Enough, but Not Too Much: Johnson=s Decisions for War, 1963-1965

Identifications

National Security Council Actions Memorandum (NASM) 273
General Ngyuen Khahn
National Security Council Actions Memorandum (NASM) 288
OPLAN 34A
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
Ernest Gruening
George Ball
Operation ARolling Thunder
Aenclave strategy
ATarget: College Campuses
General Nguyen Van Thieu
Clark Clifford
Bui Diem

Questions for consideration

1		What did President Johnson mean when he felt like a catfish that had just Agrabbed a big juicy worm with a right sharp hook in the middle of it?
2		What type of personality did President Johnson have and how did it affect his policymaking decisions?
3		Does the author believe that McNamara and Johnson purposely misled the Congress and the American people to secure the passage of the resolution?
4		According to the author, why did the Johnson administration choose war in late 1964?
5		Why was the approval of the air campaign in early December 1964 characterized as a Amomentous decision?
6		What were Maxwell Taylor=s objections to Westmoreland=s troop requests in early 1965? Why does the author characterize them as Ain many way prophetic?
7		Why does the author argue, AJohnson thus took the nation into war by indirection and dissimulation?”
8		What were the “fateful decisions” President Johnson made in July 1965 that set “the United States on a course from which it would not deviate for nearly three years and opening the way for eight years of bloody warfare in Vietnam?”
9		Why does the author argue that AJohnson=s middle course probably reflected the aspirations of the American public and Congress?
10		According to the author, what were the Atwo fatal miscalculations on which the administration based its policies decisions in the first two years in office?