[1]176-10030-10168
[3]| 2025 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992 |
[5]JFK Assassination System ; Date: 5/5/2016
[6]Identification Form
[8]Agency Information
[12]AGENCY: NARA ;
[13]RECORD NUMBER: 176-10030-10168 [Dup /4¢-se029-/ 0085)
[14]RECORD SERIES: ORAL HISTORY
[15]AGENCY FILE NUMBER :
[16]Document Information
[17]ORIGINATOR :
[18]FROM:
[19]TO:
[20]TITLE : ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW WITH EDWARD G. LANSDALE
[21]DATE: 07/11/1970
[22]PAGES: 124.
[23]SUBJECTS :
[24]VIETNAM; CUBA-BAY OF PIGS
[25]- DOCUMENT TYPE: TRANSCRIPT :
[26]CLASSIFICATION: Not Marked
[27]RESTRICTIONS: 1B
[28]CURRENT STATUS: Redact
[29]DATE OF LASTREVIEW: 06/26/1998
[30]OPENING CRITERIA :
[31]COMMENTS: sanitized version
[33]34
[35]roo. eS : ¢
[37]fe Shuiritgo Me I99 + Too.
[39]Oral History Interview
[41]- with
[42]Dyed. >
[43]ATR, Lansdale
[45]IS
[47]July 11, 1976
[48]Alexandria, Virginia
[50]By Dennis J. O'Brien
[52]For the John F. Kennedy Library
[54]O'BRIEN: I think a logical place to begin in anything —
[55]. * like this is just simply with the question;
[56]when did you first meet President Kennedy,
[57]or Senator Kennedy, if you met him before
[58]he was President?
[59]LANSDALE: . I don} recall meeting him before he was
[60]T kehe? Qe
[61]Presidento. The first meeting,was/ I~belisve, _
[62]the first Saturday following the inauguration,
[63]whatever date that was. I was called into a.
[64]meeting in the White House by {Robert s.)
[65]‘McNamara. It was a neeting,om, actually, on
[67]a report that I had written for (Dwight D>
[69]Eisenhower, It was sort of 24 _ i'n not sure
[74]that it was,NSC (National Security Council]
[75]meeting )but it was comparable to that with
[77]A
[78]the ‘personnel that were attending. There were
[79]several Secretaries: Defense, state, and his 7
[81]National Security people were there.
[83]: 6 { ,
[84]O'Brien: Beds cave mars cectesy with McNamara and PReswel J
[86]4
[90]Glopeatrlsc, uembers of the ‘incoming administra- woe
[91]tion, before they actually assumed office?
[92]LANSDALE: Just before, that is,a day or so before. I'd
[93]eo A -
[94]' been in Vietnam for a brief visit and got back
[95]. 4 Gust before the. inaugural, maybe two or three
[96]days, and at that time both McNamara and.
[97]' Gilpatric were in Defense getting briefed for
[98]their new jobs. I met them at that time. oO
[99]The outgoing Deputy Secretary of Defense asked .
[100]me to start working with Gilpatric, and so I
[101]to Know A :
[102]got Gilpatric rather than MeNamarag,
[103]CJemes
[104]O'BRIEN: This is, Douglas.
[105]LANSDALE: Douglas, Jin Douglasa@lai aesciponglasD
[107]' Q'BRIEN: How is Douglas to work with, while you're with
[109]him? Is he a pretty sympathetic person?
[110]LANSDALE: Yes, very much so, very much som He was ‘the
[112]one, actually, who wrote the orders and back-
[117]“LANSDALE:
[119]stopped my visit to Vietnam, and back-
[120]stopped it principally so that I could take
[122]a look at some of the political factors as
[124]well as economic, military, and psychological *
[126]and everything else. This, frankly, took a
[127]consi. ° Lot -_ Weanding on his part.
[128]. chat because my views weren't always .
[129]sopular in other parts of the governnente
[130]I gathered that there was some opposition to:
[131]my going out, and he insisted on it.. .
[132]I'd like to ‘come back to that. I wonder if
[133]we could go on to talk about one of the major
[135]problems, which is Cuba. When is the first
[136]a.
[138]". time that you hear: about the Bay of Pigs
[140]invasion’ not the Bay of Pigs, but the plansty,
[142]Sometime in the. fall of sixty I think that
[144]I heard’ of it about the first time that it
[146]was brought up to the -saneex-policy group of
[148]the Eisenhower administration. I was the
[149]Peputy Assistant to the Sécretary of Defense,
[150]at the time, for Special Operations and used
[151]to accompany the Deputy Secretary, who was a
[153]han Oy
[154]member of the Anterpolicy group, to most of
[155]A
[159]the meetings that th: vad. When Allen Dulles
[161]oe .
[162](Ailen-W.—Dullesp ~.. st raised the notion to
[164]Weed VAnNeLT
[166]O'BRIEN:
[170]ais
[172]e/Senate” grour:, I was present at the meeting
[174]as an plssist: . , ’
[176]What is ‘the :ainking about it at that time?’
[177]What kind of operation is ee ~» it
[179]ve r ; .
[180]basically a guerilla operation at this point?
[182]Initially,it was. Initially,it was very differ-
[183]A
[185]rom “ . .
[186]ent them the way it turned out. It was based
[188]on a ‘premise thet ms many people in Cuba were very
[189]unhappy with fhe etre administration and the
[190]way it was turning away from the initial
[191]revolutionary objectives and the capture of ‘the
[192]revolutionary movement -by the Communist Party,
[193]which surprised many of the supporters of °
[194]Castro as a guerilla and as i revolutionary
[195]actnon. so the. thought was to back a number
[197]of” Cubans who either had been supporters of
[199]Castro or were very unhappy» “were still resident
[201]in Cuba, and to cause some overturn at the time.
[203]The change of plan towards the Bay of Pigs
[204]gradua\td)
[205]thing evolved tainty regiclyand apparently
[207]there was a | planning group | ena CIA § (Central -
[210]O'BRIEN: -
[214]O' BRIEN:.
[217]O'BRIEN:
[219]Intelligence Agency) who were working on this
[220]initial plan who started thinking in military
[222]invasion terms. I suspect that they were
[224]. doing that because some of the Cuban military.
[226]and military types], that is)very militant,
[228]Po. = 4
[230]kro ple “aS, were coming, out of
[232]a
[234]Cuba as” reiugees, and they suddenly saw a
[236]windfall of mafi~ power and started thinking in
[237]other terms of use of them. But / this-ohange?
[238]was, the changed plan towards the Bay of Pigs —
[240]wand Joly: r
[243]thing,jwas well under way in the inn er circle
[245]thinking of CIA by December of "60, very defi-
[246]A
[248]nitely so .
[250]Who were some of the inner, circle people at
[251]you recall ?
[253]this point, (Pterres ay) Salinger; 600
[255]OBRIEN: DeeecRherd m1 Bissell vas, a
[257]Let's seep os Oh golly. A Dick Bissell j
[259]~ eiiisharer He BrsselD> | was the overall chief of
[261].. the group.
[263]Tracy Barnes, was he in it at ‘that time?
[264]Tracy was'an assistant to hin), "yo nhig WTO)
[265]Tracy, went in the aaah planning. 74 ee my
[266]doubts that he was. . . O°
[268]How about Sroe., William roe. ?
[270](festhim—v¥-Bxoe]
[275]O'BRIEN:
[277]the planning
[281]. He was one of a planning ‘group who were
[284]planning the operation, but he wasn't pe chief,
[286]and I can't. recall the. guy! s name offhand.
[288]Oh well, maybe when youg get the transcript back;
[289]‘LANSDALE MBYybe Sdo oO
[290]you can. » How about . fre: ‘some of the other
[292]t ite
[293]cn Woh Cea se tw
[295]places ’ a c1) Mann, I
[297]Greve
[300]LANSDALE: " Ses, but initially it was all CIA. “They,
[302]borrowed some military personnel to help with _
[303]early OW)
[305]jearbien? but they were people -
[307]who had been attached to CIA for temporary -
[308]duty on other matters, and they hadn't come
[310]' din initially for this specific planning. In
[312]December, when the planning had obviously
[314]started-coming in with a beach landing and so
[316]on, the way it turned out, I urged at that
[318]point to “get military planning in on the
[319]thing. I was worrying about vt. Tas a matter
[320]of fact, Allen Dulles brought his planners
[322]to a policy meeting, a policy group meeting, —
[323]and they were explaining the concept, end ny
[324]questioning was such .that Allen Dulles pleaded
[325]with me not to spoil the pian at an early .
[327]A.
[333]O'BRIEN:
[337]_ them to get some rm‘
[339]a
[341]‘stage. I remember General (Lyman Li).
[343]Lemnitzer was sitcing in Othe meeting; —
[345]4
[347]je was chairman of the JCS (Joint Chiefs of
[349]Start} at the time, ‘and he backed up my urging
[351]7itary planning in on thats.
[352]After th ee  .aviit among our
[353]DOL: | oe pae of that, and then the JCS set up.
[355]@ special section to plan along with the
[357]This is yet in the Eisenhower administration.
[358]‘This is all back in 1960. This was still in
[359]sied“early planning stageso ‘This -was vefore
[361]When the JCS got into the act, I asked to be
[363]disassociated with the project. I was rather
[365]ook.
[366]critical of the concept, and it wae) just . too
[367], OANA
[369]clumsy and overt} and a poor-planned 25eSPe
[371]Kk dhe)
[372]Avot of ‘people. have knowledge of this, by the
[374]end of the Eisenhower administration?
[375]I don't know how widespread it was. There -
[376]were key executives that were knowledgeable,
[378]there was a small group in the JCS that was
[380]Hrovgheot . °
[382](central—Intelligencé) | agency | on that. ’ And who 7
[384]the hell headed that?
[386]| training or anything like that was put forward. _
[388]pernmen
[391]O'BRIEN:
[393]_ LANSDALE:
[395]"thought it was rather closely held.
[397]knowledgeable, and there was a planning group
[398]at CIA, but I don't think it went beyond that.
[400]I don't know how far it was known, but I
[402]You don't knew whether the preside-tial candi-
[404]“dates - at all,.do you?”
[406]Ye.  ..sy were. There was a very definite,
[408]no, wait a minuteg the candidates, no, I don't
[410]-. think they were. As a matter of fact, it was.
[411]in Yhic
[413]. still ina rather nebulous stage ‘es, shifting
[414]‘over in Caray Novenberg I think somebody
[416]told me, if I recall correctly) that the concept -
[417]was in the form.of a memo in CIA about August,
[418]so this would be well after the candidates
[420]had been nominated and so on. I imagine that
[423]i?
[424]- it was ne1a i, two or three people in, the CIA
[425]A
[427]A
[428]Ou
[429]at the time. At-teast, the rest of us certainly
[431]' didn't know it. I forget exactly when I first
[433]heard it, but it would be possibly October,
[434]put it might have even been November, by the -
[436]time I heard about it. As I say, I heard.
[438]“about it when it was surfaced with the inner -
[440]_ circle of our administration executives.
[443]O'BRIEN:
[445]- LANSDALE:
[446]O'BRIEN:
[450]O'BRIEN:
[454]Well, I suppose you had some conversations
[456]with Dulles and with Bissell and some of
[458]‘these people about it.
[460]Yes. 7
[462]What's their feeling? You already discussed
[463]Dot. es - using you to sort of —
[464]hold your criticism, . -@ —
[465]Well, Bissell definitely felt the same waye
[467]Bissell was a very ‘hard-working, intenselperson, |
[468]ar
[470]. almost high; strung type of,individual. - He
[472]became rather impatient with my questioning
[474]of: the. changed concegt when it took place. Jo Hog hp
[476]that
[477]nitially, - -if-they had the correct personnel
[479]‘and they had a correct reading of dissent _
[481]inside of Cuba, that was a.fair chance to do
[483]something. My only concern at the time was/;
[485]dia eee” CIA have ¢he»Americans who could work.
[487]with such a situation? I Just” didn't know -
[488]es,
[490]of any, “but I was assured that there were such
[491]Americans but I'm not certain that there were.
[492]Did you question the kind of intelligence that
[493]was coming out about Cuba and the expected
[495]reaction of Cubans” to an invasion /‘and the
[497]| LANSDALE: |
[499]-10- |
[501]reaction to Castro in general?
[503]‘Just in very general terms. = didn't have
[505]os enough concrete and specific information
[507]O'BRIEN:
[511]; myself that was separate from theirs. Most -
[513]of the intelligence take at the time, avail-
[514]able inside the U.S. governnent, was pretty -~
[516]colored with this dissatisfaction and state-.
[518]ments of, it. “soft had no real way of ©
[520]determining the accuracy or inaccuracy of it.
[522]| Some of the adjectives used in describing this
[524]in briefings to us alerted. o° a little bit.
[525]- mas
[527]It Just Sounded ,+00 much, Seda sales job on
[529]a viewpoint. I'd question that, whether that
[531]was an accurate thing, so this is about as far
[533]as I went. |
[535]How Seed a guy like Douglas react? Do you
[539]Well, he approved of . the plan, so he and the
[541]others at the policy level approved of going
[543]ahead ‘with it fend. developing it. I was his
[545]advisor on this thing! (that was my staff job),
[546]a’
[548]. and I told him to be certain to get the JCS
[550]to give ita real hard scrutiny and to. come
[552]r
[558]O'BRIEN:
[564]up with details of whether it could succeed
[566]or not. That was my last advisory role with
[568]him. I was taken off advising on the project
[570]~ after that, actually by my own request because
[572]‘I was apparently causing too much trouble and
[574]Wa va :-2ks of progress.
[576]ets tae reaction of the Joint Chiefs, people
[577]like -Lemnitzer, towards this? Is there an |
[578]institutional rivalry or bureaucratic rivalry
[579]here in their minds? _ .
[581]Somewhat, somewhat qt was a little bit as
[582]though,’ well, somebody's going to be playing
[583]Boy Scouts, so this isn't really rivalry.
[585]They had. a difficult time taking this really. -
[586]seriously. Later, I know, when the JCS got
[588]ard felps
[589]in,on the actual planning of this, they became
[590]A .
[592]. much more serious on it because they had a
[593]share of it. |
[594]Well, do you get involved in the informing
[596]' of McNamara and Gilpatric about this? Do you
[598]get any way of sensing what their reactions
[600]are on first being informed? -
[602]No. They had apparently known by the time I
[605]O'BRIEN:
[612]met them), Tl didn't, get in on that The one
[613]would have,
[614]person who a view of their reactions
[615]twrillta on fa
[617]would probably = Bundy, (etre B .
[618]shi who I know at the time was discussing
[619]this with them.-
[621]Did you have. re sa oundy and
[623]his fic | ve ~e ae that. point?
[625]Yesg ‘nis was a Little out of Bundy’ s field.
[627]- He was always trying to figure. out what - the
[629]chances» were, the percentages of win or losso
[631]He was, 1ovg arid I hadn't known the final plan
[633]on this thing, and Bundy did, ane he asked me
[635]what I thought. I told hin, “wellyif the JCS»
[636]maybe shade -
[638]guarantees something, you canWtaie, it. 10 percent
[640]lower than that and 40 along with itm I'm not-
[642]~ sure that they know a clandeStine operation, |
[644]but they'd Sure know a military landing, whether
[645]it would succeed or not. Given some of the -. ©
[646]. ° why) shade ts .
[647]unknowns in this thing, J eae they 10 percent”
[648]and go along with the figure. “ ’ Well, apparently
[649]a
[650]they had given it a high chance of success,
[652]the JCS had, because Bundy said, "Well, you mean
[654]| A py 4
[655]it's going to succeed then{ I said, Well, I.
[658]O'BRIEN: .
[660]so DBR
[662]So
[664]don't know." ,1 gathered that he felt it would
[666]succeed.
[668]ven) then /’you are pretty much out of touch
[669]\_ From the Pont hak ev we tutle ifs
[670]A
[672]. with it until it actually comes" off, You Nw 8! That's
[676]O'BRIEN:
[678]“LANSDALE:
[679]O'BRIEN:
[683]O'BRIEN: |
[685]A
[689]' didn't get inthe any of the changes: in the
[691]-
[692]plans there at all oo,
[693]September seth -— tes
[694]No. I left ‘& around the. first of,December, . ..
[696]"60. I really didn't: follow it from then on@
[697]Does
[699]fr’ anyone come to you from the Agency/ or
[700]from State) or “Prem the White House, as far-
[702]A
[703]as that goes, and attempt to seek an indepen-. —
[705]+ auaet , ; ard Lh on su
[706]dent judgbaent on your party sper backenend BPM Pek
[707]No. , . me
[708]How about the noise level on this?. Obviously |
[709]you're out of it, but is there much talk ©
[711]about it that is ‘sort of filtering down
[714]‘in Defense “andthe people that are around you”.
[716]that really have no need to know and direct ©
[718]involvement?
[720]I wasn't ‘aware.of it. There might have been,
[722]‘but Ihave no knowledge of that.
[723]When @né=thines the operation? actually begins _
[724]and the landing has taken place, do you come 7
[726]7
[727]¢ .
[731]O'BRIEN:
[734]into it again at that point. at any time?
[736]No.
[738]You do become involved in Cuban affairs at a
[740]"- later time.
[743]O'BRIEN:
[745]_ LANSDALE:
[747]Later, yes.
[748]ks
[749]When ¢2 yo% "24 you. have-any-
[750]thls aw Wa the Ween) Taylor
[751]committee?” uht ch makes Ha Hea in gust Y abgut it ?
[752]I met with them once, and. they weren't biterested
[753]with the Bay of Pigso. They were interested
[755]in the decision-making processive making. bof
[757]-policy, and ‘asked me if I had any ideas on
[759]how better the Bresident could be served in
[760]the policy decisions and arriving at them.
[762]The thing was, right at that moment, McNamara
[764]-had previously asked me for the same thing)
[765]. : . “A
[766]-and I had ‘come up with a proposal for him
[768]. which he put to. Kennedy. I just told them?
[770]o of ; a
[771]Weil, I had some ideas but I had given them -
[773]to somebody else, and I was skeptical of the
[775]boss anyhowg). ad this was on putting together -
[777]task forces. The Kennedy administration had
[779]eliminated: a bureaucratic voonédoggling thing
[784]sr what the hell was that called’ —
[785]O'BRIEN: cet ” (Operations Coordinating Board]g
[786]LANSDALE: Yes, the OCB) I pointed out that the one. _
[787]good thing about it was that the principals
[788]met for lunchyand 1 said the. pest of at's Gr. Re birds
[789]Pat to set men an osc coven who are talking
[790]' to we ye a ew are held responsible by
[791]. him for managing men, money, and material and | a
[792]so on, who can understand the problem well a
[793], enough around. the lunch table to have one
[794]"secretary or “deputy secretary or under secretary
[795], = say, ‘well, -we'll take care of that: Lie mee
[796]good way of doing business a ith the
[797]- president's own’ national security man sitting
[798]in on it, going back and telling him this is’
[799]og going to happen for these reasons, why, it
[800]. was a good control. mechanism. F so essentially
[801]all I told the Taylor ‘people and told
[802]McNamara in my paper was that this ‘function nad .
[803]been eliminated, along with cutting out t diot of
[804]dead wood, and there was some live wood a, “pow
[806]about restoring the live wood? This oseutiatyy
[808]was what my proposition was with the task force,
[809]. A
[814]of getting the people most concerned with
[815]something} who could operate for: the
[817]president, and having them get together and -
[819]help form the policy, get the president's
[820]approval, and they were the same ones'who
[821]could;st-~ _ """" = 12 immediately.
