policy - The Black Vault

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the need for US involvement; they criticized tactics, Diem, secrecy, weaknesses
and other operational aspects. The early 1966 Fulbright hearings
gave respectability to criticism of the US policy in Vietnam. The New York
Times pressed hard for "negotiations." If the major media did not become
"dovish", they gradually became more critical and more willing to print the
critics' views.
by early 1971
rhe uproar over Cambodia should not oh;cure the fact that
tiie antiwar movement had largely died as draft calls ebbed
and US troop cuts took effect. The oppf:sition was in Congress, and it did
not become decisive until after US
troops had withdrawn in 1973 and after
Watergate.
Politicians look at the short-term--getting past the next election or
the next sticky period with Congress.
The media are impatient by nature
and easily bored with unspecta.;ular gains or long lead times for policy to
bear fiuit. It may put the burden on the military leadership to direct the
attention of the political leadership toward the long-term military consequences
of action or inaction, and thus to press for a the choice of a
decisive strategy which in turn is necessary for political coherence, media
understanding,
and public support--an extremely difficult task for the
military in the Amarican political context.
Presidential behavior and the plausibility of presidential policy are
the key to understanding media treatment--with its Washington orientation--
of the Vietnam war as a whole. Because the "hawk" side of the debate had
no 'respectable" or vocal champions (as does the hawk side of the SALT
debate) in Congress, the JCS position on what was needed to "win" rarely
got aired; the debate in 1965-68 was depicted as a fight between the administration
and its dovish critics (at least until George Wallace came along
in late 1968). Hence, a second point must be noted; each major policy
alternative must have a respectable spokesman in Washington for it to be
reflected in the media and this spokeman must have an articulate, wellinformed
group in Congress, particularly if the issue is an alternative to
administration policy. No such group existed to reflect the JCS view on
Vietnam in 1965-68.
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