McNamara Taylor mission - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The McNamara-Taylor mission was a 10-day fact-finding expedition to South Vietnam

South Vietnam

South Vietnam was a state which governed southern Vietnam until 1975. It received international recognition in 1950 as the "State of Vietnam" and later as the "Republic of Vietnam" . Its capital was Saigon...

in September 1963 by the Kennedy administration to review progress in the battle by the Army of the Republic of Vietnam

Army of the Republic of Vietnam

The Army of the Republic of Viet Nam , sometimes parsimoniously referred to as the South Vietnamese Army , was the land-based military forces of the Republic of Vietnam , which existed from October 26, 1955 until the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975...

and its American advisers against the communist insurgency of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam. The mission was led by US Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara

Robert McNamara

Robert Strange McNamara was an American business executive and the eighth Secretary of Defense, serving under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson from 1961 to 1968, during which time he played a large role in escalating the United States involvement in the Vietnam War...

and General Maxwell D. Taylor

Maxwell D. Taylor

General Maxwell Davenport "Max" Taylor was an United States Army four star general and diplomat of the mid-20th century, who served as the fifth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff after having been appointed by the President of the United States John F...

, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is by law the highest ranking military officer in the United States Armed Forces, and is the principal military adviser to the President of the United States, the National Security Council, the Homeland Security Council and the Secretary of Defense...

. The mission came in the wake of the Krulak-Mendenhall mission

Krulak Mendenhall mission

The Krulak Mendenhall mission was a fact-finding expedition dispatched by the Kennedy administration to South Vietnam in early September 1963. The stated purpose of the expedition was to investigate the progress of the war by the South Vietnamese regime and their US military advisers against the...

in which United States Marine Corps

United States Marine Corps

The United States Marine Corps is a branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for providing power projection from the sea, using the mobility of the United States Navy to deliver combined-arms task forces rapidly. It is one of seven uniformed services of the United States...

General Victor Krulak and State Department official Joseph Mendenhall

Joseph Mendenhall

Joseph A. Mendenhall was U.S. State Department official, known for his advisory work during the Kennedy administration on policy towards Vietnam and Laos. He is best known for his participation in the Krulak Mendenhall mission to South Vietnam in 1963 with General Victor Krulak. Their vastly...

gave diametrically differing outlooks on the military and political situation in Vietnam. Upon their return, McNamara and Taylor recommended measures intended to restrict the regime of President Ngo Dinh Diem

Ngo Dinh Diem

Ngô Đình Diệm was the first president of South Vietnam . In the wake of the French withdrawal from Indochina as a result of the 1954 Geneva Accords, Diệm led the effort to create the Republic of Vietnam. Accruing considerable U.S. support due to his staunch anti-Communism, he achieved victory in a...

, feeling that Diem was pre-occupied with suppressing dissent rather than fighting the communists. The measures also sought to pressure Diem to respect human rights more.

Background

In May, civil unrest broke out in South Vietnam

South Vietnam

following the Hue Vesak shootings

Hue Vesak shootings

The Huế Phật Đản shootings refer to the deaths of nine unarmed Buddhist civilians on May 8, 1963, in the city of Huế in South Vietnam, at the hands of the army and security forces of the government of Ngô Đình Diệm...

. Nine Buddhists were gunned down by the minority Catholic regime of President Ngo Dinh Diem

Ngo Dinh Diem

after defying a government ban on the flying of Buddhist flag

Buddhist flag

The Buddhist flag is a flag designed in the late 19th century to symbolise and universally represent Buddhism. It is used by Buddhists throughout the world.-History:...

s on Vesak

Vesak

Vesākha is a holiday observed traditionally by Buddhists in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and the South East Asian countries of Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Burma, and Indonesia...

, the birthday of Gautama Buddha

Gautama Buddha

Siddhārtha Gautama was a spiritual teacher from the Indian subcontinent, on whose teachings Buddhism was founded. In most Buddhist traditions, he is regarded as the Supreme Buddha Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit: सिद्धार्थ गौतम; Pali: Siddhattha Gotama) was a spiritual teacher from the Indian...

and marching in an anti-government protest. Following the shootings, Buddhist leaders began to lobby Diem for religious equality and compensation and justice for the families of the victims. With Diem remaining recalcitrant, the protests escalated. The self-immolation of Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc at a busy Saigon intersection was a public relations disaster for the Diem regime, and as protests continued, the Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces

Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces

The Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces were the elite military units of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam . Following the establishment of the Republic of Vietnam in October 1955, the Special Forces were formed at Nha Trang in February 1956...

loyal to his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu

Ngo Dinh Nhu

Ngô Ðình Nhu was the younger brother and chief political advisor of South Vietnam's first president, Ngô Ðình Diệm. Nhu was widely regarded as the architect of the Ngô family's nepotistic and autocratic rule over South Vietnam from 1955 to 1963...