[822]Oe -~ 4ut to create another big
[824]vureaucratic thing. 7 and of course, after they
[826]_ first tried this, it rapidiy started becoming |
[827]a big bureaucratic thing. the task forces
[828]that were later set up were just big staffs
[829]sitting;in different buildings. It was
[830]almost: like OCB again, not guste: but it got
[832]' out of hand. Anytime you aes? to change. the
[834]government around, it seems to come right back
[836]. A Yoo BE EN! Yes) we have a tendeney of doa
[837]-dn form again and close ranks on a But “that “40 Lani
[839]‘was all,I did with the Taylor group. Inciden-
[840]tally; in that inquiry into the. Cuban bit was |
[841]ye the first time that I met (Robert F.) Bobby
[842], Kennedy. For some reason or other, I didn't
[843]. . A
[844]-- connect him personally , with the pictures of
[845]mP . wed NeResthet 9 P
[847]him and so on, on TeVg, and I wondered what the <— Ivo-
[849]youngster was doing sitting in the meeting
[852]_
[854]O'BRIEN:
[856]LANSDALE: -
[858]O'BRIEN:
[862]O'BRIEN:
[864]'. government would operate at a decision level,
[868]talking so much.”
[870]Was he pretty tough 7
[871]Well; he wasn't bough. - He was thé most indver- i
[872]ested of anyone in the room there of what I |
[873]would say on things and plague me with many
[875]guestions.
[877]How were his questions? Was he fairly naive
[879]_ about the problems?
[880]Nog, this was on Brobions questions of how the
[882]. A
[883]and they weren't naive at.all. He had a very
[885]good understanding. He was very much concerned’
[886]about his brother’ getting good servis in the —
[887]way of information and full details “of elterna-
[888]tives and so on, on a policy decision.
[890]Well, Ef you;-You-know, in that period right
[892]after the’ Bay of Pigs--of course you had a lot
[894].. Of contacts. and friendships in other places
[896]LANSDALE: Yes. O'BRIEN:
[898]. outside the Pentagon. , What kind of an impact -
[901]Acid? the Bay of Pigs have, let's say over in.
[903]the Agency) and State Department, and in Defense,
[904]“A _ A
[906]and in the White House?
[911]' LANSDALE: It was a traumatic: experience at top Loveland
[912]. of the government. I think it affected
[913]President Kennedy more than any other single
[914]. an A .
[915]thing. It was almost a taboo subjectgif you
[916]were going in to do business and to get an
[917]approv:2 sn somethin wi: “ever even hinted
[918]x oa Such
[919]CAGU Juba or. . ~uban affair. “It was an
[920]sutense rly. sore subject.among all of these
[921]people. I felt that almost all of the key
[922], executives in the administration must have
[923]dreamt about it at night or something, end
[924]' during the daytime working hours they: just
[925]even n2yew
[926]didn't even want to, contemplate it. and yet -
[927]they were honest enough people that they knew .
[928]they had to face up and look. at it and. would ‘ao
[929]so,.but it was an extremely emotional subject
[930]with then, very ‘much so. .
[931]O'BRIEN: Well, in terms | of the Agency, there's a “number
[932]. of programs end, of course involvements in
[933]A
[934]operations that they have. Do you see any
[935]shift in these, any attempt on the part: of the
[937]" Defense Department to move into some of ‘these
[939]areas which they felt were traditionally theirs.
[944]rather than the Agency. I guess. what I'm
[946]trying ae sey is, can you see any decline in
[950]the father influence Tie? tne Agency "EE aecisions?
[951]LANSDALE: Yes, I think so. i'n 1 not certain that at was
[952]. _ the military as such. It night, have been the -
[953]tei Poet “2K McNamara personally, -
[954]par encouragement of. some of the military who -
[955]were somewhat interested but wouldn't really |
[957]have expressed the interest unless they were -
[959]directly asked a and: there always had been some.
[961]Fa feeling of junease think would be the best | 2
[963]“word to describe it] -onong the military about
[965]any clandestiney operations. They felt that
[967]once it got over into guerrilla type of operations
[968]. or anything that would involve a military subject,
[969]| thet it would be far better to let the military —
[971]establishment of the U.S. handle it. # aut that.
[972]would be sort of a dintior-codbail party type of
[974]a gambit on their: pert,ratner than sitting and
[976]planning and so on of “twe must grab some of
[978]thie,
[980]pate," | Fiven though among themselves they talked
[982]that way. They aiaa't express “it ‘in terms of -
[984]their attendgnce at policy councils or even in
[989]‘talks with peoplé| Like the ecretary of Defense
[990]or the civilian, executive side of Detense. On
[991]this, I think thet McNamara himselt probably.
[992]- started thinking initially that, this was & 7
[993]military operation and just to be more efficient
[994]and effective,the military should take over
[995]" silch things. 1 imagine that he palked that way
[996]to some of the military people ‘ef were seeing
[997]“him from the JCs, awd. the Chiefs, and from the
[998]intelligence community, the military intelligence
[999]community. I know that DIA [Defense Intelligence
[1000]Agency]. got its great start under McNamara,and -
[1001]I feel almost certain, I've got a strong hunch,
[1002]that the Bay of Pigs and the misreading of the |
[1003]; temper of the people in’ Cuba gave McNamara
[1004]great impetus in setting that up initially.
[1005]A307 sotualty, wasn't a military ambition
[1007]to set up 4 vival intelligence ‘agency to Wve
[1008]CIA, though there had been tremendous rivalry
[1009]between the military service intelligence
[1010]agencies and tie CIA and had been right along.
[1011]from the initiation of GIA originally. But this —
[1013]-was sort of a business rivalry,and it wasnt |
[1014]A So,
[1018]_ Sort of dealing with them, of categories of
[1020]work, and where the boundary lines of) who did
[1021]what on the things and this is where their
[1022]jealousies and emotions and everything would
[1023]come up over almost nitpicking of boundary lines
[1025]of who would do what. It wasn't a thing of
[1027]. \ we'll do it ali, and you go out of pustness that
[1029]feeling hadn't come up/-- but kate Eloe after the
[1030]Bay of Pigs, the DIA and its creation, a lot of |
[1032]- . the people in that who were civilian employees,
[1033]: : _ A
[1035]O'BRIEN: |
[1037]LANSDALE: .
[1039]Defense Department employees, had an idea, "We —
[1040]can do a better job than CIA," and in a much.
[1041]wicor field than the service intelligence agencies
[1042]pest aone. a ,
[1044]Are there enough. skilled and “competent people
[1046]around, in the universities and the military,
[1048]' to staff all the intelligence agencies: the NSA
[1050](National Security Agency], DIA, CTA, and organi-
[1052]zations? Are there enough people or are these
[1053]point | ?
[1055]operations just simply too viel,
[1057]Wadadeed They might be too big. me need to
[1059]know things is a very elastic bit. I'm certain
[1061]that the chief executive of the United States,
[1063]O'BRIEN:
[1065]“LANSDALE:
[1067]in whose name these works are accomplished, -
[1069]would have no idea that he would ever desire .
[1071]“to know: some of the ‘things that they're working ©
[1073]on very nargZyou discover whole buildings
[1074]and all sorts of equipment pusildy accumulating
[1078]8G .. 2sutes ever needing to know sone
[1080]of that "ak yet he would hesitate, given the
[1081]“A.
[1083]world today and the technological advances and...
[1085]everything, it's very hard to say what you need
[1087]to know and what you don't. Given this sort of
[1088]a gray shading of the end objectiveslon this
[1090]thing, it's very difficult to say whether youve.
[1091]got £00 bigan establishment or not.
[1093]Do you ever take this question up, or is this
[1095]_ question ever raised in the administration by He
[1097]civilian people in DOD [ Department of Defense]
[1098]or the White’ House, with you?
[1099]Not with me. No. My theme on. overseas operations
[1101]was reiterated enough so that it was known by
[1103]_ @ number of peoples, and I audse felt eet it wh i
[1105]A
[1106]more efficient and effective to have a very ~
[1108]small group working and to choose them with very
[1113]. great selectivity and go for a handful of
[1114]highly qualified people rather than a large
[1115]group, of Americans charging overseas someplace.
[1116]‘This went for intelligence as well as diplomatic a
[1117]and other. economic work, and soon. TI used to .
[1118]; point out the embassies--for example, ‘behing
[1119]_.the Iron ‘Curtain-- that would get desdimated by -
[1120]Cs being | TINT ana so’.ong in Eastern Europe)
[1121](S for example, it would neppeng ee voura wind up
[1122]with an ambassador and two or three people
[1123]left in an embassy, and their work would increase |
[1124]in quality, and their representing U.S. interests
[1125]‘would seem to improve tremendously when that
[1126]would happen. .
[1127]O'BRIEN: Does the werk that you get this reputation,
[1128]mainly out, the writings of guys like [Eugene]
[1129]Burdick and Graham Greene, does this affect you
[1130]in any way in your relations with the bureau-
[1131]cracy? | ' 7
[1132]LANSDALE: Yes. It made life rather difficult. With
[1133]7 . much of the work, I had to do in Washington,
[1134]I came back from a lot of operations abroad
[1136]and went up into policy-forming levels in
[1141]Washington almost immediately, and into facing
[1143]‘people who were very sensitive on my presence
[1144]abroad initially. Since I didn't just stick
[1145]in.a regular military category but would get
[1146]over into their own subject matter, this made
[1147]' them very unconfortablep en can ‘understand
[1148]it. while it happened but it was carried to
[1150]| too great an emotionel length.“ at times I
[1152]"would suggest certain individuals be sent to
[1153]look into a situation in a given country and
[1154]would: arrange their: transportation. and so ong
[1155]ea I would get backing throughout the U.S.
[1157]- government for this thing/ and have an individual
[1158]approved by the Secretary of State’ as well as
[1159]Defense and up at the White .House and so on,
[1160]put would set up a means of communicating
[1161]back so that we would get reports back. There
[1162]wipula be times: when these individuals would.
[1163]‘show up in. a country, and the first time they
[1165]sent a message to ma, the ambassador would
[1167]ask them kindly ‘to Seave- the country, to get
[1169]out of there, just because of my name. I wou.
[1170]wash .
[1172]apparently, the enemy to some, of these
[1175]as.
[1177]FI
[1179]oetween. Thailand and Saigon, and there was a
[1180]2
[1182]people. One of my assistants was traveling
[1184]‘coup going on in Saigon at the timepgan@ hi
[1186]plane, which was Air France, put down--commercial
[1187]“NN . . . .
[1189]“A ; . .
[1190]flight--in Phnom Penh, in Cambodia, and the
[1192]military attache very kindly picked up this.
[1193])
[1195]guy and several other Americans from the
[1196]plane and found a place for them to stay
[1197]until they could get another flight out of
[1199]Phnom Penh. He asked this lad of mine where
[1201]he'd worked, and he said, "In the Pentagon,"--
[1203]he was a civilian employee--and he mentioned
[1204]that he worked for mey)and the attaché got
[1207]all excited, called the ambassador, and he
[1209]was given two hours to come out of the country.
[1211][Laughter] All he was doing was looking for .
[1213]a place to sleep at nightg so it became very
[1215]‘emotional and very silly, and detrimental to
[1216]the U.S. For example, once in Indonesia, in
[1217]meeting our folks around the embassy in
[1218]Djakarta, I had spotted an assistant army
[1219]attaché, who was the one aAmericen, along with.
[1221]; A
[1222]one of the economic mission guys--there were
[1226]two Americans, 1 “who ' were / not only best known
[1227]by the Indonesians but were respected, and
[1228]. oy Aneta
[1229]. there was an affection thereg. and I Kite, told
[1230]re
[1231]the ambassador at the time, afterwards,,. ‘neke
[1233]of
[1234]real use of: these people f, the Indonesians
[1236]a believe them, and there's some antipathy towards
[1238]the U. ae but they make an exception. tF tnese
[1239]twopand. they! re just invaluabied put the army
[1241]man was extremely close to the general staff
[1243]of the Indonesian army. I went on some visits
[1245]to members at their homes of the Indonesian Cine
[1246]staff, and this lad who was tall and blond--
[1247]a Nordic. type, if you will--would go in,and -
[1248]the small brown Indonesians qweut ‘and their
[1249]fami lies+welcome him Like a long lost uncle/
[1250]or brother or something. The children would
[1251]run up and jump in his arms and climb all. over
[1252]him, and he was Uncle J something to them:
[1254]Fo later, when ‘the Soviets start moving in
[1256]| sand’ [ surtace- to- -air mi sgie] missile sites into
[1257]' Indonesia and the U.S. needed to know what
[1259]|
[1261]sort of antiaircraft armaments werdgoing inj
[1263]-our embassy couldn't get the answers to its
[1265]. -27-
[1267]I suggested that.we. get the State; Defense
[1269]' sponsorship and send this one fellow who ,s
[1270]- @ lieutenantzcolonel over and just let him’ -
[1271]stay a week or so. He'd go right in and
[1272]talk to his old friends) and they'd probably
[1273]tell him what: the. soviets were up to. He
[1274]arrived theref’ the Indonesian general staff
[1275]a ~ ~ sites
[1276]took him out and showed him these 53 and.
[1277]asked him what he thought of them and so on
[1278]‘the first day he was there. That night he
[1279]ke r
[1280]got back, and wrote out a-radio message/ and
[1281]asked the ambassador to send it to me) at
[1282]. A
[1284]. which point our ambassador told him to leave ©
[1286]the countryguw-—/
[1287]Co [Howard P.7\
[1288]O'BRIEN: Now) this was, Jones?
[1290]- LANSDALE: | That was Jones, yeso ae And he said, "Well,
[1291]. . let me put that in. the messages)" sol just .
[1292]asked the Department of State, +" please let
[1293]Jones know that you! re sponsoring this guy)
[1294]‘ | - too,.snd there might be some more things that
[1295]he finds out that you ‘need to know as much as
[1297]1
[1299]an?) a +0 a 7
[1300]we do. .So they told Jones ,just &> sit back
[1302]O'BRIEN:
[1306]O'BRIEN:
[1310]' ~28-
[1312]and let him do that.
[1314]_We have some wonderful Americans) and this
[1315]was what I was trying to do) to find out
[1316]which Americans have not only: our interests
[1318]at heart but were enough interested in foreign
[1320]-0@unte fer to Be stl toe understand and have
[1322]Py
[1324]mpa a veally would be serving the best
[1325]interests of other countries: in things. I'd
[1327]far rather see one man get in on something
[1329]like that than- send a whole team in with all
[1331]sorts of nings Jana sort of aggravate a
[1332]situation, than do something rather simple. ,
[1333]Almost sensitivity training. . 0
[1335]SAY paths Incidentally, along these lines,
[1336]I've: got a good story for your account.
[1337]Great. ° -
[1339]About’ the time of the Cuban Missile gvisia,
[1341]McNamara came back from a meeting at the
[1343]White House one day and asked me to provide
[1345]the means for President Kennedy to talk to
[1347]- the Cuban people on TaVs, How. the hell did I
[1348]a
[1352]know how to do that? He told me-set-he
[1354]wanted to do it within the next twenty-four
[1358]hours. Well, it didn't happen. I suspected
[1359]thet it, would take longer than that; I don't
[1361]- . : o . _ U
[1362]know how you intrude on a TW Stations
[1363]broadcasting and get the people in the
[1365]a 79°
[1366]country to 26 inmediatelyat to their TAY Sets
[1367].and watch a program. “I called scientists
[1368]in from all over the U. Ss, who were electronic
[1369]whizzes on this type of a subject, and our
[1370]intelligence people and everybody else I
[1371]could think of. to get some information
[1374]together in a real crash basis. CIA couldn't
[1376]2 cechniaal deterred
[1378]give me details, e% technical details<on any
[1380]- A 2
[1381]of the TaVy, stations - in Havana’ and elsewhere. .
[1383]Fone of the Defense civilian scientists--and I
[1384]can't ‘think of his name of fand; Bast. European
[1385]name--left .the room and came. back ten minutes
[1387]“later and provided all the technical infor-
[1388]mation, to the great amazement of everybody |
[1389]there. and I said, Where the hell did you
[1390]get that ?/‘ana he said, "Well, I went out to
[1391]the corridor in the Pentagon/ (shere we were
[1393]having the meeting) wnt in one of the phone
[1395]booths there;’ and . called a friend of mine
[1397]O'BRIEN:
[1400]- 30-
[1402]down in Havana who ‘operates a 2K Matation
[1403]and asked him. He gave me all (pee cope, and
[1404]I. just wrote it dow." So this is the “way
[1405]we got the information for it." one intrusion .
[1406]of the tiv space never took place, but we
[1407]got the means together and some airborne lv I~
[1408]transmitters. It. was developed finally by the
[1409]hoe that 2 be
[1411]Navy, and the project--Itwe"asked iS put on
[1412]a sort of sled so that it could be picked up
[1413]and changed over from one aircraft to enother,
[1414]or used elsevhere“ later when we started the
[1415]rit oroadcasts in Vietnam, this Navy equip
[1416]ment that was “Initially intended to let
[1418]; Tee a ae
[1419]President Kennedy talk to the Cubans ,was the
[1421]proadcast equipment that was used from the
[1423]dor
[1424]‘air--flying in the aircraft--in Saigon downs CO!
[1425]to initiate tht /proadcast?”in Saigon in °
[1426]1965.
[1428]Ly
[1430]why didn't it come off?
[1433]It took us too. long to figure, ways of getting ,
[1434]in on the. theme and finding a channel and
[1436]. ; 40
[1437]finding a way of getting people thet’ do that.
[1440]ee ee St Nt ae me edie wesmeathtethis © peel
[1442]O'BRIEN:
[1446]O'BRIEN:
[1452]It took us tien “tuielive days to do it, and the
[1453]time for them to do it had passed over, and
[1455]“A
[1456]the Russiaris stood down in the interim, so the.
[1458]need had passed.
[1460]'. ¢Well how do you come back into. . oo well,
[1462]mayba, perhaps we ought. to pursue this whole
[1464]business of counterinsurgency first. It sort
[1465]of becoines the thing with the Kenne dy admin-
[1466]istration, doesn't it?
[1468]Yes.
[1470]How do you see that? JI was in the Marine
[1471]ox, Ffties
[1473]Corps in the late 50*s) and there was a good
[1475]: A .
[1476]‘deal of guerrilla and counterguerrilla training
[1478]that was going on, and it becomes a part of »
[1480]the new administration. Who are the principte+
[1482]‘proponents of this, outside of yourself? Do
[1484]you have any conversations, say, with Bobby---
[1485]well, you don't really see Bobby ‘antil after
[1486]Aprilg But do you have any conversations with
[1488]the president, let's say, meeting with him. ..-
[1490]No, ‘no,I didn'tg “I don't know who talked to him
[1492]‘ about this. When he came in office, this was
[1494]already one of his themesg Where he picked
[1499]that up originally, I don't know. I-was
[1501]rather surprised--he seemed to have seen
[1503]copies of lectures and other things that
[1505]hot?
[1507]. Ive’ given on the subject, me, who had
[1509]-O BRIEN:
[1513]4
[1515]O'BRIEN:
[1519]' OQ BRIEN:
[1523]passed those to him and who had talked to
[1525]him about it; I just don't know.
[1526]Let's say, let's take a person like Max Taylor.
[1528]Do you have anything in the way of conversations
[1530]with Max Taylor in the late fifties?
[1532]No.
