zation, the total size of which is of course considerably greater than the 

fi gure given for the military force.”44

Reaction to SNIE 14.3–67 within the intelligence community was 

mixed. CIA Director Helms, George Carver, the senior military offi cers, 

and some uniformed and civilian analysts accepted the estimate as a 

reasonably accurate picture of enemy strength. Other CIA analysts denounced Helms and Carver for “caving in” to MACV by marching the 

self-defense elements out of the order of battle and accepting overly 

low estimates for the other components. A substantial faction of military intelligence offi cers at MACV and other headquarters echoed CIA 

criticism of the estimate and continued to resent the command positions they had been forced to support and the order of battle methods 

they were compelled to follow. Some, increasingly disillusioned and 

cynical, became convinced they were participating in a deliberate falsifi cation of intelligence. An offi cer from the Army staff who followed 

the issue refl ected the extreme view: “I came to believe that General 

Westmoreland had authorized his MACV intelligence staff to intentionally falsify intelligence information about enemy strength . . . to 

give the erroneous impression that we were winning the war. I viewed 

this as a conscious effort or conspiracy on MACV’s part to distort crucial intelligence on the enemy we faced in Vietnam.”45

Tensions between the Military Assistance Command and the Central Intelligence Agency were further exacerbated during preparation of 

the offi cial statement presenting SNIE 14.3–67 to the news media. Although the release was issued by MACV in Saigon, the Offi ce of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs in Washington prepared 

the draft, which underwent intensive review by the White House and 

other interested agencies. Early versions of the statement all but omitted mention of the self-defense forces and political cadre or dismissed 

them as of no military importance. They also stressed the decline of 

enemy forces rather than the intelligence estimate’s conclusion that 

the other side was far from collapse. A senior CIA offi cer called the 

fi rst draft of the statement “one of the greatest snow jobs since Potemkin constructed his village.” The fi nal version, issued by Brig. Gen. 

Winant Sidle, the MACV chief of information, on 24 November, gave 

due treatment to the self-defense forces and political cadre as signifi -

cant elements of the enemy’s manpower, although not of his military 

strength. Nevertheless, the statement reiterated that any increases in 

enemy numbers resulted solely from improved analysis and that the 

opposing forces actually were decreasing in size. While mollifi ed, the 

CIA still refused to associate itself with the briefi ng on the grounds that 

it drew unsupportable conclusions at variance with the letter of SNIE 

14.3–67 and the spirit of the Saigon agreements.46

The order of battle dispute consumed a great deal of time and energy and created considerable ill will, with no satisfactory resolution, 

among the agencies involved. Since the dispute involved recalculation 

Chap 13.indd 459 
460

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

of the size of the enemy force already in the fi eld rather than sud

den discovery of a new buildup, its impact on policy and strategy wa

minimal. Although aware of the issue, departmental and White Hous

policymakers considered it at best peripheral to their own judgmen

of the state of the war. William P. Bundy, Assistant Secretary of State fo

East Asian and Pacifi c Affairs, recalled: “We attached far more weigh

to action evidence of enemy capabilities and performance than est

mates of size and tended to view all size estimates with considerabl

scepticism.” Secretary McNamara, even more emphatically, declare

that, however the argument over the size of the enemy had come ou

it “would not have infl uenced my thinking because I already felt ther

was no way to win the war militarily.”47

Which side was right in the argument over the number of enem

irregulars remains impossible to determine. Probably, the Communis

themselves did not know for certain the strength of their guerrilla

self-defense personnel, and political cadre. All of the intelligence agen

cies conceded the desirability of dividing the purely military elemen

of the order of battle from the paramilitary and political. The stickin

point was MACV’s insistence, largely for public relations reasons, tha

the self-defense elements should not be quantifi ed and that SNIE 14.3

67 should not contain any numbers for the paramilitary and politica

forces that the press could add to the military strength to enlarge th

Communist order of battle. That insistence, and what many CIA an

military intelligence offi cers considered MACV’s unprofessional, eve

dishonest manipulation of fi gures to stay within an arbitrary enem

strength ceiling, prolonged and embittered the controversy. In th

end, the Saigon agreement proved only a temporary compromise tha

left the CIA analysts, in particular, angry, frustrated, and spoiling for a

opportunity to revive the dispute. The Military Assistance Comman

had permitted public relations to invade the intelligence process, t

the detriment of the process itself and of the command’s reputatio

within the intelligence community.48

MACV’s strenuous campaign to maintain an image of progress i

the war refl ected more than the excessive salesmanship of an admin

istration hypersensitive to the pronouncements of news commenta

tors and the fl uctuations of public opinion polls. The command an

its Washington overseers understood, though probably less well tha

their adversaries, that the unconventional war in Vietnam would tur

on appearances as much as on realities.49 Since the military struggl

would inevitably be prolonged and indecisive, victory might well go t

whichever side could persuade enough people, offi cials and ordinar

citizens alike, both within its own ranks and among the enemy, that i

cause was just, its methods honorable, and its victory inevitable. Wha

peoples and governments believed about the situation in Vietnam i

the end would determine their political actions and the outcome of th

war. Hence, the allies and the Communists strove to shape the percep

Chap 13.indd 460 
461

An Autumn of Uncertainty

tions of various audiences in Southeast Asia and the rest of the world 

even as they tried to destroy each other’s forces on the battlefi eld. By 

late 1967, the Johnson administration probably was already beginning 

to lose the battle of perceptions even as its combat fortunes may have 

been improving. 

President Johnson Moves to Level Off the War

If the American administration was losing the external battle of 

perceptions, it also was losing the same battle within its own ranks. 

Offi cials who took an optimistic line in public often expressed growing doubts in private about the rightness and sustainability of the 

government’s course. After a trip to South Vietnam in late October 

to represent the United States at President Thieu’s inauguration, Vice 

President Hubert Humphrey, for example, cabled to President Johnson 

from Saigon that he had observed “evident progress” and declared that 

he was certain that “what we are doing here is right and that we have 

no choice but to persevere and see it through to success.” At the same 

time, he confi ded to a close friend who accompanied him, “I think 

we’re in real trouble. America is throwing lives and money down a corrupt rat hole.” Humphrey’s visit to South Vietnam left him convinced, 

as he later recalled, that “the American people would not stand for this 

involvement much longer.”50

Even as Humphrey was expressing his misgivings, Secretary McNamara reiterated his long-standing opposition to further American 

military escalation and proposed an alternative course of action. In a 

1 November memorandum to President Johnson, McNamara repeated 

more emphatically his earlier assertion that heavier bombing of North 

Vietnam and the dispatch of additional U.S. troops to South Vietnam 

would not cause the enemy to give up. Instead, this course, besides 

increasing America’s war costs and casualties, would lead simultaneously to military demands for still more escalation and to intensifi ed 

congressional and public calls for U.S. withdrawal. Under such circumstances, McNamara doubted that the United States could maintain its 

efforts in South Vietnam “for the time necessary to accomplish our 

objective there.”

McNamara went on to elaborate on his proposals for stabilizing 

both U.S. ground operations in the south and bombing in the north, so 

as to reduce domestic opposition to the war and to create an incentive 

for Hanoi to negotiate and/or cut back its military activities in South 

Vietnam. He urged the administration to top off the American troop 

commitment at the approved Program Five level of 525,000 and to rule 

out a mobilization of reserves and an expansion of ground actions into 

North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. Instead, the United States should 

“endeavor to maintain our current rates of progress but with lesser U.S. 

casualties and lesser destruction in South Vietnam” while gradually 

Chap 13.indd 461 
462

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

transferring the “major burden of the fi ghting” to Saigon’s forces.

Regarding North Vietnam, McNamara argued against any intens

fi cation of ROLLING THUNDER and opposed any blockade of the enemy

seaports. He strongly advocated a complete cessation of the bombin

in the belief that in response Hanoi would open negotiations and po

sibly halt or reduce its attacks across the Demilitarized Zone. Even 

these results did not occur, he insisted, the United States at least woul

have established in the eyes of domestic and foreign public opinio

that its bombing campaign was not the main obstacle to a peaceful se

tlement of the war. In conclusion, McNamara urged Johnson publicl

to announce a stabilization policy; to halt ROLLING THUNDER before th

end of the year; and to conduct an intensive review of U.S. operation

in South Vietnam with a view to reducing American casualties, lessen

ing the destruction of the south’s people and wealth, and progressivel

increasing Saigon’s combat role.51

The most immediately tangible effect of McNamara’s memoran

dum was to convince President Johnson that his secretary of defens

could no longer be relied upon to support the war. Unwilling to fi r

McNamara, for whom he still had high respect, and desiring to avoid 

politically embarrassing resignation by so prominent a member of h

cabinet, Johnson resorted to indirection to rid himself of his wave

ing defense secretary. He arranged for McNamara’s nomination for th

presidency of the World Bank, a position in which McNamara had pre

viously expressed interest. After the bank’s member governments ap

proved the nomination, McNamara accepted the job. On 29 Novembe

he announced at a Pentagon news conference that he would be leavin

the post that he had held for nearly seven years, but that he woul

remain in offi ce through February 1968 to prepare the next defens

budget. To the disappointment of Robert Kennedy and other antiwa

Democrats, McNamara made no public mention of his disillusionmen

with existing policy on Vietnam when announcing his departure an

throughout his remaining months in the Pentagon. He explained late

that despite his growing differences with Johnson over the war, he di

not resign in protest because he remained “loyal to the presidency an

loyal to him” and believed that he could still infl uence the president

decisions. “I therefore felt I had a responsibility to stay at my post.”52

Although Johnson eased McNamara out as secretary of defense, h

principal advisers were moving toward a consensus in favor of levelin

off if not deescalating the American effort. Commenting at the pre

ident’s request on McNamara’s 1 November memorandum, Secretar

of State Rusk, Undersecretary of State Nicholas DeB. Katzenbach, Mc

George Bundy, Walt Rostow, Ambassador Bunker, and unoffi cial pres

dential counselors Justice Abe Fortas and Clark Clifford all opposed a

immediate halt to the bombing of North Vietnam and any publicly an

nounced stabilization or deescalation of operations in South Vietnam

At the same time, however, they all rejected further escalation—wheth

Chap 13.indd 462 
463

An Autumn of Uncertainty

er by heavier bombing or a naval blockade of the north, deployment 

of additional U.S. troops to the south, or ground offensives in Laos and 

Cambodia—as unlikely to result in decisive success and certain to raise 

the human, economic, and political costs of the war to an unsustainable level. To maintain American public support and gird the country for a prolonged struggle, all advocated keeping ROLLING THUNDER

at about its current intensity, holding MACV’s forces at 525,000, and 

gradually shifting the burden of combat and pacifi cation to the South 

Vietnamese.53

General Westmoreland’s views fi tted in with this emerging consensus. He had discussed leveling off American troop strength with McNamara the previous year and realized that Johnson’s decision not to mobilize the reserves established a ceiling on the forces he could expect to 

receive. Commenting along with Bunker on McNamara’s 1 November 

memorandum, Westmoreland rejected a bombing halt but declined to 

recommend blockading or mining North Vietnam’s ports. He declared 

that it would be “foolish” for the United States to announce publicly 

a 525,000-man limit to its troop strength in South Vietnam, although 

he expressed the hope that no greater numbers would be needed. Despite his continuing concern with reducing casualties and destruction 

in South Vietnam, the MACV commander insisted that those considerations should not be allowed to dictate the conduct of his tactical 

operations. Recognizing the political problems that inhibited ground 

attacks in North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, he nevertheless favored maintaining the capability for those incursions and keeping the 

options open. Finally, Westmoreland declared that over the next two 

years he would have as his “central purpose” the transfer of military 

functions to the South Vietnamese, although he acknowledged that a 

“mature operational program” for doing so had yet to be developed. 

He declared, nevertheless, that he was “extremely conscious” that the 

United States, beyond achieving its “immediate purpose” in Vietnam, 

must “leave behind a military establishment capable of looking after 

itself increasingly.”54

The allies’ Combined Campaign Plan for 1968, issued by MACV 

and the Joint General Staff on 11 November, contained no program for 

transferring functions to the South Vietnamese. It called for the allies 

to continue military offensives to drive the North Vietnamese and Viet 

Cong main forces away from major population centers and food-producing areas and to conduct pacifi cation operations that would provide 

“territorial security at a level adequate to permit the destruction of VC 

infrastructure” and facilitate “the uninterrupted and accelerated progress of political, economic, sociological and pyschological programs” of 

the Saigon government. Maintaining the existing military division of 

labor, American and other allied forces would operate primarily against 

enemy units and bases, and the South Vietnamese would concentrate 

on territorial security. Without mentioning any turnover of responsiChap 13.indd 463 
464

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

bilities, the plan provided for continued improvement of the Sout

Vietnamese armed forces with emphasis on the Regional and Popula

Forces and for an increase in combined U.S.-Vietnamese training an

operations.55

In contrast to his campaign plan, Westmoreland’s public pro

nouncements refl ected and amplifi ed the inclination of the admin

istration to stabilize the war effort. The MACV commander sounde

many of these themes in his speech to the National Press Club on 2

November. Besides suggesting that the United States could begin turn

ing over military operations to the South Vietnamese within the nex

two years, Westmoreland predicted that in 1968 the war would ente

a new phase characterized by American efforts to ready Saigon’s force

for their assumption of “an ever-increasing share of the war.” At th

same time, the allies would work harder to “isolate the guerrilla from 

the people,” destroy the Viet Cong shadow government, help the Sa

gon regime eliminate corruption and “respond to popular aspirations

and improve the South Vietnamese economy and standard of living

This phase would be followed by a fi nal one during which the Unite

States would progressively withdraw its military forces while the en

larged, modernized South Vietnamese armed forces took charge of “th

fi nal mopping up of the Viet Cong,” a process that probably woul

take several years. Westmoreland did not address the question of who

if anyone, would mop up the North Vietnamese. Asked whether h

had enough American troops to achieve his objective, Westmorelan

declared that Program Five would provide him with “a well-balanced

hard-hitting military force that our country is capable of sustaining a

long as required.” With it, he could continue “indefi nitely” to main

tain and accelerate his pressure on the enemy.56

Shortly after the speech, Westmoreland explained to Genera

Abrams that he made these statements “on my own initiative,” afte

“considerable thought,” and with several considerations in mind:

I believe the concept and objective plan . . . is feasible and as such it should serv

as an incentive. The concept is compatible with the evolution of the war since ou

initial commitment and portrays to the American people ‘some light at the end 

the tunnel.’ The concept justifi es the augmentation of troops I’ve asked for based o

the principle of reinforcing success and also supports an increase in the strength 

the Vietnamese forces and their modernization. The concept straddles the presidenti

election of November 1968, implying that the election is not a bench mark from 

military point of view. Finally, it puts emphasis on the essential role of the Vietname

in carrying a major burden of their war against the Communists but also suggests th

we must be prepared for a protracted commitment.57

Westmoreland’s motives in making his pronouncements wer

clearly mixed. He seemed as concerned with ensuring American publ

support for further U.S. troop deployments and a prolonged confl ic

as with strengthening the South Vietnamese. Nevertheless, the MAC

Chap 13.indd 464 
465

An Autumn of Uncertainty

commander had obviously assimilated the themes that had emerged 

during nearly two years of exchanges with Washington over Programs Four and Five and that were coming to dominate administration thinking. He acknowledged implicitly that the struggle would be 

long; that the American buildup was nearing the limits of resources 

and political feasibility; that the South Vietnamese must be made to 

carry more of the load; and that, as McNamara had suggested, the 

American people required reassurance that their government knew 

how to end the confl ict or at minimum how to control the costs of 

U.S. engagement in it.

The fi nal word belonged to Lyndon Johnson, who gave it in a 

“memorandum for the fi le” dated 18 December. Johnson declared that 

he had studied McNamara’s proposals of 1 November and consulted 

about them with his Washington advisers as well as with Ambassador 

Bunker and General Westmoreland. He had, he said, reached certain 

conclusions. On ROLLING THUNDER, he had decided to continue the 

bombing at about the existing level of intensity and range of targets, 

while trying at the same time to reduce the “drama and public attention” that the air strikes received in the United States. “Under present 

circumstances,” the president ruled out a unilateral bombing halt because it would be interpreted in both North Vietnam and the United 

States as “a sign of weakening will.” In the United States, a bombing 

cessation would “decrease support from our most steady friends” and 

gain support from “only a small group of moderate doves.” The United States should play its “bombing card” only when “there is reason 

for confi dence that it would move us toward peace.” In Johnson’s 

judgment, that time had not yet come.

Regarding operations in South Vietnam, the president considered 

that the announcement of a “so-called policy of stabilization” would 

be another indication of American lack of determination. However, he 

endorsed stabilization in fact. He declared that “at the moment” he 

saw “no basis” for increasing U.S. forces above the Program Five level. 

In considering proposals for American ground offensives outside South 

Vietnam, he was “inclined to be extremely reserved unless a powerful 

case can be made” because such operations entailed political risks and 

would divert forces from “pressure on the VC” and pacifi cation. Nevertheless, he deemed it unwise to announce a policy that would deny 

the United States these options. Johnson agreed with McNamara’s recommendation that the administration review the conduct of military 

operations in the south with a view to reducing the toll of American 

dead and wounded, “accelerating” the turnover of combat to Saigon’s 

forces, and “working toward less destruction and fewer casualties in 

South Vietnam.”58

By the close of 1967, the Johnson administration had reached a 

consensus on ending the expansion of the American military effort 

in Vietnam and had abandoned its hope, which had never been very 

Chap 13.indd 465 
466

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

strong, for a clear-cut battlefi eld victory. Instead, the administratio

would try to hold the line in Southeast Asia and at home until diplo

macy or improvements in the Saigon government and its armed force

opened an honorable way out of the war. Although this approach ha

yet to be embodied in formal operational plans and directives, key ele

ments of it were in effect as the result of earlier decisions. By his repea

ed refusal to breach the political “Plimsoll line” of a reserve call-up, fo

example, Johnson for practical purposes had already imposed a ceilin

on U.S. troop strength in South Vietnam. 

The Enemy Plans an Offensive

Even as President Johnson and his advisers tentatively decided t

level off the American war effort in Vietnam, their adversaries in Hano

completed preparations to do the opposite. Undeterred by the increa

ing American pressure, the northern and southern revolutionary lead

ers held unwaveringly to their maximum goal: a unifi ed Communi

Vietnam. Like the Americans, the Communist leaders believed that th

confl ict had reached a stalemate, but for them a stalemate represente

only a temporary equilibrium of forces, a stage on their march to inev

table victory. Instead of a way out of the confl ict, they sought a mean

to shift the balance in their favor.59

By the spring of 1967, the Vietnamese Communists believed tha

they had passed through the fi rst two stages of revolutionary people

war—those of organization and base building and of guerrilla wa

fare—and had entered the third and fi nal stage. In that stage, larg

combat-seasoned guerrilla and main forces, backed by a strong politic

infrastructure and mass popular following, were in position to launc

what the Communists called the General Offensive–General Uprising

In this revolutionary climax, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong mil

tary units would launch attacks to destroy the South Vietnamese Arm

and pin down American forces. As these actions went on, urban an

rural popular uprisings, spearheaded by commando assaults on Sout

Vietnamese military headquarters, administrative facilities, and com

munications centers, would sweep away the puppet regime and insta

National Liberation Front governments at every level from the ham

lets to Saigon. Since the early 1960s, the North Vietnamese Commu

nist party had identifi ed the General Offensive–General Uprising as th

culminating point of its politico-military campaign in the south. Fo

the Saigon area, the Central Offi ce for South Vietnam (COSVN), the se

nior enemy headquarters for the southern half of South Vietnam, ha

prepared detailed plans for such an operation. Since 1965 COSVN ha

been compelled to divert its resources to the growing battle against th

Americans, but its plans remained in the fi les ready to be brought up t

date and executed.

