The New York Times
Times Square

April 3, 1970

GENERAL

Dear Henry,

KISSINGER, HENRY A.

I write this first note to you at the White House because I will be in Washington April 15 through 18 and have just realized that 13 months have passed since our last private talk.

That startles me a bit when I recall that in the previous six years there were only two or three occasions when I did not have a background session with Mac or Walt during my (normally) bi-monthly Washington visits. You (and your secretaries and assistants) have been equally gracious but somehow a succession of tentative appointments have remained tentative.

Many other sources of information and analysis, of course, are available on the foreign policy, defense and arms control subjects on which I have to comment on behalf of The Times, but they cannot make up entirely for the White House gap. This is an especially great loss because telephone contact with the NSC staff between my Washington visits has also declined. In the past, hardly a week went by without telephone contact with at least one of a dozen Bundy-Rostow assistants. We didn't always agree; but we talked and, at the very least, exchanged and cross-checked data.

The attitude in the White House basement (and across the street) in those days was one of welcoming all opportunities to contribute grist to the mill and to comment on on-going situations while they were being mulled over here rather than after The Times had published its comment. These days there seems to be a preference for post-publication remarks, some of which (if accurately reported to me) I find rather curious in view of the pre-publication opportunities passed up!

In any event, this letter is simply to say that my assistant, Ed Mossien, will be making the usual phone calls in the coming days to arrange the schedule for my Washington visit and will be in touch with your office.

Best regards.

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
The White House
Washington, D.C.

RECEIVED
APR1 8 1970
CENTRAL FILED

The New York Times

Published every day by The New York Times Company

ADOLPH E. OCHS, Publisher 1896-1955

ARTHUR HAYS SULZBERGER, Publisher 1935-1961

ORYILL E. DRYFOOS, Publisher 1961-1963

Isolating America

The devastating diplomatic defeat sustained by the United States in the U.N. General Assembly vote on China raises serious questions about the conduct of American foreign policy not only in recent days but in recent years.

The agonizing reappraisal required can be evaded, of course, by diverting attention to scapegoats. Ambassador George Bush loyally blamed himself rather than President Nixon and pointed the finger particularly at several small countries that reportedly defected before the vote despite prior indications of support. And a move is under way in the Congress to penalize the United Nations as a whole by cutting the American financial contribution, a move surprisingly abetted by President Nixon and Secretary Rogers.

But the question that needs to be faced is not why the United States lost the support of Qatar, Oman, Cyprus, Senegal, Togo, Tunisia and Ireland—seven countries with a total population of twelve million. The real question is why the United States had frantically to woo or pressure these and other small states in the first place.

The sad answer is that the mini-states became crucial to the United States because most of this country's important allies had already parted company with Washington on the China issue. The United States lost the critical "important question" ballot, on which the whole outcome turned, by only four votes, 59 to 55. Ten of the country's 13 NATO allies in the U.N.—seven more than the last two voted against the United States on this

than last year—voted against the United States: Greece, Portugal and Luxembourg.

Why did Britain, Canada, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Turkey and Iceland switch their votes this year? Domestic politics played a role in some countries, trade in others; all were exasperated by the long delay before the United States finally came out for a two-China policy. Even a year or two earlier, the American proposal to seat both Chinese governments in the General Assembly and Peking in the Security Council would have passed with ease.

Starting with the Kennedy Administration, the United States increasingly kept its own counsel in world affairs outside Europe. Unilateral action without adequate consultation with the nation's closest allies—and sometimes without even informing them in advance—became more frequent in the Johnson Administration and, under President Nixon, has become the normal pattern.

The concept of common policies, jointly determined, has given way progressively to a go-it-alone approach. Even Britain's Prime Minister Edward Heath finally felt constrained earlier this month to protest Mr. Nixon's search for "direct arrangements" with the Soviet Union and Communist China. Since Aug. 15, when Mr. Nixon's unilateral economic decisions threw the world into a monetary and trade crisis, Washington's emphasis on "American interests first," instead of the common interests of the free world alliance, has brought a strong "Gaullist" echo back from Western Europe, Canada and Japan.

Japan finally was bludgeoned into supporting the American position in the U.N. But of the ten member nations of the enlarged European Common Market that is coming into being with Britain's entry, only Luxembourg voted with the United States on the China issue.

The U.N. vote showed that Mr. Nixon cannot have it both ways. He cannot expect the full support of the country's allies if he goes it alone in negotiations with Communist China and the Soviet Union and replaces the free world economic cooperation of the past quarter century with rivalry and America-first self-interestedness. There must either be a return to the alliance cooperation of the past both with West Europe and Japan or a progressive disintegration of the free world fabric.

The danger we face is not that of isolationism or neo-isolationism in the United States, but that of an American nationalism that ultimately will isolate the United States in the world.

11/1/71

# How Nixon Got to China

By ROBERT KLEIMAN

When Henry Kissinger and his 13 ales drove into Peking airport Oct. 26 to board their Presidential Boeing 707 for Washington, they noticed some- thing missing: the huge billboard that had faced them on arrival six days before. Gone were the 40-foot-high Chinese characters, each mounted on a wooden framework, that proclaimed: "Oppose U.S. Imperialism and All Its Running Dogs!"

Earlier, they found that Peking's diplomatic store, the Anti-Imperialist Shop, had been renamed the Friendship Shop since Mr. Kissinger's visit in July. The Anti-Imperialist Hospital was now the Friendship Hospital and the same change reportedly had been made elsewhere.

None of this, of course, means that friendship has replaced official antagonism, nor that the anti-American slogans that blanket China are all coming down. Nevertheless, symbolic gestures can play a valuable role in the new Chinese-American relationship.

The chief danger at the moment, as Japan warned the United Nations last month, is that the expulsion of Taiwan at Peking's demand could interrupt an

by peacemaker means once Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, now 84, was gone.

In these circumstances, Secretary of State Rogers on Nov. 7, 1969, secretly cabled the American Embassies in Tokyo, Seoul and Taipei to notify those Governments that the regular Taiwan Straits Patrol would be discontinued for budget reasons on Nov. 15. Taipei complained bitterly in private.

But within days after the unannounced suspension of the destroyer patrol, Peking's representatives in Hong Kong were asking whether the move had any significance. They were assured that it had.

It was a propitious moment for the Nixon Administration's yearlong effort to open talks with China. Peking wanted a counterbalance for its impending border negotiations with Moscow, arranged after repeated frontier clashes and an indirect Soviet threat of a pre-emptive nuclear strike.

By Dec. 11, procedural Chinese-American discussions were under way in Warsaw, followed by formal ambassadorial talks on Jan. 20 and Feb. 20, 1970, the first in two years. A precedent was set by meeting alternately in the two embassies, instead of a Polish-only meeting.

Transatlantic Gaullism

Prime Minister Heath's warning that Western Europe
can no longer rely on the United States as it did in the
past highlights the growing distrust stimulated by recent
Administration policies among most of the country's
closest allies abroad.

Britain's Conservative leader has gone beyond the
dispute over currency and trade to suggest that Wash-
ington is on the verge of reducing its defense role in
Europe and seeking "direct arrangements with the
Soviet Union and Communist China." However, it is
doubtful that President Nixon's projected trips to Peking
and Moscow would arouse such suspicions were it not
for the emphasis Washington's new economic policies
put on American interests to the virtual exclusion of
the interests of other countries.

Only three months ago, Mr. Heath was planning an
early visit to San Clemente for exhaustive private talks
with Mr. Nixon on the enhanced future he foresaw for
Europe and the Atlantic Community after Britain's
impending entry into the Common Market. Now, instead
of joint action by the Atlantic nations in the common
interest, Britain's Prime Minister sees the United States
"acting drastically" to protect "its own" balance of
payments and trading position. And he calls on the
countries of Western Europe to secure "their own" pros-
perity and even "their own" defense.

The drift toward Gaullist go-it-alone attitudes of supposed self-interest on both sides of the Atlantic can still be reversed. It requires not only closer consultation but the achievement of common policies toward Russia and China with the NATO allies and with Japan. Most critical, however, is rapid liquidation of the world monetary and trade crisis and, as a first step, a sharp change in the tactics adopted by Secretary Connally.

The adversary posture assumed by Mr. Connally
again last weekend in a Virginia news conference, vir-
tually assures that the present monetary turmoil will
continue indefinitely, a prospect that he asserts does
not trouble him. Mr. Connally in effect has written off

JULIUS KLEIN
UNITED OF AMERICA BUILDING
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60601

January 7, 1971

Honorable Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
Special Assistant To The President
For National Security Affairs
c/o The Western White House,
San Clemente, California

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

My old friend, Mr. Carmel Offie was for many years a State Department official. He was close to Bill Bullit, with whom he served at our Embassy in Moscow, and during World War II Mr. Offie became a close adviser to Bob Muprhy and Lucius Clay. Mr. Offie has written me a very interesting letter about the forthcoming visit of Dr. Ernst Wolf Mommsen, who occupies the same position in the German Defense Department as does Deputy Secretary Packard in our Defense Department.

Dr. Mommsen is the former head of the huge German Thyssen company, and while still maintaining his connections there, he was drafted by German Defense Minister Schmidt to be his right-hand man, as Staats Sekretär. Dr. Mommsen is well known to me, and he has always been outspokenly pro-American in his views. Politically he is a conservative.

I understand that he has an appointment to see Mr. Laird and Mr. Packard on the 18th of January, and he is scheduled to arrive in Washington on the 15th of January for a conference with Under-Secretary Nathan Samuels of the State Department.

