MOSCOW, HANOI'S OFFENSIVE, AND THE SUMMIT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79B01737A002000010047-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 10, 2005
• Sequence Number: 47
• Content Type: MEMO

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MEMORANDUM
SUBJECT: Moscow, Hanoi's Offensive, and the Summit
Two basic factors must underlie any analysisof Soviet
interventions in Vietnam. Fi ^t, the USSR wants to see the
North triumph over the South. It believes that such an
outcome would be a major blow to its imperialist rival and would
give a strong push to Communist interests, most particularly
in Indochina but also on a global scale as well. Conversely,
some decisive Southern victory in the conflict would be
felt as an important setback to Soviet interests, given
the
high degree of Soviet commitment and support to Hanoi's cause.
Yet this proposition must be qualified. The USSR does
not attach the same overriding priority to the struggle as
does 'he DRV. In 1954 the Soviets worked out a deal with
the French which fell well short of North Vietnam's objectives;
by 1964 Khrushchev was all but ignoring,the area. His
ro V164%
successors ha etruer and more consistent allies, but--
even given the interests shared on the two sides--they can
i
hardly be expected to subordinate all their international
concefns to this single problem.
The second proposition is that Soviet room for maneuver is
limited. It is dealing, not with a puppet, but with a distant
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independent client to which, in the Communist context,it has
obligations of some weight. Furthermore, this client has,
in China, another patron which is eager to pillory the Soviet
Union for any faltering in its support and gives military
and economic aid of its own. The Soviets should derive some
leverage from their position as supplier of complex, advanced
weapons, but even here the Chinese could confound their
attempts to apply this leverage by replacing them in this
field as well, albeit incompletely and with difficulty.
Lastly, the North Vietnamese themselves are immensely
jealouyo of their independence ~an they^work their relations
with their two big supporters assiduousl not only to
maximize the aid, but also to minimize the influence of the
45X1
Soviets feel a special obligation to help in the air a en
of North Vietnam, as a socialist state under bombing by
the imperialists. As for military supplies intended for use in
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the South, the bulk are by now routinely supplied, and
beyond this Moscow is anxious to help the DRV overcome
the advantage in modern weapons which the other side has
enjoyed. Hanoi for its part probably submits its aid requests
with a minimum of explanations. The North Vietnamese
are loath/ to be drawn into the kinds of consultations which
might grow into joint planning, lest they find themselves
caught up in a bargaining relationship with the USSR. The
Soviets can draw many conclusions from the kinds and volume
of aid requested, plus intelligence from thi
people in
North Vietnam, but they have no satisfactory mechanism for
advising on strategy and tactics--that is, on matters beyond
those; affecting training in and use of their equipment.
And they recognize that, given Hanoi's sensitivities and
its Pe i king option, they would be treading on delicate ground if
they nought to intrude into this sphere.
r
Xf these views are correct, then it is likely that over
the last two years or so, and particularly after the DRV's heavy
losses, of equipment in Lam Son 719, the Soviet Union has been
delivering to North Vietnam the large shipments of pons
S T~.vrC
and supplies being used in the present offensive. ,A'~number
of mi]'itary aid agreements have been announced during this
period, including one in y-urn--crf 1971, another
in t and the most recent in December (the
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Chinese have kept pace throughout with similar announcements
25X1
Moscow would
clearly have been aware that Hanoi was accumulating larger
in
y'CAP'c bY'~ than normal of tanks, for example, and long-
range artillery. This process almost certainly began before the
Soviets were aware of the President's planned visit to Peking,
and before their own summit was scheduled. The Soviets could
easily infer that the North Vietnamese were preparing for
large-scale conventional action, which would occur during
a dry season. They told as much, but they
were probably not informed of Hanoi's detailed plans for
a multi-front offensive, including its timing.
When, with tis buildup in rocess, summit diplomacy
t - i^. a ate. I-,.. u'n Warr , 1;
begain to develop fire in Peking and
then in Moscow, the Soviets must have had to consider the
relationship between their diplomacy and the Vietnam war. They
may have thought, while secret US-North Vietnamese negotiations
were going on, that a settlement was in view which would abort
the coming offensive. If so, they could readily have foreseen an
orchestration of such a settlement with their own ..,,
diplomacy. In any event, this option disappeared in November,
and their task then became how to relate what they knew of
Hanoi's military plans to the May summit.
