NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011 TOP SECRET – Sensitive
A public controversy on the subject was touched off by an article filed in Saigon on 15 August 1963 by David Halberstam of the New York Times. The Halberstam article said that the RVN military situation in the Delta had deteriorated seriously over the past year, and was getting increasingly worse. The VC had been increasing greatly in number, were in possession of more and better arms and had larger stores of them, and their boldness to operate in large units -- up to 600 or even 1,000 men -- had become marked. The VC weapon losses were down and the GVN weapon losses were up. U.S. military men and civilian officials in the field, according to this article, were reported to be very apprehensive of the effect of all this upon the Strategic Hamlet Program, and the whole future of GVN control in the Delta was in doubt. But, it was hinted strongly, higher echelon authorities were unwilling to perceive the dangers. "Some long-time observers are comparing official American optimism about the Delta to the French optimism that preceded France's route from Indochina in 1954. They warn of "high-level self-deception."
The official refutation of the Halberstam article, prepared for the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs by SACSA, categorically denied everything. Based upon what it termed "the most reliable and accurate data available from both classified and unclassified sources" the analysis showed, in the language of its summary, that "the military situation is improving throughout the Republic of Vietnam, not as rapidly in the Mekong Delta as in the North, but improving markedly none the less. The picture is precisely the opposite of the one painted by Mr. Halberstam." 15/ In the body of the refutation, 13 of the principle changes in the Halberstam article were analyzed, one-by-one, and battered by an array of percentages, statistics presented both tabularly and in graphs, and all of the numbers were very impressive and persuasive if taken at face value. They showed, for instance, that the VC armed attacks and VC initiated incidents (not armed), in mid-summer 1963 were below the 1962 average, that the average net weekly loss of GVN weapons to the VC had fallen from 62 in 1961 to 12 in 1962 to only 6 of 1963, and that the rate of both company-sized and battalion-sized VN attacks had fallen markedly, in 1963 from the 1962 level.
Generalizations about how the different groups, agencies, and echelons sided on the issue of the Vietnam situation tend to over-simplify because however they are made, there are exceptions. Most of the senior officers in-field in the direct line of operational responsibility tended to accept the more optimistic interpretation. Examples in this category would include CINCPAC (Admiral Felt), COMUSMACV (General Harkins), Ambassador Nolting (who was soon to be replaced, however, by Ambassador Lodge, who tended to be less optimistic), and CIA Station Chief Richardson. Nolting and Richardson had been charged to develop a close and friendly relationship with Diem, and this involved necessarily a special sort of sympathy for his outlook. The lives of most senior officers charged with operating responsibility have been pointed to giving leadership in situations
