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Noam Chomsky

C H A P T E R   T W O
Interpretations
We have reviewed the first three categories of
evidence concerning Kennedy's war and plans, and the
presidential transition: the events themselves, public
statements, and the internal record. The last source
of evidence is the memoirs and other comments of his
associates. These come in two versions: before and
after the Tet offensive. We review these in the next
two sections, then turning to the 1991-1992 revival.
This survey only adds conviction to what we have
already found, while shedding interesting light on the
cultural scene. 
1. The Early Version
Kennedy's commitment to stay the course was clear to
those closest to him. As noted, Arthur Schlesinger
shared JFK's perception of the enormous stakes and his
optimism that the military escalation had reversed the
"aggression" of the indigenous guerrillas in 1962.
There is not a word in Schlesinger's chronicle of the
Kennedy years that hints of any intention, however
vague, to withdraw without victory (1965, reprinted
1967). 
In fact, Schlesinger gives no indication that JFK
thought about withdrawal at all. The withdrawal plans
receive one sentence in his voluminous text. In the
context of the debate over pressuring the Diem regime,
Schlesinger writes that McNamara returned from Saigon
in October 1963 and "announced...that a thousand
American troops could be withdrawn by the end of the
year and that the major part of the American military
task would be completed by the end of 1965." That is
the entire discussion of withdrawal plans in this
940-page virtual day-by-day record of the Kennedy
Administration by its quasi-official historian.1 
These facts leave only three possible conclusions: (1)
the historian was keeping the President's intentions
secret; (2) this close JFK confidant had no inkling of
his intentions; (3) there were no such intentions. 
Which is it? The question is addressed only obliquely
by advocates of the withdrawal-without-victory thesis.
The only plausible conclusion is (3), but that is
rejected by the advocates, leaving (1) or (2). The
latter might strain credulity, unless taken to show
the lengths to which JFK went to deceive all around
him. Newman cites Schlesinger's justification in 1978
of JFK's "decision to hide his plans" (324), implying
that the correct conclusion is (1) -- unless
Schlesinger had learned about these "secret plans" in
the interim, which no one claims, including
Schlesinger himself. Hence Schlesinger too must be
adopting (1). Furthermore, he lauds Newman's book with
no relevant reservations, again suggesting that he
regards (1) as accurate. One would be interested to
hear an explanation. 
Similar questions arise in the case of another close
associate, Theodore Sorenson, who also published a
history of the Administration in 1965. Sorenson was
Kennedy's first appointed official, served as his
special counsel, and attended all NSC meetings. He
stayed on through the early months of the Johnson
Administration. He devotes little attention to
Vietnam. No withdrawal plans are mentioned. Quite the
contrary. Kennedy's "essential contribution" was to
avoid the extremes advocated "by those impatient to
win or withdraw. His strategy essentially was to avoid
escalation, retreat or a choice limited to these two,
while seeking to buy time..." He opposed withdrawal or
"bargain[ing] away Vietnam's security at the
conference table." 
Sorenson notes Kennedy's view that the stakes were
high: "free world security," which would be severely
compromised if Vietnam were lost and Southeast Asia
were to fall to "the hungry Chinese." Kennedy's
commitment to defend South Vietnam, Sorenson says,
"was not only carried out but...reinforced by a vast
expansion of effort." Impressed with Douglas
MacArthur's opposition to sending troops, Kennedy
preferred "a major counterinsurgency effort," though
he "never made a final negative decision on troops"
and "ordered the departments to be prepared for the
introduction of combat troops should they prove to be
necessary." Meanwhile, he "steadily expanded the size
of the military assistance mission (2000 at the end of
1961, 15,500 at the end of 1963)2 by sending in combat
support units, air combat and helicopter teams, still
more military advisers and instructors, and 600 of the
green-hatted Special Forces to train and lead the
South Vietnamese in anti-guerrilla tactics." 
