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William Childs Westmoreland (March 26, 1914
– July 18, 2005) was a U.S. Army General who
commanded American military operations in the
Vietnam War from 1964 to 1968 and who served as US
Army Chief of Staff from 1968 to 1972.

== Early career ==
He was born in Spartanburg County, South Carolina
in 1914. His upper class family was involved in
the banking and textile industries. Westmoreland,
an Eagle Scout, entered West Point in 1932 after
one year at The Citadel (Military College)|The
Citadel. Westmoreland was a member of a very
distinguished class at West Point. His classmates
included Creighton Abrams and Benjamin O. Davis
Jr. who also became very distinguished generals. 
His initial motive for entering was to "see the
world." Following graduation in 1936 he became an
artillery officer and served in several different
commands, taking part in combat operations in
Tunisia, Sicily, France and Germany, and reaching
the ranks of lieutenant colonel and subsequently
colonel during combat operations in Europe during
World War II. Westmoreland always balanced a
reputation as a stern taskmaster with that of an
officer who cared about his men and took a great
interest in their welfare. One called him "the
most caring officer, for soldiers, that I have
ever known". 

During World War II, in 1943 while in Sicily, his
battalion was selected to be the artillery support
for the 82nd Airborne Division. By war’s end, he
was serving as the chief of staff of the 9th
Infantry Division. His connection with the 82nd
continued after the war when Westmoreland
commanded the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment in
the 82nd and then served as the division chief of
staff.

== Regimental and divisional commands ==
Westmoreland's World War II experience with the
82nd Airborne led to his being asked by General
James M. Gavin to join the 82nd as a regimental
commander after the war, which was the beginning
of his professional association with airborne and
airmobile troops. He served with the 82nd Airborne
for four years.

During the Korean War he commanded the 187th
Regimental Combat Team.

In late 1953 Westmoreland was promoted brigadier
general and spent the next 5 years at The
Pentagon. At age 42, in 1956, he became the
youngest major general in the Army. In 1958 he
assumed command of the 101st Airborne Division. In
1960 he became Superintendent of West Point, and
in 1963 became commander of the U.S. XVIII
Airborne Corps|XVIII Airborne Corps.

== Vietnam Era ==


In 1964 he became deputy commander of Military
Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), assuming
command from General Paul Harkins. As the head of
the MACV he was known for highly publicized,
positive assessments of US military prospects in
Vietnam. However, as time went on, the
strengthening of North Vietnamese combat forces in
the South led to regular requests for increases in
US troop strength, from less than 100,000 when he
arrived to over 500,000 in 1968.

The most notable campaign was the 1968 Tet
Offensive, in which Communism|Communist forces
attacked cities and towns throughout South
Vietnam. US and South Vietnamese troops
successfully fought off the attacks, and the
Communist forces took heavy losses, but the
ferocity of the assault shook public confidence in
Westmoreland's previous assurances about the state
of the war. Political debate and public opinion
led the Johnson administration to limit further
increases in US troops in Vietnam.

General Westmoreland would work seven day weeks at
seventeen hours a day without any rest. He was
very angry when the press reported he would play
tennis during lunch. He would often fly into
combat areas to talk to soldiers and their
officers. He loved ice cream and would drink two
gin and tonics every night. Several times a week,
the General would fly out into the field to talk
to the ordinary soldiers in the trenches.
Westmoreland always said his saddest duty was
signing the many condolence letters to the
families of those killed.

Westmoreland has said about the US involvement in
Vietnam: "It's not that we lost the war
militarily. The fact is we as a nation did not
make good our commitment to the South Vietnamese."

== Post-Vietnam ==
Westmoreland served as US Army Chief of Staff from
1968 to 1972, then retired from the Army. Many
military historians have pointed out that
Westmoreland became Chief of Staff at the worst
time in history with regards to the Army. Guiding
the Army as it transitioned to an all-volunteer
force, he issued many policies to try to make Army
life better and more palatable for America's
youth. However, many hard-liners scorned these as
too liberal. For example, Westmoreland allowed
soldiers to wear sideburns and drink beer in the
mess hall. Westmoreland ran unsuccessfully for
Governor of South Carolina in 1974. He published
his autobiography A Soldier Reports the following
year. Westmoreland later served on a task force to
improve educational standards in the state of
South Carolina.

In 1982, Mike Wallace (journalist)|Mike Wallace
interviewed Westmoreland for the CBS special The
Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception. The
documentary alleged that Westmoreland and others
had deliberately underestimated Vietcong troop
strength in order to maintain morale and popular
support for the war.

