RIPPLE SALVO… #198… PREPARE FOR THE WORST… but first…
Good Morning: Day ONE HUNDRED NINETY-EIGHT of Rolling Thunder 101 through Rolling Thunder 402… Eight semesters of military history… 1,000 lessons on line, no quizzes, no term papers or book reports, and open opportunities to participate… One day at a time of honoring the service and sacrifice of the warriors of Operation Rolling Thunder, living and dead, and especially those who died on the battlefield… fifty years ago…
15 SEPTEMBER 1966… FRONT PAGE NEWS ON THE HOME FRONT… from the New York Times… A cloudy, rainy Thursday in the big city…
Page (1) “President Buoyed By Voter Support Of Vietnam Policy”…”President Johnson was reported to be pleased today by evidence of voters support for his Vietnam policy but disturbed by the ‘white backlash’ that helped George Mahoney apparently win the Democratic nomination for Governor of Maryland…The White House following standard policy on commenting on primaries, was publicly silent today about the results of nomination contests yesterday in eleven states. Mr. Johnson’s private views paralleled those of most political observers…They concluded that voters in New Jersey, Massachusetts and Wisconsin had strongly endorsed Mr. Johnson’s Vietnamese policy by choosing candidates who supported the war over those who criticized the war.”…Page 1: “Astronauts Soar 850 Miles, Spin Tethered With Agena”…”The Gemini astronauts set an altitude record of 850 miles today, took pictures of stars though an open hatch, and spun in tandem with their Agena companion vehicle at the end of a 100-foot tether…The three day mission will end at 9:45 AM EST tomorrow (16th).”… Page 1: “Senate 54-42 Defeats Closure on Rights Bill”…”The Senate dealt a heavy and perhaps fatal blow today to the Administration’s civil rights bill when it failed by a margin of 10 votes to cut off a filibuster against the measure. The vote was 54 to 42 to end debate that began last week. However, the votes of two-thirds of the Senators present and voting are needed to impose closure. Since the 96 Senators voted, a total of 64 would have been required. Senator Majority Leader said he would decide tomorrow whether to make a second attempt to end the filibuster.”…
Page 1: “Philippine Chief Hails Johnson For Firm Asian Stand”…”President Ferdinand E. Marcos of the Philippines began a two week State visit here today by praising President Johnson for accepting ‘loneliness’ and rejecting the counsel of friends in order to stand firm in Asia. President Marcos broke the formality of his reception in the East Room of the White House by departing from the text of his brief prepared remarks. He told President Johnson who was standing next to him: “We have watched the leadership of President Johnson and we can only say, as the Orientals say, ‘Leadership is the other side of the coin of loneliness, and he who is the leader must always act alone, and acting alone, accept everything alone.’ We have seen you accept everything. The compulsion of the timorous you have discarded; the importuning of friends you have rejected. But staying close to the image you knew of America and your vision of what is America, you have ensured the security of my part of the world.’…” …Page 1: “China Suspends Cultural Purge”…”Communist China today ordered a suspension of the cultural revolution it launched six months ago so that the people might concentrate on bringing in the fall harvest. The order told the Red Guard youths to stay off the farms and out of the factories. ‘The cultural revolution movement will be allowed to be suspended temporarily…this is the first year of the third five year plan. All comrades are required to work to accomplish the goals of the party and state during the remaining period of the first year. Red Guard and revolutionary teachers and students do not have to go to the farms and factories to proceed with the cultural revolution, nor do they need to interfere with the organization there.’..The statement seemed to indicate the Chinese were running into serious economic problems created by interference from the Red Guard.”…
Page 8: “Canada Proves To Be Haven For Draft Dodgers From U.S.”…”This city (Toronto) and others in Canada have become havens for young men from the United States who want to dodge the draft. Estimates of number of draft dodgers now in Canada range as high as 400. Typical of the draft dodgers is a 26 year old New Yorker who has worked in Toronto since 1962 and is afraid to visit his aging parents back home because a warrant has been issued for his arrest if he returns. ‘I am really in a pickle,’ he said in an interview. ‘I could become a Canadian citizen, but I’d like to go home someday without going to prison. I’d go back tomorrow if I could satisfy my obligation with the Peace Corps.’…”…
15 September 1966… The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS Sanitized)…Brief for Vietnam is still classified!!!(redacted)…Soviet Union: The Soviets have again shown a willingness to cooperate with the US in limited bilateral agreements in areas unrelated to Vietnam. Yesterday Gromyko told Ambassador Kohler that he might be ready to sign a US-Soviet civil air transport agreement while in New York next week.
