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Our "excess of righteousness and disinterested benevolence" in Vietnam is commonly attributed to the Cold War, the felt need "to resist every hint of Soviet expansion wherever it occurred, even in areas that were not vital to our interests," in the phrase that has grown stale through overuse.15 The doctrine is not wholly false, but must be translated from Newspeak to English. The term "Soviet expansion" served throughout the Cold War as a cover for policy initiatives that could not be justified, whatever their actual grounds.
The Indochina wars provide a revealing illustration of the general practice. On deciding in 1950 to support France's effort to quell the threat of independent nationalism in Vietnam, Washington assigned to the intelligence services the task of demonstrating that Ho Chi Minh was a puppet of Moscow or Peiping (either would do). Despite diligent efforts, the task proved hopeless. Evidence of "Kremlin-directed conspiracy" could be found "in virtually all countries except Vietnam," which appeared to be "an anomaly." Nor could links with China be detected. But all was not lost. Analysts concluded that Moscow considers the Viet Minh "sufficiently loyal to be trusted to determine their day-to-day policy without supervision." Soviet expansion is thereby established, and the formula is available to every sober commentator -- though in retrospect, it is permissible to say that the fears were exaggerated. One of the few really surprising disclosures in the Pentagon Papers was that in an intelligence record of 25 years, the analysts could find only one paper -- a staff paper not submitted -- that even raised the question whether Hanoi was pursuing its national interests, not following the orders of its foreign masters. One can scarcely exaggerate the effectiveness of doctrinal need in enforcing a kind of institutional stupidity.16
The actual reasons for terror and subversion, and finally aggression, derive from the basic logic of North-South relations, developed with unusual explicitness in the early postwar period. Recognizing that they held unprecedented power, US planners undertook to organize the world in the interests of the masters, "assum[ing], out of self-interest, responsibility for the welfare of the world capitalist system," as the chief historian of the CIA, Gerald Haines, puts the matter in a highly-regarded study of US policy in Latin America. Each region of the South was assigned its proper place. Latin America was to be taken over by the United States, its rivals Britain and France excluded. Policy there, Haines explains, was designed "to develop larger and more efficient sources of supply for the American economy, as well as create expanded markets for U.S. exports and expanded opportunities for the investment of American capital," a "neocolonial, neomercantilist policy" that permitted local development only "as long as it did not interfere with American profits and dominance." The Monroe Doctrine was also effectively extended to the Middle East, where the huge oil resources, and crucially the enormous profits they generated, were to be controlled by the US and its British client, operating behind an "Arab Façade" of pliant family dictatorships. As explained by George Kennan and his State Department Policy Planning Staff, Africa was to be "exploited" for the reconstruction of Europe, while Southeast Asia would "fulfill its major function as a source of raw materials for Japan and Western Europe," helping them to overcome the "dollar gap" so that they would be able to purchase US manufacturing exports and provide lucrative opportunities for US investors.
In short, the Third World was to be kept in its traditional service role, providing cheap labor and resources, markets, investment opportunities, and other amenities for the masters, with local elites permitted to share in the plunder as long as they cooperate. By the same logic, the major threat to US interests was always recognized to be "radical and nationalistic regimes" that are responsive to popular pressures for "immediate improvement in the low living standards of the masses" and development for domestic needs. Such "ultranationalism" is unacceptable, irrespective of its political coloration, because it conflicts with the demand for "a political and economic climate conducive to private investment," with adequate repatriation of profits and "protection of our raw materials."
An "ultranationalist" regime becomes an even greater threat if it appears to be succeeding in ways that might be meaningful to other poor and oppressed people. In that case it is a "virus" that might "infect" others, a "rotten apple" that might "spoil the barrel." It is a threat to "stability," that is, to unhampered pursuit of the vile maxim. A virus must be destroyed, and surrounding regions inoculated to ensure that the disease does not spread. That may require measures of extreme savagery, which are, accordingly, acceptable or even admirable. The joyous reaction to the "boiling bloodbath" as General Suharto took power in Indonesia in 1965 is a dramatic illustration; the self-acclaim for the bloodbath that the US orchestrated in Central America in the 1980s is another. Examples are all too easy to find. North-South relations, and their ideological cover, quite regularly fall into this pattern.