More than the diversion of resources may have held back the o

Chap 13.indd 466 
467

An Autumn of Uncertainty

fensive. In response to the massive intervention of American combat 

forces, factions among the North Vietnamese leaders engaged in a twoyear debate over war strategy. Masking their differences in Marxist-Leninist jargon, the contending groups promoted their views through 

polemics published in the offi cial Communist press and broadcast on 

North Vietnam’s state radio. They argued over the proper relationship 

between large-unit and guerrilla operations, the relative roles of political and military struggle and of fi ghting and diplomacy, and the merits 

of protracted confl ict versus an all-out drive for victory in the shortest 

possible time. By mid-1967, they had reached a consensus that would 

blend most of the contending elements of their strategy in the context 

of the General Offensive–General Uprising.60

In a mirror image of General Westmoreland’s view of the confl ict, 

the Communist leaders believed that they were making slow but steady 

progress in their struggle. Maj. Gen. Tran Van Tra, the COSVN military 

commander, for example, acknowledged in retrospect that his forces 

had encountered “diffi culties and weaknesses” in replacing casualties, 

building political strength, and “conducting mass movements in urban 

areas.” Nevertheless, he argued, these problems existed “in the context 

of a favorable situation” in which the revolutionary army held the initiative and the Americans were “bewildered by the new battlefi eld” and 

by the Communists’ “new form of war.”61

Although the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong were taking heavy 

losses and winning few victories on the battlefi eld and the U.S. bombing was placing severe pressure on the north’s society and economy, 

the political situation held much promise. The leaders in Hanoi knew 

that antiwar sentiment was mounting in the United States and among 

“progressive” forces around the world. Still better, during 1968, a presidential election year, the American administration would be under 

additional strain that likely would inhibit its response to new Communist initiatives. Even more promising, South Vietnam appeared to 

be extremely vulnerable. The majority of South Vietnamese soldiers 

and people, the Communists assumed, in their hearts hated the Saigon 

regime and its American “imperialist” sponsors. Viewed from Hanoi, 

the I Corps revolt of 1966, periodic antigovernment demonstrations 

by Buddhists and other groups, the relatively small proportion of the 

popular vote received by the Thieu-Ky ticket in the September 1967 

presidential election, and the presence of tens of thousands of impoverished, displaced peasants in city slums were harbingers of incipient 

revolution in the urban centers of Saigon’s power. Only a spark, a catalytic event, was needed to set South Vietnam’s cities afl ame, inspire 

Saigon’s troops to defect, and sweep away the puppet regime.

Around May 1967 the collective leadership of the North Vietnamese Communist (Lao Dong) Party initiated planning for the General 

Offensive–General Uprising. At that time, the Politburo, the party’s 

inner executive directorate, instructed the Central Party Military AfChap 13.indd 467 
468

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fairs Committee, in coordination with the major theater commands i

the south, to prepare an overall plan for the assault. During June, th

party’s Central Committee unanimously endorsed the Politburo’s stra

tegic decision to “prepare a decisive victory in 1968.” In July the Poli

buro approved the Military Affairs Committee’s plan and set a tenta

tive date for the offensive. At the end of October, on the basis of repor

from the south, the leaders in Hanoi pushed the date forward to 30–3

January 1968, the beginning of Vietnam’s Tet lunar new year holiday

The change left local commanders in the south with a very short tim

for preparation, but the Communist leaders believed that an offensiv

during the festivities would catch Saigon’s forces off guard and hav

maximum military and political impact. The Politburo then develope

a policy resolution and a detailed operational plan based on the earlie

work of the Military Affairs Committee.

In December the Politburo presented the resolution to the Fou

teenth Plenum, or general meeting, of the Lao Dong Party Centra

Committee. Approved by the delegates and formally issued on 1 Janu

ary 1968 as Central Resolution Fourteen, the document defi ned th

enemy’s “crucial mission” during the winter–spring 1967–1968 cam

paigning season as “to mobilize the greatest efforts of the entire Part

the entire army, and the entire people in both regions [north and south

to carry our revolutionary war to the highest level of development an

use the general offensive and general uprising to secure a decisive vic

tory in a relatively short time.”

By the time the Central Committee adopted Resolution Fourteen, prep

arations for the campaign were well under way. During the summer an

fall, North Vietnam concluded new military and economic aid agreemen

with the Soviet Union and China, ensuring itself of the wherewithal t

fi ght the coming battles. The North Vietnamese increased the fl ow of me

and materiel down the Ho Chi Minh Trail. According to a later Communi

account, more than 31,700 personnel entered South Vietnam during 196

more than twice the number infi ltrated during the previous year, alon

with over 6,500 tons of weapons and supplies. The weaponry include

thousands of automatic rifl es, machine guns, and rocket-propelled ant

tank grenade launchers. Viet Cong military units clandestinely assemble

supplies near South Vietnam’s cities and prepared for their urban attac

missions. Party cadres assembled lists of government offi cials and suppor

ers to be killed or kidnapped, as well as lists of members of the prospectiv

NLF town and province administrations. To wear down American force

and divert their attention from the offensive preparations, North Vietnam

ese and Viet Cong main forces launched heavy attacks on allied position

near South Vietnam’s borders in I, II, and III Corps. General Westmorelan

interpreted these engagements, all of which ended in Communist defeat

as desperate enemy efforts to gain limited successes for political and psy

chological purposes that had backfi red by exposing their troops to slaugh

ter by American fi repower.62

Chap 13.indd 468 
469

An Autumn of Uncertainty

As 1967 ended, the two sides in Vietnam were moving in opposite 

directions. Believing that its escalation during the previous two years 

had resulted only in stalemate, the Johnson administration was set on 

stabilizing the American effort in the hope of holding on long enough 

to negotiate an acceptable compromise with the Communists or, failing that, to prepare the South Vietnamese to take over the fi ghting. By 

contrast, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong, equally aware that the 

war seemed to be on dead center but still committed to their maximum 

objectives, were preparing for a major escalation of violence that they 

believed would bring them closer to fi nal victory. Largely ignorant of 

each other’s intentions, the antagonists marched toward a climactic 

collision.

Chap 13.indd 469 
470

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Notes

1 This and the preceding paragraph are based on Msg, Westmoreland MAC 531

to Sharp, 4 Jun 67, and Memo, Westmoreland for Bunker, 21 Jun 67, tabs A–7 an

A–17, Westmoreland Hist File 19 (1 Jun–5 Jul 67); Westmoreland Notes for Talk wit

the President, Nov 67, tab A–13, Westmoreland Hist File 25 (13–28 Nov 67). Msg

Westmoreland MAC 8073 and MAC 10295 to Wheeler, 25 Aug and 30 Oct 67; Lt Ge

Bruce Palmer to Westmoreland, 11 Dec 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, Aug–De

67, CMH. 2 First quote is from Affi davit, Barry Zorthian, 15 Dec 83, in U.S. District Cour

Southern District of New York, General William C. Westmoreland, Plaintiff, v. CBS, Inc., 

al., Defendants. 82 Civ. 7913 (PNL). Plaintiff General William C. Westmoreland’s Memora

dum of Law in Opposition to Defendant CBS’s Motion to Dismiss and for Summary Judgmen

Appendix A—Affi davits Cited in Support of Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant’s Motion, 

406. Second is from Msg, Komer to President via CIA Channel, 9 Jul 67, Montagu

Papers, copy in CMH; in same collection, see Draft Ltr, Komer to President, 20 Aug 6

Memo, Roy Wehrle for Ambassador Bunker, 6 Jul 67, sub: Stalemate?, tab A–3, Westm

reland Hist File 19 (6 Jul–7 Aug 67), CMH. 3 McNaughton quote is from U.S.–Vietnam Relations, sec. 4.C.6(b), p. 147. For a

counts of trends in public opinion, see: Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–196

pp. 263–64, 338–40; and Don Oberdorfer, Tet! (New York: DaCapo Press, 1984), ch. 

passim. 4 First quote is from Msg, Wheeler CJCS 2837–66 to Westmoreland info Sharp, 2

May 66. Second quote is from Msg, Wheeler JCS 7126–67 to Westmoreland, 30 Au

67. Third is from Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 24 Dec 66. See also Msg, Gen Johnson WD

13029 to Westmoreland, 2 Oct 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1966–1967, CMH

Memo, Westmoreland for Bunker, 16 May 67, sub: Mobilization of the Republic 

Vietnam, Westmoreland Sig File, May 67, CMH. Affi davit, Maj Gen Winant Sidle, 2

Apr 84, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland Law Memorandum, app. A, p. A–369. 5 The evolution of mission and MACV information policy is traced in detail 

Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, chs. 3–10, passim. Examples of Wes

moreland’s approach to the media are in Westmoreland Hist Notes, 20 Nov 65, ta

D, Westmoreland Hist File 2 (25 Oct– 20 Dec 65), CMH; in same fi le, see “Speech D

livered by General Westmoreland at the Closing of the MACV Information Offi cer

Conference,” 8 Nov 65, tab D–2; and Westmoreland Hist Notes, 1 Dec 65, tab F. 6 First quote is from MFR, Maj K. W. Accousti, 25 Dec 65, sub: COMUSMACV Vis

to 1st Inf Div and 173d Airborne Bde, 24 Dec 65, tab A–2, Westmoreland Hist File 

(20 Dec 65–29 Jan 66), CMH. Second quote is from Msg, Westmoreland MAC 5693 

Component and Field Force Cmdrs, 16 Jun 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–30 Ju

67, CMH. Third is from MacDonald-Westmoreland Interv, 28 Jan 73, CMH fi les. 7 Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 292–300, 328–31. MACV Com

mand History, 1967, p. 1200. Memo, Westmoreland for Bunker, 8 Aug 67, sub: Recen

Improvement in RVNAF Combat Effectiveness, Westmoreland Sig File, Aug 67, CMH

Msgs, Wheeler JCS 6105–67 to Westmoreland and Gen Johnson, 1 Aug 67; Westmor

land MAC 7180 to Wheeler, Johnson and Sharp, 2 Aug 67; Westmoreland MAC 718

and MAC 7430 to Sharp, 3 Aug and 8 Aug 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, Jul–Se

67, CMH. For Ridgway visit, see same fi les for Oct 67. 8 Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 287–90, 330–40. Westmor

land tells his own story of the trips in A Soldier Reports, pp. 224–34, 276. Senate crit

cisms of Westmoreland’s speech are in Summary of Senate Remarks on Westmorelan

Chap 13.indd 470 
471

An Autumn of Uncertainty

Visit, 28 Apr 67, tab B–20, Westmoreland Hist File 15 (3 Mar–30 Apr 67), CMH. Final 

quote is from MFR, Westmoreland, 22 Nov 67, sub: Breakfast Meeting at White House 

on 22 November, tab A–31, Westmoreland Hist File 25 (13–28 Nov 67), CMH. 9 Msg, Wheeler JCS 00920 to Westmoreland info Sharp, 27 Jan 68, Westmoreland Msg Files, Jan 68, CMH, describes the president’s hopefulness. Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 289–90, notes correspondents’ growing skepticism 

after Westmoreland’s fi rst Washington trip. Brig Gen Winant Sidle, the MACV chief of 

public affairs, warns of the danger of overselling progress in MFR, Chaisson, 12 Oct 67, 

sub: MACV Commanders’ Conference, 24 Sep 67, encl. 3, tab A–22, Westmoreland Hist 

File 22 (10–30 Sep 67), CMH. 10 This issue is recounted in Hammond, Military and the Media, 1962–1968, pp. 

280–82. 11 Thayer, War Without Fronts, pp. 785–88; Deposition, George Carver, pp. 15, 

299–300, in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection—Westmoreland v. CBS (Microfi che), 

(Broomfi eld, Colo.: Clearwater Publishing Co., Inc., 1985), cards 167 and 170; U.S. 

District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 135–38; Memo, J. 

A. Norkin for Dr. Heyman through Mr. Thayer, 24 Jan 67, sub: VC/NVA Offensive Capability—Battalions with No Positive Contact, Folder 123, Thayer Papers, CMH. Lt Gen 

Phillip B. Davidson, Secrets of the Vietnam War (Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1990), pp. 

74–75, 80–81. 12 Gen Bruce Palmer, Jr., “US Intelligence in Vietnam,” Studies in Intelligence, Special 

Issue, 28 (1984):10–14; Palmer, 25-Year War, p. 30; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 

415–16; U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, p. 14. Ibid., app. 

A, pp. 39–40, 221, 228; Carver Deposition, pp. 22–23, Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, card 167. Intervs, LBJL with Lt Gen Phillip B. Davidson, 30 Mar and 30 Jun 82, 

Interv 1, pp. 22–25; Interv 2, pp. 27–32. 13 U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 17–18, 

25–26, 327–29, 331–32, 357–58; Carver Deposition, pp. 75–77, Vietnam: A Documentary 

Collection, card 167; Memo, Rostow for the President, Friday, 20 Jan 67, 3:05 p.m., LBJL, 

copy in CMH. 14 Quote is from Msg, Taylor Saigon 108 to SecState, 15 Jul 64; see also Taylor Saigon 107 to SecState, 15 Jul 64; and Msg, State 234 to AmEmb Saigon, 24 Jul 64. All in 

NSC Country File, Vietnam, box 6, LBJL. Msg, Wheeler CJCS 7859–66 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 21 Dec 66, Westmoreland Msg Files, Oct–Dec 66, CMH. U.S. District 

Court, Westmoreland Memorandum of Law, app. A, p. 328. Interv, CMH with George 

Allen (tape), 4 May 92, emphasizes general agreement that the enemy force was declining, but from a higher starting point than earlier estimated. 15 Msg, Wheeler CJCS 0547–67 to Westmoreland and Sharp, 20 Jan 67, in U.S. 

District Court, Southern District of New York, General William C. Westmoreland, Plaintiff, v. CBS, Inc., et al., Defendants. 82 Civ. 7913 (PNL). Plaintiff’s Counter–Statement of 

Undisputed Material Facts Pursuant to Local Rule 3(g) and Appendix B—Important Documents Cited in Support of Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant’s Motion, pp. 363–67; Rpt, 

Intelligence Conference, CINCPAC, Camp H. M. Smith, Hawaii, 6–11 Feb 67, JX 227, 

Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, card 615; 6–11 Feb 67; McChristian, Military Intelligence, pp. 128–29. 16 CINCPAC Intel Conf, 6–11 Feb 67, ann. B, pp. 1–2. 

17 For an early discussion of the problem of counting irregulars, see Msg, COMUSMACV to DIA, 21 May 64, CMH fi les. Affi davit, Col Edward H. Caton, USAF, 16 Mar 

84, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS: Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 42–43; 

Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 33–34; and CINCPAC Intel Conf Rpt, 6–11 Feb 67, pp. 

9–10, are additional typical statements of the problem.

Chap 13.indd 471 
472

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

18 Quotes are from CINCPAC Intel Conf Rpt, 6–11 Feb 67, p. 8; see also pp. 9–1

Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 32, 34–35; U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CB

Memorandum of Law, pp. 12–13, 33–38; and app. A, pp. 197, 223–26, 310–11. 19 Memo, McChristian for Komer, 21 May 67, sub: Strength of VC Irregular Force

with attachment: USMACV–JGS RVNAF Estimate of the Strength of Viet Cong Irregul

Forces in SVN, 18 May 67, U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum 

Law, app. B, pp. 441–43; all quotes are from latter document. Memo, McChristian f

Louis W. Sandine, 12 Mar 67, sub: Request for Comment on Captured Notebooks an

Possible Impact on Order of Battle Holdings, in ibid., pp. 446–47. 20 McChristian gives two slightly different versions of this meeting in his Affi dav

21 Dec 83, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, p

222–24; and Affi davit, 20 Apr 84, in U.S. District Court, Southern District of New Yor

General William C. Westmoreland, Plaintiff, v. CBS, Inc., et al., Defendants. 82 Civ. 791

(PNL). Memorandum in Support of Defendant CBS’s Motion to Dismiss and for Summa

Judgment, pp. 47–48. See also Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 36–41. 21 Quotes are from MFR, Hendry, USAF, 20 May 67, sub: CIIC Meeting, 19 Ma

67, tab A–20, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67), CMH; in same fi le, see ta

B–6. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, pp. 16–18; Affi d

vit, Kelly Robinson, 25 Jul 83, ibid., app. A, p. 311. Ltr, Col Gains B. Hawkins to M

Hawkins, 30 May 67, U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of La

app. B, p. 147. Msgs, Sharp to Westmoreland, 10 Jun 67; Westmoreland MAC 5616 an

MAC 6117 to Sharp, 14 Jun 67 and 29 Jun 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Apr–3

Jun 67, CMH. 22 The public relations element in Westmoreland’s approach is acknowledged 

Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 41–42; and Palmer, Intelligence in Vietnam, pp. 49–5

For views on military importance of the self-defense and secret self-defense forces, se

Memo, Col R. M. Montague for Komer, 29 Sep 66, sub: Guerrilla Strength, LBJL, cop

in CMH; and U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Counter-Statement, app. B, p

310, 365, 377–78, 397–411, 446–47. Komer emphasizes the public relations aspect 

Memo for Westmoreland, 19 Jun 67, sub: How to Get Our Case across to McNamara, 

Westmoreland Memos, RWK (1967–68), DEPCORDS Files, CMH. 23 Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 34–36; Palmer, Intelligence in Vietnam, pp. 34–3

40–41, 52–54; U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 64–6

U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, pp. 31–33, 46, 194 an

app. A, pp. 25, 219, 266–67, 399; MFR, Allen, 5 Jul 67, in U.S. District Court, Westm

reland v. CBS, Counter-Statement, app. B, pp. 309–11; Carver Deposition, pp. 446–52, 

Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, card 171; Paper, 28 Jun 68, sub: Uncertainties abou

VC/NVA Force Levels, Folder 42, Thayer Papers, CMH. 24 U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, p. 47. Carver D

position, pp. 56–57, 66–67, in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, card 167. 25 CBS Memorandum, p. 65. Draft MFR, Sam Adams, 23 Jun 67, sub: NIE 14.3–67—

The USIB Representatives Meeting, 23 Jun 67, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland 

CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 336–40. 26 Director Helms, and Carver as his deputy and alter ego on Vietnam matter

played a dual role in preparation of the intelligence estimate, in that the CIA direct

acted both as chairman of the Board of National Estimates and as head of the CIA. I

the former role, he was supposed to preside impartially over the interagency deba

and try to secure consensus; in the latter, he was expected, at least by his CIA subord

nates, to fi ght hard for the agency position. For comment on these points, see Carv

Deposition, pp. 9–10, 54–55, 413–14, 417–18, 421, in Vietnam: A Documentary Colle

tion, cards 167 and 171.

Chap 13.indd 472 
473

An Autumn of Uncertainty

27 Quote is from MFR, Allen, 5 Jul 67, U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, 

Counter-Statement, app. B, pp. 309–11. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 213–16, 269–71, 309–10, 317–18, 396. Carver’s views are in 

his Deposition, pp. 299–300, 454, 463–64, 635–37, Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, 

cards 170, 171, 173. 28 Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 2014 and MAC 2311 to Gen Johnson, 1 Mar 67 and 

10 Mar 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jan–31 Mar 67; Westmoreland Hist Notes, 23–31 

May 67, tab B, Westmoreland Hist File 17 (1–31 May 67). All in CMH. McChristian 

Affi davit, 21 Dec 83, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, 

app. A, p. 222. Davidson Interv, 30 Mar and 30 Jun 82, sess. 1, pp. 1–2, 4–5, 21–22; 

Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 1–2, 6–7. 29 This discussion is based on depositions and affi davits in U.S. District Court, 

Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 46, 137, 254–55, 263–64, 281–82, 

300–301, 383; U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 149–53; 

and Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 251, 269, 275, 345, 346, 358. See also Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 10–14, 108; Davidson Intervs, 30 Mar and 30 Jun 82, sess.1, 

pp. 6–8; Intervs, LBJL with Daniel O. Graham, 24 May and 8 Nov 82, sess. 1, pp. 1–3, 

33–34; sess. 2, pp. 10–13, 18–19. 30 Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 69–70. Graham Intervs, 24 May and 8 Nov 82, 

sess. 1, pp. 6–10, 31–33; sess. 2, pp. 1–6, 22–23. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland Memorandum of Law, app. A, p. 134. Msg, Scorberg to Director, CIA, 11 Jul 67, in U.S. District 

Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, App. B, pp. 332–34. Memo, Thomas 

Thayer for Mr. Glass, [1967], sub: VC/NVA Order of Battle, etc., Folder 123, Thayer Papers, CMH. Depositions, Michael D. Hankins, p. 63; Charles Morris (no. 2), pp. 427–29; 

in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 269 and 351. 31 Komer quote is from Memo for Davidson, 7 Sep 67, copy in CMH. Memos, Walt 

Rostow for the President, 3 Jan 67, 6:10 pm., and 31 Jul 67, 1:55 pm., LBJL, copies in 

CMH. Westmoreland Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 197–98, 228, 261. Westmoreland 

Hist Notes, 17 Jul 66, tab F, Westmoreland Hist File 7 (29 May–16 Jul 66), CMH. Msg, 

Robert Komer to President via CIA Channel, 9 Jul 67; Draft Ltr, Komer to the President, 

20 Aug 67. Both in Robert Montague Papers, Historians fi les, CMH. 32 Graham quote is from LBJL Intervs, 24 May and 8 Nov 82, sess. 2, pp. 3–4. U.S. 