, raided pagodas across the country

Xa Loi Pagoda raids

The Xa Loi Pagoda raids were a series of synchronized attacks on various Buddhist pagodas in the major cities of South Vietnam shortly after midnight on August 21, 1963...

on August 21, killing hundreds and causing extensive damage under the declaration of martial law. Universities and high schools were closed amid mass pro-Buddhist protests. In the meantime, the fight against the Vietcong insurgency had begun to lose intensity as rumours spread of sectarian infighting among ARVN troops. This was compounded by coup plotting by various ARVN officers which distracted attention from fighting the insurgency. In the aftermath of the pagoda raids, the Kennedy administration sent Cable 243

Cable 243

DEPTEL 243, also known as Telegram 243, the August 24 cable or most commonly Cable 243, was a high-profile message sent on August 24, 1963 by the United States Department of State to Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., the US ambassador to South Vietnam...

to its embassy in Saigon, ordering it to explore alternative leadership possibilities.

Authorization of mission

US President John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy

John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....

gave the following instructions to McNamara regarding the purpose of the mission:

I am asking you to go because of my desire to have the best possible on-the-spot appraisal of the military and paramilitary effort to defeat the Viet Cong. . . . The events in South Vietnam since May have now raised serious questions both about the present prospects for success against the Viet Cong and still more about the future effectiveness of this effort unless there can be important political improvement in the country. It is in this context that I now need your appraisal of the situation. If the prognosis in your judgment is not hopeful, I would like your views on what action must be taken by the South Vietnamese Government and what steps our Government should take to lead the Vietnamese to that action.

The US ambassador in Saigon, Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.

Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr.

Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. was a Republican United States Senator from Massachusetts and a U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, South Vietnam, West Germany, and the Holy See . He was the Republican nominee for Vice President in the 1960 Presidential election.-Early life:Lodge was born in Nahant,...

reacted immediately to the proposed mission, pointing out to Kennedy that such a high level visit would require McNamara and Taylor to visit Diem. Since the pagoda raids, the Americans had been snubbing Diem to show their disapproval of the conduct of his family in recent times. A visit by senior military figures such as Taylor and McNamara would be construed by the Ngos as a return to normal business. Since Lodge had been deliberately pursuing a strategy of official aloofness, he wondered whether such a high level delegation was desirable. Lodge worried that Diem would use the visit as a propaganda move to claim that it was a restoration of US support. Kennedy recommended a strategy aimed at encouraging rebel generals in the ARVN to act. The White House

White House

The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...

and the Saigon embassy were to publicly state that the visit did not signify approval of Diem's policies. McNamara was to "speak some home truths" and emphasize that the administration was not "open to oriental divisive tactics" and that the advancement of the military campaign was the sole objective.
In addition the missions was to coincide with the National Assembly elections on September 27. A visit during such a time could only be construed as an indication of the lack of importance that the United States attached to the poll. Kennedy insisted on the trip, so Lodge acquiesced, suggesting that the public press release state that Lodge had requested the visit. After an exchange of over proposed phraseology, it was agreed that the release would say that Kennedy had decided to send the mission after consulting Lodge. Kennedy instructed Lodge to "clear the air" by convincing Diem to make the "dramatic, symbolic move" of removing Nhu and refocusing the nation on the war effort.

Objective

The stated purpose of the trip was fourfold:

To appraise the war effort
To assess the impact on that effort of recent political developments
To recommend a course of action for the Government of Vietnam and for the US
To examine with Lodge ways of tailoring our aid to achieve our foreign policy objectives.

