139. Telegram From the Embassy in Australia to the Department of State1
2337. Literally eyes only for Sec. Rusk and Sec. McNamara from Walt Rostow. At lunch, just completed, between President Park and President Johnson,2 President Johnson committed himself to: the most forthcoming response possible to Park’s equipment requests, to be in Park’s hands at the latest on January 1; and the most accelerated possible delivery dates for equipment.
The President wishes not only staff work completed but the greatest possible imagination in finding ways of accelerating equipment delivery; for example, even the possibility of switching a destroyer from U.S. to Korean command might be examined. In return, President Park said that he would do his utmost to get troops to Vietnam by March 1, his original earliest date being April.
At the close of a very good and frank session, Park said wryly, sometimes when we decide to do something, we can do it quicker than you. President Johnson accepted the challenge.
Park’s problem is, as you know, that he must get promise from his Assembly; and, in the face of expected increased pressures at the 38th parallel in the spring, he must demonstrate to the Assembly that he will gain as much short run security in equipment as he is losing by sending the unit to South Vietnam.
- Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1967–69, POL KOR S-US. Secret; Immediate; Nodis.↩
- Both were in Canberra to attend the funeral of former Prime Minister Holt; see Document 140.↩