District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 96, 239. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 18–32, 57–58, 123–26; Jones, 

War Without Windows, pp. 63–65, 72. Affi davits, Howard A. Daniel III; Michael Fraboni; 

George Hamscher; Kelly Robinson; cards 444 and 445. Quote is from Hawkins Deposition, p. 356; see also pp. 58–62, 160, 189, 443–45, 506–09, cards 271–76. All in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection. 33 Quotes and most details of this meeting are from U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 168–71; see also pp. 311, 332–33. Komer 

Affi davit, 19 Apr 84, ibid., app. A, p. 202. Carver Deposition, pp. 466–67, Vietnam: A 

Documentary Collection, card 171. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 65–66. 34 Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 42–45, 53–54. Copy of MACV Vu–Graph Slide, 

Aug 67; Msg, Brig Gen George Godding DB–2CI 050 to Maj Gen C. G. Peterson info 

Davidson, 19 Aug 67. Both in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum 

of Law, app. B, pp. 183, 414–15. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, p. 66; Deposition, George Godding, pp. 5–6, 262–66, Vietnam: A Documentary 

Collection, cards 250 and 252. 35 Quote is from Msg, Davidson to Godding, 19 Aug 67, U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, p. 198. Westmoreland defends his actions 

Chap 13.indd 473 
474

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

in A Soldier Reports, p. 416. For other testimony that MACV intelligence offi cers b

lieved there was a ceiling, see U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memora

dum, pp. 72–78. 

36 Hawkins Deposition, see also pp. 244–45, 527. First Quote is from Kelly Robin

son, Affi davit, 28 Oct 83, paras. 22–26; second is from Hamscher Affi davit, Questio

9, see also Question 1; Carver Deposition, p. 322; Godding Deposition, pp. 85, 19

198–99. All in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 250–52, 273, 276, 322, 44

445. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 312–1

U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 67–68, 70–72, 81. 37 Msg, Abrams MAC 7840 to Wheeler, Sharp, and Westmoreland, 20 Aug 67, Wes

moreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH; in same fi le, see Msgs, Abrams MAC 784

to Westmoreland, 20 Aug 67, and Westmoreland MAC 7859 to Wheeler and Shar

20 Aug 67. Msgs, Komer to Carver, 19 Aug 67; Bunker to Rostow, 29 Aug 67, in U.

District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 195–96, 449–5

Affi davits, Ellsworth Bunker 22 Dec 83; Robert Komer 19 Apr 84. Both in U.S. Distri

Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, app. A, pp. 26, 202–04. 38 U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 34

417–18, 424–25. Msg, Godding to Peterson and Davidson, 25 Aug 67, Historians File

CMH. Msg, Sharp to Wheeler, 26 Aug 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 6

CMH. 39 First two quotes are from Draft Cable, Westmoreland to Wheeler, att. to Mem

Davidson for Komer, [Aug 67], CMH. While nominally drafted by Davidson, the ke

points in the message seem to have been provided by Komer. Third quote is from Ms

Godding to Peterson and Davidson, 25 Aug 67, CMH. U.S. District Court, Westmorelan

v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 18–20, 27, 205–06, 329–30, 406–08. Davidso

Vietnam Secrets, pp. 44, 66–67. 40 Quotes are from Msgs, Westmoreland MAC 8068 to Wheeler and Sharp, 25 Au

67; and Wheeler JCS 7143–67 to Sharp and Westmoreland, 30 Aug 67; see also Ms

Wheeler JCS 6483–67 to Westmoreland, 11 Aug 67. All in Westmoreland Msg Files, 

Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Msgs, Godding DB–2C1050 to Peterson info Davidson, 19 Aug 6

CIA Washington to Saigon Station. Both in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CB

Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 343–47, 413. Godding Deposition, p. 318; Hawkin

Deposition, pp. 434–35. Both in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 253, 275. 41 U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 205–3

393–94. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 120

23, 204–05, 368. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 11

121–22; Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 45–47, 71. Carver Deposition, pp. 417, 459–6

481–83; Davidson Deposition 2, pp. 74–75. Both in Vietnam: A Documentary Collectio

cards 171, 172, 231; Graham Intervs, 24 May and 8 Nov 1982, sess. 2, pp. 13–15. 42 Msgs, Carver to Helms, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandu

of Law, app. B, pp. 211–35, 237–39; Bunker, Affi davit 22 Dec 83, in ibid., app. A, 

27. Carver Deposition, pp. 423–24, 509–11, 540–41, 552–55, 632–35, 641–42, 662–6

Davidson Deposition 1, pp. 149–50. Both in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, card

171–73, 228. Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, pp. 47–50, 68–69. Westmoreland Hist Note

21 Aug–9 Sep 67, Westmoreland Hist File 21 (21 Aug–9 Sep 67), and Hist Notes, 10–2

Sep 67, tab A, Westmoreland Hist File 22 (10–30 Sep 67), CMH. 43 First quote, and text of the compromise, is in Msg, Carver to Helms, Westm

reland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, App. B, pp. 221–28. Second quote is from Ms

Westmoreland MAC 8703 to McConnell and Sharp, 14 Sep 67, Westmoreland M

Files, 1 Jul–30 Sep 67, CMH. Paper, CIA Directorate of Intelligence, 15 Sep 67, su

Communist Strength in South Vietnam, no. 1269/67, copy in CMH. For compariso

Chap 13.indd 474 
475

An Autumn of Uncertainty

of fi nal fi gures with earlier CIA and MACV versions, see Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, 

pp. 50–51. 44 Special National Intelligence Estimate (SNIE). Submitted by Richard Helms, Director 

of Central Intelligence. Concurred in by the United States Intelligence Board . . . 13 Nov 67, 

reproduced in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 243–

72; Quote is from p. 262 (p. 16 of original). In ibid., pp. 385–89, see Memo, CIA, 15 Nov 67. 45 MFR, Adams, 9 Nov 67; quote is from Affi davit, Col Elmer Martin, paras. 1 and 

15. Both in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, CBS Memorandum, pp. 33n and 

130; see also pp. 114–25, 131. Jones, War Without Windows, pp. 106–10. For defenses 

of the estimate, see U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. 

A, pp. 49–52, 120, 122, 215–16, 395–98; Davidson, Vietnam Secrets, p. 51; and Carver 

Deposition, pp. 396–97, 596–98, in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 171, 173. 46 Quote is from U.S. District Court, CBS Memorandum, pp. 133–34; see also pp. 

135–42. U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, Memorandum of Law, pp. 89–90; and 

app. A, pp. 127–28, 369, 398–99, 405–06. MACV Briefi ng on Enemy Order of Battle, 

Released in Saigon at 0400 hrs EST, 24 Nov 67, in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. 

CBS, Memorandum of Law, app. B, pp. 273–82; see also p. 241. Carver Deposition, pp. 

229–30, 250–52, 809–10, in Vietnam: A Documentary Collection, cards 169, 175. White 

House involvement with the press release is recounted in Hammond, Military and the 

Media, 1962–1968, p. 327. 47 First quote is from Affi davit, William P. Bundy, 19 Dec 83; second is from Affi -

davit, Robert S. McNamara, 1 Dec 83. Both in U.S. District Court, Westmoreland v. CBS, 

Memorandum of Law, app. A, pp. 20, 231–32. In same collection, see Affi davits, John 

P. Roche, 20 Apr 84, pp. 322–23; and John L. Hart, 21 Feb 84, pp. 116–18. Davidson, 

Vietnam Secrets, pp. 63–66. 48 For comments on the uncertainty of numbers, see Lung, Intelligence, p. 86. Allen 

Interv eloquently expresses a CIA offi cer’s frustration at “unprofessional” MACV intelligence behavior. A retrospective CIA history alleges that Carver caved in in Saigon; 

see Harold P. Ford, CIA and the Vietnam Policymakers: Three Episodes, 1962–1968 (Washington, D.C.: History Staff, Center for the Study of Intelligence, Central Intelligence 

Agency, 1998), pp. 95–104. 49 North Vietnamese emphasis on molding perceptions of the struggle and thereby 

shaping the result is summarized in Douglas Pike, PAVN: People’s Army of Vietnam (Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1986), pp. 247–49. 50 U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, The U.S. Government and 

the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part IV: July 1965–January 1968 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1994), pp. 894–95. Hereafter 

cited as U.S. Congress, Senate, Government and the Vietnam War 4. 51 U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968. vol. 5,

Vietnam 1967 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 2002), hereafter cited 

as FRUS Vietnam, 1967, pp. 943–50. 52 Quotes are from Robert S. McNamara with Brian VanDeMark, In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam (New York: Random House, 1995), pp. 311–14. See also Deborah 

Shapley, Promise and Power: The Life and Times of Robert McNamara (Boston: Little, Brown, 

and Company, 1993), pp. 436–41. 53 U.S. Congress, Senate, Government and the Vietnam War 4, pp. 884–91. 54 FRUS Vietnam, 1967, pp. 1040–42. 55 HQMACV, Combined Campaign Plan, 1968, AB 143, 11 Nov 67, pp. 1–12. Historians 

Files, CMH. 56 Gen William C. Westmoreland, Address to National Press Club, Washington, D.C., 

21 Nov 67, Historians Files, CMH. Westmoreland also made the “well balanced hard–

Chap 13.indd 475 
476

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

hitting force” comment in a meeting with President Johnson and his advisers on 20 N

vember; see FRUS Vietnam, 1967, p. 1058. 57 Quotes are from Msg, Westmoreland HWA 3445 to Abrams, 25 Nov 67, Wes

moreland Msg Files, 1–30 Nov 67, CMH. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, pp. 221–2

234–35, 255, gives his version of the origins and rationale of his remarks. He com

ments in a similar vein in Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, pp. 136, 219. 58 Full text is in FRUS Vietnam, 1967, pp. 1118–20. See also U.S. Congress, Senat

Government and the Vietnam War 4, pp. 892–93, 924–28. 59 Unless otherwise noted, this section is based on John M. Carland, “The Tet O

fensive of 1968: Desperate Gamble or Calculated Risk?” (Unpublished paper, U.S. Arm

Center of Military History, 2001) and William M. Hammond, “Preparations Begin

(Unpublished Paper, U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2002). 60 Thomas K. Latimer, “Hanoi’s Leaders and their South Vietnam Policies, 1954

1968” (Ph.D. diss., Georgetown University, 1972), chs. 8 and 9, summarizes the con

troversies. 61 Quotes are from Carland, “Tet Offensive,” pp. 4–5.

62 Westmoreland gives his view of the purpose of the border battles in Msg, MA

10547 to Wheeler, 6 Nov 67, Westmoreland Msg Files, Nov 67, CMH.

Chap 13.indd 476 
14

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

The fi rst fi ve years of the existence of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, were years of expansion amid an escalating war. 

Established in 1962 as a small, temporary command to provide advice 

and support to the South Vietnamese government in antiguerrilla operations and pacifi cation, MACV had grown by the end of 1967 into a 

large permanent headquarters that controlled half a million U.S. military personnel engaged in combat against formidable enemy guerrilla 

and light infantry forces. At the same time, it remained responsible 

for assisting the South Vietnamese in building up their armed forces 

and had become the principal U.S. agency supporting pacifi cation. The 

command played a substantial role in American efforts to develop a 

stable, constitutional government in Saigon.

At its activation, the Military Assistance Command confronted a 

well-established rural guerrilla insurgency in South Vietnam. Supporting 

and directing the insurgency as an integral part of a unifi ed Vietnamese 

nationalist movement, the North Vietnamese Communist government 

countered each incremental increase of American aid to Saigon with an 

increase of its own support to the revolutionary forces. Beginning with 

political and military cadres, this aid grew to comprise a growing volume of arms and supplies and eventually regiments and divisions of the 

North Vietnamese regular army. The enemy had the capacity to move 

as he chose along the spectrum of people’s revolutionary war, opportunistically combining guerrilla and large-unit military operations with 

campaigns of political subversion. He had access to substantial military 

and economic assistance from the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. North Vietnamese and Viet Cong pressure, along with the 

military and political disarray of successive South Vietnamese regimes, 

elicited a succession of improvised American responses that expanded 

the size and proliferated the tasks of MACV.

The war developed through three stages. In the fi rst, during 1962 

and 1963, the Military Assistance Command directed an enlarged advisery contingent engaged in training and equipping South Vietnam’s 

armed forces while commanding American helicopter and other specialized military units supporting President Ngo Dinh Diem’s strategic 

Chap 14.indd 477 
478

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

hamlet pacifi cation campaign. In this stage, the long-standing U.S. Mi

itary Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) remained in operation unde

the supervision of the small MACV headquarters, which was suppose

to complete its task and go out of business by mid-1965. After appa

ent early gains, the counterinsurgency effort foundered. The Viet Con

learned to counter the ARVN’s American-advised tactics and American

supplied weapons, and President Diem stumbled into a fatal confl ic

with South Vietnam’s Buddhists and ultimately with his own gene

als. The overthrow and murder of Diem in November 1963 ended th

fi rst phase of MACV’s war and discredited the fi rst MACV commande

General Paul D. Harkins, who had defended to the end the policy o

supporting the fallen president.

During the second stage, which lasted through all of 1964 and int

early 1965, the United States followed a two-track strategy in Vietnam

The fi rst track was more of the same in South Vietnam—more advise

and more American support units for a revived antiguerrilla pacifi ca

tion campaign. On the second track, the administration of Presiden

Lyndon B. Johnson initiated planning and preparation for direct pre

sure on North Vietnam to cease its support of the Viet Cong. Initiall

this pressure took the form of small-scale commando raids on the nort

combined with equally limited American air operations in Laos. In Au

gust 1964 the Tonkin Gulf incident brought one-time U.S. air attack

on North Vietnam and provided the occasion for Johnson to secur

congressional authorization for expanded military action in Southea

Asia. By the end of 1964 an American air buildup was under way in th

western Pacifi c, and troop deployments to South Vietnam were unde

discussion.

During this period MACV, under a new commander, General Wi

liam C. Westmoreland, absorbed the MAAG and prepared for long–term 

participation in a growing struggle. Attempting to press ahead with th

counterinsurgency campaign, the command’s efforts were frustrate

by persistent South Vietnamese governmental instability and by a

equally persistent increase in Viet Cong numbers and military effec

tiveness. Unknown to the Americans until the very end of the period

the Communists had decided to move from purely guerrilla warfar

to large-unit operations aimed at demoralizing or destroying Saigon

army, the only remaining pillar of the South Vietnamese state. To th

end, the enemy began sending North Vietnamese regular army uni

into the south. As 1965 began, with success in the south nowhere i

sight, American offi cials in Washington and Saigon prepared to imple

ment their plans for an air offensive against North Vietnam.

With the start of ROLLING THUNDER in March 1965, followed by th

dispatch to South Vietnam of U.S. combat units, the war entered i

third stage. At this point, the Johnson administration attempted t

secure success in Vietnam through a massive commitment of U.S. mil

tary forces on the ground in the south and in the air over the north

Chap 14.indd 478 
479

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

While continuing its assistance and advisory mission, the Military Assistance Command deployed an American and allied expeditionary 

force of more than half a million troops to fi ght the North Vietnamese 

and Viet Cong. After much controversy within the American government, the Military Assistance Command through the Offi ce of Civil 

Operations and Revolutionary Development Support assumed the 

principal responsibility for U.S. support to the South Vietnamese pacifi cation campaign. At ever-growing cost in money and blood, this stage 

of the war continued through the end of 1967 with American claims of 

progress but with no end in sight.

The evolution of MACV as a U.S. military organization was itself a 

complex process driven by American interservice and bureaucratic politics as well as by the requirements of the Southeast Asian confl ict. At 

every point, service interests affected MACV’s structure and command 

relationships. In the initial planning, the Navy insisted upon the insertion of the Pacifi c Command into the chain between the headquarters 

in Vietnam and the secretary of defense. In a process that at times resembled a nineteenth-century political fi ght over patronage spoils, the 

services battled each other for key positions in the expanding MACV 

staff. Formation of MACV’s component commands also required negotiation with the services, whose leaders occasionally tried to intervene 

in operational matters that were properly the prerogative of the joint 

commander. 

Control of air power was especially controversial because the resolution of disputes in Vietnam would set precedents of wider application. During MACV’s early days, General Harkins and his Air Force 

commanders took opposing positions on the control of helicopters 

and fi xed-wing tactical aircraft. Within the Air Force, MACV’s air component commander contended with the Strategic Air Command for 

control of the B–52s. After the Johnson-McConnell agreement settled 

Army–Air Force differences over helicopters, Generals Westmoreland 

and Momyer united against the Marine Corps in repeated skirmishes 

over central management of fi xed-wing tactical aircraft.

By the end of 1967, most of these command disputes had been resolved by compromises in which General Westmoreland usually played 

the role of honest broker among the services while at the same time 

trying to maintain effective control over his forces. By informal means, 

Westmoreland, Admiral Sharp, and General Wheeler maintained harmony along the Saigon-Honolulu-Washington chain of command. 

They formed a united front in dealing with Secretary of Defense Robert 

S. McNamara, the president’s principal civilian deputy for conducting 

the war. By late 1967 MACV’s fi eld force and component commands 

had taken mature form, and their relationships with the joint headquarters had stabilized. However, MACV and the III Marine Amphibious Force were still in contention over arrangements for directing the 

increasingly large and complicated battle for I Corps. Although the 

Chap 14.indd 479 
480

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

basic doctrinal disputes over control of air power persisted, Westmore

land and his service components put into effect working compromise

that allowed the MACV commander to wield his fi xed- and rotary-win

aircraft as a unifi ed weapon in support of the ground campaign.

Organizational weaknesses persisted in the Military Assistanc

Command throughout the years of escalation. After MACV absorbe

the advisory group, the headquarters lacked a strong staff agency t

give focus and force to the Army advisory effort. Creation of an a

sistant chief of staff for military assistance came late and was at best 

partial remedy. Intelligence was an even more signifi cant defi ciency

MACV’s expansion in this area ran well behind the buildup of its com

bat forces. Not until late 1966 did the command’s J2 Directorate and i

Joint Intelligence Centers reach a point where they could provide a fu

and accurate picture of the enemy threat. Even then, public relation

distorted the directorate’s product at times, most notably in MACV

order of battle dispute with the Central Intelligence Agency. If know

edge is power, MACV was for too long a ninety-pound weakling in i

contest with the Communist enemy. 

The MACV commander and the U.S. ambassador to South Vietnam 

were supposed to cooperate as equals, referring unresolved dispute

to Washington through their respective chains of command. In prac

tice, harmony did not always prevail between the military and civilia

heads of the American effort. General Harkins and Ambassador Frede

ick Nolting worked smoothly together at the start, but Harkins fell ou

with Henry Cabot Lodge over the American role in Diem’s overthrow

Westmoreland restored MACV’s cooperation with Lodge, then acte

as a virtual military deputy to Ambassador Maxwell Taylor, to whom 

President Johnson had granted full authority over military as well a

civilian activities. In spite of differences over the organization of pacifi 

cation support, which President Johnson ultimately resolved by estab

lishing CORDS, the general maintained cooperation with Lodge durin

that ambassador’s second tour of duty. From Ellsworth Bunker’s arriva

in Saigon in May 1967 onward, the embassy and MACV acted as on

on most policy issues. At any event, by the time Bunker took ove

the sheer weight of manpower and resources had shifted the embassy

MACV balance decisively in favor of the latter, as exemplifi ed by th

placement of CORDS within the military headquarters.

Where operations outside South Vietnam were concerned, Genera

Westmoreland had to deal with Admiral Sharp and the Ambassador t

Laos, William Sullivan. Both men jealously guarded their jurisdiction

over their respective pieces of the Southeast Asian war, and both ha

Washington’s support in doing so. In this area also, compromise pre

vailed. Under close Washington supervision, Sharp directed the ROLLIN

THUNDER air attacks on North Vietnam. Even so, he delegated control o

operations in the southernmost route package to Westmoreland. Sim

larly, Sullivan protected his role as “fi eld marshal” of the unacknow

Chap 14.indd 480 
481

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

edged American war in Laos and restricted MACV’s operations against 

the Ho Chi Minh Trail so as to protect the facade of Laotian neutrality. 

Westmoreland nevertheless gradually negotiated the expansion of his 

cross-border ground and air attacks on the enemy’s infi ltration routes. 

In each case, he maintained cordial working relations with his military 

superior and civilian colleague while securing a substantial degree of 

infl uence over the operations that most directly affected the war in 

South Vietnam.

