| This work, based primarily on archival research at the National Archives in Washington D.C., the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library in Austin, Texas, and the Harry S. Truman Library in Independence, Missouri, analyses the ideas which influenced American foreign policy planners from 1944 through 1964 with regard to events in the Philippines, a former United States colony, and Vietnam, a former French colony. It discusses the persistence of feudalism in both countries, colonial policies which led to outbreaks of insurgency, the search for political leadership, the build-up of the United States military machine, and the decisions which eventually led to military, rather than political solutions in both cases.;The work traces the career of John F. Melby, a Foreign Service officer who became chief of the Far Eastern desk in the Department of State until he was fired for suspected subversion. It discusses the activities of Edward G. Lansdale, a CIA operative active in both the Philippines and Vietnam. It summarizes the leadership of Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson with regard to the Philippines and Vietnam.;The work traces the origins of attempts at pacification of the Philippines after World War II through the growth of American decisions to arm, train, equip, and pay the salaries of the entire 32,000 man Filipino army in 1950 in order to quell a minor insurgency of about 8,000 Filipino peasants known as Hukbalahap. Using the same personnel involved in the Philippines activities, including Melby and Lansdale, the United States attempted to quell the peasant rebellion in Vietnam by manipulating political leadership in that country, by arming, training, and equipping the Army of South Vietnam, and by eventually creating the Gulf of Tonkin events which the United States claimed was an attack on destroyers in international waters.;This work shows that attack to have been bogus, that American ships fired first at lightly armed patrol torpedo boats which had attempted to warn that the ships were within North Vietnamese territorial waters, and that the so-called attacks were then exploited by the United States in order to attempt to bring about a desired political outcome. |
