Folks,
You can download the report at http://www.nsa.gov/vietnam/releases/relea00012.pdf
Good read
Best
Tom
Printable View
Folks,
You can download the report at http://www.nsa.gov/vietnam/releases/relea00012.pdf
Good read
Best
Tom
Looking for some feedback on former CIA Director William Colby's Lost Victory. I finished the book about 3 weeks ago and found it to be among the most informative and optimistic books on the Vietnam War with respect to understanding the U.S. role in the war, our many mistakes, and probably most important, how we eventually learned from these mistakes in developing a joint-pacification effort that some say led to the war being all but won by 1971-1972.
I'm not a Vietnam expert by any stretch, but did find this book, as well as Lewis Sorley's A Better War convincing in describing what could have been had we not completely pulled out militarily and cut off funding. Both books paint a very different picture of the war than others that generally focus on all things during and before the Tet Offensive.
Colby made an interesting point about how the Easter Offensive validated our success (and that of the South Vietnamese Government) because the North Vietnamese were left with little choice but to attack conventionally because the communist infrastracture in South Vietnam had been mostly destroyed by 1972. He argues this was even more the case after all three NVA conventional thrusts were defeated or fought to a stalemate during the Easter Offensive. He goes on to say that things in South Vietnam would have turned out very differently had the U.S., in 1972-1973, guaranteed the country's security from conventional external threats, much like we did when signing security alliances with South Korea and Japan.
Anybody out there with experience on the ground in Vietnam or Vietnam history experts in general that can shed some light on Colby's book?
I'm particularly interested because I see many parallels between how he describes Vietnam in 1968-1969 and where we're at in Iraq today (i.e., just now seriously embracing a pacification effort, making progress on inter-agency cooperation, really trying counterinsurgency, etc. all with decreasing political support on the homefront).
I would also recommend what seems to be the closest thing to a definitive after action report on CORDS, Pacification by Richard A. Hunt, Westview Press, 1995. The jacket, incidentally, has Colby's endorsement of this work. The author was a CORDS captain, apparently assigned to MACV HQ. As for Lost Victory, definitely a worthwhile read, and I concur in the conclusion, basically as you have put it. Concur as well in Sorely, which puts the Colby/CORDS story in context. I worked in a number of MR III provinces as a civilian in CORDS and its successor outfit, the Embassy's SAA/FO (Special Asst. to the Amb. for Field Operations) Program 1971 to April 1975. All my former colleagues who were there when I was and, to whom I have spoken since, consider, as do I, that by mid-1970 the turning point had been reached in our favor. To all of us, every stage of the pulling of the plug was an outrage. My quick and (very) dirty take on CORDS is that our advisory effort was laudably successful in ensuring the needed US and GVN focus on recruiting, training and equiping the Territorial Forces (RF/PF) and recognizing their key role in pacification--(falls under the rubric of organizing the population in its own self defense). I'll not dwell on recurring problems such as enemy penetration, but overall, to me the vindication of the program came in the 1972 PAVN offensive when US observers were able to comment in a number of situations that RF units had performed measurably better than ARVN. To me, progress with RF/PF alone more than justified the CORDS enterprise.
On another important initiative, Colby is overly sanguin, however, viz., Phoenix. After all, this was his baby. And this is why to me the CORDS advisory effort was the house half finished. Sorely quotes Abrams putting it better: there was "still a lot of work to do." Most VCI were killed not through Phoenix but by RF during the course of their normal operations. This is because many VCI (including the senior ones) resided and travelled with the enemy combatant units in the bush, not within the population. And PRU, an effective anti-VCI strike force, diminished very significantly in effectiveness once it was Vietnamized. Despite undeniably serious attrition in their ranks, the VCI were still around when CORDS ended in Feb 1973, and despite smaller numbers, able to keep their fellow villagers in a state of terror in certain areas. Communist enforcers continued to assasinate, the guides were still there to lead PAVN conbatants, and in the waning year of 1974, political agitators were unabashedly vocal. (The GVN in MR III did not demonstrate seriousness of intent in neutralizing the legal cadre--the ones living within the population. Keep in mind that CORDS was strictly advisory--if the GVN didn't do it, it wasn't done.) Conspicuously absent from Colby's account was any discussion of the thriving Shadow Supply System of local procurement for the enemy forces--an important VCI undertaking. The whole question of accommodation with the enemy was a perennial problem with which the advisers struggled, but unfortunately, as our force drawdown accellerated, the Vietnamese, no longer convinced of US commitment (the key!) were driven to increasing collaboration with the enemy.
In conclusion, I'd assess CORDS as a real success in regard to the RF/PF. But recent accounts of the successes of Phoenix (at best spotty, but overall, wanting) leave me incredulous. Some months ago, Council Member Slapout (if memory serves) suggested that I do an evaluation of CORDS, which I refrained from attempting since I am not qualified. The foregoing will confirm that judgement.
Cheers,
Mike.
Let's not forget that the Easter Offensive in 1972, while an utter failure and disaster for the North Vietnamese in their attempt to take urban centers and destroy South Vietnam, did manage to successfully overrun and keep the Central Highlands. While not a major population center, it provided an excellent safe zone within the South for resupply and rebuilding. Note as well that without American advisors, FACs, and pilots, ARVN would have utterly collapsed in 1972.
Also focusing exclusively on successes in the counterinsurgency battle ignores a critical aspect of Maoist revolutionary warfare, which prescribes transitioning to conventional forces as soon as possible. The Communists in China didn't win due to guerrilla uprisings in Nanking --- they crushed the Nationalists in the major force-on-force battles, where guerrillas acted primarily as guides, supply, and political mobilization rather than playing a significant military role. The same thing happened in Vietnam, except when the major conventional campaign occurred South Vietnam fell far faster than the KMT in China.
Hi Mike, thanks for the post on CORDS, yes that was me with a request for an evaluation of CORDS. I disagree with you on your qualifications, seems like you are exactly the right person as your post proves. I am at my day job but will post more later.
After the war the communist said that the Phoenix program was very successful.
The communist insurgency in Vietnam was beaten many times. In Mark Moyars' Triumph Forsaken he notes that in 1959 the Diem regime had reduced the communist forces down to just 6,000 men.
After the north started sending more troops down, they were defeated again in the early '60's. What helped them in 1963 was their infiltration of the Buddhist movement creating what appeared to be a sectarian strife.
The US fell for the ruse and started putting pressure on Diem to make concessions to the Buddhist leaders who kept moving the goal post. State Department people began back a coup against Diem and were assisted in that effort by Ambassador Lodge and some reporters in Vietnam who later received Pulitzer Prizes for their efforts. The coup caused the South Vietnamese to lose momentum in their war against the communist, and President Johnson's weak response to provocations encouraged them to send more troops south.
If you are interested in counterinsurgency warfare, you will want to read Moyar's book. It only goes through 1965, so you will probably have to wait for the next volume to read about the CORDS program from his perspective.