Political considerations dominated the Military Assistance Command’s relationships with allied forces. Until the introduction of major 

American combat units, MACV’s role was one of advice and support 

to a host government; a combined U.S.–South Vietnamese command 

never was contemplated. As U.S. troops prepared to enter the battle, 

General Westmoreland initially favored a combined command, or at 

least a U.S.–South Vietnamese central military staff. He quickly abandoned this concept, however, in deference to South Vietnamese nationalist sensitivities and to an American offi cial policy of maintaining 

at least the appearance and as much as possible the reality of Saigon’s 

sovereignty. Instead, MACV and its American forces worked with the 

South Vietnamese on the basis of cooperation and coordination. General Westmoreland attempted to shape South Vietnamese operations 

by means of his advisory network, regular high-level contacts with the 

Joint General Staff and South Vietnamese political leaders, the promotion of combined campaign plans and other cooperative staff work, and 

the provision or threatened withholding of military assistance. His infl uence, however, was limited, especially when it came to inducing the 

Saigon government to correct its forces’ defi ciencies in leadership, administration, and operations. Due to the vast difference in capabilities 

between the American and Vietnamese armies, cooperation between 

them in the fi eld was usually a matter of form rather than substance. 

In the end, the Americans made do by concentrating primarily on attacking the enemy’s large units while the South Vietnamese regulars 

and territorials conducted clearing and securing operations in support 

of pacifi cation.

With the other allies, notably the South Koreans, political considerations also prevailed. Given Washington’s eagerness to obtain “more 

fl ags” in Vietnam, the allies could set their own terms for their presence. The Koreans in particular did so in a restrictive manner, insisting 

upon and obtaining what amounted to their own independent area of 

operations. Westmoreland employed persuasion and the provision of 

U.S. combat and logistical support to infl uence their activities, largely 

to limited effect. Other allies, such as the Australians and New Zealanders, were more cooperative; but they, too, kept some political strings on 

their contingents.

At full development, the structure that resulted from all these compromises was complex and fell far short of the military ideal of unity of 

Chap 14.indd 481 
482

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

command. Nevertheless, every alternative seemed to pose insuperabl

political and military problems. Making MACV independent of Pacifi 

Command, for example, would still have left the forces in Vietnam de

pendent on PACOM for their line of communications and would hav

raised issues of control of the naval task forces supporting MACV’s op

erations. By the same token, if the MACV commander had been give

control of U.S. forces throughout mainland Southeast Asia, the a

rangement would have created diplomatic diffi culties with allies suc

as Thailand and would have forced MACV to deal with many problem

unrelated to the war in South Vietnam. A combined allied comman

in South Vietnam might have increased General Westmoreland’s leve

age over Saigon’s forces, but at the cost of allowing the Communis

to portray the American effort as colonialist aggression and possibl

of demoralizing South Vietnamese offi cers and troops. In addition, 

combined military command would have required an allied civilia

authority to oversee it and lend it political legitimacy, but no such au

thority was readily available. Overall, the U.S. command structure i

Southeast Asia was dictated by the complexities and contradictions o

American policy toward the region’s confl icts.

In practice, General Westmoreland exercised effective control ove

the military operations of principal concern to him in South Vietnam 

and its neighboring countries. He had full command of the America

military effort within South Vietnam and by late 1967 was in charg

of the pacifi cation program as well. Insofar as he could within restric

tions imposed by the embassy in Vientiane and by President Johnson

policy of limiting the war, he conducted ground and air operation

against the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos. Although Admiral Sharp d

rected the air war against North Vietnam, that campaign, particularl

in the route packages that covered the Hanoi-Haiphong area and th

Tonkin delta, was more closely related to President Johnson’s diplo

macy than to the fi ghting in South Vietnam. Westmoreland controlle

strikes in the route package where air interdiction most directly infl u

enced the course of combat in the south.

Disputes among the American armed services and civilian agencie

along with interallied diplomacy, were a constant source of friction fo

Harkins and Westmoreland. They and their staffs had to devote man

hours to these issues, but the extent to which these controversies ham

pered actual military and pacifi cation operations remains diffi cult t

determine. Similar policy disputes, personal and institutional rivalrie

and organizational ineffi ciencies have characterized America’s conduc

of even its most successful wars. Often, as in Vietnam, leaders resolve

the problems through compromises that appeared illogical but mad

sense in the context of the time. The MACV commander possessed

in the main, suffi cient authority over the operations for which he wa

responsible. In the fi eld, American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and ma

rines made even the most convoluted arrangements work well enoug

Chap 14.indd 482 
483

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

to accomplish their missions. Coordination between American and 

allied forces was adequate for the relatively static territorial struggle 

being waged, especially when the inherent differences in capability 

among the forces are taken into account. In summary, it seems clear 

that policy and strategy on both sides, rather than the American and 

allied command structure, were decisive in shaping the course of the 

Vietnam War.

Under the Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations, the strategic objective of the United States in Vietnam remained 

the same: preventing a Communist takeover of the country as part of 

the general containment policy. After the Geneva Agreement in 1954, 

the objective was reduced to saving South Vietnam but otherwise held 

fi rm. Equally consistent was the method for achieving this goal: providing military and other assistance to an anti-Communist Vietnamese 

nationalist government. At the time of MACV’s activation, the United 

States, as it had since the mid-1950s, pinned its hopes to Ngo Dinh 

Diem. After Diem’s overthrow, as one successor regime after another 

proved ineffective and as enemy pressure increased, the Johnson administration incrementally enlarged the American commitment, ultimately to the point of large-scale, although still limited, war.

In South Vietnam, the pattern of the allies’ campaign against the 

Viet Cong was set well before MACV’s activation. It comprised on the 

one hand attacks by regular forces against the enemy’s organized military units and logistical bases and on the other efforts to protect the 

villages, to uproot the Communist underground, and to reestablish the 

peasants’ allegiance to the Saigon government. The two elements often 

were described by the shorthand labels of attrition and pacifi cation. In 

1965 the Johnson administration added to the mixture a campaign to 

interdict the fl ow of enemy troops and supplies through Laos and one 

of air attacks on North Vietnam. Begun as an exercise in diplomatic coercion, when the raids on the north failed to bring Hanoi to terms, they 

came to be explained and justifi ed as contributing to interdiction.

The Military Assistance Command played the dominant role in carrying out attrition and pacifi cation within South Vietnam, was a signifi -

cant participant in interdiction in Laos, and took a secondary part in 

the bombing of the north. Its commanders as a result sought all possible 

resources for the effort in South Vietnam and Laos. They viewed the attack on North Vietnam as at best a secondary campaign and urged the 

administration to delay undertaking it until the situation in the south 

was stabilized. Once ROLLING THUNDER began, General Westmoreland, 

supported by Secretary McNamara, consistently fought to ensure fi rst 

priority for the south in the allocation of American air power.

The two successive commanders of MACV faced different situations and had varying degrees of success in performing their jobs and 

infl uencing U.S. policy. Although General Harkins lacked experience 

in antiguerrilla warfare, his background in working with allies and in 

Chap 14.indd 483 
484

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

administering military assistance, along with his knowledge of th

Southeast Asia theater gained during his service at U.S. Army, Pacifi 

made him a sensible selection for what was expected to be primaril

a high-level diplomatic and managerial assignment. Rather than lead

ing troops in combat, Harkins was supposed to direct the expansion o

American military aid and advice and to work with the ambassador i

persuading Diem to adopt and carry out effective policies.

Harkins performed his military administrative and planning task

with competence, and he cooperated harmoniously with Ambassado

Nolting in the thankless chore of trying to infl uence Diem. He fe

out of step with Nolting’s successor, Henry Cabot Lodge, and with h

Washington superiors, however, when President Kennedy, dismayed a

Diem’s handling of the Buddhist crisis, changed American policy fi r

to confrontation with the South Vietnamese president and then to sup

port for his overthrow. In increasingly acrimonious confl ict with Am

bassador Lodge, who enthusiastically endorsed and did much to shap

the anti-Diem policy, Harkins remained stubbornly loyal to Diem. I

retrospect, Harkins’ assessment that the generals who deposed an

murdered the president would do little to improve South Vietnames

performance proved to be correct; but that fact did not save the MAC

commander. Diem’s fall discredited Harkins in the view of the admin

istration, the American press, and the American public, and his tour o

duty in Vietnam soon came to a bitter end. 

Perhaps the most persistent legacy of Harkins’ command was th

pattern of optimism that he established in MACV’s reporting of th

situation in Vietnam. From the beginning of his tenure in Saigon, Ha

kins emphasized progress in his classifi ed communications to Hono

lulu and Washington and in his public statements to the news medi

Although fully aware of the many defi ciencies of Diem’s regime and i

armed forces and while working to change them, Harkins persistentl

put the best face on even the most disastrous events, to the point o

suppressing reports from fi eld advisers that contradicted his optimism

He did this in the belief that the American programs were doing a

well overall as could be expected and in the conviction that he had t

maintain a positive tone to sustain the morale of the Vietnamese. Ha

kins’ upbeat assessments nonetheless increasingly were challenged b

other U.S. offi cials and by the Saigon news correspondents, whom th

general accused of undermining the war effort.

When he succeeded Harkins, General Westmoreland initially an

nounced a policy of objective reporting and had considerable succe

at the outset in restoring his command’s credibility with the newsmen

Westmoreland, however, soon fell into much the same pattern of op

timism. He couched his reports in terms of progress, accentuated th

positive, and rarely if ever admitted setbacks. He did so for the sam

reasons Harkins had—a conviction that the allies were in fact movin

forward and that he had to keep up South Vietnamese spirits. In add

Chap 14.indd 484 
485

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

tion, as the confl ict became controversial, President Johnson pressed 

him for good news to counter allegations that the war was a stalemate. 

During 1965 and 1966, the years of the American buildup, Westmoreland portrayed his command as seizing the initiative from the enemy 

when in fact his operations were mostly spoiling attacks to cover the 

U.S. deployment and to keep the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese off 

balance. He thereby left the American public and many government offi cials unaware of the actual diffi culties he was facing and raised unwarranted expectations of early success. On issues such as the number of 

enemy battalion-size attacks and the question of enemy strength, Westmoreland permitted public relations to infl uence MACV’s reports and 

analyses, causing other agencies to lose confi dence in the command’s 

integrity. Westmoreland’s emergence in 1967 as a spokesman for and 

advocate of Johnson’s war policy further weakened his credibility.

In Westmoreland’s defense, it should be noted that the general attempted to balance his overall optimistic tone with acknowledgment 

of the enemy’s strength and tenacity and warnings that the war would 

be long and diffi cult. When he asked for troops in mid-1965, for example, he promised in return a prolonged struggle, not a quick victory. 

He was also candid in stating that the war would be one of attrition. In 

his November 1967 speech at the National Press Club, moreover, if he 

presented a generally hopeful picture of progress, he still declared that 

any substantial American turnover of the burden to the South Vietnamese was at least two more years away. These caveats notwithstanding, the dominant note sounded by the Military Assistance Command 

was positive. As a result, by the end of 1967 the command’s assurances 

of progress were beginning to ring hollow in the ears of government 

offi cials and of an increasingly skeptical American press and public.

General Westmoreland assumed command of MACV with a reputation as one of the U.S. Army’s most promising general offi cers and 

with a stronger background than Harkins in the theory of counterinsurgency warfare. He grasped the unconventional dimensions of the 

confl ict in Vietnam and began with a fi rm commitment to a pacifi cation-oriented approach. After his fi rst year in command, three factors 

shaped his operational priorities: the military and political disarray of 

the Saigon regime, the growing North Vietnamese and Viet Cong main 

force threat, and Johnson’s decision to respond to those problems by 

committing American combat troops on a large scale. Westmoreland 

continued the twofold strategy of attrition and pacifi cation, but with 

more emphasis on attrition, especially as the mission of his expanding U.S. contingent. Advice and support to the South Vietnamese took 

second place to the completion of the American buildup and the organization of American forces. Pacifi cation remained in the doldrums 

while MACV and the embassy struggled to reestablish a stable Saigon 

government and provincial administration and tried to resolve the U.S. 

interagency confl ict over organization for pacifi cation support.

Chap 14.indd 485 
486

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

Throughout this period, Westmoreland, in contrast to Harkins, re

tained the confi dence of his civilian and military superiors, even thos

like McNamara who came to have doubts about the correctness of U.

policy. A team player by temperament, Westmoreland sought to lea

by consensus and compromise. He carefully tailored his advice and rec

ommendations to conform to administration desires as he perceive

them. He probed constantly by every available means to discover th

trend of Washington thinking and continually sought to embody in h

recommendations the offi cial policy consensus as he saw it developin

in conferences and exchanges of messages between himself and his su

periors in Honolulu and Washington. As a result, his recommendation

usually met with acceptance. On issues where he knew he could no

prevail, such as offensive operations in Laos, he tactfully advocated h

position but never to the point of irrevocably antagonizing his supe

riors. Westmoreland exercised great apparent infl uence on the cours

of operations in South Vietnam, but he did so by ascertaining at eac

step which way most of the crowd was already moving and then goin

in that direction himself.

Westmoreland’s method of operation is illustrated by his role i

deciding two of the most important policy issues of the period—th

commitment of large American combat forces to South Vietnam an

the evolution of U.S. strategy in the ground war. President Johnso

took the fateful step of sending in combat forces for reasons that wer

a combination of “push” from within the administration and “pull

from the developing crisis in South Vietnam. At the start, the “push

factor predominated, as the president and his advisers searched for 

means other than bombing the north to reinvigorate the allied wa

effort. To this end, Johnson in late December 1964 urged a reluctan

ambassador and the MACV commander to propose increased use o

American combat troops within South Vietnam. Administration prod

ding and encouragement continued with General Harold K. Johnson

March 1965 visit to Saigon and with further presidential imperative

in April. At this stage, however, politically motivated presidential cau

tion, disagreements among his advisers over whether American so

diers could fi ght effectively under South Vietnamese conditions, an

Ambassador Taylor’s resistance limited actual troop commitments.

At mid-year, the “pull” element came into play. The absence of po

litical results from ROLLING THUNDER, combined with MACV and U.

Mission reports of South Vietnamese military and governmental de

terioration and possible imminent collapse, prompted a major troo

commitment in late July. Yet the “push” side was also still present. Fa

from sending the minimum force required to stabilize the situation

the president and his associates, once committed to a large America

reinforcement, initiated planning for the insertion of enough U.

troops to overwhelm the enemy with numbers and fi repower and t

reestablish Saigon’s authority throughout the country. They accepte

Chap 14.indd 486 
487

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

almost without question Westmoreland’s steadily increasing estimates 

of the force required to accomplish those objectives. Indeed, at Honolulu in February 1966 President Johnson confi rmed the American commitment to ambitious military and pacifi cation goals and assured his 

fi eld commander that all the troops he requested would be sent.

Throughout this sequence of decisions, General Westmoreland and 

his headquarters played an infl uential but largely reactive role. Rather 

than creating it, MACV headquarters responded to and amplifi ed the 

emerging policy consensus. Westmoreland furnished the ambassador 

and the president with much of the information they used to form 

their understanding of the situation in South Vietnam. And certainly 

his and Ambassador Taylor’s declaration in June that South Vietnam 

probably would fall if not shored up by American divisions decisively 

affected the timing and nature of administration actions. To that extent, he infl uenced political as well as military decisions. 

Yet at the same time Westmoreland, in recommending military 

courses of action, tempered his advice with a view to what would be 

acceptable higher up the chain of command. Although the general 

and key members of his staff became convinced early in 1965 that 

substantial American ground forces would be necessary to counter the 

Viet Cong’s main force buildup, the MACV commander held back from 

requesting those forces, in part in deference to Taylor’s reluctance to 

bring in American troops. His fi rst major request, aside from limited 

ones for air base defense, came only after General Johnson indicated in 

March that the authorities in Washington were receptive. Westmoreland continued to move cautiously during April and May, seeming to 

follow rather than lead the administration’s experimental initiatives. 

He took a more forceful position in June, but even then he acted only 

after Taylor changed his stand on the issue and after General Wheeler 

indicated that the Joint Chiefs were going to reopen the question of 

committing division-size forces. He made his initial Phase II proposals 

at the direction of Secretary McNamara.

On questions of troop employment and campaign strategy, Westmoreland also tried to stay within a policy consensus. While early 

persuaded that American units should concentrate on pursuing and 

attacking the enemy’s main forces, he readily modifi ed the wording 

of his concepts of operation to accommodate the interest of Admiral 

Sharp and other offi cials in the systematic securing of the populated 

coastal areas. His campaign plans and troop dispositions were derived 

in large part from earlier MACV and Pacifi c Command contingency 

plans and incorporated concepts from Sharp and the Joint Chiefs. 

During the two years of combat that followed the initial deployments, General Westmoreland modifi ed his strategy in response to the 

situation and to his perception of offi cial concerns. He advocated the 

buildup when it was administration policy but shifted emphasis to a 

“level-off” force when administration interest and his own appreciaChap 14.indd 487 
488

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

tion of service capabilities pointed in that direction. He pursued th

anti-main force campaign but also paid increasing attention to pacifi 

cation in response to presidential urging and as responsibility for con

duct of the program fell into MACV’s hands. Westmoreland chafe

at civilian-imposed restrictions on his freedom of action in Laos an

Cambodia and, like Admiral Sharp, deplored what he considered th

administration’s excessive caution in striking at North Vietnam. Unlik

Sharp, he never pressed his recommendations for more aggressive ac

tion to the point of direct confl ict with Secretary McNamara or othe

high offi cials. Although annoyed at the interventions into militar

matters of embassy civilians, Defense Department analysts, and othe

outsiders, Westmoreland endured them with outward equanimity. A

times, as in the barrier episode, he adjusted his operations to accom

modate their views. In many aspects of the campaign, he repeatedl

accepted less in terms of forces and actions than what his best militar

judgment indicated would bring the most expeditious and favorabl

result. He did so, he claimed later, out of confi dence that he could wi

within the limits imposed upon him, which he saw “not as leadin

to failure but only as delaying success.”1 He was convinced that h

was making progress within the constraints and always hoped that h

could obtain additional reinforcements and wider freedom of action i

the future.

Westmoreland’s decision to employ his American troops primaril

against the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong big units was perhaps h

most controversial one. U.S. Marine commanders and other militar

and civilian offi cials at the time, echoed subsequently by historian

and analysts, argued that this approach diverted to a secondary objec

tive forces that could have been more profi tably employed in clearin

and securing the villages, the true road to victory. In addition, the

claimed that the accompanying military division of labor, which le

pacifi cation support mainly to the South Vietnamese Army, demora

ized the South Vietnamese and excessively “Americanized” the con

duct of the war.

Westmoreland’s defenders rest their case on both political and mil

tary grounds. On the political side, Westmoreland was following a con

sensus among both American and South Vietnamese policymakers. H

decision conformed to the Johnson administration’s preoccupatio

with limiting the extent and duration of the U.S. military commitmen

If the Americans concentrated on fi ghting the North Vietnamese whil

the South Vietnamese focused on territorial security, a negotiated de

escalation of the confl ict or mutual withdrawal of outside forces woul

leave Saigon in a relatively favorable position against the indigenou

Viet Cong. On the other hand, if territorial security depended on Ame

ican troops, a mutual U.S.–North Vietnamese withdrawal would doom 

Saigon. McNamara, Komer, and the Defense Department’s systems an

alysts all considered pacifi cation the key to success, but all insisted tha

Chap 14.indd 488 
489

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

it must be done with South Vietnamese forces to have lasting effect. 

American troops could at most provide a shield while the Saigon government pulled itself and its army together. Even though McNamara 

ultimately concluded that military escalation in Vietnam had reached 

a point of diminishing returns, he never challenged Westmoreland’s 

allocation of the American troops under MACV’s command. 

Militarily, Westmoreland’s approach made the best use of the mobility and fi repower of his American soldiers while minimizing the adverse effects of their ignorance of local language and culture. In addition, the American infantry battalions available to MACV, especially 

in the critical period of late 1965 and early 1966, were too few to clear 

and secure any signifi cant portion of the South Vietnamese countryside while helping ARVN forces to ward off the enemy regiments and 

divisions. The III Marine Amphibious Force tried to overcome this defi ciency by pairing some of its rifl e squads with Vietnamese Popular 

Force platoons to defend hamlets in the Combined Action Program. 

There were far more hamlets than Marine rifl e squads, however; and III 

MAF had to keep most of its infantry battalions concentrated against 

the North Vietnamese regulars who began moving into I Corps. Inevitably, then, most of the manpower for clearing and securing operations 

had to be Vietnamese. 

