EUROPEANS BELIEVE THAT UNITED STATES HAS DECIDED TO BACK DOWN IN SOUTHEAST ASIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP66B00403R000200150018-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 29, 2004
• Sequence Number: 18
• Publication Date: June 23, 1964
• Content Type: OPEN

 Approvect
Ow0n/OAIow-000200150018-3
1. The Swiss newspaper Tribune of Lau-
sanne, June 6, 1964:,:g
+Tiii 'UNITED STATES IIAS oat. OVYfLkb t,`lf'1'i;Ir
8167' e WAYi Y1! v4 tAfii
"T 6. possibility of engaging in operations
against North ietnam; in order to cut the
Vietcong supply lines, has been rejected in
view,of_the if involved.'* For the mo-
ment it is, necessary to continue to fight the
Viet.:on~ insurrections. 'For the moment'
means; without ` d'd t, until the " American
elections , after which negotiations will' be
possible-negotiations which the United
States wants to oonduct, granted, from a pos-
ition of strength. But one notices, neverthe-
less, that Washington now seems once and
for all' to "have"give n up the idea of carrying
the war beyond the frontiers of Vietnam."
2. The Paris newspaper Le Monde of June
6, 1964 (commenting on` "the U.N. Security
Council vote pn the Cambodian complaint) :
"The' United Nations vote on Cambodia has
less importance than the speech in which
Mr. Stevenspn exposed. in even clearer terms
certain intentions of American policy in
Indochina. :Theepresentative com-
plained that" the Security Council had not
adopted the American" proposal and had not
decided to send the 'blue helmets' to,patrol
the Cambodian-South Vietnamese frontier.
* ? f At the same time, Mr. Stevenson noted
that the resolution does provide for the send-
.lug of a commission of three members to
Cambodia and'/ietnam:to examine the situa-
tionon the spot. This can be a beginning;
said Stevenson. * * * Mr Stevenson also de-
clared that the reservations of certain coun-
tries toward a U.N. intervention in anarea
`
like southeast Asia are understandable, but
that the fundamental task of the U.N. is the
safeguarding of peace and it must extend
itself tq ,aii ei'eas of t'he world.
' "In other words, the U.S. U.N. chief
has of9cially admitted that from now
oil 4his: country " will try with ever greater
insistence, to obtain a `U.N. intervention, not
only in the relatively minor affair of the
Saigon- Cambodian conflict; but in the in-
finitely more complex civil war in South
Vietnam."
8. Le Monde again, June 7, 1964:
"In an pleotion period any problem' settled,
even, badly, is a trump for the administra-
tion. Xn a_ period of detente and of a search-
along the Kennedy lines-for areas ofrap-
prochement with the V S SR., any negoti-
atton.whigll auce eds. ,s useful in Itself.
The Axner1can .people have no interest
In a faraway war and the current President
sees It rather ,as a source pf vborxy which
would be ;ouch better ay6lded in aT} election
year, than as a front to maintain, cost what
it will. P ozn t,440
fact"c. tnga t'he impression
that the eiiota;Bnade y the Honolulu Con-
ference to del o,pstxate the . 'deteFmi etlon'
of the ;4ineric.ai s lap,.lc, ,_conyictlon, and so
Washington is: looking fora way out through
the United.Nations. T sie is meraly a camou-
flaged retreat, and there is no reason for
those who believe In it to be olne indignant
at the .French proposition for neutraliza-
tion."
"Neutralization " of course, Is the French
prescription for an Indochina settlement and
it is strongly backed by such influential
commentators ag Walter Lippmann. Since
the United States now seems to be moving
in this direction it is well to examine the
French-Lippmann thesis.
In essence, the argument maintains that
the United States cap disengage from. the
mainland of southeast Asia without. the
area falling under Chinese Communist con-
trol, This hypothesis rests upon the com-
forting assumptions that (a) China- is so
preoccupledwithRussis that she has o in-
A3425
swung to the philosophical viewpoint that
Communist nations as such -are not dan-
gerous or worthy of opposition so long as
they are semi-independent of Moscow or
Peiping, or if they do not engage too overtly
in the spread of revolution. If Washington
itself no longer takes the official position that
communism itself is evil and contrary to the
basic interests and aspirations of mankind,
it Is less and less likely that the people of
target countries will think so either. There
will be no effective counter to Communist
propaganda and, as a consequence, Com-
munist rule through parliamentary ma-
neuver and even through the ballot box will
become more likely. Communism will be-
come increasingly respectable. This is a
major objective of the strategy of peaceful
coexistence.
On the other hand, a U.S. military defeat
in southeast Asia, resulting in a further
geographical loss to communism will make it
appear even more inevitable.