For a dissenting opinion on CORDs and pacification, I'd strongly recommend reading Eric Bergerud's The Dynamics of Defeat; the Vietnam War in Hau Nghia Province (Westview Press, 1991). Bergerud looks clsely at once province in Vietnam and assess that the pacification efforts could only, at best, achieve a mediocre tie with the VC and that the population, was never in a position to accept the GVN, even when the VC fighters were swept from the battlefield in the "better war" of the Abrams era.
For me Bergerud's book proves the point made by David Galula that the counterinsurgent must be armed with a better idea than the insurgent, and be able to sell that idea.
Thanks for all the feedback thus far. Will be sure to pick up the recommended books.
A few questions and observations that came to mind as I was reading the responses:
Colby described how he sent John Paul Vann down to the Delta region to lead the pacification efforts because the VC had a dominant presence in the region, at least initially. He talked about visiting this region multiple times throughout the book and for a long time it definitely wasn't a nice place. But about a year or so after Vann moved down that way (1970-1971 timeframe), Abrams in charge, pacification/CORDS really the main effort, local elections took place, fairly legitimate central government in place, etc. the Delta had significantly changed, to the point where Colby and Vann would ride around on a motorcycle, stopping in villages for days at a time, while not once being attacked or threatened. He mentioned that they would have certainly been killed had they done this in the mid-to late 1960s.
Did anyone spend time in the Delta region? If yes, please share thoughts on why things changed so dramatically.
This brings to mind all the talk of late over Senator McCain's recent trip to Baghdad. While I haven't been in Baghdad for a few years now, and don't think there are any places where an American would be wise to walk around alone in the city, I do know of significant changes on the ground in this direction in other areas.
For example, a few weeks back I spoke to a Lt that had recently returned from the once "Wild, Wild West" in Anbar. Tomorrow marks the 3-year anniversary of a battlion-sized fight in Husaybah that has proven to be one of the most intense the Marines have had in Anbar since 2004. I'm very close with many of the Marines that fought in Husaybah. One of the guys led a heavy machine gun platoon in the AO in Spring/Fall 2004 and commented that he rarely went anywhere unless he had 6 vehicles and at least 30 Marines with him. Friends from the two battalions that replaced this battalion had similar experiences.
Back to the Lt that I recently spoke to... following the clear/secure, hold, build strategy employed in this AO in late 2005/early 2006, platoons were married up with Iraqi Army and police units (many of the Iraqis were from the area) and moved in with the people. The Lt assumed control of one of these positions for 5 months. Unlike the 30-Marine/lots of machine guns patrols from years past, he routinely sent out fire team (+) to squad (-) dismounted patrols that operated alongside Iraqi security forces. While there was still an occassional threat, ultimately the people were very happy to work with the Marines/ISF, the insurgency lost most of its appeal, the economy took many steps in a positive direction, and politics at the local level began having a significant influence in the AO.
Two major things struck me about his comments:
1) He said the AO was so peaceful that the deployment was boring in many ways, and if sent back to Iraq, part of him wants to go somewhere where he can participate in a "clearing" operation (he understands that it's not a good thing if we continue to have to do "clearing" ops, but part of him feels like this is what infantry Marines are trained/supposed to do).
2) Many of his Marines had previously served in this AO. Initially they didn't believe "higher" when told how much things had changed on the ground. In fact, many thought he was insane when saying that they'd be conducting indepenent squad-sized patrols on their first day in the AO. His squad leaders warned him about how dangerous certain areas were and recommended bringing a larger force. Much to their surprise, the environment had fundamentally changed after clear/secure, hold, build was executed and committed to, now going on almost 16 months.
Thanks in advance for any more thoughts on the subject or feedback on Colby's book.
1) For Tequila: Absolutely--not quite "the highlands" but a slice of territory along the border from the DMZ all the way to the Dellta essentially fell to the enemy in 1972. Stretching it though, to say this (or 1975) was Maoist third stage--After all, the enemy conventional forces were PAVN--a foreign army. This force didn't evolve out of the village guerillas because we had killed those off. Yes, there were still VCI around to provide that army with local support--and we could, based on historical experience, predict pretty well which areas that linkage would resurface--i.e., the surprisingly precise location of the "leopard spots" was no secret. Concur 100 percent that to meet a conventional threat US advisers and tactical air support remained essential. (GVN could have duked it out with local forces forever.) When Song Be was besieged Christmas 1974, I was instructed to tell my counterparts that "the Ambassador says he is very hopeful that Congress will provide the expected assistance funds." Replied the VN Lt. Col. Deputy Sector Commander, "We don't need the aid--we need tactical air support." The ultimate outrage was not congress cutting off funds in 1975--It was the mid-1973 Congressional prohibition on any US military activity anywhere in (or over) Indochina, thus giving the enemy a green light to grossly violate the cease fire.
2) For Merv: Concur completely in Moyar's thesis. Former advisers to the ARVN 7th Division who were in the Delta in 62-63 told me they were convinced Strategic Hamlets had turned the tide in the Delta--unfortunately it all fell apart when Diem was killed. But a far better write up is provided by Dennis Duncanson in Government and Revolution in Viet Nam, Oxford Univ. Press, 1968. This history of VN ends in '67 but if you had to read just one book about VN, this would unquestionably be the one. (Then you might use Sorely to fill in 1968-75.) Duncanson was Bob Thompson's No.2 in BRIAM (UK Adv Mission to VN) throughout the Diem years and knew Diem and Nhu very well--as did then COS Colby. Re Phoenix--The Communist statements I have seen about Phoenix, in their full context, plainly use the term generically to refer to all penetration ops. According to Sorely, the friendlies had even penetrated COSVN. But that had nothing to do with Phoenix, which was a very specific intel coordination effort centered at province and district level.
3) For Phil: I also highly recommend Bergerud. Considering the base line, though, progress in Hau Nghia was impressive. To me the lesson here is that US military withdrawals (in this case 25th ID) were pemature. Two problems with Hau Nghia Province, which I covered intermitently. First, this is a place where the insurgency was entrenched because it was indivisible from family. Membership had been inherited for a couple of generations. This was unusual in the proper South Vietnam--but common in the Central Coast (eg: Binh Dinh and Quang Ngai). Trang Bang District was rubber plantation land since the French days. Among the earliest "cannonfodder" recruits to the Viet Minh in the South (c.1946) were the rubber workers--the true underclass--an impoverished rural proletariate the French had brought down from the North where there was a labor surplus. I'd like to see a study (but haven't found one) looking at whether the hard core VC of Hau Nghia came from those families, as this would explain a lot. Second problem with Hau Nghia was its location on the border and on an infiltration route (Plain of Reeds) pointed toward Saigon. So, close proximity to a PAVN base area was a problem. (Problem with oil spots is that the enemy worked their own.)