The attached letter from Mr. Offie to me is self-explanatory. I don't have to add any comment to same, with the exception that if your time permits and if you are interested in receiving first hand confidential information about the Ostpolitik and the defense Politik of the Brandt regime, I know that Dr. Mommsen would be highly honored to meet with you. The German Embassy, the State Department or the Defense Department have his itinerary. To encourage open and free discussion, it might be more practical to hold this meeting between yourselves without anyone else being present as you are both bilingual.

In New York Dr. Mommsen and Mr. Offie will meet with General Clay, and later Dr. Mommsen will be the house guest of Mr. Offie in Mr. Offie's Washington home during Mommsen's stay in the capital. Mr. Offie's

JULIUS KLEIN

Dr. Henry Kissinger, page 2

January 7, 1971

home address in Washington is 3105 Woodley Road, N.W., - phone
AD-4-2854. His New York address is 415 E 52nd Street, Suite 6 K-C,
- phone PL-2-4820. Personally I feel that such an "off-the-record"
meeting should prove most fruitful.

Incidentally Mr. Offie is still on very close terms with Bob Murphy
and Lucius Clay, and he shares their views on foreign policy , along
with Dr. Mommsen.

I beg to remain with my best regards and all good wishes for the
New Year,

Julius Klein
Major General, AUS (ret.)

Encl.

P.S. Mr. Offie was called by cable to Germany to discuss
with Dr. Mommsen his Washington trip. He will return
to his Washington home at the beginning of next week.

ANDRÉ KLENIEWSKI
INGÉNIEUR CHIMISTE

ANCIEN ÉLÈVE DE L'ÉCOLE
POLYTECHNIQUE DE VARSOVIE
W.S.E. - C.N.A.M. - LICENCIÉ EN ÉCONOMIE
Docteur Es-Sciences
18, RUE DES MOINES
PARIS-XVII
TÉL. : 228 11-22

PARIS, LE

4th July 1973

Monsieur Henry A.KISSINGER
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON, D.C.
U.S.A.

Subject : Harvard University International Seminar

Sir,

I had the honour of corresponding with you when you were the Head of HARVARD SUMMER SCHOOL OF ARTS and SCIENCES and of EDUCATION between 1961 and 1968.

Since then so much has happened. You are now at the top of the international policy and no diplomat could have compared the greatness of his mission with yours.

As for me, in spite of the passing of years, I still believe in a co-operation with the University and in the unification of Europe. I very much wish to be able to take part again in the Harvard University International Seminar in 1973.

As you promised me in your letter of 9th May 1968, may I ask you to sponsor my application to the present Head of the Harvard Seminar ?

I shall be very grateful for your sponsoring and I have the honour to remain

Enc. Photocopies of letters.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
INTERNATIONAL SEMINAR

CONDUCTED UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE
HARVARD SUMMER SCHOOL
OF ARTS AND SCIENCES AND OF EDUCATION

6 DIVINITY AVENUE
CAMBRIDGE 38, MASSACHUSETTS

HENRY A. KISSINGER, Executive Director

December 1, 1960

M. Andre Kelniewski
49, rue Gustave Nast
Chelles (Seine et Marne)
France

Dear M. Kleniewski:

Thank you for your letter of November 21. We have now received letters of recommendation from Prof. P. Dubois and Prof. Zaleski, which complete your application.

We will give your application careful consideration and you will hear from us again as soon as possible.

XXXXXXXXXX 6 Divinity Ave.
CAMBRIDGE 38, MASSACHUSETTS

May 11, 1961

Mr. Andre Kleniewski
49, Rue Gustave Nast
Batiment A, Esc. II
Chelles, Seine-et-Marne, France

Dear Mr. Kleiniewski:

We are sorry to tell you that it has
been impossible to include you in this year's
International Seminar. I think you will be
interested to know that we received well over
seven hundred applications and that we have
places for only forty participants. As you
can imagine, the problem of choosing was a
difficult one.

I would like to take this opportunity to
thank you for your interest in the Seminar.

November 7, 1960

Monsieur Andre Kleniewski
49, Rue Gustave Nast
Batiment A, Esc. II
Chelles
Seine-et-Marne
France

Dear M. Kleniewski:-

Thank you for your application for the 1961 session of the Harvard International Seminar. Please be assured that we will give it careful consideration in relation to the many applications that we receive.

I noticed that you had not enclosed two letters of recommendation from sponsors who know you well and wanted to make sure that you understood that they are necessary to make your application complete.

6 DIVINITY AVENUE
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS 02138

May 10, 1967

Mr. A. Kleniewski
6, Rue Andre-Messager
93 Rosny-Sous-Bois
France

Dear Mr. Kleniewski:

Thank you for your letter of 15 March
which we just received today. The deadline
for applications to the Seminar was February
1. I would suggest that you write to us in
early November if you are interested in
applying to the 1968 Seminar. At that time
we will send you the announcement and the
necessary forms for application.

Thank you for your interest in the
Seminar.

With kind regards.

HARVARD SUMMER SCHOOL
6 DIVINITY AVENUE, CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS 02138

HENRY A. KISSINGER
Executive Director

May 8, 1968

Mr. Andre Kleniewski
6, rue Andre-Messager
Rosny-sous-Bois 93, France

Dear Mr. Kleniewski:

We are sorry to tell you that it was impossible to include you in the International Seminar this summer. However, the selection committee named you as one of the finalists from your country, and I would, therefore, like to suggest that you submit your application once more. Your failure to be accepted should in no way be considered a reflection of our appreciation of your merit. Rather, we must choose from a large number of highly qualified candidates and, at the same time, maintain the geographical balance. An individual who is a finalist one year may well be a participant another year. In fact, there have been many cases in which a candidate was accepted after several reapplications.

Should you wish to apply for a future session, it will not be necessary to fill out another form. Simply notify us in November that you would like your previous application brought forward, and supply us with any information about your activities in the meantime which you feel may be pertinent.

We hope to hear from you again.

With kind regards.

CONDUCTED UNDER THE AusPICES OF THE JOHN FITZGERALD KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT AND THE CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Battelle Memorial Institute • COLUMBUS LABORATORIES

505 KING AVENUE COLUMBUS, OHIO 43201 • AREA CODE 614, TELEPHONE 299-3151 • CABLE ADDRESS: BATMIN

October 10, 1969

Honorable Henry A. Kissinger
National Security Advisor to the President
White House
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Henry:

Thank you very much for your letter of 19 September 1969.

I am forwarding for your retention unedited transcripts of
Sir Robert Thompson's discussions at the Battelle Columbus Laboratories.
Copies are being forwarded to Sir Robert in England for his editing and
return to us. This will obviously take some time so if you wish copies
of the edited versions, please have your secretary notify mine.

Some of Sir Robert's lectures were presented elsewhere than
Battelle in August as follows:

Army War College - "The Nature of Conflict in the 1990's"

Armed Forces Staff College - "Basic Principles of Counterinsurgency"

United States Military Academy - "Malayan Pacification"; "The
Advisor's Role in the War in Vietnam, 1961-1965".

At the moment, it appears that Bob's next trip to the United
States will not be until May, 1970, for ARPA's Counterinsurgency Research
and Development Symposium to be held at the Battelle Columbus Laboratories.

Kind personal regards.

IJK:ar

Encls.

September 16, 1969

Honorable Henry A. Kissenger
National Security Advisor to the President
White House
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Henry:

Your schedule has been rather hectic the past few months, but on the chance that you might be doing some commuting between San Clemente and the White House last month, I checked with your office to see whether you might wish to talk with Sir Robert Thompson during his visit to this country. I was advised that you would be remaining in San Clemente during the President's stay there.

Bob was in the United States in connection with the publication by the David McKay Company of his book *No Exit From Vietnam*. You received an unedited proof copy earlier this year. Reviews of the book have been quite favorable. You might be interested in one of Bob's press interviews, copy of which is enclosed.

During his visit, Bob also lectured and participated in seminars at the Army War College, Armed Forces Staff College, Army Institute for Land Combat, U. S. Military Academy, and here at Battelle. We taped his discussions and transcripts will be made of them. If you desire copies of any or all of them, I could have one of our information specialists bracket and underline the transcripts to save reading time. The subjects of Bob's talks are:

* "Basic Principles of Counterinsurgency"

* "Malayan Pacification"

* "The Nature of Conflict in the 1990's"

* "Lessons Learned from the Application of Air Power in Southeast Asia-Burma (World War II); Malaya (The Emergency); South Vietnam; North Vietnam"

* "The Advisor's Role in the War in Vietnam, 1961-1965".

Just have your secretary call mine at (614) 299-3151, Extension 3644 to indicate which, if any, you might want.

I have followed with keen interest your many timely and varied efforts in your present role as National Security Advisor and, needless to say, am most pleased with the new dimensions you have brought to the position. You should be pleased too.

Erosion
A Danger:
Britisher

By JOHN GREENBACKER

Virginian-Pilot Staff Writer

NORFOLK—A British counter-
insurgency expert said Thursday
that the United States would
have lost the “contest of wills”
in Vietnam if former Vice Presi-
dent Hubert H. Humphrey had
been elected president last Nov-
ember.

Sir Robert Thompson, former
defense minister of Malaya and
a well-known expert on Commu-
nist guerrilla wars, was in Nor-
folk to lecture at the Armed
Forces Staff College.

Thompson said the North Viet-
namese thought they would win
the Vietnamese war in 1968 by
"completely eroding the United
States' will.

"My own feeling at the time," he said, "was that if Vice President Humphrey had won the election, the United States' position would have eroded to this extent, that it would so have effected the South Vietnamese that their will to continue fighting would have eroded."

