207. Memorandum From the Director of the Policy Planning Staff (Rostow) to the Secretary of State1
SUBJECT
- Laos and North Viet-Nam
The possibility of putting US combat forces into Laos raises this question: Is our objective (a) a split Laos; or (b) a unified Laos from which the North Vietnamese are made to withdraw and from which the Chinese Communists are barred? The issue has been obscured because (a) has been regarded as a “tough” policy; (b), as a “soft” policy. I believe the opposite is the case.
If our objective is (a), it probably can be attained if we move sufficient US forces into the area and if we are prepared to have them stay there indefinitely. Our movement would face the Communists with a choice. They could either accept the split, de facto or de jure; consolidate on their side of the line, probably introducing Chinese Communists as well as North Vietnamese forces; and then look forward to a gradual extension of their power in Laos by indirect aggression which the long lines of demarcation and the nature of the terrain would make thoroughly possible. From their point of view the split would be a great advance over the situation in 1954 when the Communists were merely granted two Lao provinces in the north. Moreover, it would be very difficult for us under the new de facto situation to argue that it was inappropriate for the Vietminh and the Chinese Communists to come into the north if we remained in the south.
On the whole I believe this is the outcome Ho, Mao, and Souphanouvong want.
My hunch is that the Soviet Union has, on the whole, opposed a split because it raised the possibility of escalation in which their prestige would be involved and because it would push North Viet-Nam closer to Peiping. On the other hand, the attractive situation on the ground and the low costs we have imposed on the North Vietnamese for their aggression in northern Laos, have made it difficult for Moscow to persuade Ho and Souphanouvong honestly to back a neutral, independent Laos.
On the other hand, if we set as our objective a Laos from which both North Vietnamese and Chinese Communist troops are excluded, I suspect we shall have to raise the costs to the Communists beyond the point of present defensive planning. We should have to take the view that our policy in Southeast Asia is to get the North Vietnamese [Page 433] forces back to North Viet-Nam; and to keep the Chinese Communists from using the road into Laos they are now building; and we would have to be prepared to impose on North Viet-Nam sufficient costs to make a neutral, independent Laos the most attractive realistic alternative open to the Communists.
Specifically, therefore, if aggression is resumed in Laos by the Communists, I urge that we consider the following track:
- 1.
- We restate our objectives in both South Viet-Nam and Laos as, essentially, a return to the Geneva Accords of 1954 (including explicitly a neutral, independent Laos).
- 2.
- We surface the crucial role of the North Vietnamese forces in Laos, as well as in South Viet-Nam, stating publicly for the first time what is true; namely, that the aggression in Laos is essentially Hoʼs rather than Souphanouvongʼs.
- 3.
- We propose to inflict selective damage on North Viet-Nam for its aggression beyond its borders until that aggression ceases. I do not have in mind here massive bombing of Hanoi. I do have in mind highly selective attack on transport and power facilities, by precision methods, which are now within our capability, plus some mining of Haiphong harbor.
- 4.
- In this setting we would move vigorously into Laos and immediately take measures to close off the infiltration through Laos into South Viet-Nam.
It is my assessment that, unless we are prepared to raise the ante in this way, the Communists will judge—and judge correctly—that their present salami tactics in Southeast Asia will succeed. If, however, we are prepared to take the risks of this wholly legitimate act against North Viet-Nam—which has no right to have its soldiers south of the 1 7th parallel or in Laos—we have a fair chance of giving Khrushchev a legitimate argument for going forward on the track which Mr. Harriman and Mr. Pushkin discussed in Geneva.
There are, of course, risks in this as in any other action designed to stop aggression; and we should be prepared for any level of escalation that the Communists may choose in response. On the other hand, the internal situation in both North Viet-Nam and Communist China, plus the relatively favorable balance of nuclear strength between the US and the Soviet Union, and the Sino-Soviet split, make this as good a time to face this risk as any we are likely to confront in this decade.
Finally, I believe our relatively passive policy in both Viet-Nam and Laos has weakened the hand of those in Moscow—including Mr. Pushkin—who wish to see the situation in Southeast Asia defused.
In short, I believe a bolder policy than that now envisaged has a chance of fending off an outcome we have long sought to avoid; that is, an indefinitely prolonged US commitment to hold with US troops the Mekong Valley and southern Laos.
- Source: Department of State,S/P Files: Lot 69 D 121, Chron. Top Secret.↩