UNClASSIFIED - The Black Vault

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rema1n as they were; or to withdraw our troops through son~
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face -saving fonmula such as neutralization .
form of
(U) Instrumental in influ"encing the course that the U.S. would
..I take were the reconmendations of Secretary of Defense (SECOEF) Robert S.
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McNamara and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS) General Maxwell D.
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Taylor. FollOWing th~ir return from a r~arch 1964 vis1t to Saigon, Secre ­
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tary McNamara recqmmended to President Lyndon B. Johnson a program of
increased operations against the Vietcong (ve) guerrillas, Further.
-I both 11r. McNamara and General Taylor concluded that the "RVN needed addi ­
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tional U.S. military. economic, and political support, and that such help
should be furnished as long as it was necessary to bring Cor.lTIunist aggression
and terror-ism under. control .
The direction the U.S. would travel
.I ) seemed firm on March 26 when Secretary McNamara delivered a speech that
had been prepared in concert wi th President Johnson and Secreta-ry of
State Dean Rusk.
In his speech, Mr . McNamara rejected the ideas of
I1 withdrawal,11 "neutralization," or "peace at any price" in the war
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against the Communist insurgents.
(U) So it was that 1965 became a pivotal year . Conditions
continued to be politically unstable, and offered, perhaps for the
last t i me, an opportunity for the U.S. to make a near-term disengage­
I ment from SEA. Instead, the number of U.S. military personnel in SVN
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approximately 23,000.
was s lowly increased, until by the end of the year the force stood at
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