Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume II, Vietnam, 1962

267. Memorandum From the Ambassador at Large (Bowles) to the Secretary of State¹

Washington, August 16, 1962.

Before leaving for Maine I would like to make a few comments regarding the proposed mission to Southeast Asia which we first discussed a month or so ago.²

I gather from our talk last Friday³ that the Far East Bureau is strongly opposed to the proposal, and that under the circumstances you feel that the mission should be abandoned or postponed.

Although I bow to any decision which you may wish to make I would like to offer a strong personal dissent from the reasoning that appears to have led the Bureau to oppose the core of my proposal: A speech by the President outlining U.S. political, economic and military objectives in the area.

The arguments as stated in a memorandum to my office on July 31 (a copy of which I am enclosing)⁴ strike me as specious in the extreme. If these views prevail I believe we will have lost our opportunity to recapture the political initiative in that part of the world, and for this reason I am anxious to have my own views fully understood. Let us first consider the Bureauʼs objections.

The memorandum argues that there is no point in the President asking the Southeast Asian nations to restate their opposition to the use of force since they are already on record through the U.N. Charter and because our Communist opponents cannot be expected to live up to whatever verbal commitments they might make for tactical purposes. If we adopted this view as national policy we would abandon the entire peace initiative to the Communists.

The memorandum then discounts the value of any “paper guarantees” that we might obtain from the U.S.S.R. or Communist China, in regard to overt aggression in Southeast Asia, and ridicules the suggestion that broader international inspection machinery might be effective in curbing internal subversion. While experience may prove their pessimism to be correct, this view is contrary to the assumptions on which the Laotian negotiations and the Geneva agreements have been based, i.e., that the Soviets in Southeast Asia as in the case of Austria may carry out whatever agreements they believe to be in their interest; and that if their interests in this area should coincide with ours there is some hope of curbing the more overt forms of internal subversion.

The memorandum also asserts that there is no hope now or in the foreseeable future that Southeast Asian nations may be willing to forego some degree of sovereignty in order to increase regional economic and political cooperation.

This judgment appears particularly defeatist in light of the new Malaysian Federation, the recent proposals by Macapagal, ASAʼs tentative early steps toward closer economic cooperation, and the support already demonstrated by the four riparian countries for the development of the Mekong.

Finally, the memorandum asserts that what the North Vietnamese really need is a good stiff military lesson and until we have given them that lesson we will be wasting our time in attempting to create a less negative U.S. posture in Southeast Asia.

On the basis of such reasoning Wilsonʼs Fourteen Points could be condemned as an empty gesture, Secretary Marshallʼs 1947 speech at Harvard viewed as a visionary bit of do-goodism, Trumanʼs Point Four proposals as unrealistic, the Alliance for Progress as a blatant case of international day dreaming, and The Ten Commandments as the ultimate in utopianism.

Let me again briefly state my position in regard to Southeast Asia:

1. My hat goes off to Averell Harriman for his brilliant performance in negotiating the Laos agreement. Had he been bound by the paralyzing inhibitions laid down in the attached memorandum, we would never have reached that agreement.

If the Soviet Union should choose to live up to its agreements (and Averell would be the first to agree that this is a crucial “if”) we may be able to work our way out of a miserable situation which we inherited from the previous administration and gradually to create a relatively stable Laos, neutral and independent.

On the other hand if the Soviet Union fails to live up to its side of the bargain it will be clear to everyone in Southeast Asia and throughout the world as to who wants peace and who wants trouble, and the stage will be set for whatever may follow.

2. At present we are faced with a most difficult security situation in South Vietnam. Although our military authorities appear hopeful about the outcome, qualified outside observers place the odds for a clear cut victory at less than fifty-fifty.

If, as many fear, the situation deteriorates we may be forced within the next year or so to choose between committing more and more American troops and material to what the Presidentʼs political opponents will describe as “another Democratic War” or withdrawing in embarrassed frustration.

For the U.S. Government to adopt the classic “letʼs wait and see” posture under such circumstances strikes me as not only sterile but foolhardy.

3. Since F.D.R.ʼs efforts to persuade the French to leave Indo China in 1945 and our efforts in 1948 on behalf of Indonesian independence, the U.S. has drifted into a singularly negative posture throughout Southeast Asia.

This has been due in part to our involvement with Chinese Nationalist troops in North Burma, to our strong military support for the French prior to their defeat at Dien Bien Phu, to our alleged effort to upset the Sukarno government in 1958, to our close association with the Nationalist Chinese government on Taiwan, and to our support of such right wing Southeast Asian leaders as Diem, Bao Dai, Sarit, and Phoumi.

