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4 - Taking Charge of Vietnam Policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2019

Aurélie Basha i Novosejt
Affiliation:
University of Kent, Canterbury
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Summary

Roger Hilsman and Robert Thompson prepared plans for Vietnam that counterbalanced the increasing pressure to deploy troops. Thompson had a great influence on McNamara. He informed the Secretary’s frustrations with the US mission’s inability to coordinate existing programs and with the Chiefs’ focus on conventional tools. By July, McNamara instructed the Chiefs to prepare a phaseout plan for US advisors in Vietnam, which was called the Comprehensive Plan for South Vietnam (CPSVN). It was designed to train the South Vietnamese to fight the communist insurgency themselves. Growing unrest in South Vietnam did not dampen these plans; instead, they accelerated. A phaseout brought order to existing programs and promised to secure their long-term funding.

Type
Chapter
Information
‘I Made Mistakes’
Robert McNamara's Vietnam War Policy, 1960–1968
, pp. 74 - 92
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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