The South Vietnamese govern-
ment would have collapsed as a
result, Thompson said.

He also strongly criticized the
Johnson administration's han-
dling of the Vietnam involve-
ment during the years 1965 to
1968.

"The great mistake of the
years 1965 to 1968 is that you es-
calated the costs beyond the
point that the United States peo-
ple were prepared to pay,"
Thompson said.

The proper course of action,
he said, would be to de-escalate
the intensity of the fighting while
continuing to work for South
Vietnamese selfsufficiency.

This is apparently what Presi-
dent Nixon is working for,
Thompson said.

"Victory in the end has to be
won, in other words, by the Viet-
namese standing on their own
feet," he said.

Thompson said the United
States could win or lose the war,
and the options are open.

"I have a strong feeling the
other side isn't capable of esca-
lating it, even to the tempo of
1968," he said.

"If President Nixon would say,
'I'm prepared to stay with it for-
ever,' then they've got to negoti-
ate.'

But the Communists believe
the lack of American resolve is
so obvious that they will contin-
ue to stall at the Paris peace
talks, Thompson asserted.

"They're just sitting there
waiting for this erosion," he
said.

If the United States decides to
commit itself to a long-term in-
volvement in Vietnam, Thomp-
son said the Vietcong and the
North Vietnamese will have two
options.

"Either they've got to negoti-
ate to preserve what is left,
which is mainly their political
organization, or leave that un-
derground organization there as
an underground organization and
fade the guerrilla units," he
said.

Thompson, the former head of
the British Advisory Mission to
Vietnam, praised the current
American representatives in Sai-
gon.

"I think the quality of all the
leadership has improved," he
said. "I wish Ambassador (Ell-

(sworth) Bunker had been there
10 years ago and was 10 years
younger. He's a fine ambassa-
dor."

At the same time, the Ameri-
can and South Vietnamese paci-
fication efforts are having im-
proved results now, he said.

Thompson

MEMORANDUM

THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON

10797

ACTION

June 23, 1970

MEMORANDUM FOR DR. KISSINGER

FROM: John H. Holdridge
SUBJECT: Letter from Manny Klette

You have received a letter from Manny Klette of the Battelle
Institute, expressing the hope to see you while Sir Robert Thompson
was here and also urging that the President increase our withdrawal
schedule to over 150,000.

As it turned out you did not see Klette, but you may wish to send him
a brief acknowledgment.

RECOMMENDATION:

That you sign the attached letter to Mr. Klette.

Attachment

Battelle Memorial Institute.

COLUMBUS LABORATORIES

505 KING AVENUE COLUMBUS, OHIO 43201 · AREA CODE 614, TELEPHONE 299-3151 · CABLE ADDRESS: BATMIN

May 26, 1970

Honorable Henry A. Kissinger
National Security Advisor to the President
The White House
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Henry:

Thank you for your letter of April 18, 1970.

Bob Thompson has been with me for the past two weeks researching for his next book on worldwide riot situations. The counterinsurgency symposium which was to have been held here last week was postponed by ARPA due to local campus unrest, however, Bob, Ted Serong and I were able to engage in some useful discussions here at Battelle concerning the current situation in South-east Asia.

I am convinced, as a result of the general reporting of the operations in Cambodia by the Press, that the American public has not been made aware thus far of the outstanding successes achieved there. This is especially pertinent to the manner in which South Vietnamese units conducted their operations, thus attesting to success of the Vietnamization program. It would appear to me, though I am not as close to the situation as you are, that ARVN forces could carry on those tasks initiated by U.S. forces including disposition of the captured stores, and U.S. combat forces could be redeployed to SVN during the first few days of June. Further tribute to the progress of the Vietnamization program would result. A Presidential announcement immediately after U.S. redeployment revising upward the 150,000 reduction in force might be politically expedient rather than withholding such an announcement until July or later.

Bob is in California this week but we plan to meet in Washington on Monday 1 June and will be available if you wish to see us then or the next day. We have kept our schedules free for late afternoon on both days. I will contact Diane, your secretary, by telephone to ascertain your desires.

Warmest regards.

IJK:ar
Airmail/Special Delivery

KISSINGER, HENRY A

APR 18 1970

Dear Many:

Thank you for your letter of April 10. It is good
to hear from you and I was glad to have a chance
to look over Bob's talk at Battelle.

I was sorry to have missed seeing both of you.
As I explained to Bob, that week was an incredibly
busy one. Perhaps my schedule will be lighter in
June. I can always hope. Please do stay in touch
with my office.

Mr. I. J. Klette, Senior Fellow
Battelle Memorial Institute
505 King Avenue
Columbus, Ohio 43201

jlp:4/16/70

RECEIVED
MAY 5 1970

CENTRAL FILES

PRELIMINARY COPY

THE CURRENT SITUATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

Sir Robert Thompson

16 March 1970

INTRODUCTION*

Ladies and gentlemen, it's certainly a very, very great pleasure for me, and on behalf of you also, to welcome back to Columbus, Ohio, and to the Battelle Memorial Institute, a very close friend of mine personally, and a very close friend of some of you, and also a colleague of many of us here at Battelle. Our speaker today needs no introduction. You have, I'm sure, seen the flier that we've put out on Sir Robert Thompson. Many of you I know have read one of his latest books, *No Exit From Vietnam*, and I understand that the sale of it now is almost complete. There will have to be a new edition very shortly. A new book is in the offing by Sir Robert and will be published in the next few months. Some of you have read in this current month's edition of *Readers' Digest* magazine his most recent article, "On the Road to a Just Peace", and some of you probably read in the December issue of *Readers' Digest* - and if you didn't we have reprint copies available outside when you depart for you to pick up - a nonattributed editorial in which the editor utilized a great many of Sir Robert's thoughts.

Sir Robert's talk this afternoon will be off the record on the subject of the current situation in Southeast Asia. When the talk is completed we will have a question and answer period. So, feel free after it's all over if you wish to stay to ask questions.

Sir Robert comes to us fresh from an around-the-world trip with stops in various countries, cities in Southeast Asia, and with an extended stay of some weeks in Australia. The entire trip was sponsored by the Australian government.

We're delighted to have him back with us this afternoon and quite eager to hear his off-the-record remarks, which will be nonattributable, and it's a pleasure for me to present to you again Sir Robert Thompson.

* * *

*Introductory remarks by Dr. I. J. Klette, Senior Fellow, Battelle Memorial Institute - Columbus Laboratories.

2

Dr. Klette, ladies and gentlemen, my talk this afternoon will center mainly around South Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand. Those after all are the four countries which at this present moment in Southeast Asia are most concerned with the situation. There's one thing though, I've of course been to Malaya and Singapore and on to Australia, and let us have one thing absolutely straight, they are all watching what the outcome is going to be in Vietnam. Now I don't like the domino theory, not because I don't believe it but just because I think it is a not very pleasant prospect, and plenty of arguments can always be produced to get you away from an unpleasant prospect. Many people are quite ready to devour these arguments. Well, I'm afraid that I believe in the domino theory for one simple reason, I go and ask the dominoes and they all know that as far as this is concerned they are dominoes. Now I said that they're all watching the outcome, and this is one thing I would like to dispose of right away. I do not think, and I have always said, that there will not be a negotiated settlement. There is going to be a result in South Vietnam. Either North Vietnam is going to get South Vietnam or it is not. It doesn't matter whether in that process it is immediate due to something happening, and the complete collapse, and the thing's all over or whether it is rather slow and gradual and does look as if it's being produced by some sort of concessions that are being made at the table. But don't forget this, that the moment concessions get made at the table which go beyond a certain point, the thing is over, and at that moment no further negotiations are necessary. The other side understands this quite well and so do the South Vietnamese understand it quite well. And you will see that the South Vietnamese, have come to a point beyond which I do not think they can go. They have been prepared to offer negotiations, offer elections, under international supervision at any time the other side likes to agree to them. And quite clearly, of course, the other side is bound to refuse that because it knows perfectly well what the outcome of those elections would be. They would lose hands down. They are standing and negotiating on one point only. They may have lots of other points but it all hinges back to one thing: all they are negotiating is the speed and the manner of the United States' withdrawal. Everything to them hinges on that. If they get an undertaking that there is going to be quite definitely a withdrawal, not necessarily within six months, within a year, as long as there is a complete withdrawal in that undertaking, they have got their point. They know that's all they have to wait for. There is no need then for them to negotiate any sort of concessions in the South at all.

3

Now, the really interesting thing, of course, is what has happened in South Vietnam in spite of this very uncertain period in which we've been what has happened in the last year to 18 months. I just want to run through that and then through the situation facing the North Vietnamese at the present time and the Viet Cong and then come on a little bit to Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand.

Now I'll have to take this very quickly but I'll be perfectly prepared to answer questions on it. The most significant program which has shown progress in South Vietnam over this last year has been the pacification program. I think the main results that one can see from this are in two main fields. One, because it has recovered control in the major populated areas of the countryside for the GVN, it has completely altered the manpower situation within the country. I look back to, say, a period like 1964 when one used to go down to the provinces in the Mekong Delta (these are all heavily populated provinces) and you would get a briefing from the province chief and you would find that the estimated VC strength in the province was say 7,000 and his actual government strength in the province was also 7,000. But one significant thing in that was that the VC units and strengths were going up and his units and strengths were going down. In fact, at that time there was probably hardly a regional force company which was meant to be a 130 strong that was more than about 50 or 60 strong, and great difficulty in getting recruits. Now this has been completely reversed. There is no problem in any of these populated provinces in getting as many Regional Forces or Popular Forces, which are the platoons defending the villages, as money and equipment can manage.

