GENERAL TAYLOR'S TASK-
By Joseph Hansen ~
Johnsont s decision, announced June 23, to name the top gon~ eral of the United States, Maxwell D, Taylor, as ambassador to South Vietnam caused a ripple of apprehension throughout the world,
The Democratic senator from Oregon, Wayne Morse, declared that the U,S. “is headed for war in Asia and will be hated for the next 500 years by a majority of mankind." He added that he had told Defense Secretary Robert 5, McNamara and General Taylor that their statements in a secret briefing given the Senate Foreign Relations Committee had convinced him that "the greatest threat to the peace of the world is the United States."
How immediate is the threat? On this crucial question, Johnson was deliberately vague. An essential in the practice of psychological terror, as taught by the Dr, Strangeloves who stand at the elbow of the Texas rancher, is not to say everything. 7
The American people, however, do not like to be left in the | dark, partioularly in relation to threats that could escalate into another world war, Like the rest of humanity, they live in deep anxiety under the shadow of the nuclear weapons which proved to be the main fruit of victory in World War II. The American press was at once filled with interpretations of Johnson's move,
J. William Fulbright, head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who is considered to be the most knowledgeable congress~ man in this field, said: "The emphasis in South Vietnam, of course, is primarily a military one. But I dontt think there has been any decision to escalate the war beyond the borders of South Vietnam,"
The New York Times observed editorially [une 25]: "Since General Taylor is known to be opposed: to any expansion of the war, his appointment may also be interpreted as indicating the President's decision to give the present policy further trial."
James Reston, Washington correspondent of the same newspaper, said, "This Administration is not prepared either to launch any spectacular offensive against North Vietnam or to accept any speocta~ cular defeat there, particularly in an election year." (For the ‘safety of the world, the U.S,.Constitution ought to be. amended to make every year an * election" year, )
Hanson W, Baldwin, the military expert of the New York Times and a well-known spokesman for a sector of the Pentagon, voiced an almost identical opinion [June 26]: "The Taylor appointment, in addition to the psychological and political importance emphasized by the President. . . represents clearly a 'hold-the-fort! opera~ tion -- a continuation and intensification of present policies until
= One
after the election, unless a tremendous emergency intervenes,"
Walter Lippmann went so far as to state [June 26] that it is his impression a decision has been taken in a direction opposite to widening the war: "The real. policy, I venture to think, is about like this: there is not.and cannot be such. a thing as a military victory in the civil war, and an attack on North Vietnam will not cause the Viet Cong rebels, who are predominantly South Vietnamese, to surrender to Gen. Khanh. To attack North Vietnam would be, therefore, a quite incalculable risk -- incalculable as to what could be gained by it and incalculable in what it would provoke,
"The only tolerable outcome, therefore, is a settlement by negotiation in which China and the United States are the principals, with the Soviet Union, France, Great Britain and India participating as mediators and eventual guarantors,"
It is difficult to tell how much of this is wish-thinking, Lippmann has been advocating precisely this kind of policy.
C.L,Sulzberger, the New York Times specialist in foreign affairs, sees the move from still another angle. He points out [June 27-28 edition of the International edition] that France, despite the most excruciating effort, proved incapable of countering "revolutionary warfare" as practiced by the people of Indo~ ~ china, After “exhaustive studies of revolutionary warfare" the French tried again in Algeria, The result "was the disastrous O.A.S. military conspiracy, in Algeria -- which they also lost, after almost losing France,"
..- In Malaya, the British found that a "12-1 superiority is usually required to defeat skilled guerrillas," "However," Sulzberger adds, "revolutionary warfare, a kind of four-dimensional variety, seems almost undefeatable,"
This is what the U.S. is up against in South Vietnam, New weapons, new techniques, new tactics -- all the devices of "armed non-intervention" ~- were brought to bear. "But we failed to distinguish between guerrilla warfare and China's new doctrine of revolutionary warfare,"
The White House and the Pentagon are floundering for an answer: "Thus General Taylor's crucial task is not only to check the dry-rot in Vietnam. It is also to discover a successful formu~ la for revolutionary-counter-warfare,% perhaps the most important assignment any U.S. ambassador ever had,"
*The persistence of America's revolutionary past shows up in the most unexpected places, Sulzberger's tongue trips on “counter revolutionary warfare,"
A certain parallel obviously exists between the mission assigned to General Taylor and the one assigned to General George C, Marshall by Truman in 1946, Marshall was sent as-an envoy to China in hope of blocking the victory of the Chinese Revolution by bringing the Communist party leaders into a coalition govern~ ment with Chiang Kai-shek. They were willing, but by an odd and | fortunate quirk of history, the Generalissimo wes not. Marshall's mission ended in failure, -
‘Marshall, however, was made Secretary of State by Truman and his name became associated with the famous Plan that saved capitalism in Western Europe from an outcome like the one in China. Perhaps Johnson had this precedent in mind when he decided to send General Taylor to South Vietnam.
‘The ‘assurances being made to the American: people by columists in the capitalist press that General Taylor's appointment really signifies nothing new and that they can relax, stand in obvious contradiction to the impression which the White House and the Pentagon are seeking to make abroad, Johnson declared June 28 that the U,S. is "prepared to risk war" with China. Planes armed with nuclear weapons are on patrol duty, greater military forces are being massed in the area, the borders of South Vietnam have been crossed in several instances. Even if Johnson aims "only" at a bluff, this has its logic, too. What if the bluff doesn't work?
Johnson seems to be following the pattern of Kennedy's 1962 ride to the brink, On June 19 an administration spokesman in obvious imitation of Kennedy said that the U.S. is "ready to fight alone if necessary," and that it will not heed “cooling off" efforts of. its allies, "It will not permit its allies to influence any war decision because it is felt that American national security interests in Southeast Asia and the Pacifico are too important to be decided by others," The spokesman appears to have been Secretary of State Dean Rusk himself,
On June 24, an unnamed "American official" was quoted by the Associated Press to have said, in commenting on the U.S, course in South Vietnam: "The only consolation, and it's a rather negative one, is that I'm afraid we are going to louse this thing up so badly as to preoipitate a major war, ‘That, at least, we know how to deal with,
The anonymous official could prove to be right. But where would be the historians to record the fact?
~Ll-