Ellsberg, McNamara and JFK: The Pentagon Papers

[James DiEugenio]

Its funny, this is the only notice about Ellsberg's death which actually deals with the specifics of how he got into the crosshairs of Kissinger and Nixon.

It is such an interesting story, I mean really.

In this article, I put forth my theory as to why McNamara did what he did.  

IMO, the real bad guys in this story were Nixon and Kissinger. The PP coverage of the war only went to late 1968.  So it did not really concern them.

And I add in what Gravel did and Peter Scott.  What a great story.  It would take a four night mini-series to do it justice.

https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/ellsberg-mcnamara-and-jfk-the-pentagon-papers

Edited June 22, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[Joe Bauer]

6 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Its funny, this is the only notice about Ellsberg's death which actually deals with the specifics of how he got into the crosshairs of Kissinger and Nixon.

It is such an interesting story, I mean really.

In this article, I put forth my theory as to why McNamara did what he did.  

IMO, the real bad guys in this story were Nixon and Kissinger. The PP coverage of the war only went to late 1968.  So it did not really concern them.

And I add in what Gravel did and Peter Scott.  What a great story.  It would take a four night mini-series to do it justice.

https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/ellsberg-mcnamara-and-jfk-the-pentagon-papers

Great essay.

55,000 American deaths.

2 "million" Vietnamese deaths. 

A 40 to 1 ratio.  40 to 1 !

Millions more wounded. 

Chomsky and Zinn didn't want the public to see the full Gravel edition because it showed that "a president can make a difference ?"

???

LBJ's "not going to lose Vietnam on my watch" ego a main driving force for escalating the war and the bombing?

No wonder McNamara became a weeping conflicted moral battle basket case.

Loyalty to LBJ's ego or stopping the increasingly hard to justify carnage.

 

 

[Michael Griffith]

2 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

Great essay.

55,000 American deaths.

2 "million" Vietnamese deaths. 

A 40 to 1 ratio.  40 to 1 !

Millions more wounded. 

Chomsky and Zinn didn't want the public to see the full Gravel edition because it showed that "a president can make a difference ?"

???

LBJ's "not going to lose Vietnam on my watch" ego a main driving force for escalating the war and the bombing?

No wonder McNamara became a weeping conflicted moral battle basket case.

Loyalty to LBJ's ego or stopping the increasingly hard to justify carnage.

The consequences of the liberal betrayal of South Vietnam:

60,000 South Vietnamese executed by the Communists following the fall of Saigon after the so-called "anti-war movement" and most news outlets succeeded in pressuring Congress to break our promise to maintain adequate aid to South Vietnam.

At least 700,000 South Vietnamese sent to Communist concentration camps, where the death rate was at least 5%.

An exodus of at least 800,000 "boat people" following the Communist takeover of South Vietnam.

The remaining 17 million South Vietnamese forced to suffer under Communist tyranny, which included massive looting by Communist forces, the revocation of private property rights, the abolition of private education, the Communist takeover of all public schools and their curriculum, and the denial of the basic rights of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of the press. 

And while all of these terrible things were happening, liberal "anti-war" protestors actually celebrated North Vietnam's victory and had nothing to say about the terrible human suffering imposed by the Hanoi regime.

[Anthony Venturella]

Incredible article, JD, thanks very much.  Mr. Ellseberg is a Profile in Courage.

And exactly, Joe - "I'm not gonna be the first American President to lose a war -- and see Vietnam go the way of China!" - LBJ

[James DiEugenio]

Thanks Anthony and Joe.

It is really  fascinating story I think, in its human and character dimensions as well as the epic tragedy.

The casualty rates are even worse.   The latest I have seen, and I think the most accurate are 3.8 million in VIetnam, and 2 million in Cambodia.  And I think you have to add in Cambodia for the reasons given in William Shawcross' fine book Sideshow.

The trial of Ellsberg and Russo was an interesting affair.  Russo and Ellsberg did not want the judge to dismiss the charges since they thought they were going to be acquitted. Which it turns out, when they polled the jury, they were. And recall, they actually did throw Russo in jail for several weeks, in order to get him to testify against Ellsberg.  But he would not.

I should also add in, the ida of prosecution was not really Nixon's idea.  It was Kissinger's.  He really knew how to push Nixon's buttons.  And he did in this case. Saying Ellsberg was making him look like a weakling. Even though, the PP did not even cover the Nixon administration.  Therefore how could they be helping the enemy?

[Joe Bauer]

57 minutes ago, Michael Griffith said:

The consequences of the liberal betrayal of South Vietnam:

60,000 South Vietnamese executed by the Communists following the fall of Saigon after the so-called "anti-war movement" and most news outlets succeeded in pressuring Congress to break our promise to maintain adequate aid to South Vietnam.

At least 700,000 South Vietnamese sent to Communist concentration camps, where the death rate was at least 5%.

An exodus of at least 800,000 "boat people" following the Communist takeover of South Vietnam.

