THE VIET NAM TIMETABLE

ONCE Richard Nixon announced his decision to start withdrawing U.S. troops from Viet Nam, the national debate on the war moved quickly to discussion of next steps in U.S. disengagement. The most prominent voice in the argument last week belonged to Clark Clifford, Secretary of Defense in the final ten months of the Johnson Administration. It was Clifford who persuaded Lyndon Johnson to call a partial bombing halt in North Viet Nam last March--a decision that led directly to the opening of negotiations in Paris. Now, in a Foreign Affairs article, Clifford proposed that 100,000 U.S. servicemen be pulled out this year and that all American ground-combat forces leave South Viet Nam by the end of 1970.

The President replied sharply and ad hominem. While Clifford was at the Pentagon, Nixon observed at his press conference, U.S. casualties were the highest since the war began. All that anyone agreed on in Paris during Clifford's tenure was the "shape of the bargaining table." But then, with what seemed to be uncharacteristic lack of caution, Nixon went Clifford one better on the schedule for troop withdrawal by saying: "I would hope that we could beat Mr. Clifford's timetable." Nixon's aides hastily explained that the President was only expressing a desire and not setting a deadline or making a promise. Some professed to take him more literally. Senator Edward Kennedy said Nixon had made "a definite commitment that ought to be carried out."

Substantial Difference. In some ways, Clifford's position and the Administration's are similar. The White House is already thinking of pulling out a total of 70,000 men from Viet Nam during 1969, a figure not far behind Clifford's 100,000. Further, Nixon and Clifford agree on at least one justification for the reduction. As the quality of South Vietnamese forces improves, they will be able to assume greater responsibility for conducting the war. Beyond that point, however, Clifford and the Administration differ substantially on several premises and conclusions. In essence, Clifford's arguments, and their implications, are these:

> "The world situation has changed dramatically, and American involvement in Viet Nam can and must change with it." Since the major U.S. Viet Nam buildup began in 1965, the U.S.S.R. and China have grown more hostile toward each other; Communist-courting Sukarno has been turned out of power in Indonesia; other Asian nations have made great economic gains. The region is now better able to withstand a weakened Communist challenge.

> "South Vietnamese in the various components of the armed forces, with American logistics, air lift and air support, should be able, if they have the will, to prevent the imposition by force of a Hanoi-controlled regime. If they lack a sense or a sufficiency of national purpose, we can never force it on them."

> The best way to induce a settlement is to announce a firm timetable for U.S. withdrawal. With U.S. supporting forces remaining to bolster South Vietnamese troops, "Hanoi's only alternative would be to arrange, tacitly or explicitly, for a mutual withdrawal of all external forces." By showing confidence in Saigon's strength, the U.S. would persuade Hanoi to begin serious negotiations; by demonstrating that its commitment is finite, the U.S. would convince Saigon itself to move more quickly to a political settlement.

> The U.S. has largely achieved its limited aim in Viet Nam, which is "to prevent its subjugation by the North and to enable the people of South Viet Nam to determine their own future." The U.S. has reached its goal, and now it can make an honorable exit.

Debatable Points. There is widespread though not unanimous agreement that the old domino theory has little relevance in the Southeast Asia of today. Clifford's other points are more debatable. Although the South Vietnamese army is gaining in capability, it is unlikely to be strong enough within the next 18 months to fight the ground war on its own, even with U.S. air support. The contention that Hanoi would have no choice but to match a unilateral U.S. pullout is also questionable; the North Vietnamese might easily decide to wait out the U.S. exodus and then attempt to march on Saigon as the "liberators" of South Viet Nam. The Administration argues that the American pullout is best left flexible and subject to periodic review.

Furthermore, the announcement of a firm deadline for U.S. withdrawal might topple President Nguyen Van Thieu. Clifford evidently would not mind that, particularly since the Communists--at least for the record--keep insisting that they will not agree to a peace settlement while Thieu is in power. Clifford thinks Saigon's future is up to the South Vietnamese alone. "Thieu is none of our business," he has said privately. Nixon, by contrast, went extraordinarily far to back Thieu. "We are not going to accede to the demands of the enemy that we have to dispose of President Thieu before they will talk," said the President. "That would mean a defeat on our part."

In the end, the crucial difference between the two men is this: Nixon apparently believes that his approach, which may require continuing some U.S. ground-force commitment well beyond 1970, could result in salvaging part of the original U.S. goal--a non-Communist government in Saigon, or at least one not completely dominated by Hanoi. Clifford thinks that if the South Vietnamese cannot carry on alone now, they will never be able to. Therefore, it is better to find that out now rather than later, after still more U.S. casualties and expenditure on the war. If South Viet Nam then falls to the Communists, says Clifford, so be it. Ultimately, the U.S. will have to weigh the odds that something can still be saved in Saigon against the cost--even on Nixon's reduced level--of continued commitment.

Up and Down the Hill. The cost in men, money and national morale seems to be felt ever more painfully. To reduce that cost, Clifford and many others want U.S. military pressure in Viet Nam scaled down. Nixon counters, not wholly convincingly, that the level of the fighting is up to the enemy. Nixon also contends that a cease-fire is unenforceable in a guerrilla war unless supervised by outside forces.

The flesh and blood realities behind these arguments are stunningly demonstrated in this week's issue of LIFE which devotes twelve pages to photographs of the 242 Americans killed in a recent week of ordinary combat--a moving presentation of the grim daily price of commitment. That price was also illustrated in Viet Nam itself. Last week Communist prisoners captured in the A Shau Valley reported that North Vietnamese troops had reoccupied Hamburger Hill, taken last month by the 101st Airborne Division and then abandoned after a ten-day assault that cost 84 dead and 480 wounded. The operation seemed futile to many, but U.S. officers defended it: enemy casualties were heavy, they point out, and besides, the 101st never intended to hold the hill indefinitely. The division commander, Major General John M. Wright Jr., announced that if ordered to take the hill again, "I am prepared to commit everything that it takes, up to the entire division, to do the job."

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