136. Memorandum From the Secretary of Defense’s Deputy Assistant for Special Operations (Lansdale) to the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for National Security Council Affairs and Plans (Williams)1
SUBJECT
- Counter-Guerrilla Training in Vietnam
In the meeting you chaired this morning, it is my understanding that there was an informal discussion of British-Malayan advice and training of the Vietnamese in their operations against Communist guerrillas. Presume you are talking this over with Admiral O’Donnell who is, of course, right in the midst of U.S. military thinking and actions on advice, training, and equipment for the Vietnamese.
My personal misgivings about British help are based on three points:
- a.
- It is unsound to turn over U.S. aid funds and energies to a foreigner to spend for us. This, of course, would be essentially what would happen in reality if a persuasive British “expert” were placed to advise President Diem and his appointed assistants on these operations.
- b.
- British experience in Malaya is sharply different in some vital fundamentals from the problem in Vietnam. In Vietnam, the Vietnamese are fighting their brother Vietnamese. In Malaya, a colonial power of another race led native forces against guerrillas who were largely foreigners (that is, Chinese from Communist China who had to operate in a mixed Indo-Sino-Malay population). The political attraction and security of village populations is quite different—and yet this is the “grass roots” basis of military operations.
- c.
- The U.S. and Vietnamese military have an unexcelled potential for teamwork, if we can get the wraps taken off. U.S. advisors have a record of counter-guerrilla success in this same area of Vietnam in the past, and in the Philippines, which stands up well against the British accomplishments in Malaya. All we have to do is remember the lessons we learned in the very recent past, and to make use of them wisely and energetically.
On the other hand, I believe there are some British, Malayan, Filipino, and Burmese counter-guerrilla experts who would have some thoughtful suggestions to make which would be well-worth considering. I would like to see the U.S. military invite some of these folks in to visit Vietnam, with the approval of the Vietnamese government, where they could get a first-hand look at the situation and come up with ideas for U.S. and Vietnamese military to consider. This might prove most useful, and would be far different than asking them to come in to do a U.S. military task.
- Source: Washington National Records Center, RG 330, Lansdale Papers: FRC 63 A 1803, Vietnam Correspondence 1960. Confidential. F. Haydn Williams served under the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, John N. Irwin, II.↩