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Moscow coud foresee several outcomes. First, t
North Vietname e might score a, big victory, of a scope to
have major repercussions on South Vietnam's stability. This
would not only be welcome for its own sake but, they would
reason, would put them at an advantage vis-a-vis the
President in Moscow. It would strengthen their general global
position for the summit bargaining and, in any discussion of
Vietnameire the US to be the supplicant. It would thus
be all to the good, unless the US reacted so negatively as to
postpone or cancel the summit. And the Soviets would see some
benefits even in this reaction, in that they would anticipate
a weakening of the President's domestic position and electoral
chances plus a major opportunity to cast the US in the role of
the saboteur of detente.`tIt is possible to argue that these
advantages are so great that the USSR s hoped that a North
Vietnamese offensive would provoke the US to put off the
summit, and ,dm's even contrived to arrange matters to this end.
Putting aside for the moment the question of its ability to
control events in this fashion, it is doubtful that Moscow sees
tis as the preferred outcome. Its interest ina successful summit
is substantial. It has a stake of some import in certain bilateral
matters, especially arms control and trade. It has an interest
r p
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in improved US-USSR relations as the centerpiece of a detente
campaign which is meant to forward its interests in Western
Europe. Most important of all, it is deeply concerned not to
encourage the rapprochement between its major antagonists,
0, G1Vt
China and the US, to a stage of Vanti-Soviet cooperation, a
contingency to which the Soviets have shown themselves
acutely sensitive. Lastly they could have no assurance that
Hanoi would not lose the battle, with the consequences
described below.
Second,.the North Vietnamese might suffer a major defeat.
This would clearly be a.bad outcome. Its only virtue, from
the Soviet standpoint, would be to deflate the importance of
the Vietnam issue as a problem in Soviet-US relations, thus
leaving more time for the bilateral matters which are Moscow's
primary incentive for a summit. But if this defeat had been
accompanied by heavy US bombing of the North, the Soviets would
have a hard time justifying any summit at all. This this
outcome could be a double defeat for the USSR..
Third, the battle could be indecisive. This would be,
in terms of summit considerations along, an undesirable result,
since!Vietnam would ten play an even larger role in the Soviet US
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encounter, but without any new strength on the Communist
Fourth, as a special case of the third possibility, the
otcome might be not only indecisive but hotly contested at the
time of the summit itself. This would run the major risk
of the first case--a US postponement or cancellation--and
would put Moscow under pressure to do the same. If the
summit nonetheless took place, this.situation would almost
guarantee that Vietnam would dominate them And Vietnam,
to the Soviets, is the wrong issue for this meeting.
All these considerations, however, are rather beside
the point if one accepts that there was little which the USSR
could do about the North Vietnamese offensive anyway. We
believe this to be the case. The Soviets have long been
committed to the military support of North Vietnam, and they
probakly began to be committed to the aid which lies behind
the present offensive before they arranged the Moscow summit.
For the Politburo, it would have been a momentous decision
to change course in the latter part of 1971. Supporters of a
summit would have had the greatest difficulty in mustering
a majority behind the proposition that North Vietnam should
be pressed to call off its offensive and, failing that,
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be sacrificed to the hoped for gains available under improved
Soviet-American relations. In fact, it is doubtful that they
would have prevailed, especially since it would have been
argued that Hanoi would not have turned aside from its plane
in any event, while prospects for tAls success would diminish ]
However the individual Soviet leaders appraised the situation,
it would be uncharacteristic of the present leadership, which
is closer to a collective than to the Khrushchevian model, to
consider such radical alternatives.
In sum, the Soviets, through their long commitment to
North Vietnam and the momentum of their military aid program,
probably began to underwrite the present offensive without
being;fully consulted on Hanoi's specific intentions and
before the summit was in view. They see dangers to their
interests in the way in which Vietnam and the summit have
become related, but the alternatives available to them as
this relationship developed were even more unpalatable. As
a
of now, they want both a North Vietnamese victory and
s,
~Ad' ert ~n ~ .?. ~: J? 4.P.~CY CCa o a }J "'~l Y
rrd-thebape-tl~a-thesedo-no-t-pure ~ncampatib-lc:
summit,
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