In a statement to the media at Andrews Air Force Base

Andrews Air Force Base

Joint Base Andrews is a United States military facility located in Prince George's County, Maryland. The facility is under the jurisdiction of the United States Air Force 11th Wing, Air Force District of Washington ....

just before leaving for Vietnam on September 23, McNamara said that the purpose of the trip was "to determine whether that military effort has been adversely affected by the unrest of the past several weeks". Privately, other White House

White House

officials contended that there were other reasons for the trip. Arthur Schlesinger and Assistant Secretary of State Roger Hilsman

Roger Hilsman

Roger Hilsman is an author and political scientist. He served as an American soldier in Merrill's Marauders and then the Office of Strategic Services in China-Burma-India Theater of World War II during World War II and as an aide and adviser to President John F. Kennedy...

, contended that Kennedy sent McNamara and Taylor to Vietnam to convince them of the negative effect on the counterinsurgency that the protracted Buddhist crisis

Buddhist crisis

The Buddhist crisis was a period of political and religious tension in South Vietnam from May 1963 to November 1963 characterized by a series of repressive acts by the South Vietnamese government and a campaign of civil resistance, led mainly by Buddhist monks....

was having, and of the need to apply sanctions to the Diem regime to bring about change. According to this hypothesis, Kennedy believed that he could not afford a major policy rift in the administration over the question of applying sanctions. He felt that this was particularly the case if any policy shift attracted the opposition of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and concluded that only McNamara, if convinced, could convert the US military. Whatever the real purpose of the trip, McNamara and Taylor's party left Washington on September 23 and returned ten days later after an exhausting trip and a comprehensive review of the situation on the ground. They were accompanied by National Security Adviser Michael Forrestal

Michael Forrestal

Michael V. Forrestal was one of the leading aides to McGeorge Bundy, the national security adviser of President John F. Kennedy during the mid and latter stages of the Vietnam War . He was seen as a pivotal figure in the changing of U.S...

, the CIA's William Colby

William Colby

William Egan Colby spent a career in intelligence for the United States, culminating in holding the post of Director of Central Intelligence from September 1973, to January 1976....

, William Bundy

William Bundy

William Putnam "Bill" Bundy was a member of the CIA and foreign affairs advisor to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. He had a key role in planning the Vietnam War. After leaving government service he became a historian.-Early years:Raised in Boston, Massachusetts he came from a...

and William Sullivan

William H. Sullivan

William Healy Sullivan was an American Foreign Service career officer who served as Ambassador to Laos from 1964-1969, the Philippines from 1973-1977, and Iran from 1977-1979....

from the State Department.

An objective analysis of the situation in Vietnam was unlikely given the prejudice apparent on the journey to Vietnam. During the flight, Bundy and others received binders of materials, including a draft of the report that they were to prepare afterwards. Years after the mission, Forrestal asserted that the observations had already been "carefully spelled out, [with] all the statistics to back them up". He described it as a "dreadful visit" where the members attempt to accumulate "phony statistical" evidence of success.

Expedition

The timing of the mission was crucial due to the pessimistic military forecasts and the widespread rumours of an imminent coup. Diem's Presidential military adviser Duong Van Minh

Duong Van Minh

Minh was born on 16 February 1916 in Mỹ Tho Province in the Mekong Delta, the son of a wealthy landowner who served in a prominent position in the Finance Ministry of the French colonial administration...

had recently informed Lodge that 80 percent of Vietnamese people had no motive for supporting Diem and that the recent lifting of martial law was "eyewash for Americans". Despite his title, Minh had no command power and was confined to primarily ceremonial duties. Diem feared that Minh had become too popular after his success in the Battle for Saigon

Battle for Saigon

The Battle for Saigon was a month-long battle between the Vietnamese National Army of the State of Vietnam and the private army of the Binh Xuyen organised crime syndicate...

against the criminal Binh Xuyen

Binh Xuyen

Bình Xuyên, often linked to its infamous leader, General Le van "Bay" Vien, was an independent military force within the Vietnamese National Army whose leaders once had lived outside the law and had sided with the Viet Minh...

and his campaigns to quell the private armies of the Hoa Hao

Hoa Hao

Hòa Hảo is a religious tradition, based on Buddhism, founded in 1939 by Huỳnh Phú Sổ, a native of the Mekong River Delta region of southern Vietnam. Adherents consider Sổ to be a prophet, and Hòa Hảo a continuation of a 19th-century Buddhist ministry known as Bửu Sơn Kỳ Hương...

and Cao Dai

Cao Dai

Cao Đài is a syncretistic, monotheistic religion, officially established in the city of Tay Ninh, southern Vietnam, in 1926. Đạo Cao Đài is the religion's shortened name, the full name is Đại Đạo Tam Kỳ Phổ Độ...

