THE FUTURE OF THE ANTI-VCI EFFORT IN SOUTH VIETNAM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80R01720R001100070020-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 8
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 8, 2004
• Sequence Number: 20
• Publication Date: November 9, 1971
• Content Type: MEMO

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MEMORANDUM
9 November 1971
SUBJECT: The Future of the Anti-VCI Effort in South Vietnam
1. Recent communications from MACV indicate that the US
Command there is in the process of reexamining the Phung Hoang
program. While this action was anticipated, the proposed phase out
should precipitate a thorough review of the program's objectives and
in South Vietnam, the proposed new organization and structure of the
anti-VCI effort should be examined carefully so that its capabilities
parallel the demands that will be placed on it.
2. The current plan prepared by MACV would transfer "national
level responsibility for the full anti-VCI effort to the National Police,
including Police Special Branch, on a time-phased basis... ". This
plan is in general agreement with the recommendations of Sir Robert
Thompson; both as applies to his lengthy report on the situation and
with respect to his current (October 1971) opinion on the matter.
3. If the program currently is distorted and ineffective as the
MACV says it is, then there are few who would argue strongly for re:.-en-
tion of the program as it is presently constituted. There also appear,
however, to be several shortcomings in the proposed changes: (1) Not
all of the purposes of the Phoenix/Phung Hoang program were made
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study conducted, particularly when, (2) few currently on the staff of
M.ACV have a tenure sufficient to recall the evolution of the program or
its implicit objectives.
4. Of the implicit themes that were embodied in the Phung
Hoang program, two remain significant to our objectives in South
Vietnam. The first was a coordination effort--thus the name of the
program's immediate predecessor, Intelligence Coordination and
Exploitation (ILEX)--that was believed necessary due to the plethora of
military, paramilitary, and paracivilian organizations loose in South
Vietnam's countryside. Each of these organizations had more or
less independent command structures and were sources of intelligence
on the VCI'even though more often than not they lacked any formalized
intelligence structure. Coordination was necessary not only to ration-
alize the collection of intelligence but also to feed it into a place where
some action could be taken on the basis of it. The coordination pro-
cedures that would succeed the Phung H'oang structure have not been
spelled out.
5. The situation in the countryside of South Vietnam remains
essentially the same in the sense that the penchant of the GVN--abetted
by us to some degree--for overlaying one organization on another has
not been altered. It appears that there will be a continuing need to
coordinate intelligence gathering and, in some cases more importantly,
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receives an appropriate share. It is by no means clear that the phase-
out proposal treats this need in an adequate way.
6. The second theme implicit in the development of the Phoenix/
Phung Hoang program dealt with the inertia problem. It was.known
that at the district level there was considerable reluctance to pursue
the non-military elements of the insurgency with the remorseless
efficiency needed to do the job. It was also known that the problem
could not be cured at the distruct level but that pressure had to be applied
from the top down. With this need in mind, an advisory effort was ini-
tiated to stimulate a national level program, with appropriate coordina-
tion at ministry levels, and a presidential-level push that would motivate
some action. Ultimately this advisory effort was effective; producing at
first only directives that no one paid much attention to, but subsequently
a program that with all of its shortcomings at least worked. It is believed
that part of the reason why the inertia that pervaded all levels of the GVN
was finally overcome lies in their realization that we thought it to be
important. Our parallel structure, our resources, our command empha-
sis combined to impress upon the GVN the importance of the anti-VCI
program to a successful conclusion of the war. It is feared that aban-
donment of the program by the US will bring forth an equivalent action on
the part of the South Vietnamese. The proposed arrangements do not
provide for any continuing momentum.
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7. In the purposes of discussion, we can assume that the
National Police command is currently incapable of implementing, let
alone managing, the program at the present time. The MACV proposal
attempts to asuage this difficulty by time-phasing the changeover in
responsibility; essentially transferring responsibility on a district-
by-district, province-by-province basis until the tasking of the National
Police is complete. This process, however, obviously only defers the
problem unless thereois an appropriate improvement in National Police
performance in the interim period. Moreover, the very fact that respon-
sibility is somewhat vague and ambiguous throughout the transition period
may effect irrevocable damage to the momentum of the program.
8. A critical point in.the proposed changes concerns the ad-
visory role of the US, both in the motivational and the operational sense.
