Editing Strategic Hamlet Program (section)

==Problems==
Although many people in both the [[Federal government of the United States|U.S. government]] and government of South Vietnam (GVN) agreed that the Strategic Hamlet Program was strong in theory, its actual implementation was deficient on several grounds. [[Roger Hilsman]] himself later claimed that the GVN's execution of program constituted a "total misunderstanding of what the [Strategic Hamlet] program should try to do."<ref>Hilsman, Roger, ''To Move a Nation'', p. 440.</ref>

The speed of the implementation of the Program was one of the main causes for its eventual failure. The [[Pentagon Papers]] reported that in September 1962, 4.3 million people were housed in 3,225 completed hamlets with more than two thousand still under construction.<ref>"The Pentagon Papers v. 2". Gravel ed. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. p. 151.</ref> By July 1963, over eight and a half million people had been settled in 7,205 hamlets according to figures given by the Vietnam Press.<ref>Osborne, Milton E. ''Strategic Hamlets in South Viet-nam: A Survey and Comparison'', p. 33.</ref> In less than a year, both the number of completed hamlets and its population had doubled. Given this rapid rate of construction, the GVN was unable to fully support or protect the hamlets or its residents, despite funding by the United States government. Viet Cong insurgents easily sabotaged and overran the poorly defended communities, gaining access to the South Vietnamese peasants. Only twenty percent of the hamlets in the Mekong Delta area were controlled by the GVN by the end of 1963.<ref>Osborne, Milton E. ''Strategic Hamlets in South Viet-nam: A Survey and Comparison'', p. 38.</ref> In an interview, a resident of a hamlet in Vinh-Long described the situation: "It is dangerous in my village because the civil guard from the district headquarters cross the river to the village only in the daytime…leaving the village unprotected at night. The village people have no protection from the Viet Cong so they will not inform on them to the authorities."<ref>Osborne, Milton E. ''Strategic Hamlets in South Viet-nam: A Survey and Comparison'', p. 6.</ref>

Alongside the execution and intimidation of hamlet officials, the Viet Cong opposition to the Strategic Hamlet program included a fierce propaganda campaign, which portrayed U.S. strategy in Vietnam as [[imperialism]].<ref name=":3">{{Cite book|last=Latham|first=Michael|title=Modernization as Ideology: American Social Science and 'Nation Building' in the Kennedy Era|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|year=2000|location=Chapel Hill|pages=188}}</ref> When Robert Thompson sent Filipino field operatives into local hamlet settlements, they reported that South Vietnamese peasants accepted [[Viet Cong]] propaganda as they believed that ‘America had replaced France as a colonial power in Vietnam’.<ref name=":3" />

The U.S. officials tried to counter Viet Cong propaganda with their own, which included hiring Asian operatives in provinces, particularly Filipino. In theory, this would convince the South Vietnamese of the purpose of American assistance through their shared ethnicity, or ‘indigenous nationalism.’<ref name=":3" /> This became known as the ‘demonstration effect’ as Filipinos were deemed a prime example of a country which had been ‘modelled on the enlightenment and benevolence of American tutelage.’<ref name=":3" />

Another propaganda technique was using the forced relocations to inform South Vietnamese peasants that if they supported the North, then they would allow them to return home once the communist revolution had been won.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Latham|first=Michael|title=Modernization as Ideology: American Social Science and 'Nation Building' in the Kennedy Era|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|year=2000|location=Chapel Hill|pages=181}}</ref>

The Viet Cong also escalated their recruitment program by using women. This was not only through presenting women as victims by drawing on Vietnamese atrocities such as the rape of women, but Northern officials believed that women were the ideal political and psychological weapon for infiltration within the Strategic Hamlets.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Latham|first=Michael|title=Modernization as Ideology: American Social Science and 'Nation Building' in the Kennedy Era|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|year=2000|location=Chapel Hill|pages=198}}</ref> Their usefulness as operatives was underpinned by the fact that Northern officials thought that the U.S. government would not suspect women of being Communist allies. Although the U.S. also attempted to mobilise women, namely the [https://womenshistorynetwork.org/tag/vietnam-solidarity-campaign/ Women’s Solidarity Movement], which Thompson believed could be trained alongside the [https://history.state.gov/ Republican Youth Movement] to protect the hamlets if they needed, this was unsuccessful.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bradley|first=Mark|title=Imagining Vietnam and America: The Making of Postcolonial Vietnam, 1919–1950|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|year=2000|location=Chapel Hill|pages=124}}</ref> Not only were the members upper class and educated women, therefore not representative of the Vietnamese peasant population, but the founder; [[Madame Nhu]], eventually instructed the Movement to oppose U.S. intervention strategies.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Langguth|first=A. J.|title=Our Vietnam: the war, 1954–1975|publisher=Simon & Schuster|year=2000|isbn=0-684-81202-9|location=New York|pages=219}}</ref>