Like Schlesinger, Sorenson highlights JFK's hopeful
January 1963 prediction that "the spear point of
aggression has been blunted in Vietnam." But "In
mid-1963 the picture worsened rapidly" with the
repression of the Buddhists, Nhu's reported moves
towards "a secret deal with the North," and his
failure to heed US admonitions to "get back to the
war." Worse yet was Nhu's public statement that "there
were too many US troops in Vietnam." Even after the
overthrow of the Diem-Nhu regime, "no early end to the
Vietnam war was in sight" and "the struggle could well
be, [JFK] thought, this nation's severest test of
endurance and patience": 
He was simply going to weather it out, a nasty, untidy
mess to which there was no other acceptable solution.
Talk of abandoning so unstable an ally and so costly a
commitment "only makes it easy for the Communists,"
said the President. "I think we should stay." 
So Sorenson's account ends. Here too, there is no hint
of any intent to withdraw short of victory. Again, we
may choose among the same three conclusions. 
__________________________
No one was closer to JFK than his brother, the
Attorney-General. Sorenson notes that as RFK fully
acknowledged, his own role "was one of complete
support for the U.S. commitment," which he had
expressed in 1962: "The solution lies in our winning
it. This is what the President intends to do... We
will remain here [in Saigon] until we do." In a 1964
oral history, RFK said that the Administration had
never faced the possibilities of either withdrawal or
escalation. Asked what JFK would have done if the
South Vietnamese appeared doomed, he said: "We'd face
that when we came to it." "Robert's own understanding
of his brother's position," his biographer Arthur
Schlesinger reports, was that "we should win the war"
because of the domino effect. RFK said further that by
late 1963, the President had become "very unhappy"
with his dovish adviser Averell Harriman, who was
expressing skepticism about the optimistic reports
from Saigon. JFK's annoyance was so great that
Harriman "put on about ten years during that
period...because he was so discouraged." If indeed JFK
intended to withdraw without victory, he was fooling
both Harriman and his brother, it appears. The problem
with Diem, RFK added, was that we need "somebody that
can win the war," and he wasn't the man for it.
Accordingly, it is no surprise that RFK fully
supported Johnson's continuation of what he understood
to be his brother's policies through the 1965
escalation. By mid-1965 he was advocating negotiations
while condemning withdrawal. Schlesinger traces his
break with Johnson's escalation policy to July 1965,
Sorenson to February 1966. He never proposed
withdrawal, or indicated that his brother had such a
plan. According to Schlesinger, RFK's position as of
December 1965 was stated privately in these words: "I
don't believe in pulling out the troops. We've got to
show China we mean to stop them. If we can hold them
for about 20 years, maybe they will change the way
Russia has."3 
The last of the early accounts of the Kennedy
Administration was written by Roger Hilsman, a
representative of the dovish faction of the
Administration (along with Harriman and Forrestal, he
notes), and a high-ranking official particularly
well-placed to know about Vietnam policy. He wrote
shortly before the Tet offensive, when the US troop
level had peaked and protest against the war had
reached a substantial scale, and well after severe
doubts about the war were raised at the highest
levels, including McNamara. (The latest source Hilsman
cites is August 15, 1967.) Because of his position and
the timing, Hilsman's account is of particular
interest. 
Hilsman takes it for granted that the goal throughout
was "to defeat the Communist guerrillas," and
speculates that the overthrow of Diem had offered "a
second chance" to achieve this objective. Had JFK
lived, "he might well have introduced United States
ground forces into South Vietnam -- though I believe
he would not have ordered them to take over the war
effort from the Vietnamese but would have limited
their mission to the task of occupying ports,
airfields, and military bases to demonstrate to the
North Vietnamese that they could not win the struggle
by escalation either" -- the enclave strategy
advocated by Ball and Taylor in early 1965, then
publicly by General Gavin and others. Hilsman feels
that LBJ "sincerely even desperately wanted to make
the existing policy work," without US combat forces,
citing LBJ's statement of September 25, 1964 that "We
don't want our American boys to do the fighting for
Asian boys"; to emphasize its importance, Hilsman also
gives this LBJ quote as one of several opening his
Vietnam section.4 As we have seen, his conclusion
about LBJ is supported by the internal record. 