With regard to the latter role, it is ecpected that the major burden of
the anti-VCI effort will fall to the Police Special Branch under the as-
sumption that they are in general more competent and in particular more
familiar with the task at hand. The fact remains that the Police Special
Branch.is not at this time capable of taking over the problem either.
This consideration is not really altered by the additional 7, 000 Special
Branch recruits which are to be taken into the program over the next
year wince they will take some time to acquire the required skills.
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9. In the past, the dominant advisory role of the CIA within
the Police Special Branch has been said to have been to develop the
skills needed to exploit the VCI for intelligence. The study then says
that there is another phase to the attack on the infrastructure, that which
might be characterized as an action phase. Thus the paper sees two
roles for the Special Police, but only one role for Special Police ac-
tivities: This consideration inevitably raises the question of feasibility
at the working level. What influence will the Special Branch intelligence
advisor have, with his by the nature of things low budget, when the "name
of the game" within the Special Branch will be the action phase of neu-
tralization? Accordingly, it can be expected that the significance and
effectiveness of the CIA advisory program will drop. In fact, it is very
likely that the MACV proposal as it now stands will rapidly make the CIA
advisory role untenable, or, at best, a useless appendage. The proposed
transfer of responsibility will, then, have a serious effect not only on the
motivational role that the US played but also on the advisory role, since
the operation of the attack on the VCI will essentially be devoid of any
effective advisory effort other than the holdover from CIA's relationship
with the Police Special Branch.
10. The original concept of Phung Hoang saw no dichotomy be-
tween the VCI as an intelligence target and as an action target. VCI
were to be targetted (1) for recruitment, (2) for defection, (3) for capture,
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and (4) inadvertent neutralization. In practice, no precise lines could
be drawn but two general types of activity did emerge. That against high
level VCI intelligence targets (who were normally not vulnerable to action
operations) and low level VCI action targets (who normally did not possess
intelligence of value).
11. Proposals
The following proposals are premised on several observations
regarding the situation in South Vietnam:
(a) the effectiveness of the VCI has deteriorated more rapidly'
than its numerical strength. If, however, we decrease
the pressure on the VCI, a window will open through which
a renewed insurgency will emerge.
(b) the VCI problem, at least in the short-run, appears man-
ageable in most areas of the country. The principal ex-
ception--a crucial one--is the southern half of MRI and
the northern half of MRII. The proposed withdrawal of
US advisory support, therefore, would not have a dele-
terious effect throughout the country. It is probable that,
operationally, the Vietnamese can handle the VCI structure
in most of the countryside.
(c) the areas in which the VCI still pose a significant threat
are ones in which much of the anti-VCI effort maintains
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nominally in the hands of the National Police, a close
alliance with the various elements of the armed forces
is necessary to get anything done.
(d) the CIA advisory effort would have to be expanded sub-
stantially so that its input would cover not only the exist-
ing intelligence aspects of the Police Special Branch but
also the operating aspects of the National Police as an
anti-VCI action agency. This poses several problems,
of which two are immediate. First, whatever size the
CIA advisory might enlarge to, the CIA cannot provide
an official US committment to the program. This can be
done effectively only by an overt, official part of the US
government. Second, if the CIA advisory effort is ex-
panded into the police operational field, an undue exposure
will undoubtedly result. It would appear unlikely that this
would due much good in the public relations sense for either
the US government or the GVN.
Under these assumptions, it would appear that the current MACV
proposal courts some serious risks in the area of long-run impact on the
course of the war. Most of these risks, however, can readily be avoided
if the following steps are taken:
(1) a MACV anti-VCI staff of appropriate rank is retained.
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(2) US advisory support all the way to district level is re-
tained in the southern MRl and northern MRZ areas
where the VGI remain a problem. Under the circum-
stances, it is likely that US military advisors would be
the most appropriate.
(3) that the Phoenix/Phung Hoang term be dropped from
the US side--retained by the GVN if they so desire--
and a new term for the anti-VCI/Pacification effort in
the MRl-MR2 impact area be coined.
(4) That serious consideration be given for a long-term
(3-6 years) input of US military advisory personnel to
the National Police. This would have the advantage of
providing a continuity not generally available to USAID
projections and would also permit the insertion of CIA
personnel where this was deemed appropriate.
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