Now, there's another aspect too in the countryside that is very clear. You notice it particularly on the roads, how the traffic is moving, and from that you can also see in the villages how the economy is improving. The extent of the rice now being grown is pushing out. IR8 is coming in in a lot of places and it is estimated that last year, for example, the rice crop was 450,000 tons more than the year before. And there is now every prospect that the rice crop at the end of this year will make South Vietnam self-supporting again. And you see the improvement in all sorts of little ways. I've mentioned the traffic on the roads. Another thing, particularly in the Mekong Delta, the refugee problem is not quite over but it is almost over for the simple reason that all the refugees have been able to go back to their villages. And it's quite fascinating that when a government recovers an area the number of people actually living in that area and in the old village may be only 100 or 200. But within two or three months there are frequently 2,000 or 3,000 back there. The whole village has been sort of rebuilt and is beginning to start its normal life again.

4

I think one of the reasons for this, and this is only one of them, is that there has quite definitely been a change of strategy from the old search-and-destroy strategy over to a clear-and-hold strategy. And the military forces, both the United States and ARVN, have been supporting this program. Another reason that it is working much better than it has ever worked before is the coordination of the plan. In other words, everything is fitted together and you now have one plan covering the United States and Vietnam and covering civilian measures and military measures. In other words, for the first time the war is really being fought as one war on all fronts. Now, there are all sorts of other aspects and I will take questions on those, but I think I must get on. I want to mention that there are two very clear dangers in this situation which have still not been fixed. The first is the VC party political structure. One of the things that has happened when the villages have been recovered is that a lot of the lower level of the Viet Cong have rallied to the government. In fact, the figures for 1969 were quite surprising. And, of course, those figures can't go on because we're getting to the stage now where that level of person doesn't exist in the numbers that he did before. For example, on this last visit I visited some districts in Long An Province and this was a district where a year ago you could not go outside the district town without sort of battalion support, in other words, every exit, every move outside the district town was a major operation. The two main units in that particular district, one in the district and the other operating in that district and neighboring districts, were one a VC company which is now down to four men: the company commander, two platoon commanders, and one squad commander and they had no men under them. And the company commander is the third in six months. The other unit that operates in the whole of that area was an NVA battalion which now has 45 men. Well, that gives you an idea of how the manpower situation has changed and how there has been this sort of fall-off at the bottom in what's called the VC infrastructure. But it is all fairly low-level stuff. The one thing that has not been attacked adequately is what I would call the Viet Cong party political structure within the South. The hierarchy that runs the whole thing from the village committees, district committees, province committees, regional committees, and so on upwards. These are the key individuals and so far, while every attempt is being made to devise the intelligence machinery that's necessary to get at these people, except in one or two areas, we have not had yet the success required. It is therefore most important at this particular time as I was to explain we've got the North Vietnamese Army fairly neutralized

5

and now is the time to get at this within the South. The question is how far
it will be done. The other side, which I think is far more important than the
sort of political side, is what I would call, I must call it, I think, the
financial side within the country and this all stems from the fact that South
Vietnam has an unbacked currency. It has an official rate to the dollar which is,
I think, 118 piastres, to the dollar. The black market rate is now running
somewhere around the 350 mark, occasionally touches 400. You have had during
the war years, obviously, a great depression of revenue within the country. As
a result of that salaries have been kept very low, that is, the salaries of all
people in the government including the military forces. At the same time you've
had an enormous inflation due to the United States' input not only of aid but also
of Service spending, etc. And you have had great uncertainty there all the way
through and all this leads to one inevitable result which is corruption. And
I see no way around this until the whole of this problem is tackled right from
its beginning - the currency, the revenue, the taxation, the salaries, etc. You
have a situation now, just to give an example, you have peasant families who
because of the inflation, etc., are earning somewhere between 60,000 and 100,000
piastres a month, and you have a policeman in Saigon paid 5,000 piastres a month,
and everyone knows that he cannot possibly live on less than 10,000. And it is
a straight invitation, I mean it's more or less, you might call it, an implied
instruction that he's got to make the 5,000 some other way. So when you have a
situation like that you are bound to have corruption all the way through, and it
is not going to be tackled merely by saying this particular guy is a corrupt
guy, therefore, shoot him in the market place. This is not the way to do it.
It's going to have to be dealt with the whole way through, and one of the things
that always distresses me slightly, there's no one addressing themselves adequately
to these sort of problems and they are very dangerous problems within the country.

Now one thing that, of course, has been in front of everyone's mind
with regard to the situation in South Vietnam has been Vietnamization. Now I do
want to make one or two points about it. A lot of people seem to think that what
this means is turning the main burden of the war back to the South Vietnamese.
The South Vietnamese have been bearing the main burden of that war all the way
through. In only three weeks of the war were Vietnamese casualties killed in
action less than those of the United States and at this particular moment they're
running at four times the United States', and South Vietnam is a small country of
15 to 16 million people. So you can see that the burden on them has been very

6

[L.C]

heavy indeed all the way through. Now I think one has to look at Vietnamization as a system of balances. I will come in a minute to the enemy situation, but take it from me that the enemy's situation has gone down. So your first major important balance is the withdrawal of United States troops as effected by the improvement in the situation inside South Vietnam and the decline in the capabilities of the other side. This is leaving quite a gap in which it is fairly easy as a result to withdraw United States troops. And where the balance has to be kept is obviously that you must not withdraw too fast before the Vietnamese are ready to take up the slack nor must you withdraw too slowly so that you encourage the Vietnamese to think that they can go on leaning on you for longer than is necessary.

One minor balance in all that, which I think has to be kept in mind, is that I don't go with this business that the United States can, as it reduces the troop levels, go down entirely to a support-and-logistic role. Just think of it, for example, when one gets down to figures like 200,000, etc. I don't see that any president as commander-in-chief can possibly have 200,000 men in a situation like that without some combat infantry support. And while it's not necessary that the 200,000 should be a completely balanced force, obviously it can be weighted to support and logistics, it must have some combat infantry element there. But the third balance, I think, is much the most important of all, and this is the one that really worries me. And that is the balance within South Vietnam itself.

You have first of all within the Armed Forces, if you build up large strengths, and particularly units with sophisticated weapons, in the Army, the Air Force, and the Navy, these are all regular units. They are very expensive as compared, for example, with units like the Regional Forces which are after all no more than the equivalent of a light infantry company and the Popular Forces which are a very light infantry platoon. Now there's a great difference in the cost of these and the manpower, and some balance has to be kept there for one very good reason, that it is much easier to demobilize manpower from Regional Forces and Popular Forces than it is from regular units. Once people get regular units they tend to keep them and hang onto them. This leads me on to the problem, as I see it, that this country has got to do a lot of things other than defend itself. It's got to administer itself, the government has got to function, it has got to develop. All this is part of the process of Vietnamization just as much as dealing with the North Vietnamese Army or the Viet Cong. And if one gets all the talent and manpower into the Armed Forces then we're going to be in trouble in the other fields. In fighting a war of this nature, I've said it is one war, and supposing you've got in that one war ten sections. You can have nine sections

7

perfectly done and a complete gap in the other one; the enemy is through that gap. It is much better to have the ten sections done 50 percent and then you will have a much better chance of winning the war. In fact, I would go so far as to say that you can even be less than 50 percent. Perfection is by no means a necessity, because to start with you're not up against perfection. I would say if one looks at this in terms of efficiency and, looking around the world as I do, if one rates governments from naught to 100, I can only think of one or two who are over 50 percent. And the one I would put top at the present time in the world is Singapore. I think they're probably one of the only ones that is over 50 percent, and if we could get South Vietnam just to 25 or 30 percent, provided it is across the board, we would be through. The point that I'm getting at here with regard to Vietnamization - two things I would just like to stress that with regard to the military side, Vietnamization does not mean Americanization of the Vietnamese Armed Forces. That I'm afraid is the trouble that we're going to run into. Now I had quite the most interesting question that was put to me in South Vietnam when I was there in November. It was by a Colonel in the Vietnamese Planning Staff who understood this perfectly well, and the question was, "Sir, how do we create a people's army?" And I knew exactly what he meant. How do you create an army that is effective for the job that it has to do that doesn't cost too much and which doesn't take all the manpower resources of the country yet is thoroughly identified with the people of the country? Because the point I wish to stress is that the whole problem in front of us is to create a country that is stable and viable and unless we do that we will not succeed. In other words it is a stable country that we want, not just a military camp.

