EINTORIALS/LETTERS SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1992

Kennedy Would Have Stood by Vietnam u1465

To the Editor: "How Kennedy Viewed the Viet- Stone's faltification of history in the nam Conflict" by Roger Hilsman (let- movie "J.F.K.'!' WOLF LEHMANN •ter, Jan. 20) calls for elucidation. Rockville; Md., Jan. 27, 1992 While neither President Kennedy The writer was deputy chief of mis- — nor any other senior responsible sion of the United States Embassy in official at the time — wanted to Saigon in 1974 and 1975. Americanize the , the • Kennedy Administration neverthe- Feared China's Role less made the one fateful decision in TO the Editor: „ 1963 that'id precisely that. Fprther to the,ctscuSsion raisedy b It was the decisioni whose principal tfta, 'Sane inicksle proponent was Assistant Secretary of No one ean 'be confident what a State Roger Hilsman, to encourage PreSideniiiholliethiNoVemher'1963 the coup against President NO Dinh Diem that took place in early Novem- ber 1963 and resulted in the the assas- sination of the Vietnamese President would have done in the quite particu- and his brother. That decision - lar circumstances of July 1965. More- though not the assassination — was over, there is , bound to, be something approved by President Kennedy over self-serving as well as unscientific in the objections of Vice Piesident Lyn- any such projection. I limit myself to don B. Johnson, Gen. Maxwell D: Tay- four statements of fact. lor, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs • Representative John F. Kenne- of Staff, and John McCone, the Cen- dy's View of Asia, June 1952-Febru- tral Intelligence Agency director. ary 1961 Down to,the autumn df 1951, Ambassador Frederick E. Nolting Kennedy's view of the world was nar- chr*P'!".* , 04 Jr., who preceded Henry Cabot Lodge rowly focused on Stalin's threat to at the Embassy in Saigon, also op- Western . He did not at first French and economic'and inllitery, posed the coup. The facts on this are vote for. President Truman's Point aid for independent . • on the public record in documents Four. A trip through the Middle East' • President Kennedy's view of VieV released by the State Department and Asia late in 1951 changed his nam in July 1981: In the summer of under the Freedom of Information perspective. In the House on June 28, 1961, Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor and Act and described in detail by the 1952; he, said this about Asia:- were working with the' President on historian Ellen Hammer in the book "Mr. Chairman, last year when this this matter. Our joint memorandum "A Death in November." bill was, before the House, I offered a to the President dated Aug. 4 said:. This decision created a political motion 'to cur 'technical assistance. ' "As vie-understand your position: vacuum in the Republic of Vietnam But this fall I had an opportunity to you would wish to see every avenue of that could not possibly be filled by the visit Southeast Asia, and I think we diplomacy exhausted before we ac- ' United States or any other outsider. It would be making a tremendous mis- • cept the necessity for either position- reduced the choices available to the take to cut this money out of the bill. ing United States forcestrin the South- Johnson Administration, which suc- Here is an area, Asia, where the Com- east Asian mainland., or fighting ceeded Kennedy less than three munists are'attempting to seize con- there; you would wish' to see' the weeks after the Saigon coup, to sur- .trol ... where the tide of events has possibilities - of economic assis- rendering South Vietnam to Hanoi or been moving against us. The Commu- , tance' fully exploited to stretig' Americanizing the war. Neither the nists have a chance of seizing all of then the Southeast Asian position domestic nor the international politi- Asia in the next five or six years." you ,would wish to see indigenous", cal situation made a surrender of In that period, he also argued for forces used tetheriiiiimum if fight Vietnam to the Communists a viable Vietnamese independence from the oceni;:init that'thuitiiii*e option. for Presidentloimson. have to fight, we should use air and After the Bay of Pigs disaster, with sea, power to the maxintun) ind`en, which the