On withdrawal plans, Hilsman adds nothing of substance
to what was published in the press at the time. His
only comment is that the optimistic predictions on
which withdrawal was conditioned would come "to haunt
Secretary McNamara and the whole history of American
involvement in Vietnam." The "real tragedy," Hilsman
writes, "is that many of the ranking American officers
in Saigon and the Pentagon believed it." He reports
his feeling at the time that unless the Diem regime
responded to US pressure to dedicate itself to
victory, or was replaced by generals who would, "in
six months to a year the Viet Cong would control the
country -- or we would have to take over the war with
American ground forces, which President Kennedy was
convinced would be a tragic error. But the real hell
of it was that, even if something did happen [in
Saigon], the situation might still come to that
choice." The question of how to respond to a collapse
of the Saigon regime was delayed, in the hope that it
would not arise. "We'd face that when we came to it,"
as RFK put it in 1964.5 
Hilsman's reservations about Johnson's war in this
late 1967 account are subdued. He reports the
objections he shared with Harriman and Forrestal to
Rostow's "well-reasoned case for a gradual
escalation," including ultimate bombing of the North,
the "fundamental" objection being "that it probably
would not work" (recall Forrestal's shift toward
Rostow's position by March-May 1964). He writes that
the March 1964 memo that he sent LBJ "as a sort of
political testament on my departure concentrated on
warning against the bombing of North Vietnam," a
highly contentious issue by late 1967. This reference
to the memo is not accurate. Bombing of the North is
raised in only 3 of the 19 paragraphs. The memo
concentrates on counterinsurgency, and secondarily, on
ensuring "political stability" in Saigon, where talk
of "neutralization" must be terminated and a Marine
battalion might be dispatched to prevent another coup.
With regard to bombing of the North, Hilsman's memo
raised only tactical objections, calling for such
bombing as a "useful supplement" to counterinsurgency
while repeating his recommendation of a year earlier
that covert actions against the North be continued,
"keeping the threat of eventual destruction alive in
Hanoi's mind." He also suggested "selected attacks on
their infiltration bases and training camps" after
sufficient progress had been made in suppressing the
southern insurgency.6 
In short, four years after the assassination, this
dovish Vietnam policy insider has only limited
objections to Johnson's already highly unpopular war.
He praises LBJ for his "sincere" and "desperate"
efforts to implement JFK's policies, and gives no
indication that JFK planned to withdraw without
victory, or had even considered withdrawal beyond his
(tepid) authorization of McNamara's recommendations,
based on the precondition of victory. He considers the
withdrawal issue insignificant, so much so that he
adds essentially nothing to what had been prominently
published before the assassination. In retrospect, he
feels that JFK might have made different choices than
his senior advisers, but offers nothing to support
that belief. Again, we face the same three
alternatives, and are left only with the third as a
plausible contender: the President had no plan to
withdraw short of victory. 
The internal record of 1964 shows that Kennedy doves
saw matters much as described in the 1964-1967
memoirs, and therefore continued to support Johnson's
policies, some pressing for further escalation, others
(Ball, Mansfield) praising Johnson for choosing the
middle course between escalation and withdrawal. All
of this material adds further confirmation to the
record of public statements and internal
deliberations. 
This completes the review of crucial evidence: the
pre-Tet memoirs conform closely to the other sources
of evidence. The conclusions are unambiguous,
surprisingly so on a matter of current history:
President Kennedy was firmly committed to the policy
of victory that he inherited and transmitted to his
successor, and to the doctrinal framework that
assigned enormous significance to that outcome; he had
no plan or intention to withdraw without victory; he
had apparently given little thought to the matter
altogether, and it was regarded as of marginal
interest by those closest to him. Furthermore, the
basic facts were prominently published at the time,
with more detail than is provided by the early
memoirs. 



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