113. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in Vietnam 1
140. Task Force VN 22. This telegram constitutes the President’s instructions for Ambassador Nolting and Task Force Saigon.
The following letter from President Kennedy to President Diem incorporates Task Force Saigon’s suggestions in Embtel 145.2
Ambassador Nolting is requested to transmit the letter to President Diem at once.
[Here follows the text of the letter from President Kennedy to President Diem, which Nolting delivered to Diem on August 6, Document 114.]
An essential part of Ambassador Nolting’s presentation of the President’s letter should refer to planning. In order to derive long-range benefits from our joint efforts to win in the present emergency, Viet-Nam needs long-range planning. To develop and carry out a long-range plan, Viet-Nam needs its own planners and the help of experts from outside. In the context of a long-range plan and considering the limitations that the agreed criteria place upon imports, the capital goods component of the commodity aid program can be expanded. It should be made clear that long-range planning and the increase in capacity to absorb capital goods will facilitate the flow of American development assistance. In focusing on such a Plan as an urgent item of current business, the nation can be inspired and consolidated. The U.S. is willing to help the long-range development effort with men and resources, and without diminishing in any way the U.S. support for the present counter-insurgency effort. We hope that one consequence of our new joint efforts will be an effective projection to the nation, its friends and its enemies, of our confidence in a long-range future for an independent VietNam. In this connection, the Ambassador should seek discreetly to impress upon President Diem that he should use the total U.S. program for the greatest political effect in his achievement of maximum appreciation of his government by the people of Viet-Nam and the people of the world. (It is hoped that the Ambassador will continue his efforts to [Page 263] persuade President Diem to engage more fully in his civic action program non-Communist elements now in political opposition.) This is, of course, part of a continuing effort that must be made with President Diem and his government generally.
Ambassador Nolting should make clear in his presentation that, if this is to be a truly joint effective effort, action by each country must be related to that by the other. In particular we attach great importance to the reasonable implementation of the agreed criteria governing imports; we also consider the raising of the effective piaster rate applicable to U.S. commodity aid, to which it is understood President Diem has already agreed, an indispensable part of our effort. Action by the GVN on both of these matters will be very closely related to the U.S. contribution to the overall effort. The Ambassador may assure President Diem that increased piaster realization per dollar’s worth of imports will not be used as a reason for reducing the American share of our joint efforts.
President Diem and his government need to be reminded of adverse criticism that our Viet-Nam program has experienced in the Congress and in the American press generally favorable to his cause, and to be discreetly warned that the program cannot profit from further attack. In the avoidance of such attack, the GVN itself plays the essential role.
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 751K.5-MSP/7-3161. Secret; Priority. Drafted by Wood, Silver, and other members of the Viet-Nam Task Force; cleared with various other officers in the Departments of State, Defense, and the Treasury, as well as with the Bureau of the Budget, the International Cooperation Administration, and the President (per Rostow); repeated to CINCPAC for PolAd; and pouched to Phnom Penh, Bangkok, Vientiane, Paris, London, Ottawa, New Delhi, and Tokyo.↩
- In telegram 145, July 31, the Embassy reported that it considered the draft letter to Diem “excellent in tone and substance” and offered suggestions for minor changes and some additions. (Ibid.)↩