Office of the Historian

174. Memorandum From Chester L. Cooper of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy)1

Washington, October 20, 1965.

SUBJECT

  • Lodge vs Goldberg

The attached telegram2 raises a delicate matter which merits your attention. Lodge here (and I believe in conversations with Alsop, Reston and others) is taking a line which has already stirred up some speculation and difficulties (see attached Mansfield’s remarks).3

Potentially more serious is the difference between Goldberg’s public and private statements at the UN (which are presumably made on instructions from Washington) and Lodge’s not-so-private views. We may be confronted with the Hawk-Dove syndrome in the press and, more importantly, with the erosion of the government’s credibility. The [Page 468] fact of the matter is that if Hanoi gives a clear “signal” that it is ready to talk we will be placed in a very awkward position if we don’t respond in the light of the President’s statement (most recently re-asserted in a speech by Cy Vance)4 that we will go “anywhere anytime without preconditions.”

I was told yesterday by Joe Sisco that Goldberg is very concerned about this—as well he might be.

You may recall that before Lodge left I suggested that the President clear up the negotiations matter with him. The longer we leave this in limbo the more difficult it will be to deal with when we have to. At a minimum, I suggest that Lodge be instructed to keep his private thoughts private and be reminded that when and if the time comes when Hanoi says “Geneva here we come”, we will be going too. One of Lodge’s high priority tasks should be to reach the kind of understanding with the GVN that will permit the U.S. and the GVN to proceed in tandem.

C
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, Negotiation. Secret; Eyes Only.↩
  2. Apparent reference to Document 162.↩
  3. Apparent reference to Mansfield’s October 19 speech to the Senate, in which he claimed that unnamed U.S. officials had encouraged press stories that the war in Vietnam need not end in a negotiated settlement, but with a total military solution—the defeat of the Viet Cong. (Congressional Record-Senate, October 19, 1965, pp. 27288-27291)↩
  4. Not found.↩