page_title: Peer de Silva
section_title: Sudden assignment
hierarchical_section_title: Peer de Silva / Chief of Station (COS) / Saigon 1963 to 1965 / Sudden assignment
caption_attribution_description: English: William Egan Colby, 10th Director of Central Intelligence.
context_page_description: Peer de Silva was a station chief in the Central Intelligence Agency. A 1941 West Point graduate, during World War II he served as an Army officer providing security for the Manhattan Engineer District; this undercover project sought to build the first atomic bomb. After the war, he joined a pre-CIA military intelligence unit. Then, having learned Russian, he worked in central Europe, frequently traveling to Moscow. Resigning from the Army, he rose within CIA ranks, becoming a chief of station. He first held such rank in Vienna, 1956-1959.
  He next led the CIA station at the American Embassy in Seoul, South Korea, where he played a role in two major events. First was the democratic April Revolution in 1960. Yet in 1961 a successful May coup d'état installed General Pak Chung Hee. De Silva then was assigned to Hong Kong as COS.
  Following the November 1963 military overthrow of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem, President Johnson personally ratified de Silva as the CIA's new Chief of Station in Saigon. He quickly came to view the Vietnam War as political. He then advocated a counterinsurgency strategy, and took an active role in fostering such programs.
context_section_description: In November 1963, the new chief of CIA's Far East Division William Colby requested that de Silva travel from Hong Kong to Vietnam, and meet him there for an extensive inspection of CIA operations. Colby had recently served as COS in Saigon. Since, John H. Richardson, a "long-time friend" of de Silva, had been COS in Saigon, until that October when he'd been fired by the new Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge. In their inspection Colby and de Silva focused on the government's conflict with the Viet Cong insurgency, investigating the cities and the countryside. It was soon after the military coup that overthrew President Ngo Dinh Diem on November 1. Colby told de Silva his next assignment would probably be Saigon. On December 10, DCI John McCone suddenly ("Upon receipt of this message") transferred de Silva to COS Saigon. Immediately de Silva flew to Washington to see the Director, who took him to the White House. Previously Johnson had made it clear to McCone he wanted a "four-star CIA man for the post." Meeting the President in person, de Silva "passed muster".
  When de Silva arrived in Saigon as COS the CIA station numbered about 400 people, the largest in the agency. Its personnel performed at least fifteen different lines of professional and technical work. The CIA worked with Vietnamese intelligence to establish National Interrogation Centers, and instructed the National Police on modern methods. The "soft" technique the CIA taught caused the subject being questioned to realize that his or her "well-being was best served by responding truthfully". Not effective every time, it was "consistently  productive". It worked better than torture.
caption: William Colby, Far East Div. of CIA, Head of CORDS in 1968.
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