[1534]‘How about the rest of the Joint Chiefs?
[1536]No. Taylor was opposed to this type of thinge
[1538]' He did quite:a considerable switch, see? ' He
[1540]was about the last person I would have’ ever
[1542]picked ‘to have headed up something the way
[1545]Kennedy asked him to do it©
[1547]That's what I was wondering about, Taylor's
[1549]role in this whole thing. He is opposed@® -
[1551]2
[1553]Well, he was the one that<>in the very early
[1555]te a
[1557]rere re or entries ae dee en ee
[1561]formation of the Special Forces in the Axrmy-- .
[1562]; he was Chief of Staff of the Army at the time J-—
[1563]‘arr took one look at these american troops: in
[1564]green berets and said, "Take that God damn silly
[1566]headgear off," or "Take that--that's it." No
[1568]ri. - pally ae Four h om oy
[1569]g&een berets, and ne pitetife TDS oe
[1573]_ the thing. He wasn't too happy with a special
[1575]| unit of that nature. But-at the time, it was.
[1577]' He went along with the concept that
[1579]e . ’ .
[1581]|
[1582]\. it was only a wartime outfitAthat somebody
[1583]A
[1584]would have to go and jump in and work with
[1587]gquerrillas. again, this is a rivalry type of
[1589]a thing,so there wouldn't be another OSS loffice
[1591]A cect werent
[1593]of Strategic Services] ~-theze“d be a CIA or”
[1595]something doing it, but this, afterall i part -
[1597]A
[1598]of the modern military function) so. let' s: ‘make
[1599]“A
[1600]it military. “$0 he went that far on the thing.
[1602]. . Neale
[1603]But that was a concept--gyou ° j have a regular
[1605]force fighting battle)and someplace ivack of. the
[1606]A
[1608]enemy lines, you'd want to blow up bridges and
[1610]A
[1614]gather information and so on to support
[1616]your tactical force? so well why not have
[1617]. a A > . .
[1618]somebody in working and fomenting trouble
[1620]back there for the enemy, but connected with
[1622]v
[1624]the torces? Now the concept of peoples war-.
[1625]Haak Gees tbo | ;
[1626]fare mow is. pushed, We've seen jpeent in Vietnam:
[1628]_ &
[1629]and elsewhere! feally wasn't something that
[1631]he or others understood at all, that almost
[1632]van Wwoutd. be. oe
[1633]all of us speak—see—guerrrlrator counter-guer— _
[1634]' rilla, and that people like special forces
[1635]\ pishe well,' having learned guerilla operations,
[1637]would—then be qualified to start coping with
[1639][eal would understand the importance of
[1641]j political basis for operations and political.
[1644]|
[1645]| goals and behavior and the psychological part
[1648]¥ . . .
[1649]‘\of.the operations This really wasn't in
[1651]any of'their thinking because, as witnessed in
[1652]Korea, we went and sort of had a small World
[1654]War II in Korea. And in Vietnam later, we went
[1656]in
[1657]A
[1659]P wgain with Taylor ag the ambassador, but
[1661]O'BRIEN:
[1665]having quite a bit of an advisory role with
[1667]e
[1670]pot military commanders out there, and influence
[1673]with them,‘was” fighting another Korea in Vietnam
[1674]ye, ; ,
[1675]more or less. There wes some changes in tactics,
[1676]4 . . , ‘ A
[1678]. ib
[1679]but, was more use of helicopters just for: verti-
[1681]cal envelopment nother instead of
[1683]Sfart
[1684]moving guys along the ground to,with the thing.
[1685]Qe
[1687]Why don' t they come to an understanding? f{parking]
[1690]LANSDALE+—=E!m=suré that's going to makexa-:good=broadcast—
[1694]em
[1695]for-youy-“axgood-tape.” .
[1696]wo)
[1698]. . . = Lo, . .
[1699]O_BRIEN:—-A—diversionuwatzleast.
[1703]O'BRIEN:
[1707]I'm completely. baffled by that. I just don't
[1708]know. .
[1709]Don't they read?
[1711]They speak the words, and particularly when they
[1712]were talking with President Kennedy, they picked
[1713]up the words and enthusiasm. and responded, but
[1715]would show by what they did that they didn't
[1717]understand what they were saying. It's some-
[1719]thing that, of course, I have been trying to
[1724]do something about all along. I've never
[1726]- ; «i ‘
[1727]-understood what it wash. - @ I've always
[1729]gelt that I was too inarticulate or: hadn't
[1730]found a way of doing. things for myself, but
[1731]there have been so many other exponents of
[1733]this thing--not just, Americans, -but of many
[1734]countries, who 1 have written rather good books
[1736]‘on the subject and on parts of ieAtnat you ‘a
[1738]by now
[1739]surely think, that we Americans would produce
[1741]7 top Lender some understanding of some-
[1742]” < LVo Mgayen] |
[1743]/\thing that Mao [Tse<tung] and,Giap and others
[1746]. Cc ‘have got tz , every page down -throwgh the rank
[1748]| and file to undérstand. ‘ene 7
[1750]; \ Jf [cau nterinse ge J
[1752]O BRIEN: Well, in the formation of the CI,group--it was
[1753]designed, as I understand it, primarily as a
[1754]kind of educational group for top-level admin~
[1755]istration people--when do you first come into
[1756]that group?
[1758]“LANSDALE: I was never really, part of that group. I was
[1760]working with a smaller group of executives, of
[1762]Which Taylor was a part
[1764]O'BRIEN:
[1766]“- LANSDALE:
[1770]This is Mongoose, ‘isn't it?
[1772]Yes, This was a national security group of.
[1774]top executives.close to the president, with
[1775]the undersecretary of State, and the deputy
[1777]secretary of Defense,and so on, and the
[1778]/ A ee .
[1780]national ‘security advisorp anG Taylor sat
[1782]in on those meetings after he got his CI
[1784]group going. But/ in forming the CI group
[1786]“inddeianty, Taylor was starting to do some
[1788]“studies for Kennedy, and Kennedy had asked me ‘to.
[1790]. A .
[1791]help him. ‘So I put my staff in the Pentagon
[1793]at taylor's disposal. “rnitially, in Kennedy's
[1794]presence, [I offered to put together a study
[1796]for ‘Taylor on resources in the United States
[1797]and among our alliesifor such things--not allies
[1798]as much as friends of ‘the United'States in many
[1800]countries--and this was done with eume CIA and
[1802]‘some of the military services and the intelli-
[1804]gence part of State. They had a little working
[1806]group) and we had severalsessions in my office
[1807]A ;
[1810]O'BRIEN: .
[1816]O'BRIEN:
[1822]and put together some rough first papers ~
[1824]for Taylor to start his thinking for the
[1826]ce formed ;
[1828]president. Then when Taylor s*peeedrhis. group)
[1830]L : : . A.
[1832]I wasn't invited in on it,and = didn't attend. |
[1833]“A
[1835]Sure, WoO wonder Sc on got any insight. ....
[1837]weiisu 1t, right after the formation
[1839]of that group, and early--it was‘in May or June--
[1842]they dispatched some teams to go around Latin
[1843]America to survey the ability of various nations
[1845]to respond to Castro-type guerrilla activity.
[1846]Oe A :
[1848]1
[1849]a.
[1851]Yes, yes.’
[1853]Did you get involved in the planning of that
[1855]at all or any of the fallout of that?:--
[1857]Just peripherally on both. I forget the,,details
[1859]on that. ‘I had@ been worrying about places like
[1860]OF i ; . . .
[1862]Columbia and several other Latin American
[1864]countries close to the Panama Canal and had
[1866]urged that this be looked into, on some of the
[1868]A“ y
[1869]_ specific things that were being done there. I¥s bode
[1870]encouraged Has the Columbians start civic action
[1871]wo A
[1873]O'BRIEN:
[1879]‘in dealing with some of the dissident
[1880]areas and so on. All’ I had done was, not plan-
[1881]ning as much as coming in with sort of a
[1883]shopping list of what people might look for,
[1885]_ and individuals in these countries they might
[1887]talk to to. get information, on what was happening.
[1888]Well, are lyou in Colombia in the Kennedy
[1889]administration ‘at all as. . -
[1891]No.-No, the most I did was--1 went to venezusta
[1892]4j/A during the Kennedy administration, and Bolivia,
[1894]A
[1895]No, by that time folks were highly sensitive
[1897]about my showing up in “foreign countries-~
[1899]that is, Americans, not foreigners--and I really
[1900]A
[1901]wasn't permitted, or I was stopped really at
[1902]‘policy levels from going back into Vietnam or
[1903]the phitkippines J or anyplace in Asia. I begged
[1905]to be permitted £0 go down and take a look in
[1907]7
[1908]Latin America ,and Gilpatric wan the Cre Hot Pla we
[1909]A - 7 ths ‘Ateis im hod kacw wade.
[1911]BEGIN SIDE II TAPE I
[1913]O BRIEN:
[1915]outside of Verogula, oo. .
[1917]1
[1918]Bia you get to any other countres?
[1919]A
[1922]he Dele ee
[1924]. LANSDALE:
[1927]Well, Bolivia. ~ In Bolivia, I was interested
[1929]in particularly the Bolivian Air Force's
[1931]_ work of setting up a public school system
[1933]_ over in the eastern slopes of the Andes---
[1935]down in the jungles and in the very sparse |
[1937]settlements. They were really the one
[1939]governmental group that could get around
[1941]places. “they were very enthusiastically setting
[1943]up one-room school houses down there / and flying .
[1945]_in teachers and bringing some education in there, —
[1946]WAS _ A
[1948]which I thought was a great project, andjencouraging
[1949]Then, :
[1951]them. n finite I. was in Bolivia, I gotinvolved
[1953]with the resettlement of. indians from the
[1954]Altiplano over onto the eastern:slopes into
[1955]some new communities, in which the whole Bolivian
[1957]i A
[1958]government was involved,eté the U.S. Economic
[1959]af = .
[1961]Mission was working with them, and the
[1963]' Bolivian military was supporting it with trucks
[1965]Sonc-
[1967]and with, “people g going in. But, this was & very
[1968]exciting, agricultural-community-type of a
[1969]project of moving people out where they'd have
[1970]an economic chance at 1ite/ ana also a chance
[1972]to own land. It was changing the social
[1977]structure considerably for they lowest class”
[1978]in Bolivia, and with the armed forces doing
[1979]it. This, again, jwas the very first visit.
[1981]In Veneavia, I had come up with some
[1982]ways of safeguarding our own interests in.
[1983]venezuliteLnich are not only oil production),
[1984]but we’ rave steel mills down there and a& “
[1985]number of things Zout I did this ag much for
[1986]the Venezuy{l an oatense Ministry as I did for.
[1987]the United States at the time. They were
[1988]concerned.
[1990]“O'BRIEN: ’ What are your relations with the people
[1991]. involved in the school in Panama’ which spreads
[1993]a lot of this entity gospel of civie action
[1995]among the military? Are your relations with
[1996]those people pretty good?
[1997]- LANSDALE: It was. They had picked up a lot of my
[1998]. , material from earlier times, in the form |
[1999]i ; Qe. ard. wonees Prat
[2000]. . of meémosizemd lectures, I had written on these
[2001]"subjects. Whiten they set up the school, I
[2002]"talked with them on the program of instruction
[2004]that they were going to p¥igz give. The first ~
[2006]adoption of any of these principles was in
[2008]O'BRIEN:
[2012]Guatemala, and it worked very well there for.
[2015]a time. The Latin Americans ‘became quite
[2017]enthusiastic, though again jealousies come in.
[2018]“A
[2020]They thought the Guatemalans were boasting ..
[2022]too much about it. sof when I was told that
[2024]‘\S , .
[2025]problem,I said, Well, get them to emulate and
[2026]fe
[2028]_ try ‘end ‘beat them and get ‘a healthy rivalry .
[2030]yl. -
[2031]going, which is what happened actually.
[2033]I suspect {Fulton] Freeman is there as ambass-
[2035].  ador in Colnbi a when you! re there--no, Freeman
[2039]O'BRIEN:
[2042]O'BRIEN;
[2047]was in Coltinbia.
[2049]. Yes, he was in sophie.
[2051]I can't think of the guy who was in Vonesutla
[2052]that was aéinbassador.
[2054]ve he was from. Arizona and was a journalist.
[2055]Not Citaucicn, Me Bernbain- LAvsDALE: No-
[2056]Well, how is he to deal with, and do you get
[2058]a chance to see [Romulo]: ‘Betancourt or any
[2060]of the political leaders?
[2062]Yes, I saw political leaders there.- I had
[2063]five days in Venezufta, and I think I got
[2065]AN
[2066]two hours’ sleep all the time.I was there. I
[2067][C. Allan Ste wa: ail |
[2069]found our ambassador there,at the time very
[2071]gad HY geod bunk wi AO
[2072]open-minded, I wrote a report, coming back
[2074]_ “43+
[2076]from Venezupla afterward, and. submitted ityere
[2077]by the time I got to Washington. It went up
[2078]"to President Kennedy as well as ‘Dean J Rusk,
[2079]‘and some. of Rusk's staff immediately wired the
[2080]anbessadorgand 3: was one of ‘these/ "You don't
[2081]want to buy this, _ do you, " and ey said I'd-
[2082]come out’ with a report on Veneaufiie, and here
[2083]were the main points of my recommendations and
[2084]some findings. “He was just there five days. -
[2085]He couldn't possible have found out enough
[2086]to come to these conclusions, isn't that
[2087]right?” Bless his heart, the ambassador came .
[2088]7 back ‘and said,in effect, "I'm amazed that he
[2089]found out. that much, and the recommendations
[2090]“are sound, -and we'd discussed this before he
[2091]left, and we're working with them already.'
[2093]‘vou | don't have. to be in a place jong. »
[2094]For example ,_ we had a phopty large American
[2095]community down there who themselves were
[2096]. practically government}: U.S. Steel. and all .
[2098]our big oil companies and so on. There was
[2100]very little relationship between the American
[2102]O'BRIEN:
[2104]“you
[2108]business community and the U.S. Embassyy cad |
[2110]I had urged that they meet maybe once a week
[2112]or once a month--the. American: executives and
[2114]the Ambassador and several members of his
[2115]staff,and have lunch together rather frequently
[2116]and discuss mutual problems because the U.S.”
[2117]firms dou there had very large security
[2118]starts). (they were very close to the police
[2119]type of forces, the constabulary ‘down therd<
[2120]and ; sind the embassy would be very. well inforned |
[2122]from this, as woll as passing some of thks
[2124]information back to these people; and everybody
[2127]would gain by it. Well, this doesn't take
[2129]very long to. .. . In talking to the vice
[2130]jn che
[2131]president | of 08. Sie Steel operations - down there,
[2133]you'd an say, "One thing you would change if you
[2134]“haa the ‘power--what would it bef" and he'd
[2135]tell you something like this, yoi=tou, so,
[2136]ey it was rather easy to come up with ‘ens that
[2138]' thing.
[2140]Did you find them fairly knowledgeable and
[2141]enlightened about some of the things that you
[2149]O'BRIEN:
[2153]of their (ompioyeose-not thet
[2157]; _ Oo
[2158]Very much so, very much sop.——<
[2160]‘Like rural economic development, and agricul-
[2164]Particularly the oil companies, ana I was
[2166]' surprised. Standard [0il Company] of ow-verseyt
[2168]showed me what it was doing because the: rigs
[2169]out in Lake Maracaibo were getting blown up
[2171]and their pipelines were getting blow up-
[2172]vt ; ; “3
[2174]_ dy saboteurs coming in who were really expert.
[2176]I found out. later that they were affiliated
[2177]with communists in Coldinbi a and had come on
[2179]of
[2180]overs+ they were really experts at explosives,
[2182]and they weren't: the student type of revolu~
[2184]tionapies and so on, who also were present
[2186]Fi
[2187]in Venezuela. Buty in seeing what they were
[2189]doing, it went far beyond a.company paternalism
[2191]: They
[2192]type of a thing for employees thiet ,3¢ started
[2194]credit systems with farm groups and housing
[2195]projects for people living in the vicinity
[2196]sf employees sO
[2198]much,who also gained a great deal out of this.
[2199]aA | . : .
[2201]And then U.S. Steel, in pushing its developments
[2203]7 . . Alb
[2204]. . . —
[2205]| | (eater ? 2,
[2206]way down to the south. . . , He-probably \
[2208]wouldn't do“ity-he'a chew The tiniee an tne’
[2211]‘here. . . - a \
[2212]|
[2214]|
[2215]|
[2217]O'BRIEN: Oh my God._It!s.a wonder -he-hasn!t“elect?i=—
[2218]_ cuted. himsett.-={Leughter}-
[2219]LANSDALE: Yeah...._It!s not yours, ae =somo-of- ming .~
[2221]1 BRIEW: Wellj—Lln. not. worried ‘about. that. ~-Wires,-
[2225]. 2
[2227]not sure. ebout 5 ‘yours.
[2229]LANSDALE: —" Worse“ tivan-rats.
[2231]nm Nour - .
[2232]_ 04BRIEN:———We115~ hes /8- spirited animal and se can’t” 7
[2233]Cee we
[2235]yen _———=
[2236]LAXSDALE? Yeah. 7 Well, one of the stories on Kennedy
[2238]I'd like to put in was! ou On my reports
[2240]from Vietnam in the very early days of -- just
[2241]before he was inaugurated, and he read it :
[2242]A .
[2243]apparently right after the inaugural--one of
[2244]- : the reports was a little side piece that I.
[2245]‘did'on a village in’ South Vietnam inhabited
[2246]by some Chinese refugees that: President
[2247]9°. Pann ; .
[2248]nh Diem had located down in the midst
[2250]of a communist~held territory, and I was very .
[2254]impressed by then eA just as an example of
[2255]what, humans will do in such a situation, I'd
[2257]written it up and turned in a separate report
[2259]on iteFang ebout the 2... . It was still
[2261]January, '61, ‘about ten days ‘after the inaugural,
[2262]A
[2264]my telephone in the ‘Pentegon rangyand this —
[2265]ope “
[2267]“voice ‘that sounded like Praegigehs Kennedy's
[2269]told me it was President Kennedy talking, and
[2270]A
[2271]he had read this report of mine and wanted me
[2272]to have it published in the ‘Saturday Evening
[2273]ia at dhe fone ;
[2274]Post. I was wondering which joker in the-
[2275] ¥, oo ams . .
[2276]Pentagon s-you=know, was imitating this
[2277]Harvard, Massachusetts aééent and was putting
[2278]$0 Ff. ;
[2279]me on, and I said, "Yes, yes, yes." I then
[2280]A : .
[2281]had my secretary check over at the White
[2283]House) and sure enough, it had been President
[2285]Kennedy, so I had to then go ahead ZT'a
[2287]promised to do 4) ea figuring out I didn't
[2289]know how to get Something in the Saturday
[2290]Evening Post, but quickly ‘found. out how, and
[2292]they published this thing afterwards as a
[2293]report that the President wanted published in
[2295]their magazine.
[2297]- -48-
[2298]ran
[2299]O'BRIEN: | welthet——— You had taken/-of course,
[2300]you'd had that interest in Vietnam and Laos. eee
[2301]You talked to a lot of people, as I under-
[2302]. stand, about Laos and Vietnam end the incoming
[2303]administration. _Did.you have eny intent or
[2304]: pylipose in mind outside of Just explaining
[2305]_ the way that it was?