4) For Maximus: No question, throughout populated MRIII (but not the jungle areas) I could drive alone and unarmed where it would have been suicide to do so mid 60's. (To be honest, if I wanted to drive over a landmine or get myself captured, I also knew where I could still do that--but lots fewer places than in the 60's.) Laying on security for the Colby trip must have been a hell of an effort. The highlight was a stretch they drove at night! But security had improved greatly. Three points. First, the enemy initiated offensives of 1968-69 caused them great casualties. The locally recruited (i.e., insurgent) forces were decimated and never recovered. And filling the vacuum rapidly with recruitment and deployment of RF/PF (i.e., pacification) allowed the cleared areas to be held. Second, MR IV (the Delta) was not exposed to pressure from long standing enemy base areas (an exception: U Minh Forest) where PAVN resided in division strength. Third, the Delta people (true South Vietnamese as opposed to the Central Vietnamese of MR I and II) did not have the cultural baggage that made their compatriates from farther north such intractable foes. The Deltaic feudal society was essentially pre-nationalist. Anti-colonial chauvinism (likewise anti-Chinese chauvinism) were largely absent. (Personal experience--you're not likely to read this anywhere.) Places like Kien Hoa (Ben Tre) were very exceptional in having a generationally entrenched insurgency. Interestingly, among the more secure provinces in the Delta were those in which a history of land tenure inequity happened to have been the greatest (huge landholdings owned by the oligarchy and farmed by sharecroppers.) Land reform made a difference, but that was after the Colby Vann trip....But such cultural minutiae escaped many Americans...Recognizing that the resonating VC message was not nationalism after all, we might well have charted our course differently.
Finally, Your description of Anbar is reminiscent of the USMC CAP ops in MR I--the most direct US COIN effort in VN (as opposed to advisory activities).
5) For Slapout: Thanks
Cheers,
Mike.
Mike,
Thanks so much for the quick and detailed response. You've helped tremendously in my understanding of events on the ground in Vietnam.
I instruct USMC infantry Lts headed to Iraq, most within 3-6 months after graduation. They're required to read The Village, focusing on answering the questions provided in the attached document. We then have a discussion group based on the questions. If you have a few minutes, I'd greatly appreciate it if you would look over the questions and responses that I use to steer the discussion group. Please provide comments/suggestions.
Thanks again.
Semper Fi,
Scott
Maximus, you may want to check out the unit history of the 3rd Brigade 82nd Airborne. It was 68 or 69 that they worked on heavy clearing operations in the Delta area. I have been to the KIA monument at the division museum at Bragg many times. For only being over there a year it was a pretty tough operation.
Mike inHilo I also asked if you new a friend of mine who was part of Phoenix and I don't think I ever told you but his opinions were very close to yours. The first time I met him and we talked about Vietnam I was just shocked when he flaty said "We could have won if we had wanted to, we just gave up." Thats why I like first hand accounts of situations usually much more accurate.
I would check out the book, Slowburn, concerning the author's viewpoint on Phoenix and the Pacification efforts. Not sure if it's in print anymore but the author is a stud and the intro is written by Stuart Herrington. I believe his first name is Stuart. Last year I ran into one of his guys who is now retired while I was at Quantico. The guy was waiting to take a job as an Intel Analyst for some FAST teams in Afghanistan. He had great things to say about Herrington which in turn reflects well on the author.
Very interesting thread and the current discussion paper. Being a Brit my knowledge of Vietnam is limited to reading, however there are other places where working with and FOR the locals led to victory.
I refer not to Malaya, but the campaingn in Borneo and the Oman. The two books readily to hand are:
'SAS The Jungle Frontier' (SAS Regmt in Borneo 1963-1966) by Peter Dickens (pub. 1983).
'SAS Operation Oman' (1971-1974) by Col. Tony Jeapes (pub. 1980) - which should be read alongside 'We Won a War: The Campaign in Oman 1965-1975' by John Akehurst (pub.1983).
I am sure there are accounts by non-special forces in both campaigns, just they are not on my bookshelves.
Davidbfpo
De Forrest's Slow Burn is definitely worth reading. I note that the author is also quite critical of Phoenix (but not of the Phoenix advisers, for whom he has well deserved high regard); laudatory of the RF; and dismissive of the "useless" RD Cadre. As I've pointed out elswhere on this site, De Forrest was able to be as successful as he was because his job with CIA enabled him to conduct a unilteral op. Phoenix/Phuong-Huang was a US-advised indig op, and therein lay the problem. (CIA, by the way, was not within CORDS). Stu Herrington was the Phoenix Adviser on the Hau Nghia Province CORDS team--same province which is the subject of Bergerud's Dynamics of Defeat.
Cheers,
Mike
I been here before -- and last time it really hurt.
I haven't read Colby's book, and don't know how he handles the issue of GVN competence. In my fading recollection is concern expressed by U.S. advisors that the Thieu government "didn't get it." Success in the field could not make up for lack of legitimacy in the central government. The same is true in every COIN fight. Ouch.
As I recall, the military had advisors in GVN civilian departments because more civilian experts were not available. Ouch.
Baghdad. Ouch.
Old Eagle: Colby generally had good things to say about the Thieu government. I recall him crediting Thieu for understanding the importance of pacification, dedicating the appropriate assets to the CORDS effort (as best he could), coordinating the actions of military and regional and local forces, and continuously supervising regional and local leaders to make sure they were performing. I probably wrote "supervision works... inspect what you expect" 15-20 times throughout the book when Colby discussed Thieu's leadership style.
All things being equal, I think Colby would gladly take the Thieu government over Maliki's in Iraq today.
And as you suggest, this is definitely not a good thing 4 years into this war.
Just how badly we didn't want to win is the subject of Col. McMasters's (3rd Armored Cav at Tal Afar) book, Dereliction of Duty, which shows how an a priori aversion toward winning informed the Cmdr in Chief"s decisonmaking as early as 1964. The book is unfortunately tedious, but the documented info Col. McMasters makes available is seriously shocking.
Cheers,
Mike.
My two cents. This was, after all, the third world--and as far as third world governments and armies are concerned, Thieu's was almost certainly above average--just not good enough to beat the odds without some ongoing US help. Both army and gov't had been around for decades, unlike the Iraqi army. The ministries and their provincial branches were competent (well educated engineers, agronomists, public health officials, etc., etc...). And Thieu could not have made territorial forces and land reform the priorities that he did without "getting it." The problem was far less one of incompetence than lack of political will (as it relates to acommodation with the enemy) and the related issue of corruption. And this last failing was CORDS's greatest fault, as most of the "old timers" will agree--That is, we never tackled corruption to the extent we could have (yes, we did get some province chiefs tranferred). But no doubt US relief at finding militarily competent officers to deal with constrained us from using our leverage to the fullest extent to combat this systemic problem.
Legitimacy was in VN a function of the people's confidence in the ability of the government to prevail. In 1970 VN, the government that had legitimacy in the eyes of the people was the USG! Not the NLF or Communist Party for sure...And they believed, correctly in the event, that the GVN would fold under PAVN pressure after we left. (As the Vietnamese peasants were wont to tell me in their GI English, "[When] GI go home, VC come in."
Unquestionably, the pre-WW II French regime had legitimacy. When the communists started subversion in the North Vietnamese countryside in the1930's, they knew that no villager would dare take up arms against a Frenchman. So they began by getting villagers to sully their hands first, by having them participate in "peoples' executions" of Vietnamese village elders.
