The Alternatives

SOUTHEAST ASIA

In Hawaii this week, on the President's orders, Dean Rusk, Robert McNamara and Maxwell Taylor will sit down once again with top U.S. diplomats and soldiers to discuss the deteriorating situation in Southeast Asia. Lyndon Johnson obviously wants to avoid any drastic action until after the elections, but events may not permit such delay. In the growing debate about what to do, what are the alternatives?

Neutralization

Some prominent U.S. voices are convinced that the military commitment in Viet Nam should never have been taken over by the U.S. from the defeated French and must now be liquidated as soon as possible, at almost any cost. Columnist Walter Lippmann, for one, thinks that an honorable and perhaps successful way out lies in Charles de Gaulle's proposal for neutralization. Though never spelled out by De Gaulle, this would mean a negotiated peace under auspices of the U.N. or of a renewed Geneva conference, to strengthen by international guarantees the vows made--and since broken--in the original 1954 Indo-China settlement. This possibility is backed by Senators Mike Mansfield, George McGovern and others, who see defeat and humiliation for the U.S. as the only fruits of continued fighting in South Viet Nam.

Proponents of neutralization do not deny that, at the very least, it would increase Chinese "influence" in the area; as the University of Chicago's Hans Morgenthau argues, this influence has always existed and cannot be prevented short of a head-on war with China, and perhaps not even then. But some believe that a neutralized South Viet Nam would encourage North Vietnamese Premier Ho Chi Minh to become a kind of Tito in the shadow of Red China. In one view, expressed by Asian Expert Bernard Fall, Ho Chi Minh is afraid of U.S. air strikes, which could destroy his struggling economy, and if suitably threatened he would accept a neutral, more or less independent South Viet Nam.

Most neutralization advocates, however, agree that at present the Communists are doing so well in South Viet Nam that the U.S. couldn't get neutralization even if it wanted it. It would first have to improve the military situation. This means, in effect, urging the South Vietnamese, not to mention the American "advisers," to fight and die with only an uncertain neutrality as the declared prize--a dubious war aim, to say the least. On balance, the State Department and Pentagon are convinced that any agreement to neutralize Southeast Asia, even if one would be concluded, could not be enforced. It would be, in Dean Rusk's words, "a formula for surrender"--merely a cover for Red infiltration and eventual Communization of all Viet Nam, which has been the clear Communist purpose ever since Laos was "neutralized" in 1962.

Withdrawal

Then why not get it over with fast and pull out at once? This is the argument of Senator Wayne Morse, who believes that current U.S. participation in the Viet Nam war is not only unconstitutional but "threatens to engulf the resources and manpower of the American people on the continent of Asia for an undefined time and purpose." Some argue wistfully that the U.S. might as well extricate itself from the messy, soft center of Southeast Asia --Viet Nam, Laos, Cambodia--and make a firm stand along a "hard perimeter" based on Malaysia, the Philippines and Okinawa. There, with massive air support and the Seventh Fleet, the U.S. would at least know where it stands and what it is defending.

Or would it? Under such conditions, staunchly pro-Western Thailand would succumb sooner or later, and Burma, acutely aware of its 1,370-mile frontier with China, would swing away from its current neutralism toward Peking. The pressure on India would be great. For that matter, argue some U.S. strategists, the security of Malaysia and the Philippines has largely been due to the existence of non-Communist buffers in Indo-China. A series of takeovers by the Reds on the Southeast Asian mainland would revive the Communist threat in the island nations, and a U.S. defeat might well persuade Indonesia's Sukarno that he could press his own expansionist plans with impunity. In effect, U.S. defenses would be pushed to Okinawa.

Above all, a U.S. pull-out would convince all of Asia, including Japan, that Americans cannot be relied on as allies against Communism. Chances are that the U.S. would only have to fight later.

Attack the North

If these are indeed the consequences of withdrawal, shouldn't the U.S. move to the offensive right now? Many think so, and one proposal is an attack on North Viet Nam, which guides and supplies the Viet Cong and other Communist forces in Southeast Asia.

Such an attack could take several forms. One would be a drastic insurgent campaign conducted by South Vietnamese commandos in enemy territory. Premier Nguyen Khanh supports the idea only if he receives guarantees of total U.S. backing should moves against the North draw massive Chinese retaliation. Besides, South Vietnamese Special Forces teams have been trying to penetrate North Viet Nam for at least two years, have met with almost total disaster so far.

Another possibility, strongly favored by some U.S. officials, is to bomb Ho Chi Minh's industrial and military bases and supply routes. This could hurt. But everyone at the Pentagon recalls Korea's Operation Strangle, an Air Force effort to prevent Chinese and North Korean supplies from reaching the front in 1951. After each day's bombing, no matter how many bridges and railroad facilities were blown up, the Korean peasants succeeded in patching things up at night. Ho Chi Minh's men doubtless could do the same. Besides, there is a growing belief that, while ideological direction from the North is important, northern supplies are not essential to the Viet Cong terrorists in South Viet Nam, who are armed largely with captured weapons. Many believe that even if North Viet Nam were to withhold all aid, the Viet Cong could fight on for at least two to three years.

If the U.S. did strike at North Viet Nam, would the Chinese strike back by sending their own infantry hordes south? Chances are that Peking would, though no one can say on what scale. Some American strategists would actually welcome such Chinese intervention as a chance for the U.S. to blast Red Chinese atomic developments and other installations.

Yet, for all the tensions of the Sino-Soviet split, who is to say for certain that Russia would not feel compelled to step in on the side of a fellow Communist nation? In fact, could Russia afford not to do so?

Win in the South

One of the seemingly simplest proposals is to ignore North Viet Nam for the moment, drop the U.S. "adviser" role in South Viet Nam and add 30,000 to 40,000 U.S. troops to the fray. Some feel that this added strength in fighting men, plus the addition of perhaps a few hundred thousand newly recruited Vietnamese soldiers to General Khanh's existing 450,000-man force, would be enough to back the Viet Cong into a corner. It would make the ratio closer to the 10-to-l troop strength the British used to defeat the Reds in Malaya; at present, the U.S. and Khanh are trying to do the job with a troop ratio of only 4 1/2 to 1, inadequate where the enemy has the advantage of guerrilla status.

Such direct intervention would at least demonstrate beyond all doubt that the U.S. means business in South Viet Nam. It would also enable the U.S. to drop the cumbersome and frustrating task of trying to run the war by advising and persuading Vietnamese officers, and instead to assume direct command of operations. In fact, most U.S. military men badly want to do this right now but realize it would be difficult without more U.S. troops on hand.

U.S. forces in the South might well draw Red Chinese "volunteers" into the battle, although Russia probably would not find it necessary to join the fighting on this account. There are other, greater risks. For one thing, relatively modest estimates of U.S. troop requirements are questionable; some believe the U.S. might have to send in 100,000 to 200,000 men to make a dent. Moreover, how would American troops take to a guerrilla war, compared to which even Korea was an old-fashioned textbook conflict? In the swamps of the Mekong Delta, would they be any better at telling friend from foe than the South Vietnamese troops themselves? And how much could an alien Western force do to win popular support?

There is, of course, always the possibility of choosing the status quo--with a few new trimmings. One suggestion in the trimmings category does not directly concern Viet Nam but Laos: bomb the Pathet Lao forces, encourage Thailand's army to occupy part of Laos, and move U.S. marines into Thailand more or less permanently. But even if these moves were to be decided on, it is far from clear whether they would make any real difference--or whether they would simply demonstrate the need for real intervention.

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