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"By Christmas it will be all over". (American General Paul Harkins, April 1963) |
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1961
1962
1963
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Gen. William Westmoreland
Born 1914. Graduated West Point 1936 Served with distinction in WWII Superintendent West Point in 1960 Commander US Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV) 1964-1968. General Westmoreland took command in Vietnam in June 1964 replacing Gen. Paul Harkins. He was instrumental in raising the level of US forces deployed in Vietnam and in developing the strategies implemented in the region. |
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Westmoreland continuously requested for an increase in manpower
in Vietnam and President Johnson, who had his own troubles at home,
refused to send more troops and finally recalled Westmoreland after he
successfully stopped the North Vietnamese Tet Offensive in 1968. He was
replaced by General Creighton W. Abrams Upon his return to the US, Westmoreland was appointed as Chief of Staff of the US Army. His biggest challenge was to withdraw the troops from Vietnam and ready them for duty in other regions of the world. He was successful in restructuring the Army at a difficult time, but his tactics in Vietnam had become unpopular with some groups in the US. He maintained for many years that the policy in Vietnam had been the right one. General Westmoreland retired in 1972. |
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Creighton
Williams Abrams, Jr.
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He was promoted to first lieutenant, June 1939, and to temporary captain, September 1940; was briefly a tank company commander in the 1st Armoured Division, 1941; was a battalion commander in the 37th Armoured Regiment, 1942–1943; was promoted to temporary major (February) and lieutenant colonel (September), 1943; commanded the 37th Tank Battalion and Combat Command B, 4th Armoured Division, in Allied operations across Europe, 1943–1945; was promoted to temporary colonel, April 1945; served on the Army General Staff, 1945 A veteran of three wars, General Abrams rose to the Army's highest leadership position because he was pre-eminently a leader and commander of troops, particularly in wartime. From platoon to corps, he commanded at every Level and finally served as Joint Commander of all U.S. Forces in Vietnam. Commissioned in the Cavalry in 1936, General Abrams served initially with various cavalry and tank units of the 1st Cavalry Division and the 1st Armoured Division. Joining the newly activated 4th Armoured Division in 1941, he remained with the Division throughout World War II. As a battalion commander, and then combat command commander, he participated in every campaign the Division fought and became widely known as one of the Army's most aggressive and successful Armour commanders. It was
Lieutenant Colonel Abrams, in a conference on the banks of the Moselle,
who pointed east and remarked: "That is the shortest way
home." It was a tank unit called Task Force "Abe" that
led the thrust across the Moselle; it was a
tank unit commanded by Abrams that broke the German encirclement at
Bastogne in the Battle of the Bulge. It
was Abrams' unit that tore from Bitburg to the Rhine including an attack
of over forty miles in less than two days. Time and time again Abrams
led the thrust across the German homeland and into Czechoslovakia, often
at the head of the column. His World War II commander, General
George S. Patton, Jr., once said: "I'm supposed to be the best tank
commander in the Army but I have one peer - Abe Abrams. He's the world
champion." During the
Korean War, General Abrams served successively as Chief of Staff of I,
IX and X Corps. He participated in the defence against the last major
Communist offensives of the war. He remained to help set up I Corps as a
key link in the United Nations Command organization. Following his
duty in Korea, General Abrams served for a period as Chief of Staff of
the Armour Centre at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Returning to Europe in 1959,
he was assigned as Assistant Division Commander, 3d Armoured Division,
and later as Commanding General of the Division. After another tour in
Washington and yet another in Europe, this time as a Corps Commander, he
received his fourth star and was selected as the Army's Vice Chief of
Staff. In 1967, he
became Deputy Commander of the U.S. Military Assistance Command,
Vietnam; a year later, he was appointed its Commander. For the four
years General Abrams commanded in Vietnam, it was his task to reduce
direct U.S. military involvement and to transfer increasing defence
responsibilities to Vietnamese forces, as they became capable of
assuming them. By the time he left Vietnam in 1972, that job had
been virtually completed. After his
extensive service in Vietnam, General Abrams was nominated to be Chief
of Staff, United States Army, and was confirmed by the Senate on October
12, 1972. Since that day, General Abrams' principal challenge was to
knit together an Army that had suffered the double trauma of rapid
reduction in size and massive repositioning of forces, both occasioned
by the end of U.S. military operations in Vietnam. To add to the
challenge, it was during this same period that authority for induction
ended, and the Army shifted to an all-volunteer footing. The major themes in the Army during those two years were Abrams themes, as plain and strong as the man who established them: the readiness mission; rethinking the Army's role; and taking care of the soldier. The actions that flowed from this guidance increased the readiness and effectiveness of the Army dramatically. At the same time, morale improved and disciplinary problems subsided, responding to the firm hand at the top. Just prior to his being stricken by lung cancer, General Abrams had set in motion a program to increase markedly the Army's combat capability without increasing its total strength. It was to be done the Abrams way, by cutting out entire headquarters, by making other headquarters - including his own - much smaller, and by making every element in the Army count toward the overall mission. |
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