Well, to sum up, on the government side in South Vietnam, I would say the thing that impressed me most was not just particular programs all the way through, some obviously much better than others, but the amount of progress that had been achieved in the time and in the environment of an American withdrawal taking place. I think if you look at it in that way and say what did this place look like at the end of 1968, and what does it look like now at the end of 1969, considering just 12 months, considering that American withdrawals had already started, not just American withdrawals, considerable doubts as to what the American decisions would be, etc., yet in spite of all that remarkable progress in a mere 12 months. The question in front of us is how far that progress can be maintained in this next year or two. Now, the enemy (and I think this is a very interesting side and will bring us on also to Laos and Cambodia), I think the enemy, and I'm

8

referring here to Hanoi and the North Vietnamese Army, I think they are in quite a serious dilemma at this present moment. We have every reason to believe that there are great arguments going on as to whether they should continue trying to mount offensives as we saw in 1968 and early in 1969 or whether they should go back to what is called protracted war. My own view on this is that they are keeping their options open on this one and that if they can do an offensive in the next few months or anyway this year they will try to do so. One major piece of evidence for that is that they have not in any way altered the structure of their forces. In other words, they've kept the whole structure, regiments, battalions, etc. All of them are greatly understrength but the structure is there to be filled. Now, when we come on to their capability, can they mount an offensive at the present time? My answer to that is quite definitely no. Not any real meaningful offensive. And here we need to look back to Tet and after Tet the offensives occurring during the summer of 1968 and the offensives of Tet in 1969 and the sort of high points through 1969. I am convinced - I've heard much higher figures - but I am convinced that in that period the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong lost, and by that I mean killed in action, people who died of disease, etc., and people who were seriously wounded not to be fit to fight again, they lost about half a million men. Now if you convert that to, say, the United States it would be equivalent to you losing 5 million men. In the United Kingdom, it would be equivalent to us failing to rescue a single man from three Dunkirks. Now just imagine the sort of impact that that would have on your country. It's not an equal comparison because they have much more recuperative powers and women do a lot more of the work, and the age groups are much younger, etc. In other words they would recover quicker than we can. But it is still a very heavy loss and all the evidence is that from last summer onwards they have not really been replacing casualties in the South as they occur. In other words all their units are very much understrength. This doesn't mean that they can't put two or three of them together, come into South Vietnam in quite a reasonably strong force, and do a raid. But here they run into other problems. Now you will remember that at the time of Tet in 1968, for example, North Vietnamese divisions could sit around Saigon for weeks on end. Why? Because all the stuff was parked there ready for them. All the forward logistics had been done, the rice was there, the ammunition was there, etc. That is not the case now. I don't say that every cache has been found, but one result of the pacification program is that you have much more control of the

9

countryside, and it is therefore much more difficult for them to prestock forward
any supplies that they need for an offensive. Now another thing has happened
on this. The Russians have fouled them up. They have given them AK47's amongst
other things. They have given them 122-millimeter rockets. Now these all have
to come in either through Haiphong and down the Ho Chi Minh trail or they have to
come in through Sihanoukville and up. They have a long way to go, and now that
everyone has been equipped with these things, like everyone else they want to go
on being equipped with them. The enemy therefore to a certain extent is ceasing
to be a people's revolutionary army. He is becoming and tending to be a modern
army. In fact they have now got Chinese uniforms coming down which make the
North Vietnamese look as if they're on American aid. Once they get this they're
going to go on wanting it, and this is certainly reducing their capacity. Another
thing that has happened, of course, is, I mentioned the fact that there wasn't
this prestocking of food but there's also the fact that having lost control in
a lot of areas of the countryside they are not now getting the food stocks out
of South Vietnam that they need. What's the answer to that one? They're having
to bring rice down the Ho Chi Minh trail. And Vietnamese province chiefs and
military commanders take great pleasure in giving you dinner in the evening and
feeding you on captured Chinese rice. And there's no doubt about it, it is captured
Chinese rice. So one effect of this, therefore, if you add all this together,
is that a lot more supplies are having to come down the trail to keep less going
than was the case, say, two years ago. They have therefore now got themselves
into a situation where they have quite serious logistic problems, and I'll
mention this a bit more with regard to Cambodia.

Now, I've said that I don't think they can mount an offensive this
year partly for these reasons. There is no sign that they've been able to build
up enough men in one area to mount a really reasonable offensive before the
monsoon starts in about May. It is just possible that they could fill in, after
all they've got the way stations and everything else, and you could feed men in
fairly fast down the Ho Chi Minh trail to fill up units. One point to remember
is we're not dealing any longer with the old North Vietnamese regular army,
we're now onto an army which is young, and conscripts getting inadequate training,
etc. I mean the cream of what you might call the Vietminh and original North
Vietnamese army has been very largely destroyed. Now if they do an offensive,
which they might try and which could for two or three days possibly look quite
nasty, because after all they have the initiative with regard to the attack and

10

where they attack, etc., and the timing. You can always quite easily lose a provincial town for two or three days and everyone will get very excited about it if that happens, but it will cost them very dear. And I have no doubt at all that they would be driven out of it with heavy losses. The point to remember here is, of course, that the town itself is not their target, nor is the sort of military success in that sense any really military objective, what they are after. Their targets, I think, are quite clear. They still look back basically in their minds to the French war, to Dien Bien Phu and to what has happened over the last two years. And their target will be American public opinion and nothing else. In order to damage that, of course, and to affect that they have got to try to do an offensive that would give them either much higher American casualties or they've got to take, as I said, a South Vietnamese town. They've got to try to catch an ARVN battalion, or preferably an ARVN regiment, with its pants down and inflict very heavy casualties in order to show that Vietnamization isn't working. People also say that pacification will also be a target, but pacification is a bit vague as a target. Merely because you go and lose two or three villages in some remote area again is not something that I think would really come through. So I don't think that that will be a particular target during this year. Now they have one other objective which I think is very important. They realize that the VC political structure within South Vietnam is their vital asset in the long term and, therefore, they will be inclined to direct their military effort towards supporting that and in fact keeping up what you might call VC morale within the South. Now as they make any of these sort of efforts they've also got other factors that will influence when they do it, and quite clearly those factors are political factors. There are three obvious ones looming ahead: the mid-term elections here, President Thieu's reelection in 1971, and President Nixon's reelection in 1972. I think we will find that if their military activity does go up it will be directed to those particular periods.

Now turning over to the other countries - Laos. I think there are various factors in the Laos situation. If you look back at the Vietminh war in Indochina, if you look back at previous periods here in 1960 and 1961, there has always been a diversion in Laos when they were stuck in South Vietnam. It's always been part of Jap strategy to be able to switch on these two fronts and develop a threat in Laos when he gets stuck on the other front. I think that's one factor in the present drive. I think another factor in the present drive, and I don't think these are necessarily dominating factors, when the Macs under

11

General Vang Pao took the Plain of Jars last year, I think they went too far, and they broke what you might call the non-gentlemen's agreement as to who holds what, and who does what in Laos. And I think, therefore, that in this present offensive there is an element of retribution for it. There's also possibly, I said because when they get stuck in South Vietnam, there may be a morale element in it that they've got divisions in the North Vietnamese army that they can use on this and they want them to have a success so at least they've got something to talk about. Now these are all minor, but I think part factors in the situation. I think the major factor is a perfectly straightforward one and a very obvious one. It is a message. And the message is this, "We can take Laos any time we want to and the United States does not intend to stop us". Now that message is not addressed to the Laos it is addressed to the Thais and the rest of Southeast Asia. And it is a perfectly simple message which everyone is getting. Now there's a sidekick to that, by doing this they generate, of course, a certain amount of heat within the United States and everyone jumping up and down saying the United States must not get involved in Laos. And because I don't think that you do intend to get involved in Laos anymore and won't get involved in Laos anymore you then get yourselves as it were being conditioned not to get involved in the next stages, and this is a sort of nice conditioning process. I think this is the real purpose behind what is happening in Laos at the present time. If I am right, but I needn't necessarily be wrong if other things happen, but if I am right, I think that what will happen in Laos is that they will cut the road between Vientiane and Luang Prabang. For a period they may log mortar shells or rockets into either of those two towns, they may put in an appearance somewhere on the Mekong perhaps down in the Pakse area and what have you and then just temporarily withdraw. In other words, not pressing things too far at this stage. They will have got their message across without creating any possible repercussions.

The much more interesting thing, and I don't know what's happening, is recent events in Cambodia. Because what makes this so interesting, if you can remember the map slightly, all the North Vietnamese forces roughly from Tay Ninh north of Saigon round what's called the Parrot's Beak - which is the bit of Cambodia sticking in quite close to Saigon - right down to those who have crossed into the Southern part of the Mekong Delta, all those North Vietnamese forces are dependent on supplies from Cambodia and for ammunition and more specialized stock, particularly medicines, from what comes in through Sihanoukville and is then trucked up to these areas by the Cambodians who are doing well out of

12

it and that is now rather vulnerable and how far, who is playing what within
Cambodia I frankly do not know. And whether the Cambodians put the squeeze
on at the present time or will tighten the squeeze and will make this logistic
route more vulnerable, I do not know. But it is a very ticklish area for the
other side. If they lose that route in through Sihanoukville those forces in the
whole of that area will be out on a limb. In fact, they will have to push North.
Of course if they're really ruthless about it, when you have forces out on a
limb, as has happened before, you just wade into the attack. If you get them
killed, you don't have to feed them. That has happened before and it could happen
again. It may compel them to act.

Now, the country that is watching all this is Thailand. There are three
areas of Thailand where there are very minor insurgencies at the present moment.
Right in the North on the Burmese-Laos border where the Chinese road is coming
through Northern Laos. That incidentally, of course, is a perfectly clear sort
of little dagger, nothing is coming down the road at the present moment. It
just has a very nice psychological effect on the Thais. It's a good road, it
would take tourists, everything, and it's got a good complex and it's got within
about 20 to 30 miles of the Thai border. So it is sitting there as a nice little
sort of threat for the future. But practically nothing is coming in from the
Chinese at the present time because the Chinese really have got this do-it-yourself
business right and they make the insurgents do it themselves and until they are
doing it themselves and really show that they can do it, not until then do they
get any Chinese aid. Well in this area the insurgency is really confined at this
particular moment to the Miao tribes on that border all in hill country, jungle
country, some of it going up to 5,000 feet, etc., and the total tribes all around
that area probably not more than 50,000. So far they have not from there penetrated
into the valleys and into the ethnic Thais. But this is a possibility for the
future. Anyway, it is manageable if the right measures are taken. In the whole
of that big Northeast which goes right out to the Mekong - you see it on the map,
the whole of that area of Thailand like that with Udorn, Ubon, etc., in it - they
have really over this last five years, from the insurgent point of view, made very
little progress. A lot of the right measures are taken and there is no real
threat. In fact, if any threat developed it would come literally from infiltration
forces coming over the Mekong, and really there's not very much to stop them.
You can't make a barrier of the Mekong. The Mekong is one of the great passageways
of the world, and anyone can cross it in a boat at night. Finally, of course,
there are the ex-Malayan communists down on the Thai-Malayan border in the South.