Retrospective commentaries from the other side affi rm the importance of the main force threat and the effectiveness of Westmoreland’s 

deployment of American troops to counter it. In North Vietnamese 

revolutionary theory, a “general offensive” by massed regular forces to 

smash the south’s “puppet” army was the essential precondition for the 

“general uprising” or insurrection of the masses that would overthrow 

the counterrevolutionary regime. According to North Vietnamese accounts, during the years after 1963 when the Saigon government was 

in disarray and the revolution was advancing throughout the countryside, only Communist organizational weakness in the cities and the 

lack of a strong enough main force “fi st” stood between the party and 

victory. By early 1965, the party was building up its main force and 

beginning to conduct offensive campaigns, only to be blocked by the 

“savagery” and “guile” of U.S. units. As a result, a former COSVN commander declared in a postwar analysis, “the conditions for a general 

insurrection at that time never became ripe and disappeared.”2

During the period of the American buildup, General Westmoreland’s disposition of his forces and conduct of operations were sound 

within the strategic limitations under which he had to work. Given the 

administration’s determination to restrict the confl ict as much as possible to South Vietnam, Westmoreland had no alternative to waging 

what amounted to a defensive war of attrition while trying to rebuild 

the Saigon government and restart pacifi cation. By late 1967, he had 

achieved the administration’s minimum goal of preventing a South 

Vietnamese collapse and had laid the foundations for progress in paciChap 14.indd 489 
490

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

fying the countryside. However, nothing that he could do in the sout

would affect the will and capacity of the North Vietnamese to continu

the war. Hence, he was unable to bring the confl ict to an end.

Were there alternative ways of fi ghting the war? The Johnson ad

ministration ruled out one—an invasion of North Vietnam—due t

well-grounded concern that it would provoke Communist Chinese in

tervention as had happened in Korea.3 In addition, the Hanoi govern

ment had organized its people for guerrilla warfare in anticipation of 

U.S. invasion; hence this course of action would simply have extende

to North Vietnam the pacifi cation problems with which the Amer

cans and South Vietnamese were already contending in the south. B

conducting limited amphibious attacks just north of the Demilitarize

Zone, the United States could have infl icted heavy losses on the enem

fi ghting the marines in northern I Corps, but this would have been 

tactical success rather than a war-deciding stroke and was not wort

the risk of hostilities with China it would have entailed. 

Similar objections applied to the solution favored by Admiral Shar

and many U.S. Air Force leaders: heavier bombing and a naval blockad

of North Vietnam. That course of action also ran the risk, in Johnson

view, of provoking the Russians and Chinese while offering in retur

no certain prospect of a military decision. At a later point in the wa

President Richard Nixon would bomb and blockade North Vietnam 

with no Chinese intervention and with apparent success in securin

a peace agreement, but he would do so in international circumstance

much different from those Johnson faced.4

A more politically acceptable and militarily feasible alternativ

would have been the establishment of a cordon of American, Sout

Vietnamese, and possibly Thai and Laotian troops across the Laos pan

handle from the western end of the Demilitarized Zone in Vietnam t

the Mekong River. Since the cordon could be established without in

vading North Vietnam, this strategy entailed minimal risk of Chines

intervention. Especially if supplemented by a naval blockade or qua

antine of Sihanoukville, the move would have prevented the infi ltra

tion of large North Vietnamese units and heavy tonnages of supplie

into South Vietnam and would thus have limited the escalation of th

fi ghting there. With American advisers and air support, the South Vie

namese could then have handled the struggle against the Viet Cong an

whatever small Communist reinforcements managed to slip throug

from the north. Standing on the defense, the U.S. divisions would hav

had a simply defi ned protective mission and probably would have su

fered fewer casualties, making the troop commitment more acceptabl

to the American public. While not directly knocking North Vietnam 

out of the war, the cordon would have prevented Hanoi’s leaders from 

expanding the battle in the south, making it possible for Saigon, if 

could achieve a measure of reform, to eliminate the Viet Cong as a ser

ous threat to the regime.

Chap 14.indd 490 
491

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

At various times, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Westmoreland, 

and the Chief of the Joint General Staff, General Cao Van Vien, all 

acknowledged the potential value of this course of action. General 

Bruce Palmer, a former deputy commander of U.S. Army, Vietnam, and 

commander of II Field Force, argued in retrospect that the divisions 

sent to Westmoreland in 1965 and 1966 should have been used for 

this purpose instead of being spread all over South Vietnam on missions that the South Vietnamese Army should have been performing.5

Even with these endorsements, however, the Johnson administration 

never seriously considered adopting the cordon strategy. The embassy 

in Vientiane adamantly opposed such a policy, along with Westmoreland’s proposals for limited attacks on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, on the 

familiar grounds that it would wreck Laotian neutrality, lead to the 

overthrow of Souvanna Phouma’s government, and perhaps result in 

the North Vietnamese overrunning northern Laos. Admiral Sharp and 

the Joint Chiefs, for their parts, were more interested in expanding 

ROLLING THUNDER than in establishing a line across Laos. McNamara 

saw possibilities in a barrier, but not one manned by ground troops. 

In his commander’s estimate of March 1965, moreover, Westmoreland 

himself emphasized the diplomatic and logistical diffi culties of establishing a cordon and declared that it would not help him solve the immediate military crisis in South Vietnam. He later proposed operations 

in Laos, but only as a supplement to his campaign in South Vietnam, a 

campaign that he believed he was slowly winning. Above all, President 

Johnson was determined to minimize enlargement of the war beyond 

South Vietnam’s borders. In summary, whatever its merits, the cordon 

concept had powerful enemies and no determined individual or institutional sponsor.

A fi nal alternative would have been to minimize escalation during 

and after 1965 and go for a stalemate at the lowest possible cost in lives, 

money, and political controversy. In this approach, the administration 

would have conducted ROLLING THUNDER at a level of intensity suffi cient 

only to infl ict limited pain on the North Vietnamese and to keep up 

the morale of the South Vietnamese. It would have avoided committing U.S. ground troops or sent in only enough to provide a last–ditch 

reserve to back up the ARVN. The United States would have relied on 

the South Vietnamese, reinforced by American advisers and tactical air 

power, to contain the enemy main force offensive. At the same time, 

MACV would have made a maximum effort to expand the RVNAF and 

improve its training and armament. The objective would have been to 

keep the Saigon government and armed forces in being and in control 

of the cities and at least a portion of the countryside during a struggle 

that would continue indefi nitely. This policy would have minimized 

the diplomatic and political cost to the United States of the northern 

bombing campaign and at the same time have prevented the steadily 

rising toll of American battle casualties that more than any other factor 

Chap 14.indd 491 
492

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 19621967

undermined domestic support for the war. It also, of course, entaile

the risk of defeat if the South Vietnamese could not hold out.

In mid-1965 President Johnson and his advisers rejected this cours

of action because of the continuing ineffectiveness of their Saigo

ally. Less from overconfi dence than from a conviction that there wa

nothing else to be done, they inserted American air and ground force

into the war on a large scale. In late 1967, when that commitment ap

peared to to have reached the limit of political and economic feasibi

ity without producing decisive results, Johnson set his course towar

the lower cost alternative. He leveled off both ROLLING THUNDER an

MACV’s troop strength and initiated an effort to turn the fi ghting i

the south over to Saigon’s forces. By that time, however, the size of th

American military presence in South Vietnam had become so great tha

cutting back would be a prolonged and diffi cult process. Considerin

the toll that escalation had already taken in American lives, treasur

and political capital, it was uncertain whether even under the most fa

vorable circumstances the government could retain public support fo

the Southeast Asia struggle long enough to carry the low-cost strateg

through to a successful conclusion.

As 1967 came to an end, the Vietnam War was thus in an uneas

balance. In South Vietnam, the American forces had completed the

buildup and infl icted heavy combat losses on the North Vietnames

and Viet Cong. MACV and the U.S. embassy had restored stability an

a semblance of constitutional legitimacy to the Saigon government an

had put in place an organization to support another try at pacifi cation

On the other side, the Communist leaders in Hanoi and in the sout

believed that they had survived the worst that the United States coul

throw at them and had achieved an equilibrium of forces. They wer

making plans and preparations for a major offensive to tilt that equ

librium in their favor. In Washington, President Johnson and his advi

ers proclaimed that the war was going well in their public statement

Privately, they were none too certain and had decided to level off th

American effort and seek a way out of the confl ict, either by turnin

over combat to the South Vietnamese or through negotiation with th

Communists. For the Military Assistance Command, as for the rest o

the U.S. government, the years of escalation had come to an end.

Chap 14.indd 492 
493

Conclusion: The Years of Escalation

Notes

1 Quotation is from Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports, p. 261; see also pp. 230, 262, 

and 410–11. Westmoreland enumerates the restraints under which he had to operate 

in Ltr to CINCPAC, 30 Jun 68, in Sharp and Westmoreland, Report on War, p. 292. 2 See for example Senior General Hoang Van Thai, “A Few Strategic Issues in the 

Spring 1968 Tet Offensive and Uprising,” Military History Magazine, Published by the 

Ministry of Defense’s Military Institute of Vietnam, Issue 2 (26), 1988. Translated by 

Merle Pribbenow. Copy in Historians fi les, CMH; quote is from p. 6 of the translation. 

General Van Thai was military commander of COSVN at the time of the Tet offensive. 3 Accounts based on Chinese sources indicate that Johnson’s concerns were well 

founded. See for example Xiaoming Zhang, “The Vietnam War: A Chinese Perspective, 

1964–1969,” Journal of Military History 60 (October 1996): 731–62. 4 Mark Clodfelter, The Limits of Air power: The American Bombing of North Vietnam

(New York: The Free Press, 1989), compares the circumstances and objectives of Johnson’s and Nixon’s bombing campaigns. 5 Palmer, J., 25-Year War, pp. 187–88. 

Chap 14.indd 493 
Chap 14.indd 494 
Bibliographical Note

This account of a joint headquarters engaged in the making of 

theater-level policy and strategy, the conduct of joint and combined 

military operations, and the provision of advice and support to the 

South Vietnamese government and armed forces of necessity draws on 

a wide range of sources. The work is based primarily on the message 

traffi c and other papers of successive MACV commanders, principally 

those of General William C. Westmoreland. These materials are 

supplemented by documents from the MACV records in the National 

Archives; the national security fi les of Presidents John F. Kennedy and 

Lyndon B. Johnson; and the records of the Department of State, the 

Central Intelligence Agency, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the American 

armed services.

Unpublished Sources

National Archives and Records Administration

Major record groups bearing on the Military Assistance Command 

are located in the National Archives and Records Administration 

facility at College Park, Maryland. Record Group (RG) 472 (Records of 

the United States Forces in Southeast Asia, 1950–1975) now contains 

the main body of MACV headquarters material. This record group 

also includes the records of the Military Assistance Advisory Group, 

Vietnam, and those of many agencies subordinate or related to MACV. 

These include Headquarters U.S. Army, Vietnam; Army corps, divisions, 

brigades, and support organizations; Army and Air Force advisory 

groups; the regional assistance commands; the U.S. Military Assistance 

Command, Thailand; the Defense Attaché Offi ce, Saigon; the Military 

Equipment Delivery Team to Cambodia; and the U.S. Delegation to the 

Four-Party Joint Military Commission. Also useful are records of the 

Army Staff (RG 319), U.S. Army commands (RG 338), and Interservice 

Agencies (RG 334). Since citations in this volume may retain the former 

record group designation, researchers should seek the assistance of 

NARA archivists in locating documents.

Back_Matter 575.indd 495 4
496

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

U.S. Army Center of Military History

The U.S. Army Center of Military History (CMH) in Washington

D.C., holds a large and varied mass of documents collected by th

historians preparing the Center’s multivolume history of the Army’s ro

in Southeast Asia. Many of these are copies or duplicates of materi

in other repositories. The Center will transfer these materials to th

National Archives upon completion of the U.S. Army in Vietnam serie

Most important of these for the historian of the Military Assistanc

Command, Vietnam, are the papers of General Westmoreland. Th

Westmoreland Papers are photocopies of those held by the Lyndo

Baines Johnson Library in Austin, Texas. They consist of two mai

collections. The fi rst is a historical diary that the general dictated a

intervals to members of his staff, describing his day-to-day activities an

decisions and supported by copies of messages, memorandums, report

staff studies, and other documents. The second is a chronological fi 

of messages between Westmoreland and other senior commanders i

Vietnam and between him and his superiors in Hawaii and Washington

Through these messages, the historian can follow the policy dialogu

between the theater commander and higher authorities. Unfortunatel

a comparable collection does not exist for Westmoreland’s predecesso

General Paul D. Harkins, although the Center’s fi les contain scattere

messages and other documents for his period in command.

Besides the Westmoreland Papers, the Center’s holdings includ

more than 100 linear feet of documents provided by Ambassado

Robert Komer on the CORDS effort. These messages, memorandum

and reports detail the pacifi cation effort under both Ambassador Kome

and Ambassador William E. Colby. Other Vietnam holdings includ

an extensive body of province pacifi cation reports; a complete set o

the annual combined campaign plans; manuals for MACV’s automate

data processing systems; message fi les of U.S. Army, Vietnam, deput

commanders; and numerous unit operational reports.

U.S. Army Military History Institute

The U.S. Army Military History Institute (MHI) at Carlisle Barrack

Pennsylvania, holds important collections on the history of the Militar

Assistance Command. These include numerous MACV Periodic

Intelligence Reports and offi cer end-of-tour debriefi ngs. Besides thes

paper documents, the institute possesses a microfi lm collection o

documents used to support the annual MACV command histories wit

a printout of a computer-generated fi nding aid. 

Other personal papers collections at MHI bear on MACV’s histor

Most important is the large body of papers of General Harold K. Johnson

Smaller but quite useful for the 1962–1967 period are the papers of Arthu

S. Collins, William E. DePuy, Joseph H. McChristian, Francis Fox Parr

Back_Matter 575.indd 496 4
497

Bibliographical Note

William R. Peers, and John P. Vann. The institute also holds a duplicate 

set of the Westmoreland historical and message fi les.

Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps Documents

This volume draws from materials held by the other service historical 

offi ces in the Washington, D.C., area. The Offi ce of Air Force History 

contains copies of documents and oral histories held at the Air University 

at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. The Naval Historical Center at the 

Washington Navy Yard possesses the records of the commander, U.S. 

Naval Forces, Vietnam. Among the collections of the Marine Corps 

Historical Center, also at the Washington Navy Yard, the III Marine 

Amphibious Force message fi les, the Marine Corps headquarters fi le 

on single management, the Victor H. Krulak Papers, and the Keith B. 

McCutcheon Papers were of special value for this study.

Other Manuscript Collections

The Lyndon Baines Johnson Library holds the national security fi les 

of the Johnson administration. They include National Security Council 

histories, compilations of key documents on particular topics. The 

histories of Presidential Decisions on the Gulf of Tonkin Attacks; the 

Honolulu Conference, 1966; and the Deployment of Major U.S. Forces 

to Vietnam, 1965, were used extensively in this volume.

In Washington, D.C., the National Defense University holds 

the papers of Maxwell D. Taylor. This collection documents Taylor’s 

successive roles as special military assistant to President Kennedy, 

chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and ambassador to South Vietnam; 

it also includes important documents on the creation of the Military 

Assistance Command and command relations in Southeast Asia.

The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace at Stanford 

University, Palo Alto, California, contains the papers of Maj. Gen. 

John R. Chaisson, USMC, the offi cer who headed the MACV Combat 

Operations Center from late 1966 until well into 1968. Chaisson’s letters 

to his wife and the notebooks he used during his travels and meetings 

with Westmoreland provide a rare glimpse of the personalities and inner 

workings of MACV headquarters during a critical period of the war. They 

are especially useful when read in conjunction with Westmoreland’s 

history and message fi les. Also in the Hoover Institution are the papers 

of Lt. Gen. Samuel T. Williams, a chief of the Military Assistance Advisory 

Group.

Oral History Interviews

Most of the principal fi gures in this study—the successive Pacifi c 

Command and MACV commanders and the ambassadors to South 

Back_Matter 575.indd 497 4
498

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Vietnam—were interviewed at different times by various institution

While uneven in coverage and candor, these materials are an indispensab

supplement to the documentary record, especially for the details the

provide concerning offi cial and personal relationships among the senio

leaders. The Naval Historical Center holds the transcript of a length

reminiscence by Admiral Ulysses S. G. Sharp. This interview formed th

basis of Sharp’s published memoir, Strategy for Defeat, but the transcrip

contains blunt comments on events and personalities that do no

appear in the book. A briefer interview with Sharp by the Air Force

Project CORONA HARVEST is available at the Offi ce of Air Force History i

Washington, D.C.

 Of the MACV commanders, the Military History Institute holds 

transcript of an interview of General Paul D. Harkins, conducted for th

Army War College’s Senior Offi cer Debriefi ng Program, that covers h

entire career including his tenure as MACV commander. Harkins also gav

an interview to Project CORONA HARVEST, which can be consulted at th

Offi ce of Air Force History. The Lyndon B. Johnson Library conducted a

interview with General Westmoreland, which is available at the librar

An extensive interview with Westmoreland, done for the Senior Offi ce

Debriefi ng Program, is available at the Military History Institute. Th

Center of Military History possesses a copy of the MHI interview an

also the notes which Army historian Charles B. MacDonald took whi

assisting Westmoreland in the writing of his memoirs. As with Admir

Sharp’s reminiscences, these notes include revealing material that di

not appear in the published volume. 

As to the ambassadors, Frederick C. Nolting was interviewed fo

Project CORONA HARVEST; a transcript is at the Offi ce of Air Force Histor

The Military History Institute possesses a career interview of Gener

Maxwell Taylor and one of Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker, although th

Bunker interview is more useful for the period after that covered in th

volume.

Military History Institute fi les also contain career and topica

interviews with Army offi cers who played signifi cant roles in MACV

history. They include Donald D. Blackburn, William E. DePuy, Jean E

Engler, John A. Heintges, Harold K. Johnson, Walter T. Kerwin, Stanle

R. Larsen, Glenn Muggleberg, Spurgeon H. Neel, Bruce Palmer, William 

R. Peers, William B. Rosson, and John L. Throckmorton. Copies o

transcripts of many of these interviews are available at the Center o

Military History, which also possesses a transcript of an interview o

John P. Vann, conducted by a CMH historian immediately after Vann

return from Vietnam in July 1963. The Center also possesses a copy o

an interview of Ambassador Robert Komer by the RAND Corporatio

on pacifi cation organization and management, as well as tapes an

transcripts of interviews the author conducted with George Allen

James M. Loome, and Paul E. Suplizio bearing on aspects of intelligenc

pacifi cation, and military operations.

Back_Matter 575.indd 498 4
499

Bibliographical Note

Interviews of value to this study are contained in other service historical 

collections. The Offi ce of Air Force History possesses transcripts of interviews 

of key offi cers of Seventh Air Force and other air commands involved in 

Southeast Asia, including Generals Rollen Anthis, Gordon Blood, Hunter 

Harris, John McConnell, and Gilbert Myers. The Naval Historical Center’s 

holdings include the aforementioned reminiscences of Admiral Sharp. The 

Marine Corps Historical Center contains interviews with almost all the 

important Marine commanders of the period, as well as numerous lowerranking Marine offi cers. Most useful for this study were those of John 

Chaisson, William K. Jones, Victor H. Krulak, Keith B. McCutcheon, and 

Carl Youngdale.

In the Lyndon B. Johnson Library, the interviews of Philip Davidson 

and Daniel Graham are of value on the 1967 order of battle controversy. For 

insights into the interaction of State Department offi cials with MACV and 

the military in Southeast Asia, at every level from the embassy to CORDS 

district offi ces, researchers should consult the growing collections of the 

Foreign Affairs Oral History Program, Association for Diplomatic Studies 

and Training, located at the National Foreign Affairs Training Center, 

Arlington, Virginia. Nearly 900 transcripts of these interviews have been 

published on CD-ROM.

Published Primary Sources

Heading the list of published primary sources are the so-called Pentagon 

Papers. Initially classifi ed histories of Defense Department policy-making on 

Vietnam from 1945 through early 1968, prepared at Secretary McNamara’s 

direction, they were leaked to the press in 1971 by Daniel Ellsberg. The 

narrative in these volumes is supplemented by extracts and complete 

reproductions of many high-level offi cial documents. Throughout, this 

study cites the original Defense Department version of the papers, which 

was published as U.S. Congress, House Committee on Armed Services. 

United States–Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: Study Prepared by the Department 

of Defense. 12 vols. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1971.

Second in importance for the story of the Military Assistance Command 

are its own annual histories, comprehensive, highly detailed multivolume 

studies prepared by the headquarters’ Military History Branch. Although 

these histories generally conform in their interpretation to the progressoriented MACV view of the war, they contain occasional candid observations 

and large quantities of raw historical data. They are indispensable sources 

for study of the Military Assistance Command’s many functions. Most 

of them include a special annex, which was published and distributed 

separately, covering activities of the Studies and Observations Group (SOG). 

