Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume III, Vietnam, June–December 1965

83. Memorandum From the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy) to President Johnson¹

Washington, July 24, 1965, 8:20 p.m.

Mr. President:

I enclose two memoranda. One is from Joe Sisco,² and the other is a paper on the history of troop recommendations which you instructed me to prepare in our meeting yesterday.

I also had a talk with Sisco, and my own belief is that with further effort we can find a way, showing our readiness to go to the UN without exposing ourselves to much danger in the Security Council. We did it successfully at the time of the Gulf of Tonkin, and I think we can do it again. I believe that the public advantage of showing readiness to speak our peace [piece] in the Security Council outweighs the disadvantage of the Soviet response, and I also think that with appropriate pressures, we can keep at least 8 members of the Security Council on our side in keeping the focus sharply on the need for discussions. The members of the Security Council, for your information, are:

US, UK, France, Nationalist China, and the Soviet Union—Permanent Members

The Netherlands, Uruguay, Bolivia, Jordan, Ivory Coast, and Malaysia—Temporary Members

Sisco himself says we can get the US, the UK, the ChiNats, the Dutch, and the two Latin Americans. I believe that strong diplomacy would give us Jordan, the Ivory Coast, and Malaysia as well—all three of them owe us a lot in different ways.

McG.B.³

Enclosure⁴

Washington, July 24, 1965, 8:15 p.m.

SUBJECT

• The History of Recommendations for Increased US Forces in Vietnam

This story relates almost entirely to 1965. When you became President, US forces in Vietnam totaled 16,000. On 31 December 1964, they totaled 23,000. Today they are between 75 and 80,000, and you are considering increases of another 100,000 between now and November.

In December and January, our attention did not focus upon increased ground forces. We were trying to get the Huong Government to pull up its socks, and we were preparing to authorize air strikes at the right moment. We had no recommendations from the military for major ground force deployments.

At the end of January, after Bob and I discussed with you our growing doubts, you sent me to Vietnam. During that trip, the attack on Pleiku occurred and in February, you put into effect the program of limited air strikes against North Vietnam,⁵ and unlimited air action in South Vietnam. It is in this connection that the Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended, and you approved, the deployment of Marines to Danang. Two battalion landing teams were approved for such deployment on February 25.⁶

The bombing did not reverse the situation and we did not expect it would. In the first week of March, you sent General Harold Johnson to Vietnam. He returned with three basic recommendations:⁷

• First, a 21-Point program of small actions which was promptly approved;
• Second, a deployment of a tailored division force either to the highlands or to certain bases; and
• Third, a four division ground force to contain infiltration by land.

The last two recommendations were tentative in form and were not pressed to a decision. General Taylor, in an important dispatch on March 16 (Saigon 3003) weighed the pros and cons of a single US division and recommended that judgment be reserved.⁸

At the end of March, General Taylor visited Washington and there was discussion of a possible three-division force, as suggested by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but Taylor himself was skeptical and reported a similar skepticism in Prime Minister Quat.⁹ The Secretaries of State and Defense recommended that the decision be deferred and that instead we should approve deployment of two additional Marine battalions and an 18-20,000 man increase in other US support forces. This recommendation was accepted in the first days of April.¹⁰

The study of ground-force deployment continued in April, and on Tuesday, April 20, McNamara, Taylor, Wheeler, Sharp, Westmoreland, McNaughton, and William Bundy met in Honolulu.¹¹ At that point there were 2,000 Koreans and 33,000 US troops in the country, and an additional 18,000 were already approved. After the Honolulu discussions, McNamara recommended additional deployments leading to a total strength of 82,000—including 13 combat battalions. Part of this recommendation was given formal approval on April 21;¹² and other parts on May 15. This set of recommendations was the most important between January and the present, and I attach McNamara’s memorandum of April 21.¹³

Early in May, you requested $700 million for Vietnam,¹⁴ and our defense of this request and related statements made it clear that additional forces were being sent. On June 16, McNamara gave a full public exposition, announcing the planned deployment of 15 battalions, with a total military strength of 70-75,000.¹⁵

Meanwhile, on June 11, after discussions with MACV and Ambassador Taylor, the Joint Chiefs recommended additional deployments to a total of 116,000.¹⁶ The most important element in this recommendation was the air-mobile division. On June 19 you gave approval to the necessary preparatory steps for these deployments, without deciding on the deployment itself.

On July 2, the Joint Chiefs produced a further recommendation for a total troop strength of 179,000, again in coordination with MACV and Ambassador Taylor. Before approving this recommendation, you sent McNamara to Vietnam.¹⁷ With marginal modifications, it is this recommendation which is now before you for decision.

The essence of this history, I think, is that initially we all had grave objections to major US ground force deployments. Even those in favor (like my brother Bill), wanted to try other things first, and none of us was prepared to urge on Westmoreland things he was not urging on us.

Then when we got major bases of our own, largely for air action, we moved quite promptly to protect them. These deployments did not give us bad reactions, and it became easier for Westmoreland to propose, and for us to accept, additional deployments. Thus, between the end of March and the beginning of July—a period of only three months—we moved from recommended force levels of 33,000 to recommended force levels of 180,000. We also moved from the mission of base security to the mission of active combat in whatever way seems wise to General Westmoreland.

I have found this review instructive. It suggests to me that McNamara’s Plan 3 is better than his other two plans. I think we should now approve the recommended deployments through November. I think that at the same time we should explicitly and plainly reserve decision about further major deployments. After all, we have not yet had even a company-level engagement with Viet Cong forces which choose to stand their ground and fight.

McG.B.¹⁸

1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Memos to the President, McGeorge Bundy, Vol. XII. Secret.
2. Not attached and not found.
3. Printed from a copy that bears these typed initials.
4. Secret.
5. See vol. II, Documents 131 and 149.
6. See ibid., Document 170.
7. See ibid., Documents 179 and 197.
8. Ibid., Document 204. Telegram 3003 was received on March 17.
9. See ibid., Document 220.
10. See ibid., Documents 230 and 242.
11. See ibid., Documents 264 and 265.
12. See ibid., Documents 266, 269, and 271.
13. Ibid., Document 265.
14. See ibid., Document 283.
15. A transcript of McNamara’s news conference is in the Johnson Library, Public Statements of Secretary of Defense McNamara, 1965, vol. 5, pp. 1791-1803.
16. See vol. II, Document 346.
17. See Document 49.
18. Printed from a copy that bears these typed initials.