PRESIDENT KENNEDY 1…2…3…4…5…Monday, November 4,

1963. The ah…Over the weekend the ah…coup in Saigon took place--

culminated ah three months of ah conversation about a coup, conversation

which divided the government here and in Saigon. Opposed to a coup was

ah General Taylor, the Attorney General, Secretary McNamara, to a

somewhat lesser degree, John McCone, partly because of an old hostility to

Lodge, which causes him to lack confidence in Lodge’s judgment, partly to

as a result of a new hostility because Lodge shifted his station chief; in favor

of the coup was State led by Averell Harriman, George Ball, Roger Hilsman,

supported by Mike Forrestal at the White House.

I ah feel that we must bear a good deal of responsibility for it beginning with

our cable of early August in which we suggested the coup. In my judgment

that wire was badly drafted, it should never have been sent on a Saturday, I

ah should not have given my consent to it without a round table conference

in which McNamara and Taylor could have presented their views. While we

did redress that balance in later wires, that first wire encouraged Lodge

along a course to which he was in any case inclined. Harkins continued to

oppose the coup on the grounds that the military effort was doing well.

There was a sharp split between Saigon and the rest of the country.

Politically the situation is deteriorating. Militarily they had not had its

effect. There was a feeling whoever that it would for this reason Secretary

McNamara and General Taylor supported applying additional pressures to

Diem and Nhu in order to move them…

[John, Jr. enters the room]