What may very well happen, then, is that
both of the psychological pillars which have
previously served as barriers to Communist
expansion; namely: (1) That it was an evil,
inherently aggressive force and (2) that it
would be successfully resisted by U.S. power,
will be swept away. The way will be opened
for a tidal wave which could rapidly over-
whelm the last barriers of Western civiliza-
tion, leaving the field of history to a final,
infinitely bloody contest between the Soviet
and Chinese brands of totalitarian commu=
nism for the mastery of the world.
The President has chosen to emphasize
peace as our goal in southeast Asia as well
as in all the world. Well and good, but
peace can never be successfully purchased
at the price of liberty. When peace is
placed above liberty, liberty is surely lost
and in the long run peace as well. When
liberty is placed above peace and the Nation
so placing it enjoys superiority of strength
over the Nation which would deny liberty,
then both liberty and peace are preserved.
FRANK J. JOHNSON,
Foreign Editor.
SPEECH
OF
HON. OREN HARRIS
OF ARKANSAS
IN TEE HOUSE. OF REPRESENTATIVES
Mr. IX4RRIS. Mr. Speaker, I want to
join in the sentiments expressed by the.
Members of the House on the death of
Clarence S. Lea, one of our former col-
leagues.
Clarence, as he was affectionately
known, served as a Representative in the
Congress from California's First District
for 32 years. I had the very great priv-
ilege of serving on the Interstate and
Foreign Commerce Committee under the
chairmanship of Mr. Lea during the 78th
and 79th Congresses. During the 80th
Congress, he was the ranking minority
Member and at the end of that Congress
he retired after 32 years of service.
Clarence Lea presided over the Com-
mittee on Interstate and Foreign Com-
merce with the same nonpartisanship
which led both parties in his district to
give him their endorsement.
stability on her souther frontier. 1l~~uis r. is per-
she will be satisfied withii V tea ~ ~p~ed t~eatYF(i~ff w OR&~'4~ ft-htl qualified
Ity in the area and will do nothing to sup- events. On the one hand, Washington has him to be a legislator. His patience and
port subsequent Communist takeovers of
the neutralized states of Indochina. This
will be especially true if American carriers
are still patrolling the coasts (the me-
chanics of this one. are left quite vague) ;
(b) Even if this view is overly optimistic
Communist regimes in southeast Asia will
certainly be independent and therefore not
dangerous because of the historical enmity
of these peoples toward China.
Until quite recently Washington did not
even begin to buy. this argument. Every
serious Asian expert understands that it Is
nonsense on both counts, because (a) the
nature of the Sino-Soviet dispute compels
China to try and prove her case by extend-
ing communism by means of her more ag-
gressive methods, and (b) sheer economic
necessity drives China to try and solve her
-food problem by seizing control of the un-
derpopulated rice surplus areas in southeast
Asia. Whatever the nationalist feelings of
'the Indochinese Communists might be,
the sheer power of modern China is irre-
sistible. unless the protection of the United
States is extended to the non-Communist
Asian peoples.
This is why Secretary McNamara made
his very realistic speech on the stakes in-
volved last March (see Washington Report
.64-15). This is why we were resolved, up
to now, to fight in this area. And this is
certainly why, up to now, we did not sug-
gest any U.N. intervention. There are an
infinite number of reasons why U.N. inter-
- vention is not compatible with' determined
resistance to communism.
The steadily deteriorating military situa-
tion In South Vietnam, however, capped by
the most recent Communist advance in Laos,
forced the United States at last to the ugly
alternatives which we had sought desperately
to'avoid. The Vietnamese, themselves, can-
not realistically be expected to fight end-
lessly if there is no prospect of victory.
Either we must attempt to force the Com-
munists to desist from their aggression by
punishing their homeland, as the Joint
Chiefs of Staff unanimously recommended in
March, or we must accommodate ourselves to
the prospect of their ultimate victory. We
have already cried' "wolf" too many times,
to no permanent avail. Plans were indeed
prepared for the carrying out of these threats,
but it would- now seem from a careful read-
ing between the lines of the multitude of
vague, ambiguous, and contradictory U.S.
statements that the European assessment is
certainly correct and that President John-
son is unable to bring himself to an exten-
sion of the war. This is the implication of
his specific disavowal, at his press conference
on June 2, 1964, of any plan to carry the war
to the North.
In, reaching this decision, President John
son presumably understands the conse-
quences, but he is in large part imprisoned
by the fatal policy of detente and accommo-
dation which now determines our actions
toward the Communist nations. A larger war
in Asia would fly directly in the face of this
policy; it would be repugnant to almost all
of our allies and to many of our own people
who have been infected by the false notion
that Communists generally are changing and
may no longer be interested in spreading
their doctrine over the world.
Still, politics requires that the situation in
Vietnam be held together at least through
the November elections. There may still be
time for the American people to soberly re-
flect on the consequences of a U.S. "disen-
gagement" from Vietnam, no matter how the
pill is sugar coated, and to register their
opinions. This is why it is so important to