Making the Decisions

It was a drowsy Friday morning in Honolulu when the news clattered in over wire-service tickers. Within 32 hours, President Johnson and a small army of "peace warriors" would descend on the island for a whirlwind summit conference with the leaders of South Viet Nam. Hordes of communications, security and transportation experts were already on the way, to be followed by nearly half the U.S. Cabinet, 125 other American and Vietnamese officials, two dozen Secret Service men, 354 newsmen. For Hawaiians, it was to prove the most harrowing ordeal since Maunaloa last blew its top.

To make way for the enormous entourage at the staid, pink stucco Royal Hawaiian Hotel, 40 disgruntled guests were hustled off to other rooms, while 140 other patrons arriving over the weekend were lodged elsewhere. Workmen swarmed over the pentagonal three-room King Kalakaua Suite-overlooking Waikiki Beach to ready it for the President. A seven-ton air conditioner, a monarchic double bed, and several cases of Tab and low-calorie Dr. Pepper were sent up. An ancient freight elevator was refurbished for the President's use with red carpeting and plywood paneling from the Philippines. Signal Corpsmen from Pacific Command Headquarters at nearby Camp Smith worked through the night stringing communications wires at the hotel.

Bare Branch. It was the President's first trip outside the North American continent since entering the White House, and it was organized with the characteristic Johnsonian gusto for the unexpected. A compelling though unacknowledged reason for the sudden decision was the opportunity it gave the President to steal the spotlight from the Fulbright committee's televised hearings on the war. But there were other motives of greater consequence. The President wanted to galvanize the lagging pacification program in Viet Nam-and thereby show such critics as New York's Democratic Senator Robert Kennedy that he was not ignoring the political and social aspects of the war. He was anxious to follow up the abortive peace offensive with an equally grand and, he hoped, more successful gesture. Johnson also was eager to meet and take the measure of South Viet Nam's leaders.

When he left Washington, the President practically picked the executive branch bare. Aboard Air Force One with him on the 11-hr., 4,946-mi. hop to Honolulu were Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Earle Wheeler. A surprise passenger was 17-year-old Kathy Westmoreland, the general's oldest daughter and a student at Washington's National Cathedral School. En route separately were Agriculture Secretary Orville Freeman, Health, Education and Welfare Secretary John Gardner, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Maxwell Taylor.

Pig Pictures. Arriving a day ahead of the hurriedly assembled Vietnamese delegation, Johnson grumbled a bit about the weather being unfit for swimming-though McNamara braved the surf anyway. Instead, the President held a protracted council of war with General Westmoreland, whom he had met only once before and was anxious to size up further. Johnson's approving verdict: "He's got a military mind and a social worker's heart."

It was the military aspect of the war that Johnson emphasized when Premier Nguyen Cao Ky flew in from Saigon with 47 other Vietnamese and U.S. officials, including U.S. Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge. "They fight on," the President said of the South Vietnamese. "They fight for the essential rights of human existence, and only the callous or the timid can ignore their cause." From then on, however, the keynote was "construction" in Viet Nam--so much so that the President advised Barry Zorthian, U.S. Public Affairs Chief in Saigon: "Barry, every time I see a picture of a battle in the papers, I want to see a picture of a pig."

"One Aces." In formal sessions and shirtsleeve seminars that ranged from Camp Smith, high in the sparkling Hawaiian Hills over Pearl Harbor, to breezy hotel suites in Honolulu, the Americans and their Vietnamese counterparts spoke of crops and classrooms, highways and hospitals. The President let it be known that he expected the talk to be followed by action. After posing for pictures with Ky and Chief of State General Nguyen Van Thieu at Camp Smith, he steered them into the office of Pacific Commander Admiral U. S. Grant Sharp Jr. for a ten-minute talk. There he told them that while he could not personally return with them to Viet Nam, he wanted the best man he knew of to help promote rural welfare programs. That man, he said, was Vice President Hubert Humphrey. The Vietnamese were delighted.

The President told Ky he would like to meet him in Honolulu in three to six months to see if "we have only talked or something has been accomplished." That reminded him of a story about two poker players. As the President told it, the first player asked, "What do you have?" "Aces," said the second. "How many aces?" asked the first. "One aces," replied the second. "I hope," said the President, "we don't find out we only had one aces." In fact, the President was surprised and deeply impressed by the determination and political awareness of the Vietnamese.

Nuts & Bolts. The sessions ended with the ringing Declaration of Honolulu, in which Viet Nam's leaders, referring to themselves as a government "of revolutionary transformation," pledged to submit a draft constitution to the people for ratification in the near future and to hold free elections.

The President then took off for his Los Angeles meeting with Hubert Humphrey. When Johnson landed, Humphrey was ushered aboard the plane for an hour-long briefing. Afterward, faithful "Mother"--Johnson's electronic podium with built-in prompter screens-- was trundled into a nearby hangar so that the President could read a statement to newsmen. "The road ahead may be long and difficult," he said, "but we shall fight the battle against aggression in Viet Nam; we shall fight the battle for social construction; and throughout the world, we shall fight the battle for peace. And we shall prevail."

Humphrey headed west, joined Ky, Thieu and such top U.S. officials as White House Aide McGeorge Bundy and Ambassador-at-Large W. Averell Harriman in Honolulu for the flight to Saigon.

Lyndon Johnson returned to Andrews Air Force Base 89 hrs. and 1 min. after he left for Honolulu. During that period, he had laid down no new programs, chartered no fresh departures in the Viet Nam struggle. Nevertheless, as Johnson said proudly: "For a President of the United States, no matter what his name, to sit down and discuss the nuts and bolts of reform, just like a social worker in Chicago, is unprecedented."

* Named for Hawaii's last king, who ruled from 1874 to 1891. A burly fellow known as "the Merry Monarch," he is described in one history as "a lively paradox, at once kingly and democratic."

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