RIPPLE SALVO… #558… Gradualism gradually gets there… 50 untouched targets to go… but first…
Good Morning: Day FIVE HUNDRED FIFTY-EIGHT of a daily journal covering the forty-four months of Operation Rolling Thunder…
15 September 1967… HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a sunny, mild Friday in Manhattan…
SUMMER IN AMERICA 1967: “President Asks Aid on Crime and Gun Control–Also Attacks Riot Leaders In Kansas City Address to Police Chiefs’ Parley”... “President Johnson flew to mid-country today to plead with the American people for help in passing his programs to fight crime and limit the sale of firearms. Addressing the International Association of Chiefs of Police, Mr. Johnson appealed to all local communities to substitute legislation and action for hand wringing and self-righteous indignation about crime. He coupled his message with his most impassioned denunciation yet of the urban rioters and he advocates of violence spawned’ by the riots. ‘These wretched, vulgar men, these poisonous propagandists, posed as spokesmen for the underprivileged and capitalized on the real grievances of suffering people.’ “… Page 1: “Federal Reserve Board Chairman Says U.S. Faces Inflation–Urges Tax Increase–Warns of Steady Price Increases If Levy is Not Passes–Backs Cuts in Spending–Scores Spree in Stocks–House Unit Ends Hearings on Johnson Proposal”... “The Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board William McChesney Martin, Jr. warned Congress today that the nation was in the grip of an inflationary psychology… urged prompt enactment of a tax increase.”… Page 1: “Senator Robert Kennedy’s Plan on Slums Scored–Two Johnson Aides Assail Proposal for Tax Help to Build Low Cost Housing.”... Page 1: “Johnson Makes Early Bid For New Hampshire Vote”… Page 1: “New York City Halts Talks With Teachers–Both Sides dig In–Long Tie-Up is Feared As School Board Sees No Point in “Rehearsing” The Dispute–Court Hearing Today–Attendance Off At Schools”…
Page 37: “Chicago Battles Ghetto snipers–Negro Youths Erupt after Black Power Rally Ends”... “Negro youths mobilized for a black power rally by anonymously printed leaflets charging the police with brutality, smashed windows and threw stones at passing cars on the South Side tonight. Scattered sniper fire was reported. Eleven persons were hurt, 5 of them policemen and at least 30 persons were arrested including a representative of the Non Violent Coordinating Committee.”… Page 42: ” ‘Exile’ Explained By Brooklyn CORE–American Negro Compared To Jew In Nazi Germany”… “The Brooklyn Chapter of CORE has compared the status of Negroes in America to the Jews in Nazi Germany in a document explaining why the civil rights group plans to leave the ghetto to establish a new world… Meanwhile the Congress of Racial Equality Chapter in Harlem has requested separate schools for Harlem.”…
VIETNAM: Page 1: “Shift Is Reported In Hanoi’s Terms–But U.S. Is Doubtful There Is Meaningful Change”... “Reliable sources here in Hanoi indicated today that if the United States stopped bombing North Vietnam, talks between Hanoi and Washington could begin three of four weeks afterward… evidence to support this possibility can be found in speech by Premier Pham Van Dong delivered 30 August. ‘If the American side really desires conversations it should first cease unconditionally the bombings and every other act of war against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.’ Washington: ‘Nothing new there.’ “… Page 2: “U.S. Troops Kill 134 Of Enemy In Delta Sweep”... “United States Army Units and supporting aircraft and artillery killed 134 Vietcong on Wednesday in a 12-hour sweep 47 miles southwest of Saigon. Ninth Infantry lost 9 killed-in-action and 29 troopers were wounded as they advanced slowly across flooded rice fields in the Mekong Delta. Air support included 39 Air Force strikes. Marines in the North at Cothien continued to take casualties from enemy artillery and rocket fire. Five Marines were killed and 17 wounded…Casualties for the week ended 9 September were the highest since July. During the week 242 Americans died along with 250 South Vietnamese and 23 allied troops. 1,490 U.S. troops were wounded with half requiring hospitalization. Enemy dead for the week was placed at 2,103.”…
15 September 1967…The President’s TS eyes Only Daily CIA Brief… COMMUNIST CHINA: the strife-torn industrial province of Szechwan now seems virtually isolated from the rest of the country. Rail service has been suspended for more than a month, and telecommunications are disrupted. Some air and river traffic is still moving…an effort was made in August to effect a cease-fire between the warring factions, but this seems to have broken down, and there are frequent references to armed struggle in many parts of the province… Local officials are flailing around desperately in the midst of this chaos… (rest redacted)… Special Daily Report on NVN for the President’s Eyes Only: Hanoi May Be Seeking Additional Cuban Assistance: Havana radio announced the arrival in Cuba yesterday of Le Thanh Nghi, a North Vietnamese Politburo member. Nghi has been negotiating new extensions of economic and military assistance in various Communist capitals for several weeks. He undertakes these missions twice yearly but has never visited Cuba... Hanoi Evacuation Continues:... A Hanoi newspaper editorial of late August points up the continued departure of nonessential people from the capital city. The paper stated that “almost all agencies, enterprises, and handicraft cooperatives in the zones likely to be attacked have been evacuated of dispersed to new locations.” The general evacuation movement was said to have been stepped up in various city districts, with many families making arrangements to reside outside the city of Hanoi permanently. In addition, very few evacuated school children returned to visit their homes during their summer vacation. We had estimated that as of the end of last year more than a third of Hanoi’s total population of 1,000,000 had left. This further evacuation may reduce the city’s total population to less than half million.
