THE PRESIDENT'S DAILY BRIEF 8 OCTOBER 1968

• Document Type: FOIA
• Collection: President's Daily Brief 1961-1969
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 0005976397
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: September 16, 2015
• Document Release Date: September 16, 2015
• Publication Date: October 8, 1968

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2015/07/24,: CIA-RDP79T00936A006400320001-1
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The President's Daily Brief
October 1968
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THE PRESIDENT'S
DAILY BRIEF
8 OCTOBER 1968
1. South Vietnam
Interior Minister Khiem is appre-
hensive about fresh reports of coup
plotting. Thieu, he says, shares this
anxiety.
Khiem told Ambassador Berger yes-
terday that six or so junior officers
are being investigated in connection
with the present reports. Khiem said
the plotters are implying that Ky sup-
ports them.
There is no evidence that such
powerful figures as Ky are involved.
Thieu, however, takes rumors of in-
trigue seriously. He knows his atti-
tudes on peace and postwar political
competition are ahead of some of his
colleagues who consider him too re-
sponsive to American influence. Under
these circumstances, Thieu can be ex-
pected to examine carefully any coup
reports--eventhoseinvolving a small
group of junior officers.
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2, Mexico
3,-Peru
4, Laos
A temporary truce may follow last
night's decision by student leaders to
suspend mass rallies. If observed,
this ban will smooth things out for
the Olympics, but the students by no
means have given up, and any armistice
will be uneasy at best.
The government has not abandoned
its charges that leftists are-respon-
sible for the disorders, Some
however, are saying the stu-
dents' principal assistance is coming
from enemies of Diaz Ordaz in his own
party.
Meanwhile, in Veracruz, the Cuban
consul is spreading rumors that the US
is behind the trouble and hopes to use
it as a pretext for military-interven-
tion.
Stresses are appearing in the new
military government. The services are
bickering over government appointments.
The plans for the coup appear to have
been better than the plans for how to
govern afterward.
The rainy season is coming to a
close and, if the pattern of past years
is followed, it will be the Communists'
turn to begin offensive probing. Their
strength is greater now than at any
time since 1963. Government forces
made some modest gains during their tra-
ditional wet season campaign, but there
were no major changes this summer in
the real estate held by the two sides.
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5. Turkey
6. West Germany -
France
Leftist students are busily orga-
nizing a new anti-Western campaign to
coincide with the opening of the uni-
versities early next month. The US,
NATO, and the Demirel regime will be
the main targets. There are indica-
tions that the students are getting
some help from foreign Communist
sources. Clashes with rightist stu-
dents and the security forces are al-
most a foregone conclusion.
The Kiesinger - De Gaulle meet-
ings of 27-28 September left the Ger-
mans quite discouraged over the future
of relations with France. De Gaulle
would make no firm pledge to back
West Germany in event of attack, and
the Germans sense France is withdraw-
ing from international commitments
across the board. The US Embassy. be-
lieves Bonn may now give priority to
its own defense needs and put rela-
tions with the US ahead of those with
France.
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Top Secret
FOR THE PRESIDENT'S EYES ONLY
1.) Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
2.) North Vietnamese Reflections of U S
Political Attitudes
Top Secret
16
8 October 1968
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Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
for the President's Eyes Only
8 October 1968
I. NOTES ON THE SITUATION
Fatherland Front Reactivated: Hanoi is dragging
its main mass organization, the Fatherland Front, out
of moth balls; The Front has had little publicity and
even less responsibility in the past few years, but
the Communists appear to be turning to it more fre-
quently in the past few months in aneffort to generate
increasing popular support for regime objectives.
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Full coverage of a new "enlarged 16th congress"
of the Front was given over the domestic radio on
6 October. The party sent politburo member Truong
Chinh to give the pep talk, and he succeeded in get-
ting the group to pledge renewed efforts to help mo-
bilize the people for "support of the South and de-
fense of the North." The Front offered to bend its
best efforts toward educating the people in the proper
political views and spurring them on to greater mili-
tary and economic feats.
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II. NORTH VIETNAMESE REFLECTIONS OF US POLITICAL
,ATTITUDES'ONITHE WAR
day.
There is nothing of significance to report to-
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