Re US civilians in VN--They were in fact all over the place. And why not? Other than Tet, Saigon was quite safe. I'm reminded of the USAID woman assigned to Saigon who did a TDY in Jamaica--She was so relieved to get back to Saigon because she found crime-ridden Kingston so dangerous. US military advisers in civilan GVN ministries?--Not during my tenure, and, I believe, not ever.
Cheers,
Mike.
But how truly competent was it really compared to the NLF and DRV? An example would be Thieu's land-reform program. While better executed than the travesty that occurred under Diem, which ended up disenfranchising farmers, how was it anything but a pale imitation of what the Front had already done in its "liberated" zones?
So would you assess GVN as never having real legitimacy in the eyes of the South Vietnamese population?Quote:
Legitimacy was in VN a function of the people's confidence in the ability of the government to prevail. In 1970 VN, the government that had legitimacy in the eyes of the people was the USG! Not the NLF or Communist Party for sure...And they believed, correctly in the event, that the GVN would fold under PAVN pressure after we left. (As the Vietnamese peasants were wont to tell me in their GI English, "[When] GI go home, VC come in."
How true is this? The De Tham resistance went on for almost 30 years before being finally suppressed in 1913. French "legitimacy" must have been rather thin on the ground given their utter failure to defeat the Viet Minh or regain control of the countryside after 1950.Quote:
Unquestionably, the pre-WW II French regime had legitimacy. When the communists started subversion in the North Vietnamese countryside in the1930's, they knew that no villager would dare take up arms against a Frenchman. So they began by getting villagers to sully their hands first, by having them participate in "peoples' executions" of Vietnamese village elders.
Also, how successful were Diem's programs once the NLF was formed and started hitting back rather than accomodating, that is by 1962, when VC main forces had acheived the ability to mass for battalion-sized attacks on ARVN bases? How truly successful were the Strategic Hamlets, given the incompetence of the Diem administration in the countryside and the inability of the Civil Guard to face down the rural guerrillas, as well as the fact that the man running them and the previously disastrous "agroville" program was a VC agent?
Good questions.
1) French: Even after the 30's insurrection, pre-war French strength in all of Indochina was only 70K, acording to Fall, Street without Joy. As you know, the deux-ex-machina of Japanese occupation knocked the hell out of French rule in VN. At war's end, the Japanese commander disobeyed orders and, instead of awaiting the coming allied forces, surrendered men--and all their weapons--to the Viet Minh. Three months later the temporary Nationalist Chinese occupation force for the North arrived and liberally sold weponry to the VM. The Party had been organizing in the populated areas with discreet assistance from the Kempeitai even as Ho's forces were guiding downed US air crews to safety through the northern mountains. Meanwhile, France was on the ropes. The "real" France had just lost the war, 685K military and civilian KIA, including 66K civilian victims of allied bombing! (Fall again). Communists were the largest political party in France, with almost daily rioting, and because of Red political pressure instead of relying on French conscripts, the expeditionary force to VN was heavily North and West African. (But lots of Vietnamese did step up.) True, a multi-province chunk of Central VN coast (where most US casualties would later be incurred) was never reoccupied by the French....But these weaknesses considered, it may be remarkable that the French did, after all, manage to fight the VM to a sustainable (for France) stalemate....until 1950 when the Chinese Communist victory resulted in French loss of the border forts and ensured Viet Minh access to a friendly neighbor.
2) GVN land reform a pale imitation: No. In fact, this was a robust land reform that blanketed the rice lands and was well received. Exception: those few villages where residual VCI influence was such that cadre were able to organize sharecroppers to refuse the land titles. The program was competently and fairly administered. Importantly, most sharecropper rice land was in the Delta and, pre-land reform, the Delta was already the most secure region in the country. Absent security, the necessary surveys could not have been undertaken. The problem with land reform was not that it was too little. Rather, it was too late. By 1971, the nature of the war and of the VC message had changed. The message was now peace at any cost to end the suffering., no longer land. The reform may have been largely irrelevant.
3) Strategic Hamlets: Captured Communist docs. were clear in complaining that the program kept them from their population base, seemingly contradicting US sources saying that ill treatment of participating villagers generated many new insurgents. Large swaths of Delta were in fact cordoned off, thereby draining the swamp....The problems with the program were (a) excessive rate at which new hamlets were added, and (b) decidedly non-strategic-based decisions on where to locate the hamlets.
4) Legitimacy: In 1968, shortly after hard core Ben Tre, in Kien Hoa Province, was cleared, interviewed villagers said that "the government" (=chanh-phu in Viet.) had suffered a great defeat. They referred to the VC as the government! From my arrival in VN in 1971 to the end, no way could you have found Vietnamese who would have referred to VC/NLF as the government. But most Vietnamese plainly believed that we ran the country. Given a colonial history, an abundance of white faces in GVN offices, and VC propaganda as well, ths was an easy thought pattern to fall into. CORDS was supposed to foster a transferrence of such confidence--however misplaced--from the US to the GVN. We never succeeded! Now, once our forces left (Feb73), it became clear to all and sundry that we were not their government. And the GVN did control (to varying degrees) over 90% of the people. (The liberated zone from near Muc Hoa (Delta) to Khe Sanh near the DMZ was largely unpopulated.) And they did govern, and people were reasonably obedient. So, can you have legitimacy by default? Or else my definition of legitimacy was too high a bar and I should have settled for a more modest "a government that is seen to govern." The people knew this was just a hiatus before communism, but most clearly feared and loathed the "night riders" and the conscripts did fight--not for Thieu but to stave off the feared, violent hordes (backlash effect of terrorism).
5) Diem. I wasn't there then, but strongly suspect that he gradually acquired legitimacy. But perhaps in some rural areas, never. Take a look at Fall's papers about '50s VN available on line (look first in the SWJ Library). On a map, he plots a ring around Saigon of wholesale village chief asasinations beginning in 1956 and accellerating dramatically each year. The VC preparing for the upcoming war. Kitson's "subversion" stage. No dip at all during the alleged hiatus when the GVN oppressive apparatus was allegedly working and the enemy quiescent. Suspect the quiescence and "successful supression" was largely VC propaganda, echoed by Karnow et al. ("The North finally responded to distress calls from the southern cadre"--fosters the impression that the insurgency was not a preplanned northern driven enterprise.) The patient enemy campaign bore fruit when the villages were sufficiently controlled and organized to receive and support the main force units (Yes, took them till 1962.) Also see Duncanson, and Ellen Hammer, who contends that stay-at-home cadre called the shots in rural hamlets right from the end of the war in 1954. Clearly, there were some villages where Diem never attained legitimacy.
6) Counterintel issues/penetration and enemy agent recruitment/cryptocommunists in high places: When you mentioned the Agroville guy, you hit upon a grave and debilitating problem. Anecdotes are legion, from the French 40's to the end, and in instances reached strategic import. The issue is obviously linked to the accommodation/political will problems.
7) GVN vs DRV: For securing their base, controlling their people and marshalling them to fight you can't beat a totalitarian regime. And certain classical COIN population and food control/rationing measures seem openly immitative of communist TTPs. Now, economically, the South Vietnamese living standard would have been unbelievably extravagant by DRV standards, even after the bubble burst when the US military departed.