religious sects in the 1950s and had removed him from commanding troops. The two guardhouses outside Minh's headquarters at Tan Son Nhut Air Base

Tan Son Nhut Air Base

Tan Son Nhut Air Base was a Republic of Vietnam Air Force facility. It is located near the city of Saigon in southern Vietnam. The United States used it as a major base during the Vietnam War , stationing Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marine units there...

were filled with political prisoners, many of them student protestors. Minh was widely believed to be seeking a coup against Diem. He frequently railed against Diem in his meeting with Lodge, decrying the police state that was being created by the Can Lao Party

Can Lao Party

The Cần lao Nhân vị Cách Mạng Ðảng, or Personalist Labor Revolutionary Party, was a secret party formed to support the Ngô Đình Diệm regime in South Vietnam, and largely operated by his brother, Ngô Đình Nhu...

of the Ngo family. Harkins reported that Minh "has done nothing but complain to me about the government and the way it is handled since I have been here". Harkins also put scepticism onto Minh's claims of widespread public disenchantment.
The differing views of the members of the U.S. mission about the progress of the war against the Vietcong, and how it was affected by the Buddhist crisis were immediately manifested in the first session that McNamara and Taylor held in Saigon with embassy officials on September 25. General Paul D. Harkins

Paul D. Harkins

Paul Donal Harkins was Deputy Chief of Staff during World War II to George S. Patton Jr. and later became a U.S. Army General and the first Military Assistance Command, Vietnam commander from 1962 to 1964.-Early life:...

and his MACV staff generally presented a favourable picture of military progress, emphasizing the progress of the Strategic Hamlet Program

Strategic Hamlet Program

The Strategic Hamlet Program was a plan by the governments of South Vietnam and the United States during the Vietnam War to combat the Communist insurgency by means of population transfer.In 1961, U.S...

, and the improved ARVN position. This was in spite of a recent surge in communist initiated incidents and a decline in ARVN operation due to the increased number of troops used to quell dissidents. McNamara and Taylor prompted the presenters with questions in an attempt to get comparative indicators of the evolution of the situation over the last two years. McNamara in particular probed for details about the military situation in the Mekong Delta

Mekong Delta

The Mekong Delta is the region in southwestern Vietnam where the Mekong River approaches and empties into the sea through a network of distributaries. The Mekong delta region encompasses a large portion of southwestern Vietnam of . The size of the area covered by water depends on the season.The...

. American civilian officials sharply disagreed with the assessment of their military colleagues in their reading of the situation. Lodge and John Mecklin

John Mecklin

John Martin Mecklin was an American journalist and diplomat. He wrote for the New York Times, Time magazine and Fortune magazine. He also served as the Public Affairs Advisor for the U.S. Mission to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development of the United States Information Agency...

of the United States Information Service viewed things more grimly. Lodge stressed the more political and intangible aspects of the war and cast doubt on the "hardness" of the statistical data provided by the MACV. With the Mission's division of opinion exposed, McNamara left to tour the countryside.

McNamara met for two hours with John H. Richardson, head of the CIA's mission in Saigon. Richardson argued that the situation was quickly deteriorating and stated that the country was engulfed in a "climate of suspicion." Richardson felt that there was a Catch 22 situation in that there was nobody who commanded Diem's respect yet Diem's continual hold on power would ensure disaster. Richardson felt Diem's loyalty to family was handicapping him. Richardson reported that many cabinet ministers had wanted to resign in the wake of the pagoda raids but were afraid of being jailed or unwilling to go into exile.

McNamara's itinerary took him throughout the country, interviewing Americans and Vietnamese at both headquarters and in the field. In Saigon, during the last few days of the trip, he was given extensive briefings by the civilian side of the mission and. Since he stayed at Lodge's residence, McNamara had ample opportunity for discussions with the Ambassador.

