If, coulda, woulda, shoulda about history may not change it but does change our understanding of what happened and why. The two gravest mistakes the US made in Vietnam were to participate in, even bless, the overthrow of President Diem and then to not use our overwhelming force to bring North Vietnam to its knees.
The overthrow of Diem in 1963 upended the South Vietnamese pacification efforts and disrupted the organization of the professional army, requiring the large-scale US involvement. The failure to then use our massive force, especially in the air on North Vietnamese strategic targets instead of sending multi-million dollar planes against cheap trucks, allowed the North to extend its reach and prolong the war.
Mark Moyars wrote the book "Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War, 1954-1965." It details how Diem's efforts were succeeding and were destroyed by the coup. In the June 29 Wall Street Journal (behind the paywall) Moyar reviews three other recent books that come to the same conclusion. Wise guys in Washington should not be in such a hurry to think they can superimpose their ideal of Western democracy where the foundations have not been laid and in the midst of war requiring unified stern measures.
Of historical note is, not only in 1964-5 the failure to bring to bear the Joint Chiefs' recommendations for strategic targeting of the North, but how in 1970 there was a similar failure of will in Washington. As President Nixon showed in 1972 by launching such a ferocious air attack on Hanoi and Haiphong, the war could have been shortened and many thousands of lives saved. Rear Admiral Joe Vasey was right hand man to Admiral John McCain Jr, Commander-In-Chief Pacific Command during 1968-1972. In an exclusive to this blog, for historical record, Joe Vasey has agreed to publish the below "after inaction" report on what could have been in 1970. (My apologies for the spacing below, due to copying-pasting from an email.)
A New CincPac Strategy to Defeat NVN Aggression Against the South, Sent to Washington for Approval in 1970
Aboard CincPac's 4 engine command aircraft with Admiral McCain and several staff,enroute Honolulu to Saigon in July 1970. The Admiral had me awakened in the middle of the night and in his private compartment the gist of our conversation follows:
Vasey, you are supposed to be my war planner. Why the hell don't you have a strategy to win this war ? (This was his brusque manner of speaking to me even though we had been very close since our time together in the USS Gunnel, a submarine he commanded in WW2).
I do have one sir, It's back at headquarters wending its way to your office, but it may not survive the critiques of generals on your staff.
Brief me !
That I did for the next 30 or so minutes.
What's the next step ?
Wait until you return to headquarters to hear comments on it from your staff.
Screw you! While we are in Vietnam, I want to brief General Abrams (Commander of US Forces in Vietnam COMUSMACV was under the command of CincPac) on the strategy and get his ok to execute if possible.
Then I convinced him as a preliminary step to convene a conference at the ChaoPhya RR hotel in Bangkok to review the conceptual strategy and to ask General Abrams to send senior representatives to attend. For the next hour on the a/c,with the help of two of my planning officers, we drafted a 10 page outline of the proposed strategy in a message addressed to General Abrams, and to CincPac's military commanders in Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand directing them to attend the conference in Bangkok two days later.The message also went to the US ambassadors in the three countries plus South Vietnam, and all the CIA Station Chiefs, inviting them as well.
Forty five or so attendees including the US ambassadors to the four countries, CIA Station Chiefs and several senior officers from General Abram's staff attended. After several hours of discussion and vetting of our recommended strategy all endorsed the conceptual basis of the strategy. We spent the next four days rounding out the details, including annexes for logistics, communications, operations, intelligence, special operations, PsyOps etc. Fortunately, LGen Charles Corcoran USA, Chief of Staff for Admiral McCain had arrived from Hawaii to preside over the discussions.
Afterward while the Chief of Staff returned to Hawaii, I carried the completed package to Saigon and met with General Abrams and staff with Adm. McCain already there. Amazingly to me, the proposed strategy was strongly endorsed by COMUSMACV and staff. Of Course several senior officers from General Abrams's staff and subordinate commands had actively participated in the Bangkok proceedings..
Admiral McCain then turned to me and asked, what's the next step, Joe ?
We should take it back to your headquarters in Hawaii and provide your staff the opportunity to vet the strategy and provide inputs.
The hell with you Vasey. You take our proposed strategy to defeat North Vietnam’s communist infiltration and aggression against South Vietnam and fly directly to Washington on the next flight, civilian or military. I want you to personally brief the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretary of Defense and Secretary of State.
I was accompanied on the trip by that famous Special Forces tough guy Charlie Beckwith who carried a big briefcase stuffed with the highly classified war plans. When the stewardess told him the briefcase had to be stowed up forward he responded, "I am keeping it with me maam", pulling up both trouser legs and exposing a Baretta strapped to one leg and a switchblade on the other..
The Joint Chiefs endorsed the recommended strategy, and State Dept. and DOD initially indicated general approval. But within days it was watered down (not by the JCS) and some crucial actions were delayed or gelded:
The proposed major air offensive against key military and logistic targets in NVN, including Hanoi, avoiding suspected POW sites while targeting the logistic sanctuaries a few miles on either side of the river between Haiphong and Hanoi, was held in abeyance. It should be noted here that the ongoing air campaign against the North was anemic by comparison. The Secretary of Defense and White House micromanaged the campaign, limiting the targets designated for attack each day, effectively gelding the strategic impact of US air power on NVN’s ability to continue its logistic support of aggression against the South.
The mining blockade of Haiphong and other ports on the coast of NVN, Approval held in abeyance.
The movement of one US Army division into Laos adjacent to the Vietnam border, to block the Ho Chi Minh Trail, the major route for North Vietnam’s infiltration of communist guerrillas and logistics into the South was modified.Washington disapproved using US troops and substituted a division of South Vietnamese ARVN soldiers be deployed instead and limited to only two weeks. This was a big mistake anticipated by US military commanders in the field who had a good feel for the internal situation in South Vietnam and the readiness of the ARVN troops..After a few days the ARVN soldiers started returning in droves to their farms and homes just across the border in Vietnam. The American media latched onto this story and played it up as a US failure.
Surprise amphibious raid by a brigade of US Marines against a port in the southern part of North Vietnam used as a key logistic staging area for assaults into South Vietnam. Washington approved only of an amphibious "feint" toward the coast accompanied by a PsyOps campaign to simulate a landing. At least the feint was successful in diverting the movements of one or more North Vietnamese army divisions to repel the anticipated landings.
Special Forces Ops launched from Laos and Cambodia into RVN for COIN Ops. . .
All the foregoing to be accompanied by a major PsyOps campaign against NVN that included leaflet drops, miniature radios to dissidents, radio broadcasts, even small dummies simulating paratroopers dropped by parachute at night --- all to give the impression that an internal uprising was brewing. Only limited aspects of this campaign were approved..
In retrospect , had this multi-pronged offensive been approved and executed as proposed in 1970 tens of thousands of personnel casualties would have been prevented, NVN aggression against the South halted and hostilities ended favorably on US terms. In 1972 President Nixon finally approved of the mining blockade and later that year of major air attacks against the North including military targets in Hanoi itself. So effective were these attacks and the blockade, that North Vietnam returned to the ongoing negotiations in Paris with a conciliatory attitude leading to a peace agreement.
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The foregoing written in 2011 by
Rear Admiral L.R. “Joe” Vasey USN Ret.
Chief of Strategic Plans at CincPac, 1969-72