Cheers,
Mike
Council member Merv Benson reviews Triumph Forsaken, The Vietnam War, 1954-1965 by Mark Moyer on his PrairiePundit blog - How to Lose a War.
Quote:
Mark Moyar's Triumph Forsaken, The Vietnam War, 1954-1965, gives the history of the conflict up to the day Johnson ordered US ground troops to Vietnam to prevent a communist victory in 1965. This is a book that should be required reading for all those who think they know what caused the war and how it was lost. If they follow the tale told by the winners of the Pulitzer Prizes, they will be very wrong...
Merv deserves thanks for an absolutely top notch review of this important book.
Some others have supported the same thesis, but, as Merv has pointed out, notably not the well known journalist historians. Colby, for one, recorded his shock and dismay over Diem's death in his two autobiographical works. Others who come to mind are historian Ellen Hammer, and Dennis Duncanson, whose landmark history of VN by a long time COIN practitioner, Government and Revolution in Viet Nam, has unfortunately been out of print for some time, but is likewise an essential read. ("The highest ratio of talent to numbers seen in Viet Nam previously or since," from Colby's Honorable Men, My Life in the CIA, is Colby's asessment of Sir Robert Thompson and his cohorts in the British Advisory Mission to VN, Desmond Palmer and Dennis Duncanson.)
But as Merv points out, Moyar adds lots of new material. Of great interest is the fresh analysis of the much discussed Battle of Ap Bac.
By the way, I clicked on SWJED's link to Amazon and checked out the reviews of this book that Amazon has posted, and noted that one of those is by Council Member Meara.
Cheers,
Mike.
... Merv did a great job reviewing this book. I work (day job) in the same building as Dr. Moyer - plan on doing a drive-by next week to say hey and let him know about the review.
I'm not normally a fan of The Nation, but found it tough to disagree with this take on revisionist history of the Vietnam War:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071015/perlstein
Thoughts?Quote:
And here's the remarkable thing: Out of his determination--or desperation--to stay on message, Owens overlooks fundamental contradictions between these two books. Moyar's hero is William Westmoreland. He is a hero because he rejected the idea of flexible, small, counterinsurgency patrols in favor of "using large conventional forces to search for and engage the Communists." Sorley despises Westmoreland. Indeed, A Better War was all but written to drive home this single idea: that using large conventional forces to search for and engage the Communists was what almost lost us the war. Sorley's heroes are heroes because they understand that a key to victory was to monitor and improve the political quality of the South Vietnamese government from top to bottom, the better to abet "their efforts to carry out--carry through--a social revolution." Moyar's Triumph Forsaken was all but written to excoriate such people, whose insistence on monitoring and improving the political quality of the South Vietnamese government almost lost us the war.
It's a shame that the author seemed so bitter about a new wave of revisionism reacting against the "reliable" products that came out in the 1960s...:wry:
Seriously, I always find it interesting when one side of the political spectrum comes out guns-blazing against the opposite side when it comes to historical writing. One could almost smell the torches being kindled to burn two "witches" at the stake for going against conventional liberal wisdom regarding Vietnam. Not that I agree with Sorley and Moyar and their positions on Vietnam...I tend after many years of study to come closer to the view that all we were doing was postponing the inevitable...and the question was more a matter of how much time we were buying our client state in the process. Hard-core liberals have the same cut and paste function when it comes to history...witness the efforts on the part of some of them to claim that Kennedy would have pulled out of Vietnam...ignoring his own personal ties to Diem and general lack of foreign policy success. He was too afraid of "losing" Vietnam...a fear he passed on to Johnson who had even less foreign policy experience and knowledge.
Like most historical events, the "truth" of Vietnam lies somewhere in the middle. It's very much a mix of misperceptions, colored by Cold War thinking and worldviews that need to be considered when writing about the subject. We might have bought the South more breathing room had we gone with an Abrams strategy in the early 1960s as opposed to the big war/Korea theory, but at the end of the day it would have been just that...buying time.
Definitely agree, I'm on the opposite end of the spectrum politically from The Nation, but I take his larger point about a revisionist history of Vietnam being used as an important rhetorical point in the debate on Iraq. Like Malaya, which Steve Metz for one has noted as being so exceptional, how we see Vietnam has a lot of relevance to how we see the entire viability of counterinsurgency.
I agree to a degree, but also consider that political types will pull out anything they can find to make their "historical" points.
Vietnam is a hard one to consider because in the pure Maoist sense there were two wars going on at the same time, IMO. You had the insurgency, which was a real threat in parts of the country and not so much in others, and the conventional force element that was being pumped into the South by the North. The Vietnamese genius here was the willingness (and ability) to shift back and forth between the two styles of war almost at will. Note that this was not without some internal problems (with Tet being the best example of this...although the VCI losses during Tet DID solve one major problem for the North: it removed any local leadership competition from the field), but at the end of the day they were willing to outlast us and the government of the South (which did more harm than good to its own cause).
For many years both the Right and Left held up Vietnam as an almost isolationist banner to keep the US from getting involved in anything beyond its borders, and for the same reason: both sides argued (from their own reasoning bases) that you couldn't defeat an insurgency. As always this ignored the complex nature of both our reasons for getting into Vietnam, the situation we encountered there, and the aftermath. So in a sense Vietnam for political individuals is more a symbol than a historical reality. I've argued before that the best comparison between Vietnam and Iraq can be found in the responses of our own military and governmental institutions to the situation...not on the battlefield.:)
I find a lot in the Perlstein article with which to disagree. Aside from his pseudo sophisticated political diatribe, he elides fact.
Sheehan, Halbertsam et.al. were emphatically not on the side of the angels. Aside from the fact they didn't understand all they knew about what they saw, they let their personal biases enter the effort. Sheehan's later apologia to excuse the way they 'covered' the war, A Bright Shining Lie, was just that -- and he, IMO, did not cover himself with glory with that fairly worthless tome. The media did not 'lose' Viet Nam, the Army did -- but the media were certainly less than helpful. Their overall ignorance was -- and remains today -- generally appalling.
Perlstein also ignores the fact that Kennedy almost certainly approved the Diem assassination. While there is no question that the Diems (plural) were a piece of work , the message that assassination sent to the Viet Namese certainly was one that we were, um, expedient. They remembered that and used it to their advantage over the next 10 years.
I'll ignore Perlstein's mention that Jimmy Carter, of all Presidents, cited the current Bush administration as the worst in history :)
I'll also ignore that he cites the CIA as authority on virtually anything... :(
In short, he penned a political hit piece that is full of misinformation and succeeds in citing a few facts but only in the context of his politics. I have to agree with Steve Blair, burning witches doesn't fill the air with a pleasant smell.
I also agree with him that we were only postponing the inevitable. However, he and I may not agree on my opinion that it didn't have to be that way. There were literally dozens of alternative strategies that could have been pursued. No matter, they weren't so we ended up the way we did.
