JOHNSON PREPARES TO "GO FOR BROKE" IN SOUTHEAST ASIA
By George Novack
The big question in Washington as 1968 begins is whether the White House has given the Pentagon a green light to expand the war in Southeast Asia. McNamara's removal, the rumored departure of U.S. Ambassador Goldberg from the United Nations, and General Eisenhower's projec-— tion of the policy of "hot pursuit" over the borders of Cambodia and China are taken as premonitory signs that such a step is in prospect.
Johnson is not only commander-inchief of the U.S. armed forces; he is also a Democratic politician who must contrive to be returned to the presidency this year. His main moves at home and abroad are shaped with a view to promoting his reelection next November.
The polls report that Vietnam is by far the issue of greatest public concern. The American people are more and more exasperated with the course and conduct of the war which has dragged along without any end in sight as the costs and casualties keep mounting. A large and growing minority want the troops withdrawn and brought home immediately. But many others hope that the war can be quickly ended in the opposite way by resort to more drastic military measures.
This attitude was described by Congressman Resnick, a candidate for the Democratic Senate nomination against Republican Senator Javits in New York. He stated in Saigon December 19 that "the overwhelming majority of the American people and the Congress are in favor of invading Cambodia, Laos and North Vietnam and dropping the bomb on anyone who tries to stop us...I think they want us to get in there and wipe them all out." Resnick is a Johnson supporter.
Johnson banks upon this mood of bellicose impatience to facilitate the Pentagon's plans for a sharp escalation of military operations. He is getting ready to "go for broke" in Vietnam on the assumption that more vigorous action there will serve to stifle domestic dissent and guarantee victory at the polls.
The propaganda buildup is already under way. On December 18 tke chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Earle G. Wheeler, presented the Pentagon's analysis of the military situation in Vietnam to the Economic Club of Detroit. He stated that "to stem the erosion of the Viet Cong's power base, the Communists have sought to divert allied forces from the heartlands of South Vietnam to the border areas. By operating close to their sanctuaries, they anticipated engaging allied forces in
areas most advantageous to the Communist
forces."
The general stopped just short of
recommending action to deal with the bor-
der sanctuaries but his point was plain.
New York Times Washington correspondent
Tom Wicker wrote the next day that Wheel-
er's remarks "tend to confirm what many
here believe -- that the Johnson adminis-
tration now is committed to the military
defeat of the Communists in Vietnam and
is not seeking a compromise solution."
On December 14, the day before
Congress adjourned, Under Secretary of
State Katzenbach testified at a closed
hearing before the Senate Foreign Rela-
tions Committee. According to committee
sources, he declined to give a positive
answer one way or the other on whether
the administration intended to extend
military actions in Laos, Cambodia or
North Vietnam. At the same time he con-
firmed reports that the administration
was considering giving field commanders
greater latitude in adopting tactics of
"hot pursuit" of North Vietnam and NFL
forces into Cambodia.
This so alarmed critics of John-
son's policy that leading senators of
both parties persuaded Kentucky Republi-
can Senator Cooper to deliver a speech
in the closing minutes of the congres-
sional session urging the administration
not to widen the war. Any moves into
Cambodia and Laos, Cooper said, "would
only lead to a further and more dangerous
expansion of the war" and make a negoti-
ated settlement more difficult, if not
impossible.
Cooper's appeal was backed by Sen-
ate Majority leader Mansfield, Senator
Fulbright, chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, Republican Senator
Javits of New York and Democratic Senator
Hart of Michigan,who fear what Johnson
may do after Congress is adjourned.
A Los Angeles Times-Washington Post
dispatch from the national capital on
December 20 outlined what the Pentagon
has in store. It said that the highest
levels of the Johnson administration are
considering a plan to use South Vietnamese
troops to pursue the National Liberation
Front into neutral Cambodia. The South
Vietnamese will make the first public
breach of the Cambodian border, and Ameri-
can commanders would then feel free to
reinforce them with U.S. troops.
This proposal goes beyond even a
policy of "hot pursuit." It is understood
that U.S. Ambassador Bunker has approved
the plan, which has been recommended by commanding General Westmoreland. "Sources in Washington say that the decision to move into Cambodia is all but made," the report continued. "They say that the American strategy to fight along the borders makes military arguments controlling, and that the military has the ear of President Johnson."
It is very likely that Johnson discussed this matter with the satellite Asian heads of state who attended memorial rites for Australian Prime Minister Holt in Melbourne on December 22. Johnson has usually prefaced escalation of his intervention in the civil war in Vietnam with phony peace maneuvers. It is no different this time.
As his staff prepared new military moves, he informed the American voters in a Christmas Eve television interview that he had generously offered new peace terms to the Vietnamese Communists and made a Christmas pilgrimage to the Pope in Rome. The public was not told that his "offer" was tantamount to a demand on the NLF and Hanoi to surrender unconditionally to the imperialist invaders of their country. The North Vietnamese have justly derided and rejected Johnson's five-point overture as a mask for intensifying the war. This is confirmed by a New York Post dispatch that the President conveyed a warn~ ing to Hanoi through diplomatic channels to accept his latest proposal for negoti-~ ations or face a major escalation of the Vietnam war.
Johnson seems set on this course despite the public warning to Washington from the Soviet Union on December 9
-7-
against extending military operations
into Cambodia and Laos. The Kremlin is a
pledged guarantor of the neutrality of
both these nations. Evidently the U.S.
policy makers do not attach much weight
to Moscow's admonitions.
On January 6, 1967, I wrote in
World Outlook [Vol. 5, No. 1, p. 9]:
"Johnson...is bent on staying indefi-
nitely in Vietnam. He has staked the
prestige, and even the fate, of his lead-
ership upon gaining a favorable outcome
of the intervention in Southeast Asia
which he and his advisers regard as in-
dispensable for the global military
strategy of U.S. imperialism.
"Despite the billions of dollars
expended and the massive deployment of
men and equipment in that area, this
goal is no nearer realization than it
was two years ago. Nonetheless, Johnson
hopes to come before the electorate in
1968 as the tough and dauntless commander-
in-chief who beat the 'Commies' in Viet-
nam and did not buckle before his 'panty-
waisted' critics. He has raised Vietnam
into a make-or-break issue for his ad-
ministration."
There is no reason to revise this
appraisal a year later. Scorning the
counsel of his critics in ruling circles
to cut losses and negotiate a compromise
settlement, he is about to plunge ahead
in a gamble which risks bringing the
whole world to the brink of destruction.
The antiwar movement has the gi-
gantic task of trying to put a strait-
jacket on the dangerous men now in
charge of affairs in Washington.
NEW WARNINGS OF