Complete citations for the histories used in this volume are:

Military History Branch, Headquarters, United States Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam. Command History, 1964. Saigon, 1965.

———. Command History, 1965. Saigon, 1966.

Back_Matter 575.indd 499 4
500

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

———. Command History, 1966. Saigon, 1967.

———. Command History, 1967. 3 vols. Saigon, 1968.

For the period 1964–1968, Admiral Sharp and General Westmorelan

directed the preparation of an overview of their stewardship. See U.

Pacifi c Command, Report on the War in Vietnam (as of 30 June 1968

Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Offi ce, 1969. While it contain

useful information, this report is very much a defense of its author

conduct of the war and should be read as such. 

The Offi ce of the Joint Chiefs of Staff prepared its own offi cial historie

of the JCS role in the Southeast Asia confl ict. Now in the process of bein

published in declassifi ed and updated form, these histories illuminat

the higher-level policy context within which the Military Assistanc

Command operated and record the Saigon command’s exchanges wit

its overseers in Washington. The critical volume for the period covere

in this volume is:

Historical Division, Joint Secretariat, U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. “Th

Joint Chiefs of Staff and the War in Vietnam, 1960–1968.” Pts. 1–3

The History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Washington, D.C., 1970.

The Pacifi c Command also issued annual offi cial histories of th

Vietnam War period. These volumes are less useful than the MACV an

JCS histories for study of the Military Assistance Command since the

concentrate heavily on PACOM’s responsibilities outside the Southea

Asian theater of war and largely duplicate the MACV histories i

coverage of the confl ict itself.

In 1984 General Westmoreland sued the Columbia Broadcastin

System (CBS) for libel in response to a CBS documentary, “Th

Uncounted Enemy,” which aired on CBS Reports and which charge

Westmoreland with falsifi cation of intelligence during the 1967 orde

of battle controversy. The trial, which ended inconclusively, resulte

in the declassifi cation and publication of a large mass of document

affi davits, and testimony concerning not only the immediate issue o

enemy numbers but also the inner workings and personal feuds of th

MACV intelligence staff. The Center of Military History possesses copie

of the memorandums of law and affi davits assembled by both side

These are:

U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York. William C. Westmorelan

Plaintiff, v. CBS, Inc., et al., Defendants. 82 Civ. 7913 (PNL). Plainti

General William C. Westmoreland’s Memorandum of Law in Opposition 

Defendant CBS’s Motion to Dismiss and for Summary Judgment.

———.William C. Westmoreland, Plaintiff, v. CBS Inc., et al., Defendants. 8

Civ. 7913 (PNL). Memorandum in Support of Defendant CBS’s Motion 

Dismiss and for Summary Judgment.

———. William C. Westmoreland, Plaintiff, v. CBS Inc., et al., Defendants. 8

Civ. 7913 (PNL). Plaintiff’s Counter-Statement of Undisputed Material Fac

Pursuant to Local Rule 3(g) and Appendix B—Important Documents Cited i

Support of Plaintiff’s Opposition to Defendant’s Motion.

Back_Matter 575.indd 500 4
501

Bibliographical Note

In addition, the testimony and documents of the trial are available 

on microfi che as Vietnam: A Documentary Collection—Westmoreland v. 

CBS. Broomfi eld, Colo.: Clearwater Publishing Company, Inc., 1985. 

Copies of this collection exist, among other places, in the Library of 

Congress and the Military History Institute. The original documents are 

in the National Archives.

Two sets of studies prepared under Department of the Army auspices 

contain primary elements. The fi rst series, the Vietnam Studies, consists 

of monographs by active and retired Army offi cers who served in 

Southeast Asia on subjects of which they had special knowledge. While 

authored in some instances by subordinates instead of the principals, 

these studies provide information on many aspects of the war. The 

monographs of most use in this study were:

Eckhardt, George S. Command and Control, 1950–1969. Washington, 

D.C.: Department of the Army, 1974.

Kelley, Francis J. U.S. Army Special Forces, 1961–1971. Washington, D.C.: 

Department of the Army, 1973.

Larsen, Stanley R., and Collins, James L., Jr., Allied Participation in 

Vietnam. Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1975.

McChristian, Joseph A. The Role of Military Intelligence, 1965–1967. 

Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1974.

Rienzi, Thomas M. Communications-Electronics, 1962–1970. Washington, 

D.C.: Department of the Army, 1972.

Tolson, John J. Airmobility, 1961–1971. Washington, D.C.: Department 

of the Army, 1973.

The second set of studies, the Indochina Monographs, helps to 

fi ll in the South Vietnamese side of the history of the war. A series of 

twenty narratives prepared by former South Vietnamese, Cambodian, 

and Laotian military leaders under the supervision of Lt. Gen. William 

E. Potts, USA (Ret.) and the staff of the General Research Corporation, 

the monographs are based on records available to the authors but also 

include much personal comment and experience, thereby acquiring to 

some extent the character of primary documents. The Center of Military 

History published these studies for limited distribution and retains 

copies of them. For this volume, the following monographs were the 

most useful:

Truong, Ngo Quang. RVNAF and U.S. Operational Cooperation and 

Coordination. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military 

History, 1976.

Vien, Cao Van, et. al. The U.S. Advisor. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army 

Center of Military History, 1980.

Since the end of the Cold War, published source documents on 

the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong conduct of the Vietnam confl ict 

are gradually becoming available. The Center of Military History is 

accumulating a growing body of translated offi cial People’s Army of 

Vietnam operational histories. While highly propagandistic in some 

Back_Matter 575.indd 501 4
502

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

respects, especially their handling of statistics, these histories contai

valuable information on enemy plans, order of battle, and comba

operations. Of more direct use in preparing this history of MACV wer

translations of two other accounts from the revolutionary side whic

treat high level policy and strategy. They are:

Tra, Tran Van. History of the Bulwark B2 Theater. Vol 5. Concluding th

Thirty-Years War. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, 1982. Trans. b

Foreign Broadcast Information Service. Joint Publications Researc

Service, Southeast Asia Report no. 1247, 1983.

War Experiences Recapitulation Committee of the High-Level Militar

Institute. Vietnam: The Anti-U.S. Resistance War for National Salvation

1954–1975: Military Events. Hanoi: People’s Army Publishing Hous

1980. Trans. by Joint Publications Research Service. Doc no. 80968

1982.

Published Offi cial Histories

U.S. Army

The Center of Military History’s U.S. Army in Vietnam series currentl

consists of eight published works, including a pictorial volume, wit

additional volumes in progress. The following have been published: 

Bergen, John D. Military Communications: A Test for Technolog

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1986.

Carland, John M. Combat Operations: Stemming the Tide, May 196

to October 1966. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Militar

History, 2000.

Clarke, Jeffrey J. Advice and Support: The Final Years. Washington, D.C

U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1988.

Hammond, William M. Public Affairs: The Military and the Media, 1962

1968. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military Histor

1988.

———. Public Affairs: The Military and the Media, 1968–1973. Washington

D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1996.

MacGarrigle, George L. Combat Operations: Taking the Offensive, Octob

1966 to October 1967. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Militar

History, 1998.

Meyerson, Joel D. Images of a Lengthy War. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Arm

Center of Military History, 1986.

Spector, Ronald H. Advice and Support: The Early Years, 1941–196

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1983.

U.S. Air Force

The Offi ce of Air Force History is publishing its own series, The United Stat

Air Force in Southeast Asia, three volumes of which were drawn upon:

Back_Matter 575.indd 502 4
503

Bibliographical Note

Bowers, Ray L. Tactical Airlift. Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of Air Force 

History, 1983.

Futrell, Robert F. The Advisory Years to 1965. Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of 

Air Force History, 1981.

Schlight, John. The War in South Vietnam: The Years of the Offensive, 

1965–1968. Washington, D.C.: Offi ce of Air Force History, 1988.

In addition, the author had access to an unpublished study, Wayne 

Thompson’s “From Rolling Thunder to Linebacker: The Air War over 

North Vietnam, 1966–1973.” This study has now been published as 

To Hanoi and Back: The U.S. Air Force and North Vietnam, 1966–1973. 

Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2000. 

U.S. Navy

Two volumes of the Naval Historical Center’s series, The United 

States Navy and the Vietnam Confl ict, have been published. The volume 

bearing on Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, is:

Marolda, Edward J. and Fitzgerald, Oscar P. From Military Assistance to 

Combat, 1959–1965. Washington, D.C.: Naval Historical Center, 

1986.

The Naval Historical Center also has published an illustrated 

overview of the Navy’s role in Southeast Asia:

Marolda, Edward J. By Sea, Air, and Land: An Illustrated History of the 

U.S. Navy and the War in Southeast Asia. Washington, D.C.: Naval 

Historical Center, 1994.

U.S. Marine Corps

The Marine Corps History and Museums Division has completed 

publication of its chronological series on U.S. Marines in Vietnam. The 

following volumes were consulted in the preparation of this study:

Shulimson, Jack and Johnson, Charles M. The Landing and the Buildup, 

1965. Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, Headquarters, 

U.S. Marine Corps, 1978.

Shulimson, Jack. An Expanding War, 1966. Washington, D.C.: History 

and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1982.

Telfer, Gary L.; Rogers, Lane; and Fleming, V. Keith. Fighting the North 

Vietnamese, 1967. Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, 

Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1984.

Whitlow, Robert H. The Advisory and Combat Assistance Era, 1954–1964. 

Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, Headquarters, 

U.S. Marine Corps, 1977.

Largely superceded by the chronological volumes but still useful is:

The Marines in Vietnam, 1954–1973: An Anthology and Annotated 

Bibliography. Washington, D.C.: History and Museums Division, 

Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1974.

Back_Matter 575.indd 503 4
504

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Joint History Offi ce

Cole, Ronald H.; Poole, Walter S.; Schnabel, James F.; Watson, Robe

J.; and Webb, Willard J. The History of the Unifi ed Command Plan

1946–1993. Washington, D.C.: Joint History Offi ce, Offi ce of th

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1995.

Secondary Works

Books and Articles

Adams, Sam. War of Numbers: An Intelligence Memoir. South Royalton

Vt.: Steerforth Press, 1994.

Berman, Larry. Planning a Tragedy: The Americanization of the War i

Vietnam. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1982.

Blaufarb, Douglas S. The Counterinsurgency Era: U.S. Doctrine an

Performance, 1950 to the Present. New York: The Free Press, 1977.

Borklund, C. W. The Department of Defense. New York: Frederick A

Praeger, 1968.

Brownlee, Romie L. and Mullen, William J., III. Changing an Army: A

Oral History of General William E. DePuy, USA Retired. Washington

D.C.: U.S. Army Military History Institute and U.S. Army Center o

Military History, 1988.

Cardwell, Thomas A. Command Structure for Theater Warfare: The Quest fo

Unity of Command. Maxwell AFB, Ala.: Air University Press, 1984.

Davidson, Phillip B. Secrets of the Vietnam War. Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1990

———. Vietnam at War: The History, 1946–1975. New York: Oxfor

University Press, 1988.

Duiker, William J. The Communist Road to Power in Vietnam. Boulde

Colo.: The Westview Press, Inc., 1981.

Ford, Harold P. CIA and the Vietnam Policymakers: Three Episodes, 1962

1968. Washington, D.C.: Center for the Study of Intelligence, Centra

Intelligence Agency, 1998.

Furgerson, Ernest B. Westmoreland: The Inevitable General. Boston: Littl

Brown and Company, 1968.

Gelb, Leslie H. and Betts, Richard K. The Irony of Vietnam: The System 

Worked. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1979.

Halberstam, David. The Best and the Brightest. New York: Random Hous

1972.

———. The Making of a Quagmire. New York: Random House, 1972.

Hammer, Ellen J. A Death in November: America in Vietnam, 1963. New York

E. P. Dutton, 1987.

Hannah, Norman B. The Key to Failure: Laos and the Vietnam War. New 

York: Madison Books, 1987.

Herring, George C. America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950

1975. New York: Wiley, 1979.

Back_Matter 575.indd 504 4
505

Bibliographical Note

———. “‘Peoples Quite Apart’: Americans, South Vietnamese, and the 

War in Vietnam.” Diplomatic History 14 (Winter 1990): 1–23.

———. “Cold Blood”: LBJ’s Conduct of Limited War in Vietnam. The 

Harmon Memorial Lectures in Military History, Number ThirtyThree. Colorado Springs, Colo.: U.S. Air Force Academy, 1990.

Hilsman, Roger. To Move a Nation: The Politics of Foreign Policy in the 

Administration of John F. Kennedy. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday and 

Company, Inc., 1967.

Hunt, Richard A. Pacifi cation: The American Struggle for Vietnam’s Hearts 

and Minds. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1995.

Jones, Bruce. War Without Windows: A True Account by a Young Army 

Offi cer Trapped in an Intelligence Cover-Up in Vietnam. New York: 

Vanguard Press, 1987.

Kahin, George McT. Intervention: How America Became Involved in Vietnam. 

New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1986.

Kinnard, Douglas. The War Managers. Hanover, N.H.: The University 

Press of New England, 1977.

Komer, Robert W. Bureaucracy Does Its Thing: Institutional Constraints on 

U.S.-GVN Performance in Vietnam. Santa Monica, Calif.: The Rand 

Corporation, 1973.

McMaster, H. R. Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam. New York: 

Harper Collins, 1997.

McNamara, Robert S. with Brian VanDeMark. In Retrospect: The Tragedy 

and Lessons of Vietnam. New York: Times Books, 1995.

Momyer, William M. Airpower in Three Wars. Washington, D.C.: 

Department of the Air Force, 1978.

Nolting, Frederick. From Trust to Tragedy: The Political Memoirs of Frederick 

Nolting, Kennedy’s Ambassador to Diem’s Vietnam. New York: Praeger 

Publishers, 1988.

Oberdorfer, Don. Tet! Da Capo Edition. New York: Da Capo Press, Inc., 

1984.

Palmer, Bruce. The 25-Year War: America’s Military Role in Vietnam. 

Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1984.

Pike, Douglas. “The Other Side.” The Wilson Quarterly (Summer 1983): 

114–124.

———. PAVN: People’s Army of Vietnam. Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 

1986.

———. Viet Cong: The Organization and Techniques of the National 

Liberation Front of South Vietnam. Cambridge, Mass.: The M.I.T. Press, 

1966.

———. Vietnam and the Soviet Union: Anatomy of an Alliance. Boulder, 

Colo.: Westview Press, 1987.

Porter, Gareth, ed. Vietnam: The Defi nitive Documentation of Human 

Decisions. 2 vols. Stanfordville, N.Y.: Earl M. Coleman Enterprises, 

Inc., 1979.

Back_Matter 575.indd 505 4
506

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Rostow, Walt W. The Diffusion of Power: An Essay in Recent History. New 

York: The Macmillan Company, 1972.

Rust, William J. and the Editors of U.S. News Books. Kennedy in Vietnam

New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1985.

Schlight, John, ed. Second Indochina War Symposium: Papers an

Commentary. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military Histor

1986.

Scoville, Thomas W. Reorganizing for Pacifi cation Support. Washington

D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1982.

Shapley, Deborah. Promise and Power: The Life and Times of Robe

McNamara. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1993.

Sharp, Ulysses S. G. Strategy for Defeat: Vietnam in Retrospect. San Rafae

Calif.: Presidio Press, 1978.

Sheehan, Neil. A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America i

Vietnam. New York: Random House, 1988.

Smith, Ralph B. An International History of the Vietnam War. Vol. 

Revolution versus Containment, 1955–1961. New York: St. Martin’s Pres

1983.

———. An International History of the Vietnam War. Vol. 2. The Kenned

Strategy. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1985.

Sorley, Lewis. Thunderbolt: General Creighton Abrams and the Army of H

Times. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992.

Stevenson, Charles A. The End of Nowhere: American Policy Toward Lao

Since 1954. Boston: Beacon Press, 1972.

Taylor, Maxwell D. Swords and Ploughshares. New York: W. W. Norton an

Co., Inc., 1972.

Thayer, Thomas C. How To Analyze a War Without Fronts: Vietnam 1965

1972. Journal of Defense Research. Series B, Tactical Warfare Analys

of Vietnam Data, 7B, no. 3, Fall 1975.

Thies, Wallace J. When Governments Collide: Coercion and Diplomacy in th

Vietnam Confl ict, 1964–1968. Berkeley and Los Angeles: Universit

of California Press, 1980.

Turley, William S. The Second Indochina War: A Short Political and Militar

History, 1954–1975. New York: New American Library, 1987.

Westmoreland, William C. A Soldier Reports. Garden City, N.Y

Doubleday and Company, 1976.

Zaffi ri, Samuel. Westmoreland: A Biography of General William C

Westmoreland. New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc

1994.

Unpublished Secondary Works

Barlow, Jeffrey G. “President John F. Kennedy and His Joint Chiefs o

Staff.” PhD Dissertation. University of South Carolina, 1981. 

Dietrich, Steve E. “Corps-Level Command-and-Control in a

Unconventional Confl ict: U.S. Army Field Forces in Vietnam

Back_Matter 575.indd 506 4
507

Bibliographical Note

Unpublished MS. Military Studies Branch, U.S. Army Center of 

Military History, 1989. 

Hermes, Walter. “Department of the Army: The Buildup.” Unpublished 

MS. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, n.d. 

Latimer, Thomas K. “Hanoi’s Leaders and their South Vietnam Policies, 

1954–1968.” PhD Dissertation. Georgetown University, 1972. 

Lewis, Thomas J. “Year of the Hare: Bureaucratic Distortion in the U.S. 

Military View of the Vietnam War in 1963.” MA Thesis. George 

Washington University, 1972. 

Meyerson, Joel. “Logistics in the Buildup” and “Logistics of an OpenEnded War.” Unpublished Papers. U.S. Army Center of Military 

History, 1989. 

Rosson, Gen William B. “Four Periods of American Involvement in 

Vietnam: Development and Implementation of Policy, Strategy and 

Programs, Described and Analyzed on the Basis of Service Experience 

at Progressively Senior Levels.” PhD Thesis. New College, Oxford 

University, England, 1979. 

Suplizio, Maj. Paul E. “A Study of the Military Support of Pacifi cation in 

South Vietnam, April 1964–April 1965.” Thesis. U.S. Army Command 

and General Staff College, 1966.

Von Luttichau, Charles. “The U.S. Army Role in the Confl ict in Vietnam.” 

MS. U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1964.

Back_Matter 575.indd 507 4
Back_Matter 575.indd 508 4
Glossary

509

ACTIV Army Concept Team in Vietnam

ADVON Advance Echelon

AID Agency for International Development (U.S.)

ARPA Advanced Research Projects Agency

ARVN Army of the Republic of Vietnam

BLT Battalion landing team

CDTC Combat Development and Test Center

CIA Central Intelligence Agency

CICV Combined Intelligence Center, Vietnam

CIDG Civilian Irregular Defense Group

CINCPAC Commander in Chief, Pacifi c (U.S.)

COC Combat Operations Center

COMUSMACV Commander, U.S. Military Assistance Command, 

 Vietnam

CORDS Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development 

 Support

COSVN Central Offi ce for South Vietnam

DCA Defense Communications Agency

DCPG Defense Communications Planning Group

DIA Defense Intelligence Agency

DRV Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam)

FMFPAC Fleet Marine Force, Pacifi c

HAWK Homing All the Way Killer

HES Hamlet Evaluation System

HSAS Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon

IMAO International Military Assistance Offi ce

JAOC Joint Air Operations Center

JGS Joint General Staff (South Vietnamese)

JOEG-V Joint Operational Evaluation Group–Vietnam

Back_Matter 575.indd 509 4
510

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

JTD Joint Table of Distribution

JTF Joint Task Force

JUSMAG Joint U.S. Military Assistance Group

JUSPAO Joint U.S. Public Affairs Offi ce

KANZUS Korea, Australia, New Zealand, United States forces

LAAM Light Antiaircraft Missile

MAAG Military Assistance Advisory Group (U.S.)

MACEVAL MACV Operations Research/Systems Analysis

 Office

MACOI MACV Offi ce of Information

MACV Military Assistance Command, Vietnam

MAF Marine Amphibious Force

MAG Marine aircraft group

MAP Military Assistance Program

MEB Marine Expeditionary Brigade

MEF Marine Expeditionary Force

NAVFORV (U.S.) Naval Forces, Vietnam

NCO Noncommissioned offi cer

NLF National Liberation Front

NSAM National Security Action Memorandum

OCO Offi ce of Civil Operations

PACAF (U.S.) Pacifi c Air Forces

PACOM Pacifi c Command (U.S.)

