4 - The Black Vault

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THE BDM CORPCRATION
rapidly. 28/ However, US military strength in Vietnam crested in April
1969 and thereafter began to decline without there being a commensurate
de,1'.re in the MACV IG workload. 29/ Investigations actually increased as
the number of troops declined, with one of the contributing factors cited
in the History being "Low
level of combat activity witn attendant idle.ness
and mischievous behavior of United States troops." 30/
Things worsened with the accelerated drawdown in 1971.
As the IG
Historny notes, the coincidence of a drawdown and problems was no acLident:
-' The drawdown of United States units created many
I
problems that previously had not be~n as evident nor
[sic] as pronounced. Wit? ".,e loss of offensive combat
missiens many units were wichdrawn intc enclaves on the
coast or in populated areas and began processing for
their return to the United States. This resulted in
more free time for the troops. The additional free
time not constructively channelled resulted in
increased drug abuse, imagined problems, and a tendency
by some to blame inything that went wrong on the
"system" or on other people... ... As a result, some
units were plaguEd by increased drug usage and racial
polarization manifested in a rapid deterioration of
small unit discipline. 31/
A second study done by the MACV IG Office, "Lessons Learned: Racially
Oriented Incidents," provides, in its discussicai of racial problems, an
interesting picture of the general deterioration of discipline in some
units. This study is included, in part, in the endnotes.
Works done by the MACV IG Office thus tend to bear out the
picture of an army suffering from mor3le and discipline problems,
especially during the drawdown phase, but noticeably from 1967 onward-.
3. The Deserters and the Discharged
One of the most frequently cited indices of the decline in military
morale and discipline is the desertion rate. 32/
appears to be particularly sinister as it
In fact, desertion
is often considered to be a
statement of antiwar sentiment, a cvnclusion reached by numerous authors
when analyzing the high rates of desertion in Vietnam. 33/
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