NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
TOP SECRET - Sensitive
India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Japan, Taiwan, the Republic of Korea, and the Republic of the Philippines with respect to U.S. durability, resolution, and trustworthiness. Finally, this being the first real test of our determination to defeat the Communist wars of national liberation formula, it is not unreasonable to conclude that there would be a corresponding unfavorable effect upon our image in Africa and in Latin America." [20]
Similarly, in Secretary Rusk's perception.
"We must demonstrate to both the Cormunist and the non-Communist worlds that the wars of national liberation formula now being pushed so actively by the Communists will not succeed." [21]
B. Interagency Study, February-March 1964
The immediate effect of the heightened interest in causing Hanoi to alter its policies by exerting greater punitive pressures was to stimulate a variety of planning activities within the national security establishment. For example, on 20 February, at a meeting with the Secretaries of State and Defense, CIA Director MeCone, CJCS Taylor and members of the Vietnam Committee, the President directed:
"Contingency planning for pressures against North Vietnam should be speeded up. Particular attention should be given to shaping such pressures so as to produce the maximum credible deterrent effect on Hanoi." [22]
Underway at the time was a detailed interagency study intended to determine ways of bringing measured pressures to bear against the DRV. Directed by Robert Johnson, of the Department of State Policy Planning Council, the study group was assembled under the auspices of State's Vietnam Committee. Its products were funneled through Willian Sullivan, head of the committee, to its members and thence to the principal officials of the agencies represented. However, the papers produced by the study group did not necessarily represent coordinated interdepartmental views. [23]
The study examined three alternative approaches to subjecting North Vietnam to coercive pressures: (1) non-attributable pressures (similar to the advanced stages of the covert actions program); (2) overt U.S. deployments and operations not directed toward DEV territory; and (3) overt U.S. actions against North Vietnam, including amphibious, naval studies" attacks. In addition, it encompassed a number of "supporting on such subjects as U.S. objectives, problems of timing, upper limits of U.S. action, congressional action, control arrangements, information policy, negotiating problems, and specific country problems. By addressing such a range of subjects, participants in the study came to grips with a number of broader issues valuable for later policy deliberations (e.g., costs and risks to the U.S. of contemplated actions; impact of the Sino-Soviet split; possible face-saving retreats). [24]
