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Rh (D-Day) launch first strikes (see Attachment C** for targets). Initially, mine their ports, and strike forth Vietnan's transport and related ability (bridges, trains) to move south; and then against targets which have maximum psychological. effect on the North's willingness to stop insurgency -- FOL storage, selected airfields, barracks/training areas, bridges, railroad yards, port facilities, communications, and end industries. Initially, these strikes would be by South Vietnamese aircraft; they could then be expanded by adding FARMGATE, or U.S. aircraft, or any combination of them.

16. (D-Day) call for conference on Vietnam (and go to UI). State the limited objective: Not to overthrow the North Vietnamese regime nor to destroy the country, but to stop DRV-directed Viet Cong terrorism and end resistance to pacification efforts in the South. Essential that it be made clear that attacks on the North kill continue ( i.e ., no cease-fire) until (a) terrorism, armed attacks, and armed resistance to pacification efforts in the South stop, and (b) communications on the networks out of the North are conducted entirely in uncoded form."

The scenario was circulated among members of the ExCom and discussed during their meetings of 24 and 25 May. Apparently, modifications were made in the course of these meetings, as negotiations in the SecDef files indicate scenario versions of 24, 25 and 26 May. In addition to the assessments that accompanied the scenario proposal, the discussants had available to them an estimate of likely consequences of the proposed action prepared by the Board of National Estimates, CIA, with state and DIA assistance, and concurred in by the U.S. Intelligence Board.

The national estimate agreed essentially with the proposal's assessment of Soviet and Chinese reactions and concluded that Hanoi's would vary with the intensity of the U.S./GVN actions. The national intelligence boards believed that Hanoi "would order the Viet Cong and Pathet Lao to refrain from dramatic new attacks, and night reduce the level of the insurrections for the moment" in response to U.S. force deployments or CV-USAF/FARMGATE attacks. The expected DRV rationale, supported by Peking and Moscow would be to bank on "a new Geneve. Conference or UN action... [to] bring a cessation of attacks" and to stabilize communist gains in Vietnam and Laos. Comunist agitation of world opinion would be employed to bring on the conference. If attacks on North Vietnam continued, the Intelligence boards saw Hanoi intensifying its political initiatives, but also possibly increasing "the tempo of the Insurrections in South Vietnam and Laos." If these tactics failed to produce a settlement "and North Vietnam began to suffer considerable destruction," the boards estimated:

""We incline to the view that [DRV leaders] would lower their terms for a negotiating outcome; they would do so in the Interests of preserving their regime and in the expectation" Rh