Analysis of U.S. Strategy in Vietnam, July 1965

Abstract

Abstract : After reviewing the documents that your staff provided, I have enclosed my thoughts on the current situation in South Vietnam. At this time, we have already deployed Marine main force elements and have completed a limited bombing operation in North Vietnam. deployment of these units concerns me because I don't think we have a clear understanding of the situation in Vietnam. We have crossed the Rubicon with little more than the Johnson administration's guidance to kill more VC and maintain the current status quo. This assessment comes at a time when SECDEF McNamara and the JCS do not seem to be working in concert. Clear ideas are not being considered. Developing a clear set of ideas is a difficult skill to master, especially once a conflict has begun. I believe that most of the high level discussions about proceeding in Vietnam, ...are futile bandying of words, (which) either leave each man sticking to his own ideas (the service chiefs) or they end with everyone agreeing, for the sake of agreement (the Johnson administration) on a compromise with nothing to be said for it. If the United States does not review its policies and develop a workable military strategy based on a clear sense of the situation, then we are heading for a long, protracted struggle in South Vietnam. I have made these conclusions based on the following three main reasons: 1) We do not fully understand the forces that are at work in this conflict, 2) We are engaging in a defensive strategy devoid of a clear end state, and 3) We have not properly tied the U.S. political goals to our military strategy. U.S. is at war and we must remember that, The political object is the goal, war is the means of reaching it, and means can never be considered in isolation from their purpose.