The Best and the Brightest: Kennedy-Johnson Administrations (Modern Library)

by David Halberstam

Vann began to get higher and higher hearings in the Pentagon until finally General Barksdale Hamlett, the Deputy Chief of Staff of the Army, heard the briefing, was impressed and arranged for Vann to meet with the Joint Chiefs. Vann was warned by several high officers that above all he must not appear to be critical of General Harkins, who was the personal choice of Maxwell Taylor (by this time Chairman of the Joint Chiefs), since Taylor seemed to be particularly sensitive and protective of Harkins and his reporting. He was also warned not to show his briefing until the last minute to General Krulak, who was the Secretary of Defense’s special adviser on guerrilla warfare, and a person who was already surfacing as a man with a vested interest in the optimism, having just returned from a tour of Saigon and reported to the Chiefs that the war was going very well, every bit as well as Harkins said. The Vann briefing was set for 2 p.m. on July 8, 1963. At 9:45 he sent a copy to General Krulak’s office. A little later Vann, eager, starched, finally getting his hearing, showed up outside the office of General Earle G. Wheeler, the Chief of Staff, to be on hand in case there were any new developments. He was sitting there when a phone call came in to one of Wheeler’s aides. “Who wants the item removed from the agenda?” the aide asked. The voice at the other end spoke for a few minutes. “Is this the Secretary of Defense’s or the Chairman’s office?” There was more talk. “Is that an ...