751G.5/5–2654
Memorandum by the Regional Planning Adviser, Bureau of Far Eastern Affairs (Ogburn), to the Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Drumright)
Subject:
- Presidential Message on Indochina1
The argument presented in the draft Presidential message informing Congress of the Administration’s decision to contribute American armed forces to Indochina “sufficient to assist the French Union forces to restore peace and order” at the cost of possible general war, rests upon three main contentions, all specious. These are as follows:
- 1.
- That Vietnam has been the victim of “implacable aggression”. The statement is made that “if not stopped [in]2 Indochina as it was in Korea, Red Chinese forces will roll on to menace and overpower new victims”. The fact is that the Communist forces in Vietnam are Vietnamese. The war there is a civil war. There has been no aggression in Vietnam as there was in Korea. If there had been, the presumption must be that the situation would have been reported to the UN when it first developed.
- 2.
- That “the French Union forces have been fighting for eight long years to bring peace with freedom to Indochina”. The fact is that even as of today, the French have not promised to give freedom to Indochina. For the first four years of this war, the French did not afford the Vietnamese the opportunity to enlist even with a nominally autonomous Vietnamese government. It was not until 1950 that a government under Bao Dai was set up. Until then, the Vietnamese had a choice of [Page 1621] siding with the French or siding with Ho Chi Minh. Under those conditions, this Government quite properly refused to provide the French with any ammunition or arms, being convinced that the French purpose was essentially to suppress the independence movement in Vietnam.
- 3.
- That US intervention will restore peace and bring freedom to Vietnam. In the first place, our intelligence estimate is that US intervention will bring not peace but will bring Chinese Communist intervention. This will mean general war with Communist China in which—and again I quote from our intelligence estimate—the Soviet Union will not stand by and allow the Chinese Communist regime to be destroyed. As for our bringing freedom to Vietnam, it is impossible to speak of American troops as bringing freedom to another people when the great preponderance of that people would be bitterly opposed to the appearance of American troops in their country. What this paper is talking about is “liberation” in the Communist sense.
To my mind it is impossible to produce a good statement based on false premises and accordingly it would seem to me futile to attempt to improve this paper merely by superficial changes in drafting. At the same time, I must admit I can find no honest grounds on which the sending of American troops to Indochina, and the sacrifice of thousands or perhaps many more lives, for ends that I believe would prove worse than futile, could be justified.
- The specific draft under reference has not been identified. A draft Presidential message was being prepared in connection with NSC 5421 which consisted of studies on aspects of possible U.S. intervention in Indochina. For table of contents from NSC 5421, June 1, and additional information on this project, see p. 1649.↩
- Brackets in the source text.↩