Assume it is 1954 (not the 21st century, with 20/20 hindsight)

Assume it is 1954 (not the 21st century, with 20/20 hindsight). The Korean War has been over for about eleven months. President Eisenhower asks you to advise him on the question of whether the United States should physically replace France in Vietnam, in the name of stopping the spread of communism there. You know that there are only three Americans who can read and write the Vietnamese language, two of whom are teaching at the University of Indiana. What do you tell the President, and why?