BEHIND JOHNSON'S SECRECY
The respite in the Vietnam crisis provided by the last coup d'état turned out to be only too brief. The Johnson administration has resumed where it left off. Jet planes manned by American aviators are now systematically bombing targets in South Vietnam. With this move the White House ended the lying pretense about American troops being only "advisers" in the civil war. On the domestic front, Johnson issued a "White Paper" February 27 that sought to justify the dirty colonial war which Washington is now openly waging in Southeast Asia.
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As yet, President Johnson has not seen fit to give out any information about his aims in this bloody conflict. The pressure for facts, however, has been very heavy. AS a result unofficial accounts are now being *ieaked, " and the American public is getting an inkling of the monstrous game afoot. To the New York Times goes credit for finally.breaking through in its campaign to at least find out where the United States is being led. Two articles, one from correspondent Robert Kleiman in Saigon, the other by the Times military editor, Hanson W. Baldwin, are so informative that they deserve extensive quotation. Both articles appeared in the March 2 issue of the international edition.
Kleiman reveals that the "highest American and Vietnamese officials" in Saigon said March 1 that they are “virtuslly certain" that "President Johnson has decided to open s continuing but limited air war against North Vietnam. . ." In fact "instructions" were received from Washington in mid-February "to prepare the first air strike of the new series -- a joint American-South Vietnamese strike that was postponed during the abortive Feb. 19 Saigon coup and for which new orders now are awaited daily."
The "latest version" of the plan was submitted to Johnson in December. "“Harlier last year, the project was known as the 'McNamara- McGeorge Bundy plan.'" [This confirms deductions made in World’ Outlook February 19. .
During the election, nothing was done about the plan. "But as soon as the election was over, two of the State Department's most brilliant young Asian experts sparked a new draft which, for the first time, won unanimous interagency agreement both in Washington and Saigon."
This plan was to offer North Vietnam some attractive bait in return for capitulation -- Washington is said to believe that Hanoi has absolute control over the freedom fighters in South Vietnam. The offer "was to be made even more attractive by opening a Low= intensity war against North Vietnam."
"The idea was to reply to Hanoi's continuing, surreptitious, undeclared ground war against South Vietnam not with tit-for-tat blows set off only when Americans were injured but with a continuing, surreptitious, undeclared war against North Vietnam as already was being carried on in Laos." (We thus, learn, in passing, that the U.S. is waging a deliberate, undeclared war on Laos!)
"attacks would neither be announced nor officially admitted. Raids, two or three a week, were to start near the 17th Parallel border with South Vietnam, These were to remain restricted initially to a few planes -- a 24-plane reid is by far the biggest yet employed in Laos -- striking at the bottom third of North Vietnam south of the 19th Parallel."
The “limit'’ would thus be the "19th Parallel." Something. else was involved, however. "More important, the 19th Parallel limit would support assurances to Moscow and Peking that the raids were aimed neither sat China nor at the destruction of the Hanoi regime.
It is thus quite clear that warmongers deliberately plotted to have the United States attack North Vietnam, These warmongers included President Johnson, who shelved the warmongering plot until after the election was safely over. Then he put it into action,
The article by Hanson W. Baldwin, which is a long one, marshals all the arguments in favor of going ahead with this war plot. The central thesis is that it is worth running the risk of a world wer for the sake of the possible "gains" in Southeast Asia. ‘Baldwin, it should be observed, does nat represent the more reckless wing of the American military caste. He was among those in 1945 who deplored Truman's use of atomic weapons in Japan as a very serious "mistake" from the military point of view.
Baldwin puts the case for going shead now. "and if we will not fight in Vietnam, where -~ after the series of Communist conquests in the past 20 years -- will we fight? Where will we draw the line?" He is against any course that would give the United States a "portrait of flabby indecision."
He readily admits that “in itself" South Vietnam is not vital to the United States. "But if lost we would be forced to commence the next chapter of the world conflict in retreat, and st a disadvantage,"
Baldwin takes up the various counter arguments and answers them one by one. In so doing he provides us with a good indication of the discussion now going on among top ruling circles in the United States, This is most instructive.