PAVN People’s Army of Vietnam

PERINTREP Periodic Intelligence Report

PLAF People’s Liberation Armed Forces

PROVN Program for the Pacifi cation and Long-Term 

 Development of South Vietnam

PRP People’s Revolutionary Party

R&R Rest and recuperation

ROKFORV Republic of Korea Forces, Vietnam

RVNAF Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces

SAC Strategic Air Command

SEACOORD Coordinating Committee for U.S. Missions in 

 Southeast Asia

SEATO Southeast Asia Treaty Organization

SITREP Situation Report

SLF Special Landing Force

Back_Matter 575.indd 510 4
511

Bibliographical Note Glossary

SNIE Special National Intelligence Estimate

SOG Studies and Observations Group

TACS Tactical air control system

TAOR Tactical area of responsibility

TASE Tactical air support element

TF Task Force

USAID U.S. Agency for International Development

USARPAC United States Army, Pacifi c

USARYIS U.S. Army, Ryukyu Islands

USASCV U.S. Army Support Command, Vietnam

USASGV U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam

USFV United States Forces, Vietnam

USIA United States Information Agency

USIS United States Information Service

USMACTHAI U.S. Military Assistance Command, Thailand

USOM United States Operations Mission

VNAF (South) Vietnamese Air Force

VNSF (South) Vietnamese Special Forces

Back_Matter 575.indd 511 4
Military Map Symbols

Function

Size

Regiment 

Brigade 

Division 

Corps 

III

X X

X

XXX

Airborne Infantry 

Airmobile Infantry 

Armored Cavalry 

Infantry 

Marine Infantry 

Examples

1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division 

Headquarters, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) 

X

1 101

X X

1 CAV

Back_Matter 575.indd 512 4
Index

Abrams, General Creighton W., Jr., 

277–78, 289, 326, 362, 456

Accelerated Model Plan, 81

Adams, Maj. Gen. Milton B., 57, 174

Administrative control

defi ned, 63n

Advance Echelon (ADVON), 326–27

Advanced Research Projects Agency 

(ARPA), 46, 50–52, 66n, 127, 293

Agency for International Development 

(AID), 21, 172, 363

Air defense missiles, 169, 170–71, 

176–77, 183n

Air Force, Eighth

command of, 325–26

Air Force, Seventh

command of, 320–23

Air Force Test Unit, 127

Air offensive

command of, 323–30

increased campaign in South Vietnam, 230–32

against North Vietnam in 1965, 

172–80

Air Support Operations Centers (ASOC), 59

Airborne Brigade, 173d, 218, 234, 236, 

249

Airborne Division, 101st, 234, 236, 245

Aircraft

B–52 heavy bombers, 231–32, 

325–27

B–26 light bomber, 58

duplication of services, 56, 68n

F–4B Phantom II, 199

Stratofortresses, 231

T–28 fi ghter-bombers, South Vietnamese, 58

Airmobility controversy, 56–60, 68n

Allen, George, 452

Allies. See also specifi c country by name.

counterinsurgency strategy, 75–85

operations coordination, 343–48

Anderson, Admiral George W., Jr., 

37–38, 53

Anthis, Brig. Gen. Rollen H., 55–59, 134

Antiaircraft missiles, 169, 170–71, 

176–77, 183n

Antiwar protests, 441–45

Ap Bac battle, 86, 91

Armed Forces Council, 144

Armed Forces of the Republic of Vietnam. See Republic of Vietnam 

Armed Forces (RVNAF).

Armed Forces Radio station, 129

Army Concept Team in Vietnam (ACTIV), 50, 56–57, 127

Army-Navy Mobile Riverine Force, 

312–13

Army of the Republic of Vietnam 

(ARVN), 11, 82–83, 86–87, 

190–92, 420–22

Army Special Forces, 15, 16, 18, 78

Associated States of Indochina, 7

Australia

allied force troops, 343

KANZUS force, 164

Westmoreland’s operational control 

over forces, 248, 344

BACK PORCH, 282–83

Ball, George, 237–38, 244

Bankson, Col. Roger, 129

Bao Dai, Emperor, 6–10

Battalion landing teams (BLT), 178

Bien Hoa Air Base, 159, 172

Binh Gia ambush, 194

Binh Xuyen, 9, 10

Blackburn, Col. Donald D., 375–76

Bonesteel, General Charles, 348

Brink Hotel bombing, 172

British Advisory Mission, 76

Brown, Dr. Harold, 51

Brownfi eld, Brig. Gen. Albert R., 289

Buddhists

confl ict with Diem, 88, 93, 97

riots against U.S. in 1965, 144

self-immolation, 89

Buddhists’ General Association, 88

Back_Matter 575.indd 513 4
Bundy, McGeorge, 122, 173–74, 189, 

210, 237

Bunker, Ellsworth, 354, 356, 360, 388

Bureau of Intelligence and Research 

(INR), 446

Cam Ranh Bay complex, 245–47

Cambodia

command relationships, 379–82

enemy-controlled areas, 373–74

Cao Dai, 9, 10, 12, 121

Carver, George, 452, 454–57, 472n

Cavalry Division, 1st, 240, 245–46, 249

Central Committee of the Vietnam 

Workers’ Party, 121

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), 15, 

21, 78–79, 103, 160, 375, 446–61

Central Offi ce for South Vietnam (COSVN),

14, 71, 72, 74, 87, 408, 466–67

Central Pacifi cation Committee, 141

Central Party Military Affairs Committee, 467–68

Chae Myung Shin, General, 248–49, 345–46

Chaisson, Brig. Gen. John R., 279

Chapman, General Leonard D., 334

CHIEN THANG plan, 139, 141, 190–95, 

427

Civil Guard, 16, 86, 135

Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS), 

361–64

Civilian Irregular Defense Groups 

(CIDGs), 78–79, 80, 136, 145–46

Collins, Brig. Gen. James L., 289

Collins, General James F., 54, 214–15

Collins, Maj. Gen. William R., 310

Combat Development and Test Center 

(CDTC), 50, 51

Combat Operations Center (COC), 127, 

278–79, 297–98

Combined Action Program, 402

Combined Campaign Plans, 351, 400, 

463

Combined Document Exploitation 

Center, 287

Combined Intelligence Center, Vietnam 

(CICV), 287, 325, 449

Combined Materiel Exploitation Center, 

287

Combined Military Interrogation Center, 286

Combined Planning Section, 165–66

Comintern, 5

Commander, Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (COMUSMACV), 24, 27, 39

Commander, Republic of Korea Forces, 

Vietnam, 248

Commander in Chief, Pacifi c Fleet 

(CINCPACFLT), 53

Commander in Chief, U.S. Forces, 

Pacifi c (CINCPAC), 11, 27, 37–38

167

Commander, U.S. Military Assistance 

Command, Thailand (COMUS

MACTHAI), 39–40, 372

Commander, U.S. Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam/Thailand 

(COMUSMAC, Vietnam/Thailand), 40

Communications system, 282–83

Communist International, 5

Communist Party. See Vietnam Worker

Party.

Communist Party Central Committee, 

13, 14

Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam

80–81, 99, 100

Computerized data management, 292

“Concept of Operations in the Republic 

of Vietnam,” 249–50

Construction Directorate, 282

Construction program, 281–82

Cook, Col. Robert M., 284

Coordinating authority defi ned, 339n

Coordinating Committee for U.S. Missions in Southeast Asia (SEACO

ORD), 163–64, 376–77, 382

CORDS, 357–64. See also Pacifi cation.

Counterinsurgency Plan, 16, 75

Counterintelligence Advisory Committee, 128

Current Intelligence and Indications 

Center, 128

Cushman, Lt. Gen. Robert E., 334

Da Nang, dispatch of Marine Expeditionary Brigade to, 177–80

Data Management Agency, 292

Davidson, Maj. Gen. Phillip B., 452–55

De Gaulle, Charles, 118

De Saussure, Brig. Gen. Edward H., 346

Decker, General George W., 47

Defense Communications Agency 

(DCA), 283

Defense Communications Planning 

Group (CDPG), 423, 425

Defense Communications System, 283

Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), 72, 

446

Defense Research and Engineering, 

Deputy for (DDR&E), 66n

514

MACV The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Back_Matter 575.indd 514 4
Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV)

establishment of, 6, 8

DePuy, Brig. Gen. William E., 138, 146, 

190, 242, 252–54, 276, 279, 330

Detachment 7, 55

Diem, Ngo Dinh

acceptance of British counterinsurgency plan, 76–77

confl ict with Buddhist movement, 

88, 93, 97

death of, 104

establishment of ground forces 

chain of command, 82–83

Harkins support of, 90–91

impact of U.S. command creation, 

21, 24, 26–28

increased U.S. assistance during 

1960s, 15–16, 18–19

Kennedy’s expectations, 20

leadership style, 86–88

military coup against, 95–106

National Internal Security Council, 75

presidential election, 10

Presidential Survey Offi ce, 78

as Prime Minister, 9

strategic hamlet plan, 78

uprisings against regime, 13–15

U.S. advisory group actions, 10–12

DIEN HUONG pacifi cation plan, 139

Directorate of Intelligence, 129

Disosway, Lt. Gen. Gabriel P., 68n

DMZ Front Command, 280

Don, Maj. Gen. Tran Van, 95, 99–100, 

102–05

“DOVE” unit, 343, 345

Dulles, John Foster, 8

Dunn, Lt. Col. John M., 151n

Dunn, Maj. Gen. Carroll H., 281–82, 298

Durbrow, Elbridge, 21, 95

Easterbrook, Maj. Gen. Ernest F., 372

Eighth Air Force, command of, 325–26

Eisenhower, Dwight D., 8, 9–10, 187, 

316

Engineer’s Offi ce, 281

Engler, Lt. Gen. Jean E., 315, 318

Enthoven, Alain, 418

Explosion Plan, 82

5th Special Forces Group (Airborne), 136

Far East Command, 37

FARM GATE unit, 55, 56, 58, 89, 134, 162, 

165, 167

Felt, Admiral Harry D.

mediation of air power control 

debate, 59

Felt, Admiral Harry D.—Continued

objection to McNamara’s MACV 

headquarters plan, 37–38

opposition to eliminating the 

MAAG, 125–26

as PACOM commander, 21, 27, 35, 

41–42, 50–51, 55

proposal for COMUSMAC, Thailand/Vietnam formation, 39–40

reorganization of MAAG headquarters, 43–44

Research and Evaluation Division 

proposal, 52

Field Force Vietnam, 247, 248, 331–34

Fleet Marine Force Pacifi c (FMFPAC), 

312

Flexible Response strategy, 36

Forrestal, Michael, 96, 123, 124

Forsythe, Maj. Gen. George, 362

Foster, Dr. John W., 293

France

beginnings of antagonism in Vietnam, 5

cease-fi re agreement with Viet 

Minh, 8

mutual assistance pact with U.S. in 

Indochina, 7

war with Viet Minh beginning in 

1946, 6–7

Free World Military Assistance Offi ce, 

344

Freund, Brig. Gen. John F., 289, 352

Gavin, General James M., 443

General Offensive Campaign Plan, 83, 85

General Offensive–General Uprising, 

466–67

Geneva Conference, 7–8

Geographically Phased National Level 

Operation Plan for Counterinsurgency, 75

Giap, Vo Nguyen, 71

Godding, Brig. Gen. George, 455, 457

Graham, Col. Daniel O., 452–53

Green Berets, 136

Greene, General Wallace M., Jr., 207, 

312, 333

Ground troop commitment

collapse of the CHIEN THANG plan, 

190–95

command questions, 212–19

concept of operations questions, 

212–19

decisions from 1966 Honolulu conference, 256–59

implementing Phase I, 245–51

515

Index

Back_Matter 575.indd 515 4
516

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Ground troop commitment—Continued 

increase in reinforcements, 232–45

limited response, 195–200

movement into ground war, 206–12

Phase I Add-ons, 251

Phase II planning, 252–56

plans and proposals, 1954–1964, 

187–90

proposals for sending troops, 200–206

Group 559, 73

Group 759, 73

Halberstam, David, 94

Hamlet Evaluation System (HES), 291, 292

Hamscher, Col. George, 455

Harkins, Gen. Paul Donal

acceptance of Khanh’s coup, 119

air power control debate, 56–59

assumption of duties as MACV commander, 3

career background, 3, 38–39

component commands, 53–56, 

483–84

Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam, 80–81

concerns related to the strategic 

hamlet project, 77

confl ict with Lodge, 100–103, 

122–23

criticism of U.S. action in overthrow 

of Diem, 105–06

McNamara’s nomination as MACV 

commander, 24

National Campaign Plan, 81–82

opposition to eliminating the 

MAAG, 125

opposition to escalation of war, 158

optimism concerning progress of 

the war, 91–92

recommendations for MACV staff, 

46–49

reorganization of MAAG headquarters, 43–44

Research and Evaluation Division 

proposal, 52

responsibilities as MACV commander, 26–28, 35, 39–42, 45, 50–52

retirement of, 123

support of Diem regime, 90–91, 101–02

support of pressure to remove Nhu 

from Diem’s regime, 97–98, 100

Harriman, W. Averell, 96

Harris, General Hunter, 321

HAWK battalions, 169, 170–71, 176–77, 

183n

Hawkins, Col. Gains, 454

Headquarters Area Command, 312

Headquarters Support Activity, Saigon 

(HSAS), 53, 170, 312

Heintges, Lt. Gen. John A., 277, 296, 

302n

Helms, Richard, 451, 457, 472n

High National Council, 144

Hilsman, Roger, 96

Ho Chi Minh

beginnings of antagonism with 

France, 5–6

establishment of Democratic Repub

lic of Vietnam, 6

Ho Chi Minh Trail, 13–14, 18, 73, 

373–79

Hoa Hao, 9, 10, 12, 121

Honolulu conference

order of battle determination, 

447–48

Phase II planning decisions, 256–5

Howze, Lt. Gen. Hamilton H., 68n

Humphrey, Hubert, 461

Huong, Tran Van, 144

Hyland, Vice Admiral John J., 314

Indochina Military Assistance Advisory 

Group, 7, 9–10

Infantry Division, 1st, 234, 245, 249

Information and Reports Working 

Group, 130

Integrated Wideband Communications 

System, 282

Intelligence agencies, 127–29

Intelligence Collection Plan, 128

Intelligence Directorate, 284, 286, 290, 

454

Intelligence system, 284–88

Interagency Committee on Province 

Rehabilitation, 77

International Military Assistance Offi ce 

(IMAO), 127, 344

Johnson, Capt. William R., 93

Johnson, General Harold K., 200–202, 

205, 207, 244, 315, 320

Johnson, Lyndon B.

authorization of ground troop com

mitment, 208, 212

authorization of ground troop rein

forcement, 240, 243–44

commitment to pacifi cation, 353, 

360

conference with McNamara and 

Taylor, 166

consideration of ground troop com

mitment, 189

Back_Matter 575.indd 516 4
517

Bibliographical Note

Johnson, Lyndon B.—Continued

consideration of Westmoreland’s 

request for increase in ground 

troops, 237–39

decision against mobilization of 

reserves, 244–45, 253

efforts to level off the war, 461–66

escalation of war in 1964, 157–58

Honolulu Conference, 1966, 256–58

implementing Phase I of ground 

troop reinforcement, 245–51

Khanh regime support, 119

order for removal of dependents 

from South Vietnam, 176

public relations aspect of war, 

441–45

relationship with Westmoreland, 

308–09

Johnson, U. Alexis, 141, 233

Joint Air-Ground Operations System, 

328

Joint Air Operations Center (JAOC), 57, 

58, 59

Joint Airlift Allocation Board, 57

Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), 22–24, 135, 

169–70, 206–07, 209, 233–34, 

307–10

Joint General Staff, South Vietnamese 

(JGS), 11, 50, 82–83, 85, 100, 

129, 268, 351–52

Joint Operational Evaluation Group, 46, 60

Joint Operational Evaluation Group–

Vietnam (JOEG-V), 50, 51, 127

Joint Operations Center, 83, 104

Joint Personnel Recovery Center, 375

Joint Research and Testing Agency, 127, 

293

Joint Table of Distribution (JTD), 46, 

132, 150n, 268, 296

Joint Task Force 116 (JTF 116), 39–40

Joint U.S. Military Assistance Group 

(JUSMAG), 39

Joint U.S. Public Affairs Offi ce (JUSPAO), 

363

Jones, Brig. Gen. William K., 278, 279, 298

KANZUS force, 164

Kennedy, John F.

assasination of, 106

civilian-military command creation in 

South Vietnam, 21–29

consideration of ground troop commitment, 187–88

counterinsurgency plan for South 

Vietnam, 16–20

creation of USMACTHAI, 39

Kennedy, John F.—Continued 

differences among administration 

concerning coup against Diem, 

96–99

reneutralization plan in Laos, 17–18

support of military coup against 

Diem, 99–100, 103

Kerwin, Maj. Gen. Walter T., 277, 362

Khan, Lt. Gen. Le Nghen, 350

Khanh, Maj. Gen. Nguyen, 118–19, 139, 

141–42, 144–45, 167, 174, 190

Khiem, Maj. Gen. Tran Thien, 119

Khruschev, Nikita S., 122

Knowlton, Brig. Gen. William A., 359

Komer, Robert W., 357, 358, 360–63, 

439–40, 453–56

Korea

KANZUS force, 164

Westmoreland’s operational control 

over forces, 248–49

Korean Capital Division, 245

Krulak, Lt. Gen. Victor H., 330, 333, 

403–04

Ky, Marshal Nguyen Cao, 145, 212, 

229–30, 237, 242, 256–57, 353–57

Lansdale, Brig. Gen. Edward G., 357

Lao Dong Central Committee and Politburo, 71–72

Lao Dong (Communist) Party of North 

Vietnam, 71, 73, 467

Laos

air war planning, 164–67

enemy-controlled areas, 373–74

U.S. air and ground operations, 

161–64

U.S. air campaign, 374–76

U.S. reneutralization plan, 17–18

Larsen, Maj. Gen. Stanley R., 248, 333, 

345–46, 380

Lathram, L. Wade, 361

LeMay, General Curtis E., 47–48, 55, 

135

Lemnitzer, General Lyman W., 24–25, 

28

Light Antiaircraft Missile Battalion 

(LAAM), 171, 177

Loc, General Vinh, 248

Lodge, Henry Cabot, 95–103, 122–24, 

141–42, 151n, 242, 353–54, 

357–58

Logistical Command, 1st, 246, 273, 312

Logistics Directorate, 282

Loi, Col. Ho Van, 286

Long Binh headquarters, 317

Lotz, Brig. Gen. Walter E., Jr., 283, 297

Index

Back_Matter 575.indd 517 4
518

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

MacArthur, General Douglas, 316

McChristian, Maj. Gen. Joseph A., 

284–86, 296, 448–50, 452–54

McCone, John A., 79

McConnell, General John P., 207, 

236–37, 255, 321–23

McCutcheon, Brig. Gen. Keith B., 328

McGarr, Lt. Gen. Lionel C.

as chief of MAAG, 21, 23

counterinsurgency recommendation in War Zone D, 77

opposition to command structure, 

24–25, 45

replacement by Maj. Gen. Timmes, 43

McGown, Maj. Gen. Hal D., 347

McMillan, Dr. William G., 293–94

McNamara, Robert S.

conference with Johnson and Taylor, 166

as director of Kennedy’s Vietnam 

program, 20–26, 29

dissatisfaction with MACV staff 

qualifi cations, 137

ground troop commitment recommendations, 211–12

Honolulu Conference, 1966, 258

Khanh regime support, 118

MACV command structure proposal, 37–38, 40, 47

management style controversy, 36

opposition to military escalation, 

461–62

plan to phase out MACV, 79–80

presidency of the World Bank, 462

recommendation to deemphasize 

ROLLING THUNDER campaign, 

414–16

recommendation for full implementation of Phase II plan, 254

rejection of Comprehensive Plan for 

South Vietnam, 80–81

rejection of McGarr’s counterinsurgency recommendation in War 

Zone D, 77

request for estimate of required 

troop reinforcements, 241–43, 

411–12

support of increase in ground troop 

reinforcement, 240–41

support of plan to eliminate the 

MAAG, 125

support for single pacifi cation manager, 357

transfer of Civilian Irregular Defense 

Program to MACV, 79

McNaughton, John, 179, 441

MACV Offi ce of Information (MACCOI

129, 132

MACV Operations Research/Systems 

Analysis Offi ce (MACEVAL), 

292–93

Mao Tse Tung, 71

Marine aircraft group (MAG), 186n

Marine Amphibious Force (MAF), III, 

214, 218, 245–47, 310–12, 329

331–34, 425–26

Marine Divisions

3d, 234

7th, 245, 249

Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB), 

169–70, 177–80, 186n, 213, 21

Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF), 

213–14

Martin, Graham, 347, 372

Massive Retaliation strategy, 36

Military Assistance Advisory Group, 

Vietnam, 10–11

Military Assistance Advisory Groups 

(MAAGs)

Geographically Phased National 

Level Operation Plan for Coun

terinsurgency, 75

Indochina, 7, 9–10

relationship with Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, 

42–44

South Vietnam, 11–12, 15–16, 20–2

Military Assistance Command, Thailan

(MACTHAI), 373

Military Assistance Command, Vietnam 

(MACV). See also Harkins, Gen

Paul Donal; Westmoreland, Lt

Gen. William C.

advisory mission, 288–90, 481

air power control debate, 56–60

amenities for staff, 272

campaign progress during 1962 an

1963, 85–86

command structure, 60–62, 307–10

479–83

commander’s responsibilities, 35

component commands, 53–56

Comprehensive Plan for South Vie

nam, 80–81

creation of, 24, 26–27, 29

Executive Council, 138

function of, 3, 35, 477

headquarters expansion, 1965–1967, 

267–75

headquarters formation, 44–53

headquarters reorganization and 

expansion, 125–39

Back_Matter 575.indd 518 4
519

Bibliographical Note

Military Assistance Command, Vietnam 

(MACV)—Continued

initial strategy concept, 397–405

intelligence system, 284–88

joint command, 295–99

operations planning and control, 

275–84

OPLAN 34A, 159–61, 164–67

order of battle controversy, 446–61

pacification role, 139–43, 478, 483

place in Pacifi c chain of command, 

36–41

reinforcement of South Vietnam after Tonkin Gulf attacks, 167–72

relationship with Military Assistance Advisory Groups, 42–44

reporting, research, and analysis, 

290–95

Research and Evaluation Division 

proposal, 52

ROLLING THUNDER campaign, 382–89, 

478

staff organization, 44–53, 133, 276

strategy implementation problems, 

405–11

strategy questions, 395–97

strength adjustments, 420–30

support of military coup against 

Diem, 95–106

troop strength strategy, 411–20

Military Assistance Program (MAP), 

42–44, 78, 80–81, 126

Military Assistance Program Directorate, 

288, 290

Military operations. See Operations, 

military.