The remaining 17 million South Vietnamese forced to suffer under Communist tyranny, which included massive looting by Communist forces, the revocation of private property rights, the abolition of private education, the Communist takeover of all public schools and their curriculum, and the denial of the basic rights of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of the press. 

And while all of these terrible things were happening, liberal "anti-war" protestors actually celebrated North Vietnam's victory and had nothing to say about the terrible human suffering imposed by the Hanoi regime.

I acknowledge everything you state regards the mass brutality, death, torture and suffering inflicted by the North Vietnamese and VC against their own people MC.

It was monstruous.

I never defended the Chinese/NV communists in that war.

But if we had never gone in there and escalated like LBJ did, perhaps the South Vietnamese would not have suffered near as much as they did when their regime fell to the North?

I think JFK sensed the futility of trying to stop the inevitable. 

And so, South Vietnam fell. With devastating death and suffering.

And yet 30 years later to now they are part of an American friendly economic partnership.

The cost of that war was also devastating to our own country.

 

 

 

Edited June 22, 2023 by Joe Bauer

[James DiEugenio]

The costs to the USA were pretty awful.

No conflict since the War Between the States did more to disintegrate the social and political fabric of America than what Vietnam did.

I mentioned above what it did to McNamara's own family.

But politically it gave new life to the GOP.  After the 1964 elections the Republican party was about to slide into oblivion. The Democrats had veto proof majorities in both the Senate and the House. They had an astonishing 295-140 supermajority in the House. The GOP was essentially irrelevant, a sideshow.

Johnson's escalation of the war in 1965-66 was the major factor  in creating the circumstances for a Republican comeback in 1966, where they got back something like 47 seats in the House. And it was this continuing escalation--resulting in Tet-- that eventually forced LBJ to abdicate. He had more or less lost New Hampshire and was about to actually get blasted in Wisconsin when he decided to drop out.

I would also add that this escalation is the major reason behind the disastrous Chicago convention and the splitting asunder of the Democratic Party in 1968 thus providing the road to victory for Nixon.  The Democratic party has not been the same since.  

And that is just in the USA.  I mean the price for Vietnam was simply mind boggling, the stats are above.

 

Edited June 22, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Getting back to Ellsberg.

The interesting thing about him, as I tried to show above, is that he was a Democratic Cold Warrior at the beginning.

He actually joined the Marines before he graduated from Harvard.

Two things started to turn him around on this.

He decided to go to Vietnam as an observer for the State Department through Rand.  He was utterly appalled at what he saw.  And BTW, it was the hawkish Jean Paul Vann who was his first tour guide and showed him just how bad the war was going.  The Viet Cong owned the night because the ARVN was so utterly useless.  And the civilian casualties through bombing were simply beyond the pale.  After a battle over a village, he saw a little  girl go back into what was left of her house.  She came back with a little doll--that was all she could find.

The other thing that changed his attitude was when his girlfriend brought him to an anti war seminar.  A guy stood up and said he would not pay his taxes to fight the war, and if he had to go to jail, he would do so.

So those two things changed his mindset in advance of reading the Pentagon Papers.  Once he saw all the BS that was exposed in those documents--the rigged elections, the reason we were staying in, the Tonkin Gulf deception--that is why he did what he did.

 

Edited June 22, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[Ron Bulman]

6 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

I would also add that this escalation is the major reason behind the disastrous Chicago convention and the splitting asunder of the Democratic Party in 1968 thus providing the road to victory for Nixon.  The Democratic party has not been the same since.  

Hi Jim.  Just wanted to offer this.  I think the Democratic party was well split many months before the convention between those opposed to war and those committed to stay the course, back the president and fight Communism. 

This to me is the asunder part, the assassination of RFK.  Your esteemed cohort Lisa Pease's fine work A Lie Too Big To Fail gave me an "oh" moment in all of this.

June 6, 1968.  "Bob Maheu called to ask about the Don Nixon meeting and suggested 8:30 for breakfast at the Desert Inn Country Club.  I went to the club.  Maheu was all smiles, and Don Nixon walks in all smiles.  What followed next had to be seen to be believed.  They embraced each other and Don Nixon said, well that pricck is dead, and Maheu said, Well it looks like your brother is in now.

This scrambled my brain for a minute.  Maheu, who connected Roselli to the CIA, with Nixon's brother in Vegas the morning RFK died saying this?

RFK's death finished splitting the party asunder, imho.  With LBJ's abdication and RFK's death there was no leadership left.

Edited June 23, 2023 by Ron Bulman

[James DiEugenio]

I would agree with that Ron.

It probably does go back to the murder of RFK. (Great quote from Lisa's excellent book.)

Because of his death, there was no outlet for the anti war protestors.  And without RFK, there was no one to rein in Daley.

BTW, during the convention CBS, I think it was Rather, said literally that the Democratic Party was breaking apart.

When you watch those films, and the pictures, its really disgusting. The culmination of the deaths of JFK, Malcolm, King and RFK.

