Vietnam: An American Tragedy

...It is curious that the Communists, who have so little to offer, are so stubborn in pushing their wares and so adroit in their propaganda...

...That country is an American dilemma which is rapidly becoming an American tragedy, for there appears to be no way to bring satisfactory order out of its ever intensifying chaos...

...Their ultimate purpose is twofold: conquest of the entire underdeveloped world for Communism by exploiting the chaos they create...

...the purposeful, if flavorless bustle of modern industry epitomized by the Bundesrepublik...

...Perhaps it is because they know exactly what they want and we do not...

...The diffusion of the Communist movement serves humanity well...

...They have undoubtedly given a temporary fillip to the spirits of our friends in Southeast Asia, as well as temporarily assuaged the terrible frustration of American generals and admirals who, accustomed to commanding immensely superior forces, can devise no way to deploy our massively superior firepower effectively against guerrillas...

...But I cannot do so...

...Everyone is anxious to be done with South Vietnam's problems...

...At least they have not, as yet, resulted in "escalation...

...We must cut the supply lines from North Vietnam to South Vietnam by bombing the key communications centers in Laos—and, if necessary, use ground troops to block the columns of reinforcements and equipment that flow through the country...

...It is unlikely that the grand design of the Chinese will succeed in full, not because of its undeniable grandioseness and its transcendental ambitiousness, but chiefly because history mocks such sweeping projects...

...A Chinese victory in Vietnam, either military or diplomatic, would not only tick off Khrushchev...

...The United States simply cannot afford to step away from the present challenge, for the challenges that followed would be twice as great and many times more dangerous than those we now face...

...My correspondent is convinced that the Vietnamese Army simply cannot fight the guerrillas successfully and that we will, therefore, be forced to negotiate, granting the Communist-sponsored National Liberation Front participation in the government of South Vietnam...

...But it would be much more dangerous for the West if Mao Tsetung should succeed in his campaign to enthrone himself as the new overlord of revolutionary world Communism...

...The Russians have been forced to dissociate themselves from Peking by the reckless equanimity with which the Chinese faced, and even gloried in, the danger that their deliberate efforts to create chaos might inadvertently result in a major conflict between the two nuclear powers...

...PERSPECTIVES Vietnam: An American Tragedy By Robert S. Elegant After reporting on Vietnam for more than 10 years, the last five dealing with a drama that has remained the same through various changes in the cast, one would dearly like to compose a final, definitive article...

...Recognizing that our vital interests are at stake, we must act in a manner abhorrent to American instincts and exercise greater and more direct control over both political and military affairs in Vietnam...

...For our success or failure there will demonstrate whether the United States can still adapt itself to new challenges with a vigor comparable to that with which it faced down the Communist threat in Europe and turned back Stalinist militarism in Korea...

...We must force Cambodia to close its borders to Communist units...

...Because we seem unable to meet the challenge it poses, we are diminished materially and morally...

...Perhaps it is because they care deeply and we do not...

...We must reconcile ourselves to fighting a war of containment against the guerrillas, though it will take at least five years before their resolution even begins to weaken...

...It is therefore no wonder that the American government and the American people are longing for a single plan that will bring quick victory...

...There is no reason—even if there were any effective means— for us to support him against China in his struggle to restore his former authority...

...And the chances seem to be at least even that Mao Tse-tung will be proved right—if the United States fails to check the southward progress of Communist domination...

...The objective of this challenge is to make us abandon vital interests and vital areas by persuading us, first, that they are indefensible and, second, that they are, after all, not terribly important...

...Although neither of these trends is irreversible, they are now so pronounced that it would be an exceedingly difficult task to reverse them...

...Sheer human impatience, as well as the judgment of military staffs, was undoubtedly behind the recent decision to bomb North Vietnamese naval bases in reprisal for attacks on American destroyers...

...Above all, we need to recognize that we may never win a clear-cut victory in South Vietnam and that, in any event, results will be painfully slow and distressingly meager...

...Robert S. Elegant, Newsweek correspondent in the Far East for many years, is the author of The Center of the World (Doubleday...

...The Chinese Communists, by no means secretive, have revealed that they seek nothing less than the conquest of the entire underdeveloped world—Asia, Africa and Latin America—by a combination of military and political tactics based upon the strategy that won them victory in China itself...

...It would also enlist powerful new forces in the array he commands...

...It would be gratifying to say: "This is the way it is...

...and isolating the "capitalist" world of Western Europe, North America, Japan, and the Antipodes by surrounding it with a hostile, Communist-controlled hinterland...

...The conflict in that country has, in a most direct sense, become a confrontation between Peking and Washington, despite the fact that both fight through proxies...

...The formal challenge, pressed by conventional political, economic and military means, has been overcome...

...With the two bright exceptions of the Korean War and the emergency in Malaya, the West has consistently failed to hold against Communist expansion in Asia...

...We seem to have gotten away with those bombings...

...This is what should be done...

...even the startling and encouraging metamorphosis occurring in nations which can no longer be called mere "satellites"—none approaches the immediate urgency that Vietnam holds for both the United States and the Communist world...

...But we must not yield to the Communist campaign which seeks to convince us that we cannot defend South Vietnam...

...But the bombings can have no real effect upon the outcome of the conflict in South Vietnam, except for stimulating Mao Tse-tung to accelerate his campaign to take full control of Laos...

...I have just had a letter from a correspondent who is the most acute observer writing from the Far East today...

...Negotiation is undoubtedly a quick way to end the agony of the South Vietnamese and our own troops...

...What can the United States do in South Vietnam...