There are several other important problems that the GVN faced in addition to those created by the failure to provide basic social needs for the peasants and over-extension of its resources. One of these was wide public opposition to the Program stemming partly from the inability of the committee to choose safe and agriculturally sound locations for the hamlets.<ref>Osborne, Milton E. ''Strategic Hamlets in South Viet-nam: A Survey and Comparison'', p. 25.</ref>  However, according to the Pentagon Papers, the most important source of failure was the inflexible nature of the ruling Ngo family.<ref>"The Pentagon Papers v. 2." Gravel ed. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, p. 158.</ref>

In 1962, [[Ngô Đình Nhu]], President Diem's brother, headed the Strategic Hamlet Program, attempting to build fortified villages that would provide security for rural Vietnamese. The objective was to lock the Viet Cong out so that they could not operate among the villagers. Colonel [[Phạm Ngọc Thảo]] supervised these efforts, and when told that the peasants resented being forcibly removed from their ancestral lands and put into forts they were compelled to build, he advised Nhu it was imperative to build as many hamlets as fast as possible. The Ngôs were unaware Thảo, ostensibly a Catholic, was in fact a communist double agent acting to turn the rural populace against Saigon. Thảo helped to ruin Nhu's scheme by having strategic hamlets built in communist strongholds. This increased the number of communist sympathizers who were placed inside the hamlets and given identification cards. As a result, the Viet Cong were able to more effectively penetrate the villages to access supplies and personnel.

===Forced relocation===

In the best case scenario, restructuring peasant villages to create a defensible perimeter would require the forced relocation of some of the peasants on the outskirts of the existing villages. To ease the burden, those forced to move were supposed to be financially compensated, but they were not always paid by the GVN forces. Sometimes relocated villagers had their old homes burnt. This occurred during Operation Sunrise.<ref>[https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon2/pent4.htm ''Pentagon Papers''], "The Strategic Hamlet Program, 1961–1963," pp. 128–159.</ref> Some relocated people also had to build new homes with their own labor and at their own expense.<ref name=":0" /> There was also the compulsory labor the South Vietnamese government forced on relocated peasants, leading [[Noam Chomsky]] to compare the hamlets to "virtual concentration camps."<ref>{{Cite book|title=Who Rules the World?|last=Chomsky|first=Noam|publisher=Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Company|year=2016|location=New York|pages=203}}</ref>

President Diem and his brother Nhu, who oversaw the program, decided{{snd}}contrary to Hilsman's and Thompson's theory{{snd}}that in most cases they would relocate entire villages rather than simply restructuring them. This decision led to large-scale forced relocation that was deeply unpopular among the peasantry. The mostly-Buddhist peasantry practiced ancestor worship, an important part of their religion that was disrupted by being forced out of their villages and away from their ancestors' graves and their ancestral homes. Some who resisted resettlement were summarily executed by GVN forces.<ref>Sheehan, Neil, ''A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam'', New York: Random House, 1988, pp. 309–310; Castan, Sam, "Vietnam’s Two Wars", ''Look'' (28 Jan. 1964), pp. 32–36; Kuno Knoebl, ''Victor Charlie'', New York: Frederick A. Praegar Publishers, 1967, p. 257.</ref>

===Corruption===

Promised compensation for resettled peasants was not always forthcoming and instead found its way in the pockets of South Vietnamese government officials. Peasants were promised wages for their labor building the new villages and fortifications; some corrupt officials kept the money for themselves. Wealthier peasants sometimes bribed their way out of working on construction, leaving more labor for the poorer peasants. Although the U.S. provided materials like sheet metal and barbed wire, corrupt officials sometimes forced the locals to buy the materials intended to provide them with protection.<ref name=":0">Sheehan, Neil, ''Bright Shining Lie'', p. 310.</ref>

===Security shortcomings===

Perhaps the greatest shortcoming of the Strategic Hamlet Program was its failure to provide the basic security envisioned by its proponents. This failure was partly due to poor placement of the hamlets. Ignoring the "oil-blot" principle (establish first in secure areas, then spread out), the South Vietnamese government began building strategic hamlets as quickly as possible and seemingly without considering "geographical priorities," according to a U.S. official. The randomly placed hamlets were isolated, not mutually supporting, and tempting targets for the Vietcong.<ref>''Foreign Relations of the United States: 1961–1963: Vietnam'', 4 vols. (Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1991), 2:429; Hilsman, Roger, ''To Move a Nation'', p. 441.</ref>

Each hamlet was given a radio with which to call for South Vietnamese army [[ARVN]] support, but in fact ARVN forces were unreliable in responding to calls for help, especially when attacks occurred after nightfall. The villagers were also given weapons and training, but were only expected to hold out until conventional reinforcements arrived. Once it became clear that ARVN could not be relied upon, many villagers proved unwilling to fight even small Vietcong detachments, which could then capture the villagers' weapons. "Why should we die for weapons?" asked one Vietnamese peasant.<ref>''Foreign Relations'', 4:688; Castan, "Vietnam’s Two Wars", p. 35; Knoebl, ''Victor Charlie'', p. 261.</ref>