Page:Pentagon-Papers-Part IV. A. 5.djvu/350

Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3 NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011  Comments

Here are some additional thoughts:

a. President Diem said that Hit hadn't been for the dedicated anti-communism of about a million Catholics, Vietnam could never have kept going this long. Yet his brother, Archbishop Thuc, told me that the refugees from the north (inc1uding many Catholics) had been settled into such remunerative new lives in the south that they had gone soft, no longer wanted to fight, and criticized the government for wanting to continue the war. Also, the Saigon~Cholon area is seething with political discontent while the people are far better off in material possessions than ever before. The shops are full of goods for Tet and the people are buying heavily. Somehow, the U. S. has filled their bellies but has neglected their spirit.

b. Many of the Vietnamese in the cotmtryside who were right up against the Viet Cong terror were full of patriotic spirit. Thosc who seemed to be in the hardest circumstances, fighting barefoot and with makeshift weapons, had the highest morale. They still can lick the Viet Cong with a little help. There's a lesson here on our giving aid. Maybe we should learn that our funds cannot buy friends or a patriotic spirit by mere materialistic giving. Perhaps we should help those who help themselves; and not have a lot of strings on that help.

c. The Viet Cong crowded a lot of action into the year 1960. They infiltrated thousands of armed forces into South Vietnam, recruited local levies of military territorials and guerrillas, and undertook large scale guerrilla and terroristic operations. In so doing. they neglected doing sound political work at the grass roots level and broke one of Mao Tse Tung's cardinal rules. Many people in the south now under their thumb are unhappy about it, but too terrified to act against these new rulers. The Viet Cong apparently have been working hard recently to rectify this error, and now have political cadres in the field. We still have a chance of beating them if we can give the people some fighting chance of gaining security and some political basis of action. Since both of these actions will have to be carried out by Vietnamese forces in their Defense establishment, it is worthwhile to make U. S. help to the Vietnamese in the contested provinces along these sorely needed lines a priority mission of the U. S. military in Vietnam. The political actions should be the implementing of Vietnamese governmental policy by Vietmanese Rh