Inactive Intel

Vietnam

Memorandum From the Director of the United States Information Agency (Rowan) to the President

Information-Psychological Warfare Program in South Viet-Nam

During the recent trip to Saigon with Secretary Rusk, I came to the conclusion that the weakest part of the war operation, both on our part and that of the Government of South Viet-Nam, is in the field of information and psychological warfare. According to a report by the Military Advisory Commission as well as information gathered by USIS, this is true on both a nationwide basis and a province-by-province basis...

In view of the importance of public opinion in Viet-Nam, in this country and in the world at large, I believe that top priority should be given to a large scale United States program to improve the GVN ability to win the support of the people and to tell its story abroad.

Two steps are urgently required:

1. We must place informational-psychological advisors into every major area, just as we have placed military and economic development advisors throughout the GVN organization.

2. We must begin a crash program to train promising South VietNamese personnel in radio, motion picture, publishing and other techniques crucial to any program of psychological warfare. This is essential because it is unanimously agreed that the GVN is sorely lacking in personnel with the motivation and training to do the job required.

[Memorandum From the Director of the United States Information Agency (Rowan) to the President, April 21, 1964] Foreign Relations 1964-1968, Volume I, Vietnam, 1964

Black radio operations have now been expanded to a total of 14 hours per day on two frequencies; white radio activities are carried on for two hours daily while gray transmitters broadcast six hours per day in Cantonese and 20 hours in Vietnamese. In addition, airborne transmitters over the Gulf of Tonkin broadcast for 3-1/2 hours daily, usually repeating black radio broadcasts. Each of these broadcasts is carried on two different frequencies.

The success of those broadcasts devoted to the notional Sacred Sword Patriotic League (SSPL) is attested by a report (based on an interrogation) that, early in July, 17 Catholic men and women put to sea from Nghe An Province in the hope that they would be captured by SSPL boats, as they call the PTF's. At the 30 fathom curve they met 2 US warships (destroyers?). The warships gave the Vietnamese food but would not take them aboard. They sailed about until their food gave out in the hope that they would encounter PTF's. Some wanted to commit suicide rather than to return to North Vietnam. However, they were deterred by the women aboard who reminded them that since they were Catholic they would not go to heaven if they committed suicide. On their return to Nghe An the leaders of the group were arrested and have not been heard of since.

Among other psychological activities, more than 100 letters are mailed in third countries to North Vietnam every month. Some one and a half million leaflets are distributed over North Vietnam, along with some three to five hundred news letters. Over a thousand fixed frequency radios and several hundred rice bowls, the latter bearing the symbol of the SSPL, are given to fishermen on junks stopped and searched by the PTF's.

[Memorandum From the Deputy Director for Coordination, Bureau of Intelligence and Research (Trueheart) to the Deputy Director (Denney) and Director, Bureau of Intelligence and Research (Hughes), August 21, 1968] Foreign Relations, 1964-1968, Volume VI, Vietnam, January-August 1968.

1. CIA conducts unilaterally or in cooperation with other agencies in Vietnam a wide gamut of defector inducement programs which range from the pin-pointed approach to high-level VC cadre to broad propaganda appeals to enemy troops of all categories.

Inducement of Desertions
2. CIA and MACV jointly conduct a sizable program designed to induce desertion by VC and NVA soldiers. Through black radio and leaflets continuing efforts are made to lower the morale of the individual enemy soldier to the point where he realizes the futility of his situation and begins to seek an alternative to inevitable death. Radio and leaflet output emphasizes the endless sacrifice these soldiers are required to make the awesome fire power they must face and the heavy casualties their units endure. The privation caused by lack of sufficient food and medicine, the dissension between Northerner and Southerner, the failure of the people of South Vietnam to support them except when forced to do so, and the failures and inadequacies of their own command and support structure are additional themes. Publicity is given to defections, particularly those involving high ranking officers and groups, and defectors are used in a variety of ways to attempt to induce the defection of their comrades.

5. In addition to operational endeavors, the intelligence capabilities of the CIA Station provide a steady flow of useful information and analysis which is utilized by the various components involved in the inducement of deserters and defectors. For example, the [less than 1 line of source text not declassified] National Interrogation Center (NIC) provides a considerable volume of comment from prisoners and ralliers concerning the effectiveness of radio and leaflet operations. This data provides insights useful for refining the content of these psychological operations to increase their effectiveness. The Station has provided a variety of papers on the character and life of the NVA soldier in South Vietnam and on his strengths and vulnerabilities which have been used in the planning of psychological operations.

[CIA Programs to Induce Desertions and Defections in South Vietnam (Paper Prepared in the Central Intelligence Agency, July 1968)] Foreign Relations, 1964-1968, Volume VI, Vietnam, January-August 1968.