McNamara was shown first hand accounts of negative diagnoses of the military progress which contradicted the optimistic statements that he had been accustomed to giving. At one point during a military inspection tour, he visited a government "open arms" camp near Tam Ky. He pointed to a weapon from a pile of arms captured from Vietcong insurgents and triumphantly asked "Is this Chinese?" only to be told by his embarrassed Vietnamese guide that it was an American rifle which had been earlier captured by the communists. Following a briefing from senior army officers which glossed over the capture of two towns in An Xuyen Province by the communists, Taylor and McNamara asked a major stationed at Can Tho to assess the situation. The young officer did not toe the line of his senior officers and gave a detailed and gloomy account of the situation before encouraging his colleagues to comment. According to Forrestal, "all hell broke loose." By the end of the trip, Bundy conceded that the evidence was eye opening, commenting that "I was left, as I think McNamara was, with a lasting skepticism of the ability of any man, however honest, to interpret accurately what was going on."
Negative reports continued to reach the American delegation through a variety of Vietnamese civilian figures. A group of university professors complained to McNamara that Diem had transformed the country into a police state with widespread use of torture. They asserted that this had prompted people to turn to the Vietcong. The mission was also informed by the French embassy and the Canadian and Indian members of the International Control Commission

International Control Commission

The International Control Commission , formally called the International Commission for Supervision and Control in Vietnam , was an international force established in 1954 that oversaw the implementation of the Geneva Accords that ended the First Indochina War with the Partition of Vietnam. It...

that was charged with enforcing the Geneva Accords

Geneva Conference (1954)

The Geneva Conference was a conference which took place in Geneva, Switzerland, whose purpose was to attempt to find a way to unify Korea and discuss the possibility of restoring peace in Indochina...

that Nhu was pursuing a peace agreement with North Vietnam and that an agreement would be reached in the next three or four months.

Meeting with Diem

On September 29, McNamara, Taylor, Harkins, and Lodge visited Diem, having decided against delivering a bluntly worded letter from Kennedy. Diem was accompanied by his Secretary of State Nguyen Dinh Thuan

Nguyen Dinh Thuan

Nguyễn Đình Thuận was the Secretary of State under President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam....

. Diem spoke passionately in defense of his government and chain smoked as he walked around the room pointing to maps. After a two-hour monologue by Diem, McNamara was finally able to speak. He stressed American concerns that political unrest was undermining anti-Vietcong military operations. McNamara emphasized the difficulties being caused by anti-Buddhist repressions were creating for Kennedy's support of South Vietnam due to the arousal of negative public opinion against Diem. He pointed out that Diem's foreign minister Vu Van Mau and his ambassador in Washington Tran Van Chuong

Tran Van Chuong

Trần Văn Chương was South Vietnam's ambassador to the United States in the early 1960s and the father of the country's de facto first lady, Madame Nhu .-Family life:...

had resigned, and that Saigon University

Saigon University

Saigon University is a public university in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This university was established in 25 April 2007 by Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, operating under the People's Committee in Ho Chi Minh City. This university was founded on the basis of the Ho Chi Minh City College...

was closed. McNamara fell short of asking Diem to remove the Nhus; this was a matter Washington had left to his and Lodge's discretion. McNamara went on to say that Washington did not see value in supporting a government which could not command the confidence of its citizens, but his comments seemed to have little impact on Diem. Diem cut off McNamara and asserted that "Vietnam will be a model democracy" in a few years time. He asserted that this had been facilitated by the Strategic Hamlet Program

Strategic Hamlet Program

and was shown in the high turnout in the recent legislative elections. Lodge became irritated at this point and derisively pointed out that Diem's legislators had achieved increased votes because ARVN troops had been bussed around to vote multiple times at various polling booths. Diem himself had risen to power in a fraudulent referendum supervised by Nhu in which he was credited with 133% of the vote in Saigon.

The awkward silence was broken when McNamara raised the issue of Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu

Madame Ngo Dinh Nhu

Trần Lệ Xuân , popularly known as Madame Nhu, was considered the first lady of South Vietnam from 1955 to 1963. She was the wife of Ngo Dinh Nhu who was the brother and chief adviser to President Ngo Dinh Diem...