He's also correct, I think, that a more judicious blend of conventional and COIN tactics early on might have made a difference. Unfortunately, Harkins and Westmorealnd were Euro-war graduate mediocrities who didn't adapt at all well. If anyone wants the single most adverse impactor on Viet Nam, it was really quite simple -- the one year tour.
We, incidentally suffer from that same problem in Iraq and Afghanistan. Additionally, I think Steve is also correct on this:
The failure in Viet Nam, as Steve says, is principally the fault of Kennedy and Johnson both of whom were excessively long on idealism and excessively short on smarts. I'd add poor choices by the Army were almost as significant. The coup de grace was of course a pusillanimous Congress. C'est la guerre, C'est la vie... Xin Loi...Quote:
"For many years both the Right and Left held up Vietnam as an almost isolationist banner to keep the US from getting involved in anything beyond its borders, and for the same reason: both sides argued (from their own reasoning bases) that you couldn't defeat an insurgency. As always this ignored the complex nature of both our reasons for getting into Vietnam, the situation we encountered there, and the aftermath. So in a sense Vietnam for political individuals is more a symbol than a historical reality. I've argued before that the best comparison between Vietnam and Iraq can be found in the responses of our own military and governmental institutions to the situation...not on the battlefield."
We actually do agree here, although I think many of the strategies that might have worked were beyond our political grasp at the time. Given the mindset of the times, especially on the part of Democratic advisors (and some Republicans) regarding the "loss" of China I'm not sure if they could have considered strategies that did not center around resisting that monolithic Commie conspiracy. While the loss was certainly not inevitable, the shackles we hung around ourselves at the time certainly went a long way toward making it so.
I'm afraid that most strategies have long been beyond our political grasp. I wouldn't change our system of governance for anything but it does tend to almost force shortsighted strategy in the geopolitical arena. Fascinating thing is that Hamilton and Madison both foresaw that and kept it away from Congress. Unfortunately, they did not foresee the total lack of common sense and patience that would accrue to us as a nation in the late 20th Century. :mad:
That'll probably get worse before something forces it to get better... :(
For all the inaccuracies of the review, I think that he is correct on this most important point - one that does need to be driven home before a new Myth is created about Iraq.
There does still appear to be a widespread myth that the media, or the opposition more generally, is solely responsible for losing the war. I've noticed that believers in this myth tend to have little to no interest in, or knowledge of, the actual details regarding Vietnam and how the war was fought because they don't believe those things mattered. Instead, they seem to believe that as long as we had the necessary "will" we would have won using just about any approach.
I think this myth had a direct effect on mishandling of the Iraq war, specifically on the decision by the Administration to spend years playing down the insurgency as the "last throes of dead enders". I believe that decision, among others, reflected the belief that "as long as we keep the anti-war movement in check, we will win no matter how badly we screw up in Iraq itself". If our actions in Iraq don't have anything to do with winning the war, then why not take the opportunity to put 21-year old college republicans in charge of key areas of reconstruction?
In the end I believe this myth contributes to hubris and a lack of respect for our actual and potential enemies that will hurt us until we lose the myth and embrace reality.
I just started reading it. This jumped out at me, regarding Dien Bien Phu:
"Most have discerned in France's humiliating defeat a classic example of a hubristic colonial power foolishly underestimating a nonwhite enemy."
Gee. Here all along I've thought it was a classic example of what happens when you combine almost non existent intelligence with a tactically inferior position.
I also would like him to point out when French hubris has not resulted in "foolishly underestimating" any enemy.
I don't see the contradiction. The reason they thought they could win a battle under those conditions is because they underestimated their enemy.
I'm not sure it can be chalked up to simple racism but I feel confident in saying that they never would have tried such a thing against the Germans - they would have chosen an entirely different way of losing.
but I think I partly agree with what it appears to be.
We can agree there are a lot of know-nothings out there on both sides of the political divide. For everyone who thinks the press did the dirty deed, there's one who believes the press is blameless. The truth, as always, is in between..
I agree there are a few inclined to blame the media for what didn't happen in Viet Nam. There are also those who blame the protestors, the politicians, the Army -- and some who go for most or all of the above and some who probably would ascribe other things. The obvious truth is that all those were factors and people will weight the factors according to their own predilection and political views. I'm an all of the above with very, very strong emphasis on the Army, personally. YMMV.
You may or may not be correct on that myth having a direct effect on the handling of the Iraq war. I think there's little doubt that some sort of myth did have that adverse impact. I also think there's little doubt that the Army leadership did not do its job as fully as we might all have hoped in apprising the Civilian leadership of the potential problems and pitfalls and that earlier Army leadership contributed to that by diligently ignoring nation building and counterinsurgency, thus the then current leadership had no doctrinal footing on which to stand or base a reclama and the political bosses took that opening...
The BCTP is a great program today. It was pretty good before 2001. However, then it lacked two things; non-traditional combat (even though it was very obvious that was a strong potential) and, even more importantly, what happened in the conventional battle after the good guys won. The practice was to 'win,' then turn off the computers and the lights and leave the room. Fortunately, they've fixed that.
In any event, the Armed Forces at least are now very much in tune with reality. Good news is it took only 18 months in this war versus the seven long years it took during Viet Nam. Pity about todays politicians and news media; but then, both crowds always have been a little slow...
Some of your other comments are perhaps more appropriate for one of the many political blogs out there.
.
You have to remember that this myth is also a two-way street. Members of the media and the anti-war movement also want people to believe that their impact was much more profound than it actually was. I believe that the MSM has grown quite accustomed to, and proud of, what it feels its "role" was in Vietnam and will defend it to the last roll of audio tape or DVD/RW in the supply locker. The myth was also aided by the fact that many Americans were accustomed to (as in World War II accustomed) to a media that echoed the government line in a conflict. The difference they saw in Vietnam shocked them, and aided in the creation of the myth.
The lack of respect for potential enemies has been around for some time (remember how the Japanese were shown as ratty little men with glasses who couldn't fly prior to World War II?), and will remain a fixture for some time. Either that, or the ten-foot tall foe. Why? It's easier to paint in sound-bite terms if you stick with simple stereotypes. Nations have done this for ages, and will most likely continue to do so.
Agreed! This is one thing I'm glad to say has not been a parallel of Vietnam in terms of institution response time (and response in general). The Army and Marines have learned MUCH faster than they did in Vietnam, and are taking steps to make sure that the lessons aren't lost in the shuffle away from this and into the next "good war."
The MSM actually feels threatened, IMO, by its reputation from Vietnam in some quarters and (perhaps more importantly) the threat it sees from the Internet in terms of being the sole provider of what Americans see and hear about world events. That will always shape its response to events, coupled with the desire in some quarters to be the next Sheehan or Halberstam. As for politicians....they have a two-year attention span (at best) and are not likely to change.
The Media hubris indicated by such comments as those of Evan Thomas that media support was worth 15 points to John Kerry. Does that mean that without their support, he'd only have gotten 34% of the vote? :D
Seriously, you're correct, they really do want to believe they have far more power than they've ever possessed. that's why there so non-plussed by this one, they absolutely cannot understand why it isn't 'over'... :rolleyes:
That was exactly my take on it. Despite the transparent politics of the piece, and its innacuracies, and general tone, I think he's on to something about revisionist histories of Vietnam. And about how you can't have it both ways on Moyar and Sorley, re: Westmoreland.
