169. Memorandum From the Director of the United States Information Agency (Marks) to President Johnson1
VIET-NAM
To counter the barrage of misinformation presented by the world press on Viet-Nam, we have increased our output on Viet-Nam subjects through television and films as follows:
1. Secretary Rusk was interviewed on television by five European journalists.2 Before undertaking the program, we received commitments from television organizations in approximately 25 countries that they would carry such a program.
A previous appearance of this nature by Secretary Rusk was very successful and was carried in about 60 countries, and also shown repeatedly at USIS auditoriums and in private Embassy gatherings.3
2. A similar television film will be prepared with Walt Rostow on/or about November 1 in which he will review “Where we are in Viet-Nam.”
3. A documentary film using newsclips dating back to the French involvement in Viet-Nam will be prepared explaining, “Why the United States is involved in the present controversy.”
4. Based upon recent conversations with Ambassador George McGhee and other European Ambassadors, I am inaugurating a series of five or ten-minute news clips that can be sent to European capitals for inclusion in regular news programs over their television facilities.
During my recent visit to London, Madrid and Lisbon, I was told repeatedly by journalists in those capitals that public opinion in Europe is based upon fragmentary, erroneous and frequently distorted reports emanating from U.S. news services, magazines and television newsreels. It is difficult, if not impossible, to counter these reports without [Page 525] a world-wide news gathering and film clip service. The efforts recited above will at best be a limited response to this daily barrage.
Despite repeated and continuing efforts with the Information Ministry of the Government of Viet-Nam, there has been little progress in supplying press officers with assistance in the embassies located in principal world capitals. In London, I was informed that the Government of Viet-Nam Embassy receives “virtually no logistical support from its government” and as a result USIS must bear the principal burden of supplying press and pamphlet materials and advising on press relations. A similar report was received from Rome. Good cooperation exists at these embassies but the program would be far more effective if Saigon were able to supply the necessary assistance.4
SOVIET UNION
On September 23 a bitter anti-U.S. attack was shown on Soviet television during prime time. Our post reports that the program featured our involvement in Viet-Nam, the “brutalization of western civilization” and the “threat of foreign tourism in the USSR.” The following is an excerpt from that report:
“The program opened with a reference to VOA reports of a barrier between North and South Vietnam. The commentator, with a sneer accentuating his verbalized disgust for the barbaric aggressors, explained that U.S. policy is bankrupt. The North Vietnamese will soon hang their wash on the McNamarra wall, a barrier created as an election gimmick to dupe Americans that the war is not futile. The commentator asks with barbed hostility: “Americans, what do you think of your war in Vietnam? We are listening to you!”
President Johnson’s photo flashes on the screen and a masculine documentary film voice says: “President Johnson, Washington, D.C., August 17 . . .” and continues in Russian to the foreboding droning of bombers to quote a statement made by the President that the Vietnamese seek relief from the surrounding terror.
The commentator interrupts: “Thanks, Mister President, for your clear estimate of the forces of resistance of the Vietnamese patriots. Continue, Gentlemen, we are all listening!”
Senator Robert Kennedy, Governor George Romney, Howard Rusk in the New York Times, Senator William Fulbright, Associated Press, Senator Wayne Morse, a New York daily newspaper, Senator Stuart Symington, and President Johnson are quoted by the documentary voice in a composite conceived to condemn the cruel external manifestations of a hopelessly sick society.”
This reference would confirm my previous reports that Soviet citizens are being fed a strong diet of malicious statements frequently including personal attacks on American leaders.
A STUDY OF FOREIGN TEXT BOOKS
Several months ago I initiated a worldwide study to determine what children in primary and secondary schools are being taught about the United States, its political, economic and social systems. A preliminary report indicates basic misconceptions and inadequate information is being presented.5 I am now working with an interagency committee to propose a legislative program which would provide an expanded program in the field of education aimed at correcting this situation, of increasing the exchange of teachers, and providing additional textbooks and reference material about the U.S.
- Source: Johnson Library, White House Central Files, Confidential File, Agency Reports, U.S. Information Agency, Box 135 [2 of 2], United States Information Agency, 1967 [2 of 3]. Confidential. Sent through Maguire, who did not initial the memorandum.↩
- On October 16, Rusk was interviewed at the USIA television studio in Washington by five journalists from West Germany, Italy, Australia, France, and the Netherlands. For a transcript of the interview, see Department of State Bulletin, November 6, 1967, pp. 595–602.↩
- Presumably a reference to the January 31 interview Rusk took part in with four journalists from British media outlets and to which Marks referred in an August 8 memorandum to Rusk. (Department of State Bulletin, February 20, 1967, pp. 274–284; National Archives, RG 306, Director Subject Files, 1967–1967, Entry UD WW 108, Box 7, Policy and Plans—General, 1967)↩
- Marks echoed the same observation he shared with Johnson following his July trip to Vietnam: “There is a desperate urgency for the Vietnamese story to be told by the Vietnamese in world capitals—and yet little is being done.” See Document 157.↩
- See Document 166.↩