Thanks to our role in negotiating the Geneva agreements and the near settlement in West Irian, our prestige is starting to rise. However, it still has a long way to go.

4. In these circumstances the most effective course of American policy, in my opinion, should be along the following lines:

a. Continue to make it clear that we will massively oppose any overt Communist effort to take over Southeast Asia.

b. Continue our strong military support for the Diem government in its opposition to the Communists in South Vietnam, while pressing Diem more vigorously to broaden his political base and to institute essential administrative and economic reforms.

c. Discreetly keep our eyes open for an alternative to Diem who would provide a broader political base from which to oppose the Communists.

d. Insist on a firm but realistic enforcement of the Geneva agreements regarding Laos.

e. Give generous encouragement to the Souvanna Phouma government, being careful not to embrace him so fondly that he will be dismissed as a new U.S. satellite.

f. Encourage better relationships between the Souvanna Phouma government and its non-Communist neighbors.

g. Improve our almost non-existent intelligence capability in regard to Ho Chi Minhʼs attitudes and objectives.

5. Against this background of political action it is urgently necessary for the U.S. Government to clarify its overall objectives in Southeast Asia.

I believe that this can best be accomplished through a carefully conceived statement by the President of the United States, patterned on the concept of Wilsonʼs Fourteen Points, in which he would outline the kind of Southeast Asia we are striving to build once the fighting in Vietnam has been halted.

I believe that the proposed outline of such a speech which I attached to my June 13 memorandum to the President⁵ and the 15 points which were included in my July 18 memorandum⁶ to you are generally valid. They can be substantially improved, however, as a result of constructive discussions in the Department of State and White House.

In my opinion a visit by me to the area would be useful at some stage in this situation. However, it is in no sense essential to the speech or statement which I think the President should make on the earliest practicable occasion.

A personal note: As you know, I have been deeply concerned about many phases of U.S. foreign policy in Southeast Asia and indeed in all of Asia between Tehran and Seoul. To an uncomfortable degree I believe we still remain captives of actions by the past administration and of right wing associations and commitments which we inherited twenty months ago.

To base U.S. policy in Southeast Asia on the optimistic assumption that we are about to teach the Communists a hard lesson in Vietnam and that other matters can wait sounds perilously similar to the posture of the French in the early 1950ʼs. At best it is putting our eggs in a basket of questionable durability.

In a political sense an “American bastion” in Southeast Asia is a dead end street even if it were feasible militarily. Our best hope for stability in this area lies in the development of a buffer concept into which we can draw most elements of the non-Communist left and right with the neutral orientation which has effectively curbed Communism in India, Burma, Indonesia and Cambodia. (As Mike Mansfield recently suggested, the two Southeast Asian countries which have been least closely connected with us—Cambodia and Burma—have been the most free of Communist pressure.)

The prospects for a successful Laotian operation are moderately encouraging. The U.S.S.R. is far away and the harried Chinese Communists are steadily losing their capacity either to frighten or to persuade the nations of this area.

I believe that our national interests will best be served by disengaging ourselves from the SEATO concept and encouraging a buffer area approach—as a means of undercutting the position of the Viet Cong and as a basis for the regional development of the entire area when the fighting is over.

Even if this effort fails I believe that our overall position in Southeast Asia will be strengthened, and our objectives clarified before world opinion.

The several memoranda which I have written to you and the President on Asia in general and this area in particular are based on intimate study of and association with these countries and many of their leaders over the last decade.

On the basis of this experience, I was outspokenly critical of the negativism of U.S. policy in Asia during the eight years of the last administration. As the Presidentʼs Adviser on Asian policy I am troubled to see the same kind of thinking still deeply rooted at the operational levels of the Department as illustrated by this memorandum.

The Geneva settlement provides the basis for something more affirmative. Letʼs build on it.

A good place to start is with an affirmative statement by the President in which he boldly spells out U.S. political, military and economic objectives in Southeast Asia.

This could give us the initiative in Asia for the first time since Mao Tse-tung conquered China.

1. Source: Kennedy Library, Presidentʼs Office Files, Special Correspondence, Bowles. Secret; Eyes Only.
2. See Document 241.
3. No record of Bowles’ conversation with Rusk on Friday, August 10, has been found.
4. Not found, but see Document 253.
5. Document 214.
6. See the Attachment to Document 241.