unemployment and expand trade, profits and
incomes, so generating more money for the
administration to spend. Kennedy, though cau-
tious about creating large budget deficits,
believed that the US did not lack the necessary
resources to undertake all that was necessary for
its security and for its position as the leader of the
free world. The military budget was immediately
increased. The secretary of defence, Robert
McNamara, with his experience of running the
giant Ford Motor Company, was to apply the
latest business techniques to ensure the most
effective application of funds, both in respect of
procurement and to identify the right policies to
be pursued. Another adviser was Walt Rostow, an
economics professor who had studied the stages
of economic growth of particular importance
to underdeveloped countries. Dean Rusk was
secretary of state, and for personal military advice
Kennedy turned to General Maxwell Taylor.
Returning from a fact-finding mission to South
Vietnam, Rusk and Taylor both advocated in-
creasing the American commitment there. For
Kennedy, the crucial question was how much.
The military situation had not yet deteriorated to
the point where a massive infusion of American
troops seemed to be essential. Nevertheless, it was
already under discussion.
April 1961 was a critical month for the White
House. Cuba, Vietnam and Laos simultaneously
became the focus of crisis management. On 19
April the invasion by American-backed Cuban
exiles of their homeland had ignominiously failed
in the Bay of Pigs; the following day Kennedy
ordered a review of what military, political and
economic action – overt and covert – it would be
necessary for the US to undertake to prevent the
communist domination of South Vietnam. On
the 26th the American position in neighbouring
Laos seemed on the brink of disaster. There was
wild talk by the military of air strikes against
North Vietnam and southern China. On 29 April
US troop deployments to Thailand and South
Vietnam were discussed within the administra-
tion. Kennedy kept his nerve. Alerts went out to
American bases, a modest 100-man increase in
the nearly 700-strong American advisory mission
in South Vietnam was approved and, early in
May, approval for the despatch of a further 400
special-forces troops was given. Extra military
resources were provided, enabling the Vietnamese
army to be expanded from 150,000 to 170,000
troops. Finally, US troops were stationed in
Thailand.
Later that same May the panic in the White
House over Laos subsided. America’s threatening
posture seemed to have been effective in re-
straining the Chinese and North Vietnamese.
Khrushchev, too, had been alarmed and wanted
to quieten things down. The White House’s
primary concern was once again Vietnam.
Doubts had surfaced about the strongman of
South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem. He and his
brother Ngo Dinh Nhu, and his formidable sister-
in-law Madame Nhu, were heading a government
pervaded by corruption, and internal opposition
was growing; the lack of morale among the South
Vietnamese army was also only too evident.
Might not American training, advice and leader-
ship be the best way to stiffen their resolve? But
this would entail a considerable increase to the
US military presence in South Vietnam. By the
autumn of 1961 General Taylor had recom-
mended to the president the despatch of 8,000
US combat soldiers; in a memorandum the joint
chiefs of staff had estimated that 40,000 US
troops would ‘clean up the Vietcong threat’ and
that if the North Vietnamese and Chinese inter-
vened another 128,000 would be sufficient to
repel them. The idea of punishing North
Vietnamese intervention and discouraging further
incursions by bombing North Vietnam had also
been raised. All these were proposals to Ameri-
canise the conflict in Vietnam. Vice-President
Johnson had already provided the justification
for this after returning from a fact-finding mission
the previous spring: he had advised the president
that the battle against communism had to be
taken up in south-east Asia or the US would lose
the Pacific and have to defend its own shores.
But, even faced with such exaggerated catastro-
phe scenarios, Kennedy resisted sending substan-
tial numbers of US servicemen. He was sceptical
whether a few thousand US troops would make
the crucial difference to the military situation.
Nevertheless, by October 1963, shortly before his