THE PRESIDENT'S DAILY BRIEF 9 MARCH 1968

• Document Type: FOIA
• Collection: President's Daily Brief 1961-1969
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 0005974319
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: September 16, 2015
• Document Release Date: September 16, 2015
• Publication Date: March 9, 1968

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The President's Daily Brief
Top Secret 9 March 1968
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DAILY BRIEF
9 MARCH 1968
1. Vietnam
2. United Kingdom
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Fighting has been light in South
Vietnam except in northeastern Quang Tri -
Province, where there have been shar
clashes
In provincial and district towns in
nearly all parts of South Vietnam,
Communist harassment
is keeping the populace apprehensive and
is reducing its confidence in the govern-
ment.
Outside of the towns, US offi-
cials believe the Communists are consoli-
dating their grip in broad areas. They
seem to have had some success in replen-
ishing their ranks through recruitment
and impressment, and they may also have
acquired large stocks of food and funds
from the rural populace.
The embassy in London has word that
a week-long program of anti-US demonstra-
tions is to begin on Monday. Targets of
the demonstrations are to include British
firms involved in supplying material for
the US in Vietnam, as well as US companies
such as Pan Am and Dow Chemical. Next
Sunday, 17 March, there is to be a mass
demonstration in Grosvenor Square in
front of the embassy. The embassy is
taking precautions.
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3. Panama
4. Philippines
. Guatemala
The next confrontation seems like-
ly to come on Monday, when the assembly
reconvenes to set a date for consider-
ing the impeachment charges against
Robles. Arias--whose followers have
not been turning out very impressively
for him--reportedly is putting out a
call for demonstrators to mass Monday at
the assembly building. Robles has a
court injunction ordering suspension of
the impeachment proceedings, and his sup-
porters in the legislature boycotted its
session yesterday.
More on the question of leave in
the Philippines for US servicemen
: our em-
bassy in Manila makes it clear that the
only people being prohibited are US ser-
vicemen posted elsewhere 1:itho enter the
Philippines through US bases to spend
their leave on the islands. This would
amount to about 1,000 men a year. The
Filipinos apparently feel they must
tighten their controls over US service-
men passing through as tourists. Per-
sonnel on R&R from Vietnam have special
documentation and are not affected.
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6. Communist China
7. Warsaw Pact
8. Czechoslovakia
Chinese guards at diplomatic mis-
sions in Peking now stand their whole
tour "clasping the little red book to
their middle,"
The changing of the guard is
accompanied by much waving of the book
and shouting of "Long, long life to
Chairman Mao!" Telephone switchboards
and the time and weather girls repeat
the same invocation before giving their
information.
The meeting of the pact's Politi-
cal Consultative Committee in Sofia
failed, as expected, to agree on the
draft nonproliferation treaty. Rumania
was the holdout. This is the first time
the committee has had to publicize a
failure to reach agreement--a sign of
the pact's dwindling effectiveness as a
unifying force.
More groups are expressing their
dissatisfaction with Novotn and the
old re?ime
Contacts of the embassy in Prague
are also saying that some loosening up
in Czech foreign policy can be expected
over the next few months. No earthshak-
ing changes are in prospect, but we
probably will see a greater emphasis on
Czech national interest, a testing of
the bonds with the USSR, and a somewhat
greater openness toward the West.
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9. Cyprus
10. Cuba-France
Makarios has announced the removal
of all restrictions on the movement of
Turkish Cypriots. With Turks and Greeks
mingling freely again, there is always
the possibility that some local fight
will lead to widespread communal vio-
lence.
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Top Secret
FOR THE PRESIDENT'S EYES ONLY
Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
Top Secret
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9 March 1968
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Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
for the President's Eyes Only
9 March 1968
I. NOTES ON THE SITUATION
* * *
Repairs are Under Way on the Paul Doumer Bridge:
Photography of 7 February, which has just been given
a detailed review in Washington, showed that dropped
bridge sections on the east end of the Doumer bridge
had been spanned by means of steel cables up to 500
feet long resting on intermediate supports. It can
not be determined as yet if the Communists intend to
repair the bridge permanently, but cables have been
used previously to aid reconstruction work. The
cables may be intended, however, for constructing a
highway cable bridge or pedestrian walk using the
bridge piers for anchorage. There are no lengthy
cable bridges being used for rail traffic in North
Vietnam.
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Seven spans of the 19-span, mile-long bridge
are either dropped or damaged, and considerable work
remains before the bridge could be opened to even,
limited traffic. There are 16 alternate rail and
highway crossings over which-traffic can move in and
out of Hanoi.
* * *
French Report on Monday's Raid on Hanoi: The
Paris newspaper Le Monde carried a story this week
claiming that after the air strike on Hanoi on Mon-
day, "the Americans can no longer say that their
aircraft attack only military targets." The raid
on Monday, the article goes on, was aimed at a rice-
hulling factory and the surrounding workers' houses.
One wonders, the article concludes, "whether Wash-
ington has not decided to take a new step in escala-
tion."
* * *
North Vietnamese POWs: The return of the
three North Vietnamese sailors seems to have hit a
snag. An Indian International Control Commission
(ICC) official, whose responsibilitieS include
handling of ICC flights to Hanoi, is boggling at
putting the prisoners on the flight unless there
is firm assurance from Hanoi that it will receive
the prisoners. He maintains the Indians would
face a difficult and embarrassing situation if
Hanoi refused to accept them after they arrived.
The US Embassy in Saigon is pressing to get them
on next Friday's flight, but doubts that the Indian
objections can be overcome without a statement from
Hanoi that it will accept them. The embassy sug-
gests this will require a request from the Interna-
tional Red Cross in Geneva. Hanoi may refuse to
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give any prior assurances of this kind, but it prob-
ably would accept the prisoners if they arrive.
* * *
Conditions in Han
Le normal rice ration
for workers in North Vietnam is 22 to 26 pounds a
month, while skilled workers get more and children
less. Additional rice rations sometimes are
granted as incentive payments. The standard cloth
ration in Hanoi is three meters a year but more is
given to workers who produce more than their quotas.
II. NORTH VIETNAMESE REFLECTIONS OF US POLITICAL
ATTITUDES ON THE WAR
Hanoi Reports Plans for New Demonstrations in
US: On 8 March, Hanoi's international service broad-
za-st a report on preparations for new demonstrations
in the US against the war. It noted that the Nation-
al Mobilization Committee had appealed for people to
join in 10 days of protest beginning 12 April. The
broadcast said that Students for a Democratic Society
and a newly formed black antiwar group had joined the
committee in issuing the appeal. A student strike,
it noted, is slated for 26 April and a "unified dem-
onstration" of the full force of the movement is to
occur the following day.
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Hanoi on Antiwar Movement: On 7 March, Hanoi
radio's international service carried a brief sum-
mary of antiwar activities in the US. It noted
that some 1,300 young women at Smith and Wellesley
were beginning fasts to protest the war, and that
some faculty members and students from Amherst had
joined the girls. The same item noted the trial of
a US pilot who refused to train other pilots for
combat in Vietnam. UPI was cited as saying that
the pilot had said he would rather go to prison
than take part in anything that might assist the war
effort.
The same day Hanoi radio's broadcast to US
servicemen in Vietnam reported that Senator Eugene
McCarthy said on 3 March that the US cannot tackle
its domestic programs when it persists in "wasting
manpower, money, and moral energy" in Vietnam. The
broadcast said that McCarthy told a Dartmouth Col-
lege audience recently that we are pursuing a war
we seem unable to end, and that this was causing
sharp cutbacks in all key domestic programs.
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