Word: ellsbergs
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...Ellsberg fully develops the hypothesis he becomes more and more persuasive. A two phase stalemate machine with inadequate lines of internal communication would produce the sort of policy that we have...
...Americans, the two thresholds with the greatest domestic political consequences were decisions calling up the reserves or committing ground troops to an Asian land war. The first of these was never crossed in a major way, but Johnson did commit ground troops. Buried in a footnote on page 72 Ellsberg admits that quite possibly the introduction of ground troops was motivate by the belief that the U.S. was not merely buying time, but rather embarking on a course that could lead to victory. In other words, at a crucial point the stalemate machine may have ordered victory and gotten stuck...
...underlying fear that supports the first rule of administrative conduct--don't lose an Asian country to communism--Ellsberg ascribes to the aftermath of McCarthyism. Certainly neither the China White Paper of 1949 nor the Pentagon Papers have exactly secured the public confidence in the foreign policy establishment of the country. But Ellsberg does little to document that McCarthyite fears are what has motivated the American response to Vietnam...
...remainder of this collection of essays deals with Ellsberg's concerns in the last few years. It takes a different form from that which had been written previously. The memoranda-producing insider began discussing his opinions in speeches, conferences, and book reviews. He ends Papers on the War with a discussion of "The Responsibility of Officials in a Criminal War." This final essay grew out of a lecture he delivered before a church group in Boston during the interval between his delivery of the Pentagon Papers to Neil Sheehan and their publication...
...WITH COMMENTS on that issue he ends the collection. The book is neither the story of the progressive disappointment of a Rand Corporation Department of Defense insider, nor is it a comprehensive examination of American Indochinese policy. Rather, it is Ellsberg's multifaceted and discontinuous response to the impact and nature of American policy in a variety of arenas...