. Diem was a bachelor so Madame Nhu was the de facto First Lady, living in the palace. Dubbed the Dragon Lady due to her acerbic nature, she had a long history of anti-American remarks. McNamara complained about her "ill-advised and unfortunate declarations". He removed a newspaper clipping from his pocket in which she was quoted as calling some US officers as "acting like little soldiers of fortune" which she claimed had caused the Americans to pursue a "confused policy". McNamara said that such comment hurt the bilateral relationship and that the American public would be less generous in sending their officers to support the anti-communist counterinsurgency. One of the Americans lost his composure and asked Diem whether "there was not something the government could do to shut her up."
Diem appeared to be shocked and demoralised by the stinging question. Lodge pointedly claimed that Madame Chiang Kai-shek had been pivotal in the defeat of the Chinese Nationalists by the communists of Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung , and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao , was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution...

in 1949 and alluded that Madame Nhu could have a similar effect. Diem dismissed this and said that US policy was being undermined by failures in analysis of the situation that he claimed were fuelled by distorted attacks by American journalists in Saigon. He asserted that Madame Nhu's membership in the National Assembly as a citizen of a "free country" allowed her to express her sentiments, alleging that "one cannot deny a lady the right to defend herself when she has been unjustly attacked."

Diem went on to make sensational claims against the Buddhist majority that had his visitors taken aback. He asserted that his kindness towards Buddhists had helped to cause the civil unrest by encouraging them to seek what he felt were special rights. He claimed that the number of Buddhist pagodas in the country had doubled during his rule and said that it was due to his government's funding. For twenty minutes he repeatedly charged the Buddhists of partaking in orgies in the pagodas on a regular basis, without offering proof. He then alleged that "some American services in Saigon" were plotting against him. Taylor later noted that Diem had not realised the seriousness of the meeting and the warnings of the American delegation, recalling that "You could just see it bouncing off him."

Diem asked Taylor for his appraisal of the war, and after being approved by McNamara, a long letter from the general was delivered to Diem on October 2. The letter outlined the major military problems in the Delta, warned of the danger that the Buddhist crisis posed to the war effort, and listed many of the specific steps needed to improve the military effort that later appeared in the report presented to Kennedy. The letter summarised with a terse, tough statement of the American view:

Coup speculation

The mission took a diversion into investigating a possible coup by ARVN officers when General Duong Van Minh

Duong Van Minh

expressed an interest in meeting McNamara and Taylor, either alone or together. After an extensive series of discretionary arrangements were made, Taylor joined Minh in a game of doubles on the tennis court of the Saigon Officers Club. McNamara watched on as Taylor played with Minh, waiting anxiously for any signals from Minh to "broad hints of our interest in other subjects which we gave him during breaks in the game". Minh revealed nothing of his thoughts about a possible coup, leaving his guest bewildered to his intentions in inviting them. McNamara later grumbled to Kennedy that "I sat on a sideline two feet from Big Minh for over an hour and I couldn't get a damn thing out of him." Taylor got one of the tennis players, Colonel Raymond Jones, to contact Minh about the situation, to which Minh replied with a complaint about a perceived lack of support from Washington for a coup. Minh claimed that he thought McNamara and Taylor were seeking nothing but a match of tennis and offered to discuss military affairs at any time.

Meeting with civilian officials

On September 30, Taylor and McNamara's last day in Vietnam, together with Lodge, the trio met with South Vietnamese Vice President Nguyen Ngoc Tho

Nguyen Ngoc Tho

Nguyễn Ngọc Thơ is a Vietnamese politician who was the first Prime Minister of South Vietnam, serving from November 1963 to late January 1964. Thơ was appointed to head a civilian cabinet by the military junta of General Dương Văn Minh, which came to power after overthrowing and assassinating Ngô...

. Tho thanked the US for its continued support and response to the recommendations outlined in a report by Taylor prepared in 1961. However, he asserted that the Americans had failed in recent times in using their strength and influence to prevent the political deterioration in South Vietnam. Tho did not offer any methods to rectify this and went on to sharply question the success of the Strategic Hamlet Program. Tho said that increased Viet Cong strength had to be attributed to widespread rural discontent with the Diem regime. According to the Pentagon Papers "these views, from the man most often mentioned in U.S. circles as an alternative to Diem, coming at the end of the visit as they did, must have had an important influence on McNamara's conclusions." The delegation left Saigon to return to Washington at the end of the day.

Meetings with Lodge

During the briefings that Lodge made to McNamara and Taylor, the ambassador repeatedly his previously expressed doubts about the potential effectiveness of aid suspension as a lever against Diem. He also expressed his concern that the foreign aid bill that was being tabled in US Congress could be halted due to negative sentiment over Diem's repressions of the Buddhists. During the visit, Lodge reiterated in his cables to Washington that he felt that an aid suspension could backfire on the United States by alienating the population as well as the regime. Aware that an aid suspension was a potential recommendation of the mission's report, the USAID director Brent also openly expressed his concerns over such move. Both opinions were regarded as important because McNamara and Taylor had been specifically charged by the Kennedy with examining ways to make American aid better facilitate US foreign policy goals objectives. Lodge and Brent tabled papers which included a program-by-program consideration of the impact of an aid suspension.