13

These from a figure of roughly 500 or 600 in 1961 are now up to over 1,000 and they are based mainly on the Chinese population in that southern part of Thailand where there are a lot of rubber estates, etc. There the threat is slightly expanding. But it is not a great threat at this particular moment. In other words, the situation in Thailand is that from all points of view there is nothing that cannot be handled provided they have the will to handle it. This is where we come back to the whole problem. How far have they got the will? Of course, insofar as they have any will they are immediately saying how much support are we going to get. That is the vital question for Thailand.

This I might say is the vital question for everyone else. And the only other point that I'd just like to bring up in Southeast Asia, it comes really from the British and Australian point of view, that a great deal will depend of course as to what happens in the U.K. elections which are likely to be held next October but could come literally at any moment. The Prime Minister as you know can prorogue the House like that and then elections have to be held within three weeks. He might well do it this Spring. If a conservative government comes back, they have already stated their policy that they intend to remain East of Suez. Now this doesn't mean that they're going to put a lot of stuff there, they're going to put just enough to show that they are still committed, and we hope that during the course of this year what is called the Five Power Agreement will be (I don't think it needs a signature) reached between Malaya, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, and Britain, centering mainly on the Singapore area. I might mention that Australia is very cognizant of her responsibilities in this area. She, in any case, is keeping forces in Malaya and an Air Force and, of course, she is particularly worried too about the Indian Ocean, and is now stopping to consider bases which she has never really had before on the west coast of Australia.

I would just like to end by saying what I see as the main danger in the situation in front of us. Everyone is watching what the outcome is going to be in South Vietnam, and what the United States is going to do, and what the United States is going to remain committed to. As I see it, we are beginning to reach a situation where from the Communist side they have established a formula whereby Communist countries are off limits but everywhere else is a free for all. And if you just look at that you are therefore establishing a situation where they can't lose but they can win. A situation, too, is developing in that where coming back to the Truman Doctrine and I think this is what we do come back to and I personally think if you look beyond the Truman Doctrine as a policy that President Nixon is trying, in this do-it-yourself with limited assistance, to produce the

14

strategy which will give effect to the policy of the Truman Doctrine. But if the
Truman Doctrine is not held then we get a situation where Communist countries and
revolutionary parties know that they will be supported and small threatened
governments do not know whether they are going to be supported. I think that
will be a very dangerous situation.

QUESTION AND ANSWER PERIOD

DR. KLETTE: Thank you very much, Sir Robert. We appreciate these
views coming fresh from the area. I couldn't help but as I listened to Sir Robert
talk to compare his words today with those last August here, and there's much
more from the economic development point of view coming out today, from the
political development point of view, and also a little cheerier note than last
August. So perhaps, although things still are not in resolve over there,
perhaps they look a little better. I believe now we'd like to throw the floor
open to questions.

QUESTION: Sir Robert, you mentioned that you feel that Vietnamization is working. In 1961 we had a very limited advisory effort going on. In '64, '65 the advisory effort had built up and the big buildup started shortly thereafter and now our revolutionary development aids and other programs seem to be working. It seems to be that troop casualties and deaths are the one large area that many Americans are objecting to in the war, and yet you feel that we can withdraw to some degree a certain number of troops. Even though we withdraw troops are we withdrawing firepower, are we withdrawing those things that are really prosecuting and assisting in the prosecution of this war? That's the first question.

SIR ROBERT: I have made it clear that the enemy's capability has gone
down. If you take all the major actions with North Vietnamese forces coming in
across the Laos border, Cambodian border, etc., from last fall onward now
Ban Het, Bu Prang, Doc Lap, all these sort of things, from the point of view of
combat infantry it has been done entirely by the South Vietnamese. There has
been of course American fire support, both from fire support bases and air support.
If you get into questions of how much of that have you actually withdrawn then
you probably know better than I do. But the withdrawals so far, apart from a
lot of fat that's still there, have been mainly combat troops. I'd just like
to add that is working so far, that is okay at the moment.

QUESTION: The second question. Did you notice or did you get any
feeling on whether or not the advisory effort itself in Thailand has been on the
increase or is it staying about what it has been in the past year?

2

**SIR ROBERT:** I don't think the advisory effort - now I'm not dead certain of this with regard to units, but certainly the advisory effort in the provinces, districts, etc. - has altered very much at the present time. For example, let me give you, some people who really are pulling their weight in that country are what are known as MATS teams where you have these small teams of sometimes two but generally about five men who go around RF companies, PF platoons, villages, and I think this is very important, they're all helping to organize the defense of the villages, etc., working in these small teams very often now in villages that a year ago were under complete VC control. And these people are scattered all over the Delta and I think five men operating in that way are proving of as much value as operational platoons because they're getting good results from the local people.

**QUESTION:** I've been particularly concerned for quite awhile about the lack of support we seem to be getting from other countries and particularly from the United Kingdom, France, and Japan. Would you like to comment on their attitude toward us?

**SIR ROBERT:** The United Kingdom's attitude, which I have not always entirely agreed with myself, stemmed originally from 1954 in that we were cochairmen of the Geneva Agreements with the Russians and it was our job to try to balance the Russians off as it were in that. While the Russians have given the other side aid, incidentally the United Kingdom does give South Vietnam aid though not military aid. It gives aid in police administrative and economic fields. Both the conservative and labor governments have said that they support United States policy in South Vietnam but they've been very careful not to get pressed to a vote on it. I think you will find that if a conservative government comes in it will certainly repeat that, but it will not, it will definitely not send troops there. Now one of the reasons why Britain never got involved with troops there at the time that you did was that we were already involved in Southeast Asia, in fact when you had, what, 15,000, 20,000 advisors in South Vietnam, we had 50,000 troops actually engaged in confrontation with Indonesia in Malaya and Borneo. And they were so engaged right through 1966, and it wasn't until 1967 that one could start to withdraw those at which time we were also running into financial difficulties, and I don't think the question ever arose of British troops switching from there and any going to Vietnam. France, after all, as the previous colonial power has been a great intriguer in this whole business and I

3

think her whole views have been dictated more by pique than by policy and I
think you made a very grave mistake in choosing Paris as the scene of the
negotiations. You would have been much better in Warsaw. Who else were you
asking about?

**ANSWER:** Japan.

**SIR ROBERT:** Japan has made an absolute killing in South Vietnam. The place is just covered in Hondas, transistors, television sets, etc. She's one country that really has made something out of that war. The point though to realize is that Japan, I think, is 10 years off being in a position where the flag has to start supporting the trade and this is something which I think will come through in the end. Japan is in fact creating for herself the co-prosperity sphere which she failed to create in 1941-1942. I think that it is quite possible that the flag eventually will start to follow the trade. But there is no question in the next two or three years of any form of Japanese military presence in Southeast Asia.

**QUESTION:** These countries have traded also all three of them with North Vietnam all along, haven't they?

**SIR ROBERT:** Oh yes. We have an absolutely open hand on this one. If you're not at war there are no powers to stop a British ship entering any port in the world. You need wartime emergency powers to control shipping and there are no such powers in existence.

**COMMENT:** The British themselves could if they wanted to.

**SIR ROBERT:** No, we can't control a British ship operating out of Hong Kong and say don't go to Haiphong. You've got no powers whatsoever to tell him not to, unless you have wartime control regulations. It's a free country. There isn't a war. There's no declared war and you can't even say it's for your own good. I mean, because obviously it isn't. You know like you might in the Spanish Civil War when some of the areas got very rough, you warned British shipping off, but you were only doing it because of that. There are no powers to control these things and certainly the French, don't forget, have rather a different view. Their attitude to this is that they were there before as the colonial power, they still have residual interests there and they're hoping that they may be able to maintain those residual interests whichever side wins. Don't forget that you haven't exactly asked anyone, and if you had, you wouldn't give anyone any say in what happened, and General DeGaulle was absolutely right on that one. Supposing we put a regiment in there, would we get any say in what

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you did in South Vietnam? None at all. The Australians haven't had any say
in what you do. I think you have to recognize that. You have run it and no one
else coming in has had any say or would have had any say. I mean a lot people
said why don't we put a regiment in there so that we get a say, but we wouldn't
get a say if we put a regiment in there.

**QUESTION:** Would President Thieu have any greater popularity if he
enlarged his base of political support?

**SIR ROBERT:** The answer to that is no, and he would probably destroy
his government. This idea that you can enlarge a political base is one that has
always intrigued me and I've often looked around at political bases to see how
one can enlarge them. What does it mean? It means you bring someone else who
is outside your government at this moment in. Now if you bring someone in,
someone else has to go out. And the question is who amongst those two has the
most support? Now let me just take the two very prominent cases in South Vietnam.
General Minh, Big Minh that is, who is supposed to have a good deal of charisma -
don't forget Big Minh did two things in South Vietnam for which he is not really
popular. First of all he killed Diem. Now this is different to overthrowing, but
he killed Diem and I might mention to you that this is beginning to come through.
It was very interesting that last November 1, there was a memorial service for
President Diem in Saigon and Madame Thieu attended. The Vietnamese are now in
the back of their minds realizing that Diem was in fact a great patriot. The
second thing that happened to Big Minh was that three months after doing this,
having done nothing during that three months, he got caught in his bed by
General Ky. Well that's not exactly as if he has the mandate of heaven. Now,
what is his price for coming in if he's head of the Army? Now I wouldn't have
Minh commanding a division let alone in charge of the Army. And it means that
you've then got to throw someone else out. Well it just simply isn't worth it.
The other person who's putting a price on himself is General Dong. The General
estimated that he would probably rate in South Vietnam somewhere between 5,000
and 10,000 votes in total. His price for coming in is Prime Minister and he isn't
even worth the Ministry and you bring him in as Prime Minister that means you have
to throw General Khiem out who's got far more support within the country than
Dong has ever had. You tend to think of these people in terms of Generals and
therefore the position is there because of their particular military command or
military power. Well, in actual fact, when it comes down Thieu is President,
Khiem is Prime Minister, they've got no command of troops at this present time.

