RIPPLE SALVO… #334… GARBLED WORD X WISHFUL THINKING=BODY BAGS… but first…
Good Morning: Day THREE HUNDRED THIRTY-FOUR of a return to North Vietnam and the air war that erupted following the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution…
2 FEBRUARY 1967… HEAD LINES from The New York Times fifty years ago on a calm, cold Thursday in NYC…
Page 1: “U.S. Drops Plans to Build 2 Dams in Grand Canyon”... “The Administration abandoned today bitterly contested plans for two power producing dams in the Grand Canyon…suggests instead the creation of a National Park at the Marble Gorge location.”... Page 1: “Hanoi Said to Call Attention of U.S. To View on Talks”… “North Vietnam, through diplomatic intermediaries has drawn the attention of the United States to its latest official statement on the possibility of peace talks…The statement appears to link the question of negotiations with a halt in American bombing of the North rather than with acceptance of Hanoi’s four point formula as in the past. The State Department however, has declined to interpret Hanoi’s latest de-escalation as a ‘change of position.’ Secretary of State Dean Rusk…said that the political power struggle in Communist China might give the North Vietnamese leaders more freedom of action ‘to seek peace negotiations.’ He said the United States was trying to learn if this was the case…Hanoi stopped short of promising to enter talks if the bombing halted. In answer to a question, Mr. Rusk disclosed that the United States had informed the foe that it was prepared to discuss acceptance of the National Liberation Front…as a full negotiating partner.”… Page 1: “Maoists Report Sinkiang Victory”…”About 20,000 troops have retreated from Shihotze, an anti-Maoist center of resistance in Sinkiang…to a mountain range to the south…”…
Page 3: “G.I.s Battered in Iron Triangle”…”A platoon of the United States First Infantry Division suffered heavy casualties today when it was attacked in pre-dawn darkness by an enemy force in the ‘Iron Triangle’ northwest of Saigon…The assault was unexpected. Only last week a large United States force ended the 19-day Operation Cedar Falls a sweep that was reported to have cleared the area of enemy units…Marines 18 miles from Danang were involved in five clashes with guerrillas.”… Page 3: “2,000 Clerics Ask 3-Day Peace Fast”… “Christians and Jews throughout the United States were urged today to join in a three day ‘Fast for Peace’ beginning next Wednesday. Plans for the fast were announced at the closing of the two-day ‘Peace Mobilization” attended by more than 2,000 Protestants, Roman Catholics and Jewish clergymen from 48 states. The Interfaith group said the fast would be an act of penitence ‘for the war in Vietnam.”…
Page 6: “The Maoist Revolution” drive for more rigorous Communism is believed to lack support of masses. Efforts by Mao Tse-tung’s partisans to smash established authorities and establish a rigorous type of Communism in China have brought them some gains in recent weeks…Experienced observers here in Hong Kong regard the gains as more tactical than strategic, more apparent than real…It is all too early to say that the Maoist movement has failed. The Maoist partisans themselves speak of a year of struggle before the objective can be attained, but the present faltering state of the Maoist drive does not hold our much hope of final success. There are more social and political grievances today–the Chinese people want more economic, cultural, and political freedom–but the opposition to the Maoist program offers more along these lines than does the party of the Chairman. As for the nationalistic emotions that counted for so much, two decades ago, they are now jaded and sustained artificially by mob demonstrations.”... Page 9: “Johnson Exhorts Israel and Arabs”... “President Johnson appealed to Israel and the Arab states today, to go that extra mile with us in the search for peace in the Middle east.”… Page 12: “Call At Cape Town by Ship Opposed”… “Negro leaders have urged the State Department to cancel plans for a Navy aircraft carrier to make a four day stop at Capetown this weekend. They expressed concern that the Negro servicemen aboard the carrier Franklin Delano Roosevelt would be affected by South Africa’s policy of apartheid, or complete racial separation…the crew will get four days of liberty.”… Page 12: “Queens Blue Angel Pilot is Killed”…when his F-11A Tiger jet crashed i the desert on a training flight. LT. FRANK GALLAGHER, Jr. He had been with the Blue Angels for only six weeks and was #6, a solo position and flew the #6 position in a formation of 8.”…
2 February 1967…The President’s Daily Brief…CIA (TS sanitized) SOUTH VIETNAM: A hassle over the separation of powers appears to be shaping up in Saigon. The constituent assembly’s working draft of the new constitution is weighted in favor of a fairly strong legislature. Military leaders, on the other hand, have made it clear they want a more nearly even division of authority. The Assembly’s version probably represents a maximum bargaining position from which it is likely to retreat as it dickers with Thieu and Company. However, this could become one of the knottiest issues in the continuing dialogue between the government and the assembly.”…
2 and 3 February 1967… U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT, Office of the Historian… Two interesting memos are at:
https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v05/d33
https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v05/d34
The SUNFLOWER diplomatic initiative was in full swing in Moscow with North Vietnam, the U.S and the Soviets trying to light a fire to get something going toward a cease-fire… The Tet truce was a four day event and there were all kinds of efforts and wishes that it could be extended for a few days to extend the talks… The 2 Feb memo is from the American Embassy in Moscow to the Secretary of State providing the details on the 1 Feb talks in Russia…”…contained a chronology of the Embassy staff’s meeting with their North Vietnamese counterparts.” The 3 Feb document is a memo from Harriman to the President that had a buck note from Walt Rostow that advised the President that “Averell Harriman suggests an extended unilateral bombing pause during Tet; and reports further arrangements to debrief Baggs (the writer who just returned from a visit to North Vietnam).”
OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…EXTRAORDINARY HEROISM… COMMANDER FREDERICK FRASER PALMER, UNITED STATES NAVY… NAVY CROSS…
“The President of the United States of America takes pleasure in presenting the NAVY CROSS to COMMANDER FREDERICK FRASER PALMER, United States Navy, for EXTRAORDINARY HEROISM in action as Commander, Attack Carrier Air Wing FOURTEEN (CVW-14), embarked in U.S.S. RANGER (CVA-61). During the devastatingly effective strike against the heavily defended Hai Phong petroleum and oil storage area in North Vietnam on 29 June 1966, COMMANDER PALMER, as leader of the entire strike force, was responsible for the precise, well coordinated and imaginative plan which ultimately was responsible for the success of the entire mission. Knowingly placing himself in the middle of the strike force so that he could coordinate and evaluate the entire mission, he effected the rendezvous of the strike group of twenty-eight airplanes, directing them to the target with deliberate precision despite complete electronic and radar silence. At the target, he fired his rockets directly into fuel tanks causing a fireball which reached up to 1500-feet. Following his own attack, COMMANDER PALMER, despite heavy gunfire, turned back to the target to make the first essential evaluation of damage, noting that all ordnance had been accurately placed within the carefully prescribed target area and that damage was extensive. His imaginative planning, skillful execution and outstanding courage in the face of extreme danger were in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Naval Service.”
Among COMMANDER PALMER’s combat awards: the NAVY CROSS, SILVER STAR, DISTINGUISHED FLYING CROSS (2), and AIR MEDALS…
2 February 1967… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER…The New York Times (3 Feb reporting 2 Feb ops)…Page 2: “Bad weather slowed the United States air effort offensive against North Vietnam again yesterday but pilots managed to get in 65 missions. United States headquarters said that most of the pilots had to drop their bombs by radar control through fog and clouds. Planes from the carrier Ticonderoga, using Zuni rockets, were reported to have destroyed seven cargo barges and damaged 10 others off the North Vietnamese coast. Other carrier based pilots said they had damaged or destroyed three railroad and highway bridges.”… (Bear #23/Zunis/barges/Vinh)… “Vietnam: Air Losses” (Hobson) There were no fixed wing aircraft losses in Southeast Asia on 2 February 1967…
RIPPLE SALVO… #334… A CAUSE FOR WAR… Today when the President’s National Security Advisor bounded into the White House Press room to “put Iran on notice,” it sounded like Obama’s “red line in Syria” to me. Worse; it rang my “Gulf of Tonkin Resolution” bell. And I remember Secretary of State at the UN making a case for WMDs in Iraq… I hope the truth be known before, rather than later about what happen in international waters close-by Iran a few days ago… Haste is a companion trait of the careless… and our history at choosing to go to war is poor…
I suggest LGEN Mike Flynn review the Gulf of Tonkin fiasco that led the President and the Congress to start an air war that lasted eight years… I have a few thoughts on this that are equally pertinent today’s events and the SUNFLOWER peace initiative of 2 February 1967… reference: The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution… at:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident#Second_alleged_attack
Within thirty minute of the “alleged second attack” on 4 August 1964 President Johnson had decided on retaliatory attacks on North Vietnam. He spent the day thinking and talking about the retaliation plan, including a conversation with the Soviets that “he had no intention of opening a broader war.” Early on the morning of August 5 he ordered the attack and within two hours of this announcement Navy carrier aircraft carried out the retaliatory attacks on targets in the Vinh area. What we know now and the President knew within an hour after he was first told our ships had been attacked, is that the original report of enemy PT boat had been questioned, and within a few hours it was known that it was much more likely there never had been any North Vietnamese PT-boats than there were. Haste rose it’s ugly head and away we went with bum dope x wishful thinking… Pride before fall. Big mistakes were made that night in the Gulf of Tonkin and nobody had the guts to admit it, or perhaps as some hold: the U.S. prompted the first attack by sending our DESOTO destroyers into North Vietnamese waters to make something happen. It happened on August 2. It didn’t happen on August 4.
Now, why am I writing about this? Because, it turns out President Johnson KNEW on 2 February 1967 he had an opportunity to get settlement talks with North Vietnam going five years earlier than was the eventual case. He knew we had blundered into the air war and SUNFLOWER on 2 February 1967 was his opportunity to right the wrong and back America out of the air war and bombing campaign with North Vietnam unilaterally and completely. A unilateral cessation.
Our nation paid dearly for the history lesson of Operation Rolling Thunder, Linebacker I and II, and the lesser air war between 1968 and 1972. Dearly! Fifty years later we are still drawing lines in the sand and putting the bullies “on notice.”… Fifty years ago we sent the destroyers to taunt and provoke. Today we are taunting in a different gulf. Are we prepared for the unintended consequences of our bold course?… “The Iranians are on notice!”…
CAG’s QUOTES for 2 January: MACARTHUR: “However horrible the incidents of war may be, to the soldier who is called upon to offer and to give his life for his country is the noblest development of mankind.” PATTON: “I cannot kill a man in combat training, but I can make every man wish to be dead rather than take the wrath of my anger.”…
Lest we forget…. Bear