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Ears, .Er- Nbe Your Unpublished Thesis, Submitted for a Degree at Williams College and Administered by the Williams College WILLIAMS COLLEGE LIBRARIES Your unpublished thesis, submitted for a degree at Williams College and administered by the Williams College Libraries, will be made available for research use. You may, through this form, provide instructions regarding copyright, access, dissemination and reproduction ofyour thesis. _ The faculty advisor to the student writing the thesis wishes to claim joint authorship in this work. In each section, please check the ONE statement that reflects your wishes. I. PUBLICATION AND QUOTATION: LITERARY PROPERTY RIGHTS A student author automatically owns the copyright to his/her work, whether or not a copyright symbol and date are placed on the piece. 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Wwhen a hardcopy thesis is duplicated for a researcher, a copy of the release form always accompanies the copy. Any digital version ofyour thesis will include the release form. / Copies ofthe thesis may be provided to any researcher. Selecting this option allows any researcher to request a copy from the Williams College Libraries, or to make one from an electronic version. _ Copying ofthe thesis is restricted for _ years, at which time copies may be provided to any researcher. TillS option allows the author to set a time limit on copying restrictions. During this period, an electronic version of the thesis wiJl be protected against duplication. _ Copying of the thesis or portions thereof, except as needed to maintain an adequate number ofresearch copies available in the Williams College Libraries, is expressly prohibited. The electronic version ofthe thesis will be protected against duplication. Selecting this option allows no reproductions to be made for researcbers. The electronic version ofthe thesis will be protected against duplication. This option does not dis-allow researchers from reading/viewing the work in either hardcopy or digital form. Signed (student author)_ Signed (faculty advisor) . 1------------- Ro~v" j~;/sYvlev'.~ I• Thesis title l(Ah I1fvcsi:, or Free,JoM Ii: 'J. 1ft h!.lM flv1 .' I - ~ Date / ·/0.)'-/ ! g I ZOOS T ' Accepted for the Libraries Date accepted c.:.L;-'-·/---:-_..:::.......:~ _ "An Illusion of Freedom": Roger Hilsman's Vietnam, 1961-1963 by Mark Hobel A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Bachelor ofArts with Honors in Political Science WILLIAMS COLLEGE Williamstown, Massachusetts May 10,2005 © Mark Hobel, 2005 To be sure it is desirable that South Viet Nam remain free ofCommunism but it is also desirable that we do not spend countless American lives and billions ofdollars to maintain an illusion offreedom in a devastated South Viet Nam. Senator Mike Mansfield, August 19, 1963, in a letter to President John F. Kennedy.l One sign ofthe presidential distaste and disillusion with Vietnam was the change and rise ofHUsman. He was, if anything, a talisman ofthe Kennedy years in both strengths and contradictions. - David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest (1969).2 I Foreign Relations ofthe United States, 1961-1963. Vol. III. Vietnam, January-August 1963. Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, 1991, p. 587. 2 Ha1berstam, David. The Best and the Brightest. New York: Random House, Inc., 1969, p. 254. Mark Hobel. Introduction. Introduction It was a Saturday in late August, and President John F. Kennedy had taken advantage ofone ofthe last summer weekends of 1963 to spend some time at the family compound in Hyannisport. Several ofhis top lieutenants had opted to vacate Washington, D.C., as well: Secretary ofState Dean Rusk, Special Assistant for National Security Affairs McGeorge Bundy, Secretary ofDefense Robert McNamara, and Attomey General Robert Kennedy. Other top advisors, Cabinet members, and their deputies took advantage ofthe weekend to kick back and engage in favorite pastimes: Undersecretary ofState George Ball, for example, headed for the golfcourse. Left manning the assorted offices ofthe national security bureaucracy were a host ofsecond­ tier officials. Among them was Roger Hilsman, Assistant Secretary ofState for Far Eastem Affairs, whose actions on that particular day in August would have far-reaching consequences. In Saigon, business didn't stop for the weekend. New American Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge was faced with a severe crisis that had exploded before he even stepped offthe plane in the South Vietnamese capitol. Since May, the cities ofSouth Vietnam had been in the throes ofthe "Buddhist Crisis," in which Buddhist monks and other politically disaffected groups had drawn attention to the repressive policies of President Ngo Dinh Diem and his govemment [the GVN]. The monks had used, among other forms ofprotest, public self-immolation. Diem, America's ally in Saigon since 1954, had chosen confrontation over conciliation: the unrest in the cities now threatened, in the eyes ofmany Amelican officials, to undermine the regime's counterinsurgency struggle against the communist National Liberation Front (NLF). On August 21, 1963, 1 Mark Hobel. Introduction. Diem's increasingly influential brother Ngo Dinh Nhu had ordered his Special Forces, operating independently ofthe Army ofthe Republic ofSouth Vietnam (ARVN), to smash a Buddhist sanctuary in Saigon under cover ofdarkness. Apprised ofthe situation, Ambassador Lodge considered his options. He knew that several ARVN generals, unhappy with the Diem regime, would seek to organize a coup ifpromised non- interference by the American government. In a cable to State Department headquarters on August 24, he reported, "Nhu, probably with full support ofDiem, had large hand in planning of action against Buddhists, ifhe did not fully mastermind it. His influence has also been significantly increased...Suggestion has been made that U.S. has only to indicate to 'Generals' that it would be happy to see Diem and/or Nhus go, and deed would be done. Situation is not so simple in our view."} The touch ofambiguity masked the surprising reality; America's powerful new ambassador was suggesting that the previously strained relations between the Kennedy Administration and the Diem regime had reached a breaking point, and that the U.S. should now tum on its ally. Roger Hilsman received the cable in Washington. Hilsman believed that Saigon's counterinsurgency campaign against the NLF depended most prominently on political factors. Ifthe Diem regime could win the hearts and minds ofthe rural peasantry of South Vietnam, it could destroy the NLF insurgency. Ifit could not win political legitimacy and popular appeal, then no amount ofmilitary force could quell the communist uprising.
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