year ago; but don’t get your hopes up any time soon. His briefing had so few bright spots that another of Westmoreland’s generals—William DePuy, the J-3, chief of operations—interrupted to say that surely McChristian was overlooking many signs of near-term progress. The high-level audience listened raptly as the two staffers had it out. Although their dispute might have seemed the usual one between operations (traditionally upbeat), and intelligence (often glum), Westmoreland was far from disagreeing with McChristian. 6 When Johnson asked him in private howlong he thought the war might last, Westmoreland answered: “Several years.” 7
Nonetheless the conference had a solid result. Until then, Westmoreland had fought the war in Vietnam without formal orders on strategy. He got them at Camp Smith. Drafted by a deputy to McNamara, dated 8 February 1966, stamped “Top Secret,” and approved by President Johnson, the orders concluded: “Attrite, by year’s end, [the communist] forces at a rate as high as their ability to put men in the field.” 8
Westmoreland was to fight a war of attrition, its object to grind down the enemy until he gave up. America had fought, and won, earlier wars of attrition: the Civil War for one, World War I for another. General Westmoreland took the orders back with him to Vietnam. He was to carry them even into retirement at Charleston, South Carolina. There, many years later, when a researcher asked him what his wartime strategy had been, Westmoreland referred him to the February 1966 “instructions,” the ones he received at Camp Smith.
My next session with Co Yung was just like the first one. She dictated from one side of the wooden table, I wrote notes from the other, while the overhead fan continued its slow revolutions. As the hours passed, our pace quickened. Safaris of box-bearing Chieu Hois came and went. I gave each box its own number: no. 16 for Private Liem’s, 261st Infantry Battalion, twelve months with the VC; no. 21 for Assistant Squad Leader Ut’s, village guerrilla, thirty-three months with the VC; no. 60 for Recruit Mam’s, six days with the VC (he’d previously deserted Saigon’s army, having cut off a finger). 9 With Co Yung’s English improving rapidly, we kept at it until Doctor Lowe got better from dengue fever. After that I caught her at odd moments, using most of my spare time to rewrite notes and travel around the province.
My first trip was with Travis King. He was doing his “daily rounds,” he said, in this case trying to persuade the Vietnamese to put up a school house at Thu Thua District’s seat, about five miles to the north by crow, perhaps twice that by USAID pickup. We careened over the narrow, winding dirt track to Thu Thua at about sixty miles an hour. (“Doesn’tgive the VC time to set up an ambush,” he said.) When we got there, he went off to talk to the district senior advisor, while I asked another advisor, a potbellied black sergeant called McCrae, what he thought about VC morale.
“Don’t know about your end of the province,” he said, “but up at my end they’re feeling pretty good.” McCrae said that local guerrillas had the run of the hamlets thereabouts, that they collected taxes even in Thu Thua itself (“about fifty feet from where we’re standing”), and that they had little trouble keeping their province units up to strength. “Like last month we heard that the VC Long An Province Battalion, that’s the 506th, had five hundred men in it. Hell, that’s damn near T, O and E.” (T, O and E stands for “table of organization and equipment,” military jargon for full complement.) When King was done talking about the school, we drove back to Tan An just in time for Doctor Lowe’s daily swing through the province hospital. The doctor invited me to come along. I thanked him and went.
The hospital was a two-story stuccoed building with high ceilings, stinking pissoirs, huge cauldrons of steaming rice, and many
Nonetheless the conference had a solid result. Until then, Westmoreland had fought the war in Vietnam without formal orders on strategy. He got them at Camp Smith. Drafted by a deputy to McNamara, dated 8 February 1966, stamped “Top Secret,” and approved by President Johnson, the orders concluded: “Attrite, by year’s end, [the communist] forces at a rate as high as their ability to put men in the field.” 8
Westmoreland was to fight a war of attrition, its object to grind down the enemy until he gave up. America had fought, and won, earlier wars of attrition: the Civil War for one, World War I for another. General Westmoreland took the orders back with him to Vietnam. He was to carry them even into retirement at Charleston, South Carolina. There, many years later, when a researcher asked him what his wartime strategy had been, Westmoreland referred him to the February 1966 “instructions,” the ones he received at Camp Smith.
My next session with Co Yung was just like the first one. She dictated from one side of the wooden table, I wrote notes from the other, while the overhead fan continued its slow revolutions. As the hours passed, our pace quickened. Safaris of box-bearing Chieu Hois came and went. I gave each box its own number: no. 16 for Private Liem’s, 261st Infantry Battalion, twelve months with the VC; no. 21 for Assistant Squad Leader Ut’s, village guerrilla, thirty-three months with the VC; no. 60 for Recruit Mam’s, six days with the VC (he’d previously deserted Saigon’s army, having cut off a finger). 9 With Co Yung’s English improving rapidly, we kept at it until Doctor Lowe got better from dengue fever. After that I caught her at odd moments, using most of my spare time to rewrite notes and travel around the province.
My first trip was with Travis King. He was doing his “daily rounds,” he said, in this case trying to persuade the Vietnamese to put up a school house at Thu Thua District’s seat, about five miles to the north by crow, perhaps twice that by USAID pickup. We careened over the narrow, winding dirt track to Thu Thua at about sixty miles an hour. (“Doesn’tgive the VC time to set up an ambush,” he said.) When we got there, he went off to talk to the district senior advisor, while I asked another advisor, a potbellied black sergeant called McCrae, what he thought about VC morale.
“Don’t know about your end of the province,” he said, “but up at my end they’re feeling pretty good.” McCrae said that local guerrillas had the run of the hamlets thereabouts, that they collected taxes even in Thu Thua itself (“about fifty feet from where we’re standing”), and that they had little trouble keeping their province units up to strength. “Like last month we heard that the VC Long An Province Battalion, that’s the 506th, had five hundred men in it. Hell, that’s damn near T, O and E.” (T, O and E stands for “table of organization and equipment,” military jargon for full complement.) When King was done talking about the school, we drove back to Tan An just in time for Doctor Lowe’s daily swing through the province hospital. The doctor invited me to come along. I thanked him and went.
The hospital was a two-story stuccoed building with high ceilings, stinking pissoirs, huge cauldrons of steaming rice, and many
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