Military Police, 172, 176

Military Revolutionary Council, 104, 119

Military Working Arrangement, 248–49

Minh, Maj. Gen. Duong Van, 82–83, 

95–96, 98, 100, 104, 118–19

Ministry of Defense, 11

Ministry of Revolutionary Development, 

353

Mission Council, 141

Mission Intelligence Committee, 233

Mobilization Directorate, 190

Model M plan, 81

Momyer, Lt. Gen. William W., 323, 

326–27, 330, 339n

Montagnards, 12, 145–47

Montague, Maj. Robert, 143

Moore, Maj. Gen. Joseph H., 132, 134–35, 

166–68, 296, 322, 329–30

Movement of MACV dependents out of 

Saigon, 272–73

National Campaign Plan, 81–82, 87, 92

National Front for the Liberation of 

South Vietnam (NLF), 14, 71, 

72, 74, 118, 121

National Internal Security Council, 75

National Pacifi cation Program, 345

National Police Force, 81, 192

National Security Action Memorandum 

(NSAM) 18, 52, 119–20, 157, 

288

National Security Agency (NSA), 446

National Security Council, 141, 244

Nationalist Chinese, occupation of 

northern Indochina in 1945, 6

Naval Advisory Group, 310

Naval Forces, Vietnam (NAVFORV)

command of, 310–14

New Life Hamlets, 139

New Zealand

allied force troops, 343

KANZUS force, 164

Westmoreland’s operational control 

of forces, 344

News media

reports concerning U.S. role in war, 

94

Westmoreland’s reorganization of 

the Public Information Offi ce, 

129–30

Nhu, Ngo Dinh, 76, 77, 87, 88, 95–97, 

104

Nitze, Paul, 453

Nolting, Frederick E., 23–29, 55, 90, 

93–94, 95

North Atlantic Treaty, 6

Norton, Brig. Gen. John, 315–16

O’Daniel, Lt. Gen. John W. (“Iron Mike”), 

11

Offi ce of Assistant Chief of Staff for Military Assistance, 290

Offi ce of Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support 

(OCORDS), 361–64

Offi ce of Civil Operations (OCO), 

358–61

Offi ce of the Inspector General, 283–84

Offi ce of the Scientifi c Adviser, 294

Offi ce of Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency and Special Activities 

(SACSA), 16

Operation Plan 37–64, 165, 168

Operation Plan 32 (OPLAN 32), 188

Operation Plan 34A (OPLAN 34A), 

159–61, 164–67, 375

Operational control defi ned, 63n

Index

Back_Matter 575.indd 519 4
520

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Operations, military

ARC LIGHT, 231–32, 325–27

BARREL ROLL, 163, 374–75

CEDAR FALLS, 407, 422

DANIEL BOONE, 381

DE SOTO, 167

DORSAL FIN, 381

DYE MARKER, 425

FAIRFAX/RAND DONG, 352–53

FLAMING DART, 172, 174

FULL CRY, 378

HIGH PORT, 378–79

HOP TAC, 142–44, 191–92, 194, 197, 

358

ILLINOIS CITY, 437n

JACKSTAY, 314

JUNCTION CITY, 422

LEAPING LENA, 161

MARKET TIME, 310

MOOSE, 272–273

MUSCLE SHOALS, 425

PRACTICE NINE, 425, 437n

ROLLING THUNDER, 173, 175, 177, 

205, 227, 243, 323, 382–89, 

414–16, 423

SHINING BRASS, 374, 377

SLAM, 330

SOUTHPAW, 378–79

STARLITE, 249

STEAM BATH, 382

SUNRISE, 77

SWITCHBACK, 79

YANKEE TEAM, 162–63

Operations Analysis Section, 127

Operations Directorate, 290

Operations Research/Systems Analysis 

Offi ce, 292–93

Osmanski, Brig. Gen. Frank A., 49, 170

Oum, Prince Boun, 17

Pacifi c Air Forces (PACAF), 55, 57, 

321–23

Pacifi c Command, U.S. (PACOM)

command relationships, 1967, 319

contingency plans for Southeast 

Asia during the late 1950s, 15

MACV command structure, 36–41

Phase II planning conference, 253

unifi ed command structure, 22, 

307–10

Pacifi c Fleet, 311–13

Pacifi cation. See also CORDS.

CHIEN THANG plan, 139, 141, 190–95, 

427

defi ned, 17

DIEN HUONG pacifi cation plan, 139

Pacifi cation—Continued

MACV’s role in, 139–43

Saigon politics and, 353–57

U.S. policy after overthrow of Diem

117–20

Pacifi cation Committee, 140

Pacifi cation Planning and Operations 

Branch, 127, 131

Pagoda raids, 88, 97

Palmer, General Bruce, 124, 289, 317, 

318

Parry, Col. Francis F., 278–79

Pathet Lao, 8, 17–18, 73, 162

People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN), 122, 

197, 405, 409

People’s Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF), 

14, 72, 74, 121, 249, 405, 409

People’s Revolutionary Committees, 6

People’s Revolutionary Party, 71

Periodic Intelligence Report (PERINTREP), 285

Philippines

allied force troops, 343

Westmoreland’s operational contro

of forces, 344

Phoumi Nosavan, General, 17

Plain of Jars, 373–79

Plan 37, 165

Policy Planning Council, 428

Political Warfare Advisory Directorate, 

288

Pomeroy, Col. Philip S., Jr., 49

Popular Forces, 191–92

Porter, William, 358–59

PRAIRIE FIRE zone, 377–79

Preparedness Investigating Subcommittee, 134

Press Relations Division, 129

Program Four, 412–14

Program Five, 417–19, 427

Program for the Pacifi cation and LongTerm Development of South 

Vietnam (PROVN), 399, 401

Programs Evaluation Offi ce, 17

Project 640, 290

Project MACONOMY, 426

Province Reports Center, 131

Province Studies Working Group, 130

Public Information Offi ce, 127, 129

Public relations, 441–45, 484–85

Quat, Dr. Phan Huy, 144, 178, 206, 214

229–30

Raborn, William, 237

Rasmussen, Maj. Gen. Henry A., 281

Back_Matter 575.indd 520 4
521

Bibliographical Note

Raymond, Morrison-Knudsen, Brown 

and Root, and J.A. Jones 

(RMK-BRJ), 268, 281

Reedy, George F., 239

Regional Communications Group, 283

Regional Forces, 191–92

Republic of Korea

allied force troops, 343

command of troops, 345–47

Republic of Korea Forces, Vietnam 

(ROKFORV), 345–46

Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces 

(RVNAF), 3, 11, 16, 80–81, 

429–30

Republic of Vietnam Statistical Data 

Base, 130

Research Development Test and Evaluation, 51

Resolution Fourteen, 468

Revolutionary Development. See Pacifi -

cation.

Revolutionary Development Support 

Directorate, 359, 361

Rhade Montagnard tribe, 146

Richardson, John, 93–94, 99

Ridgway, General Matthew B., 443–44

Rifl es, AK–47, 193

Rosson, Maj. Gen. William B., 215, 243, 

280

Rostow, Walt W., 16, 18–19, 389, 453

Rowney, Maj. Gen. Edward L., 56–57

Royal Laotian Air Force, 162

Royal Laotian Army, 17

Rusk, Dean, 20, 23–26, 29, 122, 237, 240, 257

Ryan, General John D., 231

2d Advance Echelon, Thirteenth Air 

Force (2d ADVON), 55

2d Air Division, 55–56

Seventh Air Force, command of, 320–27

Sackton, Maj. Gen. Frank J., 253

Second Indochina War, beginning of, 14

Self-Defense Corps, 86, 135

Senior Adviser’s Monthly Report, 131

Sharp, Admiral Ulysses S. Grant

air campaign command, 166–67, 

328–30, 383–89

clarifi cation of Westmoreland’s 

authority, 239–40

disagreement with Westmoreland 

concerning air campaign, 

174–75

ground troop strategy, 178–79, 

216–17, 411

opposition to establishment of 

deputy COMUSMACV, 134, 135

Sharp, Admiral Ulysses S. Grant—

Continued

supervision of MACV activities,

307–09

Sides, Admiral John H., 53

SIGMA I–64, 165

Sihanouk, Prince Norodom, 379–82

Situation Reports (SITREPs), 279

Smart, General Jacob E., 321

Smith, Brig. Gen. Paul, 359

South Vietnam

decline in Army’s combat strength, 

228

MACV’s advisory mission, 288–90

Military Assistance Advisory Group, 

11–12, 15–16, 20–21

operations coordination, 348–53

U.S. civilian-military command 

creation, 21–29

U.S. counterinsurgency plan, 16–20

South Vietnamese Central Training 

Command, 288

South Vietnamese Joint General Staff, 

43–44, 46, 54

South Vietnamese Special Forces, 136, 

153n, 161–62

Southeast Asia Airlift System, 57, 58, 59

Southeast Asia Treaty Organization 

(SEATO), 10, 37, 40

Souvanna Phouma, Prince, 17–18, 161, 

162–63, 376–77

Spears, Col. John H., 146

Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency 

and Special Activities, Offi ce of 

(SACSA), 16

Special Forces, 15, 16, 18, 136, 146–47

Special Landing Force (SLF), 313–14

Special Liaison Offi cer, 357

Special National Intelligence Estimate 

(SNIE), 451–52, 454, 457–59

Special Operations Group, 160

Special Projects and Liaison, 129–30

Special Warfare Branch, 79

Stalin, Joseph, 7

Starbird, Gen. Alfred D., 423–24

STEEL TIGER zone, 374

Stennis, John, 134

Stilwell, Maj. Gen. Richard G., 103, 

131–32, 138, 140–41, 347

Strategic Air Command (SAC), 231, 

325–27

Strategic Communications Command, 283

Strategic hamlets, 76–78, 87, 93, 120. See 

also New Life Hamlets.

Studies and Observations Group (SOG), 

127, 160, 374–75

Index

Back_Matter 575.indd 521 4
522

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Sullivan, William L., 163, 375–78

Suu, Phan Khac, 144, 229–30

Systems Analysis Division, 292

Systems Analysis Offi ce, 292–93, 418, 

426

Tactical air control system (TACS), 57, 

59

Tactical Air Support Element (TASE), 324

Tactical area of responsibility (TAOR), 

179, 218

Tam, General Tran Ngoc, 142–43

Tan Son Nhut facility, 270, 273

Target Research and Analysis Center, 

128

Task Forces (TFs) 

115, 310

116, 310

117, 312–13

Alpha, 247, 331

Taylor, General Maxwell D.

acceptance of British counterinsurgency plan, 76

approval of Harkin’s appointment, 38

as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of 

Staff, 41

command creation proposals, 23, 25

conference with Johnson and 

McNamara, 166

counterinsurgency plan recommendations, 19–20

ground troop commitment opposition, 189–90

ground troop operations proposal, 

216

Khanh regime support, 118

MACV reorganization support, 126

Mission Council establishment, 141

opposition to Phase II plan, 255

opposition to Young Turks movement, 144–45

recommendation for larger air campaign, 227

recommendation for slow commitment of ground troops, 207–08, 

210–11

replacement of Lodge as ambassador 

in South Vietnam, 124

support of increase in ground 

troops, 237

support of Kennedy administration’s counterinsurgency plan, 

18–19

support of marine landing in Da 

Nang, 178–79

Terrorism, 273

Thailand

allied force troops, 343

Military Assistance Command, 

Thailand (MACTHAI), 373

Westmoreland’s operational contro

of forces, 344

Thang, Col. Nguyen Duc, 190

Thi, Maj. Gen. Nguyen Chanh, 179, 35

Thich Tri Quang, 88

Thieu, General Nguyen Van, 212, 229–

30, 237, 242, 256–57, 350, 353–57

Tho, Nguyen Ngoc, 96, 104

Thompson, Sir Robert G.K., 76–77

Throckmorton, Lt. Gen. John L., 131, 

137, 177, 214, 277, 296, 302n

TIGER HOUND zone, 374, 377

Timmes, Maj. Gen. Charles, 28, 43

Tonkin Gulf engagements, 158, 166–67

Tra, General Tran Van, 408, 467

Training Directorate, 288

Troop Information division, 129

Trueheart, William, 103

Truman, Harry S.

mutual assistance pact with France, 7

policy of containment in Indochina, 

6–7

Unger, Leonard, 161, 163

United States

civilian-military command creation 

in South Vietnam, 21–29

collective security pact for Southea

Asia, 10

KANZUS force, 164

Military Assistance Advisory 

Groups, 10–12

mutual assistance pact with France 

in Indochina, 7

policy after overthrow of Diem, 

117–20

response to Viet Cong insurgency 

during late 1950s and early 

1960s, 15–20

United States Forces, Vietnam (USFV), 

22–24

U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), 21, 172, 363

U.S. Air Force, air power control debate

56–60

U.S. Army

air power control debate, 56–60

fi eld force command, 331–34

U.S. Army, Pacifi c (USARPAC), 38, 316

U.S. Army, Ryukyu Islands (USARYIS), 54

U.S. Army, Vietnam (USARV), 273, 289

314–20

Back_Matter 575.indd 522 4
523

Bibliographical Note

U.S. Army Support Command, Vietnam 

(USASCV), 169, 183n, 314–15

U.S. Army Support Group, Vietnam 

(USASGV), 54

U.S. Department of Defense and Civilian 

Irregular Defense Groups, 79

U.S. Information Agency (USIA), 21, 

128, 141

U.S. Military Assistance Command, 

Thailand (USMACTHAI), 39

U.S. Mission, 77–78, 139

U.S. Naval Forces Vietnam (NAVFORV), 

312

U.S. Operations Mission (USOM), 15–16, 

78, 128, 141

USS Card, 171

USS Maddox, 183n

Vance, Cyrus, 243

Vann, Lt. Col. John P., 93, 94

Vien, General Cao Van, 289, 345, 

350–51

Viet Cong. See Vietnamese Communists.

Viet Minh

beginnings of antagonism with 

France, 5–6

breakdown of Diem’s authority, 14

cease-fi re agreement with France, 8

Diem’s denunciation campaigns, 10

establishment of Democratic Republic of Vietnam, 8

war with France beginning in 1946, 6–7

Vietnam Coordinating Committee, 353

Vietnam Workers’ Party, 14, 121

Vietnamese Advisory Division, 288

Vietnamese Air Force (VNAF), 56, 58, 89, 

173, 174–75

Vietnamese Communists

Diem’s naming of, 14

ground troop strength buildup, 228

insurgency organization, 71–75

offensive uprising, 466–69

preparation for escalation of the 

war, 120–22

terrorism aimed at MACV personnel 

and installations, 273

U.S. response to insurgency during 

late 1950s and early 1960s, 15–20

Vietnamese Independence League. See

Viet Minh.

Vietnamese National Army, 7

Vietnamese Special Forces (VNSF), 82, 

99, 100, 162

Walt, Maj. Gen. Lewis W., 310, 312, 333, 402

War Room, 127

Ward, Rear Adm. Norvell G., 311

Waters, General John K., 315, 318

Weede, Maj. Gen. Richard G., 46–49, 81, 131

Westmoreland, Lt. Gen. William C.

advisory team expansion, 136

air offensive command, 323–26, 

374–78

career background, 123

command coordination with Cambodia, 379–82

command coordination with South 

Vietnamese, 348–53

command fragmentation, 371–73, 

389, 481–82

comprehensive campaign plan, 

249–50

confi dence in military progress in 

1967, 439–40

coordination of air and ground operations in Laos, 162–64, 166

creation of deputy commander for 

air operations position, 135

efforts toward pacifi cation, 354–64

ground troop command proposal, 

214–15

ground troop operations proposal, 

216–19

ground troop strategy, 395–410, 

487–89

Honolulu Conference, 1966, 258

implementing Phase I of ground 

troop reinforcement, 245–51

increased air campaign in South 

Vietnam, 230–32

as intermediary for political stability, 145

interpretation of Viet Cong strategy, 

196–98

involvement in air offensive against 

North Vietnam in 1965, 173–75

joint command of MACV, 295–99

joint command of U.S. troops, 

307–10, 314–18, 320, 331–34

leadership style, 137–38, 275–76, 

485–87

operational control over allied 

forces, 248–49, 344–45

opposition of ground troop commitment, 189–90

order of battle controversy, 449–50

public relations concerns, 441–45, 

484–85

reaction to escalation of war, 

158–59

recommendations for ground troop 

commitment, 203–05, 209–12

Index

Back_Matter 575.indd 523 4
524

MACV: The Years of Escalation, 1962–1967

Westmoreland, Lt. Gen. William C.—

Continued 

reinforcement of South Vietnam after Tonkin Gulf attacks, 167–72

reorganization of the Public Information Offi ce, 129–30

replacement of Harkin’s as MACV 

commander, 123–25

request for increase in ground 

troops, 233–34, 236, 238–41

request of troops for Phase II, 

252–55

role in pacifi cation plan, 140–43

ROLLING THUNDER campaign, 382–89

staff rotation policies, 271–72

support of Johnson’s efforts to level 

off the war, 463–65, 490–92

support of marine landing in Da 

Nang, 178–79

Westmoreland, Lt. Gen. William C.—

Continued 

support of plan to eliminate the 

MAAG, 125

Weyand, Lt. Gen. Frederick, 271, 404

Wheeler, General Earle G., 126, 135, 

207, 233, 298, 309, 360, 386–8

Williams, Lt. Gen. Samuel T. (“Hanging 

Sam”), 11–12, 21

Wilson, Col. Jasper, 142

Wilton, Lt. Gen. John, 344

World Bank, McNamara’s presidency of, 462

Yarborough, Maj. Gen. William P., 187

York, Brig. Gen. Robert H., 51, 60, 93

Young Turks, 144, 179

Youngdale, Brig. Gen. Carl A., 128–29, 29

Zorthian, Barry, 129, 439–40

Back_Matter 575.indd 524 4
PIN : 081

The United States Army in Vietnam is a multivolume history of the 

Army’s involvement in the Vietnam War. The series treats a full range 

of topics, from combat operations and advisory efforts, to logistics, 

communications, and engineer endeavors. Two volumes deal with 

theater command. The first, MACV: The Joint Command in the Years 

of Escalation, describes the role of the theater commander during the 

early years of American involvement and how he used his resources 

to achieve the goals set by his superiors in Washington.

THE UNITED STATES

ARMY IN VIETNAM

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