The CIA’s Counterinsurgency in Vietnam Was Brutal … And Effective

As U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War escalated after the passage of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in 1964, U.S. Army general William Westmoreland knew he would be simultaneously fighting two different types of enemies on the ground — the main battle force of the North Vietnamese Army and the guerilla insurgency of the Viet Cong in South Vietnam.

Westmoreland, who served as commander of Military Assistance Command Vietnam in the early years of the war, considered the North Vietnamese Army the greater threat. However, he could not ignore the Viet Cong, a versatile and resilient fighting force guided by its network of political cadres spread across the villages and towns of South Vietnam.

The Phoenix Program became the primary counterinsurgency operation against the Viet Cong. Although Phoenix was ostensibly under military control, the Central Intelligence Agency often directed operations on the ground. As is often the case with CIA counterinsurgency programs, either by design or circumstance, Phoenix quickly became notorious for allegations of widespread torture, summary executions, and indiscriminate killings.

Westmoreland viewed the North Vietnamese Army as “bully boys with crowbars” and the Viet Cong guerrillas and their political cadres as mere “termites.” The former posed a grave and immediate threat, while the latter was a nuisance that needed to be suppressed until the bigger problem of the NVA could be dealt with.

The Viet Cong relied on the Ho Chi Minh Trail for much of their supplies and logistical support, but it also needed their political cadres and the Viet Cong infrastructure for additional supplies, recruiting and intelligence. In addition to providing support, the cadres also acted, to the extent they were capable, as a Communist shadow government in South Vietnam in order to undermine the authority of Saigon and U.S. influence.

“The Viet Cong relied on the Ho Chi Minh Trail for much of their supplies and logistical support...”

An over-broad statement. The VC had a parallel government in the south complete with taxation & food stuffs. Probably the only thing that came down the Trail with their address on it was some modern weaponry when there was a big push on.

The NVA were the coventional force dependent on fixed supply lines, like the Trail. Over 40 years later and the Media is still getting it wrong.

The communists had been doing the same thing years before:

From Bernard Fall - When I returned to Viet-Nam in 1957, after the Indochina War had been over for two years, everybody was telling me that the situation was fine. However, I noticed in the South Vietnamese press obituaries of village chiefs, and I was bothered. I thought there were just too many obituaries--about one a day--allegedly killed not by communists, but by "unknown elements," and by "bandits." I decided to plot out a year's worth of dead village officials. The result was that I counted about 452 dead village chiefs to my knowledge at that time. Then I also saw in the press, and here and there in Viet-Nam heard, discussions about "bandit attacks." These attacks were not made at random, but in certain areas. That too worried me, so I decided to plot the attacks. I immediately noted in both cases a very strange pattern. The attacks on the village chiefs were "clustered" in certain areas.

I went to see the Vietnamese Minister of the Interior, Nguyen Huu Chau, who then was, incidentally, the brother-in-law of Madame Nhu [Diem's sister-in-law], and I said to him: "Your Excellency, there is something I'm worried about. You know that I was in the North when the French were losing and I noticed the village chiefs disappearing and I think you now have the same problem here." He said, "What do you mean?" So I just showed him the map. He said, "Well, since you found that out all by yourself, let me show you my map." And he pulled out a map which showed not only the village chiefs but also the communist cells operating in South Viet-Nam in 1957-58, when Viet-Nam was at peace and there was supposedly nothing going on. It was wonderful. We all congratulated each other. Yet, very obviously, to use a somewhat unscientific term, the whole Mekong Delta was going "to hell in a basket," and much of South Viet-Nam with it.1

smallwarsjournal.com/documents/fall.pdf

Politically they executed (pun intended) better than we did.

“The CIA’s Counterinsurgency in Vietnam Was Brutal … And Effective”

I did not know this.

All I know is what government schools say General Forrest did at Fort Pillow under that Confederate flag. I read about that all the time.

By some accounts Fort Pillow was the first and last time an enemy was killed in a war under controversial circumstances - and it has never happened at all under the Stars and Stripes until the Nixon war.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.