Drafting the report

After a one-day stopover in Honolulu to prepare their report, McNamara and Taylor arrived back in Washington on October 2. The report was written hurriedly on the plane trip back to Washington. Forrestal described the report as a "mishmash of everything." During the 27 hour flight, Bundy managed only to get two hours of sleep between his writing and later opined that "neither their draftsmanship nor judgment is likely to be at its best under such working conditions. They promptly met with the President and the National Security Council. Their report concluded that the "military campaign has made great progress and continues to progress." On the other hand, it warned that the serious political tensions in Saigon due to the Buddhist crisis and the increasing unpopularity of Diem and Nhu as a result of their anti-Buddhist activities could stoke the dissent of some ARVN officers and erode what they believed was favourable military progress. Taylor and Maxwell reported to having seen no evidence of a successful coup being prepared, and felt that American pressure would probably only further harden the Ngo family's attitudes. Nevertheless, "unless such pressures are exerted, they [Diem-Nhu] are almost certain to continue past patterns of behavior."

Recommendations

The military recommendations of the report were that General Harkins should review the military effort with Diem with an eye toward its successful conclusion in I, II, and III Corps by the end of 1964 and in the IV Corps in the Mekong Delta

Mekong Delta

by the end of 1965. This would necessitate:

A shift in military emphasis and strength to the Mekong Delta
An increase in the intensity of military activity throughout the country
An emphasis on "clear and hold operations"
A consolidation of the Strategic Hamlet Program with the emphasis on security;
The fleshing out of combat units and better training and arms for the hamlet militia.

The report further proposed that an announcement be made of the planned withdrawal of 1,000 American troops by the end of 1963 in connection with a program to train Vietnamese to replace Americans in all "essential functions" by 1965. It noted mild progress in the war but saw little wisdom in maintaining the present level of US forces. The report concluded that the ARVN must focus on "clear and hold operations" rather than broad sweeps and that an improvement in Vietnamese performance would permit "the bulk of US personnel" to withdraw by the end of 1965.

The report set out three alternative policies: reconciliation with the Diem regime, "selective pressures" and active promotion of a coup. The second option was the one which the report concluded was the best option. Reconciliation would signify approval of Diem's repressive policies and alienate the ARVN, while initiating a coup was inadvisable "at the present time" in light of the apparent lack of willingness of the ARVN to act. Thus, the report concluded that the only choice was a program of "selective short-term pressures" that were economic and were conditioned to improving the performance of the regime.
In order to exert political pressure on the Diem regime to end its repressive anti-Buddhist policies, the McNamara Taylor report recommended the following measures:

Continued withholding of funds in the Commercial Import Program
Commercial Import Program
The Commercial Import Program, sometimes known as the Commodity Import Program , was an economic aid arrangement between South Vietnam and its main supporter, the United States...

, but without a public formal announcement
Suspension of approval of AID loans for the Saigon-Cholon Waterworks and the Saigon Electric Power Project
Suspension of support for Colonel Le Quang Tung
Le Quang Tung
Colonel Lê Quang Tung was the commander of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces under the command of Ngo Dinh Nhu, the brother of South Vietnam's president, Ngo Dinh Diem. A former servant of the Ngô family, Tung's military background was in security and counterespionage...

's Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces
Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces
The Army of the Republic of Vietnam Special Forces were the elite military units of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam . Following the establishment of the Republic of Vietnam in October 1955, the Special Forces were formed at Nha Trang in February 1956...

unless they were transferred to the field under the command of Joint General Staff instead of being used for repressing political dissidents under the direct control of Nhu
Maintenance of purely "correct" relations between Lodge and Diem. Harkins, on the other hand, was to continue meeting Diem at Gia Long Palace

The report called for scrutiny of the effectiveness of the sanctions, hinting that alternative leadership would have to be explored in the event that Diem did not improve his performance:

the situation must be closely watched to see what steps Diem is taking to reduce repressive practices and to improve the effectiveness of the military effort. We should set no fixed criteria, but recognize that we would have to decide in 2-4 months, whether to move to more drastic action or try to carry on with Diem even if he had not taken significant steps.

