Michigan State Vietnam Advisory Group docs from pre 1975

Thu Feb 4 14:16:09 PST 2016

The USAID database mentioned in separate emails contains an excellent trove of reports done during the Saigon regime, under USAID’s earlier institutional name, International Cooperation Administration. At the time, Michigan State University was funded to provide “technical assistance” to the Republic of South Vietnam.

Here is what is found by searching Michigan State Vietnam Advisory Group. There are 85 documents. Wikipedia also links to this database.

https://decsearch.usaid.gov/search?q=Michigan+State+University.+Vietnam+Advisory+Group+%28MSUG%29&partialfields=Authors:%22Michigan%2520State%2520University%2522%2520Vietnam%2520Advisory%2520Group%2520%2528MSUG%2529%22&client=dec_pdfs&proxystylesheet=dec_pdfs&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&site=dec_documents&access=p&proxyreload=1&filter=0&getfields=*&emdstyle=true&sort=date%3AD%3AS%3Ad1

For background, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_State_University_Vietnam_Advisory_Group

The Michigan State University Vietnam Advisory Group (commonly known as the Michigan State University Group and abbreviated MSUG) was a program of technical assistance<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Development_aid> provided to the government of South Vietnam<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Vietnam> as an effort in state-building<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State-building> by the U.S. Department of State<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_State>.[1]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_State_University_Vietnam_Advisory_Group#cite_note-1>

From 1955 to 1962, under contract to the International Cooperation Administration<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Cooperation_Administration> in Washington and the Vietnamese government in Saigon, faculty and staff from Michigan State University<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_State_University> consulted for agencies of the Ngô Đình Diệm<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ng%C3%B4_%C4%90%C3%ACnh_Di%E1%BB%87m> regime. The group advised and trained Vietnamese personnel in the disciplines of public administration, police administration, and economics. MSUG worked autonomously from most U.S. government agencies, had unmatched access to the presidency, and even assisted in writing the country's new constitution.[2]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_State_University_Vietnam_Advisory_Group#cite_note-2> Several of its proposals were undertaken by the Vietnamese government and had positive results for the people of Vietnam. However, the group had limited influence on Diệm's decision-making and on the course of events in Vietnam, and publications by dissatisfied faculty led to Diệm's termination of the contract.

When implications later arose that the Central Intelligence Agency<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Intelligence_Agency> had infiltrated MSUG as a front for covert operations, the technical assistance program became a cause célèbre<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cause_c%C3%A9l%C3%A8bre> in the early years of the anti-war movement<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposition_to_the_Vietnam_War>.

dan

Daniel C. Tsang

Distinguished Librarian

Data Librarian and Bibliographer for Asian American Studies,

Economics, Political Science, Orange County documents (interim)

468 Langson Library, University of California, Irvine

PO Box 19557, Irvine CA 92623-9557, USA

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Anh Pham gaupvn at gmail.com

Thu Feb 4 16:51:36 PST 2016

Thank you, Dan, for this wonderful reminder of days past. It was perhaps

1988 in Hanoi, I was 12 and started learning English with a textbook

somebody must have brought back from Saigon. The book with a light blue

cover was published by Michigan State University. This is the reason why

for years and years while growing up I always thought of MSU as the CIA

breeding ground. Never ever ever did I even dream that one day I would live

across the Potomac River (politicized in the Vietnamese propaganda through

To Huu's poem about Norman Morrison's self-immolation) from Langley, VA.

Thirty years ago America seemed so far away from Hanoi that for me to be

here in Washington DC at times seems to be living in a dream. As Nguyen Du

wrote in Kieu:

Trời còn để có hôm nay

Tan sương trước ngõ vén mây giữa giời

Thanks Heaven we are here today

To see the sun through the parting fog and clouds in the sky

Anh Pham

Washington DC

Dan Tsang dtsang at uci.edu

Thu Feb 4 17:06:44 PST 2016

Quite Ironic Anh Pham. Here’s more on the CIA connection by the MSU campus coordinator for the Vietnam project, who quit when he found out about the CIA connection:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stanley-k-sheinbaum/vietnam-project-michigan-state-university_b_1973274.html

dan