This week's primary document assignment contains 15 documents from the Foreign Relations of the United States series, the confidential memoranda of high foreign policy officials. The topic: US policy toward Vietnam in the winter of 1964. |
The dramatis personae:
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Lyndon Johnson: President. |
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Robert McNamara: Secretary of Defense |
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Dean Rusk: Secretary of State |
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Henry Cabot Lodge, II: US ambassador to Vietnam; also running for Republican presidential nomination |
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David Nes: Lodge's deputy |
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Maxwell Taylor: chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff |
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Walt Rostow: director, State Department Policy Planning Staff |
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McGeorge Bundy: national security advisor |
For the FRUS documents, please read documents 36, 41, 43, 49-57, 67, 68, 70, 71, 73. And ask yourself the following questions:
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What role did US diplomats (State Department) play? |
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How did international factors--whether in Europe or SE Asia--affect Vietnam policy? |
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What role did Congress or other domestic political forces (like Lodge's presidential bid) play? |
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How--if at all--did perspective on Vietnam differ between the national security bureaucracy (CIA, DOD) and other agencies? |
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What was LBJ's role in this decisionmaking process? |
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And, how does the documentary record of administration policy contrast with that evidenced in these transcripts of presidential phone calls relating to Vietnam? |
A few of these questions are posted on caucus.