Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume III, Vietnam, June–December 1965

162. Telegram From the Embassy in Vietnam to the Department of State¹

Saigon, October 8, 1965, 6 p.m.

1216. Ref: USUN’s 50.²

1. Cables from USUN indicating systematic campaign to bring US pause in bombing and disturbing implications of Vienna’s dispatch [sic] well recognized by Deptel 975³ embolden me to make following comments:

2. Mr. Peter’s assertion that “US has nothing to lose by cessation of bombing” is manifestly untrue. Bombing is our strongest current weapon against Viet Cong aggression and to cease it, in the way in which Mr. Peter suggests, would be a very serious blow both to our effort in Vietnam and to that of the Vietnamese.

3. Believe the Secretary was absolutely right to reaffirm US position.

4. It is extraordinary to one who worked eight years at the UN to find such apparently widespread indifference to the concept of aggression the prevention of which is, after all, one of the prime aims of the Charter. Yet, if the press is any guide, it is seldom mentioned. President Johnson is right in all that he has said about suppressing aggression. The UN rests on the principle that it is wrong to use force except in self-defense. If the UN does violence to that principle it will cease to deserve respect. Our actions in Vietnam are in full accord with purposes of the UN Charter, rooted in Article I, “Measures for the … Suppression of Acts of Aggression.”

5. One of the most effective things which we can do to ward off aggression and promote peace is our bombing in the north. There should be no pause from us without a pause from them. If we stop cutting roads and blowing up bridges in the north, let them stop doing the same thing in the south, or stop destroying the railroad. A proposition whereby their side is allowed to do with impunity the things which we are not to be allowed to do is manifestly unacceptable.

6. The agitation for a pause should not be taken at face value. When it comes from one of the so called non-aligned countries, it often represents a response to an organized minority more than it represents what the government really thinks.

7. We must avoid steps which: will cause the Hanoi regime to think we are weak and near defeat; of being believed in South Vietnam to be about to negotiate in a UN to which SVN does not belong and behind their backs; of thus lowering morale and destroying an important quantity of Vietnamese fighting power which our own fighting men will have to pay for; or in general, of giving up something and really getting nothing back.

Lodge

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, POL 27 VIET S. Secret; Exdis. Repeated to USUN, Moscow, and Budapest.
2. See footnote 3, Document 160.
3. Reference is to telegram 512 to Vienna for Abba Schwartz, repeated as 975 to Saigon, October 7. Schwartz was in Vienna to explore with the International Committee of the Red Cross a possible exchange of prisoners in Vietnam. The Department of State informed him in the telegram that he should not make contact with DRV or NLF representatives who might be in Vienna, but rather work through the Red Cross representative. Schwartz should also “downplay the idea” that DRV/NLF willingness to exchange prisoners “might signal the beginning of something more important.” (Department of State, Central Files, POL 27-7 VIET)