ABSTRACT
During late 1965 and early 1966, just as the 25th Division was being deployed to Cu Chi, there was a marked increase of interest shown by US policymakers in the struggle for the allegiance of the South Vietnamese rural population. This struggle was also called "the pacification campaign". The emphasis on pacification was due primarily to three factors. First, most Americans dealing with Vietnam believed correctly that US intervention in the ground war had saved South Vietnam from collapse and therefore that certain military and political assets could safely be allocated to a renewal of the struggle in the countryside. Second, most US policymakers believed, mistakenly, that the ground war was going so well that there would soon be an improvement in rural security—;;the prime requisite for a successful pacification effort. Third, Lyndon Johnson, faced with an open-ended war, wanted desperately to convince American and world opinion that the United States was succeeding.
