Background of U.S. Intervention in Vietnam

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September 12, 1969
CONGRESSIONAL RECORD -SENATE
S10509

Governments, as do people, develop 
vested Interests, and when governments 
manipulate and control the flow of 
in­formation bearing on vital public 
inter­ests it promotes its own, not the public's, 
interest. Thomas Jefferson, a believer in 
the public's right to know, put the issue 
at stake this way:
He who permits himself to tell a lie once, 
finds It much easier to do it a second and 
third time, till at length It becomes habitual; 
he tells lies without attending to it, and 
truths without the world's believing him. 
This falsehood of the tongue leads to that 
of the heart, and in time depraves all its 
good dispositions.
I hope that the disease he described 
has not reached the heart of America. 
But the disease is curable by ample doses 
of the truth. This administration can 
start the process. Whether it will do so 
remains to be seen-but this exchange 
of correspondence is not a hopeful sign.

Exhibit 1 
Department of State, 
Washington, D.C, September 2, 1969. 
Hon. J. W. Fulbright,
Chairman, Committee on Foreign Relations, 
U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C.
Dear Mr. Chairman: I am writing in 
re­sponse to your letter of May 12 to Secretary 
Rogers in which you refer to General 
West­moreland's "Report on the War in Viet-Nam." 
You specifically asked about "a formal 
re­quest from the South Vietnamese 
Govern­ment for United States intervention with 
combat troops."
As General Westmoreland's report makes 
clear, the initial decisions to deploy United 
States combat troops to South Viet-Nam in 
the spring and summer of 1965 resulted from 
a continuing analysis of a constantly-chang­ing 
situation, a major factor in which was 
the deployment to South Viet-Nam of 
regu­lar North Vietnamese Army units from the 
end of 1964 onward. As General 
Westmore­land states in later portions of his report, 
the subsequent infiltration of still more 
North Vietnamese Army units and the 
in­tensified offensive activity which those forces 
undertook necessitated the assignment of 
ad­ditional United States combat forces and 
the expansion of their role beyond the 
rela­tively limited one originally conceived.
The continuing analysis to which I have 
referred, and the series of decisions resulting 
from it, were made In close and constant 
consultation with the Government of Viet­Nam.
The process of analyzing the situation 
by the two governments, and the consulta­tion 
and agreement thereon, were such as to 
be regarded by our government as 
consti­tuting a request from the Government of 
Viet-Nam. This request was confirmed by the 
Communique issued by the office of the 
Prime Minister of the Government of 
Viet­Nam, Dr. Phan Huy Quat, on March 7, 1965, 
concerning the arrival of two United States 
Marine battalions in South Viet-Nam-the 
first such deployment of United States 
com­bat forces:
During these past months and particularly 
in the course of the last few weeks, the 
North Viet-Nam authorities have intensified 
their aggression by sending arms and troops 
by land and sea into the areas bordering the 
17th parallel.
In the face of these undeniable acts of 
open provocation, the Government of Vietnam 
has asked for and obtained the agree­ment 
of the American Government for the 
stationing of two United States Marine 
bat­talions at Da Nang, one of the vital military 
zones of Viet-Nam, in order to reinforce both 
the military and civilian defensive system.
This measure is part of a program of purely 
legitimate defense made necessary by the 
intensification of Communist aggression ­
directed, supported and enlarged by the Hanoi 
authorities.
I trust that this information will prove 
useful to you, and I hope that you will not 
hesitate to call on me if I can be of further 
assistance.
Sincerely yours,
H. G. Torbert, Jr., 
Acting Assistant Secretary for 
Congres­sional Relations.
MAY 12, 1969.

Hon. William P. Rogers, 
Secretary of State, 
Washington, D.C.
Dear Mr. Secretary: As you know, 
ques­tions have been raised, from time to time, 
concerning the circumstances under which 
United States combat forces were first sent 
to Vietnam. In the recently released "Report 
on the War in Vietnam," General 
Westmore­land wrote:
"It was my estimate that the govern­ment 
of Vietnam could not survive this 
mounting enemy military and political 
of­fensive for more than six months unless 
the United States chose to increase its 
mili­tary commitment. Substantial numbers of 
U.S. ground combat forces were required.
"I realized, as did Ambassadors Taylor and 
Johnson, that the U.S. was faced with a 
momentous and far-reaching decision. In 
making my recommendations in the spring 
and early summer of 1965, as indeed in the 
case of later recommendations, I was 
mind­ful of the stated U.S. objective with respect 
to Vietnam: 'To defeat aggression so that the 
people of South Vietnam will be free to shape 
their own destiny.' It was my judgment that 
this end could not be achieved without the 
deployment of U.S. forces. With the 
concur­rence of Ambassador Taylor, I so 
recom­mended."
I was unable to find any reference in 
General Westmoreland's account of a formal 
request from the South Vietnamese 
govern­ment for U.S. intervention with combat 
troops. For the Committee's records, would 
you please provide copies of any such 
re­quest received from that government.
Sincerely yours,
J. W. Fulbright,
Chairman.

