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30. (U) General William Westmoreland, USA,
Report on the War (As of June 1(68): Section II,
Report on Operations in South Vietnam, January
1964-June 1968 (Washington, D.C.: US GPO, 1968),
lL1~
32. (U) GIbson, 156. (U) Amencan projections
on how long the war would last were tied to the U.S.
troop ceilings. In April 1967, General Westmoreland
came to Washington and met with President Johnson
and the Chairman, .JCS, General Earle Wheeler.
Westmoreland outlined his beliefthat at current levels
(470,000) the war would last for five yers. If the ceiling
was raised to 565,000 troops, then the communists
could be beaten in three years. If he could have
665,000 troops, another four and a halfdivisions, then
the war might be ended in two years. These projections
presumed that the North Vietnamese would not
increase their troop strength. They also hinged on the
attrition rates suffered by the PAVN and NLF formations
that Westmoreland was claiming. See United
States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967, 82-84.
33. (U) Ronnie Ford, 55.
35. (U) Ronnie Ford, 57.
36. (U) Karnow, 536.
37. (U) Turley, 99; For descriptions of the August
1945 Viet Minh takeover, see Robert Hanyok,
"Guerrillas in the Mist: COJ'vlINT and the Formation
and Evolution of the Viet Minh, 1941-1945,"
Cryptologic Quarterly, Volume 15, Number 1, Spring
1996,108-110, and Schulzinger, 17-19.
39. (U) Turley, 100. (U) Not that Giap was overly
worried about troop losses. His formulation of the dau
tranli ("struggle") strategy guaranteed high losses; but
Giap was objective-oriented, and such losses were sustainable
only if victory was certain. For a critique of
Giap's Tet strategy see Douglas Pike, PAVN: People's
Army of Vietnam (New York: Da Capo Press, 1986),
226-7.
40.~lA 0487/70, 29; Wirtz, 69.
41. (U) General William C. Westmoreland, USA,
"What Did the North Vietnamese Hope to Gain with
Their 1968 Tet Offensive," Vietnam, February 1992,
62.
42. (U) Captain Ronnie Ford, USA, "Hanoi's
Intent: Khe Sanh and the Tet Offensive," American
Intelligence Journal, Vol 16, Nos. 2/3,
Autumn/Winter 1995,67.
Page 350
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