15 SEPTEMBER 1967… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times 15 Sept Page 2: “Flying a total of 137 missions on September 14, the American pilots struck at bridges and barges in North Vietnam as well as Hanoi’s northwest rail link to Communist China along the Red River...(16 Sept reporting 15 Sept ops) Page 5: “In the air war there were 71 missions over North Vietnam. On a good day about 150 missions are flown. The spokesman said that the missions had concentrated on weapons positions and lines of communication in the southern panhandle…The military command disclosed that two American planes had been lost in action over North Vietnam. This brings to 677 the total number of planes lost over the North.”…
“Vietnam: Air Losses (Chris Hobson): There was one fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 15 September 1967…
(1) MAJOR A.E. MUNSCH was flying an F-100D of the 510th TFS and 3rd TFW out of Bien Hoa was flying a close air support mission and hit by ground fire on his initial napalm run on an enemy position near My Tho in the Mekong Delta. MAJOR MUNSCH was able to get clear of the enemy controlled area before ejecting to be rescued by an Army helicopter to fly and fight again…
RIPPLE SALVO… #558… The Stennis Committee Summary Report of the three weeks of hearings on the air war was published on 31 August. The flood of information fueled the debate and “the air war” was, as a New York Times OpEd made clear,
“BOMBING IS STILL BIG ISSUE.” … I quote…
“U.S. air strikes against new targets in and around North Vietnam ports last week created more controversy over the ‘credibility’ question than over the wisdom of this latest escalation of the air war.
“Reports ricocheted through Washington that the new raids had been approved by President Johnson over the ‘strong objections’ of Defense Secretary Robert McNamara; that dissension was rife within the ‘Administration over bombing policy, and that the President had approved ‘around-the-clock’ raids on the principal North Vietnamese port of Haiphong as long as no foreign ships were damaged.
“Pentagon spokesman Fred Goulding denied any authorization had been given to bomb the port facilities at Haiphong, and a legion of nameless spokesmen scurried about denying the Defense Secretary had been squelched or that the generals were in revolt.
“These assurances and denials stemmed from the seeming disparity between Mr. McNamara’s testimony before the Senate Preparedness Subcommittee on August 25. He argued against bombing the ports of Haiphong, Hongai and Campha on the ground that it risked hitting Communist bloc ships and possibly widening the war; and that, anyway, it wouldn’t prevent North Vietnam from getting required war supplies either over-the-beach or overland through Communist China.
“But lat Sunday (10 Sept), Navy jets blasted the docks at Campha. On Monday (11 Sept) they raided the bridges, warehouses and rail yard at Haiphong. Word got out that Hongai, too, was to have been struck, but bad weather kept the warplanes at bay.
“Administration officials were quick to point out that no ships were in the Campha harbor when it was hit, and that neither the docks nor the harbor at Haiphong had been touched.
“Was Mr. McNamara overruled? One harried Pentagon official said: ‘Mr. McNamara gets overruled by the President at least once a day and has for the past seven years… He goes over to the White House just about every day with some problem or other and makes a recommendation on each. If his recommendation is not fully accepted, then I suppose you can say he was overruled.
“But the major escalatory step–an attempt to close off Haiphong by mining the harbor or blasting the docks–certainly was not taken. and well-placed sources in Washington said it would not be, not for the being at least.
“the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other top military planners long have been urging such a step, hoping to magnify the difficulties of Hanoi in supporting the war in the South and fighting off American planes in the North.
“But what they got instead of a green light on closing Haiphong from the sea, was approval to bomb supply line targets closer to the principal ports, and also closer to Hanoi and the Chinese border entry points.
“While it is clear there remain differences between the military advisors and Mr. McNamara on bombing policy–such as whether to close down Haiphong completely–it seems vastly overstated by the public furor. As one senior official put it: ‘One year ago the differences were major, but largely un-public. Now they are public and portrayed as major, when in fact they are not.
“His point was that in the earlier stages of the air campaign against North Vietnam most military men urged that more targets be hit, sooner and harder than they were permitted. On this Mr. McNamara and other officials held back, in large part because they did not want to go so fast and hard that either Communist China or Russia might feel compelled to come into the war or stir up major trouble elsewhere in the world.
“But, over the last several months, the intensity of the bombing has been stepped up substantially and many hundreds of targets recommended by the military have been bombed. The remaining number is now believed to be about 50.
“While the military would like to go after these, they now do not argue this might end the war or decisively shorten it. And they also have only to look at recent events to realize that in time, most of the forbidden targets will be opened up too.”
RTR Quote for 15 September: JOHN STUART MILL, On Liberty : “We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and even if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still.”…
Lest we forget… Bear