The most striking thing about Pearlstein's piece is that it smacks of the same political agendizing (probably invented a word there) that he accuses Moyar of. For instance he accuses Moyar of pushing a conservative agenda with his book i.e. the same ol' republican vs. democrat format (which pearlstein has all too willinginly occupied the left side of), yet he ignores the fact that one of the principles which Moyar spends a great deal of effort vilifying is Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge--a republican.
Having read the 1954-1965 volume I am mystified as to how Pearlstien draws the conclusion that Moyar considers Westmoreland a hero in this book. Westmoreland is but a minor player in this volume only coming on the scene in the last year of the period covered and his influence in the book is quite minor. I must caveat this with the fact that Westmoreland will obviously play a strong part in Moyar's follow up volume, but not having read that book, I can't and won't make assumptions as to how Westmoreland will be treated. Perhaps Pearlstien has seen an advanced copy?
Another problem I have with Pearlstein's piece is his seeming dumbfoundedness at Moyar taking communist internal communications at face value, like all communitsts lie right? A more careful reading of Moyar reveals a much more studied treatment of communist propagandizing--for instance Pearlstiens quote of how Moyar treats the communist reaction to the deposment of Diem. Yes the communists were excited about this because they felt it would help thier effort in the long run, Moyar puts this in his book because the facts bear this out when looking back at history--in other words Moyar takes the communist reaction at face value because what they predict is actually what happened! Why would a professional historian ignore such an important piece of forbearance?
Or perhaps the Communists were simply putting a good face on their reaction to events --- that Diem's death would automatically be good or bad for their cause was up in the air and, I would argue, still not definitively proven to be a positive good. I was not convinced by Moyar's thesis that Diem was popular amongst the South Vietnamese peasantry, that GVN was on its way to unstoppable victory against the VCI under Diem, that ARVN would have won the battle of Ap Bac if not for the bungling Americans, nor did I buy his spin on the joys of the Strategic Hamlet program. I did, however, like his passage on how Madam Nhu, that exemplar of moral probity, brought the whorehouses of Saigon to a stop, with American servicemen reduced to playing tic-tac-toe with virtuous barmaids, and how this was a reason why the Western press turned against Diem. With this sort of clear-eyed history, how could Moyar have failed to gain tenure?
where in the world did you draw that conclusion? Moyar tells us that South Vietnam was winning , not on its way to an "unstoppable victory".
No, moyar's take was not that the ARVN would have won if not for the americans, his take was that it was not a dehibilitating defeat that Vann and his media friends portrayed it as.Quote:
that ARVN would have won the battle of Ap Bac if not for the bungling Americans,
Now you are bordering on comedy. Did you even read the book? Please provide a page number in which Moyar derives that conclusion.Quote:
I did, however, like his passage on how Madam Nhu, that exemplar of moral probity, brought the whorehouses of Saigon to a stop, with American servicemen reduced to playing tic-tac-toe with virtuous barmaids, and how this was a reason why the Western press turned against Diem.
This sort of ad-hom attack is not helpful in critiqueing Moyar's work, but it is helpful in understanding your true motivations for posting here.Quote:
With this sort of clear-eyed history, how could Moyar have failed to gain tenure?
I'd say any reasonable assessment of the GVN's progress under Diem was that it was losing ground, not gaining it. The Strategic Hamlets Diem set up that were composed of Catholic refugees from the North were indeed fairly successful...but the others were not. Also, Diem continued the tradition of bungling relations with the hill tribes (Montagnards)...a group that could have really helped the GVN secure many border areas.
Diem's poor governance did the GVN few favors. What the VCI saw when he was assassinated was not the demise of a feared and effective opponent, but rather a chance to take advantage of the chaos that would certainly (and did) follow it.
And stanley, you might want to take a moment to introduce yourself.
One might make the comparison between "Strategic Hamlets" and Killcullen's "oilspot" concept. The idea, albiet imperfectly implemented in Vietnam (especially in the delta region), is a sound prinicple in COIN. One can obviously take issue with Moyar's assesment of the war's status just prior too the coup, but Moyar's assesment that whatever the status prior, the war took a decided turn for the worse after the coup and GVN became even more incapable of dealing with the insurgency, which led to the direct intervention of U.S. forces.
I certainly agree that if Diem had engaged the Montagnards it could have helped the war effort, but expecting him to do so would have required him to cross a cultural and racial divide, an indealistic naiveness that we Americans are famous for.
What is not helpful is gross mischaractizatons of Moyar like tequila above.
The tic-tac-toe passage is from pg. 160 and relates to the truly remarkable effects of the Social Purification Law, propounded by Madam Nhu. According to Moyar, Diem's RVN was not only defeating Communism but also prostitution.Quote:
Now you are bordering on comedy. Did you even read the book? Please provide a page number in which Moyar derives that conclusion.
Yes, I want to destroy Mark Moyar. And perhaps America, as well. :pQuote:
This sort of ad-hom attack is not helpful in critiqueing Moyar's work, but it is helpful in understanding your true motivations for posting here.
No, I simply find many of his conclusions incredible and unhelpful. I am also slightly bitter at having spent much time reading transcripts of Diem declaiming on various subjects, presented as examples of Diem's clear-eyed leadership, as well as Moyar's justifications for the butchery in Indonesia --- when something similar happened in Rwanda in 1997, it was called genocide.
Moyar is far too credulous in taking the assessments of certain officials as genuine reality rather than as points of view, while discrediting others as inherently compromised. For instance, Pham Xuan An, the Communist military intel agent and Reuters stringer, is automatically presented as providing a distorting view and propaganda stories to the Western press. The view of Merle Pribbenow, former CIA officer and Moyar's translator of Vietnamese documents, is that Pham's main value was as conduit of intelligence to VCI given his many links to South Vietnam's CIO and the CIA, as well as analyst of South Vietnamese and American intentions and motivations. Pribbenow's view that Pham would not have been wasted by presenting VCI propaganda to Western newspaper reporters, and indeed that Pham acted "more Catholic than the Pope" to avoid suspicion, is much more plausible than Moyar's take. Yet Moyar does not even pause to consider this in his rush to assault the Western press in Saigon.
Moyar also does not convince when attempting to persuade us that the Chinese would have abandoned North Vietnam to its fate upon an American invasion, that Tri Quang was a Communist agent, or that Indonesia would have been doomed to Communism in 1965 if not for American intervention in Vietnam. Perhaps most misleading is his picture of the Vietnamese peasantry as an unpoliticized, undifferentiated lumpen mass which responded only to strength - David Elliott's Social Change in the Mekong Delta 1930-1975 illustrates just how wrong this theory is.
by folks with more idealism and arrogance than good sense who approved that coup and the almost guaranteed assassination that followed.
Diem was not particularly popular with the hoi polloi (and particularly the Buddhists) -- but he was theirs and the US hand in the assassination was well known. It did not do us any favors and the South Viet Namese would not trust us after that. Probably smart. I talked to a number of SVN Officers who expressed some anger over elements of the Coup...
