Which Way?

The U.S. once again is on the threshold of fundamental and far-reaching decisions about the war in Viet Nam. The decisions have been deferred for the time being by the coming Manila conference, a fresh flurry of peace feelers and, not least, next month's congressional elections. Once Nov. 8 is past, President Johnson will not be able to delay much longer the need to determine how far and by what means--barring any realistic prospect of a negotiated peace --the U.S. is prepared to go to achieve a military victory.

A year and a half after the U.S. began bombing the North and pouring troops into the South to avert an imminent Communist victory, the war is undeniably going well for the allies. Yet there is little prospect that it can be won easily or soon. French Foreign Minister Maurice Couve de Murville. who shares Charles de Gaulle's distaste for the U.S. presence in Viet Nam, told Johnson during a 90-minute talk at the White House last week that Hanoi, for its part, no longer believes it can achieve a military victory in the South, but is convinced that it can outwait the U.S.

Thus Washington is caught in a dilemma. Should the U.S. begin to level off in the hope that diplomacy, which so far has been totally ineffectual, can end the war? Or should it risk another round of escalation, increasing the pressure just enough to force Hanoi to seek peace?

Risk & Riposte. Many U.S. military men naturally want to tighten the screws, chiefly by increased bombing. Stung by the criticism that air power has failed to stem North Vietnamese infiltration, they argue that, even though prohibited from hitting the North's most important targets, they have managed to knock out two-thirds of its petroleum supply, to keep 250,000 people constantly at work repairing bomb damage, and to deny Communist units 50% of the supplies that combat soldiers normally need.

General Curtis LeMay, who retired in 1965 as Air Force Chief of Staff, last week described this limitation as "the ultimate in military blindness," added that if the "calculated risk" of heavier bombing were to fail, "then we must be prepared to fight Red China." Dwight Eisenhower said that he "would not automatically preclude anything"--including, by implication, nuclear weapons--"that would bring the war to an honorable and successful conclusion."

To date, Johnson has been at pains to seek Eisenhower's advice at almost every turn in the war, but last week he skipped any tete a tete with Ike and merely said publicly: "The easiest thing we could do is to get into a larger war with other nations. We are constantly concerned with the dangers of that. At the same time, we have no desire to capitulate or retreat."

Former U.S. Ambassador to Moscow Foy Kohler, recently named Deputy Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that increased bombing carried the risk of killing Soviet technicians now being sent to North Viet Nam in ever greater numbers. To blockade Haiphong harbor--another step favored by the military--might, in his view, result in a military riposte from Russia.

Step-Up. Though the President so far has balked at a further step-up in the air war against the North, the South is another matter. To explore the present status of the U.S. military effort there, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara left Washington at week's end for his eighth visit to Saigon since 1961, accompanied by General Earle Wheeler, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and newly appointed Under Secretary of State Nicholas Katzenbach.

The last time McNamara was in Viet Nam, the U.S. had 180,000 men in the country and was just beginning to untangle the logistical lash-ups caused by the unprecedentedly swift buildup. This week he will find a force of 320,000 men who, in the eleven months that have intervened since his seventh visit, have kept the Reds from winning a single major battle, have 'discouraged them from mounting any attack in battalion strength or greater since March, and are finding that the badly hurt guerrillas are ever more willing to surrender. Seldom, if ever, have the Communist troops shown more willingness to drop their arms than in the 1st Air Cav's Operation Irving along the central coast, one of the most successful U.S. operations of the war (see THE WORLD). By next spring, the normal scheduled increase in U.S. strength will bring the number of troops to 400,000.

Faced with this prospect, it would seem that North Viet Nam's wisest move would be to seek a settlement rather than invite continued insupportable losses. Yet, ridiculous as it seems, there are indications that the North Vietnamese regime is convinced that Lyndon Johnson's war policy will be overwhelmingly repudiated by American voters on Nov. 8. Hanoi, misled by the noisy dissent of antiwar groups in the U.S., may well be in for a rude shock.

Two Options. Even so, there is every possibility that North Viet Nam's rulers will remain adamant in their refusal to negotiate. In that situation, the President will have to reconsider his options. Since withdrawal is out, they come down to two: aim for a stalemate or order a quantum intensification of the war effort--possibly in the air, certainly on the ground.

If the latter, commanders in the field insist that at least 750,000 men will be required to permit the allies to seal off the South's sievelike borders and to send perhaps two divisions into the Mekong Delta, the southernmost section of the country. "Something has got to be done in the delta or you aren't going to win this war," said a high-ranking U.S. officer in Saigon. "Half the people in the country live there. We've got to control the delta, but we haven't got the men to send in there now, even if the decision were made."

Unpalatable a decision as it may be, it is one that President Johnson must weigh as he packs his bags this week for his Asian journey.

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