![]() ![]() McNamara were enamored both with The Uncertain Trumpet and General Taylor, who served as their principal military adviser. Kennedy and Secretary of Defense Robert S. The theory made perfectly good sense, but its successful application depended on two things: an accurate assessment of the enemy’s powers of resistance, and a precise, overwhelming application of force against the target country.īy the time of the Kennedy administration, flexible response and graduated escalation had become gospel. national-security establishment grew comfortable with the “graduated escalation” concept. The new approach to warfare also called for using increasingly destructive doses of military power to influence the behavior of nations backing insurgencies in neighboring countries, without actually having to declare war against the aggressors. Washington anticipated fighting such limited conflicts in response to the Sino-Soviet bloc’s announced intention to back “wars of national liberation.” Hence, a cross-border invasion would be met by conventional air, sea, and ground forces insurgencies carried out by civilian-by-day, fighter-by-night guerrillas would be countered by Army Green Berets, Navy SEALs, and other counterinsurgency forces. military force should only be employed in relation to the nature of the enemy threat. The work encapsulated the belief among many civilian think-tank theorists and military leaders alike that in the nuclear age seeking outright victory against a communist country might trigger World War III. Former Army Chief of Staff Maxwell Taylor’s The Uncertain Trumpet, published in 1960, had a major impact on U.S. Intelligence mounted that Hanoi was arming, supplying, and directing communist Pathet Lao and Viet Cong guerrillas in those countries.Ĭivilian and military leaders seized on a new approach to combating such aggression-flexible response. That year, Washington became especially concerned that the DRV intended to overturn U.S.-leaning governments in Laos and the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam). campaign to neutralize North Vietnamese military power and reach in Indochina that had begun in earnest in 1959. This operation in the Desoto Patrol program, however, represented one facet of a much broader U.S. patrols of Sino-Soviet bloc nations throughout the Cold War. The surveillance and intelligence-gathering mission seemed no different than other U.S. Mission orders directed Herrick to gather intelligence on the coastal naval forces, radar stations, and other military facilities of Ho Chi Minh’s communist nation. Herrick, steamed along a predesignated track off the coast of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV, or North Vietnam). The destroyer Maddox (DD-731), under the tactical command of Captain John J. Navy warship entered the Gulf of Tonkin and began an operation that for many represented the dramatic opening of America’s long, disastrous Vietnam War. ![]()
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