15 SEPTEMBER 1966… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…NYT (16 September reporting 15 September) Page 1: “United States Air Force pilots attacking in North Vietnam yesterday reported having seen 10 MIG 17 Soviet built fighters of the older type. The pilots said they saw all the enemy planes within 30 minutes as they bombed the Daplau railroad and highway bridge 18 miles northwest of Hanoi. After seven waves of Air Force F-105 jets hit the bridge, half of it was reported resting in the river and approaches to it were cut in several places on both ends. In a total of 145 missions involving more than one aircraft each, the pilots had again smashed hardest at the highways, railroads, coastal shipping and supply depots in North Vietnam’s southern coastal strip. In a few raids near Hanoi and Haiphong they bombed railroads, highways, fuel and ammunition dumps, and an antiaircraft site. Other United States pilots attacked a tunnel complex, a storage point and an antiaircraft position, all in the demilitarized zone, with bombs and napalm. An Air Force F-105 Thunderchief pilot was rescued after his plane crashed 60 miles northeast of Haiphong, but the pilot of a downed Navy A-1H Skyraider was listed as missing (conforming to a new policy designed to give pilots after a crash in North Vietnam the opportunity to evade capture, the Navy refused to say where the Navy aircraft went down). Other planes dropped three million propaganda leaflets in the Red River Valley north of Hanoi and in the southern part of the country…”…”Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson)…There were NO fixed wing aircraft losses on 15 September 1966… (the F-105 and A-1H above were reported downed on 14 Sept in Hobson)…
RIPPLE SALVO… #198… “AN ECONOMY FOR THE LONG WAR”… First, a disclaimer: I am referring to a book written by “world famous war correspondent” Wilfred Burchett, “Vietnam North,” (1966) in this piece. Burchett was a writer who Marx, Mao, and Stalin would have welcomed into their respective living rooms. The guy was left of the left, and I always have my barf bag handy when I read one of the many books he has written for the reds and pinks of the world… Communism was Burchett’s meal ticket. And that’s why his stuff is required reading. He was always welcome in the communist camps and what he reported, and his perspective, was useful to anybody seeking to understand the enemy. In this case, North Vietnam. Burchett was “inside North Vietnam” in 1966 and Ho rolled out the red carpet for him. One of his interests and questions was how a small agricultural nation could survive in a war with a super power. Burchett posed his questions to several leaders in the NVN hierarchy. Here is one he asked the minister of planning Doan Trong Truyen: “With the wholesale mobilization of manpower, especially the youth, is there not a danger to the higher educational system you have built up in recent years? Are you not gambling with your future in drafting thousands of students and future technical cadres into the armed forces and construction projects?”… And here is the answer (which was available to our CIA and the President days after it was spoken)… I quote Truyen then Burchett…
“For a complete answer to that,” replied Truyen, “you had better talk with the minister of education. I can answer only in part. True, we have mobilized tens and hundreds of thousands of our young people. Almost all of our youth, over three million of them, have enrolled in the ‘three readies’ movement. (The ‘three readies’ are [1] ready to fight and fight valiantly, ready to enlist in the armed forces, [2] ready to overcome all difficulties, to stimulate production work and studies, under any circumstances whatsoever, and [3] ready to go anywhere and perform any task required by mobilization). We mobilized 250,000 for the mountain regions alone, to help build up the new economy in the backward areas. We mobilized many more thousands to build new communications networks and help repair bomb damage. But we have not touched the 90,000 students who are being trained as specailists, technical cadres and skilled workers. Nor have we touched their teachers. They are our precious capital for the future. For the tasks of war if it lasts that long, but above all for the peace afterwards.”…
Burchett writes (pages 62-63) of “Vietnam North”… An example of the dispersal of industry and the efforts to make each province an economically autonomous as possible is to be found in Quang Binh province, which borders along the 17th parallel and has taken the brunt of the bombings. During 1965 and early 1966 a network of machine shops was set up in every district, as well as shops at province level, to manufacture and repair a wide range of equipment for industry, agriculture and transport. These include small rice threshing, husking and winnowing machines; hand carts to replace traditional shoulder poles and baskets; ploughshares and harrows, hoes, spades, etc.; primitive types of ball bearings and presses for bricks and tiles. Small plants were also set up to manufacture cement, insecticides and fertilizers and a whole range of essential consumer goods, matches, cigarettes, soap, sugar, crockery, paper and other items. All of this was new to the province, the small plants and workshops blossoming into life literally under storms of bombs and bullets. The resultant saving in transport was considerable, and shortages that would otherwise have been inevitable. And Quang Binh at the very end of the long haul was avoided.
Investment in such regional industries was doubled in 1966 as compared to the previous year. State shops and the local markets wherever I traveled displayed an impressive variety of articles from the newly established plants. Many started in handicraft cooperatives but quickly expanded into compact little industries, as skills were acquired and machines made available. Priority was given to industries which serviced transport or turned out a wide variety of carts–drawn by hand or animal or bicycle-powered, as well as trailers for trucks and the like….Another impressive aspect was the multitude of small electric power generators all over the country, on the plains as well as the mountain areas, some powered by locally produced coal, others by liquid fuel, the latter stored in deep underground shelters. It was interesting that the 1966-67 plan provided for a considerable stepping up of mineral prospecting and for further vast irrigation and flood prevention projects, air attacks against dikes and dams having become commonplace by early 1966.
In General, the 1966-67 plan, on top of what had already been accomplished in 1965, was the most concrete evidence that North Vietnam had switched over to a long-war economy…. end quote…
North Vietnam had perfected the rope-a-dope long war strategy in their earlier struggle with the French. Ho Chi Minh and his circle of generals won that war without a city. That was the ultimate in dispersal. So North Vietnam was ready for the arrival of another powerful adversary. Especially one so ready to under estimate the tenacity, perseverance, courage, and resolve of the little agricultural nation of North Vietnam. Especially one so ready to employ a strategy for defeat–gradualism. The gradualism that provided Ho Chi and the boys the gift of time–two years to disperse, create a long war economy, reinforce their air defenses to thwart gradualism, and enroll his people in “the three readies” movement.
I wonder if anybody in our National Command Center, the CIA, or the staff of LBJ’s National Security Advisor ever read Burchett???…
Lest we forget…. Bear ……….. –30– ………..