To the demand to "negotiate now," Baldwin declares that it is impossible because the U.S. "would esd from weakness, not strength." To change the situation Nwe shall have to raise our ante considerably."
If the French couldn't win, how can the U.S. expect a
There is no comparison between French and American power, says Baldwin. “Particularly in the air and at sea we can mobilize power completely unavailable to France, backed up by the ultimate force which France did not possess -- a nuclear arsenal."
But a can't win a war against guerrillas.
Not true. We have dressed up the fighting in Vietnam with a fancy name -- 'counter-insurgency,! -- but some of its basic
military elements resemble the kind of war Americens have fought successfully many times in the past in Nicaragua, Haiti and behind the main fighting fronts during the Korean War. Other anti-Communist guerrilla wars were won in Greece, the Philippines and Malaya.
"The Portuguese seem to have done a pretty good job of stamping out the rebellion in Angole. Guerrillas can be defeated, but it takes careful organization, special training snd security forces that should be from 10 to 30 times larger than the guerrillas, It takes infinite determination and patience,"
But to continue fighting or to expand the conflict will mean higher U.S. casualties and greater risks of expanding the war.
"Of course, .You cannot win e war without spilling blood. We must pay the price of power. .. . In Vietnam, the longer we wait, the greater the price we shall have to pay for even partial victory (as we are now discovering), pnd the more restricted our choice of options," oe ‘
What about the moral problem? The U.S. has "no moral right to be in Vietnam, or to attack North: Vietnam." .
"If we are inhibited from action by Hamlet-like indecision over legalistic concepts of international law, we shall lose the world,"
On the difficulties created by the political instability in
South Vietnam, Baldwin has a crushing re joinder:
"Yet somehow or other the war has gone on, and somewhat better in some respects recently. Greater United States involvement -above all, a tangible determination to win -- may well do more for Saigon! s political Stability then any emount of diplomatic. pres= — sures, . “Not even the real danger of escalation and the possibility of a war with China moves Baldwin. .
"This is the $64 million question. It is quite clear that if the United States becomes more involved we must be prepared for greater effort by the enemy. Escalation in some form wotld be not only possible, but likely. But we have advantages. We are fighting as we did in Kores, on a peninsula where our superior sea and air power can be most effective. —
"North Vietnam's few power plants and industries are vulnerable to destruction. The Gulf of Tonkin is easily blockaded. And China itself, with an obsolete air force and minimal naval power could not defend itself effectively against a determined air and sea attack. . .. It is quite possible that the United States might become involved in a new kind of Korean war. But this would not be
hopeless by any means."
The specter of nuclear weapons and the Soviet Union joining in does not disturb Baldwin greatly either.
“There is no certain answer to these questions, but a full scale nuclear war is highly unlikely. The United States has scared itself to. death by its own nuclear propaganda. eo 2
"Ts it in any way probable that the Kremlin. would risk for Vietnam what it would not risk for Cuba?. « « «
"We must also remember the’ risks of delay. If there is a danger of nuclear retaliation today by Peking, how much greater will it be tomorrow when China will have accumulated a stockpile of weapons? Time is restricting our options. .
"Clearly, then, the stakes in Vietnam are large enough to warrant. the risks of greater United States involvement. .. . 'More of the same! on our part will no longer ‘serve any purpose, save slow defeat,"
This military expert, who, like Hitler, as Trotsky once described him, has no heart and an adding machine for a brain, outlines his own proposals. These in all likelihood reflect the thinking of the-more "sober" wing of the Pentagon.
trinst and foremost, we must recognize as a Government and as a people that we are fighting a wer in Vietnam, not merely ‘'advising! how to fight one." This, he holds, would” arouse determination, inspire an official enunciation of purpose and "create a more stream-= lined military operation in Vietnam."
Greater "security" measures must be taken. American infantry must be brought in.