MICROSTATES
Mr. FULBRIGHT. Mr. President, I 
have been noting with interest and mild 
encouragement the initiative taken by 
the U.S. Representative to the United 
Nations in proposing that the United 
Nations consider the creation of a 
cate­gory of associate membership for 
so- called mini- or micro-states.
The Committee on Foreign Relations 
has long been concerned with the 
un­realistic distribution of voting power in 
the General Assembly of the United 
Na­tions and has repeatedly questioned the 
equally unrealistic policy of the 
Depart­ment of State of assigning full-fledged 
ambassadors to every independent 
na­tion, no matter how minimum our 
interests.
I commend Ambassador Yost for 
stim­ulating thinking and action in the United 
Nations on its relations to mini- and 
micro-states and express the hope that 
our State Department will do likewise 
in this area.
I ask unanimous consent that 
Ambas­sador Yost's statement of August 27 to 
the Security Council be printed in the 
Record at this point, together with an 
editorial from the Washington Post of 
the same date.
There being no objection, the state­ment 
and editorial were ordered to be 
printed in the Record, as follows: 
Statement by Ambassador Charles W.
Yost, Representative of United States to
the United Nations, in the Security
Council on the Question of Micro-
States, August 27, 1969

Mr. President, the United States has 
re­quested this meeting of the Security 
Coun­cil to deal with an important problem which 
has long been foreseen in the evolution of 
the United Nations, but on which the first 
practical step has yet to be taken-with 
the consequence that a solution to it is 
now urgently required. That problem is to 
find a way by which the growing number 
of very small independent states, often 
called "micro-states"-many of which may 
soon seek to become members of the United 
Nations-can find an appropriate place and 
status within the United Nations family. 
Such a status should respond to their needs 
and rights, yet should not do violence either 
to their nature and interests or to the 
na­ture and interests of the United Nations 
it­self.
To put this matter in its most concrete 
terms: Should even the smallest independ­ent 
state be eligible for full membership in 
the United Nations, no matter how few its 
people or how limited its resources may be? 
What would be the consequence for the 
authority and effectiveness of our Organi­zation 
if, during the coming years, 40 or 50 
very small states, so small as to be unable 
to carry out the obligations of membership, 
should nevertheless apply and be admitted as 
members? What alternative methods might 
be devised for associating such states with 
the United Nations, for assuring them of 
its benefits without imposing upon them 
burdens they could not bear, and for giv­ing 
them a status within the UN family 
ap­propriate to their independence, their 
ca­pabilities and their needs?
This problem did not become urgent for 
the United Nations until recent years, when 
the progressive ending of the colonial age 
began to bring into being independent states 
of widely varying size-some very substantial 
but others very small indeed. Our Secretary 
General was the first to mark the problem 
officially for our attention when he referred,
in the introduction to his annual report for 
1965, to "the recent phenomenon of the 
emergence of exceptionally small new states 
(whose) limited size and resources can pose 
a difficult problem as to the role they should 
try to play in international life."
The Secretary General went on to suggest 
that "the time has come when member states 
may wi^h to examine more closely the cri­teria 
for the admission of new Members in 
the light of the long-term implications of 
present trends."
Later, in the introduction to his annual 
report in 1967, the Secretary General again 
raised this same question and discussed it 
in more detail. He urged that "the line has 
to be drawn somewhere" in the matter of 
membership, and noted that the Charter 
it­self limits United Nations membership to 
states which not only are peace-loving, but 
in the judgment of the Organization "are 
able and willing" to carry out the obligations 
laid down by the Charter. In the light of 
this Charter rule,' he pointed to the problem 
posed by emerging micro-states, some of 
which contain only a few thousand or, in 
one case, fewer than 100 people.
From these considerations the Secretary 
General drew certain conclusions which, in
my Government's view, are entirely sound, 
and which I commend to the Council:
That full membership in the United 
Na­tions "may, on the one hand, impose 
obliga­tions which are too onerous for the 
'micro- states' and, on the other hand, may lead to 
a weakening of the United Nations itself."
That "it appears desirable that a 
distinc­tion be made between the right to independ-