Office of the Historian

36. Memorandum of Conversation Between the Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Harriman) and the Chief of Staff, United States Army (Wheeler), Department of State1

Washington, February 9, 1963, 11:30 a.m.

During his call on me on Saturday, February 9, General Wheeler spoke of General Harkins’ difficulties with Diem, and said: [Page 113]

1.
General Harkins has been urging Diem to end the small self-defense units which are in static posts. He believes self-defense units should be in larger units, with active patrols laying ambush for Viet Cong.
2.
General Harkins feels Diem has been overly cautious in offensive actions in engagement with the Viet-Cong. Diem doesn’t want losses. Officers involved in action should be told not to be afraid of blame on account of losses. At the present time, they are afraid if they attack they will be criticized for losses that are sustained.

General Wheeler said that our civilian staff is not restrained in where it travels.

General Wheeler considers the strategic hamlet program good. He spoke well of Rufus Phillips. He indicated that the program was being expanded to take care of additional requirements. He said that none of the radios in strategic hamlets had been lost. Reinforcements are readily available when called for. They were on the alert at the airfields at each of the four Corps areas.

General Wheeler described the U.S. press situation as “terrible.” He pointed out that there was a good article by Beech in the morning Washington Post. He suggested that there should be a special press tour from U.S. run by Defense. When I questioned him about this, he accepted my suggestion that perhaps it would be better to try to get the press to send especially experienced men out, individually.

It has been arranged that each of the four Corps should have a U.S. press officer to handle the American press when they came there, and also to see that information got out.

Briefings by U.S. military were being conducted to “cut the press in” on information available to U.S., at least to some degree. He reported excellent relations between Nolting and Harkins. He spoke highly of each.

I suggested that he might wish to develop in more detail his proposal made in the conference with the President, that the South Vietnamese army develop commando capabilities against North Viet-Nam.2

  1. Source: Department of State, Vietnam Working Group Files: Lot 67 D 54, DEF 19-2 Advisory and Training Asst. Secret; Limit Distribution. Drafted by Harriman. Copies were sent to FE, SEA/VN, the Embassy in Saigon for Ambassador Nolting, the White House for Forrestal, and INR for Hilsman. A copy of this memorandum is also in Library of Congress, Harriman Papers.↩
  2. In another memorandum of this conversation, Harriman noted that he and Wheeler also discussed “the command problem”: “I urged General Harkins should report to the Joint Chiefs, and not CINCPAC, for well-known reasons. He said the Joint Chiefs were considering the matter. He said that confidentially, if left to him, he would take the action we recommend.” (Library of Congress, Harriman Papers, Memoranda of Conversation-Governor Harriman 1963)↩