751G.5/9–754
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs (Merchant)
Participants:
- Mr. Robert Anderson, Deputy Secretary of Defense
- Admiral Arthur Radford, Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
- Mr. Murphy
- Mr. Merchant
During a conference on another subject Secretary Anderson brought up the question of the Department’s 847 to Paris and Saigon1 (informing them of our request of JCS to study a sound force plan for the South Vietnamese National Army and pointing out that some of the extravagantly high aid figures being bandied around might have no relevance to a soundly conceived total program) and objected to its despatch. He had read it as implicitly indicating that the US was committed to a large scale military assistance program in South Vietnam. He said that no such decision had been reached by the subcommittee of OCB, on whose position paper the telegram had been based, that it had not been directed by OCB to reach any conclusions. He went on to say that Defense felt that in the absence of any sound political base in Indochina there was no justification for large scale military assistance. He referred to the uncertainties in the local political situation. Secretary Anderson also said that the JCS were not preparing a force plan nor had they been requested to do so (the letter from General Smith to Defense making this request2 had been been signed and [Page 2011] sent out the same day but had not been received at that point by Secretary Anderson).
It was pointed out to Secretary Anderson that the essential purpose of the telegram was to bring our Embassies in Paris and Saigon down to earth on the aid outlook and to get them thinking in terms of a realistic approach to the problem.
The conversation ended on a somewhat inconclusive note, but Secretary Anderson did not ask the despatch of any clarifying or amending message.