[2306]LANSDALE: That was principally my intent. The first
[2307]| meeting I had with McNamara, all he wanted to:
[2309]+o oe oo:
[2310]do. was, have me tell him about Vietnam, and-this
[2312]was essentially what most of the incoming
[2313]- oO .
[2315]administrative officials;“when they'd talk:
[2317]. ‘oe , Ao-- ;
[2318]to me-2 would want me to explain what was
[2320]A
[2322]happening and wnat the situation was. This:
[2323]essentially was: ‘how and why ‘T felt on these
[2324]subjects, but my thesis right along on this
[2326]was to help the people in the countries to
[2329]help themselves rather than,go in and do
[2331]amen ee ARIMA ah een Leena annem cate baal lacie
[2333]things for them. . It was mostly on the nuts”
[2334]and bolts pow how you go about doing this, and
[2335]the individuals you's: pick to do it, and how .
[2336]you'd select. them, ang please let's ‘have
[2338]highest quality and fewer people doing these
[2342]Be.
[2344]O'BRIEN: -
[2346]LANSDALE: -
[2350]things.
[2351]Well, you have some successes and failures
[2352]in--I guess mostly failures in the last of
[2353]the Eisenhower edninistrationg tim thinking -
[2354]in terms of Laos. Laos is the immediate
[2356]problem in 196l. How do you respond to some
[2358]of these people who are in policy-making.
[2360]_ positions at that time? I'd like to get
[2362]your feeling for thengpeople like (WaltBens]
[2364]Robertson-Zin the State "department =p03it
[2365]“A
[2367]pon Eonn and [J. Graham] Parsons: John Irwin
[2369]in wk Derense; and on? the Agency side, people
[2371]like [Desmond] Fitzgerald. How do they see. .
[2373]You have named a ‘group of people, all of whom
[2375]are friends of mine,and we were very friendly,
[2376]An A
[2378]and I had worked with a number of them for
[2380]enough years so that we more or less under-
[2382]stood each other and could take shortcuts in.
[2384]conversations and so on. All of those you
[2386]QMa?. in TAtIK
[2387]named. y ~and-teiked?w with me expressed
[2389]similar beliefs to mine) so it was very easy in
[2390]? A
[2391]talking to them, and there were others.in the
[2393]O'BRIEN:
[2399]Eisenhower ‘administration. Now this wasn't
[2401]true throughout the administration at all,
[2403]but there. was a considerable group of people
[2405]“who 1 were in various executive slots just
[2407]down the second and third level who had been
[2408]through the . . . o Interruption]
[2409]Well, Laos,as I understand it,is,with the imp*-
[2411]on ey cn IS, a7
[2412]aid that's oon in there ,het4 t | really
[2413]does in. some ways tear up the economy of the.
[2414]country. Now, how do you. look on the’ ‘training -~
[2416]of the Laotian army in Late 360-2" 159, '60--
[2418]_some of the activities of the Agency in Laos,
[2420]as well as the army and through the PEO
[2422][Programs Evaluation Office] office and things
[2424]: ts
[2425]like this? Is this the kind of thing ,you
[2427]envision in terms of--I hate to use the term
[2429]"nation building"--helping a country to help
[2431]- itself, in! helping. people to help themselves?
[2433]Yes, as long as in the modern world the leaders
[2434]of the country will think in terms of as large
[2435]a military establishment as they can afford
[2437]in a country. And they do this without any
[2439]advice from anybody. This is just a natural)
[2445]self- preservation type of an impulse on their
[2446]part. Then my thought is: They will be doing
[2447]this. Then let's make the military establish-
[2449]ment serve the country in ‘a mach bigger. way -
[2451]. than merely toting guns round and guarding
[2453]borders. It's usually the organization that
[2455]is nationwide, and there might not be any
[2456]A
[2457]other organization that's nationwide in the.
[2459]country, such ag agricultures, e even the
[2460]administrative structure: that usually comes }
[2462]he.
[2463]under, department or ministry of the Interior’
[2465]; won't really have the manpower, the communi-
[2467]cations) end so forth, that the: military forces
[2468]A
[2469]do. "30, g given that, why not then get- the
[2471]military to start doing iconstructive things
[2473]around and making full use of the manpower
[2475]that you have anyhow. Have. them be good
[2477]military men as the very first requisite of
[2479]thee
[2480]this, but, given that athere! s still energy
[2481]OA Ong <4 ‘eh
[2483]and personnel involved in that who have & lot
[2485]A
[2487]of manzhours left over that could do other -
[2488]Ce .
[2489]things» and essentiallysthis is what I was
[2491]trying to get the American advisory missions
[2493]O'BRIEN:
[2497]- a AB Qe
[2499]to do--not only: the military advisory missions,
[2500]but when other egencies would get in and be
[2502]working on these. things, to themselves become
[2504]interested in the military doing such things, -
[2505]and aiding and abetting, including economics
[2507]projects and educational work and SO on. |
[2509]Well, in this Leotian deterioration that takes
[2511]A o-
[2512]place, yew=know the competing people there--
[2513]CF Nosavan ]
[2514]Phoumi Lvongbehity ¢ and Souvann Phouma and
[2516]-all--how do you read that in 1960 just prior.
[2518]an
[2520]to the administration coming in? . bo=yowe==.——
[2522]How do you see Phoumi; how do you see
[2524]Souvannah Phouma, as people? First of all;
[2526]have you met them ‘at any time © ——
[2528]Yes, yes, yes, I didn't know them well at all.
[2529]I'a met them a usually at formal gatherings
[2530]of one kind or another. The mein thing that
[2532]I saw in Laos in the way of political stability
[2533]actually stemmed out of the king of Laos dy this -
[2534]was the only unifying political force that.
[2535]existed there in the minds of all of the various |
[2537]Lao leaders whom I'd met. So when the others
[2539]started splitting and opposing one another, I
[2542]ra oo
[2543]had. “already felt that our best bet was to
[2544]turn to ‘the king and force him _-or, not
[2545]force, but to encourage nimito ‘taking the
[2546]leadership role that would be the one thing
[2547]. acceptable to ali these leaders. “Instead of
[2548]that, we were starting to become pants—in= parfisom
[2549]ourselves: there and playing off one guy against
[2550]another, and Americans aren't good at that
[2551]game. We have many Americans wno think they
[2552]are, but this, I think, is a little too Pee fe ow neleg
[2553]err ye fell in love with the factions and.
[2554]a “ong 00 (i
[2555]; people, almost: unconscious of the fact that
[2556]“we were doing that. The paratroop leader |
[2557]there . . .-) _ :
[2558]O'BRIEN: fone Le?
[2559]LANSDALE:, us oat, who kicked over a revolt hea spent the
[2560]| night before his coup with a group of inerican
[2561]‘ . . friends, and there wasn't a damn one of them
[2562]| that knew that he was going to have a coup in
[2563]the morning. This type of a thing/ I just >
[2564]found inconceivable. People get nervous and
[2566]sort of absent-minded about what's happening
[2568]at the time when they're planning an action
[2570]O'BRIEN:
[2572]LAN DSALE :
[2576]dike that the next morning, and somebody there
[2577]A
[2579]among the Americans should have been sensitive
[2581]enough to have seid, "Well, erent you feeling ~
[2582]“Lo vnows and .
[2583]well: or. something, youshnaws and had gotten
[2585]some | feeling on it. put / this. sort of getting
[2587]| in bed with people socially and saying, "He's
[2589]Oi Lie alk righ,” u
[2590]a good. feliow,, end ‘he's my friend, and excusing
[2592]everything is a common blindness, and this had
[2593]; A
[2594]worried me in Laos quite a bit.
[2595]a
[2597]‘Well, I get the impression from reading of
[2599]this, perioa/ that there really is some lack. .j
[2600]of coordination in the various efforts that
[2602]are there—-eAotherords, the ambassador is
[2604]' not completely privy to what the Agency is
[2606]doing, ana the Agency is not completely privy
[2607]to what DOD is doing through the PEO office.
[2609]"Do you get that feeling? Maybe in regard
[2611]. : Loshn Foy
[2612]to the Parsons-Irwin-Reilly mission that
[2614]goes out there, do. you get any feeling over Husk
[2616]at all?
[2618]Yes, I'm trying to recall. ... We hit a
[2620]crisis at that point, and the group that went.
[2622]out--Parsons was on home leave, and we had a
[2623]A .
[2627]meeting in the Pentegon in the secretary of
[2629]nd ) o
[2630]Defenges office,and there were a mob of
[2631]Ave
[2633]=<. There were /-I can't.
[2635]people theres
[2636]quite, recall now what prompted the meeting »
[2637]but red was a crisis of some sort in Laos. .
[2638]And the JCS gave a briefing, that's right, as
[2639]' part ‘of: the ‘hing, and it was on the Pathet Lao
[2640]"posi tioning ang they suddenly discovered tet
[2641]there were passes over the mountains that
[2643]had some importance to the Ho Chi Minh trail,
[2644]and this great discovery was being lectured
[2645]on at this meeting. ¥ gad at the time, the
[2646]Secretary of Defense--I ae eng think, I wonder,
[2647]‘that mi ght have been [Thomas]. ‘Gates Lin] at
[2649]x
[2651]the time—might have been, but whoever it was-—
[2653]“A .
[2655]asked if I had a comment to make)and I said,
[2656]oh.
[2657]a
[2658]showing us of Pathet Lao and the other ‘situa!
[2660]. . A
[2661]“Take a look at that map that the JCS was
[2663]tions on the thing} and I said, "it should
[2664]2 =
[2665]tell everybody here just one thing. You've
[2667]Sis .
[2668]got an ambassador who ,on home leave heres?
[2670]he doesn't belong neretthe belongs out in
[2671]. A
[2672]Vientians right this noment, axa the rest of
[2675]A aes Site haetat nian! a wees an
[2677]O'BRIEN:
[2681]O'BRIEN:
[2683]And—the~a~
[2687]you who are asking questions ought” to have
[2689]‘people out there with him who would tell you
[2691]immediately and take a. first- hand look."
[2692]Ce
[2693]I remember Irwin, was picked
[2695]: he
[2696]right on the spot to go immedi ately, end, said
[2698]to me on the side, "You and your big mouths,
[2700]oo
[2702]yominown {Laughter]
[2704]Well, did you get involved in any of the
[2706]meetings on Laos-after. the Kennedy adminis-
[2708]tration comes in, and some of the jockeying
[2710]that goes. around?
[2712]Some of them, yes. I can't quite recall
[2713]which meetings they were at the time. JI was
[2715]in on some of the questions of the support of
[2717]Mesos.
[2718]the Neo the guerrilla forces.
[2720]Well, how MF aia you see in. terms of a strategy
[2721]Aw
[2723]for ‘the area?  mrorete-. By as I read it, there
[2724]That are
[2726]seems to be some various strategies, proposed;
[2728]one is a;syoueknon, going down the full road
[2730]behind Phoumi and supporting Phoumi, and
[2732]another is the panhandle strategy--I've never:
[2734]been able to quite understand what the pan-
[2736]if Qe
[2737]handle svurategy was~-that yousnou, rings
[2739]-ST-
[2741]|
[2742]| a bell.
[2743]| _ LANSDALE: | Ham yeahove lly ham, my memory isn't too
[2744]. good on this thing. - There was some talk
[2745]at the tine }-there' 's high country across
[2746]theBolovens Plateau and so forth down in the
[2747]south, and there was talk at the time ,of
[2748]that. _being the dominant area, and what we
[2749]"should dojvas to make use. of that. and the
[2750]high ground in Vietnam and so on, across
[2751]into Thailand, and ensure that that state staph
[2752]a in noncommunist hands. ,
[2753]_ a O'BRIEN: : Well, there! 8 also suggested in the Laotian
[2754]: i crisis as early as 1961, the use of strategic
[2755]' bombing on supply weyes even,as I
[2757]a)
[2759]understand it, to Hanoi, as early as that,
[2760]and | ingerdieting a A
[2762]A= SCE some of. the supply lines, -as
[2764]_well as the suggestion; that subsequently in
[2765]1962 does become a reality) the dropping
[2767]of the ‘SEATO [Southeast Asia Treaty Organi zation]
[2769]"plan five as I understand it,. How aia you
[2771]. - ‘feel about the Laotian crisis at that point,
[2772]in terms of a strategy or a direction et. which
[2774]! . should work?
[2776]o.
[2783]Well, I had wanted the Laotians to defend
[2785]I”
[2787]their, country, and I’was all for the work
[2789]A
[2790]- Meos [ors
[2791]with the ‘Maoists and so on of: doing it.
[2793]Once. it left that and started involving =
[2795]Vietnamese or uS, on bombing or anything
[2797]| else, I felt that the cost of saving some
[2799]real estate would be too high to ever engage
[2801]in;,) And on the bombing, I felt that: as long
[2803]pects 0
[2805]as you had all of the , communication with the
[2807]people theake in the hands of communist leaders
[2809]‘such as in North Vietnam and then Hanoi where
[2811]this was pushing, that anything overt such
[2813]as aerial ‘bombing that would then permit them
[2814]to use that as a unifying force psychologically |
[2815]with . the people would be dead wrong As used
[2817]to remind them of what {Winston] Churchill had
[2819]‘done 4 (ith the German bombing of Britain,
[2821]A
[2823]“cust on radio with the peoples and here were
[2825]leaders with complete access to radio and
[2827]working with the people)and it would have a
[2828]vay .
[2830]reverse effect. as far as trying to stop the
[2832]ambitions and aims and so forth of ‘the North
[2834]Vietnamese, who after all, the guys organizing
[2836]LA
[2841]the Pathet: Lao end pushing on into the area.
[2842]me: felt that more could be done with the
[2843]armed forces of Laos themselves in making ~
[2844]them more able to stend up for themselves -
[2845]-and defend their country. But if it couldn't).
[2846]I couldn't see an intervention of any sort a
[2847]in there. Morally, we'd have been on a moral.
[2848]ground then to turn around and start using
[2849]some, international moral pressure through the
[2850]_ press and so forth, to sort of shame’ the. North |
[2851]‘Vietnamese out of ‘their attempts. I'm a
[2852]great believer in exposing things to bring
[2853]‘such pressure. . .
[2854]O'BRIEN: Well, how do you see the relationship of Vietnam.
[2855]. and Laos at that point, or do you? . |
[2856]LANSDALE:. Oh, yes. The passes and the HoChi Minh trail
[2857]in bringing things down was one of the hey
[2858]-things on this. But again, there. was even
[2859]talk at the time of taking Vietnemese troops
[2863]in there, efa-—secretly;and using them up
[2865]“A
[2866]to try and Stop that, and I was opposed to
[2867]that], I didn't want to see intervention like
[2869]that from the outside.
[2872]-60-.
[2874]Well, when does some of the covert activity,
[2875]injterms of. the use of some of the: Montag rords |
[2877]yands- in interdicting those supply lines in
[2878]Q-
[2879]Laos ,2yout=kbouw, from Vietnam, start? Is that
[2880]“A .
[2881]‘going on in the late Eisenhower acministration,
[2882]: “A
[2884]or does it begin in the Kennedy administration?
[2885]I think it was the Kennedy administrations”
[2886]there had been a little of ityor there.had
[2888]been talk of itjin the Eisenhower administration.
[2889]“A .
[2891]There had been thoughts along that line by.
[2893]‘the top Vietnamese “reacers-Lisss/ sglend 1
[2894]“remember President Diem! 8 brother, went tox .
[2895]vA A in
[2897]his older brother went into Laos pax about
[2899]'SS or maybe’ '56yand had come up with a scheme
[2900]very similar to “that at the time. He had
[2901]talked about ‘the mountain people of ‘Laos
[2902]being ekin to. “the mountain 3 people of Vietnam ,
[2903]and wouldn't: it be good to get some of our .
[2904]mountain people in with them ,and ‘together
[2906]A
[2907]they could be trained.
[2909]_ O'BRIEN: Yes, well,-you're in Vietnam in the middle
[2910]‘of the fifties,and then you go back’ in 1960
[2911]A
[2913]in- the late Eisenhower administration. What's
[2916]on Senkemtn,
[2918]AAA ett ae ao eh eee ntl So ceTmanbaae a enema hd ete A cette erenbiae 1 Me th dinette ie aba A anise Me hn tented whee ase
[2920]er
[2923]O'BRIEN:
[2929]changed, or has anything?
[2930]Oh, a great deal. Excuse me. _ [Interruption]
[2932]What changes do you. find?
[2934]Well, the main change was in a growing isola- \ >
[2935]tion from reality of the constituency of the { ’
[2936]president of Vietnamg a repression of, you :
[2937]might say,a loyal opposition ora noncommunist .
[2940]aN
[2941]opposition to free? in political terms a” “There wen
[2943]professionally some among the military that
[2945]wee - ed as
[2946]Twas’ taking the Vietnamese military apart from
[2948]their people more than it had been when I had
[2950]left, because I-had gotten them working very
[2952]. 4 the g< fF fe orn oI . ae
[2953]closely with a number. of aterreeon- projects
[2954]he .
[2956]and a growing isolation of the American ’
[2958]embassy in particulary but including some of
[2959]; A '
[2960]the American agencies, from the Vietnamese
[2961]A ae
[2962]officialdom, and taking a very strange form
[2964]of concentrating on gossip essentially--gossip
[2965]as
[2967]as much as #act--about, sh-—sdhatsthe-heliis-
[2969]the word - Limctiyinst _think-of,-e€ = misdeeds
[2972]Seth ch em word diet” Pema sled 9 esate ne
[2975]3
[2976]3
[2977]5
[2978]g
[2984]jabs
[2985]ana so forth by, public officials or
[2987]people connected with the regime in Vietnam @
[2989]‘so that the information gathering process
[2991]of the United States there was devoting an
[2993]exorbitant amount of time on sort of nitpicking
[2994]. Ly te, a : ar at ,
[2995]on the people that were in power. | fhe rela-
[2997]“
[2999]tionships, such as the ambassador with the
[3000]“a .
[3002]president of the country, -the ambassador
[3004]A
[3005]Ke
[3007]would go into details of malf2x6ance in office
[3008]and so forth, or mishandling of funds by the
[3010]Vietnamese on an internal matter, and the
[3012]president would have to correct him and say,
[3014]A.
[3015]y .
[3016]\you don't have all the facts, and the ambass- .__ |
[3017], IN . A yi: ; : .
[3018]ador would say, ves) I do) too. This. to me
[3020]: A A
[3021]was very poor. I felt that we had some
[3024]Americans erat were close enough to the top
[3025]officials of the Vietnamese(who weren't
[3026], A
[3028]present in the country always), who should
[3029]. : “A
[3031]be brought there and told, "Look, we under-
[3033]stand these guys are doing something wrong.
[3035]‘since they don't understand us that well)
[3039]Can you go in and get-them to start doing
[3041]things right,as a friend of theirs?" rather
[3044]ye sae _ -
[3045]than going and try'ing to scold them and
[3047]‘something and getting the backs up of people, .
[3049]and they'd figure, "Well, these damn nosey
[3050]oe AN. A . .