...The erosion of Khrushchev's control over the international Communist movement and the slow liberalization of life in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe have, without question, radically decreased the danger of either nuclear war or further Communist expansion in Europe...

...It is a long jump from the conquest of South Vietnam to the conquest of the entire underdeveloped world—and an even longer jump to the collapse of capitalism...

...The establishment of Peking as the new center of an aggressive "proletarian" force would be disastrous...

...In this case, it is also impossible to negotiate away South Vietnam without simultaneously negotiating away American influence in Southeast Asia—in other words, Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia...

...The partial answer, which is the only answer that can be offered, is almost as unpleasant as the circumstances themselves...

...So far, the SinoSoviet quarrel has worked in the interests of greater freedom, both for the former satellites and for the people of the Soviet Union itself...

...On the other hand, the United States, with so much to offer, is sadly inept in Asia...

...Since there is no way for us to withdraw without abandoning essential interests, we must remain...

...The outcome of the conflict in Vietnam is thus particularly significant...

...This failure stands in marked contrast to our general success in Europe...

...Against his will, if not wholly against his inclinations, Nikita Khrushchev has to grant greater scope of action to the non-Soviet Communist parties and greater liberty of expression together with greater economic benefits to the people of the Soviet Union...

...I am writing on a terrace set amid fir trees looking down on the sunlit Mediterranean from a hillside in Majorca, after spending the last few months journeying through West Germany and Eastern Europe...

...The best we can hope for is to contain Communist expansion by a stalemate—and that end is highly desirable...

...But Mao's success in forcing the United States to withdraw would, nonetheless, go a very long way toward convincing the resentful men of Africa, Asia and Latin America that his grand strategy will ultimately triumph...

...it would also demonstrate to the underdeveloped world that the Maoist strategy will conquer the world...

...The Chinese strategy also threatens to impose unpredictable but dangerous retrogression upon the Communist world...

...If we continue to fail in Asia, the brief Pax Americana— which has preserved the world from major conflict since 1945 and which is rapidly becoming a Pax Russica as well—will be at an end...

...And to add: "I shall speak no more, for I have no more to say...

...The great landlocked sea, whose waters nourished the growth of Western civilization...

...Finally, we must use counter-guerrilla forces in North Vietnam to weaken Ho Chi Minh's hold and reduce his ability to harass the South...

...They were too little if they were intended to alter the course of the guerrilla war, and too much if they were simply intended to assure the safety of our destroyers, which presumably can take care of themselves...

...As for the second half, even this "hard-nosed" observer concedes that the lesson read Ho Chi Minh will have no practical effect in South Vietnam...

...In South America, in the Congo, in the Indonesian assault upon Malaysia, and in Vietnam and Laos, the Chinese Communists are now seeking their goals by supporting violence...

...A decisive victory for Moscow, with Peking crushed, is almost the last thing we should desire...

...As a general rule, however, it is impossible to negotiate from utter weakness...

...If Mao Tse-tung is right, the fate of the Mediterranean countries, all of Europe, and the United States will be dominated in good part by the tidal waves that will follow from his ultimate conquest of South Vietnam...

...Unfortunately, history has little time for nations that do not know their own purposes...

...If we feel that these sacrifices are too high, we must undertake the protracted struggle necessary to maintain a protracted stalemate...

...Although readers may feel there is indeed little more to be said, I am irresistibly drawn back to the unhappy nation which has become one of the central issues of our time...

...These are the limitations and the possibilities...

...It remains to be seen whether we can now sustain the unconventional challenge of diffuse guerrilla forces...

...The Sino-Soviet split may have given the United States an unexpected, if grudging, ally in keeping the peace, but it has also destroyed any Russian capacity to restrain the Chinese...

...Still, the Chinese strategy, however far it may ultimately fall short of its goals, imperils the United States...

...But let us also reconcile ourselves to the eclipse of the Western position in Southeast Asia, with the outlying districts called Japan and India sure to follow in time...

...The victory is undeniably ours west of the Urals: Although we have not destroyed the enemy, we have contributed importantly to the present slow metamorphosis of European Communism...

...The new trends have, as the military would put it, not only diminished the Communists' capability, but have also weakened their will...

...Sacrifice is, after all, the price of greatness, and the quality of a nation is not assessed in terms of deepfreezes, computers, and television spectaculars...

...He contends that the bombings were essential to protect our naval units, and further that they will disabuse Ho Chi Minh of the notion that the United States is a "paper tiger.'' I must disagree with the first half of this thesis on the grounds that there is something wrong if major naval units are not competent to protect themselves against the attacks of motor torpedo boats...

...The popular judgment is correct in holding that a stalemate is the best we can hope for in South Vietnam, but it is wrong in feeling that a stalemate would be a disaster...

...We must, in short, openly commit our forces as deeply as our vital interests are already committed in South Vietnam...

...It would not be in the interests of the United States to see Khrushchev's control over international Communism restored to what it once was...

...Peking is convinced that its "inevitable success" in the first endeavor will ineluctably result in the collapse of "rotten, exploitative capitalism," when it is isolated from its markets and its sources of raw material...

...Taxed by the flow of lives and treasure—and above all, by growing frustration—official Washington appears to be in a mood to resolve the problem by one bold stroke or, failing that, by negotiation as soon as "the military situation has been recouped sufficiently to restore our bargaining position.' Any solution appears preferable to no solution—even if it abandons those very interests, vaguely defined as they have always been, which dictated our original commitment...

...If we are convinced that no American interest in Southeast Asia is worth the protracted agony of seeking to contain the guerrillas, then by all means let us put the best face we can upon the retreat...

...It is precisely such a position Mao is seeking to create by pressing the offensive in South Vietnam...