Note: Andy and I are USNA-66 classmates. Andy is a highly-respected Vietnam Historian, and a combat veteran with two books and a number of papers and other writings to his credit. The following is provided with his permission. The referenced monograph is provided in a subsequent link (Bill McBride).
"Bill,
Thanks for sending this very interesting paper.
I may have told you this before, but I think, having read this paper, it bears retelling.
Even today, most historians differ as to why the communists launched the TET offensive and have offered up several opinions. There has been no real proof provided by the communists and probably never will be until we have unfettered access to their archives. Many Americans at the time, knew of the communist plans but were incredulous to such an undertaking by the communists because every analysis of the situation in late 1967 pointed to a weakening of the ability of the communists to mount a successful campaign.
Let me tell you what I know from over 40 years of research and access to some classified CIA information. I have to be careful here since I will only skirt around how I obtained this information.
First, there were three CIA spies who tipped off the agency in late 1967 that the communists were preparing to launch a country-wide attack around TET and its aim was to generate a general uprising. Two of these spies were in I Corps, one in Quang Tri and the other in the Danang Central Committee. These two spies gave detailed information for the attack, to include specific targets, especially the spy in Danang. As a result, we had a pretty good idea of what targets would be hit and how to counter them. Unfortunately, the only CIA analysis who gave credence to the claims of these two spies was in the US and his analysis never reached the President or any other senior leader. Westmoreland knew of the information provided by these spies but he lacked specific knowledge of exactly when the attack would be launched and his staff doubted that the enemy would be successful since the enemy had been so badly mauled in the summer of 1967. Only General Weyand in III Corps took any real pre-emptive action to counter the threat. For some reason, the Marines in I Corps did not take the reports from the CIA seriously. I have never found out why.
The third spy was the Tay Ninh Source, Vo Van Ba. He was the highest level penetration of the Viet Cong achieved during the war and he reported to the CIA via the S. Vietnamese Military Security Service first and later through the National Police Special Branch. He was first recruited in 1965 and he continued to provide gold standard political and military intelligence until he was betrayed in April 1970 by one of his former SVN Special Branch case officers. He later died under interrogation in early1970 when his CIA case officer, John Konosa, allowed me to read it. I write about this in my book Rice Paddy Recon. The paper I read was a synopsis of what Ba reported on COSVN Resolution 9, which was a sort of lessons learned document of the TET offensive and the enemy's plans to rectify their errors. In this document Ba stated the following (which goes against much of what has been written about the reasoning for the TET offensive):
In early 1967, the Lao Dong Party's leadership in Hanoi was concerned about three things that they felt posed an existential threat to their ability to carry on the war. First, they said the "correlation of forces" in the south was shifting badly in favor of the Americans and the South Vietnamese. They knew that the Americans were planning on reinforcing their troops in the south to well over 500K and they knew that they could not counter this buildup by infiltrating troops from the north to the south using the existing Ho Chi Minh Trail. They were also concerned about recent reports from the south that recruiting of southern soldiers and cadres was way down and may had rallied to the GVN government during the winter of 1966-67.
Second, they had received detailed information from several spies in the south that the GVN and the Americans were ready to put into action a new pacification plan that threatened their grip on the rural population of South Vietnam. This plan was the Phoenix Program and they knew the plan would be fully implemented sometime in early 1968. Without the party cadres (the target of Phoenix), the entire communist logistics, recruitment, and intelligence apparatus in the south would make conventional, main force operations impossible to conduct for any sustained period.
Third, they had also learned from their security services that the Americans planned to invade Laos in the fall of 1968 and that LBJ was going to be briefed on this plan when Westmoreland and LBJ met in late 1967. They considered the Ho Chi Minh Trail essential for their ultimate success and any physical cutting of it meant they would be unable to reinforce or resupply their forces in the south. They also knew that the logistics and command base for this invasion of Laos was Khe Sanh, so they decided they had to attack this base for the future incursion of Laos and deny it to the Americans. They felt that the Americans would not be able to invade Laos along Route 9 if Khe Sanh was besieged or destroyed.
So, that is what I know about TET from my research and my rather unique knowledge obtained from the Tay Ninh Source and some other high ranking NVA political cadres I have interviewed. Since everything about Vo Van Ba is still completely classified, we never had access to his reporting on TET until his field reports are declassified.
Semper Fi, Andy
I had the opportunity to read one of Ba's reports in late 1969
My latest publication is out. Available on Amazon.com"
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This is in response to a question I asked Andy regarding CIA declassification of the Tay Ninh source:
"Bill,
You had some questions for me in an email I deleted. I think one of them was why The Tay Ninh Source file is still classified by the CIA?
I do not have a good answer for that since they will not tell me. I submitted two FOIA's to them, both were rejected outright. I even submitted an appeal, based upon the recommendation of a close friend of mine who is currently on their roles in an important position. That, too, was rejected. The agency will not even acknowledge his existence and their rejection was only two sentences long! I have gotten some really good information on him from the North Vietnamese, who use him as a case study for their security services. Merle Pribbenow, a good friend and former CIA analyst who is fluent in Vietnamese, has translated these articles from North Vietnam for me. He also interviewed Ba's Vietnamese Special Branch case officer from Tay Ninh, who now resides in California and he gave me the interview transcripts. Of course, I know a lot from the evening John Konosa got drunk and showed me Ba's report to him about COSVN Resolution 9. My friend at the agency says he has no idea why the agency insists on keeping everything about Ba a secret, but he adds that there must be a good reason. Evidently, although he has been dead for over 40 years, the agency has some reason for keeping his file secret. I have my suspicions but I do not think an email is the best place to discuss them and they are, after all, just my suspicions.
Semper Fi, Andy
My latest publication is out. Available on Amazon.com"