As Dwight MacDonald said, its really kind of frustrating when your crusade to dump Johnson works, and you get....Nixon.

BTW, Ellsberg tried to talk to him and Kissinger about the war.  He realized it was hopeless.  This is how Kissinger knew it was Ellsberg leaking the PP.

Edited June 23, 2023 by James DiEugenio

[Michael Griffith]

18 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

 

But if we had never gone in there and escalated like LBJ did, perhaps the South Vietnamese would not have suffered near as much as they did when their regime fell to the North?

Yikes, this sounds like what a good ole boy would say about a brutalized rape victim: "If she had not resisted so much, maybe she would not have gotten hurt as badly." If Congress and the "anti-war movement" had not stabbed South Vietnam in the back, the South Vietnamese would have remained independent and there would have been no Hanoi-imposed reign of terror.

And, just to set the record straight, we escalated only in response to Hanoi's escalation after Diem's death. As a direct result of the disastrous removal of Diem, South Vietnam lost control of a number of areas. With Diem gone, Hanoi concluded that the time was right for a large escalation of their war effort. NVA infiltration of troops and weapons rose substantially. The number and scale of attacks began to increase markedly in 1964, and by 1965 things were getting worse. Even then, LBJ hesitated to take firm action, but the foolish North Vietnamese naval attack on a U.S. destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin persuaded him that he had to escalate. 

I think JFK sensed the futility of trying to stop the inevitable. 

This again? The record proves the exact opposite. The whole reason that JFK felt at liberty to start a gradual, conditional withdrawal was that the war was going well. Again, North Vietnamese sources confirm the fact that the war was going well for the U.S. and South Vietnam from early 1962 until shortly after Diem was assassinated.

If you do not believe the U.S. sources that said the war was going well during that period, then trust the NV sources that say the same thing--and say it even more clearly and in more detail. Many of the NV sources were classified, internal assessments that were never intended to be published. They report in anguish and disappointment on (1) the increasing failures and defeats being suffered by Communist forces in South Vietnam during this period, and (2) on the Saigon regime's success in expanding its control over more and more areas during this period. 

The officers and officials who were telling JFK that the war was going well were telling the truth, and JFK initiated his gradual, conditional withdrawal plan precisely because he believed them, and because he rejected the false doom-and-gloom reports coming from the likes of McNaughton, Forrestal, Harriman, and Hilsman.

Edited June 23, 2023 by Michael Griffith

[Karl Kinaski]

 Kennedy was about to enter into negotiations with North Vietnam, when he was killed. 

Quote from the book "Apokalypse Vietnam" by Wolfgang Schneider. (Published by Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag 2001)
 

Quote

 

Interview, Pierre Salinger:

"In November 1963, Kennedy sent me to Tokyo to prepare for a visit there in six weeks. He gave me the words to take with me (November 21, 1963 afternoon). "I will enter into a dialogue with the North and make it clear that there will be no war." On November 22, 1963 my plane took off (from Hawaii) three hours later I received word that he had been murdered."

 

 

Edited June 23, 2023 by Karl Kinaski

[Michael Griffith]

1 hour ago, Karl Kinaski said:

 Kennedy was about to enter into negotiations with North Vietnam, when he was killed. 

Quote from the book "Apokalypse Vietnam" by Wolfgang Schneider. (Published by Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag 2001)

Humm, well, 38 years later he makes this claim. However, just as JFK used back channels to communicate with other Communist leaders, I do not rule out the possibility that he was willing to explore a back-channel dialogue with Hanoi. But, this does not remotely suggest that he was preparing to abandon South Vietnam after the election, just as his back-channel approach to Castro suggested that JFK would make no effort to stop Castro from spreading communism in Latin America. Nixon opened a back channel with Hanoi yet did not flinch from ordering massive bombing raids on North Vietnam at the same time.

There is no trace of any weakening of JFK's will on the White House tapes. Zero. Marc Selverstone proves this in his new book The Kennedy Withdrawal.

[Karl Kinaski]

@Michael Griffith

 

 

IMO JFK wasn't about to abandon the south. His words to Salinger suggest he had in mind to bring Hanoi and Saigon to the negotiation table to work out a "Laotian solution". The Diem brothers had already established a channel to Hanoi. All looked well. But within three weeks the Diems and Kennedy were dead. BTW killing the Diems wouldn't have made much sense without killing Kennedy. Whoever killed the Diems knew without killing Kennedy there would be no Vietnam war. 

 

The Interview with Salinger was recorded in 1999 for a series of the German TV channel MDR  (Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk) if I remember correctly. 

 

 

 

Edited June 23, 2023 by Karl Kinaski

[Karl Kinaski]

Back to Ellsberg: Can anyone explain to me why Ellsberg is a hero, Snowden a traitor and Assange just another inmate? --For the US MSM I should add. 

 

Edited June 23, 2023 by Karl Kinaski