219. Memorandum From Marshall Wright of the National Security Council Staff to the Presidentʼs Special Assistant (Rostow)1
SUBJECT
- What to do about Cambodia
You asked for an alternative to a military “solution” to the Communist use of Cambodian soil.
- 1.
- Close the Mekong River to Cambodian-bound traffic. (Before the end of the day I should have a study from the Agency on the effects of this. Frankly, I do not expect its economic impact would be anything like crippling. But it would have a good psychological effect both here and there.)
- 2.
- Vigorous pursuit of the preclusive buying of Cambodian food supplies available to enemy. We do not know how effective such a program could be. At least, however, we ought to be able to complicate and make more expensive Communist use of Cambodia as a supply source.
- 3.
- Make use of the anti-Sihanouk Khmer Serei elements in South Vietnam and Thailand. There are dangers in this but they are dwarfed by the disadvantages of overt military action against Cambodia. If a rejuvenated Khmer Serei does nothing else, it might convince Sihanouk and others in the Cambodian Government that their own interests lie in trying to minimize Cambodiaʼs availability to the Communists as a sanctuary.
- 4.
- Mount a black operation to create in Phnom Penh Rangoon-type riots and demonstrations (ostensibly the work of the Chinese community). Sihanouk has already proved his extreme sensitivity to Chinese misconduct. [Page 483] We would not have to create much of a “Chinese disturbance” to send him up the wall again with all that this would imply for a more vigorous approach by him to restrain Communist freedom of action in Cambodia.
- 5.
- A re-invigorated effort against the Communist supply line in Southern Laos. [2 lines of source text not declassified] Before we go down the road of a widened war in Cambodia, we ought to try the intensification of the one everybody knows about in Laos. (There was a technical discovery some months ago of tremendous promise for making the Ho Chi Minh trail unusable for a substantial part of the year. Its name was Operation Mud.2 I do not know its present status, but if it lives up to its promise it would go far to reducing the Cambodian problem to manageable proportions.
Of course, all of the above will not work. But they do not all need to work to bring or to keep the Cambodian problem down to tolerable levels. They would serve also to alert domestic and world opinion to this problem and give us a period in which people could be prepared for sterner action should it become necessary.
Although I know you are aware of my views on this, I feel bound to repeat that I believe American public reaction to military action against Cambodia would be God-awful. I cannot believe that the military significance of the enemyʼs use of Cambodia is so great that it justifies taking a step so destructive of American public support of the war in Vietnam. In time, the American public could be prepared for what will certainly be viewed as a widened war. But it has not been prepared yet.
- Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, 5E(1)a, 5/66–1/68, Cambodia. Top Secret; Nodis.↩
- Operation Commando Lava, see Foreign Relations, 1964–1968, vol. XXVIII, for documentation on this operation.↩