289. Editorial Note
In telegram 10098 from Saigon, November 4, 1966, Ambassador Lodge advised the Department of State that the scheme to secure the defection of National Liberation Front Chairman Nguyen Huu Tho by working through his purported uncle, Nguyen Huu An, was “largely based on wishful thinking.” In forwarding the telegram to the Presidentʼs Special Assistant, Walt Rostow, Arthur McCafferty of the White House Situation Room noted in his covering memorandum that “in short, the uncle is one of the best ‘fiction’ writers of our time.” (Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, box 143, Thrush)
[Page 797]Two months earlier, Lodge had notified the Department that a promising operation had been launched to secure Nguyen Huu Thoʼs defection and that other high-level defections from the NLF might follow; see Document 204. Secretary of State Rusk and Rostow followed the case closely, and President Johnson was kept abreast of developments; see Documents 206, 214, 225, and 243 and the footnotes thereto. Additional information on White House and Department of State interest in the operation is in the Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, box 143, Thrush, and in Department of State, central Files, POL 30 VIET S/THRUSH. Director of Central Intelligence Helms was informed regularly about the operation by his Special Assistant for Vietnamese Affairs, George Carver, who wrote him at least 14 memoranda about Thrush from late September through late October 1966. In an October 11 memorandum to Helms, Carver noted that Secretary of Defense McNamara, who arrived in Saigon on October 10, had been briefed on Thrush and “seemed pleased at the way things are being handled.” Carver’s memoranda are in the Central Intelligence Agency, GAC Chron, Job 80–R01720R.
In telegram 8635, October 17, Lodge informed the Department of State of “unresolved discrepancies, inconsistencies and apparent falsifications,” especially involving Nguyen Huu An, which affected the substance of the defection effort and called into question the honesty of the participants. A “confrontation meeting” on November 3 between a CIA representative and An, reported by Lodge in telegram 7657, confirmed that An had “lied about all of his activities during July and August.” An was still regarded as a potential asset, Lodge indicated, but given the operation’s “metamorphosis into a longer term intelligence/defection effort,” full control would be turned over to CIA personnel. (Department of State, Central Files, POL VIET S/THRUSH)