271. Memorandum of the Substance of Discussion at a Department of State-Joint Chiefs of Staff Meeting, Pentagon, Washington, August 24, 1962, 11:30 a.m.1
[Here follows the beginning of the memorandum, which dealt with Laos.]
[Page 610]Crop Destruction—Viet Nam
General Lemnitzer said that the JCS were being urged by General Harkins, Ambassador Nolting and the SVN Government to agree to a program of crop destruction in the north. If this program is to be effective, it must be undertaken quickly before the crops ripen and are harvested by the VC. General Lemnitzer asked Mr. Johnson how State felt about the proposed program. Mr. Johnson said that State has not agreed to it and that State has received the views of Secretary McNamara and the JCS which support the program. Accordingly, in view of the importance of the matter and the differences in the positions taken by State and Defense, Secretaries Rusk and McNamara will have to decide the issue. General Lemnitzer then asked Mr. Johnson to cover the basis for the State position. Mr. Johnson said that the State position is contained in a memorandum to the White House which had been approved the previous evening.2 He noted that he had given a copy of this memorandum to Mr. Rowen of ISA (Rowen was present at this meeting). Mr. Rowen then passed his copy of the memorandum to General Lemnitzer. After reading the memorandum General Lemnitzer remarked that the matter will have to be decided at a higher level. However, he stated that he personally disagreed with the State memorandum. He said that he desired to proceed with the destruction of VC food stocks and this program was a good way to accomplish the objective. Mr. Johnson said it was doubtful that we could destroy VC crops without destroying Montagnard crops at the same time. The crops are in the same area and are not readily identifiable as belonging to one or the other of the two groups. General Lemnitzer said that this is not a problem because the VC have driven the Montagnards out of the area and thus all crops will be harvested and consumed by the VC. Mr. Johnson said that the crops were not planted and raised by the VC but by the Montagnards. Mr. Rowen said that the SVN program called for dose control and that the operation would be conducted on a careful basis right down to the village level. Mr. Johnson noted that the proposed program posed great psychological problems even though the chemicals to be used were obtainable at a hardware store. They were in fact similar to materials we use on our own lawns. The proposed destruction using aircraft had psychological drawbacks. General Lemnitzer remarked that the program would have great military advantages. Mr. Johnson said that there is no precedent for this type of action except in the case of British employment of a similar program in Malaya. General Lemnitzer said that it is strange that we [Page 611] can bomb, kill, and burn people but are not permitted to starve them. Mr. Johnson noted that food may be destroyed in storage dumps.
[Here follows a section on Latin America.]
- Source: Department of State, State-JCS Meetings: Lot 65 D 172. Top Secret. The source text bears a notation that it was a Department of State draft that was not cleared with the Department of Defense. The meeting was held at the Pentagon.↩
- Document 270.↩