"Continuous and heavy air and sea attacks ‘against staging areas, supply routes, training fields, camps and recuperation centers of the Vietcong in North and South Vietnam and Laos will be necessary. « « ;
"The history of air power dictates the need for unrelenting massive attacks. Bombing targets in North Vietnam probably would have to be broadened t6 include power plants, bridges, industries, road junctions, docks and oil storage facilities. A naval blockade and naval gunfire may well supplement the air bombardment. To carry out effectively any such program as this, United States air and naval Forces in the Western Pacific would require material strengthening."
. This would include "United States ground troops -= perhaps in snall numbers at first, but more later,. particularly if North Viet-
namese regular forces and Chinese soldiers joined the Vietcong."
What would be the size of this commitment?
"How many United States soldiers would be needed is uncertain. . . perhaps 200,000 to l, 000, 000 Americans would be fighting in Vietnam. "
Those figures say a erent deal and Baldwin knows it.
"Obviously, this would mean a Korea-type conflict, a major war, no matter what euphemisms would be used. Nor could we wagé it in the present 'business-as-usualt economy. We would require partial mobilization, vastly beefed-up military production. Many weaknesses in our military structure would need strengthening. Even so, ‘we could not anticipate quick success. The war would be long, nasty and wearing. .
"No one could relish such a rpospect as this; the stark statistics of war explain the President's reluctance to embark upon a path that has no turning."
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Baldwin ends his article like a true militarist:
"Vietnam is a nasty place to fight. But there are no neat’ and tidy battlefields in the struggle for freedom; there is no ' good! place to die. And it is far better to fight in Vietnam <= on China's doorstep -- than fight some yeers hence in Hawail, on our own frontiers. . .
. In brief, what Baldwin is advocating is a "preventive" war at the risk of precipitating World War III and a nuclear holocaust.
The key piece in this monstrous caloulation is the attitude of the Soviet Union. Baldwin only hints st it. For further information, we must burn to Raymond Cartier in the February 27 issue of the weekly Paris Match. Cartier maintains that the ultimate objective of Johnson's policy of widening the. war is only to sit down at the round table and negotiate from a "position of strength. tho
"From all the evidence," he declares, "this audacious and astute combination rests on tacit Russian agreement. They feason, they talk, and above all they act. in Washington as if this agreement were taken for granted. They don't believe for a second that the Soviets will furnish Ho Chi Minh with offensive arms enabling him to reply effectively. . . They hardly envisage the Russians replying by shifting the conflict to Europe and reopening, as a beginning, the Berlin dispute...
‘But an error in the calculated risk, in the forecast of the unleashing of thrusts, in the evaluation of what remains of the solidarity still uniting Russia and Chine can have tragic consequences for the entire world,"
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The truth is, however, that either of two immediate possible turns can cause the White House to hesitate and even retreat —- -9.. further rise in the revolution in South Vietnam or the sending of massive Soviet aid to North Vietnam, Either or both of these turns would not cause American imperialism to give up its long-range war plans, but it would cause the Washington warmongers to once again ask their electronic computers if this were not the wrong front at the wrong time, as they did in Korea.
The spotlight thus shifts to Moscow, where the heads of the Soviet bureaucracy sre now confronted with a4 problem perhaps evén . graver than in 1938-39 when Hitler was preparing for his eventual attack on the Soviet Union,
Meanwhile, other pressures are rising against the Washington warmongers. In the United States itself, the rulers have not yet achieved a common view on whether it is. advisable to plunge ahead. at the present time. Among the people, a few courageous voices are being heard, and a few demonstrations are to be noted. Never, in the history of the United States, has the country been brought so close to a major war with public sentiment so clearly against it on an. overwhelming scale, as was. just registered in the presidential election... re ;
Abroad there is not a single big capitalist power that really supports the United States in Vietnam. Not even the Wilson government, which enjoys nothing so much as getting down on all fours and licking Johnson's cowboy boots in public, is really for his policy. Throughout the rest of the world the candemnation of the insane war adventure is universal.
These forces, if they are registered loudly enough and emphatically enough, can strengthen and hearten the opposition in the United States to such an extent as to convince the Téxas gambler that the odds in the game of Russian roulette he is playing are not five to one, but just the reverse. ‘
STUDENT AGITATION