Kennedy Administration gage minitpuni United scatOelfottoil began, and the weakness Kennedy exhibited in his dealings with Nikita S. Ithrushchev on Berlin, surrender in Indochina would have been even less of an option ' for Kennedy, had be lived. In light of the responsibility Washington assumed in promoting the overthrow of Diem, the notion that Kennedy would or could have walked away from Vietnam by 1965 is almost as much nonsense as Oliver 4 ;• vld Brinkley: on the. Southeast Asian maitaand, Q. "Mr. President, have you had On this basis the Taylor- Mission any reason to doubt this so-called went to Southeast Asia in October. "domino theory," that if South Vieti". • President Kennedy's view of Asia nam falls, the rest of Southeast Asia;:` in December 1961: The Miming pas- will go behind it?" sage ftom my book "The Diffusion of A. "No I believe it. 1 'believe it.0, Power". (1972) sets out President think that the struggle Is Kennedy's view of Southeast Asia in enough. China is so large, AooMs relation to Asia as a whole; the only high just beyond the frontiers, that If time I heard him make such a state- South Vietnalll went, it would not on1SA, ment in private: give _them an improved geoBraphie "He said if we walked away from position -for a guerrilla assault on tt, Southeast Asia, the,Communist take- Malaya, but would also give the im: over would produce a debate in the pression that the wave of the future ire: United States more acute than that Southeast Asia was China':and th6V, over the loss of China. Unlike Truman Communists. So I helieve it -0" with China or Eisenhower in 1954, he lite;Ohiarks prepared for;delivery"- would be violating a treaty commit- at the Trade Mari in Dallas on Nolitli ment to the area. The upshot would be-- 22, 1963, included Thee wdfds aboue• a rise and convergence of left- and countries bordering the Communiat right-wing isolationism that could dz., asslattineetblhese nes!' fect commitments in Europe as weu ti Can his cost* o_ as in Asia. Under these drew* _^ ails true in Southeast stances, khrushchev and Mao cool) we dare not weary of the task." not refrain from acting to exploit the On Jan. 1,1905, the Chinese Foreign apparent shift in the balance of powt, • Minister Chen Yi said at a diplomatfc4.: el*. If Burma fell, Chinese power. reception: "Thailand is next." Bi, would be on the Indian frontier: the" early 1965 Sukarno had telt the Unitzo- stability of all of Asia, not mere11/2- ed Nations and joined an'aggressiven' Southeast Asia, was involved. W coalition led by Beijing, which includm' the Communist leaders had moved ed North Korea and "! after they were committed •— He Wigan a massive confrontatio10 United States would then react. We against Malaysia, requiring the Brit-w. would come plunging back to retrieve, ish Commonwealth to mobilize some the situation. And a much more date'. 80 warships, Regular North VietnanizP gerous crisis would result, qulte ese forces were moving for the first' sibly a nuclear crisis," ",„ , time into South Vietnam. • L.! • President Kennedy's view of, iet; ° These were the circumstances that nam and Asia, September-November''"' led Lee Kwan Yew of Singapore to: 4 1963: On Sept. 2, 1963, in an interviatz say: "We may all go: through thE4 with Walter Cronkite: ',;3% mincing machine." -Freildent John--'s " in the final, analysis it is thdi" son reluctantly, but with overWhelm0. people and the government" — or s Mg Congressional, news ,Media and South Vietnam -• "itself who have to:' public support, decided to send large? win or lose this struggle. All we catfli United States forces to Vietnam. . do is help, and we are making it veisif Those who believe that'John Fitz= u clear, but I don't agree With thosto; gerald Kennedy would have walked who say we should Withdrew. Thai'' away from the disintegrating situa- would be a great mistake. tion in Asia inj,w. have every right to *- - "We took all this 4 madeztefforts their opt n But clarity' about our to 'defend Europe., 1440W, pe history and wisdom about our future, quite secure. We heisa to participates" are not advanced by setting aside • — we May rt like lt -`In thedefensei~' hard, relevant facts. W. W. Borrow of Asia." " , Austin, Tex., Jan. 28, 199V Qn Sept. 9, 1963, questioned by Deli'