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By Root 966 0

fervent believer in the American capacity to guide and develop the underdeveloped world. A hawk in the cause of halting Communism before the word “hawk” came into use, he had already proposed a plan calling for the introduction of 25,000 American combat troops. As a target selector in the European war, he had emerged as an enthusiast of air power, although post-war surveys on effectiveness of strategic bombing had found the results uncertain. Rostow was a positivist, a Dr. Pangloss who, as described by a fellow-worker, would advise the President on learning of a nuclear attack on Manhattan that the first phase of urban renewal had been accomplished at no cost to the Treasury. When because of left-wing activity during his student days his security clearances were frequently held up, Kennedy complained, “Why are they always picking on Walt as soft-headed? Hell, he’s the biggest Cold Warrior I’ve got.” That he would find reasons for going forward in Vietnam was a foregone conclusion.

Accompanied by officials of State, Defense, Joint Chiefs and the CIA, the mission visited South Vietnam for a week, 18–25 October, and retired to the Philippines to compose its report. This document, together with “Eyes Only” cables from Taylor to the President and annexes and supplements by individual members of the mission, has defied coherent summary ever since. It said something of everything, combined yes and no, pessimism and optimism, and on the whole, with many qualifications, argued that the program to “save South Vietnam” would be made to work only by the infusion of American armed forces to convince both sides of our seriousness. It recommended the immediate deployment of 8000 troops “to halt the downward trend” of the regime and “a massive joint effort to deal with Viet-Cong aggression.” It quite accurately foresaw the consequences: American prestige, already engaged, would become more so; if the ultimate object was to eliminate insurgency in the South, “There is no limit to our possible commitment (unless we attack the source in Hanoi!).” Here, both in statement and in parenthesis, the future military problem was formulated.

The report contained other formulations equally basic if less well judged. Without having viewed the enemy’s terrain or industrial base, Taylor reported that North Vietnam was “extremely vulnerable to conventional bombing.” Rarely has military judgment owed so much to imagination.

In referring to Hanoi’s role as aggressor across an “international boundary,” the report picked up the inventive rhetoric that marked the Vietnam affair throughout its duration. The Geneva Declaration had specifically stated that the partition line was “provisional” and not to be interpreted “as constituting a political or territorial boundary.” Eisenhower had specifically recognized it as that and nothing more. Yet like “vital” national interest, “international boundary” was one of the inventions by policy-makers used to justify the case for intervention, or even to convince themselves that they had a case. Rostow had already used it in his speech at Fort Bragg. Rusk used it three months after Taylor in a public address in which he went further than anyone to speak of “external aggression” across “international boundaries.” By repeated usage, the transformation of partition line into international boundary became the norm.

In describing South Vietnam’s military performance as “disappointing,” and making the routine acknowledgment that “Only the Vietnamese can defeat the Viet-Cong,” Taylor stated his belief that Americans “as friends and partners can show them how the job might be done.” This was the elemental delusion that underwrote the whole endeavor.

The pattern that military intervention was bound to follow was thus laid out by the chosen adviser. No one advised against it, as Ridgway unequivocally had in the past. State Department members of the mission in their annexes described the situation as “deteriorating” with increasing Viet-Cong successes, and pointed out that the Communist effort started at the lowest social level,