NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011 TOP SECRET – Sensitive
There were many causes of the failure to establish and maintain an effective government. South Vietnam had never been a nation in spirit; a government which the people could call their own was new to them. Even now their instinct said any government was intrinsically their enemy. The people had long been divided by racial and religious differences which over the centuries their alien rulers had sought to perpetuate. No cement was present to bind together the heterogeneous elements of this society. Since the fall of Diem and the sudden removal of the restraints imposed by his dictatorial regime, the natural tendency to disunity and factionalism had been given free play; demonstrations, bonze immolations and military coups had been rife. These had produced the political turbulence of the last fifteen months.
The Ambassador closed his briefing by suggesting the possibility of increased activities in several areas:
a. improvement in training and mobility of existing forces;
b. establishment of priorities in the use of existing forces;
c. expansion of the' capacity of the training establishment;
d. means to give greater attractiveness to military service;
e. use of U.S. manpower to offset the present shortage in the Vietnamese armed forces;
f. use of U.S. Wavy resources to strengthen surveillance of coastal and inland waterways;
g. increased tempo for BARREL ROLL and ROLLING THUNDER;
h. expanded use of peoples action teams;
i. increased U.S. aid in combatting economic ills;
j. preparations to cope with the mounting refugee problem in central Vietnam;
k. improved procedures and equipment for resource control;
l. vitalization of public information programs, provision of a 250-kilowatt transmitter for Saigon; and
m. prompt response to all personnel requests supporting the U.S. mission. 138/
