NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011 TOP SECRET – Sensitive
within South Vietnam by actions against North Vietnam, actions which it had been hoped would lead to a unity within South Vietnam impossible under the current circumstances. There was a CAS report, for instance, of coup plotting on 24 July that said a decision had been made by the generals to remove Khanh, but that it was not clear who would replace him or whether the planned removal would be opposed. 109 / This was the same day that the Ambassador, who had scarcely been in Saigon a fortnight, had first protested to Khanh concerning his indiscreet remarks about a march to the north. The Ambassador also talked to Khanh, following the Mission Council meeting, concerning the rumors of a possible coup. Khanh said that because he (Taylor--i.e., the U.S) had imposed Minh on the MRC as Chief of State, and because of Minh's support of Generals Kim and Xuan and other partisans of French neutralist policies, Defense Minister Khiem and Chief of State Thieu were leading a group that was pressing Khanh to get rid of Minh. This Khiem block was permeated by Dai Viet political influence. Khanh asked Taylor if he should resign. Taylor said the USG could not contemplate the consequences of another change of government. Because no other leader was in sight, Khanh had our support and he must continue in the face of adversity. "Could we help?" Taylor inquired. Khanh asked that we let it be known that we wanted no more changes of government and asked Taylor to talk to Khiem and his supporters about the bad effects of politics in the armed forces. 110 /
One means of demonstrating U.S. support of Khanh was to let Khanh make the first announcement of increased U.S. aid, followed by a background statement by the Ambassador. To carry this out, the Ambassador submitted a draft statement for Khanh to use. One part of this draft statement mentioned the increase of U.S. military advisors and their extension "to the district level." When Taylor and Johnson discussed this with Khanh at Dalat two days later, Khanh saw advantages to the proclamation in general, but preferred to change the reference "advisors at the district level" to read "avisors throughout the provinces", because the original suggested an undesirably deep penetration of the GVN by the U.S. 111/
When Ambassador Taylor on 25 July reported further on Khanh's revival of the march to the north theme, he interpreted it as response to political and morale problems within South Vietnam. The Ambassador suggested several possible motivations, and commented that if Khanh had been reasonably sincere his objective probably was to:
…talk "march north" but really have in mind getting U.S. committed to program of reprisal bombing. Such a limited program could be first step to further escalation against Hanoi. 112 /
On 10 August, when the storm clouds had already appeared but before the gale had begun to blow, Ambassador Taylor filed his first monthly U.S. mission report. The report began by expressing surprise that the first sampling of advisor-level opinion revealed more