The Indochina wars are no exception. From the outset, it was understood that "Communist Ho Chi Minh is the strongest and perhaps the ablest figure in Indochina and that any suggested solution which excludes him is an expedient of uncertain outcome" (State Department, 1948). At no point did US planners delude themselves that they had been able to concoct an alternative to Communist-led Vietnamese nationalism; the possibility of a "third force" in the South dismayed them no less, since it too would be independent. Nationalist appeal aside, intelligence warned in 1959 that the US client state in the South could not compete economically with the Hanoi regime, where economic growth was faster and would continue to be, because "the national effort is concentrated on building for the future," not enriching the inheritors of the colonialist legacy. The more general problem was the "ideological threat" of Communism: "the possibility that the Chinese Communists can prove to Asians by progress in China that Communist methods are better and faster than democratic methods," as Kennedy adviser Walt Rostow put it. Adopting this conventional viewpoint, the State Department recommended that the US try to retard the economic development of the Communist Asian states.17
In Indochina, the only way to create deprivation and suffering in the North and protect the US client in the South from "the assault from the inside," as Kennedy termed the resistance to his aggression, was to increase violence. Our "blundering efforts to do good" could take no other course, given the circumstances. And as always, the same logic dictated the support for murderous terror states elsewhere in the region, to protect them from the virus. These are standard features of North-South relations, exhibited with unusual clarity in the case of Indochina, but rated X, unacceptable for a general audience.
Extremes of state terror are commonly necessary "to destroy permanently a perceived threat to the existing structure of socioeconomic privilege by eliminating the political participation of the numerical majority...," in the words of the leading academic specialist on human rights in Latin America, Lars Schoultz, describing the goals of the neo-Nazi National Security States that had their roots in Kennedy Administration policies designed to prevent the Cuban rot from spreading. The US client regime in South Vietnam was driven to the same course.
Despite their best efforts, responsible intellectuals often find it difficult to conceal US government support for these measures. That is a problem, because US leaders are benign, humane, committed to democracy and freedom and human rights, and otherwise saintly in disposition, by doctrinal fiat. When their dedication to savage atrocities is revealed too clearly, new devices are needed to resolve the contradiction between truth and Higher Truth. One technique is the doctrine of "change of course." Yes, bad things have happened as we departed from our noble course for unfortunate though understandable reasons; but now it is all past, we can forget history, and march forward proudly to a grand future. Those who cannot manage such routines with a straight face would do well to put aside any thought of a career as a respectable commentator on affairs.
The current variant of this standard device is to attribute the crimes committed by the US and its clients to the Cold War. With virtue victorious at last, we can now return to our humanitarian mission of bringing peace, joy, and plenty to suffering people everywhere. We can garb ourselves again in the mantle of "Wilsonian idealism," though bearing in mind that its a tough world, with many villains ready to assault us if we do not keep up our guard.
To select an example at random, after Indonesia committed the error of carrying out a massacre in front of TV cameras and brutally beating two US journalists in Dili, East Timor, in November 1991, the editors of the Washington Post, to their credit, suggested that the US "should be able to bring its influence to bear on this issue," noting that for 16 years Washington had been supporting an Indonesian invasion and forced annexation that had killed "up to a third of the population." The reasons, the Post explained, is that "the American government was in the throes of its Vietnam agony, unprepared to exert itself for a cause" that could harm relations "with its sturdy anti-Communist ally in Jakarta. But that was then. Today, with the East-West conflict gone, almost everyone is readier to consider legitimate calls for self-determination."18
The relation of Indonesia's invasion to the East-West conflict was a flat zero. Unexplained is why, in the throes of its Vietnam agony, the US found it necessary to increase the flow of weapons to its Indonesian client at the time of the 1975 invasion, and to render the UN "utterly ineffective in whatever measures it undertook" to counter the aggression, as UN Ambassador Daniel Patrick Moynihan proudly described his success in following State Department orders. Or why the Carter Administration felt obligated to sharply accelerate the arms flow in 1978 when Indonesian supplies were becoming depleted and the slaughter was reaching truly genocidal proportions. Or why the Free Press felt that duty required that it reduce its coverage of these events as the slaughter mounted, reaching zero as it peaked in 1978, completely ignoring easily accessible refugees, respected Church sources, human rights groups, and specialists on the topic, in favor of Indonesian Generals and State Department prevaricators. Or why today it refuses to tell us about the rush of Western oil companies to join Indonesia in the plunder of Timorese oil. All is explained by the Cold War, now behind us, so that we may dismiss past errors to the memory hole and return to the path of righteousness.
Absurdity aside, the thesis is instantly refuted by a look at what came before the Cold War and what immediately followed it; no change in the willingness to resort to repression, subversion, violence, and terror is detectable from Woodrow Wilson and his predecessors through the Cold War and beyond. The historical record, however, has no bearing on Higher Truths. The thesis stands, whatever the facts; such is the way with doctrinal necessity.
More interestingly, the thesis mistakes the nature of the Cold War, another topic that merits at least a brief look, given its importance for understanding the events of this 70-year period -- including the Indochina wars from 1945 until today -- and the doctrinal framework that is designed to provide them with an acceptable cast.
15 Lars‑Erik Nelson, "Bush's wise counsel on the use of force," Boston Globe, Jan. 9, 1993.
16 For details, see FRS, ch. 1. V (Peck, op. cit.).
17 Ibid.
18 Editorial, WP, Nov. 20, 1991.
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