Moyars and Sorley wrote essentially decent if slightly biased (ALL historians have bias) history IMO. Pearlstein uses them in an attempt to produce a preemptive political strike. Not very well but I guess he deserves credit for trying... :rolleyes:
Yet your claim that this 'tic-tac-toe' phenomena is the reason Moyar believes western press decided to dislike Diem is fallicious. My reading of Moyar leads me to the conclusion that Moyar believed the western press disliked Diem because most of the prominant journalists spent entirely too much time with and placed entirly too much weight on the opinions thereof with one small portion of the Vietnam poplulation--the social and acedemic elites of Saigon, not because "the troops had to play tic tac toe". I do not have my copy of the book available but when I do I will post pages for your reference.
I am not familiar with this event and Moyar's analysis of it, but I shall study.Quote:
No, I simply find many of his conclusions incredible and unhelpful. I am also slightly bitter at having spent much time reading transcripts of Diem declaiming on various subjects, presented as examples of Diem's clear-eyed leadership, as well as Moyar's justifications for the butchery in Indonesia ---
I'm confused here (that happens often ;) ) are you saying that Pham was reliable source or not?Quote:
Moyar is far too credulous in taking the assessments of certain officials as genuine reality rather than as points of view, while discrediting others as inherently compromised. For instance, Pham Xuan An, the Communist military intel agent and Reuters stringer, is automatically presented as providing a distorting view and propaganda stories to the Western press.
Again your line of reasoning is confusing to me. Are you saying that while Pham was a communist agent he acted "more Catholic than the Pope" to avoid suspicion, and this necessarily included not spreading communist propaganda and disinformation to the press? What was his purpose as a communist agent, to back up Diem's claims that he was winning the war?Quote:
The view of Merle Pribbenow, former CIA officer and Moyar's translator of Vietnamese documents, is that Pham's main value was as conduit of intelligence to VCI given his many links to South Vietnam's CIO and the CIA, as well as analyst of South Vietnamese and American intentions and motivations. Pribbenow's view that Pham would not have been wasted by presenting VCI propaganda to Western newspaper reporters, and indeed that Pham acted "more Catholic than the Pope" to avoid suspicion, is much more plausible than Moyar's take. Yet Moyar does not even pause to consider this in his rush to assault the Western press in Saigon.
It's interesting that you choose to use an anthropolgy of the Mekong delta as evidence of the social leanings of the Vietnamese people--preciscly the place where Diem's COIN effort was least successful--even in Moyar's account.Quote:
Perhaps most misleading is his picture of the Vietnamese peasantry as an unpoliticized, undifferentiated lumpen mass which responded only to strength - David Elliott's Social Change in the Mekong Delta 1930-1975 illustrates just how wrong this theory is.
Stanley, pg. 160 is not my main beef with Moyar - just a laughable example of his valorization of the Diem regime and its, shall we say, unironic estimation of its effectiveness. I just pulled it out because I have Moyar's book on my desk - randomly flipped and found that hilarious passage. Moyar also hints that the Social Purification Law hurt Diem with journalists because their entertainment was curtailed, with no evidence cited - par for the course for Moyar.Quote:
Yet your claim that this 'tic-tac-toe' phenomena is the reason Moyar believes western press decided to dislike Diem is fallicious. My reading of Moyar leads me to the conclusion that Moyar believed the western press disliked Diem because most of the prominant journalists spent entirely too much time with and placed entirly too much weight on the opinions thereof with one small portion of the Vietnam poplulation--the social and acedemic elites of Saigon, not because "the troops had to play tic tac toe". I do not have my copy of the book available but when I do I will post pages for your reference.
His cover was as a journalist, but his mission was not to be a propaganda officer, it was to gain intelligence and provide analysis on Western and South Vietnamese intentions and motivation, as noted before. For instance, Pham deduced late in 1964 that the U.S. would escalate its troop presence drastically in 1965-66 essentially through analysis work, from his contacts in American and RVN intel offices (he maintained excellent contacts with CIO, which sought to use him as an agent, as well as with Lou Conein and Ed Lansdale besides Western journalists). He also provided much of the planning data for the VCI's Saigon offensive during Tet in 1968, assisting greatly in the remarkable infiltration of VCI troops into the city. Those missions would have been impossible if RVN intelligence believed he was a Communist agent provocateur. See Larry Berman's Perfect Spy for the best rundown on Pham's career, as well as a more detailed rebuttal of the idea of Pham as propagandist to the Western press.Quote:
I'm confused here (that happens often ;) ) are you saying that Pham was reliable source or not?
Again your line of reasoning is confusing to me. Are you saying that while Pham was a communist agent he acted "more Catholic than the Pope" to avoid suspicion, and this necessarily included not spreading communist propaganda and disinformation to the press? What was his purpose as a communist agent, to support the Diem regime?
The Mekong was critical to RVN in terms of strategic access to Saigon, as well as forming a rather large part of the agricultural productivity and population of the country. If Diem wasn't going to win in the Mekong, it wouldn't have been much of a victory. More importantly, Elliott's account helps undercut Moyar's characterization of South Vietnamese village politics as essentially authoritarian, as responsive only to terror or propaganda, and the villagers themselves as incapable of forming political opinions or possessing social aspirations.Quote:
It's interesting that you choose to use an anthropolgy of the Mekong delta as evidence of the social leanings of the Vietnamese people--preciscly the place where Diem's COIN effort was least successful--even in Moyar's account.
If you stop to think about it from a classic subversion standpoint, it would make perfect sense for Pham to back the claims of the Diem regime. Why? Because then fewer people would look at what was really going on in the countryside and VCI activity could continue unchecked.
It's also worth noting that the majority of the ethnic Vietnamese population of SVN was in the Mekong Delta region (generally speaking...although both III and IV CTZs were densely populated compared to the rest of the country) so an examination of Diem's popularity in that region is perfectly justified. The relevance of the central government at the village level in Vietnam during this period is still the subject of some debate, but one thing that isn't debated is that Diem was not especially popular at that level (this shows up both in recent research and contemporary studies...some of which came out before the coup). Still, as Ken points out (and I'll paraphrase) "he may have been a bastard, but he was their bastard." Diem had precious little in common with the common folk of SVN, but they at least understood his brand of corruption. Could we have "won" with him? Doubtful.
My main beef is that you initally played this passage as Moyar's main belief about why western media did not like Diem. He clearly states in other places (which I will reference when I get my book back,if you desire) the reasons he thinks they disliked Diem (which I explained above), which have nothing to do with the Social Purification Law.
Because his main mission was not as a propoganda officer, you think Moyar should take his communications at face value? Where does Moyar say that Pham behaved stupidly enough that SVN intelligence should have suspected him?Quote:
His cover was as a journalist, but his mission was not to be a propaganda officer, it was to gain intelligence and provide analysis on Western and South Vietnamese intentions and motivation, as noted before...Those missions would have been impossible if RVN intelligence believed he was a Communist agent provocateur.