[3052]Americans-only got half the facts, and
[3054]A
[3056]the hell with them. We aren't going to
[3058]do what they wantg" “I just felt that we
[3060]weren't playing a very wise ballgame there
[3062]vt
[3063]at the time, on the American side. Cf also
[3065]‘felt that Diem was paying too much attention
[3067]-to similar types of his own’ people, his
[3069]fwtuawy Oe _
[3070]intelligence people, who, were ceLrostuamay telling
[3073]him what the Americans were doing too damn
[3074]much, or were bringing in alarming news about
[3075]his own subjects--and particularly political
[3077]oppositionists--and)I- suspect) manufacturing
[3078]. “A “A
[3080]‘Cases against them so that they could take
[3082]act lonsgaird he,in turn) was getting too much
[3083]" Sa No
[3088]secondhand from people) and this tended to
[3089]- A i
[3091]isolate him more) Since his main intelli-
[3094]gence officer was his brother, [Ngo Dinh] Nhu ,
[3095]. a . “A
[3097]A. ;
[3098]who was’ an ambitious person,too, I felt that
[3100]it was a poor arrangement'on the Vietnamese
[3101]side. -I personally urged Diem at the time
[3103]to get in’ touch with some of his opposition,—
[3104]A
[3106]ankwat which point he asked me where I had |
[3108]been at certain times of the day during my
[3109]visit thetes and I said, I was talking to
[3110]your, opposition, and I'm not going to tell
[3111]you who it was ox where I was, but just the
[3112]mere fact that you know that shows that you -
[3113]were having me trailed aroundgard you know
[3114]I'm a friend of your country's,and I'm |
[3115]ae A
[3117]trying to help all of you succeed here, and -
[3118]you happen to be the elected leader, and you
[3120]; val
[3121]jolly well better start reflecting what your
[3123]: ; i$ .
[3124]people desires a if you™@ spend your time
[3126]and money and efforts and so forth ‘watching
[3130]O BRIEN:
[3134]me
[3136]~65-.
[3138]a guy like me, I'm sure you're doing. a lot
[3140]. ; Hy
[3141]more for someone else you really suspect) —-
[3143]Co— -
[3144]. afnd=—
[3146]How would he react to something like this?
[3148]-Listen, I was told by a number of people
[3150]that Iwas about the only one’ that really’
[3154]ever talked to him in this manner, and-he
[3155]would listeno ard at the time, one of the
[3157]people most critical of him was his vice-~
[3159]- president, and I went over and saw the vice~
[3161]president, whose name was [Nguyen Ngoc} Tho,
[3162]and Tho immediately started ;telling me that
[3163]the president had spies all over’ his office
[3164]and in his staffpand as he was telling me
[3165]this, one of the clerks was serving us tea,
[3167]. \ . : . ;
[3168]and I said, ‘Is this guy one of the president's
[3170], p
[3171]spies?’ana he said, “Probably, I think so."
[3173][Laughter] Maybe he'll go-back and report
[3175]ton)
[3176]this one. I said, When was the last time
[3178]you two talked to each other?” Well,it had
[3182]secondhand from people) and this tended to_
[3183]. 7 nN .
[3185]., : . , . /. - + 7 , .
[3186]isolate him'more) Since his main intelli-
[3188]aA.
[3190]gence officer was his brother, [Ngo Dinh] Nhu,’
[3192]. a .
[3193]who was'an ambitious person,too. I felt that
[3195]it was a poor arrangement'on the Vietnamese
[3197]side. -I personally urged Diem at the time
[3199]‘to get in’ touch with. some of his’ opposition,
[3200]A
[3202]ank—at which point he asked me where I had |
[3204]been at certain times of the day during my
[3206]. 4 7
[3207]visit theres and I said, I was talking to.
[3209]your opposition and I'm not going to tell
[3210]you who it was or where I was, but just the
[3212]mere fact that you know that shows that -you -
[3214]‘were having me trailed aroundgar€ you know
[3216]I'm a friend of your country's,and I'm
[3217]trying to help all of you succeed here, and.
[3218]you happen to be the elected leader, and you:
[3219]. . . ; “A .
[3220]jolly well better start reflecting what your.
[3221]people desire,» wa it you ™& spend your time
[3223]and money and efforts and: so forth watching
[3225]O BRIEN:
[3227]LANSDALE: -
[3231]a guy like me, I'm sure. you're doing. a lot
[3233]. oe 4
[3234]more for Someone else you really suspecty
[3236]oC
[3237]' afta
[3239]How would he react to something like this?
[3241]Listen, I was told by a number of people —
[3243]that I was about the only one that really:
[3245]ever talked to him in this manner, and he
[3246]would listeng and at the time, one of the
[3248]people most critical of him was his vice-
[3250]“president, and I went over and saw the vicew
[3252]president, whose name was [Nguyen Ngoc} Tho,
[3253]and Tho immediately started telling me that
[3254]the president had Spies all over his office
[3255]and in his staffyand as he was telling me
[3256]this, one of the clerks was serving us tea,
[3258]A : ; .
[3259]and I said, ‘Is this guy one of the president's
[3261]spies?’ and he said, “Probably, .I ‘think so."
[3263][Laughter] Maybe he'll go back and report
[3265]oho)
[3266]this one. I said, When was the last time
[3268]you two talked to each other?” Well, it had |
[3269]oS A
[3271]. ps
[3273]“and call him over here your first free time,
[3275]don't know what your own police are doing)
[3277]' -66-
[3279]q “na
[3280]been months» so I, back to Diem, and I jumped
[3281]A
[3283]himg I said; ‘Vou've got a vice-president
[3285]who you ‘ve made responsible for all the
[3287]economic development of the - country, and I
[3288]. OM
[3289]know that you consider that very importante.
[3291]You -haven't talked to him for a long time,”
[3292]° ; . he'd “A
[3293]and I forced him to tell me when , ud done
[3294]it lastgso I said, Well, pick up the telephone
[3295]. A
[3296]and you sit down and have a long talk with ©
[3297]y ‘ - . . ;
[3298]himp. So he did itq He picked up.the phone)
[3299]- : roar
[3300]and T got the two of them together againg
[3301]He was really out of touch® He promised me
[3303]at the time to get in touch with some of tre Abe
[3305]political oppositiong he swore up_ and down
[3306]“yell, .
[3309]he wasn't. oppressing anyoneég and ‘I said, You
[3311]“A
[3312]“u
[3314]‘then, and-I gave him the list of names of
[3316]A
[3318]’ people who were in prisoné, who had been arrested’
[3320]A
[3322]at midnight and: pulled out of their homes and
[3324]OTS AE”
[3326]2 ae te ne ees ae a RR RR ee delet A Ane Aft dee he whens ger
[3330]_ LANSDALE:.
[3332]Nhu o ,
[3333]intelligence knew © - -6
[3337]"SO OMg and he promised. to look into their
[3339]cases immediately and do something about
[3341]. So \ . -
[3343]1tg And I said, I've gotten this from.
[3344]re
[3346]people who,in the opposition to you) but :I
[3347]wacther ae “A .
[3349]co nen )
[3350]don't know 3<€7you 've, gotten any reports.
[3351]: on . .
[3353]He said he'd never heard of these cases,
[3355]and I think he was telling the truth. He
[3357]had no reason to dissemble with me at all.
[3359]on these things.
[3361]Well,why is this? Is it the development of
[3362]“2 we i nonin
[3364]an independent bureaucracy,.or is tnexe—a
[3366]degree of U.S. influence on, let's say)the
[3367]: i A
[3370]There was probably some. . .:. I think by
[3372]“that time the Vietnamese intelligence was
[3374]way beyond any control by U.S.. intelligence,
[3375]A
[3377]who initially had been helping it, and Diem's
[3379]"Bother Nhu was really--really had the bit in
[3381]his teeth and was his own'man. And I suspect,
[3382]A
[3384]initially, he was really trying to serve his
[3386]. . :
[3387]wee ee eg ee en ee ee AT tates eames iNet tn arabe Geen beiliamlie IR DANVAES no ty poe cet) 0: OE nie baat
[3389]O'BRIEN:
[3393]-65- -
[3395]brother, and he was doing it by trying ‘to
[3396]A hes
[3397]get the goods on. everybody working for his
[3398]brother throughout, the government and anybody
[3399]opposed to his’ brother, and the intelligence
[3400]people, picking it up )discoverea that if
[3402]they brought in bad news about some guy that
[3403]the brother didn't like, he'd pay them and
[3404]believe it. So I'm sure that there was
[3405]3 lot of manufactured evidence in the
[3406]intelligence take that was coming ing ard
[3408]I don't think the Americans were screening
[3410]‘any of that type of information because it .-
[3412]went right into the palace,and there was a
[3413]A
[3415]big” room behind the president's office that ~
[3417]had many files and was the main 1 personner 7
[3419]dossier type of file place.
[3421]Well, you're critical of the MAAG [Military
[3423]Assistance Advisory croup] operation there.
[3425]| folie?
[3426]What's wrong with it) in the late Soba
[3429]Well, I felt that MBAG under “hanging” Sam
[3432][Samue T. 7 Williams in the late “Sos was
[3436]anfunusually well-run American military
[3437]4 . ;
[3439]. Operation. There were some unusual things
[3441]being done that made it so. One of. them’
[3442]was one of the best ideas I've ever bumped
[3443]into. “General Willians brought over the
[3445]chief of staff of the Vietnamese army
[3447]whenever .the American advisors, who at that.
[3449]A
[3451]. a oe
[3452]time were out in the countryside, but =
[3453]. “A
[3455]o Soa a :
[3457]we at fairly high levei.s)and were running
[3458]A, -
[3459]training camps more than advising on opera-
[3460]: a
[3462]‘tions or anything #-#ut. when they would come
[3464]in once a month for a weekend in Saigon,
[3466]Williams would get the Vietnamese Chief of
[3468]- Staft to come in and talk to them. The
[3470]Vietnamese Ghief of Staff at that time was
[3471]General [Tran van] Don. Don was quite
[3472]diplomatic, but had a way of being candia in
[3473]his remarks and not having them hurt too much.
[3476]“when they were told. He would leave out, so
[3478]‘on, but he would tell these Americans what
[3480]O'BRIEN:
[3486]their Vietnamese counterparts in the Viet-
[3488]namese army and so forth thought of them and
[3490]: . “A
[3491]their work)and their advice, andthe reactions
[3492]| . So | os
[3493]throughout the armed forces to them This
[3495]‘was the one part of the monthly gatherings ©
[3497]with Americans around that everybody would
[3499]stop dozing off or thinking of something else
[3500]and would sit up and. pay attention because
[3502]they were the subject of the talk,of course.
[3504]. ; A
[3506]This was a very healthy thing...
[3507]see where.’
[3509]yes, I can feel it FX weld bee
[3511]“A
[3513]t,o. sSause even though it was tough diplo-
[3515]oe
[3516]; matically, the most sordid truth, wotd— the
[3519]hardest factg@woula come out in, (phere
[3521]; And then Williams himself had been in
[3523]- Vietnam a long enough time by then--I forget
[3525]how:long; it may be three years at the time,
[3526]A .
[3528]four years--so that when he moved around the
[3530]Vietnamese army, it wasn't only just the top
[3532]staf ££ officers ana commanders who would be
[3534]. . ft odie
[3535]with him, but I noticed in a visit ,there--I
[3539]think it was "59--that sergeants and junior
[3541]lieutenants and so’on would come up and taik
[3543]y
[3544]to himg and I'd moved in close enough to
[3546]eavesdrop on some of the conversations,and |
[3547]nr Ae
[3549]these were personal problems, family problems, -
[3551]and financial problems and so forth that
[3553]individuals hadgarid this was a very unusual
[3557]relationship. for an American to have. And
[3559]. since. the American was also running our
[3563]advisory effort too, I Just figured that this
[3567]constant feeding and contact with the echelons
[3569]A
[3571]of Vietnamese military that were down below -:
[3574]the big wheels was again a very healthy
[3576]_influence that was constantly at work with
[3578]him. ‘So that he would know very well what
[3579]was going on in.places.: Some of these problems-~
[3581]personal problems-~would actually involve the
[3583]Military work that was going forward, people
[3585]griping that something was wrong and so ony.
[3587]at they were doing this out of a friendship)
[3589]ae ner Bel etn lt andes SN.
[3591]want eee eee eae eet amen es a ee ee,
[3593]O'BRIEN:
[3603]and nekas not to tell.on their bosses or
[3605]anything, but usually personal worries and
[3607]concern that WagPase or ‘something going
[3609]ay. a ; .,
[3610]wrong would @ffect them. Later they moved
[3611]in an educdtor--a military educator--{Paul -D.]
[3612]Harkins, and. . -@
[3613]Well, [Lt. Gen. Lionel-c.] McGarr comes in.
[3614]there before that, doesn't he?
[3616]McGarr, It was McGarr, yes, you're right.
[3618]it was before Harkins. McGarr. And McGarr.
[3620]built.up a staff to work on counter “insurgency
[3622]and probably put together the best staff
[3623]Hat . :
[3625]studies on counter- insurgency han any
[3628]American military men have ever done.
[3629]Is that right?
[3630]He got American military men who had ‘been
[3632]guerrilla leaders in the Philippines, for
[3634]. example) in World War II),)and in Burma and so
[3636]A A
[3637]on),and in Europe, and s«*itched most of his
[3638]A . oS
[3640]work over into compiling “How to Do it”
[3642]manuals, but I've never seen thé finished
[3644]oe ta A i lA ca A oy ns BN a inch mtd os
[3648]products. I saw them working on it at the
[3649]_ time, and all I know is they had tremendous
[3650]stacks of papers with the results of their
[3651]typed-out work’ and were putting it together.
[3652]: a ; eS
[3653]and the interpretation of this “&S. apparently, “*~
[3654]to: start’ increasing staff and American military
[3655]; a aS :
[3656]personnel to ‘handle whatever wastever was
[3657]coming up out of this whole process. The
[3658]; _ | .
[3659]feeling was we that there shoulda be closer
[3660]American Supervision of what was happening
[3661]units, ;
[3662]out .in Bunks which meant geutEt you'd put
[3663]down your’ Americans at lower echelons and
[3664]‘then get a separate reporting system on back ,
[3666]: So . : ™~N
[3667]feeding in the research process of the Americans
[3668]initially more than anything else. “It wasn't
[3669]for control; ‘it was just for information that
[3670]would go into fields of studygard this eka fad
[3673]to a proliferation of anmilitary presence
[3674]that was intended sort of for the education
[3675]of Americans)I think) more than anything else,
[3677]: A “A : “A
[3678]but of course didn't work out that way. You
[3680]|
[3681]|
[3683]ave hae
[3685]neice ewes eS re
[3687]O'BRIEN:
[3691]O'BRIEN:
[3695]. : . : Woe.
[3696]_they couldn't help but tell a guy, Well, ,if
[3700]put some red-blooded American boys in uniform
[3702]out someplace)and they're going to start doing
[3703]. A a .
[3705]other things as well. In collecting information)
[3707]bok) A
[3709]you didn't do it this way and did it the other
[3711]4 ce y
[3712]_ way, it would work better, and so on. re was
[3714]a very human. thing that started workings ana
[3716]as this happened )we started building up our
[3718]advisory effort more and more.
[3720]‘Well,in the meantime, while this is going on,
[3722]A A
[3723]. . t
[3724]the insurgency's building up, isn't it?
[3725]Yes. .
[3726]Just what is the condition of the country-
[3728]side that's different from when you're there
[3730]in the middle f$fties «sede and when you go
[3732]a
[3733]y an enemy )which
[3737]Ce
[3739]back in tatu 190.2: .
[3742]> 5S
[3744]Oh, there were guerrilla
[3745]there hadn't been in the period from Geneva
[3746]on up to the time I left in the end of ‘56@
[3748]You could drive roads at night and so forth
[3754]and not be worrying about guerrillas. There
[3755]were isolated incidents of violence, but.
[3757]they were very minor--it would be about
[3758]oo . . wilh, tae
[3759]what you'd expect in any country, crime rate
[3761]| ee
[3762]goin athe fact that former VietBSnh: guerrillas
[3764]were the guys pulling the trigger didn't
[3765]matter too much as far as the overall crime
[3767]rate went. It was in a nature of minor
[3768]Hed
[3769]terrorism,was going on. By my next visits
[3770]. so, cprlecy
[3771]later in the Ate Sy there were areas of
[3772]5 : .
[3773]guerrilla bands at work,with roads that were
[3774]: A
[3776]areas that were unsafe,
[3778]7 a
[3779]unsafe and-so on) A
[3781]. A
[3783]A 4
[3785]with great-problems of police posts being
[3787]“attacked and with their families being wiped_
[3789]out in small massacre type of things, though
[3790]the type and degree of violence had increased’
[3792]F
[3794]a. great deal... By the end of ‘'60--when I got -
[3796]od & to . ; .
[3797]there yn Christmas of '60--there were fair-
[3798]size enemy, Vietcong units operating and
[3800]oO mo,
[3801]dominating areas}, it had escalated considerably
[3803]by then. | os
[3807]O'BRIEN: Is this terrorism campaign on the local
[3808]officials as serious as some of the people
[3809]: oe
[3811]have written? abou tat?
[3813]LANSDALE: Oh) yes.
[3814]A
[3816]O'BRIEN: Do you ever get an ) feeling about the
[3817]“number of people? “I! ‘ve heard ‘all kinds
[3818]of estimates: |
[3819]LANSDALE: No, I've got [Stephen -T. } Hosmer's study
[3820]there: on fot , and, I haven't read it yet.
[3821]I just got that. from him. r imagine he's
[3822]got ‘a figure ‘in. there. The last figure. L
[3824]arounre
[3825]I remember ‘on it was--in about 66 weromctaoet
[3827]A 08 eae
[3829]ox something - 8 og
[3830]O'BRIEN: Forty thousand. That many?
[3831]LANSDALE: Yes. These were officials not. theix families
[3832]2
[3833]er anything. But these were village officials”
[3834]and district officials) ana sort of federal
[3835]-government officials,
[3836]- © BRIEN: Well,what do you see happening as a result of this
[3838]“A the: ability op
[3840]in terms of, Diem bo just simply govern in. those
[3842]hi Lo abicty Y .
[3843]. years? Is the-vals Y 4:0 govern deteriorating?
[3847]: Mes
[3849]- problems. He had.been shot at several.times,
[3853]Yes: In some ways it was. Initially, he
[3855]was oni Lig to delegate any authority
[3856]4 wl
[3858]at all”and he haa the tendency to try and
[3860]“A
[3862]do everything himself. If the problem
[3864]came up in agriculture, he would ‘be the
[3865]guy ‘to, do all the paper. work and the deciding
[3866]rather than his Minister of Agriculture and
[3868]so on. He had gotten over that to a very
[3870]' large extent .laterg so he had learned to be
[3872]more the administrator and executive later
[3874]on,as far as putting some authority in the
[3875], ; ; ,
[3876]hands of others. But at the same time, he
[3878]also seemed to have lost some of his critical
[3882]faculty, & ‘some of the things that were going
[3884]wrong,- of not being able to see it: He was
[3886]getting around the country and visiting) but
[3887]A
[3889]not as much anymore because of the security
[3891]A
[3892]so that he had a larger and larger security ©
[3894]guard around him all the time)which meant
[3895]; so, A ,
[3896]that when he went in and talked to veople,
[3901]‘they were very much aware of plain_clothes
[3902]policemen, secret service types, all around :
[3903]him, and others)that were screening out
[3904]A . 7
[3905]peoples so that the dialogue between the
[3907]president and the people became thinner and
[3909]thinner, and less and less meaningful. So
[3910]CA
[3911]while he. was. on paper becoming a better
[3913]executive, hé was, in terms of being the
[3914]A
[3916]. ao- . . . . .
[3917]national leader, w= being less ‘effective all
[3918]. A . :
[3919]the time because he had no means of measuring
[3921]what was true and what wasn'tf, what was
[3922]. . - A
[3924]worth doing and wasn't, and what wes work
[3925]wrt lt®, |
[3926]and what wasn ee It was a considerable
[3928]A.