The report recommended against active American encouragement of a coup, but it recommended seeking "urgently to identify and build contacts with an alternative leadership if and when it appears". It opined that a successful coup appeared to be unlikely, although the assassination of Diem or Nhu was possible. Forrestal also noted that the proposed suspension of the USD 200,000 monthly salary for the Special Forces would encourage a coup, saying "It was the first sign the generals had . . . that maybe the United States was serious about this".

According to the Pentagon Papers, the report was a "curiously contradictory document". The report was regarded as a compromise between General Talyor and Harkins' optimistic view of the military, McNamara's increasing conviction of the gravity of the political crisis and its potential to derail the anti-communist war effort. The recommendations for aid suspensions and the announcement of US troop withdrawals were designed as measures that would foster doubt within the Diem regime about American intentions and incentives for policy changes. The fact that such sanctions would be seen by the ARVN generals as a signal of American willingness to accept alternative leadership, in other words, a coup, was not recognised in the recommendation, since the report specifically ruled out American encouragement of "a change of government". This was a notable oversight in view of the ARVN generals' clear statement in August that they regarded an aid suspension as a green light for a coup.

Implementation

The recommendations of the McNamara Taylor mission were swiftly approved at the NSC meeting on October 2, and later in the day, McNamara made the Presidentially approved media statement that included the announcement of the 1,000 man troop withdrawal by year's end. The press release reiterated America's commitment to the struggle against the Vietcong insurgency in South Vietnam, stated the progress of the war, announced the troop withdrawal, and dissociated the Kennedy administration from Diem's anti-Buddhist activities. It avoided any reference to economic aid suspensions or other sanctions against the regime, thereby allowing the Ngo family to change policy without a public loss of face.

On October 5, Kennedy approved the military recommendations of the McNamara-Taylor report, but "directed that no formal announcement be made of the implementation of plans to withdraw 1,000 U.S. military personnel by the end of 1963". The details of how the new policy would be applied were detailed in a lengthy cable to Lodge after this meeting. The objective of the new course of action was described at the beginning:

Actions are designed to indicate to Diem Government our displeasure at its political policies and activities and to create significant uncertainty in that government and in key Vietnamese groups as to future intentions of United States. At same time, actions are designed to have at most slight impact on military or counterinsurgency effort against Viet Cong, at least in short term.

The recommendations on negotiations are concerned with what U.S. is after, i.e., GVN action to increase effectiveness of its military effort; to ensure popular support to win war; and to eliminate strains on U.S. Government and public confidence. The negotiating posture is designed not to lay down specific hard and fast demands or to set a deadline, but to produce movement in Vietnamese Government along these lines. In this way we can test and probe effectiveness of any actions the GVN actually takes and, at the same time, maintain sufficient flexibility to permit U.S. to resume full support of Diem regime at any time U.S. Government deems it appropriate.

The cable went on to acknowledge that the proposed sanctions could only be applied for between two to four months before they began to adversely affect the military effort. As a result, it noted that when the negative effects being to manifest itself that ". . . further major decisions will be required".
The specific actions to be implemented as a result of the report included:

Suspension of the Commodity Import Program without public declaration
Selective suspension of PL 480, on an individual and sometimes monthly basis after referral to Washington for review
Suspension of the loans for the Saigon-Cholon Waterworks (USD 9m) and the Saigon Electric Power Project (USD 4m)
Private notification to Saigon that funding of Colonel Tung's Special Forces would be conditional on their commitment to field operations under the command of the Joint General Staff control, again without public announcement.

Lodge was instructed to maintain a strategy of "cool correctness in order to make Diem come to you", but to be ready to re-establish contact with Gia Long Palace if this strategy did not work. Lodge was specifically told to seek improvements in the ARVN military effort, domestic reforms by Diem that would restore public belief in the South Vietnamese administration and its image. As a result of the mission and the preceding Krulak Mendenhall mission

Krulak Mendenhall mission

, the Kennedy administration made a decision that was described in the Pentagon Papers
Pentagon Papers
The Pentagon Papers, officially titled United States – Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense, is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States' political-military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967...

as a "a far-reaching decision on American policy toward South Vietnam". The tack of applying positive pressures against an ally to obtain compliance with American policies was taken optimistically given that it was to be led by an ambassador who was "uniquely equipped by background and temperament to make it succeed".

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