funds the PRU and retains overall administrative control of the project for the U.S. Government. Reasons against continued CIA involvement included a concern, much like that raised during the Korean War, about diverting CIA from its national-level to a tactical role: Continued U.S. support of the PRU program risks adverse publicity either through an untoward incident, a press campaign to publicize its efforts or complaints from accommodation-minded South Vietnamese officials or politicians. CIA will have to continue its support to a program which lies, at least in part, outside its usual intelligence mission. Vietnam 1969–1972 CIA's pacification programs in Vietnam deteriorated because the Vietnamese chose to not invest in them. Although this is contradicted in the CIA's history books which state that The National Liberation Front was beaten by the pacification programs Psychological operations From a psychological operations perspective, The Vietnam War Phoenix Program is controversial to this day. Supporters say that it was a legal and closely controlled U.S.–Vietnamese intelligence program aimed at destroying the Vietcong infrastructure, while the critics say that it was an illegal system of arresting, torturing and murdering innocent Vietnamese civilians... "Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) Directive 381-41, dated 9 July 1967, inaugurated the Intelligence Coordination and Exploitation (ICEX) program to Attack the Vietcong Infrastructure (VCI). In late 1967, MACV replaced the name "ICEX" with "Phoenix," after a mythical bird that appeared as a sign of prosperity and luck and a near translation of the South Vietnamese name for the program, "Phung Hoang" ("All-seeing bird")." As early as 1964, General William C. Westmoreland, commander of Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) "knew that he lacked the forces to wage both a war of attrition and one of pacification, so he chose the former. The argument over whether or not this was the right course of action will likely go on forever, but undoubtedly the shape of the war changed dramatically after the Tet Offensive. The enemy was badly mauled and, despite the political gains made, militarily lost the initiative for quite some time." When the VC regrouped after the Tet Offensive, "Westmoreland never had such an advantage. When American ground forces entered the war in 1965, they faced an enemy on the offensive, but in June 1968 the new MACV commander, General Creighton W. Abrams, confronted an enemy on the ropes. Abrams plainly recognized his advantage and implemented a clear-and-hold strategy aimed at moving into rural