[3929]impairment of his critical faculty. This
[3930]was one of the reasons I was urging him to
[3932]start. dialogues with his political ‘opposition=
[3933]jast A
[3934]even if it started at opposite poles and,led
[3936]to tremendous emotional clashegpthét there
[3937]would be some means for dialogue to take
[3939]place that would have been useful to hin,
[3941]particularly if he had: invited them into a
[3945]‘meal or something)and had some way of -.
[3946]scald “A
[3948]das pe 2
[3949]. qiaetening the most emotional irritations
[3951]out oe
[3952]that would take place just how-tine’ people
[3954]7
[3956]seened- polite at the timeg so the content
[3958]of what they, nad’ to Say would be something
[3959]. ra at
[3960]that he: wasn't gettingyelsewise.
[3961]O'BRIEN: Yes, well, as I understand it, the vies (viet
[3962]A
[3963]Cong} make-a great deal (of headway in those
[3964]years on the basis of ‘the land system.
[3965]LANSDALE: That was one of them.
[3966]O'BRIEN: Well;what. . . . As I understand it)there's
[3967]; A ; : ; “A
[3968]_some rub between the U.S. in this regard
[3969]and Diem about putting through some land
[3970]reform which would cure some of the rural
[3971]‘ cultural problems that the French had sort
[3972]of created, as I understand, from youcknew
[3974]the Vietnamese moving into the country. . .@
[3976]LANSDALE: “Yes, yes...
[3978]O'BRIEN: Well, how do you see that? Are you pushing Aim
[3979]oe y ,
[3980]for this sort of thing?at ot polit 2
[3981]ie hod - .
[3982]a Oe OR
[3983]LANSDALE: Yes. Actually,we-tave some very sound land
[3985]A;
[3990]reform measures on the books and had issued
[3991]decrees on them that were good. As usual,
[3992]the di fegculty Z, when you get a piece of
[3994]; A ; . ,
[3995]legislation ox sonethingytis then implementing
[3997]A
[3998]it correctly) ana I was pushing him: mostly on
[4000]implementing his neasures. Tow ‘the land
[4001]. Of
[4002]reform worke® that Diem approved and used
[4005]as the basis for his cecrees came from Wolf lade” ¢
[4009]a
[4010]and Wolf, was, when he left U.S. employment,
[4012]was agtoally enployed by Diem as his advisor on.
[4013]ASE susiect, and Wolf was getting over and
[4014]' having breakfast with Diem quite a bit.
[4015]Wolf isa very articulate, personable type
[4016]of a guy) and there was a great deal of.
[4017]. A.
[4018]affectionate friendship between the two mena
[4019](8° that Wolf, who is a champion of reforms
[4020]and of helping the man on the land, had full
[4021]access to this guy and had a way of doing
[4022]things. tana I felt that the main thing.that
[4024]‘needed doing was demonstrating to President
[4026]Diem, who was sympathetic towards this, of where’
[4027]A ;
[4029]-8)-
[4031]things weren't going right and changing some.
[4032]. : . th, Se . , .
[4033]of the inner workings of t#e“thing)instead
[4034]A A
[4036]; v oo, ;
[4037]of just falting him on intent. And his
[4039]“intent was very sound, very good. I think
[4041]he was ignorant of some of these things |
[4043]going. wrong. "r felt that we should have
[4045]bornejdown on the matters in which he was
[4047]‘ignorant and tried to get some changes there
[4049]-' and make these things work, because certainly
[4051]“A
[4053]landlords and others were circumventing
[4055]the law of the land that Diem thought ‘was
[4056]operatingyor when he circumvented it, he
[4057]was doing it for good reasons of his own,
[4058]A
[4059]which was again open to education by somebody
[4060]of hime but he was moving in people whom he .
[4061]could trust--who were refugees--into farm
[4062]communities and distributing land to them
[4063]for security reasons and political reasons
[4065]and so on, and then dictating what they
[4067]would grow and so ongAcause he'd just figure,
[4068]. A
[4070]Well,: in the national economy ,we need this
[4072]“A
[4075]ee eee ee te eR Ro Ret en ae nanoee ea coronene nen etn dasamsa nathan AD i. hPL cb UE la Ay et ene lm Rat ts nln 8
[4077]at
[4079]O'BRIEN:
[4081]O'BRIEN:: -
[4085]TAPE II SIDE
[4089]‘though, doesn't it?
[4093]. type of fiber grown or this type of crop or
[4095]something,and the land will produce it up
[4098]there, and so they should do that. sof he
[4099]A sort of
[4100]was only circumventing: ‘tthe lawafor the
[4102]greater good, in his own mind, Z nis own |
[4104]extent. vo 8
[4106]This centralization brings about a reaction, °
[4108]A
[4110]. Yes. . : ou
[4112]I
[4113]You asked about the falling out between
[4115]Ladejinsky and Diem. I know there was
[4116]- just.
[4118]something of that nature, but, what it
[4120]consisted of, or why, I don't know. I
[4122]remember that the American ambassador . 7.
[4124]hit _ - .
[4125]*Et ,would have been [Elbridge] Durbrow?
[4127]LANSDALE: _.. Durbrow-— ~~ was mindful of the fact that
[4129]A
[4132]~- a
[4134]Lede} gnsky was having breakfast with Diem
[4136]and. was close to ‘him, and,in a. “rather general
[4137]pad aaked Lodajinsky . A Y.
[4138]way, to bring up thoughts of corruption§s in
[4139]A
[4143]STEUER a oe ae eee 2 ee eee RR oe Neel ee A inn, RY allt Rallabtateir tales Sante namie fi eine ase =
[4145]we
[4147]Lo -23-
[4149]the government ana subjects beyond anything
[4150]like land reform. And I suspect that
[4151]Ladejinsky had started getting very political
[4152]in his talk)as a result of thisywith Diem,
[4154]A
[4156]; . Ff.
[4157]and that Diem had resented it. But beyond...
[4159]this, there was a very deep affection between
[4161]_ the two. When I was there in .‘59 or '60, ©
[4163]Ladejinsky had wanted to go someplaceand
[4164]. . “A .
[4165]‘I forget where it was. .... I know one
[4167]of the places was Indonesia, but there was
[4168]A
[4170]another country he wanted to go to),and Diem
[4171]; ; a 7, had-
[4172]hadn't wanted him to go/ and ke*suggested
[4173]A.
[4174]that he attend a conference--I think in
[4175]woe O- oo
[4176]Latin Americas mova finally, they had agreed
[4178]between the two of them, and r44e4insky had
[4179]ron he
[4181]gone on to -do these other thingsottet, taken
[4182]sort of a sabbatical leave to do that. * But
[4183]this was a very personal thing between two -
[4184]men, and it was two friends/ rather than a
[4186]ray
[4187]president and his consultant working. I
[4189]know Legejinsky is very sentimental about
[4192]we
[4194]O'BRIEN:
[4198]‘Diem aS a man, and I know that Diem recipro-
[4200]cated this very much. There was a point
[4202]where the rational thought would’ end, and.
[4203]; RO
[4205]the feelings of affection and so forth
[4207]; t
[4209]would come over, and say, Well, even if that
[4210]A. a
[4212]is true and everything, I still like the.
[4214]y
[4215]-guy, and,want to help him, and so ong and
[4217]A A )
[4218]this existed between the two. sof they
[4220]might have differed ‘on some things and perhaps :
[4222]on carrying out land reform exactly the way- fot
[4224]. Wolf ‘wanted, but the two men kept seeing
[4226]each other all the time, and he had ample
[4228]A
[4229]opportunity to work on that.
[4230]a) that's
[4233]Wekizest the - suggestion sit made sometimes is
[4235]that the Vietnamese military hag not been.
[4236]trained for the kind of war and the kind
[4237]of insurgency that they did encounter in
[4238]1960-611: ney had not been properly trained
[4240]for that before. Is there any validity
[4242]“in this at all?
[4244]a a  #
[4248]par 2
[4249]J
[4251]LANSDALE: ..Oh yes), They were being trained actually: to
[4253]meet the challenge that the Vietnamese and
[4255]| American top officials foresaw, and they were
[4256]‘thinking thebthi-e--and incidentally, the
[4257]French General [Paul] Ely before he left. was
[4258]thinking the same way--.just in terms of
[4259]contigency. plannings they saw a lot of artil-
[4260]lery. and armor being given the North Vietnamese
[4261]army.- So, vetng given that information, they
[4262]Saw any attack or military trouble in Vietnam
[4263]as consisting of divisions of North Vietnamese
[4264]with a lot of artillery and armor coming | |
[4265]across the border. So they built up an army
[4267]to meet the foreseeable thing that was happenings,
[4269]reine ee tar NL amen a 2 Senta aa an eNO Nt As Pah Kain Dick BELL At ellatrenn Be Ets wim berm Ln
[4271]that they thought might happen. ” Instead of
[4273]this, of course, it was more of the same old
[4274]A.
[4276]‘story. agaings ok there were many of the officers
[4278]a .
[4279]Ge vite etede he,
[4281]in the Vietnamese armed forces who haa formerly
[4282]been guerrillas themselves, who had formerly
[4283]had been Viet Me in the old: days of fighting
[4284]the French, who had broken with the gommunists
[4285]“and wanted no part of the. Gommunists and were
[4287]very sincere, patriotic Nationalists. But
[4289]‘high school and so on.
[4291]at fairly junior grades, and’ in the late-
[4293]x
[4294]=By-
[4295]since “they had had e259 this former affiliation
[4297]wet LA
[4299]and had teken their basic military training
[4301]with the enemy, so to speak, they never quite
[4303]. had the same stature among their fellow
[4305]officers in the Vietnamese army, for example,
[4307]A.
[4308]as greduates of the Vietnamese Military
[4309]Academy afid the others’ coming right out of
[4312]So as a result, the
[4314]officers corps who were Imowledgeable ENGR
[4316]'-of how to counter what was happening were kept
[4318]A
[4320]‘the highest any of them Bor that I ever knew
[4323]about was ,rank of Majors awd they had to take
[4324]orders from Colonels ‘and so forth who had
[4325]served under the French in very much the
[4327]same type of a conventional military organi-_
[4329]‘gation as the Americans had put up and were
[4331]advocating. And these junior types who wanted
[4333]to do different things were simply too junior
[4335]to do it and were unable to convince anyone
[4337]A ;
[4338]‘of the need. The initial meeting of the threot:
[4340]mort --.
[4341]was thought, to be a police problem than an
[4343]army problem, and there wes a lot of work
[4347]on trying to equip and train the national
[4349]police to cope with its en ye Americans -
[4350]did that through our economic mission and
[4352]. through, Michigan State University had a .
[4353]group helping on administration there. They
[4354]recruited some very ‘good police officials ‘from
[4355]the U: S. who were quite used to dealing with
[4357]" urban crime problems in the U. s. Mye1l, you.
[4358]can't take a man who is very good at precinct
[4359]work in Detroit, Michigan or Bifninghan, Alabema ) —
[4361]4
[4363]; _ or something, and move him’ out tio an Asian
[4364]mee a . A
[4365]country where his problem is : What do you do
[4367]“A
[4369]when a company of guerrillas comes in end
[4370]“ambushes yourlpolice: station? A completely
[4372]foreign type of a thingy s So that we had
[4373]. who
[4374]police ecvisors ff “eS were insisting on all
[4375]A
[4377]‘policemen being armeted with nothing more
[4379]i . ; 7 than, saya 38-caliber revolver, with the
[4381]: a : . poricemen saying, veaais but people are
[4382]shooting at us with rifles, and we need rifles
[4383]or something like that to shoot back at then,
[4385]or how about sub-machine guns or some--we
[4387]neec «sre fire power." Well, it was foreign
[4389]O'BRIEN:
[4395], A .
[4396]to them. So there was a mixup on a number of
[4398]things on this coping with the insurgency ©
[4400]‘that was growing—not' only the conventional
[4401]g 8} ¥.
[4403]A
[4404]_formation of the Vietnamese army but of a
[4406]conventional urban police formation of the
[4408]police.’ and yet, throughout the syatent there,
[4410]‘there were many individuals who knew better,
[4412]and who knew how to’ cope with it, and who
[4414]were continually begging, "Give us a chance
[4416]“to do it some other way."
[4418]“Well, in terms of these people we were talking
[4420]about a little earlier--the late Eisenhower
[4421]people, like Pitzgerala/ and tewin J and Parsons--
[4422]Bo they conceive of the kind of insurgency ,
[4423]at tet parr’)
[4424]that's developing in South Vietnam, ‘or are
[4425]they rr) . .
[4426]Fairly well. Feirly well. They were more
[4427]aware of, or had more understanding of, the |
[4428]needs than did some of the folks that. were
[4429]coming in sort of brand new to the problem
[4430]‘or who had been steeped in a far more
[4431]conventional approach to the problemas were
[4433]some of our military leaders at the time.
[4435]But, as I remerked earlier, these were personal
[4437]ry
[4439]"AN
[4441]1B
[4443]of
[4444]19
[4446]TIEN:
[4452]: How long. is the’ manusextpt
[4456]friends of mine, and when I'd talk to them and
[4458]“A .
[4459]tell them my views, there wes always sympathy
[4461]for them)so I might have mistaken: that for
[4462]A
[4463]understanding and so ong avd even t that was
[4465]rare enough so that I. felt that, Lantersuption] 7”
[4469]Ho ho. I went through first,/-the publishers
[4471]wanted me to tell ally snp thezwords, just .
[4473]write as much as TIT could for later “edi tings
[4474]ALY
[4475]and, said this is the way people ao it. So
[4476]Paks
[4478]-I wound up with really three of seneeiiy long
[4480]books, and ‘since I was writing one not too
[4481]. A -
[4482]long book, why I wound up with a tremendously
[4484]. x oy taem
[4485]long manuscript. | fnd, urged shen that I could
[4486]weiwulde  -
[4487]cut.it down to two books) and, publish it as
[4488]A
[4490]- two different things, and the sub ject matter
[4492]“would have permitted me. They still want
[4494]just one book, ‘so I am now. going back with
[4496]editor's Pare and with my own notes and trying
[4498]to. .. FG started off initially with a
[4500]eutcanccyente job, but I discovered I couldn't
[4501]do that and retain the proper narrative and
[4503]pds ae oe a
[4504]VOnyPies on ‘the thingy © &% I wound up having
[4506]O'BRIEN:
[4509]O'BRIEN:
[4512]O'BRIEN:
[4518]to rewrite almost of all of it, and recast it,
[4520]and retell it in a “somewhat different form.
[4521]I'm about half-way through, that, but it'll be
[4522]‘oa book even so. .
[4524]ext that's good-fmainly on the Fhilippines
[4526]and the early period in Vietnam?
[4528]Unhmn.
[4530]‘Good, you know mats really eC)
[4531]. Well, there's neehy one big period in Vietnam
[4533]that isn't known too well, and most historians
[4535]have passed over itjand the | ones who haven't
[4537]have been championing a cause, and their work |
[4538]ray
[4540]“is quite suspect. Some of the French were
[4542]or ;
[4543]sort of agents e2 provocateurs at the time,
[4544]A.
[4546]. and they are more or less justifying what
[4548]they diay end leaving out. important parts of
[4549]it.
[4550]How about the French journalist [Jean] Lacouture?
[4552]What do you think’of his work? Is it Lacouture
[4554]that's done the thing on Ho [Chi Minh]? -
[4557]eee I'm trying to remember. I think that's
[4559]who it was. Well, most-of the French writings
[4561]about Ho and some of the explanations in
[4566]O'BRIEN:
[4572]official documents of the French, ‘trying
[4573]to explain him end 80 on, by friends, I found
[4575]' Ling
[4577]very interesting ena I-had. no way of, judg:
[4579]"really on itZthere was a tremendous sympathy
[4581]and so corth being -expressed, ana then'a very. -
[4582]A
[4584]; ; woo _
[4585]Strong attempt to work out an accomodation
[4589]with hin’ afterwards, wethshim, by the French.
[4591]And again, a highly emotionel sensitivity to
[4594]any interference Awa what they were “trying to
[4596]do, and they saw almost any thing as interference.
[4598]sof what is written by. them, I read mindful
[4600]‘of their sensitivities. at the time and whet
[4602]they're trying to prevent anybody ever believing
[4603]that would be opposite at all) or something.
[4604]different at leastg oA it was just amazing.
[4606]The French press was screaming that I was
[4607]starting World War III in Vietnam in 'S5 ...
[4608]Mind if I get this on tape--well, it is
[4610]on tape, “I'm SOrrys) I didn't realize it was
[4611]going.
[4613], os simply because I think there was a feeling
[4615]by the French colonialists in Indochina) of not
[4617]wanting to give up the French presence theres=~
[4621]"and it's a human, understandable type of a.
[4622]thing. They had been there and associated
[4623]there, and some ‘of them had spent their entire
[4624]lives there, and here they were having to
[4625]give up sonetningsel i Swiss journalist once
[4626]explained. it te me? t was like a man giving |
[4627]“up his. mistress and seeing some GS evy ina
[4628]big car driving by in the streetgand even ~
[4629]though he'd given NOX up, he'd just sey) well,
[4630]he hates that guy|bteause he got. the mistress
[4631]“allegedly with material means such: as an
[4632]automobile and maybe a fur coat and so on) and he:
[4633]isn't the man that the former guy was. 4 So
[4634]some of. this” feeling was very prevalent there
[4636]and for ‘some reason.or other, I happened to
[4638]po . suddenly become the focal point of it, through
[4640]: my name or sonething @asthey so that they
[4641]“went to great. enki of charging me with all
[4642]sorts of things that I was doing: I was ‘out
[4644]Sect forces oe
[4645]buying up the loyalties of set Courses with( -
[4646]‘millions of dollars, and things that would be)
[4647]hard to prove that - wasn't, mind you, except
[4648]fae to say, "Look, I didn't have a million
[4650]dollars to buy anything with." . 4nd they'd
[4654]O'BRIEN:
[4656]-93-.
[4658]say, "Well, the U.S. government did, and you
[4659]. y A
[4660]were a secret agent for them, and so on. It
[4662]_ was very hard to disprove some of theirjtelk |
[4665]and say, Well, that just isn't so. Except
[4666]once in a while they'd get really wild and —
[4668]claim I was down--I walked in on a briefing,
[4669]A
[4671]. for oxeniple, with: French officers betting at how
[4675]some American visitors from Washington asst
[4677]"down
[4678]at that very moment I was arrying to. buy off
[4680]a sect leader, and very naively, witha
[4681]suitcase full of moneypseA I didn't now
[4683]but the ‘guy was going to ambush me ena take
[4684]all the money and not do whatever I was going
[4685]to plan to do. And at that moment, I just
[4686]asked him, I said, “well, please Keep on with
[4687]your priefing{, I want to know whet dther the
[4689]+ wad
[4691]guy killed me or not. APrazy- Now these Aho *
[4692]tf]
[4693]were very responsible French officiels*and
[4695]wei)
[4697]“the fact that I'd be miles away from the scene
[4699]of some of these things never stopped the dawe
[4700]circulation of these stories. I don't know
[4702]how you ever stop that stuff,
[4704]* Yes
[4705]Yeats well how about people like Bernard Pall
[4709]and Patty # Bony’ and their writings? Are they .. .@
[4712][25] Honey
[4715]Loe.
