policy - The Black Vault

THE BDM CORPORATION
Daily Tribute charged that communist aggression in Korea was an
inevitable consequence of a decade of wooly headed and even treasonous
appeasement of the Soviets by the Democrats.
16. Mueller, pp. 43-50. During the Korean War the polling was done by
Gallup's American Institute of Public Opinion (AIPO) and The National
Opinion Research Center (NORC). Question A was structured by AIPO
whereas NORC designed questions B and C.
17. Ihid., p. 52.
18. Larry Elowitz and John W. Spanier, "Korea and Vietnam: Limited War
and The American Political System", Orbis, Vol. 18, Summer 74, p. 516.
19. These factors were derived from the BOM authors' analysis of the key
factors illuminated by various polls and interviews with combat
officers who served in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Several of
the BDM study team and consulting team fall into the latter category. 1-
20. Mueller, p. 56.
21. Specific reasons are often given for both gradual and precipitate
loss of support for a war or a war-time president. The ptblic
opinion polls that reflect degree3 of support, or lack thereof, are
subject to error and bias. Further, many eminent historians and
social scientists posit that the military forces are accorded a
period of suppoft at the outset of hustilities. Thereafter, unless
positive results are achieved quickly, that support begins to erode
with a momentum of its own, affected by international, domestic, and
battlefield events. With respect to the reported decline in support
in late 1965, General Goodpaster suggests that the Christmas bombing
halt in 1965, coupled with over-optimistic claims that US troops
might begin t6 withdraw from Vietnam by Christmas, proved damaging
"to public understanding and support". The U.S. Army Military History
Research Collection, Senior Officers Debriefing Program, Report
of an interview with General Andrew J. Goodpaster on 9 April 1976,
by Col. William D. Johnson and LTC James C. Ferguson, Section 4,
pp. 47-48.
22. Wheeler, p. 144.
23. Harris, p. 57 provides a striking example of how presidents use the
polls:
t
Walter Jenkins, Johnson's closest aide during this period,
called right after the post-Gulf of Tonkin poll had been
published. He reported the president to be enormously pleased
with the massive puolic backing given his action and especially
with the passage of the congressional resolution.
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