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What one has to realize in a country where you've got a million men under arms is that Generals are politicians as well as soldiers. In fact there is no General that I know in South Vietnam who hasn't got just as much claim to a civilian power base as any civilian politician. And what is more, he's got his military power base too. So that in these people that we're dealing with, we had this sort Anglo-American prejudice against generals. I notice you've had one in the last decade, but we do have this prejudice against generals. But, I tell you this, that in three-quearters of the countries around the world we either have had, have got, or are going to have generals in charge of those countries. I personally think that with regard to Thieu, and particularly with regard to Khiem, who I think is probably the best Prime Minister that country has had, certainly the most effective and efficient and to my thinking one of the nicest Vietnamese that I have met, I think they have got the best government they have had since 1954, except perhaps Diem in his early days. It's certainly the best government that one can see there at the present time looking around the whole scene. And if I was Thieu I would not weaken his base by bringing these other people in. I think he's got as good a base as he's going to get, and incidentally he's dealt with the generals by saying they're the old French generals, which indeed they are, so that's the way he dismisses them. He mustn't look at this in terms of our own type of politics of creating political parties and subscriptions, etc., and getting people to vote. He is making himself very well known in the villages. You have these elected village chiefs, hamlet chiefs, village councils, etc. - thousands and thousands of them. They all come in and do about four or five weeks down at Vung Tay training and Thieu goes down and addresses every single one. He also goes around the villages just as often as he can which is quite a lot. In fact, his attention is focused on the villages. And what he is doing there is, he's merely saying to them, "Look I am doing things for you. You only have to do one thing for me, that's to vote in 1971". And this is the way voting happens in those countries. It's not like we have it, political parties and programs and things like that. A vote is a service returned for services rendered. That's the way it will come out I think in '71. Of course we don't have that horrible problem of the constitution and multiple candidates and no run-offs, etc. Well that will get a minority government in any country.

**QUESTION:** There has been a whole spectrum of opinions about the effectiveness of bombing North Vietnam, what's your opinion?

**SIR ROBERT:** My overall opinion on the bombing campaign as waged was it was a strategic error. It did more harm and did more damage, for example,

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in this country, than it ever did in North Vietnam. Now not until people really
got onto the targets just at one period and rather late in the day, in fact, after
the, not the bombing halt, but the bombing restriction in March 1968, where the
bombing was reduced. When you're bombing a country like that or any country or
anything comes under a bombing campaign there is awful temptation, because you've
got a lot of stuff, to go and hit a lot of stuff and the thing gets scattered all
over the map. The example that sort of brought this home to me was the German
railways in France in World War II. Now you can bomb all sorts of things. You
can bomb the tracks, you can bomb the marshalling yards, you can bomb the tunnels,
you can bomb the bridges, you can bomb the trains, and you can shoot up the trains,
but they finally got it down to one thing. Burst the engine boilers. And that's
the only way they could stop the trains. The Germans could move them in spite
of all the other damage. But the moment you got on to the one bottleneck in the
whole thing - if you go for the engine boilers, they cannot cannibalize the
engines, and you can't repair boilers quickly. This will bring a railway to a
halt. Exactly the same thing in the North. There was no concentration on what
really mattered. When this was tried toward the end of '68, just before the full
bombing halt, it came down to, I think, and I'm not dead certain here, six passes
and one bridge. If all the effort had gone into that, we wouldn't have had - none
of that is populated area - any of these sort of worries and it would have been
two or three times as effective. Now, I'm not against bombing provided it is
effective in achieving its object. Well it didn't, and that's really the criticism
of it. On the other hand, it caused an awful lot of damage.

QUESTION: How about the dikes of the Red River? Why was that avoided?

SIR ROBERT: Well I think that's avoided because then you really do come
on to. I will accept that the target within the North that really counted was not
the factories, or oil depots, or parks and things like that. It was the people.
There are two ways of bombing people. Either you can bomb the towns or you can
hit something that has an equal effect like the dikes. If you hit those dikes
when the Red River is in flood then you put a good deal of that Red River Delta
about 6 feet under water and apart from the people you drown you certainly destroy
the rice crop at that particular time and they would really be in trouble. But
I think this was always off limits, and I think quite rightly so. I mean you've
got to live with what you do in this world, and I don't think you could have made
it quite as severe as that and got away with it not only in world opinion, but
even opinion within your own country.

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**QUESTION:** Sir Robert, I derive from what you said that there's a good chance that the U. S. maintaining support in South Vietnam that will end up in a stable government there. But I am wondering what kind of deterrence that it could have on the Communists even if we do succeed in view of the heavy burden that we've borne...

**SIR ROBERT:** I think what one is looking at here is if you can produce a stable situation inside South Vietnam, say within the next two years, you know where things are looking pretty reasonable. You've got the North Vietnamese Army not yet fully recovered, still having these problems that I mentioned, but going to be there in two years' time and going to be there in five years' time and going to be there in fifty years' time if necessary. If at the same time the Viet Cong structure within the South has been reduced to negligible proportions - you never eliminate it - if that has been done you've got a situation where if North Vietnam is going to do anything it can only invade in a conventional invasion. Now this raises a lot of problems. First of all, they then have to restructure their Army to turn it into a more conventional army. They need all the logistics support, etc., behind that. This is very expensive. Someone is going to have to pay for it. In other words, Russia and China, would have to think again if they were ever going to do an invasion.

**QUESTION:** Well, I'm referring though, why don't they just give up on South Vietnam and move west into Thailand, what's to stop that...

**SIR ROBERT:** No, I think the strategic and critical situation is South Vietnam, That is why in Laos, I'm quite certain that you're not going to do anything more than you're doing now. No one is going to put the Marines in, I mean, or anything like that, as President Kennedy was prepared to do in 1961. But the answer to Laos is to be successful in South Vietnam. That neutralizes Laos.

**QUESTION:** I mean how? Why can't they just march across it like they're doing now?

**SIR ROBERT:** Because the North Vietnamese cannot live with a going South. I think this is psychologically, politically, and in all ways very difficult for them. I think we have to look into the future. We have to realize that this is a critical area and is liable to remain so. I mean, if it's going to be held at all then it's going to remain a critical area. Just as West Berlin has always been a critical area. Just as the 38th parallel is still a critical area. We're right on the boundaries here. There's one thing that I would like to say about

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boundaries and stop lines, that when one does have a boundary and stop line, make quite sure that the people on the stop line will fight because people often say why did we choose the 17th parallel, why didn't we come back to the Mekong or whatever. But the vital question with regard to the South Vietnamese was, will they fight? And they will. I don't reckon in present circumstances that if South Vietnam goes that you'll get much fight out of the Thais. But if South Vietnam is held, I've explained that there is nothing happening in Thailand that is really a threat at the present moment, that can't be handled with what they've got and with possibly even less aid than you're providing now and I'm excluding the whole Air Force there, I mean the actual aid to Thailand. If the Thais see South Vietnam held, they're in a completely different frame of mind. And this affects one's enemies as well, and again it means they have to do much to avert an attack and I am certain that what one of the things that is going on at the present moment is over this ten years Russia does not want a confrontation. This is one of her rows with China. That she doesn't want it played that way. China's all for these revolutionary wars and getting these things boiling but Russia is not playing it that way.

**QUESTION:** What about the option of South Vietnamese with American air support going into the areas of Laos and North Vietnam that constitute the Ho Chi Minh trail?

**SIR ROBERT:** This is an option, I just don't think it's one that anyone is at the moment going to exercise. My own view on it is "let's get it right inside South Vietnam first, and then see what happens". We don't know what would happen then. Would the North Vietnamese Army pull back a bit? We just don't know what would happen. They'll fight like mad for the Ho Chi Minh trail. I mean we'd really have some battles there. I think we're speculating too much here. Certainly not into North Vietnam, because you come back to the golden rule, "Communist states are off limits". Russia has established that.

**QUESTION:** Well, what I'm trying to get at is that we seem to "psych" ourselves into particular fixations where they set up the rules that they can do certain things that we can't do.

**SIR ROBERT:** Yes, we've allowed them to do that. Cuba was one of the things that established that, don't forget.

**QUESTION:** Sir Robert, you mentioned in your talk that one of the objectives of the Viet Cong, or the North Vietnamese, was American soldiers...what is your

9

general feeling about the feeling of the Asiatic toward the American. This could
be a great asset to the North Vietnamese to get the foreigners out and I'm sure
this is a line they make. What is your feeling on this?