[4717]LANSDALE: Well, they're very sound, very | sound. Fall's
[4718]" packground, as was Honey's, was out of
[4719]‘intelligence or information collection united
[4720]i - —_ Ld, their different countries. Fall's initial
[4721]"writings were all out of a French ermy historical.
[4722]he
[4723]sects" and I had to tell him one time Ika td read
[4724]some of his work originally by the original
[4725]author. “putf it was a deteiled military
[4726]history of operations that he'd delved intog |
[4727]et don't know, I doubt that it was intentional
[4729]plagarisn on his part. He was probably rushing
[4731]2
[4733]through, getting a book published>for academic
[4734]credits ‘end so on. And Honey/ the same way
[4735]. with British’ intelligence, who were quite
[4736]a“
[4738]active in Indochina during the French days. han
[4739]6 7 amo
[4741]But it was )-some of the stories and happenings A
[4742]were just nlmost incredible. Thé-.-—4=- Some
[4743]of the French journalists were ‘politically
[4746]‘partisan. They had connections with the
[4748]A
[4749]Communist Party or sympathies with them of
[4750]some sort. And Ho had been one of the
[4751]founders of the French Communist Party, so that
[4753]there was always a cultural or comradeship
[4755]. =
[4756]feeling of some sort theré, end vhen the
[4761]Americans started showing up on the scene
[4762]Sie
[4764]there was, very patern realistic feeling of F-
[4766]"Well, these are | our pesplecZthese Vietnamese,”
[4768]a
[4770]or Khmer 7 or Lao,® and you keep your
[4772]cotton-picking fingers off of them" type of
[4773]a thing that went to very great lengths J—~
[4774]Volatile emotions erupting on this type of a
[4776]thing. 711 remember one of the journalists,
[4778]“John Beret; published a newspaper in Saigon
[4780]and wrote a lot of the early propaganda for
[4781]individuals in the French rotate
[4782]ddventurer| types among them. ‘He then went to
[4783]Pnohm Penh »where he. started a weekly newspaper
[4784]and started also. writing speeches for LNoro dom |
[4785]Sihanoukgand the next thing I knew, Sihanouk
[4787]was" accusing me of plotting to murder him or
[4788]assnssinate hims PA T Been 't exer) @zerpbeen near
[4789]Cambodia, and I hadn't, thought | of Sihanouk |
[4791]when this happened. The governor of Siem Reap,
[4792]Rn.
[4794]. who had been very close to Sihenouk before--
[4795], and Siem Reap is where “Angkor Wak and the
[4797]historical ruins are--suddenly died,and the
[4798]ray
[4800]story started seeping out a little bit with
[4802]Sihanouk charging that this governor, whose
[4804]O'BRIEN:
[4808]name was Dao Onn) and I were in a conspiracy
[4809]to murder him and take over the government .of
[4810]Cambodia. And it didn't do any good that I had
[4812]never met Me Onn ‘and never had any dealings
[4814]with him, and Cambodia was , way outside my
[4816]bailiwickg b but. this is the story that's gone
[4818]on and’ on and on.
[4819]Well, there. was a little bit of sruth to , that,” .
[4821]wesn't theret/gome involvement of CIA. cee
[4822]ep Chis as We 5G =
[4824]LANSDALE: Yeah? Well, he was a national leader and .
[4826]4
[4828]actually had formed the political groupings
[4830]initially that supported. Sihanouk and gave |
[4832]him his political powerée=he was the organizer;
[4834]he was ‘the chief political lieutenant of
[4836]Sihanouk. And then apparently, he felt. that
[4837]Sihanouk was going sour, and he wanted to get
[4838]the government back into reflecting more the
[4839]will of the people. . How far he got, I don't
[4841]knows but: this was really something that
[4843]was foreign to me at the time.” got sent
[4845]back into Cambodia afterwards, from Washington,
[4846]with various military assistance groups / or
[4848]economic groups 7c presidential commissions”
[4852]and so ong and gach time they'd have Pnohm
[4853]: dust wet IY
[4854]Penh on the thing 7 'dasay, _ Wee better
[4856]check the embassy. there." Back would come
[4860]word that] Xo, _Sihenovk was afraid that it.
[4861]tr were a member of the party, I would be
[4862]going in to murder him. 4 5 actually went in
[4864]one: time} and the ghief of police of Pnohm
[4865]“A
[4866]‘Penh met our party--along' with the’ foreign
[4868]minister end so on--at plane! when we came
[4869]= o " oo
[4871]downy and the Chief of Police walked right
[4872]next to me,and he said, "I'm your liason
[4874]A oS . A
[4876]man fromnwme'. eid I said, "You're keeping
[4877]an eye on me, I lmowg it's “allright. I'm
[4878]not going to murder your boss; I have no
[4879]idea of doing that." [Laughter] That is
[4881]7]
[4883]about "85, 166-~in which he played the
[4885]strange. ‘ And then Sihanouk made a movie--
[4887]dorimander! if Goyal Naval Intelligence foiling
[4889]. a great American spy, who happened to have
[4891]a a!
[4893]my name) and was a role played by some petaiee Fremchnan
[4894]par whe. was visiting theres, and I was out to
[4895]overthrow the isingdom,but, of course,our boy
[4896]; 3 A
[4898]hero thwarted the ugiy Americen and won the
[4900]girl, wno was the daughter of the Brazilian.
[4904]ambassador or something. Some French gal
[4905]played the role: I've been trying to get
[4906]a print of that or some way of seeing that
[4907]’ moviesAI'd love to see it, you Imow. It
[4908]sounds great and... . ‘Ulaughter]
[4909]O'BRIEN: - LEE hadn't heard about that: Weld) that 7
[4910]does hit. on Something though) *n regerd to
[4911]Southeast Asia. .. AS t understand, in that
[4912]| Dap Cnww* incident, inés there: was an Agency
[4913]involvement with th him, through a guy by the
[4914]name ot oF na the Agency does seem - .
[4915]‘to have a kind of free hand in some of these
[4917]Asian a
[4918]Southeast jnationss eid I'm thinking of the
[4920](Auge 0]
[4921]APope situation in Indonesia as well. Can you
[4923]see any tocke put on them as'a result of
[4924]the change of administrations’how do you
[4925]react to this sort.of activity?
[4927]LANSDALE: Well, most of the things that they did that
[4928]had political consequences of any major size
[4930]at. all end certainly a thing agith ep crhuor
[4932]wrdcry
[4933]and also the Pope thing, ‘are only ,taken oy the
[4935]Agency efter approval up at topsides so as far
[4937]I
[4941]as brakes are concerned, they! ve hea them from
[4943]the beginning. However, the objectives and
[4946]the intent are approved) and not,,the means of ©
[4948]doing it--the nuts and polts--which are
[4950]supposedly overseen by- an ambassador. ” and
[4952]when we get down to the level of a country .
[4953]where: these things are happening, then I
[4954]think much. depends on the indiviguars}: the
[4956]- ambassador, and the station chief, _and how
[4958]‘they get along, and again, mostly on the. . +
[4959]Well, no it isn't either; it's a fifty-fifty
[4960]proposition. We have ambassadors who don't
[4964]want to know or er are opposed, all such things ,
[4965]and if an order comés down to do it,they very
[4966]unwillingly tell the guy to go ahead, but
[4967]watch it now, not too far. Fy station chief,
[4968]then, with orders to do some things) will have
[4970]“A
[4972]told the ambassador he semtP going to,thisg but
[4973]getters
[4974]he starts, in things, and he figures, ssh if he
[4976]a a a a eS LL ET OT TY TORT Ene OEE OEP DO COREE NN SUPE PCR vee EE Ty
[4978]‘goes back and tells the ambassador what's
[4979]happening, that He's not going to get any.
[4981]. “A
[4982]understanding and will probably get an order
[4984]Tmo : he
[4985]’ prohibiting him 2c doing something, and won't |
[4986]\ . 3 : . . =
[4988]oe a er SF
[4991]4
[4993]i
[4995]j
[4997]1
[4999]1
[5001]“O'BRIEN:
[5005]. O'BRIEN:
[5007]Washington wants us to have this happen.
[5011], ; w ;
[5012]be able to explain, Well, if I stop doing
[5014]this, then this other thing won't work, and _
[5015]€ -
[5017]wet oa,
[5018]The ambassador willysay,.No, I don't see it
[5020]that way. - Don't. do it? So I'm sure there are
[5021]things thes =onne. happening that aren't told for
[5022]this--for operational reasonsg and again, it's
[5023]a judgément of an individual on that thing.
[5025]It's not a policy type of a thing from the
[5027]“Agency.
[5029]Yes. # .
[5030]Yeah? Do you find any--in the time that
[5032]-you lire there in the middle fifties as well |
[5034]as when you go back in '60, 61, and later —
[5035]involvement in Vietnam--do you bind ai fferences
[5036]between ‘the embassies between the U.S. embassy
[5037]in, particularly, Pnohm Penh and Saigon?
[5038]I didn't notice ‘that. It might have existed),
[5039]and I wouldn't have even. known that. .
[5040]Well, there! s some feeling among people
[5042]dasa m
[5043]involved with Cambodien relations eer that time,
[5044]as T understand it, that somehow there's an’
[5045]involvement on the part of the South Vietnamese
[5047]in some of the groups like the .. .@
[5049]4 Sl A ates A Raalita bathers A treet Rar cranaetaletl in ininetl ehhh deity ath hicetelichtal  oleetnicnet tyne 82th deletes whale at Bencomeet
[5051]= ae an ete = eee en ce coat | ote «mm tenetlh Ate
[5057]-101-—
[5061]yess . L come ber
[5062]oh, doen’ “4 Both the South Vietnamese and the
[5064]Tai were playing around with groups inside
[5065]Cambodial or with exile groups: that wanted |
[5066]to go back in Gembodia, and so: ong and I'm
[5067]not certain thet the imericans from either
[5068]Thailand or South Vietnam were fully aware
[5070]of. what” all was going on. And I'm not
[5072]certain that the: Americans or the Cambodian
[5074]| government people inside Cambodia knew what.
[5075]was going on, and were tending to exaggerate —
[5077]‘some of ‘this. Things get blown up out of all;
[5079]proportion in this... put) just. the fact that
[5080]there was antipathy and it would take this
[5081]form of expression, among others that were
[5082]going on... A t don't know which people
[5083]would rather go in and take over and run
[5084]canvodiet ne Thais or the South Vietnanese<?
[5085]it's about: a. ‘boss up which one, wea” down more
[5086]on the Khmers than the other. “ana Diem
[5087]used to follow the predictions of the royal
[5089]fortune—teller in-P nohm-Penh to Sihanouk.
[5091].‘Apparently, they were spending a lot of
[5092]A
[5095]intelligence money to find-out, you know, whats
[5097]O'BRIEN:
[5101]this was
[5105]happened in each others sessions and what
[5107]he was telling the guy. Then how useful
[5109]yy mind you,I don't lkmow.
[5111]. Well) do Jou rand) again, in passing on to
[5113]“A
[5115]' the task foree<-and the formation of that.
[5116]“Vietnam task force in the early part of _ a
[5118]’ the Kentie dy administration--do you fina eo
[5120]sensitivity on the part of the people, the
[5121]political appointéés, to what's going on
[5123]in South Vietnam? Are .you able to explain
[5125]what you're telling me right now about
[5127]- South Vietnam to these people?
[5129]Te only partially. They were as bemused by
[5131]the mechanics of getting decisions in Washing-
[5133]ton asthey were with the problem that they were:
[5136]employing the mechanics to solve. It was all .
[5137]sort of new to them,and they wanted to do a
[5138], : “
[5139]good job, but in order to do it, they were
[5140]you. gfe)
[5141]suddenty working with these instruments, that
[5143]were foreign to them here. I think that the
[5146]princippes’ in the administration were not
[5148]entirely aware of thespeople they were dealing
[5150]with in Washington. I recall, at the time, scm Surplisess,
[5152]za Rusk was violently opposed in the department -
[5154]a a
[5158]over where he was by some peopley end I
[5159]noticed at times that he wasn't aware that
[5160]he was, turning around and. asking a guy who)
[5162]minutes before: Rusk had come in to ninwee
[5164]. be fia Bepactoe: 1 called kim, A mo
[5165]among his. comrades, just, "This stupid jerk,"
[5167]cand so on, which I felt was ai sloyal--behing
[5168]the guy" s back, you know. rT was always
[5169]urging then to speak up in front of people
[5171]and 80 on, and they woula%lt do it. And the
[5173]F
[5174]‘same .damn thing was tous, GaatneiTeone of the.
[5176]. military against McNamara, for example.
[5177]we
[5178]ce F] Well, the McNamara’ and ‘the nuské/end their
[5180]y S asd se en)
[5181]unders, and deputy? “types of people, and
[5183]assistant secretaries, were trying ‘to cope with
[5185]in ctinctO ly Q
[5186]people that they, felt Were =faseinetively'
[5188]opposing and foot-dragging and so on,and
[5189]. A
[5191]trying’ to get that working,so that to get
[5193]: . ' then working on a given problem was really
[5194]the thing that they were concerned withgent
[5196]you'd suddenly say, "Well, we're going to
[5197]talk about _ba08,” oF Vietnang or Israel or
[5199]! 7 a sonethingS=Yes, Yes, Fes. What have you got
[5201]in = J paper you nowt And they were
[5204]cnet dea Dpa cept ote teas ent tec eich Arena baer emeatate ath Adsl Ah me ot il neds ete gis deen et danae Sabai cea Anam ain Dts ABE REETN A DORA 8 cates oo snemennmniasl covers
[5206]-10h,-
[5208]to hin thie guy a
[5209]watching, seo): "Well, itts-—just—Iivé really
[5210]z ark “Es he gogy to
[5211]done phis homework, end-is—it-gonha come.up
[5213]“/
[5214]with some thing or not?" rather than what is
[5216]the real problem here, and how would I solve
[5217]“a
[5219]it if I weren't sitting in this room in this
[5221]particular group, and so on. So there wes a. ...,
[5224]PSso- then, working on this type of a thing which
[5226]®'BRIEN:.
[5230]I saw very much in the task force on Vietnang-~-
[5232]Gilpatric,I know,was shocked at the reactions
[5233]“A ray uo
[5235]. of some of the foreign service people that
[5237]Vv . .
[5238]came in at, rank of ambassador and so on, that
[5239]: A
[5241]were sort of the staff asSistents on the.
[5243]; assistant secretary and undersecretary level.
[5245]pu ae
[5246]They would ‘Start a meeting—infacb, I was
[5248]asked to be sort of yl forget what the title
[5249]was /-executive officer or something of it, and
[5250]they asked me to chair the meetings. Well, I'd
[5251]no sooner open it. thon these guys would be
[5252]passionately explaining way I doulan't be
[5253]sitting. in the chair of the meeting, see?
[5255]¥esh. Ye
[5257]I think it shocked some of the Kennedy
[5259]administration people. It suddenly revealed a
[5265]feud end so ong ene I hadn't said it, and I
[5266]personally didn't care that much, you knowh
[5267]I'a say, "Have you got all the hate out of
[5268]your system now? Let's go on with the
[5269]meeting,’ ’ see. This of course, would activate
[5270]it more, but I would sey, "yer. look, we really
[5271]do have. Some problems here we've: got to get
[5272]to, and if you went, 121 meet you afterwards
[5274]& A
[5275]and westen have lunch or some thing, and you
[5277]. ray
[5278]can spoil my lunch by telling me what a
[5279]heel I am or something. But we've got work
[5280]to do. nF oo then, Gilpatric or somebody would.
[5281]tell me afterwards, "Do you think we better
[5282]take you off?" "Well, yeah. If it's going
[5283]2 Cc. -
[5284]to ortect, the work done, itis better +p take
[5285]me off. It's no fun for me to sit up and
[5286]: a
[5287]chair something under conditions like this,”
[5289]' O'BRIEN: Week. Were you ever approached with the job
[5290]as ambassador to Vietnam?
[5291]Yas, Yes .
[5294]O'BRIEN: Who was pushing thet?
[5296]CSO ce ea ood
[5300]the Cc
[5302]LANSDALE: I don't know. I heard about it (jess first
[5306]‘Saturdey after the inaugurel--I “ghinik shat's
[5307]it. It was very early in the administration. ,
[5308]McNemara asked me to come down to the white
[5309]House end meet him there, and I thought it
[5311]was to brief him on something. tnd I was
[5312]“working én a number of intelligence matters.
[5313]in Defense at the tines axa I showed up) and
[5315]he askéd me to just wait outside, and. they
[5316]were meeting in the Cabinet roomy end as I!
[5317]said, it was essentially an NSC group. and
[5318]after a bit, they asked me to: come onv and’
[5319]they had me sit opposite the president.
[5321]And he looked at me, and he said, "Did Dean ©
[5322][Rusk] tell you,’ I “vant you to be ambassador
[5323]to Vietnam?" I said, "No, he didn't mention
[5324]that." “Well, he hadn't at all; A yhere was
[5325]a te. painful silence, and I figured, “yell,
[5326]See, maybe he! 8 asking me if I want to be, or
[5327]would I accept the joo.” So I finally said,
[5328]“Well,it would be a great honor,’ and that was
[5330]the last I ever-heard of it. But,’ I heard
[5332]all sorts of rumors that ee wis for
[5333]st Tt -..
[5335]Washington, and~fuir+5 afterwards that Dean Rusk
[5337]Be en rc ee ce ee RR te te ot ee ore ade Need een et
[5341]was very much opposed to it, and opposed on
[5343]the ground that I-was a military man and they
[5345]didn! fwent military’ people in on the situation.
[5346]O'BRIEN: Yeeh. "‘Yasg .
[5348]. a oa
[5350]LANSDALE: And then later I <a met one of Rusk's staff
[5352]officers at the time, and he was telling me
[5354]ucd bt, yt
[5355]that Rusk was figuring) sms he could get.
[5357]me a job some other place or a promotion or
[5359]e .
[5361]something - to. get me out of the way at the bimes<
[5362]a sort of
[5363]| Lapparently & had becomena ‘parget for a lot of
[5364]and 65 on
[5366]. GF
[5367]’ gossip and rumors,jat the time. But after that,
[5369]then, thiey asked me--Kenne dy asked me pretty
[5371]Arstrassator
[5372]point blank--aboutDurbrow, and I said, "Well,
[5373]NN
[5375]after what you just asked me and so forth, I'm
[5376]a little hesitent, but you're the President and
[5377]you need the truthy so I'll just fell you right
[5378]now, I think he's a very ill man, his juagee
[5380]I
[5383]ment's impaired by his physical conditions,he's
[5384]a fine professional foreign service officer.and
[5386]could be used some_place, but don't keep him on
[5388]in Vietnam anymore. He Is sick#, he's on his
[5390]back a lot of the time, and you need so someone
[5392]‘very alert, wis “Lie ~wnoever it iss and pull him ©
[5393]Vv.
[5397]out." And they got--Rusk and everything, you
[5398]knowZ;"You're off your subject, boy." But I
[5399]said, "Well, Durby's an old friend of mine,
[5400]and I like the guys. os T saw a lot of him o
[5401]when I was in Vietnem on this brief visits aid
[5402]I think it's a shame that the guy's kept on —
[5403]there Lecause he was quite ill, in bad shape."
[5405]And Durby never forgave me for ith, it got
[5407]. right back to him that I had sacked him and
[5409]7 . ‘so on [¥cause he was withtwun after thaty but -
[5411]O'BRIEN:
[5413]- LANSDALE:
[5415]this: certainty didn't hurt his. career at all,
[5416]in any way, ena even though State put him on
[5417]a make ~ work job after thats but he held the
[5418]rank of ambassador which | is as high as you
[5419]can get in the foreign service. And he was
[5421]sad, he really was.
