Your Duties as my Special Assistant for Vietnamese Affairs

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP78-06180A000300100002-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 11, 2001
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: July 16, 1965
• Content Type: MF

Approved For Release ~I~9~M{~Mt9J TCIA-RDP78 06180A000300100002-2
16 July 1965
SUBJECT: Your Duties as my Special Assistant
for Vietnamese Affairs
1. I have for some time been convinced that a small staff
unit should be established, responsible directly to me, which would
concern itself with major aspects of the problem of Vietnam and
our government's involvement there. As I see them now, they
are,
a. all forms of CIA activities carried on in
Vietnam, or elsewhere but in relationship to Vietnam,
as well as activities and programs concerning Vietnam
already in existence at the Headquarters level;
b. the generation of ideas and proposals intended
to improve the activities of CIA, specifically, in and
concerning Vietnam, and support of the activities and
policies of our government, generally, insofar as these
activities and policies are related"to Vietnam. This
latter general category would be primarily for my own
consideration and possible use, in discharging my
obligations within the intelligence community and
directly to the President.
2. I am well aware that there are a considerable number of
CIA components, in each of the Directorates, already working full
time or part time on various aspects of the Vietnamese problem.
I do not wish your work either to duplicate such work as is already
under way, nor do I wish that you draw under your control these
already-existing components. Rather, you and the members of your
GROUP 1
Excluded from automatic
downgrading and
declassification
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own permanent staff should establish liaison and utilize these
Vietnam-oriented components where they now find themselves.
On the other hand, I feel that you should have a small staff of
individual specialists in various fields, permanently assigned
to your Vietnamese Affairs Staff, who will serve both as your
points of contact with CIA or other governmental components,
both to keep yourself informed, on my behalf, of the total spread
of U. S. activities and programs concerning Vietnam, present
or planned, as well as to provide points of input to other com-
ponents of CIA proposals or recommendations which I have
approved. More specifically, I would like you to establish the
capability to view the Vietnamese situation in toto and present
a comprehensive and integrated picture for total CIA/DCI
considerations and actions.
3. In composing your permanent staff, I specifically wish
that you have the following specialties represented:
(1) a. psychological warfare,
b. counterintelligence and deception,
c. those military specialties relevant to the
nature of the war in Vietnam,
d. a political and possibly an economic analyst,
e. an analyst competent in the field of Soviet
and Chicom political and ideological affairs,
f. an officer of imagination and initiative in
Covert Action Affairs.
(2) Establish by name, specific liaison with all pertinent
parts of CIA and USIB.
You are authorized to have an executive officer, who shall also be your
deputy, and one additional officer, who both should be competent to
produce such special reports as your staff may itself originate, or, as
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CONFIDENTIAL
I may require of your staff. As your staff gets under way,
a few additional specialties, for which personnel may be
required, may identify themselves. Please advise me as this
takes place, and I shall decide the extent to which your staff
may or may not broaden its area of competences. It is of
course assumed that you will acquire sufficient secretarial
and clerical assistance for your initial staff, as well as
appropriate office space for this group. You may deal directly
with DDS in satisfying these needs. In satisfying your needs
for specialists, please work these matters out with the
Directorates or Offices concerned. Where any specific conflict
or difficulty should arise, please take it up with the Executive
Director or the DDCI.
4. In summation, I expect your staff to provide me with
a focal and coordinating point for all CIA activities concerned
with Vietnamese matters. I shall expect you to be familiar with
those reports, programs, and proposals regarding Vietnam that
are directed to me from within CIA, and to support me with
recommendations or derivative proposals as you may see fit.
Further, I shall expect you to anticipate problems and questions
concerning Vietnam that may be put to me by other elements of
the intelligence community or by the President or his advisors
and, insofar as possible, keep me at least one step ahead on
matters related to Vietnam.
5. In carrying out the duties I have generally outlined in
this memorandum, I shall expect that you will not insert yourself
in any existing lines of command, but shall carry out the tasks I
have assigned you through cooperation and coordination with existing
components, both within and without CIA. Given this approach,
other CIA components are enjoined to render full assistance to you
in carrying out these tasks in my behalf and recipients of this
memorandum will publicize it throughout their elements. As may
prove necessary, I shall accredit you as my Special Assistant for
Vietnamese Affairs to non-CIA elements with whom you must
establish contact.
W. F. RABORN
Director
Approved For Release : CIA- 1Q8-091 J"N0TJ 0 1262