**SIR ROBERT:** Of course it's a line they make, and it's always been a part of their propaganda. I think this is very greatly exaggerated by our side. I have seen British troops, American troops, etc., in many countries in Asia. Now I admit if one overdoes it you can make your presence fairly unpopular, but done in a reasonable way I have never seen any unpopularities towards them. You have got both Malaya and Singapore asking the British government now to keep British troops there. Can you imagine a situation like that? When you look back to the years before independence where all the thing was going the other way and when we had quite political problems getting across a defense treaty at the time of independence or other people like Tunku Abdul Rahman did. One thing I think you've got to be a bit careful about on this is bases. Everyone likes to have cast iron agreements with regard to bases. Particularly bases that might be useful in time of war. Forget it. We're not working for wartime situations, we're working for peacetime situations and trying to prevent the wartime situation and in peacetime these areas can be used. For example, why shouldn't the United States Navy use Singapore dockyards commercially in peacetime. Don't have to think of this in terms of bases. They would welcome you in there, and as long as one doesn't talk about bases it makes it very difficult for a nation politician, as you've seen yourselves from the Philippines, Okinawa, etc., the moment you have fixed base with an agreement. But general use in peacetime without too tight an agreement there is much less trouble over, and with regard to the presence of troops within these countries, your troops have been R&R'ing all over Asia, Malaya, Singapore, Bangkok, etc. I haven't seen any unpopularity. Admittedly, I don't think Singapore would stand 50,000 Americans, but I mean it hasn't got to that.

**QUESTION:** I read in the Columbus paper that the only reason we're in South Vietnam is that so a small weak nation can choose its own government. I wonder if an outsider with maybe a broader, more philosophic view...Is that a reason for pouring millions of dollars and hundreds of men that we're investing in Vietnam, I understand why we have to have Mid-East oil, what is it about that area of Asia that we have to have - trade, oil...?

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SIR ROBERT: No, I don't think you can put this in economic terms at all, and I think in many ways one's less concerned on most of the economic matters. If you look at, for example, the Middle East and what a mess that is in, but still, the oil comes out. I don't think that one can look at this economically at all. I think it comes back as I said at the end of my talk in the end to the Truman Doctrine. Don't forget that whether the country is right on the border with the Communist Powers or whether it's a long way away from that they all know that they are fairly alike. They have all in varying degrees the same sort of vulnerability, and the Truman Doctrine laid down that the United States would support small countries - I forget the actual terms - that were threatened by subjugation from internal subversion or outside pressures. Fairly vaguely worded but it was applied to Greece in the early stages and we know what was happening there and we can see similarities with a lot of other countries. Now, this has been the cornerstone of your policy and, in fact, it's been the base of the whole structure around a lot of these countries in the world, that in the last resort the United States will support these countries. When you talk about the aid that you've poured into South Vietnam, but you've poured enormous aid into countries all the way from Afghanistan right around to Japan - all in support of this policy. And what we're coming onto with regards to South Vietnam, particularly after what has happened over this last ten years, is its political and psychological now. If you can't do it there, you can't do it anywhere. That's the lesson you see that is coming home. And I would say this rule with regard to President Nixon's policy of do it yourself with limited assistance. That is exactly what Vietnamization means. And if Vietnamization doesn't work no one's going to believe it works anywhere else. And this is the problem we will be in and you come back to that final formula that I gave you, that you have countries and revolutionary movements. Look at the revolutionary movements in the Middle East and Africa, etc., which know they are going to be supported. And you have small threatened countries which don't know whether they are going to be supported. You lose the war before it starts in those circumstances. There doesn't have to be a revolutionary war in those circumstances. The thing's over even before there can ever be one. I think this would be a very dangerous situation. If you want me to take the scenarios on as I think Senator Symington has started almost to take the scenarios on, except that he hasn't got to the end. If you lose in Vietnam I wouldn't be prepared to bet on there not being a nuclear war in the end. I think it makes its inevitability,

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and we all use that term, I think it makes it much more inevitable. Because one of the things that would happen as a result of that, you've seen a change occurring in this world in the last three or four years. Whether it will change again I don't know, but we've had a situation for 20 years since the war, well a little later than that as soon as Russia became a nuclear power, where you have been a global power and a nuclear power and Russia has been a nuclear power, and a nuclear power has acted as a deterrent all the way through, and you have been the global power. We have got a tendency now for you saying, "We're not going to be a global power any longer". The Russians are definitely indicating that they intend to become a global power. Everything that they've been doing for the last ten years is showing that. As I explained to Tuck Brown, before Rome got Carthage, Rome had to build a Navy. And you see this tendency, and this will end up in a situation where the Russians are a global power and a nuclear power. What you have to be in those circumstances is a very super nuclear power and I think we're getting then into very dangerous situations in this world. We have got to face the fact that there is conflict and in all the occasions where that has come to confrontation in the past the other side has backed away and they don't want to bring it to confrontation in these next 10, 15, 20 years. Because what would confrontation do? If you like the West it makes the United States very popular, and so on. They don't want a confrontation they want to play it as a slow, crumbling erosion which no one does anything about because they've been conditioned to do nothing about it by events in Southeast Asia, and in ten, fifteen, or twenty years you wake up and you will see a very isolated looking United States and then you could well be in a position where you say, "Okay, we've got to have ABM's now, we've got to have MIRV's, etc., and you're getting up to a back-to-the-wall situation. This could happen, because that has been a trend that is started. It could easily be reversed. It is only a matter of saying we're going to stand here in these various places, and it doesn't require a lot to do it because I don't think the other side has any intention of forcing this to a confrontation at all. They've nowhere forced Vietnam to a confrontation of any sort. And I think we're going to be in a great deal of trouble in this world over the next 20 years unless one realizes exactly what has been going on over this last 25 years in this respect.

**QUESTION:** Let's take one more topic. Your scenario, doesn't it leave the United States doing all the work for all the countries, and if we shirk a little bit the whole thing will fall down?

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**SIR ROBERT:** No.

**QUESTION:** Isn't it equally possible that we say we are going to stop doing all the work, if you fall you fall, maybe we'll lose all of that peninsula but maybe some of the other countries will decide that if we have to fight communism ourselves we can't depend on the United States.

**SIR ROBERT:** Let's come back to what President Nixon is saying, which I think is the right strategy, "Do it yourself with limited American assistance". This is a change around from what has happened in Vietnam over these last five years where you were trying to do it for them. I mean, I agree with this, but the worry about South Vietnam is that no one is going to believe it. If you prove it in South Vietnam, then I think it is going to work in these other countries and you're not going to have to do it for them. And, I certainly agree to this point. We may lose one or two, I mean that can happen. But if you are working on the business of do it yourself with limited American assistance you don't get into the sort of state, say, that South Vietnam got into round about '64, '65, in everyone's mind. At least you will have tried even though you failed.

The point I'm really getting at here is that if you never try you are going to have a succession of failures. I mean it's always going to be a failure, but at least if one tries some are going to be successes and don't forget there have been some pretty good successes in some ways over the last ten years. I accept what you say, one or two will go, but let us try. And I don't think this is a matter of it being entirely the United States and you having to do it for them where this is exactly what we're trying to get away from.

**DR. KLETTE:** We have time for one more question.

**QUESTION:** What is the possibility of a Russian-Chinese confrontation?

**SIR ROBERT:** I don't think there is going to be a war between them. There are two things happening here. You have the national interest aspect from Russia and China's point of view and you have the Communist aspect. On the national interest and looking back at their histories, the power that has most encroached on China was Russia and Russia went on encroaching on China right up until the end. During the war, after the end of World War II but during the Civil War in China, and when it took Mao two months after winning in China to come to an agreement with Russia for which he got a lousy 300 million dollars and had to let Russia keep the railway in Port Arthur for so long and had to agree to the Mongolian Peoples Republic becoming independent - all of which had traditionally been areas of let's say of Chinese influence. The reason for this

13

is that in the back of Russia's mind and the dominant thing in Russia's mind has
always been the security of the Soviet base both in Europe and in the Far East
and one thing that Stalin never expected to happen was that Mao would unite China.
He had expected the United States to go on supporting Chiang Kai Shek and probably
for there to be a sort of split China for a long period. The Russians regard the
Chinese as a threat to the Soviet base. They have never given back any of those
things that they promised to give back in 1917. In other words, Russia needs to
contain China too. Now the second thing she needs to do is, and this is exactly
the same theme as with Czechoslovakia. In Communist leadership and Communist
strategy toward Communist world domination, Russia wants to control it, and Russia
is merely trying to impose on China exactly what she imposed on Czechoslovakia
which is limited sovereignty. In other words, your Communist party must in the
end take orders from the leading Communist party and this is what Mao has seen
all along and this is why the rows have taken place. China is in fact trying to
get into the position where she is pronouncing on the pure doctrines of Communism.
You, therefore, have this taking place in two fields, the national field and the
Communist field - straight dispute between them. But when you come down to basics,
I don't see them destroying each other or even attempting to. In fact, if you
attacked either, I would see the other coming in. They would definitely join
together. I think the Communist brotherhood, as it were, is still dominant.
I don't myself see them having confrontation to the extent that they have a World
War. I think Russia is to a certain extent keeping China occupied in the North
and in the West to give Russia a bit more time to extend her influence into the
Indian Ocean and into Southeast Asia as a means herself of filling the vacuum
rather than China filling the vacuum and of further containing China. I mean
Russia has quite clearly been moving strongly into India, has now proposed this
collective security treaty for Southeast Asia, and so on. This is a beautiful
kite. No one's going to grab onto it now but it might look good in three or four
years time. If you were prince Souvanna Phouma in Laos who's the one power you
could appeal to at the present moment for any sort of help at all, Russia. No
one else. So this kite is coming forward into Southeast Asia and it's all part
of the Russian competition against China.

DR. KLETTE: Sir Robert on behalf of all of us we thank you from the
bottom of our hearts for your incisive remarks, for being with us again and we're
looking forward to when you come back. Thank you.