In Westmoreland v. CBS, Westmoreland sued Wallace
and CBS for libel, and a long and arduous trial
process began. Westmoreland surprisingly settled
with CBS for an apology, about as much as they had
originally offered. Research after the trial
uncovered the reason: while CBS' internal
investigation revealed that they had used shoddy
journalistic practices, Judge Leval's instructions
to the jury over what constituted "actual malice"
to prove libel were so weighted in favour of the
defense that Westmoreland's lawyers were certain
he would lose.

In a 1998 interview for George (magazine)|George
magazine, Westmoreland dismissed the battlefield
prowess of his opponent North Vietnamese General
Vo Nguyen Giap. "Of course, he Giap was a
formidable adversary," Westmoreland told
correspondent W. Thomas Smith, Jr. "Let me also
say that Giap was trained in small-unit, guerilla
tactics, but he persisted in waging a big-unit war
with terrible losses to his own men. By his own
admission, by early 1969, I think, he had lost,
what, a half million soldiers? He reported this.
Now such a disregard for human life may make a
formidable adversary, but it does not make a
military genius. An American commander losing men
like that would hardly have lasted more than a few
weeks."

Through the end of his life, he maintained that
the United States did not lose the war in Vietnam;
he stated instead that "our country did not
fulfill its commitment to South Vietnam. By virtue
of Vietnam, the U.S. held the line for 10 years
and stopped the Domino_theory|dominoes from
falling."

Among the many honors he received during his
service, Westmoreland was awarded four
Distinguished Service Medals, the Bronze Star, the
Presidential Unit Citation, the Combat
Infantryman’s Badge, the Master Parachutist
Badge and numerous foreign decorations.

He ran unsuccessfully on the Republican ticket for
governor of South Carolina in 1974.

Despite the controversy of Vietnam and the CBS
suit, Westmoreland was always popular and beloved
by the men he led. One of the highlights of his
life was leading a large parade in Chicago in 1986
that honored the Vietnam veterans. Many of the men
proudly wore badges inscribed "WESTY'S WARRIORS".

== Personal data == 
In 1947, he married Katherine (Kitsy) S. Van
Deusen. They had four children: Katherine,
Margaret, Julie and James Ripley. He died on July
18, 2005 at the age of 91 at the Bishop Gadsden
retirement home in Charleston, South Carolina. 

On July 23, 2005, he was buried at United States
Military Academy at West Point.

== Dates of rank ==

* Second Lieutenant, Regular Army: June 1936
* First Lieutenant, Regular Army: June 1939
* Captain: Not held on active duty (held as a
permanent rank in Regular Army: June 1946)
* Major, Army of the United States: February 1942
(made permanent in Regular Army: July 1948)
* Lieutenant Colonel, Army of the United States:
September 1942 (made permanent in Regular Army:
July 1953)
* Colonel, Army of the United States: July 1944
(made permanent in Regular Army: June 1961)
* Brigadier General (temporary), Regular Army:
November 1952 (made permanent in February 1963)
* Major General (temporary), Regular Army:
December 1956 (made permanent in August 1965)
* Lieutenant General: July 1963
* General: August 1964

== References ==
* Tom Mascaro, The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam
Deception (Chicago, IL, The Museum of Broadcast
Communications)
* W. Thomas Smith Jr., An old soldier sounds off:
General Westmoreland, commander of U.S. forces in
Vietnam until 1968, talks of war and General Giap
(New York, N.Y., George, Nov. 1998)
* General William C. Westmoreland, A Soldier
Reports (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1976)

==External links==

General:
*
http://www.newsmeat.com/washington_political_donat
ions/William_Westmoreland.php Westmoreland's
political donations
News of his death:
* http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8621530/ Initial
report on the death of Westmoreland from the
Associated Press
*
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic
le/2005/07/18/AR2005071801713.html Obituary:
General Commanded Troops in Vietnam from the
Washington Post
*
http://nytimes.com/2005/07/19/international/asia/1
9westmoreland.html Gen. Westmoreland, Who Led U.S.
in Vietnam, Dies from the New York Times
*
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-1700
407,00.html Commander of US forces in Vietnam dies
aged 91 from The Times
*
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi
-0507190266jul19,1,5783234.story?coll=chi-newsnati
onworld-hed Obituary: Commander of U.S. troops in
Vietnam Gen. William Westmoreland from the Chicago
Tribune
*
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/columnis
ts/12174950.htm A general who fought to win from
The State
*
http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/12175354
.htm ‘Westy’ recalled as noble, tragic from
The State
* http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0720-20.htm
General Westmoreland's Death Wish and the War in
Iraq from CommonDreams.org

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succession box|title=Chief of Staff of the United
States Army|before=Harold K. Johnson|after=Bruce
Palmer, Jr.|years=1968–1972
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