[5423]Well, how does {Frederick E.] Noiting come into
[5425]this ae
[5426]Well, Nolting came in,as-the, apparently)as the
[5427]“A
[5429]A &
[5430]foreign services rebuttal to my going on outdof Here
[5432]I remember both McNamara and Gilpatric asked
[5434]me about him,.and I didn't know him. I said,
[5436]"Well, I'a@ just go on what I heve heard from
[5438]|
[5440]other foreign service officers who respect
[5441]him very mach." So finally, Nolting was--
[5443]a “meeting wag arranged with Nolting, and
[5445]I liked him very much when fT talked wi ale Anning)
[5446]He asked me if I would give him some briefings
[5447]on Vietnam, which I did do. And when I wound»
[5448]up the end of that, I was asked again by .
[5449]McNemara, who said he was going to tell
[5450]Kennedy) end I said, “yell, this looks like
[5452]a very good man, and I think it's a sound
[5453]appointment." ” 7 didn't want to be. ambassador.
[5454]Jesus. ‘Daring the Eisenhower administration,
[5455]they wanted to male me anbessador Si” the
[5456]Philippines) and I begged them not to. I
[5458]think that's one of the world's worst jobs.
[5459]You're stuck where you can't do what your
[5461]job is supposed to be,and I knew they were
[5462]“a
[5464]“going to put me in: places where I'd be up
[5466]against Communist political leaders of some
[5468]sort, working the other side. And of course,
[5470]you aren't in that position, but allegedly
[5471]ion ie oe
[5472]you ‘arey 224 you | pre~goingato have people running
[5475]circles eround you, £F, “youl mow it and couldn't
[5477]em
[5479]lift a ‘Little Pinger to stop them. ard this
[5485]isn't my idea of a good spot to be in. You
[5487]_ just get belabored over that.
[5489]Well, did Nolting ever try to get you back to
[5490]A
[5492]Vietnam im an advisory position?
[5494]I think so. There were ea number of attempts
[5496]by the Vietnamese themselves, and unfortunately )
[5497]; : A.
[5498]some of them werecouched in terms of wanting
[5500]me to come out as ambassador, by the Vietnamese@
[5501]but Nolting and I had very friendly relations,
[5502]and I think he had proposed that I come on
[5504]out several tines. But these things would
[5505]usually only come to me sort of second or
[5506]third hands and one time apparently President
[5507]Kennedy had said something to the JCS because
[5508]suddenly my relations with the Chiefs went
[5509]down to leds than zero. and sub-2erog mA ID
[5511]finally asked General [Curtis E.] Lemay of
[5513]the Air Force, because I'm an Air Force officer,
[5515]what the trouble was. And he said; "You and
[5516]your ambitions to have four stars." JI said,
[5517]"What's this again?" Apparently Kennedy had
[5518]said something to the Chiefs of) what. would
[5520]A
[5522]thay think of my being given four stars and
[5524]being put in charge of operations in Vietnam?
[5527]O'BRIEN:
[5529]O'BRIEN:
[5535]And I-didn't kmow ebout it, and they took it
[5537]that r was pushing myself for it. I said
[5539]S504: Ny
[5540]again, “that isn 't,rté want to do.” So. this
[5541]. Generale
[5542]was about tne time that--no, maybe [William
[5543]Ba
[5545]Westmorelend] Westy was coming in about thens=
[5547]it wes around that time.
[5549]Well) the: ‘task force really forms up the instructions
[5550]A” . ot,
[5552]. oS
[5553]for Nolting, doesn't it%...
[5554]Yes.
[5555]'.. . for the next few years. Just what kind
[5557]of recommenéations come out of that task |!
[5559]' force?
[5561]Well, I was, only in on the very original one,
[5562]which was to undertake some things such as
[5564]‘changing the specific types of things to
[5565]. oY
[5567]meet a situation injthere. One of them was:
[5569]we would get a political section that would
[5570]work out better relations with the Vietnamese
[5571]government, a political section in our embassy,
[5572]and that the foréign service would go and
[5573]search through their own personnel for people
[5574]with some real political savvy to get info
[5575]guide,/ rather than control cr belabor or have
[5577]confrontations with the Vietnamese government
[5579]oe ee ne rr ne rN en
[5583]to carry out essentially political reforms,
[5584]and getting some of the just criticism of.
[5585]the opposition considered in the governing
[5586]boay. another thing was on the police, of
[5587]getting police training done so that they |
[5588]could cope with meeting enemy units, rather ”
[5589]than doing urban police work. In this, I
[5591]was begging them to at jeast get to a state
[5592]level
[5594]constebularynas far as American advisors were-
[5596]concerneds a and I wéen't certain that the U.S.
[5598]Army! s military police could cope with it, but
[5599]a
[5600]maybe they could gst a team of them in,axd
[5602]then I was pointing out that there were
[5604]constabulary officers and officers from other
[5605]countries, including South America and the
[5607]old Philippine constabulary, who knew the .
[5609]Lew-end- “order conditions--auite similar to
[5611]Vietnem-and bring them in if they wanted’ to -
[5612]go international. I.was trying to. get them
[5614]to get very pealistidtid solving problems by
[5616]_ changing the quality and the approach that ©
[5618]Aq
[5619]we had. We drew up an original draft that
[5621]_ went to the President, out of meetings that
[5623]A
[5627]be ee te end ee A a Lill Si Oa oe eg aha
[5631]lasted about ten days, at which point, at
[5633]Rusk's insistence, the task force went over
[5635]to State and becams a general, regular body ~
[5636]there. They then proceeded to rewrite our
[5637]original kw instructions and drefts and ~
[5638]everythings, Jy 0k both McNamara and Gilpatric
[5639]said<coming back from the White Houses "Ea,
[5641]you had better not get in there." I seid,
[5643]"If I can help in any way, I will." They said,
[5644]"Well, right ‘for the time being youlbetter not 7a n
[5645]go near that group, sees! £d aan actus ty didn't J aes
[5646]get in to. some of their. policy ronjbesén again’
[5647]in a fairly early period,on the thrust of
[5648]things in Vietnam,except for some of the
[5649]Defense people who were over there. [I would
[5650]talk to them on what was being proposed and.
[5651]going on, - but this was sort of second arid
[5653]third echelon type of a ‘thing, pulling back
[5655]out of it. “pat / initially, I + was actually
[5656]trying to get a quality U.S. representation
[5658]in Vietnam, and actually smaller egain than
[5660]it was at the time, end to pick a few key
[5662]things, and to concentrate on that ,and really
[5663]ra A
[5665]_=1ly-
[5667]to get the Vietnemese coping with their own
[5668]problems more effectively than they were
[5669]doing.
[5670]o ee .
[5671]O'BRIEN: Yeah. Well, between this time and the time ~
[5672]. . A Pitty 3 .
[5673]of the TaylorzRostow mission, ave you involved
[5675]in Vietnam on a kind of regular basis or . SO
[5677]LANSDALE: Uh, no.’..0ff and on I was, but again with
[5679]second- end: third-echelon type of problems.
[5680]I was seeing Gilvatric everyday end working’
[5681]very closely with him)so that. a lot of times »
[5682]as things would come wp, he would discuss them
[5683]™ with me. Bat again, 1 was trying to explain
[5684]who certain people were that were named, their
[5685]backgrounds, and their qualities, and certain »
[5686]events and places, ‘and going to maps with
[5687]him and describing terrain, and so on “chat
[5688]the situation really meant that was making
[5689]the problem. So I was fairly well out of it.
[5690]Fas a matter of fact, T was working with some
[5692]visiting Burmese on their concepts of defense
[5694]Pa
[5695]of a country) and @Béy they brought me in with
[5696]AN :
[5698]the Israeli who had had a mission helping them
[5700]with their defense problems in Burme. And the
[5701]slo Q-
[5703]‘Israeli hed tzin turned around to their Gefense
[5705]Saat Rare aam TORT eT TSE ST re DS VIS NY TON EOS Ce TN ODW DEI Yer OT meer STV MOT IVR OMCUNEN TUN VE TTOOT OF PORE PTUPES 8 EUS OE Oe eT
[5709]minister and some of the others and invited
[5711]me to,look at wncir defense system in Israel.
[5713]At was quite enthusiastic about going and had
[5714]everything arranged and was to leave on a
[5715]Saturday, when about on a Wednesday or Thursday )
[5716]I was asked to go to Vietnam with the other
[5717]mission and stufi ef unfortunately had to
[5718]cancel out everything end-never got irlto see
[5719]what Twanted to see there.
[5720]O'BRIEN: . Well) you end up working on border actually,
[5721]. A a
[5722]tne San of the border , then, don't yout
[5723]on Be raytor- Ros.tow thing? a
[5724]LANSDALE: Yes. Yes.
[5725]O'BRIEN: What about that preoccupation? Where does
[5726]that idea come tromZis that Rostow's?
[5727]LANSDALE: Well, ‘Taylor was the one that charged me
[5728]. “with it. Taylor said, nyo 7 you foxes J” _
[5729]‘this is right 3 which startea ‘yin each
[5730]of you write down some of the things} oa
[5731]think we should look into and what you might
[5732]like to look into. "So I gave him a list of
[5735]about twenty things, I'd like to look intoe?
[5736]oo A
[5740]none of them being this,of course. FS
[5741]. . . A .
[5745]wi ‘suggested some other subjects for other people
[5747]- ; him Oa
[5748]- : on the thing and gave it to thet, exd he
[5749]Sj . ;
[5751]4 ont
[5753], called me back, said that it was a very interesting
[5755]fist oc
[5757]| Lo pbiat I had given him, and would I please work .
[5758]| on building a defense on the border. And I .
[5759]‘said, “KEEL what sort of a defense?” He said,
[5760]“Yell, a system of fortifications or a wire like
[5761]the “Tron curtain in Europe ? I said, "Good
[5762]God, you aren't going to do that, are you?"
[5763]And he said, "Well, look into it." So that
[5765]Suroosedly . yal Ss
[5766]washall I was suppoSed to do, and of course,
[5768]stir
[5769]Bo
[5770]a
[5772]I got called in on other things immediately.
[5774]@ But I wasn't even invited along to go in and
[5775]see Diem with him. I said,’ Look, these are
[5776]old friends of mine. If you'd like, way I'll -
[5777]‘do anything I can you can hit then high, and
[5778]* Tq. hit’ them low if you want. We can get
[5779]some things done that way. He said, “wed, you
[5780]aren't om our protocol List, so you “don't
[5781]attend any of these calls on the president.”
[5783]F we landed in Saigon, and the people from the
[5785]werd Prere and
[5787]presidency, met uss @& era Peylor end Rostow were
[5789]over talking with reportexs who were interviewing
[5791]femmes eee Aine see ek sma comer) momen A rag Uitabsaht Da natin a. ecemmmec Y neni mal ee’ 2 he en ssn,
[5795]them plane side, and these people from the —
[5796]presidency said, "President Diem wants you
[5798]-to come to dinner tonight@" and I said, "Well,
[5799]uth? feed o?
[5800]I better check “on my boss on this." Taylor was
[5802]busy, but I grebbed Rostow who wasn't talking
[5804]at the moment and told him, end he said, "Go
[5805]A
[5806]ahead. n Sof I said, “Well, I wasn't even on
[5808]the protocol, and everything. I don't care
[5809]about going up to these protocol meetings
[5811]‘ 7
[5812]anyhows tms I went in and saw Diem, whose °
[5813]A :
[5814]question was, "What's this mission doing here?
[5816]What are’ you all up to?" TI said, "Why don't
[5818]you wait,and they'll be in here to have a
[5819]ron
[5820]meeting with you tomorrow, and you'll find
[5821]A
[5823]out." And then it became very personal. We
[5825]just started talking over his two old friends
[5827]‘wth, and IT had dinner with him. Anna he
[5829]“prought his nephew in to join us--Nhu's boy, ©
[5831]oldest boy--who had a new toy missile, like a
[5833]‘rocket with a launcherg and I was trying to
[5835]explain to this youngster who was squatting
[5837]tf)
[5838]on the floor next to his uncle<the President: ta.
[5839]I suid, R
[5841]; i
[5842]who was eee eating dimer--you gon't point this
[5844]any
[5845]t hi imo2T didn't know how big a spring this
[5847]ce
[5848]a
[5852]thing had on it, whether it would take his
[5853]oN 0 he ;
[5854]head off or not. [a sot tex} I Ean to
[5855]shoot it up into the ventilating fan in the
[5856]ceiling. We spent dinner actually, taking
[5857]parachutes and things out of the ventilating.
[5858]fans,and the kid and I were climbing up
[5859]‘a laddes' to get these things out of the thing
[5860]in the palace. This was’ very different: from
[5861]an officiel protocol meeting.
[5863]O'BRIEN: Yes How is Diem at that point?
[5865]LANSDALE: He was a very changed man. ‘Ib was the first
[5866]time in our talks with each other.:... .
[5867]when I met him at the palace that night, his
[5868]brother Nhu came in for the first time and
[5869]sat next to himy and when TaskeS Diem a
[5870]question, his brother would. answer ito a and
[5872]Tid havé to tell him I wasn't asking him the
[5873]questions; I was asking his brother. <A very
[5875]' strange relationship at the times RAL
[5876]found that he was a talker--Diem was--and he
[5877]was very clear and concise in his statements
[5878]and had too big a grasp of details i# what-
[5880].ever subject he wes talking ebout. It'd go
[5882]on for hours--details on it, which fascinated
[5883]. A
[5885]O'BRIEN:
[5888]O'BRIEN:
[5894]me but used to bore other people. “But he
[5896]. ; Y
[5897]dic know his countryy and its history, which
[5898]A
[5900]he would give at the drop of a hat. This
[5902]. evening in '61, seeing hin, he was very
[5904]hesitant in his talk and hadn't--it was
[5907]mental hazard
[5909]something physical as well as,
[5911]or sonething, I felt.
[5912]fry CVIAERCD ©
[5913]DeShe go into thet later?
[5915]No. There wasj-mentally, people were telling
[5917]“me that his brother had ‘taken over in the
[5919]& ast . the
[5920]year following,t= “7a dominance onAthing.
[5922].But this was a man that wasn't as sure of
[5924]himself as he had been when I had seen him
[5925]less than a year before. And there had been
[5926]one assassination attempt only, but the big
[5927]one had taken place ‘before I saw him in |
[5929]Januery or December of '60--the attack on
[5931]_the palace and so on. So it hadn't been an
[5933]outside, physical happening like that that
[5934]had caused the change.
[5936]Was he a spirituelist at all? -
[5939]No, no. He wasn't superstitious. we He
[5940]se
[5942]was a very rational sort of a person--pragmatic.
[5946]O'BRIEN: ‘Well when you ged pack, you talk to President
[5947]Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, and John MeCone >
[5948]es IT understand, in a rether private meeting.
[5950]What happened here?
[5952]LANSDALE: Well, this was,when I came back, I met the
[5953], A
[5954]‘President. I went in with ‘Taylor ‘and Rostow-- .
[5956]all oftis | did who - were out on the mission--and
[5958]| jo
[5959]‘he thanked us ‘all very much and as we were, he
[5961]-asked me to stey behind and talk to “himy ok
[5963]that was when he asked me to perform this
[5965]other service for him)which was initially to
[5966]He A
[5968]think about it,and if I came up with some
[5969]rg)
[5971]ideas, why to pt them dom, cfriefly—
[5973]on paper and give them to him. 7 4nd I said,
[5974]"Well, do you want’ to forget about Vietnam
[5975]for the time being »because I haven't written
[5976]my report yet about Vietnam." He said, "Yes,
[5977]this other takes. priority over i tis s0 I
[5978]didn't even finish writing my reports on what
[5979]I had seen in Vietnam at the time. [I went
[5980]immediately into this other work.
[5982]O'BRIEN: - Well, about t2 that time, there's at least some
[5984]. thine ng in terms of mimos that are going
[5986]i
[5987]to the President about the only wey to save Vietnam
[5988]“A
[5991]is with a rather sudstantial commitfment of
[5992]U.S. troops. Is that... .@ .
[5993]LANSDALE: Yes; there was some. Now where... . . Hmm,
[5994]there was some, and I can't remember just
[5995]where it was coming from. This was one of
[5996]the things, chat Diem asked me when I saw hin.
[5997]He asked: me if he should ask for U.S. troops,
[5998]and I said, "Do you need them?" He said, “
[5999]asked rou a question," and I said, "Well, I'm ;
[6000]asking, you, a very legitimate question on this
[6002]things aA I said,"Are you ready to admit that
[6004]ve,
[6006]you have so lost control of yourl situation
[6008]that you can't cope with it here?" And I said,
[6009]"You'd have to do that before you ever turn
[6010]around and ask for American troops in here."
[6012]And he said, "No, we can still handle things,
[6014]. Hy)
[6015]end you've answered my question, so apparently
[6017]: Fi Chad ,
[6018]<— he didn't ask. There hsve been some
[6019]wn SU ) CH
[6020]conversations, going on- -Ebn-Sure. with some of
[6022]Thad:
[6023]the Americans before thatg would be my guess
[6025]on this thing lecause he didn't say, "What
[6026]Tod o-
[6027]do you ‘think OL ja atce woreTesthens anything , ot
[6029]. Wa,
[6031]should I ask?" which was sort of like somebody
[6033]had recommenced this st some point,and I
[6034]A
[6038]O'BRIEN: .
[6042]a
[6044]-1l22-
[6046]don't think it would have been completely in
[6047]Ow
[6048]Bis a Vie tnanese context.
[6050]Neéh, do you get any of this thinking when you
[6052]. get back? Any contingency planning or thinking
[6054]about the building , “of troop levels to a more
[6055]substential aever Sagoo linked with the
[6056]settling ‘of the Leotian question. first?
[6058]There might have been, and L might have known
[6059]some of it. I can't recall now of anys, it's
[6060]someplace in the back of ny head'there were
[6062]some things like that going on. I turned.
[6064]around, just took time off completely from
[6066]othen things and concentrated on this other
[6068]a
[6070]problem for a time afterwards. Actually, through
[6072]December of that year, I was sort of holed up
[6075]and working on some things. My staff would get
[6077]in and out of some of these other things, and
[6079]ra)
[6080]I used to shove them in to take my place in
[6082]K uh,
[6083]meetings and so ong @= I pcan only then just
[6084]get very quick briefings on them, but they were
[6085]essentially supporting whatever McNamare and
[6087]Gilpatric were doings SO I'd just have them
[6089]_go in and report directly and work with them
[6091]Girectly.
[6093]O'BRIEN:
[6097]Bowl!
[6099]O'BRIEN:
[6103]he wore
[6104]Yess wie
[6105]Mesh. Who were the people, on you staff
[6107]at that point?
[6110]Well, let's see?n One of them was Sam Wilson,
[6111]A
[6113]undse” now a brigadier general in n the Army fo
[6115]Jack Bowles: was a Navy Captain who went down -
[6116]. . 7 ;
[6118]to serve with the JCS afterwards and.is now
[6120]“with Standard Oil and working out of Singapore.
[6122]; foe Fhe
[6123]And I had five or six KX people Like that, but those
[6125]were my two princi bi?’ ones.
[6127]Well, this is about ready to run out, and we !ve
[6128]A
[6130]covered em quite quake a -_