I apologise for barking into the air my thoughts relating the British Commonwealth success in Malaya to Vietnam, as you clearly know that Malaya had nothing to do with Vietnam.
If he was still alive, you could also seek an apology from General Westmoreland for studying the Malayan experience and incorporating it into his command in Vietnam. I’m sure he would be grateful to you for your superior knowledge. If only you’d been there at the time, you could have stopped him making a massive mistake in Vietnam by trying something that succeeded in Malaya.
Vietnam Tries the Tactics That Halted Malaya Reds
PETER GROSE; Special to The New York Times OCT. 10, 1964
SAIGON, South Vietnam, Oct. 9—Quietly, behind the blare of the political upheavals of recent weeks, the United States and Vietnamese military commands have embarked on an intricate and intensive pacification effort in the provinces surrounding Saigon.
Many months in the planning, the operation is an attempt to apply to South Vietnam the lessons of the 12‐year Malayan struggle against Communist terrorists.
The operation holds priority in the American military effort though few important results can be expected for some time. Its purpose is to defeat the Vietcong insurgents militarily and politically in specified areas rather than in scattershot fashion.
The program is combining theories and tactics long talked about here but never applied in more than a half‐hearted and
Senior officials directing the program are aware that their effort may go the way of the poorly implemented 1962 program of fortifying so‐called strategic hamlets and building militia among the inhabitants, or of the hastily conceived country‐wide participation effort launched last March.
Furthermore, the upheavals in the cities during the last six weeks have given a clear warn*ing that it may be too late for victory through a pacification program
The example of Algeria in 1962 reminds officials that political developments can lose a war even if the ground has been won. International and internal pressures on the French Government to negotiate a settlement with the Moslem nationalists had become so overwhelming that the military situ*ation was ignored.
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The current attempt is de*signed for political as well as military impact. It follows a careful study of the nature of this war, so unlike any previous military action in which the United States has played a major role.
Observers have long noted that the Vietcong consider that their route to victory lies through political penetration and agitation rather than through purely military action.
‘Winning the War’
To deal with this, according to the concept based on the Malayan experience, “winning the war” is more complex than a classically defined military goal. A terrorist political or*ganization must he isolated and crushed by military, police and civilian operations performed in harmony before any meaningful victory is won, it is “said.
The Vietcong concentrations close to Saigon are not new. For many years two of the strongest guerrilla positions have been in the thick jungles of two zones within 50 miles of the capital. It is the Vietcong’s increasing ability to move freely out of these seemingly impenetrable areas to carry out attacks, ambushes and terrorism that helped to inspire the new pacification program.
The Malayan experience has been closely studied by American civilian and military officials. From 1948 to 1960 a spreading Communist revolt was by Britain through the use of new methods of warfare.
Britons with Malayan experience have been working in South Vietnam since 1961, but their advice was seldom heeded by the Americans or the Vietnamese until this spring. Then both countries had a new team directing the war effort. Premier Nguyen Khanh had none of the late President Ngo Dinh Diem’s suspicions of foreign ideas or interference, and Gen. William C. Westmoreland had arrived with a fresh look at the military problems facing him at the start of his command of the United States military assist*ance organization.
More Than Up Service
Instead of having only lip service paid to their lessons, the experts from Malaya found a receptive atmosphere at the top levels.
In June General Westmoreland flew to Kuala Lumpur with a few senior civilian officials for a three‐day briefing on the British methods. The current effort is a direct outgrowth of that visit.
The essence of the system is that success comes with the destruction not of the enemy’s main fighting force or of his “will to win” but rather of his apparatus of communication and command.
Once the system of inter*mediaries through which pass orders, taxes and intelligence is detected and eliminated, the insurgency becomes nothing more than aimless banditry.
This was the ‐ lesson from Algeria and Malaya. General Westmoreland and the then United States Ambassador, Henry Cabot Lodge, became convinced it applied equally to South Vietnam. In Algeria, admittedly, the nationalist army usually operated in smaller units than does the Vietcong. Even greater differences between the Malayan and Viet*namese situations were noted.
First, it was said, the enemy in Malaya was clearly identifiable by appearance—the insur
Second, Malaya has no significant land frontier with another country that could act as a base of supply and personnel for the guerrillas. South Viet*nam has 900 miles of frontier with Cambodia and Laos, both of which are said to provide facilities to the Vietcong, and with Communist North Vietnam where the guerrillas, most of whom are South Vietnamese, undergo training and from which they receive supplies.
Third, ultimate authority and responsibility in Malaya lay with the British. At every level in Vietnam, the Americans are able to offer only advice and support. Furthermore, in almost every measurable factor, such as the size of the forces on both sides, the emergency in Malaya was about half the scale of that in. Vietnam.
12‐Year‐Long Effort
Finally, it took 12 years for the system to achieve success in Malaya. For six or eight of those years the British and the Malays were living from month to month and wondering if they could continue to hold on.
The United states has been in Vietnam on an extensive scale for only three years, and during that time many energies have been dissipated in political matters remote from the war effort.
Clearly the situation is different from that in Malaya, and few purely political parallels can be drawn. However, the military differences were not judged to be so great as to preclude application of the Malayan tactics here.
The essence of the Malayan system that is absent in South Vietnam is a tight organization of all civilian and military resources under one direction, called in Malaya the War Executive Committees.
On his return from Kuala Lumpur, General Westmoreland undertook to establish similar committes for the United States effort, bringing together military advisers and represen*tatives of civilian agencies for each of the 45 provinces.
The operation was first given the code name Pica, though now Americans generally refer to it by the Vietnamese code word Hoptac, meaning “cooperation.”
The plan envisages a series of concentric circles around the capital in which, step by step, the Vietcong presence is to be eliminated.
Military units operate just outside a particular perimeter to engage and disrupt Vietcong military concentrations. Inside the perimeter it is the task of the police and administrative officers to register and scrutinize the population, detect and arrest Communist agents, and substitute a new administrative apparatus to maintain two‐way contact between the Government and the population—some*thing lacking in South Vietnam for a number of years.
Neither the United States mission nor the Government of Premier Khanh has given any publics explanation of the oper*
It will take many months before meaningful results will appear, and a senior American officer acknowledged a few days ago that the undertaking, which began early last month, had got off to a “very, very slow start.”
Clearing operations are being conducted just outside the first concentric circle, with a radius of about 12 miles from the center of the city. Most nights artillery fire can be heard in downtown Saigon.
Gia Dinh Province surround*ing the capital is the limit of the first circle. Outside this area, troops of Hoptac’s first phase are operating in Hau Nghia Binh Duong and Long An Provinces.
Hoptac is the most complex pacification operation undertaken in South Vietnam. It will require time. With the maneuver barely begun, it is an open question whether the onrush of political developments will al*low the time needed.
